The Cold War Is Back. But It Not As We Knew It
March 12, 2010
Martin McCauley writes: The Cold War is back, but not as we knew it. It’s now called Cyberwars. News that the Chinese have been extremely sophisticated in hacking into British, American and NATO computers has led to the Cabinet Office in London setting up the Office for Cyber Security. Imagine a meeting in Beijing of the Chinese Office for Internet Hacking. Director: Comrades, we’ve been rumbled. We underestimated the intelligence of our Western opponents. They’ve worked out where the hacking is coming from and what we are after. We’ll have to adopt a new, much cleverer strategy. Ideas, please. Voice: I studied in America at the best IT universities. What we have to do is to send our best brains to these universities. They will then learn how the Americans think and will be able to...
Baroness Ashton Struts Her Stuff
February 22, 2010
Martin McCauley writes: That stunning bird, Baroness Ashton of Upholland (no, that’s not in the Netherlands but in Lancashire), is called the High Representative of the European Union. That impressive title merely means she is the EU’s foreign minister. As someone, who doesn’t speak any foreign languages and has never studied diplomacy or history, she is embarking on a voyage of discovery. Imagine a meeting she has with her top advisor in Brussels as she prepares for another week of hard graft. Baroness Ashton: ‘Right, let’s decide how we’ll influence the world this week. I haven’t had any time to read the newspapers so I need a little update. By the way, please don’t quote from Le Monde or Die Welt in their native tongue to patronise me. Say it in...
A Bad New Year’s Present For The Kremlin
December 17, 2009
Martin McCauley writes: It’s cold in Moscow. However, this winter will get even colder for the men in the Kremlin, who depend so much on the revenues from the sale of natural gas. The Chinese have stolen a march on them – again. On Monday, the first gas along the pipeline from Turkmenistan to Xinjiang in western China began to flow. There will be two pipelines. The second one is due to be built next year. To mark this momentous occasion Chinese President Hu Jintao (he dyes his hair jet black, by the way, just like all other members of the Chinese leadership), together with the presidents of Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan (all of whom allegendly dye their hair black as well), celebrated with Chinese and local delicacies. As well they might. They had pulled off quite a coup....
Is Russia Pinching The Chinese Model?
December 10, 2009
Martin McCauley writes: Russia’s relations with the United States and other Western countries have never been so bad since the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991. Why is this? Is it the West’s fault has Russia had enough of Western values? Moscow’s foreign policy after the collapse of communism was pro-American. Russia wanted to join the club of ‘civilised nations’ and become a rapidly growing economy. Democracy and a liberal market economy were seen as the two keys that would unlock the door to Russia’s new national greatness. But things did not work out that way. Profound disillusionment followed as America showed little respect for Russia. When Yevgeny Primakov became foreign minister and then Prime Minister he talked of a multi-polar world in which Russia ...
Could It Be That The World Economy Is A Virtual One?
November 28, 2009
Anton Goryunov writes: Let’s be cynical about the world economy for a moment: does it actually exist or is it just a figment of our imagination, a dream, a virtual reality, like the kingdom of Dubai? It was only recently that Dubai’s all powerful ruler, Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid al-Maktoum, was saying that there was no chance of a serious crisis happening in his lovely kingdom. Yes, there were some problems, he was insisting, but nothing to be worried about. Especially as the oil rich Abu Dhabi was supposedly standing shoulder to shoulder with its neighbour. But guess what happened a couple of weeks after that? Dubai went down under the weight of its huge debts and the markets all over the world took a huge hit. The economic success story that we have been hearing so much about...
Why Space Exploration Sucks? A Cynical View Of A Practical Earthling
October 31, 2009
Anton Goryunov writes from Moscow: Deeply distressing news is coming from all over the globe: leaders of different nations are succumbing to the stupid proposals by their eggheads to waste a lot of money on manned flights to distant planets. In Russia the bad news has arrived yesterday when it was revealed that President Dmitry Medvedev has approved in principal a project that envisages creating a nuclear powered spaceship, at an estimated cost of 17 billion roubles (that’s about $350 million) by the year 2020, to fly manned missions to Mars and other planets. I will just say this about the plan: it will cost at least five or six times more than the original projection and will probably be delayed by about 10 years at least. Not to mention another small matter: Russia up to now has not...
This Whole Panic Over Swine Flu Is Becoming Ridiculous. It’s Time To Get Real
October 30, 2009
R.F.Wilson writes: I wonder, I just wonder who was it exactly that suggested to President Barack Obama to introduce a state of emergency in the United States over the swine flu epidemic? Was it, by any chance, one of his slick advisors who has been talking to the giant pharmaceutical companies that are so keen on getting all those juicy contracts for producing billions of vaccines that are supposedly needed to save mankind from the worst disease since the plague? The madness surrounding swine flu reached fever pitch in New York where the local authorities have actually made it obligatory to have an anti-swine flu vaccine. Will the rest of America follow suit, now that the President himself has declared war on the H1N1 virus and even had his two daughters vaccinated? The thing about swine flu...
How To Steal A Trillion From The Public Purse? A Cynical Look At Britain
October 16, 2009
Anton Goryunov writes from Moscow: Well, well, well. Let me tell you, people, who live in a supposedly democratic Britain, that here in Russia there are jokes going around how your Prime Minister, Gordon Brown, has managed to bankrupt your country for the next 1000 years – all to save your banker boys from going to jail. And we, in Moscow, thought that misusing public money was something that only our leaders in Russia did. Well, not only in Russia: in China, Ukraine, North Korea and Cuba as well. Still, it was a bit of a cultural shock to find out that in Britain, in that cradle of Western democracy, it’s no big deal to steal a trillion, and get away with it. No one has said a word and no one has objected. Mr Brown has not only remained in power but is even telling everyone that...
Bad Debts And Bail Outs. Western Banks Adopt Russian Methods
October 13, 2009
If anyone had ever wanted to get a loan from a bank in Russia – before this whole economic crisis had erupted – they were supposed to offer the people, who worked in the bank, a ‘commission’ to get their application approved. That was how the system worked in Russia from the early 1990s when the free market had supposedly started to emerge in the country. There was nothing free about it, of course, because everything was done semi-legally, or illegally, and banks, including state-owned ones, were lending money only to people who knew how the system worked: loans were given in return for backhanders or favours. You could bring the best business plan in the world to the bank and show that your business was growing, but it would get you nowhere. Your application for the much...
Political Correctness. And The Hell It Originated From
October 11, 2009
Anton Goryunov writes from Moscow: It is time to examine the phenomenon of political correctness. Or rather, the hell it originated from. Political correctness, in its most advanced and destructive form, dates back to post revolutionary Russia, when under the leadership of Vladimir Lenin, the Bolsheviks – i.e. communists – who had seized power in a coup in October 1917, decided that it would be better if they start courting all sorts of vested interests and minority groups to get them on their side, having the majority of the population firmly opposed to them. The Reds had been forced to tone down their revolutionary stranglehold on Russia for a while in the 1920s, and even revived capitalism so as to save the economy from totally collapsing. These were very strange times indeed....
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- As US Troops Are Preparing To Cut And Run, We Ask: Will Democracy Triumph In Iraq?
- As ‘Dwarfgate’ Hits Britain, We Ask: Is The World Run By Shorties?
- Pearls Of Wisdom. From The Stirring Trouble Team
- Samantha Cameron Talks Candidly About Her Hubby. And Sort Of Blows The Lid On Him.
- LibDems Pick A Porn Chick As Their Candidate. We Look At Other Options
- Israeli-Palestinian Peace Process? Now What Process Would That Be?
- The Cold War Is Back. But It Not As We Knew It
- More Breaking News. From The Stirring Trouble Team.
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- Winning Hearts And Minds In Afghanistan. Even When They’re Detached From The Bodies
- President Ahmadinejad Reveals Iran’s Official Policy
- A Cynical Look At Life In Britain. And The Stiff Upper Lip
- As The British Press Sells Its Soul To The Devil, We Go Behind The Scenes Of One Newspaper
- From Now On The Met Office Will Express Doubt About Its Own Forecasts
- Pearls Of Wisdom. From The Stirring Trouble Team
- Live Coverage Of The Oscars Proves A Huge Hit. With Dozens Of People
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- TV Debates Between Party Leaders Will Include Product Placements
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- BBC Cuts Costs: It’s Taking The Piss, But Not As We Know It
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- More Breaking News. From The Stirring Trouble Team
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