2 mins read
Boris Barabash
It’s done! Joe Biden was sworn in, and became the 46th president of the United States.
This is the moment of triumph of democracy for the supporters of the most democratic Democratic Party in the world.
But it seems that the good news for them may end there.
According to all public opinion polls, more than 80% of those who voted for the Republicans consider the election results to be rigged. More than 50% of all respondents share the same opinion. This means that Biden’s legitimacy as a legitimately elected president is in great doubt. His reign will turn into a grimace of history.
Donald Trump remains the leader of the US Republican Party. And it is unlikely that party functionaries will be able to unseat him by offering a different figure, equal in polarity to Trump. This means that his very existence on the domestic political stage, his restless character, and the history of his defeat will be the most irritating factor for the Democrats of the upcoming Biden four-year term.
We do not know how a person feels when he has appropriated someone else’s dissertation. But we know that it will be difficult for him to bring something new to science.
We do not know how a person feels who has appropriated someone else’s election victory. But we know that it will be difficult for him to teach others about democracy.
We also know that any actions have consequences. America has repeatedly emerged victorious from economic crises, racial unrest, and unpopular wars. Even after the Civil War, the United States came out stronger.
But that was another United States. They were dominated by common sense and healthy patriotism. Now everything is mixed up.
The Greek king Pyrrhus in the battle near Uuskula had a difficult victory over the Romans. But this victory left the commander almost without an army. The war became a protracted war of attrition, which Pyrrhus lost to the Romans. The Roman world finally defeated the Hellenistic world.
Biden’s dubious victory speaks to the final decline of the Pax Americana. A different era is coming. An era of traditional values and strong personalities.
5 mins read
April 30th is an important date in American politics. This is the day 100 for the American President in the White House, and all attention will be on the reports of his achievements and failures. But nothing can be more critical than Peace…
6 mins read
Russia’s invasion has made ordinarily outspoken critics of antisemitism wary of criticizing Ukrainian Nazi collaborators
1 min read
Richard Sakwa has for many years been one of the most distinguished and insightful observers of relations between the West and Russia, and one of the leading critics of Western policy. In this talk with Anatol Lieven, director of the Eurasia program at the Quincy Institute, Sakwa discusses his book, The Culture of the Second Cold War (Anthem 2025). The book examines the cultural-political trends and inheritances that underlie the new version of a struggle that we thought we had put behind us in 1989. Sakwa describes both the continuities from the first Cold War and the ways in which new technologies have reshaped strategies and attitudes.
