MANUFACTURED OPPOSITION

BRUCE LERRO—Meanwhile, on the right, neo-conservatives had been furious with what they felt was Nixon and Kissinger’s appeasement of the Soviet Union. Most neoconservatives hated Hough’s comparative politics because it neutralized the Soviet Union, presenting it as a state like any other state, instead of the demonical monster that it was imagined as being. In his book The Origins of Soviet Autocracy British scholar, Leonard Schapiro argued that unlike Tucker’s claim, the origins of totalitarianism in Russia do not begin with Stalin, but with Lenin. Shapiro treated the Bolshevik seizure of power as a coup rather than a democratic revolution. He did not think that Trotsky or Bukharin offered any serious alternative. Challenging Shapiro, based on his political biography of Bukharin, Steven Cohen argued that Bolshevism had a far greater evolutionary possibility that could have  been realized had Bukharin rather than Trotsky  won the power struggle against Stalin after Lenin death, but whether one sided with Trotsky or Bukharin, Bolshevism and Stalinism were very different. The differences between Bukharin and Trotsky were minimal compared to their differences with Stalin.

ERIC ZUESSE—The next day, on February 21st, HuffPo led its Home Page with “Warren Goes After Bloomberg Again, Offers Contract To Release Women From NDAs”, and right below that lead story was “Elizabeth Warren Keeps Punching, Seeking To Supercharge Campaign”; and both were puff-pieces for her — and not Sanders — to win the nomination. The top story on the Home Page bannered “Warren Fires Up: Aims For Nev. Supercharge”. Nothing puffed Sanders, who, even at that time, swamped each one of his Democratic primary competitors in the Nevada primary polling.

GILAD ATZMON—The Jewish progressive activist basically insisted that any such criticism of Israel was ‘antisemitism.’ She was also naive to prematurely vindicate the Jewish State of involvement in the unlawful assassination: a crime that may lead to unpredictable and lethal consequences in the near future. Today’s news reports that Israel was deeply involved in the targeted assassination of the Iranian general. The Times of Israel ‘s headline this morning reads: “Israeli intel helped US carry out strike that killed Iran’s Soleimani.”

ANDREW KORYBKO—The article, “Protesters clash in Hong Kong as cycle of violence intensifies,” paints a sympathetic picture of the rioters who have tried to wreak havoc across the municipality over the past two months while ignoring the commendable restraint and patience of the law enforcement representatives tasked with keeping the peace.

A reader—Subhuti 2— takes NewsGuard on, taking them at their word. He puts some important questions to them. But no answers are forthcoming.