Donald's Blog

  This old house was only a few blocks from the state Capitol in Madison, Wisconsin. All the neighborhood cats lived in the basement during the winter. The house has long since been torn down, but in 1972 there were AR2ax speakers in the front room, and a lot of good music was heard there.

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In the 21st century I am just as opinionated as ever, and I now have an outlet. I shall pontificate here about anything that catches my fancy; I hope I will not make too great a fool of myself. You may comment yea or nay about anything on the site; I may quote you here, or I may not. Send brickbats etc. to: dmclarke78@icloud.com.

 

May 26, 2015

Russia today

A Russian immigrant in New York once described his home country as "Nigeria with snow." I've just finished reading Peter Pomerantsev's book Nothing Is True And Everything Is Possible. Russia today is a zoo; maybe it always was. The fantasy-land of violence and corruption is scary and hard to believe...and maybe the West is coming to resemble it. 

I'm tempted to quote a long paragraph about the unbelievable corruption at the top of the greasy pole in Russia, but there are too many such paragraphs and it's too depressing. Russia has not yet recovered from the long Communist period, when it was necessary to believe ten impossible and contradictory things before breakfast. Take the book out of the library.