While we were all watching coverage of Queen Elizabeth II’s death, the Ukrainian army was taking back towns occupied by Russian troops. Here is a taste of Anne Applebaum’s recent piece at The Atlantic: But even though the fighting may...
Ukraine
18 members of the House of Representatives vote against Finland and Sweden joining NATO
Finland and Sweden want protection against Vladimir Putin’s Russia. As we have seen in Ukraine, Putin has expansion on his mind and both Scandinavian nations border Russia. When a NATO nation is invaded, all of the other NATO nations are...
Archivists are hard at work trying to save Ukraine’s digital history
Here is Ally Markovich at “Berkeleyside”: When Russia launched its war on Ukraine six weeks ago, a frenzied attempt to save the country’s cultural heritage from destruction began: Religious artifacts were moved underground to secret bunkers in Ukrainian cities. But...
Genocide
Here is Eugene Finkel of Johns Hopkins University: Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, visibly shaken by evidence of the Russian military’s atrocities against Ukrainian citizens in the recently liberated suburbs of Kyiv, on Sunday condemned the slaughter as genocide. The Biden administration has...
Pope Francis expresses solidarity with the people of Ukraine
Watch: Learn more here....
The GOP anti-Ukraine caucus
There members of the Congress who love Russia. Here is William Saletan at The Bulwark: After years of defending a pro-Putin American president and dismissing Russia’s interference in American elections, Republicans have returned to their old shtick: accusing Democrats of...
Debunking the Ukrainian biolabs myth promoted by Charlie Kirk and Eric Metaxas
Watch Metaxas and Kirk talk about the potential of Ukrainian biolabs that might be created bioweapons and coronaviruses. This is how fear-mongering works. Kirk says that he can’t be sure about such biolabs, but that does not stop him from...
More books to help us understand the Russia-Ukraine war
Harvard University Press offers seven: Stanislav Aseyev, In Isolation: Dispatches from Occupied Donbas Volodymyr Rafeyenko, Mondegreen: Songs about Death and Love Serhii Plokhy, The Frontline: Essays on Ukraine’s Past and Present Yuri Kostenko, Ukraine’s Nuclear Disarmament: A History Karel C....
Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky speaks to Congress
Watch:...
Report: Russian government tells its media to puff Tucker Carlson
David Corn of the progressive magazine Mother Jones is reporting that the Russian government has urged media outlets in the country to feature clips of Tucker Carlson. Here is Corn: On March 3, as Russian military forces bombed Ukrainian cities...
Andrew Sullivan on the post-liberal Right’s Putin problem
Earlier this week at Current I wrote about the conservative nationalists who love Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán and (to a lesser extent to be sure) Russian president Vladimir Putin. These critics of American liberalism are in a tough spot these...
What is happening these days on Russian TV?
A lot of pro-Putin propaganda. Olga Khazan is watching so we don’t have to. Here is a taste of her recent piece at The Atlantic: To get a sense of what Russians are told about the war, I fired up...
Madison Cawthorn calls Zelensky a “thug” and the Ukrainian government “incredibly evil” and “woke”
The North Carolina congressmen is playing the “Ukraine is woke” card. Watch: I wrote this morning about the “two things can be true at the same time” approach that many Americans, including conservative commentator Rod Dreher, is taking toward the...
Nikki Haley’s “foolish, self-serving, and pernicious” comments about the Putin invasion of Ukraine
In case you missed it, former South Carolina governor and Trump U.N. Secretary Nikki Haley is tweeting and talking. In this video she seems like she is running for president against Biden: In an interview with Chuck Todd on Meet...
What scares Putin the most?
Here is John Nichols at The Nation: A courageous anti-war movement has developed in Russia, filling the streets of cities across the country with demonstrations against Russian President Vladimir Putin’s decision to invade Ukraine. OVD-Info, an independent media project on...
How the head of the Russian Orthodox Church is spinning Putin’s invasion
Here is Cathy Young at The Bulwark: In the past ten days, plenty of rationalizations have been offered for Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine—everything from “Russia needs a buffer state to keep NATO at a distance” (just about every Kremlin...
Why some on the Christian Right support Russia
Historian Bethany Moreton explains the links between American conservatives (and conservative evangelicals) and Russia. Here is a taste of her piece at The Washington Post: From 1992 to 1997, a consortium of major U.S. evangelical organizations raised $60 million to bring former...
What can we learn from the people of Ukraine?
Chris Stirewalt asks this question in a recent piece at The Dispatch titled “Ukrainians Hold a Mirror to America’s Egotistical Anxieties.” Here is a taste: It is the natural conceit of every generation in every great power that its own...
Book an Airbnb in Ukraine?
In order to help those suffering in war-torn Ukraine, people are booking Airbnbs with no intention of showing-up. Here is Ginger Adams Otis at The Wall Street Journal: A social-media campaign that took off on March 2 has generated thousands...
Episode 96: “Thinking Historically about the Russian Invasion of Ukraine
In this episode we talk with historian Bruce Berglund about Vladmir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. Our conversation focuses on Putin’s use of history to justify the invasion, the insufficiency of the Russian military, the international ban on...