So I was at World Russia Forum 2018 today:
International Center for Public Diplomacy presents
“Towards US – Russia Rapprochement”
Discussion of the Trump – Putin Helsinki summit results and of the role of pubic diplomacy in improving US – Russia relations.
July 18, 2018; 6.00 PM; Golden Ring Hotel, Smolenskaya 5
Confirmed Speakers
Helsinki Summit Results Panel
Mikhail Strikhanov – President, National Research Nuclear University
Valery Garbuzov – Director, Institute of USA and Canada. Russian Academy of Sciences
Petr Fedorov – Head, Department of International Relations, VGTRK
Andrei Shitov – International Correspondent, TASSPublic diplomacy panel
Thomas Leary, Minister Counsellor Public Affairs, US Embassy in Moscow
Alexander Burganov – Burganov Museum
Sergei Afanasiev – US – Russia Friendship Society
Mikhail Neborsky – International Union of Russian CompatriotsEdward Lozansky – Moderator
I was a panelist at WRF 2012 and WRF 2013 in Washington D.C. It is a semi-annual event, alternately hosted in Washington D.C. and Moscow, meant to bring together Russian and American experts, academics, journalists, and policy-makers in an effort to improve relations between these two nations. It is organized by Eduard Lozansky, a Soviet dissident who emigrated from the USSR and became well-off in the US through his Russia House restaurant in Washington D.C. (incidentally, feel free to visit it if you’re in the area; it is a genuinely good and authentic upper-tier Russian restaurant, if somewhat pricey; and no, I have not been paid for this endorsement).
I won’t sugarcoat the truth… with all due respect to Lozansky, whose mission I very much respect and sympathize with, it struck me as sort of pointless. The highlight involved a statue commemorating the famous meeting on the Elbe in April 25, 1945 between American GIs and Red Army soldiers. Awesome, but ancient history, these days. Pretty irrelevant. One of the Russian speakers shared his Cold War anecdotes, another talked about scientific meetings between Russian and American nuclear researchers, another waxed lyrical about UNESCO events where Russians and Americans both happened to be involved. Everyone mouthed off nice platitudes about the necessity of student exchanges, person to person contacts, soft power, and all that jazz. Which is all very nice to be sure, but a marked decline from the far more concrete discussions on media strategy and effective lobbying that dominated 2013. In the event, none of the plans and suggestions from that period ended up getting realized. We Russians are just not that good at lobbying, even when we have a rich, high verbal IQ Jew like Lozansky leading the effort. But at least the WRF 2012 and WRF 2013 involved something relevant.
Of course, the real problem in this age of Russiagate and weaponized FARA was encapsulated by one of the distinguished guests at this forum: Thomas Leary, the Consul General at the US Embassy in Moscow.
In his speech, which was delivered in English, he complained about how work for him had gotten much harder because Russia shut down a bunch of US Consulates. Who initiated this severing of diplomatic ties was left unsaid. In response to some Russian journalists – not from state media such as RT or Sputnik, though this shouldn’t matter – complaining about how the US made it hard for them to work there, he dismissed them by saying that American journalists faced great challenges in Russia as well. (Isn’t this what the Blue Checkmarks call “whataboutism”?). In general, he disagreed with all of the Russian gripes about US conduct, such as the expansion of NATO – the only overlap with the Russians’ positions was that he agreed there should be more person to person ties and public diplomacy.
Problem? Well, that’s sort of ruled out in the present environment. No sane American politician would talk with a representative of Russia these days. And if you do it under the radar, you end up like Maria Butina: A proponent of American values such as free speech and the 2nd Amendment, who has just been arrested and faces up to 5 years in prison for practicing said “person-to-person” contacts. This is the question that I directed to the American diplomat: Given that practicing “public diplomacy” now carries the very real risk of imprisonment and jail, at least for Russians in the US, how exactly does he expect for it to work?
Leary replied that he does not comment on current criminal cases, but did emphasize that Russians should follow American laws when they are in the United States.
Perfectly “officialese” answer. Very understandable. He was, after all, probably the only person getting paid for his responses in that room.
Another Russian attendee asking him about his thoughts about setting up a commission to protect journalists’ rights in Russia and the US was the trigger that prompted him to say he had to leave.
I suppose this was discouraging and encouraging at the same time. Discouraging in the sense that for all intents and purposes, Russians and Americans live in two totally different worlds. Apart from the emptiest of platitudes, the Russians and the American were just talking past each other. Discouraging also in the sense that Trumpism is still a very much delineated phenomenon, that hasn’t even worked its way down to the diplomatic corps, who are supposed to be a direct extension of the executive branch. But also encouraging in the sense that Russian opinion was pretty much united on this matter. Even though the people at this event were primarily moderate liberals, the questions to Leary were polite but critical, and my own question seemed to be well received.
Ultimately, as I pointed out in 2013 – well before the complete breakdown of US-Russia relations – this is a values chasm that cannot be bridged anytime soon. Public diplomacy in particular is a waste of time. I was skeptical about its potential impact even back then, and considering the fate of people who courageously begged to differ – George Papadopoulos and Maria Butina immediately come to mind – I am retrospectively glad not to have stepped into that snakepit.
Ultimately, it is the United States that needs Russia, not the other way round. Russia does not have the demographic or economic strength to be a 21st century global superpower in its own right; it foreclosed on that future in 1917. So the only choice it faces is whom to sidle up to: The US, or China. Given America’s “agreement-incapability” (недоговороспособность), fully evidenced and embodied in the haughty and maximalist attitudes of its diplomatic staff, China has as good as won this struggle “by default.” I do realize that it is ironic in the extreme that a hardcore anti-Bolshevik and fan of American institutions such as free speech and gun rights such as myself would favor a Communist power over the (self-proclaimed) “shining city upon a hill”, but then again, politics and history is chock full of ironies. And I think I’m hardly atypical amongst Russians on this point.
I can confirm Russia House is well worth visiting. Probably the only place in that pathetic excuse for an imperial capital worth visiting in fact.
It’s increasingly apparent that American elites, at least outside of commerce, require wholesale replacement on a massive scale. They’re completely hopeless. Even Newt Gingrich wasn’t capable of containing himself from the reflex to condemn the Helsinki Summit (of course Gingrich condemned Reagan for meeting Gorbachev in Rejkavic as well).
Russia needs the technology of America and its vassals unless it wants to resign itself to being a bigger Australia. Made in China 2025 is still a far way off.
But it doesn’t need it at any price (i.e. submission, color revolution, dismemberment, etc.).
Anatoly,
The writing has been on the wall for quite some time! By this time Russia should have learned that any long-term working relationship with the US is unachievable and bound to fail. A productive long-term relationship with China might also fail, but it is at least worth a try. Of course one problem in such alliance is China being tempted into expanding into Russia’s unsettled far east.
BTW, Consul General Leary came across as one of His/Her Majesty’s representatives condescendingly addressing the bare-footed downtrodden.
With emphasis on cooperative vassals.
https://forums.spacebattles.com/posts/42447010/
In the current paranoid environment in American – it would be probably safer to be an Islamist, a Neo-Nazi, a gangster rapper, or a Mexico narcotrafficker – than it would be to work in the field of America-Russia relations, as a dilettante.
And at least you could have more fun with the former jobs.
I googled this organization – it sounds like next people who FBI will arrest after Butina.
This kind of article on Google:
https://thesternfacts.com/opinion-edward-lozanskys-russia-lobby-compromised-the-republican-party-9970a6eb6139
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Apparently “World Russia Forum” – 4 degrees of separation from Trump.
https://images.dailykos.com/images/384096/story_image/Lozansky.JPG?1490925054
Newsweek – in the bold part, referring to Karlin’s blog people 🙂
Gangster rappers from Compton, cocaine distributors of Medellin, Bloods, Crips and Gambinos? No, apparently, FBI should focus on a few intellectuals giving their personal opinion about international relations.
https://www.newsweek.com/russia-house-washington-dc-edward-lozansky-forum-899928
Where’s my paycheck from the FSB?
The atmosphere in the media, has changed very rapidly?
In 2009, television was very positive about this place.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hodb44PKgsg
On a fundamental level, I don’t really see how Russia can’t ultimately produce all of it herself(or from friendly states) assuming that some systemic issues are solved. Made in China is far off, but Made in Japan isn’t.
Sorry you have to ask Karlin next time you see him in the office in Lubyanka. I’m only for Mossad and MI6 at the moment.
Naveed Jamali is an establishment flack, who’d look quite foolish when substantively challenged, unlike his very managed (censored) segments on MSNBC.
Ed Lozansky and RT have been way too kind towards Andrew Kuchins, who in turn showed his appreciation.
Who is paying Jamali and how much?
Somewhat related is Tucker Carlson’s erudite commentary on Trump and the analysis of Russia, with some follow-up thereafter:
http://theduran.com/tucker-carlson-slams-attacks-against-donald-trump/
Excerpt –
Some clear examples are given in this piece:
https://www.strategic-culture.org/news/2018/07/12/more-mumbo-jumbo-on-russia.html
Excerpt –
Western world needs white villains. Currently there are none available other than the Russians. All other potential candidates have been too tame (Germans, French) or have too much melanin. All evil will be projected on Russia and Russians until we reach truly absurd levels or proceed to an actual war – that might happen simultaneously.
Recently a business guy from a Third World sh..hole told me that ‘Russians are thugs who murder each other on the streets’. This was in the context of the World Cup. So there you have it, the ever impressionable wannabes will follow the Anglo lead. I responded that his sh..hole country had murder rate 4 times Russia’s, his response: ‘Oh come on, you know what I mean‘. I guess I do, it is now obligatory to say it, and is not meant to be examined. It is a ritual, an exorcism of ‘white evil’ combined with displays of loyalty. This will be fun for a while. And then we might all come to regret it…
As you know, Russia has always been a steady supporter of Nazis and Nazi factions and countries everywhere. Mein Kampf is popularly sold in bookstores everywhere there.
Explains Trump saying that Putin is a big Israel and Bibi fan.
On Fox, Newt was recently yapping to Sean about how Russia and Germany have historically worked with each other, adding how a number of eastern Germans remain fond of the Soviet era.
Mikhail:
Tucker Carlson has listed the influences of three foreign powers which threaten American democracy: Communist government of China, Sunni Gulf States and Latin American countries forcing demographic changes in America.
But Carlson consciously neglected to identify a power far more threatening and pernicious. I applaud this failure for otherwise he would suffer opprobrium and censure. So far he has stayed from overstepping the political fine line that would torpedo his career. For this we should be all grateful for Carlson is one of the few public commentators telling it like it is. Joe Sobran is an example of what happens when the line of political discourse is overstepped. It would a tragedy if Tucker suffered a likewise fate.
On his last show, he noted a hypothetical issue if Israel were to attack NATO ally Turkey over something having to do with some recent disagreements between these two states.
To end the suspense of those wishing the identify of “the power far more threatening and pernicious” are directed to: Mearsheimer & Walt.
Mikhail:
It would be jolly if the US was obligated to come to the defense of NATO ally Turkey if attacked by Israel. I would wager the likelihood of the US fulfilling this NATO obligation to be zero or less.
Should have used space as topic.
It would not be so backward looking.
https://twitter.com/RussianSpaceWeb/status/1018918451979702273
America is on a path to become an insolvent third-world shithole by the middle of this century. It is inevitable regardless of any crazy fantasies that Thorfinnsson might entertain on this matter. US political class is NOT going to get replaced, immigration will NOT get fixed, USA will go broke and lose its control of international finance.
America won’t even have the time to realise that it needs Russia’s help, it will grow irrelevant overnight and will then have to confront much bigger problems than (potential) Chinese expansion.
We need to treat USA as a dead man walking imo. He is already dead he just doesn’t know it yet.
A recent Gallup poll conducted in the Ukraine shows that the country is deeply divided on the issue of relations with Russia.
https://news.gallup.com/poll/228086/ukrainians-russians-polarized-future-relations.aspx
It also shows how the country is being held hostage by Galician extremists. 28% of people in the Central part of the country (including Kiev) now openly say they want better relations with Russia “by any means” (up from 14% in 2014). In the South-East it’s 35% (up from 27% in 2014).
On the whole Ukrainians seem ready to yield and accept Russia’s terms, or at least moving in that direction. But they are being held back Galicians, who if anything grew even more fanatical in their hostility to Moscow: 39% want to terminate relations with Russia (up from 17% in 2014).
According to Gallup, Ukrainians who want better relations with Russia are less likely to approve of the their government, which shows that the current regime mostly represents the interests of Galician nationalists.
USA is not in terminal decline and should not be treated as such.
The various core-Americans as a people still have some positive qualities, so I’d like to disagree, but facts are stubborn things. Some regions might eventually prosper later on, but as a unified whole, the state is doomed.
It is. A country like Russia can recover from a failed ideology/political system, but there is no recovery from a demographic displacement. White Americans have a negative population growth, they are literally dying and their place is being rapidly taken by Mestizo immigrants from Latin America.
Mestizos are not only racially inferior to whites, they are going to vote for politicians, who will bring Latin America’s political culture to USA, cementing the country’s decline. In this respect Ocasio-Cortez phenomenon should be seen as a canary in the coal mine.
Not that American elections have ever meant much since Woodrow Wilson, but 2016 was a Latin American style election if we’ve ever seen one, as our dear host has pointed out.
What, no Rasika? What are you, some sort of a racist?
Steve Bannon takes the stage at Delivering Alpha
https://www.cnbc.com/video/2018/07/18/steve-bannon-delivering-alpha.html
Quite possible. Putin is no angel, neither are the Russians in general, but this reminds me of the constant vilification of Saddam. And we know how that one ended. So I don’t think we can just dismiss the risk of a war.
Brazil is a Latin American country, and had it had nukes, it’d be still formidable. Multiply Brazil by 2 or 3, its smart fraction by maybe 10, and add a vast legacy military infrastructure and thousands of nukes, and you’ll have the US of A in the second half of the century. It’ll still be formidable, even if probably less formidable than China will be at that point.
Its worse than just Mestizos, blacks still play an a very dominant role in the government, the sub Saharan population flood will hit the USA just as badly as Western Europe, then you also have an endless amount of browns coming in from South Asia (despite the endless fawning about how successful the upper caste Indians are, with enough migrants their behaviour will start to resemble the average of India).
OT
Meanwhile, the British police now claim to have identified the Skripal suspects, of course Russians. They claim to have identified them on CCTV videos and going through the list of people entering and leaving the country around that time.
Interestingly, they still haven’t released any of the camera pictures of the suspects.
However, I’d say that if they can somehow prove that there were several Russians in Salisbury at the time, moving around town close to the Skripals, who arrived a few days earlier and subsequently left the country, then that’d be some evidence that it was, indeed, Russia. However, we’re still far from that point.
The only way to set up an effective Russian lobby in America is to hire a bunch of insiders – former senators, cabinet officials, and such. Of course, no insider will agree to work for the Russian lobby.
This goes back to what I’ve been saying. Ethnic lobbies don’t drive American policy. On the contrary, American Deep State determines which ethnic lobbies are allowed to exist and exactly how much influence they should have.
No, it is the jewish ethnic lobby that determines which other ethnics are allowed to bribe politicians. Unless you are seriously going to argue that the deep state could suddenly decide to not work with AIPAC and the international jews.
British Skripal claims are worthless without evidence.
The First Commandment of AIPAC:
Or entrenched lobbies decide which new lobbies seem harmless to their influence, and more powerful lobbies have the power to remove less powerful ones from the corridors of power. Probably no lobby is all-powerful, so no lobby can throw out all the rest, but it’s possible to manage the situation, so a new Russian lobby suddenly gaining power (no matter how much money Putin would be willing to throw at it) seems most unlikely.
By the way apparently even Orbán had difficulties setting up a US lobby for himself. He could get a former one-term Congressmen and maybe a couple think tank people, but nothing more. And I think Putin found it even harder. It’s just difficult, unless your influence seems beneficial to the already entrenched lobbies.
The best public diplomacy right now is to get as many Americans and other Westerners as possible to come to Russia and discover that it’s not Mordor. Donald Trump himself could serve as an example of the success of this approach.
This means that Russia needs to introduce unilateral visa free regime with certain Western nations. I understand that this is humiliating but it’s necessary.
Why is it necessary?
Local news, even in the imperial capital, generally is much less ideological and hysterical. They’re just looking for good stories, and just about the only decent entertainment available in DC is restaurants and bars.
But sure, in 2009 it was really only the Ecommunist and a few Jewish berserkers pushing hysterical Russophobia (that went mainstream in 2014).
Russia’s large enough to do so if she likes (consider that Russia has more people today than America did in WW2), but at the price of falling considerably behind the technological frontier. Which of course is exactly what happened during the Cold War, though obviously its deficient economic system played a major role as well.
Made in Japan is indeed there now (other than jet engines)…and Japan is an American vassal state. Though one which is historically more willing to skirt the rules on American sanctions and export controls (see the Toshiba Affair). I believe Mazda now has an assembly plant in Vladivostok.
Indian food is like the same five dishes made over and over, heavily camouflaged with spices in order to protect its victims from food poisoning.
This is culture which failed to invent more than one type of cheese, and diaspora Indians are so culinarily inept that they haplessly substitute tofu for said cheese because they’ve never heard of ricotta or even thought to look into it.
The last thing I do when visiting a different city is look up Indian restaurants.
Other than Japanese all ethnic “cuisine” is a scam, and this is coming from someone who enjoys heat and strong flavors generally.
You can round up six billion people on this world and collectively they’ve contributed less to global cuisine than, say, the 500,000 people of Lyons alone.
Get me a dry-aged ribeye (won’t find that at Rasika…) or a nice filet of salmon (Atlantic, King, or sockeye).
Looking at Trip Advisor it seems now that DC has a David Burke steakhouse, and conveniently it’s at the new Trump hotel there. I know where I’ll be fining if forced to visit that shithole city again.
To go along with people who’ve been truly committed to improved US-Russian relations, along with knowing the US establishment biases and how to directly confront them.
The latest farce being a just aired CNN segment, noting that the Russian government has offered to cooperate with John Mueller in exchange for the Kremlin questioning the likes of Michael McFaul and Bill Browder. CNN then shows a McFaul Tweet saying that the Stalin era Soviet government had never attempted to arrest Americans.
Of course, that’s a deceitful comment on his part, which gets lost in the way that many Americans have been subconsciously duped. There’s also the hypocritical matter of how Russians can be arrested by the US government unlike vice versa.
For all his faults, John Bolton suggested that the indictment of 12 Russian nationals is BS if the Russian constitution forbids such a transfer. Offhand, I don’t know if that’s right – but he makes a cogent point notwithstanding.
Bribery is wrong.
If anything, the Russians should vet any westerners wishing to visit their country, not let anyone in. Now that the establishment in the West has lost its collective mind, it will be sending troublemakers Russia’s way to get revenge.
Proximity matters and to some extent US has always been destined for a slow ‘Latin-American’ transformation.
But one has to be careful with these endless analogies, things are much more complex. What is definitely happening is that there will not be a dominant power for the next few decades, if ever in our lifetimes. That is a healthy dynamic, except it comes with more danger and more conflict.
US is heading towards being a large Third World country on steroids with the usual creole elite and endless intra-group conflicts.
Slightly OT — a possible money-making opportunity for suitable member(s) of our East European commentariat.
Volunteers? Nominations?
It will still be very strong for a long time. It’s just wishful thinking to expect it to just go away over the next few years, and to think it doesn’t matter any more.
The truth about the ((threat)).
https://twitter.com/rooshv/status/1019934955286220800
I don’t think it will lose its power (only its relative power), considering their increasing dominance in science and technology, and large investment in this area (e.g. majority of world’s combined venture capital funding).
China will be significantly higher in GDP, but still far below in GDP per capita – and as a result, America will still be attracting the most intelligent workers from around the world to work in its future industries.
Culturally America will continue in decline (and the result is spread around the world, although Chinese culture will surely become an alternative, minority cultural influence, like how Korean and Japanese is becoming already now).
At the same time, in America increased racial conflicts in the country’s interior, and increasing separation between the rich and the poor, with introduction of more “Brazilian” urban models like “gated communities”.
America also loses its political consensus, and polarized. With increasingly stupid politicians – comical incidences, such as physical fights, or people flying toy drones, start to enter US Congress buildings, as their atmosphere becomes more similar to Rada in Kiev, .
This is by 2050.
But longer-term predictions are going to be inaccurate, because they are so dependent on technology which we cannot know about. (E.g. who can predict behaviour of genetically engineered American Mestizos of the future – perhaps they will be more calm, docile and nonintefering in international relations than Americans of today; perhaps the opposite).
As Ron Unz often points out, Latinos just aren’t that violent. He points out that there are no gated communities in Silicon Valley, even though its majority Hispanic now.
So long as the African element is not increasing, the US should avoid going down that road.
I think reiner Tor is spot on: “Brazil is a Latin American country, and had it had nukes, it’d be still formidable. Multiply Brazil by 2 or 3, its smart fraction by maybe 10, and add a vast legacy military infrastructure and thousands of nukes, and you’ll have the US of A in the second half of the century. It’ll still be formidable, even if probably less formidable than China will be at that point.“
Looking only at China’s progress, America’s dominance in sicence and technology is certainly not increasing. Actually, you could argue that the “dominance” is already history in many fields. That is exactly what relative decline means.
There are also some very recent reports like this: https://www.scmp.com/tech/article/2153798/china-surpasses-north-america-attracting-venture-capital-funding-first-time
Debatable and in any case not that relevant, considering China’s population is over 4 times larger.
It’s difficult to predict exchange rates, etc, but China’s PPP GDP per capita won’t necessarily be massively smaller by 2050, not that it matters too much either way due to that aforementioned population size.
Since the discovery of the perfume spray bottle, I’ve shifted from “Accidental self poisoning by the Skripals selling nerve agents” to Russians, possibly the state certainly secret service agents did it. Motive? The Mueller investigation.
The future will be bipolar.
http://chinamediaproject.org/2018/06/26/yan-xuetong-on-the-bipolar-state-of-our-world/
Cover of latest Time magazine:
https://timedotcom.files.wordpress.com/2018/07/trumpputinfinalcover1.jpg?quality=85&w=840
Per capita GDP of China will be far below US for many decades.
The relevant figure for “brain drain” are nominal figures of the salaries for the particular profession – it’s just how your salary translates when you make a decision to apply for a job in the West.
In particular, American universities have financial resources far beyond any other institutions in the world.
Salaries in America for skilled people are particularly high, even compared to a lot of Western Europe, or places like Japan (which are a few generations advanced of China in development).
At the moment, a significant proportion of the world’s cleverest people are immigrating to America, and this is problem even for high income countries of Western Europe (which is losing them to America).
There is an interesting dynamic here though, where the overly high salaries in America, also result in offshoring of a lot of work, including R&D work.
The pattern will seem some kind of bifurcation, with the most elite research increasing in America, while lower level work is being offshored (and which results in technology transfer).
R&D work can be offshored. Intel, for example, offshored part of its design of processors to Israel in the 1980s, because of much lower salaries there, while many of the top scientists of the country immigrated to America at the same time.
The same process will probably result in a lot of American companies offshoring R&D work in China, while top researchers in China will always continue immigrating to America (so long as there is the salary different).
I thought it was a joke…but its not.
From what I’ve heard, AI researchers made about as much in China as they do in the US and given cost differentials, it actually means that they make more. I’m actually dubious about elite research as well, given that there’s at least some elite research that can’t be done as well in the US, such as genetics(less access to monkeys, for example), and where there are other local resources that can be found locally in China.
It is a joke, we are meant to die laughing. This is almost as good a joke as blowing up the planet to save Al Qaeda in Aleppo as Hillary wanted. We dodged that one, but maybe just a short delay.
This is actually funny, in a macabre sort of way.
I traveled in California last summer (my brother is there at the moment), and for anecdotal evidence, also didn’t see anything bad from Latino Americans (I saw a lot working restaurants, maybe some drug addicts in the bus).
I guess the problem is on the political, rather than street, dimension – their voting for Democrat Party, which results in increased immigration and “Obama liberals” in American politics.
Surely, however, there is not anything invariably “Obama liberal” in Latino populations of America. Optimistically, they could change to neoliberal and support Republicans.
In Latin American countries themselves – it is not all a story of Venezuela and Cuba. We can see an optimistic story of Chile, where a communist leader Salvador Allende, was defeated by Augusto Pinochet.
Under Pinochet, the country itself has been reformed and developed in a neoliberal direction, and gradually transformed to a democracy, and a developed economic, with a similar level now to EU members like Portugal.
The political world of Latin America is not only negative. Also positive model of people like Pinochet already exists in Latin America ideology.
I wonder, if President Trump started a nuclear war with Russia, would the survivors still go, ”yeah, but what about…”?
So who will be the ones getting helicopter rides?
Perhaps Unz has already explained it, but how come it seems Mexico is so violent and chaotic yet US Latin Americans are relatively peaceful?
The free market can distribute quite well in these questions for jobs with immediate benefits. The salary of software engineers, particularly in somewhere like California, is so attractive, because of immediate practical value of the work they are doing.
But as a result of the higher salaries, they could become quite vulnerable to offshoring at some point (although even in this scenario, the main profits of the company would remain in America).
–
But for less directly practical research in the shortrun, but with longrun benefits? (“Elite research”). A research professor of computer science in a higher American university, will receive 2-3 the salary even of equivalent in a Western European university.
In the shortrun, the economic benefits of this work is not always clear, so it would be a “gamble” for China to try to equal American salaries, and we would surely be unlikely to see China offering these jobs at salaries competitive to America (in any large numbers, i.e. enough to be “brain-draining the world”), for many years. And even when China matches America in this area – America will still probably be in second place for elite research.
That one is relatively easy, they would blame Putin. But Trump would be blamed for ‘appeasement‘ that ‘led to the war‘. These guys have their story lines well polished, nothing ever changes…
The UK’s security minister has called that report “ill-informed speculation.”
It could also just mean that the Russians were keeping tabs on a former spy. And it may be a completely false report anyway.
Although I have thought all along that the single most likely culprit (50% probability) was a renegade GRU faction that both wanted to both take revenge on Skirpal and embarrass Putin. Second most likely being an Ivins type at Portland Down (25%).
The perfume bottle report is weird, particularly given how after Yulia’s taped statement looking noticeably more attractive, there was that Internet meme of novichok as an allure-enhancing perfume.
It seems improbable that after the assassin sprayed the novichok on the doorknob, and disposed of the bottle miles away in central Salisbury, the Skirpals would show no ill-effects for hours after touching the doorknob, until they happened to suddenly became simultaneously stricken, a short distance from where the bottle was abandoned.
And did the two druggies happen to find the bottle in the trash a short time after the attack, and then not expose themselves to its contents for months? Or did the poisoner leave the bottle some place where it went undiscovered for months?
I have wondered if the novichok on the doorknob was a deliberate red herring, designed to confuse police and draw their attention away from the true method and location of the attack.
Most Mexicans in Mexico aren’t violent either. The cartels are violent.
Fifty years ago Mexico was a safer place than America.
Of course the dysfunction of Latin American political culture fairly routinely leads to extensive corruption, state collapse, revolution, coup d’etats, etc. These entire can result in explosions of violence.
Chile is an optimistic story of the good that can be wrought from political assassination, mass torture/murder and gravity-assisted bioconversion of communists into ecological goods but its still not really a very healthy country except in comparison to its neighbors. At any rate, its exceedingly dubious that a Pinochetian renaissance will prevail in the future US.
Paul Weyrich and Jack Kemp have been dead for over a decade.
I occasionally see articles about MS-48 (or whatever they are called) trying to extend their reach into the USA, do you think this is a minor concern for now?
While Latin America is not a model for building a stable and prosperous regime, I find it impressive how, barring a few exceptions, the elite always manages to land its feet.
Even the Socialist governments seem to usually have a European or Arab or other honorary white individual in the executive or vice-executive position.
This seems a bit dubious to me; give me the kind of numbers you’re thinking of? $250k? A million per year? On that, China has offered 1 million/year for some scientists.
https://www.scmp.com/news/china/society/article/2105278/china-offering-over-million-dollars-foreigner-run-worlds-largest
AnonFromTN touched on this, though; if you’re a scientist or a researcher, you’re not looking really to maximize your wealth. You have to be driven by something else, otherwise you’d be in industry and making about a third more(at least). Academia isn’t a place to get rich in, you have to really have the right type of mindset to deal with it. I’m pretty sure that if you wanted to make money as a researcher, you shouldn’t be working for a university anyway; the only millionaire that I know who does research worked for DuPont. Its also my belief that corporate politics is slightly less insane than academic politics.
There are a lot of reasons why the US will remain a top center of science: excellent equipment, good colleagues, the ability to pursue your specific interests without government involvement, and just generally better conditions. But I don’t think that money alone is central.
The security minister has rubbished the media claims about suspects identified, another fabrication.
The US will have a civil war, trends all moving that way.
Salary for professor (or associate professor) of computer science in a good research university/higher school America? Around $120,000 + a year?
And in Oxford or Cambridge University? (famous Western European universities) – about $60,000-70,000 a year. (“Professor” has a different meaning for there – so you have to search salary of “lecturer”)
In the latter case, the private sector can drain away many talented people.
For the purposes of this discussion it doesn’t make sense to speak of separate lobbies because it’s all the same people at different points of their career. Call them nomenklatura.
You know about the Military-Industrial Complex? Similarly, there exists Government-Media-Academia-Lobbying Complex (connected to the MIC, of course.) There is a revolving door between various branches of the Complex. A Congressman who just lost an election, a researcher at a think tank, or a retired high level civil servant could be offered a job at a lobbying firm. After a stint as a lobbyist they could go back to their former occupations, or to something new, e.g. a talking head on TV.
Working as a lobbyist for Good Guys is a legitimate career choice. It will enhance you resume and you get to meet a lot of people just like you. But trying to lobby for a Bad Guy can destroy your career. Everyone knows who the Good Guys and the Bad Guys are – the group think is strong with these people.
So, Good Guys lobbies have no trouble hiring influential people. For example, in the late 90s there was a powerful Albanian lobby, which had a number of bigfoot American politicians working for it; for example Bob Dole and John McCain. On the other hand, Orban is a designated Bad Guy, so he has trouble attracting even the minor players.
I knew that I’d hear from the adepts of the Church of Holy AIPAC. You believe what you want to believe.
I think the only reason why the cartels could have gotten so powerful is because of the overall dysfunction of the government. You never hear, anywhere else, of non-state entities waging war against state entities; the idea of, say, the Mafia fighting battles against the Italian military would be farcical. The narco-guerillas successful waged war against Colombia, and cartels provide government services and levy taxes in parts of Mexico…which is hilarious, really, but it also shows that they can successfully control land and population.
At this point its a chicken and egg problem. Are governments incapable of dealing with them because they are so powerful? Did they become so powerful because the governments were so dysfunctional? Does it matter anymore?
One thing I remember was that it was considered kosher to hire a family member of a political official as a lobbyist for your cause, sometimes with quite remarkable salaries. Its hard not to see how that is not essentially, a blatant yet legal bribe.
Since they’re both supposedly our allies, let’s attack both, each on behalf of the other, and destroy them.
Back when Trump was an unlikely contender for the Republican nomination, I was struck by his relative friendliness to Russia. In American election campaigns, there is no political downside to Russophobia and no upside to Russophilia, so all other other candidates competed with each other in bashing Russia. But not Trump. He even had a couple of kind words to say about the Kremlin Beelzebub himself. Why?
My best guess is that Trump visited Russia and liked it. He does believe horror stories about it, for one. And this is why Russia should get as many foreigners as possible to come and visit. Some of them may become important in the future.
I clicked Agree, but with a caveat.
Aren’t the Russians being replaced, too, just not nearly as rapidly?
Is the total fertility rate of Russians in the Russian Federation at replacement level 2.1?
Has it been at that level at any time during the past 25 years?
I realize that the Muslim nations in the Caucasus have a small population, but aren’t the non-Russian Muslim people in Chechnya, Dagestan, etc., consistently reproducing above replacement level?
It seems that the population of Russia is becoming just slightly less Russian and slightly more non-white and Muslim with each passing year. Sadly, we may someday write “Russia” in quotes just as we are starting to write “Germany” and “France” and “Sweden.”
It’s correct there is a difference in birthrates.
But also remember minority nationalities are quite small people, and assimilating as well, through intermarriage and secularization – although this process is less rapidly than in the Soviet era.
For Tatars, for example, you can read how this is a very sensitive topic among them (intermarriage), because of how often it leads to assimilation and loss of separate identity in the next generation. They panic about this topic on the Tatar internet forums even because intermarriage is becoming more common.
The probable outcome is always that vastly larger Russian nationality swallows the smaller nationalities, than the other way round.
I’m glad you like cheese, because with desserts (Indian sweets are good but not up to European quality) and maybe sausage it is the only unique glory of European cookery that is not done better somewhere else.
That said, as a mixed Ceylonese I have to agree with you about the majority of Indian and especially Indian-American cooking, done by chefs who believe in the two great gods of ghee and salt (fake ghee half the time anyway). But odds are the Rasika is not like that, though I’ve never been there.
Since it’s in DC I had to check out Tyler Cowen’s Ethnic Dining Guide. Cowen is a perfect WEIRD and SWPL, so I was interested in what he had to say.
He has two entries under “Russia House.” From 5/20/06:
The next day:
LOL.
Well, a slow liberalisation of the visa regime does seem to happen.
https://twitter.com/RussianEmbassy/status/1018812237522395136
https://twitter.com/VisaHouseCom/status/1019128630465712128
“more non-white”
https://www.unz.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/kadyrov-1488.jpg
Food at Rasika is pretty good as is people watching. It’s not your typical neghborhood Northern Indian tandoori chicken joint.
My low opinion of Indians does not affect my appraisal of an Indian restaurant. I try to be as objective as I can. If the food is tasty, it is tasty. It really is as simple as that.
My impression about Chinese Party apparatchiks is that they are like little emperors – they not only think (like Obama) that they are the smartest guy in the room – they like to micromanage just purely as an expression of their power. That’s how you come up with something like China’s draconian one-child policy and its ban on motorcycles in the big cities. I’d expect creative foreigners to chafe under many of the arbitrary and anger-inducing diktats dreamed up by company despots, and leave fairly quickly, even if they dipped their toes in the water for short periods of time.
I can imagine that France might be the greatest single national contributor to global cuisine (though it’s not exactly clear how to go about quantifying such things), which would also make it a superlative per capita contributor.
But Indian cuisine – which is really about 10 different regional ones – is certainly no less complex. Wherever did you get this absurd idea? Also they need to be commended as the only people who managed to make vegetarianism delicious.
Japanese has more of an elite reputation because it was the first “ethnic” country to become developed and start marketing its food to moneyed gourmands. But there is nothing particular special about sushi or sashimi, nor have I ever figured out where the preoccupation with umami comes from (something that is present in all manner of cuisines, including even Russian, which I will admit doesn’t have much to write home about).
The Americans have certained brought the art of the steak to perfection. As ketoheads we can certainly appreciate that. It is interesting to note that the Japs have also developed steak (Wagyu beef) and single malt whiskey to as high a level as anything seen in the West. This reflects the East Asian talent for copying and then optimizing.
Also with respect to Mexico in particular, it does seem that the drugs issue is central.
Northern areas (US border) are the most violent, the most underdeveloped/Aztec areas are actually quite peaceful.
http://www.geocurrents.info/wp-content/uploads/2015/07/Mexico-Homicide-Rate-Map.png
It is of course very plausible that a much more Latinized US will see more Latin maladies affect its body politic, which may eventually translate to skyrocketing crime. I still haven’t really figured out why, say, Latin America is so damn violent, more so even than West Africa, or all but the most (temporarily) collapsed of Middle Eastern states.
Kadyrov is part of the problem though, as he is encouraging a lot of Islamization.
It’s a difficult problem for the authorities though. Religion is bringing various ideological and social benefits. At the same time, this multireligious policy is not good here, where you are preparing for future problems and separatism for future generations.
In the Chechen Republic, it should be encouraged secularization.
–
Grozny before the war – secular people.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1UN9VPMFWV0
Two distinct groups:
http://www.unz.com/akarlin/russia-more-russian/
Wat.
Nah, someone like that wouldn’t survive Party politics. There are issues with conflicts of interest, e.g. wanting to “show results” soonish rather than waiting the years needed but grandstanding would have quick, unpleasant consequences.
Rootlessness stemming from a combination of christian intolerance towards clans and recent colonization leaving people unrelated to their neighbors
I thought Russian demographics is your hobby, but there figures are seriously out of date. It’s actually 1,75 for Ingushetia and 2,62 for Chechnya in 2016.
All this federal investment in the Caucasus seems to be making a difference, causing the locals to adopt a modern, urbanised way of life.
It doesn’t matter how populous a third world America will be. Any growth in US population will come exclusively from non-white immigration. Population of White Americans will decline from the current level of just under 200 million. Having 300 million more POCs pumped into it will actually make the country worse off! We have seen in South Africa how quickly an advanced Anglo society can degenerate under pressure of demographic change. And I know, Mestizos are not niggers, but still. USA won’t be “formidable” at all.
Futhermore, superpower military infrastructure requires hundreds of billions of dollars to maintain – out of reach for a corrupt, disfunctional third-world dump, that America will become. Without money it falls into disrepair and becomes worthless fast. Just look at what happened in the post-Soviet Ukraine.
Well, while I have a rough idea of where things are, I don’t religiously memorize the vital stats of every Russian region for every year.
Obviously this just confirms the point that they are not a demographic threat.
Neither do I. But these are no ordinary Russian regions, and their demographic transition (towards lower fertility) is kind of a big deal.
It also vindicates Kremlin’s policy of “feeding the Caucasus” – something that lowbrow Russian nationalists at Sputnik&Pogrom fail to recognise.
Far from certain that it wouldn’t have happened without subsidies either.
Also it is ICh which is transitioning to lower fertility from anomalously higher rates. Dagestan has long been steadily around 2.0.
Such declines in fertility are usually a product of urbanisation. These Chechen cities weren’t going to rebuild themselves. Or perhaps, they would, but it would take a lot more time.
Dagestan has been around 2.0 since late 1990s, but Russia’s TFR was 1.2 at the time.
https://d.radikal.ru/d11/1807/d2/6f4d85e75f23.jpg
https://b.radikal.ru/b15/1807/94/0a825a25f26d.jpg
Agree.
4chan’s literature board /lit/ has had DC meet-ups at Russia House on several occasions in the last 6 months.
Brazil * 3 + ,000 nukes = NIGHTMARE^3
Luckily the US won’t make it whole to the end of the century. A financial crisis many times bigger than 2008 will do them for. If racial strife and political hatred won’t arrive first
The breakup of a country that big with lots of nukes and no obvious ethnic borders etc. will be an even bigger nightmare than the (Brazil *3 with thousands of nukes).