SAKER

Journalists, including those from other countries, were shown the new Russian military base in the Arctic for the first time. “Northern Clover” on Kotelny Island, it’s 300 miles from here to the mainland. One can get there only with a helicopter. There’s no internet or cell network there. Only polar bears and eternal frost around. It’s comfortable to serve there, though – a modern military base has been built for servicemen.While the above is a straightforward, and non-hostile reporting on the base, observe how the situation changes immediately when the same story is “reported” by a notorious disinformation outfit from the West, the American network CNN.

 ALL CAPTIONS AND PULL QUOTES BY THE EDITORS NOT THE AUTHORS Comment here or…

THE SAKER—There are roughly two camps vying for power inside the Kremlin: I call them the Atlantic Integrationists and the Eurasian Sovereignists. The former group is a pure product of the 1990s. We can think of them as “liberals”, IMF/Washington Consensus/WTO/WB types; folks who came to power thanks to the regime of oligarchs which ran Russia from about 1990 to 2000 and which was both deeply pro-American and which had extremely close ties to Israel and the various political Jewish and Zionist organizations in the West. The latter group is primarily a product of the armed forces and the security services. The “bridge” between the two is, by the way, the Russian military industrial complex in which both groups are represented.

STEPEHN LENDMAN—Western accusations of ballot-box stuffing and other irregularities are fake. International monitors said Sunday voting proceeded smoothly. According to Russia’s Central Election Commission (CEC), over 1,500 international monitors from 115 countries observed voting procedures – around 600 from OECD nations. The CEC instituted extra transparency-enhancing measures, including live video in every polling station – 97,027 nationwide to assure proper oversight and accountability. A CEC call center with hundreds of operators were on duty to respond rapidly to any irregularities.

THE SAKER—Switzerland is probably one of the comparatively most democratic countries out there, but mostly what we see is that western democracies are run by gangs of oligarchs and bureaucrats who have almost nothing in common with the people they are supposed to represent. As for the USA, for decades now every time the people voted for “A” they always got “non-A” as a result. It is almost comical.