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Soviet Union

Gorbachev's Sermon on the Mount

Robert Scheer | Posted 11.11.2009 | World

Read More: Robert Scheer, Angela Merkel, Berlin Wall, Mikhail Gorbachev, Cia, Barack Obama, Afghanistan, Germany, Anniversary, Stanley McChrystal, Soviet Union, World News
Robert Scheer

When Gorbachev came to power he, like Obama, inherited a war that was not in the interest of his nation. If the response of a Soviet dictator was to end it, might we not be justified in doing the same?

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An Open Letter to President Obama About Afghanistan From William R. Polk

The Nation | Posted 11.11.2009 | World

Read More: Russia, Afghanistan War, Nato, Afghan Election, Tribes, Durand Line, Kabul, Middle East, Taliban, Policy, Hamid Karzai, Afghan War, Chicago, Afghan Strategy, Un, South Waziristan, Soviet Union, Pentagon, Britain, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Troop Levels, Terrorism, Pashtun, Foreign Policy, Kashmir, Insurgency, Al Qaida, State Department, Pashtunwali, Soviet Afghan War, Counterinsurgency, World News

I was an early supporter of yours. So I hope you will accept the following analysis and proposals as being from a friend as well as a person with cons...

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20 Years After the Fall of the Berlin Wall: Will Another Superpower Meet Its End in Afghanistan?

Loretta Napoleoni | Posted 11.10.2009 | World

Read More: Mujahedeen, Berlin Wall, Al-Qaeda, United States in Afghanistan, Afghanistan, Superpower, Ussr, Cold War, Moscow, Taliban, War on Terror, Soviet Union, World News
Loretta Napoleoni

Remarkably, Afghanistan seems once again to be shaping our future. It is paradoxical that the graveyard of one superpower should become a battlefield for the other.

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Cold War's End -- The Wall Comes Down

Chris Weigant | Posted 11.10.2009 | Politics

Read More: Soviets, Russian, Germany, Nuke, The Wall, Bomb, Democracy in America, The Wall Live, Berlin, Tocqueville, Cold War, Soviet Union, Nukes, East Germany, Communism, Roger Waters, Soviet, Nuclear Weapons, Alexis De Tocqueville, Brandenburg Gate, Chris Weigant, De Tocqueville, Checkpoint Charlie, Russia, Atom Bomb, Berlin Wall, H Bomb, East Berlin, A Bomb, Nuclear Bomb, Brandenburg, Politics News
Chris Weigant

The fall of The Wall signified the fall of the Soviet Union, and an end to the Cold War. And while this was of enormous historical import, I fear that future generations won't really pay much attention to it.

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Who Caused the End of the Cold War?

Joseph Nye | Posted 11.10.2009 | World

Read More: Berlin Wall, Cold War, Mikhail Gorbachev, Berlin, The Cold War, Soviet Union, World News
Joseph Nye

The end of the Cold War was a greater historical transformation than 9/11, but controversy persists about its causes.

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Mikhail Gorbachev Supports US Withdrawal From Afghanistan (Video)

Posted 11.08.2009 | World

Read More: Berlin Wall, Mikhail Gorbachev, Gorbachev Cnn, Gorbachev, Soviet Union Afghanistan, U.S. Afghanistan, Afghanistan, Troop Levels, Former Soviet Union, Kabul, Ussr, Soviet Afghan War, Soviet Union, World News

Mikhail Gorbachev supports a troop withdrawal from Afghanistan. The former president of the Soviet Union spoke to CNN's John King Sunday on State Of ...

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When Will the U.S. and Russia Stop Acting Like It's Still the Cold War?

Russ Wellen | Posted 11.04.2009 | World

Read More: Russia, Nuclear Weapons, Ronald Reagan, Cold War, Soviet Union, Missile Defense, Doomsday Device, World News
Russ Wellen

Unless nuclear states can shed the Cold War mentality once and for all, it's hard to be optimistic about the long-terms prospects for disarmament.

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Keeping Afghanistan Safe from Democracy

Robert Scheer | Posted 11.04.2009 | World

Read More: Robert Scheer, Insurgency, David Axelrod, Lyndon Johnson, Afghanistan, Matthew Hoh, Al-Qaida, Vietnam, Democracy, Hamid Karzai, Stanley McChrystal, Soviet Union, World News
Robert Scheer

The most idiotic thing being said about America's involvement in Afghanistan is that the best way to protect the 68,000 U.S. troops there now is by putting an additional 40,000 in harm's way.

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From The Pentagon To Monty Python: The Internet Turns 40

Chris Weigant | Posted 10.29.2009 | Technology

Read More: Soviets, World Wide Web, 40th, Pentagon, Mosaic, Bulletin Board, Spam, Net, Netscape, Nuclear, China, Intergalactic Computer Network, Cold War, Britain, Personal Computer, England, Internet, Cern, 40, Malware, Apple, Pc, Russia, Usenet, Russians, Technology, Computer, Gopher, Space Race, Steve Jobs, Www, Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, Darpa, Lovely Spam, Monty Pythons Flying Circus, Swords Into Plowshares, Botnet, Soviet Union, Birthday, Wonderful Spam, Html, Sputnik, Trojan, Hormel, Arpanet, Spiced Ham, Ucla, Chris Weigant, Virus, Spam Spam Spam Spam, Apple II, Hypertext, Steve Wozniak, World War II, Monty Python, Worm, Happy 40th Birthday Internet, Compuserve, Lan, Milnet, Technology News
Chris Weigant

Technology has grown by such leaps and bounds since 1969 that it's hard to conceive how things were before we all had access to computers.

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Women at Work: Insights From Women on the Front Lines of Polish Design

Chauncey Zalkin | Posted 10.22.2009 | Style

Read More: Women, Furniture, Design, Lighting, Women in Business, Innovation, Gender, Culture, Polish Design, Emerging Economies, Communism, Design Fairs, Eastern Europe, Style, Poland, Eastern-Bloc, Designer-Maker, New Business, Female, Gallery, Soviet Union, Entepreneurship, Style News
Chauncey Zalkin

Design is about people -- the handiwork of the creator, human ingenuity, and the social ramifications of design in use.

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Obama in the Thicket of "Afghaniranistan"

William Bradley | Posted 10.21.2009 | World

Read More: Russia, Britain, Cia, France, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iran, Mi-6, Nobel Peace Prize, Iaea, Mossad, Moscow, Tehran, Israel, Iraq, Vienna, Special Forces, Taliban, Sayeret, Al Qaeda, Revolutionary Guard, Iranian Nuclear Program, Abdullah Abdullah, Hamid Karzai, George W. Bush, Dick Cheney, Soviet Union, Jihadism, Post-Soviet Space, Somalia, Cairo Address, John Kerry, World News
William Bradley

Obama is in a multi-faceted complex of geopolitical crises. He is actively using military force in two of the countries, and has threatened, at the least, tough sanctions in the third.

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Getting the Vietnam Analogy Right in Afghanistan

Leon T. Hadar | Posted 10.21.2009 | World

Read More: Nazi Germany, President Obama, Lebanon, Iran, Hitler, China, History, Muslim, Saudi Arabia, Nato, Vietnam War, John Kennedy, Chechnya, Munich, Analogies, Czechoslovakia, Syria, Xinjiang, West Germany, South Vietnam, Hamas, Soviet Union, Hizbollah, Afghanistan War, Al Quaeda, Kashmir, Shiites, Iraq War, Communism, North VIetnam, Taliban, India, Lyndon Johnson, Cuba, Ospolitik, Detente, World News
Leon T. Hadar

The ghosts of the Vietnam War seem to be hanging around the White House Situation Room as President Obama and his national security aides debate a new strategy for the war in Afghanistan.

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Stalin Libel Suit: Josef Stalin's Grandson Loses Case Against Newspaper

AP | Posted 10.13.2009 | World

Read More: Stalin's Family, Communism, Novaya Gazeta, Moscow, Russia, Libel, Kremlin, Josef Stalin, Soviet Union, Putin, Nazi-Soviet Pact, Stalin's Grandson, Stalinism, Stalin on Trial, Yevgeny Dzhugashvili, World News

MOSCOW (AP)- A Russian court ruled against Josef Stalin's grandson Tuesday in a libel suit over a newspaper article that said the Soviet dictator sent...

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Republican Leaders Join In Honoring New Rotunda Statue Of Radical Socialist Woman

Chris Weigant | Posted 10.07.2009 | Politics

Read More: Marx, International Workers of the World, Mitch McConnell, Mcconnell, The Spirit of Lenin, John Boehner, Leninism, Wells, Teacher, Statue, Republican, History, Pelosi, Barbara Bindley, American History, Socialist, Lies My Teacher Taught Me, Nancy Pelosi, Russia, Syndicalist, Handicap, Reid, Radical, Red, Leaders, How I Became a Socialist, Socialism, Alabama, marxists.org, James W Loewen, Childhood, Lenin, Soviet Union, State Quarter, HG Wells, Chris Weigant, Revolutionary, Marxism, Harry Reid, Plutocrat, Why I Became an IWW, Republicans, Boehner, Aclu, Capitol, Brooklyn Eagle, Syndicalism, Rotunda, Loewen, Bindley, Iww, Wobblies, Wobbly, Politics News
Chris Weigant

A woman whose name we all know was a proud Red, a committed Socialist, and an unapologetic Wobbly. And now she's not only buried in the National Cathedral, she's got her own statue in the Capitol.

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Our Best Way Forward in Afghanistan is Out

Mary Ellen McNish | Posted 10.06.2009 | Politics

Read More: Hamid Karzai, Kabul, President Obama, United Kingdom, Pakistan, Washington, US Troops, Afpak, Soviet Union, Cold War, Barack Obama, Osama Bin Laden, Foreign Policy, Afghan People, War in Afghanistan, Nato, Stanley McChrystal, Al-Qaeda, Afghanistan, Politics News
Mary Ellen McNish

Afghans and Americans deserve is a full, public discussion of the policy choices looming in the next weeks. We must choose to demonstrate a commitment to the rule of law, and not violence.

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Sam Tanenhaus, The Death of Conservatism (Review)

Joseph A. Palermo | Posted 10.06.2009 | Books

Read More: The Death of Conservatism, Sam Tanhenhaus, Civil Rights Movement, Joe Mccarthy, Ronald Reagan, Edmund Burke, Willam F. Buckley Jr., Daniel Patrick Moynihan, Sarah Palin, Communism, Martin Luther King, John Birchers, Tom Brokaw, Vietnam War, Benjamin Disraeli, New York Times, African Amercans, Rick Perry, Barry Goldwater, Newt Gingrich, Soviet Union, Books News
Joseph A. Palermo

Although a masterful writer, Tanenhaus gives his readers disembodied voices plucked from historical context, where the nexus of thought and action, theory and praxis, is either broken or simply ignored.

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Fidel Castro Suggested Nuclear Strike On U.S.: Documents

nytimes.com | WILLIAM J. BROAD | Posted 09.22.2009 | World

Read More: Russia, Castro Nuclear Strike, Nuclear Weapons, Cuban Missile Crisis, Ussr, Fidel Castro, Cuba, Soviet Union, World News

In the early 1980s, according to newly released documents, Fidel Castro was suggesting a Soviet nuclear strike against the United States, until Moscow...

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This Film is an Idiot's Version of Naomi Klein's Masterpiece

Johann Hari | Posted 10.22.2009 | World

Read More: Chile, Debt, Depression, Salvador Allende, Naomi Klein, Mixed Economies, Apartheid, Conservatism, Michale Winterbottom, Capitalism, Pinochet, Naomi Klein's Shock Doctrine, Communism, Freedom Charter, Channel 4, Margaret Thatcher, Anc, Shock Doctrine, Cia, World Bank, Tianamen, Imf, Milton Friedman, Soviet Union, World News
Johann Hari

Naomi Klein's The Shock Doctrine is one of the most important political books of the past decade. But Michael Winterbottom's "adaptation" for film is garbled and mumbled to the point of meaninglessness.

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I Agree With George Will

John Burton | Posted 10.21.2009 | Politics

Read More: Troop Withdrawal, Washington Post, George Will, Exit Strategy, Soviet Union, Afghanistan War, California Democratic Party, Politics News
John Burton

California Democratic Party Chairman John Burton announces his organization's desire for a speedy American withdrawal from Afghanistan.

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34 Years

Yoani Sanchez | Posted 10.20.2009 | World

Read More: Cuba, Living Alone, Raul Castro, Leaving Home, Subsidies, Independence, Fidel Castro, Soviet Union, World News
Yoani Sanchez

Since I left home in Cuba, I have learned to value autonomy, to distrust the subsidies and all these "gifts" that they constantly throw in the faces of citizens.

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Death of a Superpower: Twenty Years After

David Calleo | Posted 09.29.2009 | Politics

Read More: Clinton Foreign Policy, Bush Foreign Policy, American Foreign Policy, Unipolar, Economic Crisis, Soviet Union, Politics News
David Calleo

The root cause of our present predicament lies in our failure to understand that the end of the Soviet Union pointed not toward a "unipolar" world under American hegemony but toward a plural world of several great powers.

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Reigniting America's Human Rights Mojo

Rabbi Abraham Cooper | Posted 09.27.2009 | Politics

Read More: Ronald Reagan, United Nations, Congress, Stars and Stripes, Aung San Suu Ki, Hitler, Cold War, Soviet Union, Simon Wiesenthal, Barack Obama, World News, George Shultz, Iran, Lech Walesa, George Bush Bill Clinton, Cairo, Jimmy Carter, Roosevelt, Sharansky, Sakharov, Mauthausen, Khmoeini, Brezhnev, Politics News
Rabbi Abraham Cooper

In Cairo, President Obama rightly said that the U.S. should not be in the business of imposing democracy, but can we be indifferent to those who seek to embrace it?

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Remembering the Nazi-Soviet Pact After Seventy Years

Robert Gellately | Posted 09.24.2009 | Home

Read More: Russia, Communism, Nazi Germany, Holocaust, Stalinism, Osce, World War II, Soviet Union, Home News
Robert Gellately

On August 23, 1939 Stalin's agreement with Nazi Germany gave Hitler the green light. That signal was important at the time and seventy years later there is no reason for Russians to deny it.

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Americans Want Universal Access to Graveyards

Julia Gorin | Posted 09.18.2009 | Comedy

Read More: Julia Gorin, Aarp, Socialism, Healthcare Reform, Obamacare, Town Hall Meetings, Obama Health Care, Soviet Union, Comedy News
Julia Gorin

I've often been astounded to hear the following sentence from Americans after they've learned that I escaped from the Soviet Union: "But at least everyone had medical coverage there."

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Has Islamophobia Run Amok in America?

Sheldon Filger | Posted 09.18.2009 | Politics

Read More: 9/11, Islamophobia, India, Bollywood, Shah Rukh Khan, Abdul Kalam, Anti-Muslim Bias, Bollywood Stars, Airport Security, Cold War, Fbi-Counterterrorism, Al Qaeda, US China Relations, Counterterrorism, Post 9/11, Soviet Union, Politics News
Sheldon Filger

As America becomes increasingly seen as hostile to Muslims irrespective of who they are, while China is perceived as welcoming, these trends will translate into economic realities.

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