The last two years have produced what is, for most people around the world who ponder such things, one of the most unanticipated and yet astounding geopolitical turnarounds in modern history.

Global market liberalization and the war machine are happy bedfellows, as usual.

It was John Adams, one of the Founding Fathers who served as the second President of the United States who said that “Democracy never lasts long. It soon wastes, exhausts, and murders itself. There never was a democracy yet that did not commit suicide.”

While Alexey Navalny’s death commanded 24-hour news coverage, Gonzalo Lira’s death in Ukraine was virtually ignored. Alan MacLeod on why one death apparently mattered so much more to U.S. corporate media.

Listen to Former German General Harald Kujat at a public lecture in Germany how he destroys the false pro-war narrative of the neocons. This talk was held in German and is dubbed into English thanks to the brilliant work of Andreas Voss who makes these translations possible.

What I learned from James C. Pfautz

Trump sought major changes at the intel agencies in his first term; former officials say he could be more radical in a second.

Feb. 15—On Feb. 8, in Moscow’s Kremlin Palace, the Russian Academy of Sciences held a grand gala celebrating the 300th anniversary of the founding of the Russian Academy of Sciences. The gala featured speeches and theatrical performances depicting the history of the Academy, and even included soldiers in 18th-Century uniforms and an impersonated Tsar Peter the Great—the founder of the Academy in 1724.

Albrecht Wenzel Eusebius von Wallenstein is a name that does not trip off the tongue: And he is definitely not a fellow you are likely to come across in any of the endless words of wise punditry to appear in the New York Times or the Washington Post:

Trump’s rhetoric is unvarnished. He’s still right.