Free Republic

Sanibel, Fla., was one of the first U.S. cities to endorse the Earth Charter nearly a year ago as a part of Earth Day celebrations. It was also the first U.S. city to withdraw its endorsement. This controversial document, promoted by Mikhail Gorbachev and Maurice Strong for a decade, is seen by many to be an effort to create a new "16 Commandments" to serve as the foundation for a new global religion. Sanibel citizens were not happy about the endorsement. Forty-two citizens and five former mayors signed an open letter, published in a local newspaper, demanding that the endorsement...

Mikhail Gorbachev—the man who pulled the Soviet Union's troops out of Afghanistan after a decade of stalemate—says the US should do the same.

Bloomberg can't be posted on FR, so I can only post a link. http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601103&sid=aP_6NUKjFaSM#

Ronald Reagan's historic speech before the Berlin Wall in 1987, in which he said "Mr. Gorbachev, Tear down this wall," is one of most important speeches in world history. The Berlin Wall's falling, which came about two years later, was a victory for freedom and a crushing blow to the former Soviet Union and the tyranny of Communism around the world.

We are approaching the 20th anniversary of the fall of Communism. This comprehensively refuted the Communist claim to represent the people. Yet, the claim continues, sometimes dazzling a new generation of youngsters with no inkling of why the Berlin Wall fell on November 9, 1989. In democratic Capitalism, said Karl Marx, the rich became richer and the poor poorer. Marxism inspired young idealists for over a century. Lenin's revolution in Russia in 1917 was hailed as a new dawn. Stalin's invasions brought Communism to Eastern Europe. Communist governments there pledged to create a paradise for workers, who would be freed...

November 9, 2009 Tear down this wall! And save the planet There are urgent parallels between the fall of Communism and the fight to stop climate change Mikhail Gorbachev The German people, and the whole world alongside them, are today celebrating a landmark date in history: the 20th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall. Not many events can claim their place in the collective memory as a watershed that divides two distinct periods. The dismantling of the Berlin Wall — that stark, concrete symbol of a world divided into hostile camps — is such an event. It brought...

THE STATEMENT STILL GIVES ME CHILLS Despite the efforts of the Democrats, the wall came down 20 years ago. God blessed this nation indeed to have given us such a man of profound clarity and courage.

Twenty years ago, on Nov. 9, 1989, the Berlin Wall fell, as protestors on both sides began chipping away with sledgehammers, picks and hands. But the first crack in the wall appeared two years before that — on June 12, 1987 — when President Ronald Reagan stood at the Brandenburg Gate and gave his ultimatum to the Soviet leader: “Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!”In his new book, “Tear Down This Wall” (Simon & Schuster), Romesh Ratnesar, deputy managing editor at Time magazine, traces the origin of Reagan’s remarks, noting how administration officials disagreed over whether the president should be...

Cold War: The White House has announced our absence at ceremonies marking the 20th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall. Meanwhile, Russia has been practicing a nuclear invasion of an abandoned Poland. The Berlin Wall has been a famous backdrop for American presidents sounding the battle cry of liberty in the struggle against tyranny. It was there that John F. Kennedy expressed our solidarity with the encircled residents of that outpost of freedom with his famous "Ich bin ein Berliner." And it was there that Ronald Reagan, with a defiant "Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall," voiced our...

BERLIN (Reuters) – George Bush, Mikhail Gorbachev and Helmut Kohl paid their respects to the ordinary people who were behind the peaceful revolution of 1989 that brought down the Berlin Wall at an emotional ceremony in Berlin on Saturday. The three statesmen from the United States, Soviet Union and West Germany -- whose steady-handed leadership paved the way for the Wall's opening on November 9, 1989 -- recalled the heady events that led to the end of the Cold War at a ceremony attended by 1,800 people. "We Germans don't have very much in our history to be proud of,"...

Wow. I just noticed something. Our commander-in-chief is the least alpha of any of the leaders of our former enemies from World War II and the Cold War: Germany, Italy, and Russia. While I knew Obama exhibited beta behavior, I had no idea it was this bad. Give me a minute and I’ll lay out pictorial proof. We all know that Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi holds the title of “Intergalactic Alpha”. The 73 year-old silverback is banging 18 year-olds, has amassed a fortune, laid the smack down on his wife, and avoided indictment and/or lynching for his shenanigans....

There is nothing new under the sun: and I mean, nothing. It is a point brought home to us with increasing force by the expansion of the Internet. Conceive of an "original idea." Now, select two or more keywords suggested by it. Use them as search terms, and you will soon find that, say, 438,000 other people have entertained said "original idea," and a dozen are currently blogging on it. Before beginning today's column, my search terms were "Gorbachev" and "Obama." Yes: a lot of people have entertained the idea, that Mikhail Gorbachev was to the late great Soviet Union,...

How and why the surviving heirs of the Soviet monster are alive and well.Twenty years ago, the Communist regimes in Eastern Europe began to fall one by one -- so quickly that the coming months will be very dense with 20th anniversaries of great historic events. That was the final battle of the Cold War, where the Iron Curtain was finally broken, and the monstrous Soviet Empire ruined. Freedom triumphed in Europe at last. Or so it seemed. For the next twenty years have shown that that victory was not as final as many hoped during that momentous autumn of...

Mikhail Gorbachev has attacked Vladimir Putin for rolling back democracy in Russia and failing to fight corruption. In an interview with The Times, published today, he criticised Mr Putin over Russia’s failure to convict the killers of prominent Kremlin critics such as the journalist Anna Politkovskaya and the dissident spy Alexander Litvinenko. Mr Gorbachev accused Europe and America of a failure to understand Russia since he started his glasnost and perestroika reforms of the Soviet Union almost a quarter of a century ago. He said that the West seemed more interesting in keeping Russia “on its knees”. He had warm...

Another casual Obama-Gorbachev meeting Did former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev vet President Barack Obama’s address before Obama delivered it to graduates of the New Economic School in Moscow this morning? According to President Obama’s Schedule Today from the CBSNews Political Hotsheet, Obama spent the sum total of 15 minutes with Gorbachev immediately prior to delivery of the New Economic School address. There were no pictures of Obama and Gorbachev together, but Gorbachev attended the address and Radio Free Europe has the photograph to prove it.(here). The beaming smiles of Barack and Michelle Obama gave lie to the lukewarm reception by...

Barack Obama is on a mission to reset relations between the US and Russia with nuclear reduction at the cornerstone of his plan. US arms control experts predict the two sides could aim to reduce their arsenals to 1,500 nuclear warheads apiece. Mr Obama's plans continue what the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty began in 1991. It was signed by Ronald Reagan and Mikhail Gorbachev. In a rare interview with Sky News, the former Soviet Leader insisted further nuclear reduction is vital. He said: "If we don't get rid of nuclear weapons the 40 countries that are not members of the...

Obama Tears Down US Economy, Mikhail Gorbachev Endorses PlanJune 8, 2009 BEGIN TRANSCRIPT RUSH: Ladies and gentlemen, there can be no other way to say this now. The gloves have to come off. It's time for people to sober up. The president of the United States, Barack Obama, is destroying the United States economy. There is no other way to describe this, systematically destroying it. "Rush, are you saying he's destroying it on purpose?" I'm not going there, it doesn't matter. What matters is the United States economy is being destroyed. Even the Associated Press, government-run Associated Press with a...

History may repeat itself two or three times or even reach the point, which Francis Fukuyama described as the end of history. The US historian of Japanese origin introduced the notion during the time when there were two dominating superpowers in the world – the United States and the Soviet Union. [snip] History repeats itself. The Mideastern tour of the Afro-American head of the White House was promoted as a new page in the relations between America and the Muslim world. As a matter of fact, Mr. Obama simply did what his predecessors had done before him.

Years ago, as the Cold War was coming to an end, I said to my fellow leaders around the globe: The world is on the cusp of great events, and in the face of new challenges all of us will have to change, you as well as we. For the most part, the reaction was polite but skeptical silence. In recent years, however, during speaking tours in the United States before university audiences and business groups, I have often told listeners that I feel Americans need their own change -- a perestroika, not like the one in my country, but...

Former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev called for a perestroika, or top-to-bottom reform, in the West, arguing that its current economic model was "unsustainable" and needed replacement. Commenting on the current global economic crisis, the ex-Soviet president who presided over the collapse of his country, said that it was now clear to him "that the new Western model was an illusion that benefited chiefly the very rich. "The model that emerged during the final decades of the 20th century has turned out to be unsustainable," Gorbachev wrote in an op-ed piece in The Washington Post. "It was based on a drive...

The background to this 30-minute film is that about two years ago, director Bob Parks (http://www.black-and-right.com/) and I got a small grant to develop a demo/pilot DVD based on my book, A Patriot's History of the United States. I chose the Reagan chapter, specifically his "Star Wars" speech. The resulting film is "Reagan: The Cold War and a Speech." We ran out of money before we could do a final edit, and there are a couple of minor hiccups, but it was, after all, a demo. Overall, I was very pleased with the result.

Is Barack Obama America's version of former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev? So says Associated Press writer Steven R. Hurst, and he means it as a compliment. While historic analogies are never perfect, Obama's stark efforts to change the U.S. image abroad are reminiscent of the stunning realignments sought by former Soviet leader Michael Gorbachev. During his short — by Soviet standards — tenure, he scrambled incessantly to shed the ideological entanglements that were leading the communist empire toward ruin. You know we're in tough times when the left starts expressing the idea that only a new Gorbachev can save us....

Ten years ago Ronald Reagan stood at the Brandenburg Gate and said, "General Secretary Gorbachev, if you seek peace, if you seek prosperity for the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe, if you seek liberalization: Come here to this gate! Mr. Gorbachev, open this gate! Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!" Not long afterward, the wall came tumbling down and the most formidable empire in world history collapsed so fast that, in Vaclav Havel's words, "we had no time even to be astonished." With the disintegration of the Soviet Union, the most ambitious political and social experiment of the modern era...

A close aide to Ronald Reagan has claimed that the former US president tried to convert the Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev to Christianity.A new biography that draws on recently declassified documents discloses a secret exchange between the two leaders that left at least one official present convinced that Reagan had tried to persuade his counterpart of God's existence. The Rebellion of Ronald Reagan, by the former Los Angeles Times reporter James Mann, provides fresh insight into the former US president's religious convictions and the role they played in foreign policy. Reagan had apparently reached a conviction, which has since become...

President Ronald Reagan's Alma Mater hosts a world leader today. Eureka College honors former Soviet Leader Mikhail Gorbachev with an Honorary Doctorate. Accompanied by a small entourage, including his daughter, Gorbachev stepped foot on campus looking relaxed and right at home. It was the community that gathered in awe. “This is huge for Eureka College and Central Illinois," Reagan Museum Curator Brian Sajko said., The 78-year-old former Soviet leader came to Eureka to promote the College's new Ronald Reagan society. Gorbachev toured the Reagan Museum before spending a few moments reflecting in the Reagan Peace Garden that includes a five...

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Former Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev said on Thursday he was more optimistic about the prospect of improving U.S.-Russian relations after meeting U.S. President Barack Obama earlier this month. Ties between the former Cold War enemies have been strained by NATO expansion, a planned U.S.-backed missile defense system in Eastern Europe, tensions between Russia and Georgia and differences on how to deal with Iran's nuclear program. Russian President Dmitry Medvedev and Obama will meet in London on April 1 ahead of the G20 most developed nations summit. Gorbachev met with Obama and U.S. Vice President Joe Biden...

Agenda 21: Chapter 2 INTERNATIONAL COOPERATION TO ACCELERATE SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT IN DEVELOPING COUNTRIES AND RELATED DOMESTIC POLICIES In order to meet the challenges of environment and development, States have decided to establish a new global partnership. This partnership commits all States to engage in a continuous and constructive dialogue, inspired by the need to achieve a more efficient and equitable world economy, keeping in view the increasing interdependence of the community of nations and that sustainable development should become a priority item on the agenda of the international community. It is recognized that, for the success of this new partnership,...

[...] The US government has also been silent with respect to two important, apparently related incidents that took place on March 20. The MSM revealed yesterday that Obama and Vice President Joe Biden met former Soviet tyrant Mikhail (“I’ll Always Be a Communist”) Gorbachev at the White House last Friday, in what can only be described as a “secret meeting” since the encounter was not previously published on the US president’s official daily schedule. Reuters news agency acquired the revelation via Gorby’s spokesman Konstantin Petrenko, who refused to divulge details of the discussion. When White House spokesman Robert Gibbs was...

I had the opportunity to see Mikhail Gorbachev speak in Sarasota Florida on Monday, March 22,2009. I am aware of the vanity stance here on Free Republic, but I beg your indulgence, as I took notes and feel it is important to convey his words to the public.. He took the stage at the Town Hall meeting at the Van Wezelwith the help of a translator. In less then one minute, he managed to put down the previous United States administration. He particularly took the time to refer to Cheney as " dismissive ", and overall " not good "...

SARASOTA – Former Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev sees parallels between the Soviet Union of 1985-91 and the United States today. “The election of Barack Obama represents the fact that the American people as a whole want change,” said Gorbachev at a press conference before the first of his two lectures Monday as part of the Ringling College Library Association’s 2009 Town Hall series. “Your country needs perestroika of course, a perestroika of your own.” Gorbachev won the Nobel Peace Prize in 1990 for his efforts to end the nuclear arms race and Communist rule in Eastern Europe. His leadership coined...

The White House disclosed Monday that President Barack Obama met former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev last week, as the United States and Russia intensify efforts to "reset" strained relations. Gorbachev was at a White House meeting with Vice President Joe Biden on Friday when Obama informally dropped by, his spokesman Robert Gibbs said.

MOSCOW (Reuters) - U.S. President Barack Obama has held talks with Mikhail Gorbachev, a spokesman for the former Soviet leader said on Monday, in the latest sign of Washington's efforts to "press the reset button" on ties with Russia. Spokesman Konstantin Petrenko said Gorbachev met Obama and Vice President Joe Biden -- who coined the 'reset' phrase last month -- in Washington last Friday. He did not give any details of the discussion. Bilateral ties worsened sharply last year, with the two countries at odds over NATO expansion, U.S. plans for a missile shield in Eastern Europe, and Russia's war...

Moscow, March 20, Interfax - In 1980s, the idea that religion might change the Soviet system preoccupied US President Ronald Reagan. This is testified by the notes taken by two Reagan aides during the meeting between Ronald Reagan and Mikhail Gorbachev. According to these documents recently declassified and made available at the Reagan Library in Simi Valley, Calif., Reagan secretly attempted to persuade Gorbachev of the existence of God, Vedomosti. Pyatnitsa newspaper reports. During their fourth summit meeting in 1988, Reagan launched into a private conversation with Gorbachev, one that he promised he would deny had ever taken place. The...

It was the question that preoccupied President Ronald Reagan: Was Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev a religious believer? Reagan held a series of summits with Gorbachev from 1985 to 1988, and as their meetings proceeded, Reagan sometimes speculated to his aides that Gorbachev's use of phrases such as "God bless" might be an expression of religious faith. Many of the summit sessions involved large groups of U.S. and Soviet officials, discussing issues like arms control and regional conflicts. But in one-on-one talks with Gorbachev outside the presence of other senior officials like Secretary of State George Shultz, Reagan sometimes ventured off...

Its hard to get an automobile in the soviet union. They are owned mainly by elite bureaucrats. It takes an average of 10 years to get a car. 1 out of 7 families owned automobiles. You have to go through a major process and put the money out in advance. so this man did this and the dealer said "okay in 10 years come get your car." "Morning or afternoon?" The man replied. "well what difference does it make?" Said the dealer. "The plumber is coming in the morning." [snip] In another car incident, Gorbachev was late from getting to...

"The solution is to move toward a world without nuclear weapons. But this goal cannot be achieved if one country retains an overwhelming superiority in conventional weapons. Without specific steps to reduce these weapons - more generally, without demilitarizing international politics - we will have only empty talk. What's needed is a real breakthrough, like the one achieved in the late 1980s. Judging by Obama's inaugural speech, he understands that even while he faces the immediate challenges of the economic crisis, he should not push to the sidelines problems like poverty and environmental issues, particularly climate change. Fostering economic development...

Instead of reading so much about FDR and Lincoln, Bambi would do well to recall the 1986 Reagan-Gorbachev Summit in Reykjavik. Includes links to previously classified docs form this important summit

Stephen Hockman QC is proposing a body similar to the International Court of Justice in The Hague to be the supreme legal authority on issues regarding the environment. The first role of the new body would be to enforce international agreements on cutting greenhouse gas emissions set to be agreed next year. But the court would also fine countries or companies that fail to protect endangered species or degrade the natural environment and enforce the "right to a healthy environment". The innovative idea is being presented to an audience of politicians, scientists and public figures for the first time at...

Shadow World:  Resurgent Russia, The Global New Left, and Radical Islam By Robert Chandler Regnery Publishing, Inc., 2008 622 pp., $29.95 The fall of the Soviet Union in 1991 is viewed by the West as the end of the Cold War and the death knell for Communism. In reality, Communists continued to push for the same ultimate goal -- creating a socialist world order -- but their violent Marxist-Leninist revolutionary tactics were supplanted by an insidious cultural Marxism. Today, that push has evolved into a Moscow-led,  global strategic quadrangle consisting of Russia, China, Iran and a collection of Latin...

Have you ever wondered how capitalism was pushed over the edge of the cliff just six weeks before the American presidential election? According to financial experts, the world, as we know it will change dramatically by the year 2012. People, who provided for their families only three years ago, will be desperately searching for food. The story of the economic meltdown of 2008 begins and ends with the United Nations and its carefully managed One World Order.

Mikhail Gorbachev is calling for Messiah-Elect Barack Hussein Obama that the U.S. needs comprehensive ‘perestroika’ reforms to surmount the financial crisis and restore balance in the world.

Sure to please the America hating left that elected a Marxist as our new president, a Senior Russian Political Analyst now says “Obama's victory in the presidential election marks an end to the superpower era for the United States.” Sergei Rogov, director of the U.S. and Canada Institute says, “The U.S. presidential election has great significance. I would qualify its results as the end of an era ...of several decades when the U.S. became a superpower and attempted to emerge as the only superpower in a unipolar world after the end of the Cold War.” Does Rogov recognize that sole...

MOSCOW, November 7 (RIA Novosti) - Former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev has said that the Obama administration in the United States needs far-reaching 'perestroika' reforms to overcome the financial crisis and restore balance in the world. The term perestroika, meaning restructuring, was used by Gorbachev in the late 1980s to describe a series of reforms that abolished state planning in the Soviet Union. In an interview with Italy's La Stampa published on Friday, Gorbachev said President-elect Barack Obama needs to fundamentally change the misguided course followed by President George W. Bush over the past eight years. Gorbachev said that after...

MOSCOW, Nov 4: Barack Obama is the “American Gorbachev” who will ultimately destroy the United States, militant Russian nationalist Vladimir Zhirinovsky said on Tuesday. Credited in the West for leading the former Soviet Union away from Cold War confrontation, Mikhail Gorbachev, now 77, is vilified by many at home for presiding over the collapse of the Soviet Union and ushering in harsh economic reforms. “Obama, he is the American Gorbachev, he will destroy America, it will not be rebuilt,” Zhirinovsky said at a meeting of the ultra-nationalist party he founded, according to Russian news agency Interfax. Zhirinovsky, a 62-year old...

Former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev welcomed Barack Obama's victory in the US presidential election on Wednesday, saying he would bring "perestroika" to the United States, ITAR-TASS news agency reported. "I am very happy. Two or three years ago I said America needed perestroika, and this was greeted with cheers in the US," Mr Gorbachev was quoted as saying, using the term for his 1980s liberal reforms that helped end the Cold War. "It is no accident that the whole world followed these elections, including in Russia, where they were followed like never before. This shows there is hope that the...

BookTV/C-Span2 HEADSUP!!! Tune in at 11:15 PM EASTERN or set your TIVO/DVD Recorder. FR's own "LS" and his latest work-product (book) will be the topic of a segment on BookTV (45 min. in duration). IF you miss this first broadcast, please go to the BookTV/C-Span2 page linked for future date/time of rebroadcasts.

SUNNI CLERIC: ALLAH WILL SEND AN “AMERICAN GORBACHEV” TO END THE AMERICAN EMPIRE SOON - Can this be Obama? Following are excerpts from an interview with Lebanese Sunni cleric Sheik Muhammad Abu Al-Qat’, which aired on Al-Manar TV. Sheik Muhammad Abu Al-Qat’: Today, on May 10, 2008, at 22:50 – through Al-Manar TV – let me bring good tidings to the Muslims: Allah willing, the American empire will very soon collapse. They object to any talk about the destruction of the state of Israel. Interviewer: And they are celebrating its 60th anniversary… Sheik Muhammad Abu Al-Qat’: That’s not the issue....

Former soviet premier Mikhail Gorbachev announced that he would be forming a new political party with billionare Alexander Lebdev.

THE acute phase of the crisis provoked by the Georgian forces’ assault on Tskhinvali, the capital of South Ossetia, is now behind us. But how can one erase from memory the horrifying scenes of the nighttime rocket attack on a peaceful town, the razing of entire city blocks, the deaths of people taking cover in basements, the destruction of ancient monuments and ancestral graves? Russia did not want this crisis. The Russian leadership is in a strong enough position domestically; it did not need a little victorious war. Russia was dragged into the fray by the recklessness of the Georgian...

"Gentlemen, comrades, do not be concerned about all you hear about Glasnost and Perestroika and democracy in the coming years. They are primarily for outward consumption. There will be no significant internal changes in the Soviet Union, other than for cosmetic purposes. Our purpose is to disarm the Americans and let them fall asleep. We want to accomplish three things: One, we want the Americans to withdraw conventional forces from Europe. Two, we want them to withdraw nuclear forces from Europe. Three, we want the Americans to stop proceeding with Strategic Defense Initiative." Quote by: Mikhail Gorbachev (1931- ) General...