Friday, May 11, 2012

The Council Has Spoken! This Week's Watchers Council Results


Alea iacta est! The Council has spoken, the votes are in, and the results are here for this week's Watcher's Council match up.

But before we get to that,I want to wish the mothers amongst you an absolutely wonderful Mother's Day.



Is there any bond like that of a child and their mother? If you're fortunate enough to still have yours around, ignore the hype, the obligatory greeting card frenzy.Take her out for a leisurely lunch, talk to her, write her a long letter or take time out for a phone call if you're not living in the same city, but most of all just spend time with her and let her know how important she is to you.

And if she's made the passage, spend some time remembering how special she was and let the friendly ghost of memory envelop you.

OK,OK...to business.



In a radio broadcast in 1939, Winston Churchill once famously said, "I cannot forecast to you the action of Russia. It is a riddle, wrapped in a mystery, inside an enigma; but perhaps there is a key. That key is Russian national interest."

This week's winner, Joshuapundit's Inside Vladimir Putin takes a look at unwrapping that enigma by analyzing a surprisingly candid editorial by Russia's leader Vladimir Putin and examining what he had to say in light of Russia's history and national psychology. Here's a slice:

Russian leader and presidential candidate Vladimir Putin has an interesting op-ed in RIA Novosti ( hat tip,long time Joshua's Army member Louie Louie) that illuminates a great deal of his thinking about foreign affairs and reveals a lot about how Russia sees America and the West. Entitled 'Russia and the Changing World', it's well worth looking at in some detail. I've emphasized some areas:

Russia is part of the greater world whether we are talking about the economy, the spread of information or the development of culture. We do not wish to and cannot isolate ourselves. We hope that our openness will lead to economic and cultural development in Russia while increasing levels of mutual trust, a resource that is in increasingly short supply today.

However, we intend to be consistent in proceeding from our own interests and goals rather than decisions dictated by someone else. Russia is only respected and has its interests considered when the country is strong and stands firmly on its own feet. Russia has generally enjoyed the privilege of conducting an independent foreign policy and this is what it will continue to do. In addition, I am convinced that global security can only be achieved through cooperation with Russia rather than by attempts to push it into the background, weaken its geopolitical position or compromise its defenses.

A constant theme in Russian history is the fear of isolation and encirclement by its enemies. This has been true since the time of the Mongol invasion of the 13th century, a catastrophic event that saw the early state of Rus lose most of its territory to the Mongols and to the Polish/Lithuanian kingdom. Subsequently, what was left of Russia had to pay tribute in slaves and treasure to the Tatars, the Muslim successors to the Mongols and fight off attempted invasions by the Swedes and the Teutonic Knights. The Russians were unable to evict the Mongols from their territory until the 15th century, and Russia's historic payment of tribute and later conflict with Muslim states is something that should be kept in mind.

Russia's northern latitude and climate has also been a source of isolation, with many of Russia's early ports freezing over for part of the year.


We had a tie this week in the non-Council category between two excellent pieces that which I, as Watcher had to break.

Daniel Greenfield aka Sultan Knish had a great piece in Frontpage Magazine entitled Forward with Obama, Mao and Lenin , submitted by The Noisy Room. It's an excellent examination of the Obama campaign's troubling new motto 'Forward' and a look at how it's been used before.

We also had Bill Jacobsen over at Le·gal In·sur·rec·tion with Cruel irony in Elizabeth Warren’s Cherokee saga submitted by The Glittering Eye. It seems that not only did Fake-a-hontas use her supposed 1/32 Cherokee background to aid her in getting affirmative actions points in her academic and professorial career, but irony of ironies, one of her ancestors was actually one of the men who forcibly 'escorted' the Cherokees off their ancestral lands to reservations in Oklahoma, something aptly referred to in history as 'The Trail of Tears.'

I thought about this one for awhile, but Bill's piece, showing up the bigotry of the left's racial bean counting and the shameful dishonesty of a woman who was billed not so long ago as the new class warfare poster girl of the Left ultimately won out with me.

Here are this week’s full results. Only New Zeal was unable to vote this week, but was not affected by the 2/3 vote penalty:

Council Winners



Non-Council Winners



See you next week! And don't forget to follow us on Facebook and Twitter..'cause we're cool like that!
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