The Circus Is Over (For Now) by Lilia Shevtsova The Real Test for Obama on Russia by David J. Kramer Russia and the West: No Special Treatment by Andrew Wood

Compared to the G8 meeting in June in Northern Ireland, when he seemed isolated on the issue of Syria, Vladimir Putin seemed to have lots of company in opposing any possible U.S. military action at last week’s G20 meeting in St. Petersburg. Reasonable people can have legitimate differences over what should be done in Syria […]

In the course of history, there have been many problems that could not be solved given the tools available at the time. Such insoluble problems are generally related to a civilizational impasse of some kind. Relations between Russia and the West—and to an even greater degree between Russia and the United States—exemplify one of these […]

The dispute over Edward Snowden—if anyone still remembers him—gave us the chance to slough off the mindset constraining Western policy towards Russia. How Western nations proceed over Syria will show how far that chance is developed. The US “reset” was a reset to factory mode, not a fresh beginning, and the factory was built to […]

It has been barely more than a week since I wrote on Syria and U.S. policy, so-called, toward that issue. I started back on September 3 with an expression of surprise that things could possibly have gotten crazier since having written on August 30. So what am I to say now by way of introduction, […]

On the anniversary of the day the government of Japan bought the Senkaku islands—a handful of small rocks in the East China Sea—from a private owner, relations between China and Japan still haven’t recovered. As the anniversary approached, a number of Chinese coast guard ships and an unidentified drone thought to belong to China lurked near the islands. […]

When your debt is trading cheaper than Detroit’s, it may be time to panic. Puerto Rico is approaching a debt crisis that makes Illinois look hale and hearty. The WSJ reports: “It’s getting concerning,” said Dan Toboja, senior vice president of fixed-income trading at investment bank Ziegler. Puerto Rico yields “never got near a 10% […]

Who’s to blame for the massive blackout in Venezuela last week that left more than half the country without power? Shady saboteurs, enemies of Hugo Chavez, and American spies, of course, the same people who were responsible for a huge blast at an oil refinery last year that killed 40 people. According to Nicolas Maduro, […]

Google has just become the latest tech giant to jump in to the MOOC world, announcing yesterday that it will be partnering with Harvard and MIT’s edX to develop the company’s online MOOC platform. The project aims to create a “Youtube for MOOCs”, allowing any interested party, from schools individuals, to easily sign up and […]

Questions about technical glitches in Obamacare’s new digital platforms have dogged implementation for months now. The administration blamed the employer mandate delay on technical failures related to computer reporting systems, and observers worried that state-level exchanges wouldn’t launch on October 1st.A flurry of news stories today suggests that this particular ACA crisis has passed. California is now […]