Free Republic

Mr Gorbachev said there was still time to defuse the standoff between Moscow and the West, as he and his western counterparts had done during the Perestroika period. “Now there are once again signs of a Cold War,” he said in an interview with Tass, the state-owned news agency. “This process can and must be stopped. After all, we did it in the 1980s. We opted for de-escalation, for the reunification (of Germany). And back then it was a lot tougher than now. So we could do it again.” Mr Gorbachev, 83, who has run a civil society foundation since...

In a letter published on his website on Friday the former Soviet President and Nobel Peace Prize winner said that his position on the Ukrainian crisis remains unchanged. “Our main task is to stop the dangerous escalation and find a solution that would be supported by Ukrainian and Russian citizens and prevent a new Cold War,” the message reads. At the same time, Gorbachev wrote that he would prefer not to get personally involved in the talks and the diplomatic contacts President Vladimir Putin is having with other national leaders almost daily. The former Soviet leader holds that the original...

Mikhail Gorbachev, the former leader of the Soviet Union, piped up on Thursday with a wake-up call for the Western world: Ukraine is now everybody’s problem. The turmoil in its capital, where pitched battles have raged all week between protestors and police, “threatens not only Ukraine and her neighbors, but Europe and the entire world,” he wrote in an open letter to the U.S. and Russian Presidents. He was certainly right about Europe, which now has a real dilemma on its hands. The only question is whether Ukraine’s neighbors can do much to resolve it. For the West, there are...

The ninth of November marked the twenty-fourth anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall, probably the most important historical event since World War II and the most important lesson about human freedom experienced within the living memory of most of us. Presumably, next year there will be more of a commemoration, but the salient question now is how this lesson is being taught in the nation’s classrooms. For while those of us in our forties and older remember the fall of communism and its causes, today’s teenagers are wholly in the dark. What, then, are the high-school students of...

Twenty-six years ago today, President Ronald Reagan gave a speech at the Brandenburg Gate near the Berlin Wall.And now the Soviets themselves may, in a limited way, be coming to understand the importance of freedom. We hear much from Moscow about a new policy of reform and openness. Some political prisoners have been released. Certain foreign news broadcasts are no longer being jammed. Some economic enterprises have been permitted to operate with greater freedom from state control. Are these the beginnings of profound changes in the Soviet state? Or are they token gestures, intended to raise false hopes in the...

On April 8, House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi headlined a Boston conference on ''media reform.'' She was joined by four other congressmen, a senator, two FCC commissioners, a Nobel laureate and numerous liberal journalists. The 2,500-person event was sponsored by a group called Free Press, one of more than 180 different media-related organizations that receives money from liberal billionaire George Soros. Soros, who first made a name for himself in investing and currency trading, now makes his name in politics and policy. Since the 2004 election, the controversial financier has used his influence and billions to push a laundry list...

Meteorologist Brian Sussman blows whistle on president's scheme The environmentalist movement isn’t about protecting the environment at all, according to meteorologist-turned-journalist Brian Sussman. It’s about destroying private property, controlling behavior, and expanding government – and the Obama administration has a secret plan to further all of it, he says. Sussman is now blowing the whistle on the real nature of environmentalism in his explosive brand-new book, “Eco-Tyranny.” He reveals secret memos from inside Obama’s Bureau of Land Management, or BLM, outlining a covert plan “to pursue a program of land consolidation” for the federal government to secure tens of millions...

Twenty years ago this Christmas day, Mikhail Gorbachev gave a speech announcing “I hereby discontinue my activities at the post of President of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics.” And with that, the totalitarian and murderous construct of the USSR, already uncoupled earlier that month by Russian President Boris Yeltsin and the presidents of Ukraine and Belarus, was no more. These were monumental events. Yet so tumultuous is the world right now that the 20th anniversary of the Soviet collapse is figuring as little more than a footnote in the news. In Russia itself, the events of the hour are...

ormer Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev has said Sunday's Russian parliamentary election was marred by fraud and has called for a re-run. "The country's leaders must admit there were numerous falsifications and rigging and the results do not reflect the people's will," he said. Protesters were planning new rallies for Saturday as arrests in Tuesday's crackdown in reached 800 across Russia. Key figures in the protest movement are starting 15-day jail sentences. State TV channels have ignored the protests, giving coverage only to rallies in support of the government. Disregard for public opinion is discrediting the authorities and destabilising the situation”...

It was 16 degrees warmer in my upstate New York town this morning than it was in the Dallas-Fort Worth area. If any further portent of the apocalypse is necessary, consider that on his MSNBC show this evening, uber-lib Cenk Uygur compared Barack Obama to Ronald Reagan . . . and clearly came down on the side of Ronaldus Maximus. The subject was Egypt. Uygur played the clip of Reagan's immortal "tear down this wall," and contrasted it with Obama's wan words on the need for "orderly transition" in Egypt. View video here.

Glenn Beck gave us homework to research the green guru Maurice Strong. So let's begin with the global commission he is chairing at The Earth Charter. Steven Rockefeller is representing the USA. I posted the full list of the commission members on my site

Op-Ed Contributor Moscow PERESTROIKA, the series of political and economic reforms I undertook in the Soviet Union in 1985, has been the subject of heated debate ever since. Today the controversy has taken on a new urgency — not just because of the 25th anniversary, but also because Russia is again facing the challenge of change. In moments like this, it is appropriate and necessary to look back. We introduced perestroika because our people and the country’s leaders understood that we could no longer continue as we had. The Soviet system, created on the precepts of socialism amid great efforts...

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...

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 DUmmies are in a dilemma. Who is the true savior? Obama or Gorbachev? What set this debate off is that website mocking George W. Bush by comparing him to a chimpanzee, SmirkingChimp.com. An article at The Smirking Chimp (meaning that Bush was like a chimpanzee) stated that Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev was smarter than Barack Obama because he accepted defeat in Afghanistan and brought Soviet troops home 20 years ago. This set off an Obasm vs Gorbasm debate in DUmmieland as you can see in this THREAD, "Gorby smarter than Obama: Soviet leader accepted defeat and brought his...

MOSCOW -- The past week's events in South Ossetia are bound to shock and pain anyone. Already, thousands of people have died, tens of thousands have been turned into refugees, and towns and villages lie in ruins. Nothing can justify this loss of life and destruction. It is a warning to all. The roots of this tragedy lie in the decision of Georgia's separatist leaders in 1991 to abolish South Ossetian autonomy. This turned out to be a time bomb for Georgia's territorial integrity. Each time successive Georgian leaders tried to impose their will by force -- both in South...

The weekly Wprost, (..), shows a politburo document, signed by Mikhail Gorbachev, which appears to warrant a KGB contract killing on John Paul II. So claims Polish journalist John O. Kohler in a book, also released tomorrow, Chodzi o papie¿a. Szpiedzy w watykanie - (About the Pope: Spies in the Vatican). The politburo document says: "Use all available possibilities to prevent a new political trend, initiated by the Polish pope." The document, which dates back to November 1979, - one year after Karol Wojtyla became pope - is signed by eight top Party officials including Konstantin Rusakov, who coordinated action...

Mikhail Gorbachev, the last Communist leader of the Soviet Union, has acknowledged his Christian faith for the first time, paying a surprise visit to pray at the tomb of St Francis of Assisi. Accompanied by his daughter Irina, Mr Gorbachev spent half an hour on his knees in silent prayer at the tomb. His arrival in Assisi was described as "spiritual perestroika" by La Stampa, the Italian newspaper. "St Francis is, for me, the alter Christus, the other Christ," said Mr Gorbachev. "His story fascinates me and has played a fundamental role in my life," he added. Mr Gorbachev's surprise...

The leader of the former Soviet Union, Mikhail Gorbachev, has founded a new political movement in Russia. Mr Gorbachev told the founding congress of the Union of Social-Democrats that its mission was to fight against "negative tendencies" and corruption. He said it supported President Vladimir Putin's efforts to reform Russia. The new movement will not take part in general elections in December, which are expected to be won by the United Russia party, backed by Mr Putin. "We are fighting for power, but only for power over people's minds," Mr Gorbachev told the 200 delegates gathered in Moscow. Among the...

One of the great scenes in history took place at Ronald Reagan's funeral in Washington, D.C.. Speaker after speaker praised Reagan's leadership in bringing about the end of both the Cold War and the Evil Empire of the Soviet Union. What made it really memorial was the presence in the audience of the leader of that very failed Evil Empire, Mikhail Gorbachev. What must he have been thinking at the time? Most likely he must have gone away from that funeral with a lot of resentment over the fact that he ended up the LOSER in the global conflict....