Category: News

We all want to land our dream job and have a career that interests us and that we love going into each day. The first step to this is your resume. So, here are 12 tips to improve it and set you up on the road to success.

1. Grab The Recruiter’s Attention

The first few sentences of your resume need to make a good impression on a potential recruiter. Use strong words, highlight the most relevant details or achievements, and think about which qualities need to be demonstrated in the industry you are interested in.

2. Write A Strong Summary

Your summary should be short and straight to the point. Explain how your unique skills, talents, and experiences will translate into the things the recruiter is looking for.

You can write a few sentences at the top of your resume, or use bullet points. This is where your most important qualifications should be highlighted.

3. Customize Your Resume

Don’t send out the same resume for every position you apply to. Take the time to customize your summary to address the skills the recruiter is likely to look for. You might also need to make a few changes to the rest of your resume, for instance to draw attention to a previous work experience that is particularly relevant to the position you are going after.

4. Use Keywords

Read the job description carefully and look for the keywords used by the recruiter. Some employers use software to automatically scan resumes for these keywords, while others will read resumes and expect to find these keywords. Using the same keywords as a potential employer shows you have the right skills for the job, and shows you’re speaking the employer’s language and will fit right in.

5. Skip The Objectives

Stating what your professional goals and objectives are is not relevant in most situations. Most professional resume writers suggest you use this space for other valuable information. Focus on showing employers what you can do for them, and talk about your objectives during the job interview if the recruiter asks questions.

6. Keep It Short

Your resume shouldn’t be more than two pages long. You will only need one page if you have limited work experience. Your list of relevant skills and the description of your most recent or most relevant positions should take up the most space on your resume.

7. Stand Out From The Rest

Don’t limit yourself to listing previous job responsibilities. Recruiters aren’t looking for job descriptions. They want to find out about the skills you developed thanks to previous work experiences and about your achievements. Tell recruiters how you excelled in your previous positions.

8. Use Numbers When You Can

If you can, add some numbers to show recruiters what kind of difference you made. Talk about sales numbers, conversion rates, or about how much money you helped a previous employer save.

9. References Are Available Upon Request

There is no need to list your references on your resume. Add a single line to let a recruiter know you can share this information if needed.

10. Your Personality Is Important

Your resume should give recruiters the impression that you are an interesting and dynamic person. There is no need to talk about personality traits, but look for ways to make your personality shine through when a recruiter looks at your resume. You could mention volunteer activities, or hobbies as long as they demonstrate that you possess certain skills.

11. Get Some Feedback

Have a friend look at your resume and ask for an honest opinion. Your friend might be able to spot mistakes you missed and will tell you whether or not they would consider calling you to schedule a job interview if they received this resume.

12. Don’t Forget To Proofread

Spelling and grammar mistakes won’t make a good impression on a potential employer. You might not notice mistakes until you go back to your resume later. You should also pay attention to the presentation. Make sure everything is consistent, properly aligned, and easy to read.

Romana Klee (CC)

David Miranda, the Brazilian man who had been working with The Guardian’s Glenn Greenwald, obtained a partial victory in British court. His property that had been seized by authorities cannot be searched, unless it is for the purpose of “national security.”

BBC News reports:

The High Court ruled the authorities could examine the seized material for the defence of national security and also to investigate whether Mr Miranda, 28, is a person who is or has been concerned with the commission, preparation or instigation of acts of terrorism.

Mr Miranda’s lawyers said he had had nine items, including his laptop, mobile phone, memory cards and DVDs, taken during the detention on Sunday.

They sought the injunction to prevent access to the data, arguing his detention was unlawful and threatened “journalistic sources whose confidential information is contained in the material seized”.

Speaking after the case, Gwendolen Morgan, from law firm Bindmans, said the injunction was a “partial victory”.

She said the government now has seven days to “prove there is a genuine threat to national security”.

Ms Morgan added she knew “very little” about the criminal investigation police revealed they were undertaking.

“We don’t know of any basis for that,” she added.

Miranda had been stopped presumably because of his association with Greenwald, and the Edward Snowden affair. It can be presumed that the British authorities had been hoping to find more Snowden documents before they were released to the public. In the wake of Miranda’s detainment, Guardian editors revealed that the British government had destroyed their hard drives. Given the nature of the information, and Snowden’s claims that the information will be released no matter what happens to him, it is unlikely that destroying hard drives or seizing property of journalists will put an end to the Snowden information releases. As for the Miranda situation, while his counsel is unaware of any reason the British government would have to prove that the is a danger to national security, time will tell what sort of case the Crown will manage to present in court.

Over the past decade, the U.S.-India defense relationship has become indispensable in promoting peace, prosperity and stability in the Asia Pacific and Indian Ocean region.

In fact, America’s oldest and largest geographic combatant command changed its name last year from U.S. Pacific Command to U.S. Indo-Pacific Command, specifically to highlight the importance of South Asia and the Indian Ocean region to its mission.

Indopacom’s commander, Navy Adm. Phil Davidson, is speaking this week in New Delhi at the Raisina Dialogue, a yearly forum that has emerged as India’s flagship conference on geopolitics and security. It includes global leaders in policy, business, media and civil society.

India and the U.S. have a lot of shared principals: both nations believe in sovereignty, free and fair trade, keeping to international standards and resolving disputes peacefully. In fact, India was designated a major U.S. defense partner in 2016.

So what does this major partnership look like?

Here are some of the long-term strategies that the U.S. and India are working on:

1) Military leaders pledged in June to broaden military-to-military engagements, including more maritime activities.
2) Both nations are committed to combating terrorism by strengthening intelligence and information sharing, screening for terrorists and monitoring their use of the internet.
3) Since 2008, the U.S. has provided anti-terrorism training for 1,200 Indian security personnel.
4) A group that’s been meeting since 2002 to discuss high-technology issues of mutual interest has worked to facilitate defense trade between U.S. and Indian businesses.
6) Under the India-U.S. Joint Strategic Vision – which affirms the two nations’ shared views for prosperity and stability in the region – they are working together to develop a roadmap leveraging efforts to improve security architecture and strengthen regional dialogues.

As India continues to position itself as a global power and security partner in the Indian Ocean region, defense officials said the U.S. and Indopacom will continue to make the country a priority partnership through cooperation, dialogue and trust.

Director Neil Burger’s heartfelt comedy about a recently paroled ex-convict (Kevin Hart) who strikes up an unusual and unlikely friendship with a paralyzed billionaire (Bryan Cranston).

 

by Jason Hopkins

U.S. crude oil and natural gas reserves reached record highs in 2017, blowing passed levels not seen in nearly half a century.

Proved reserves of U.S. crude oil reached 39.2 billion barrels at the end of 2017, surpassing the previous record of 39 billion barrels set in 1970, according to datareleased Thursday by the Energy Information Administration. At the same time last year, proved reserves of natural gas reached 464.3 trillion cubic feet, smashing the previous record of 388.8 trillion cubic feet set it 2014.

These reserve numbers denote how much oil and natural gas the government believes can be extracted from the ground. Technological innovation and oil price play a major role in how much reserves are estimated to be recoverable, and can fluctuate depending on these factors.

“Stronger oil and natural gas prices combined with continuing development of shales and low permeability formations drove producers of crude oil and natural gas in the United States to report new all-time record levels of proved reserves for both fuels in 2017,” the Energy Information Administration said. “The new record for natural gas extends a longer-term trend of development, mainly in shale plays in the Northeast. Both U.S. proved reserves of crude oil and natural gas are approximately double their levels from a decade ago.”

The news comes as the U.S. continues to set new energy records across the board.

U.S. oil production has more than doubled in the past eight years, largely thanks to the implementation of hydraulic fracturing and horizontal drilling. Output in the country increased enough to overtake Russia and Saudi Arabia as the world’s top oil producing nation earlier in 2018. Record-level output in the U.S. has repeatedly worried analysts with the the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), who will meet in December to discussthe U.S. shale boom and how to best respond.

The numbers are welcome news to President Donald Trump as he continues to embark on an ambitious energy agenda while unwinding a litanyof Obama-era regulations. The Republican had pledged during the 2016 campaign to restart the country’s energy sector and breathe life back into the coal industry — a sector that was heavily targeted by the previous administration.

Former President Barack Obama raised eyebrows on Tuesday night when he tried to take credit for the country’s oil and natural gas boom.

“You wouldn’t always know it but it went up every year I was president,” Obama said at an event hosted by Rice University’s Baker Institute. “That whole, suddenly America’s like the biggest oil producer and the biggest gas — that was me, people… say ‘thank you’ please.”

Lynyrd Skynyrd’s five-times platinum-certified collection, ‘Skynyrd’s Innyrds: Their Greatest Hits,’

Released in 1989, Lynyrd Skynyrd’s five-times platinum-certified collection, Skynyrd’s Innyrds: Their Greatest Hits, is reissued today by Geffen/UMe in new black vinyl LP and limited brown vinyl LP editions.

Purchase Skynyrd’s Innyrds: Their Greatest Hits on black vinyl and limited edition brown vinyl: https://lnk.to/SkynyrdPR

For the new LP releases, the album’s original 10-song vinyl tracklist is presented with faithfully replicated sleeve and label artwork. Skynyrd’s Innyrds is stacked with many of the legendary Rock and Roll Hall of Fame band’s biggest hits, including “Sweet Home Alabama,” “Gimme Three Steps,” “What’s Your Name,” “Saturday Night Special,” “Don’t Ask Me No Questions,” “That Smell,” and of course, “Free Bird” (Outtake Version).

Lynyrd Skynyrd:  Skynyrd’s Innyrds: Their Greatest Hits
Side A
1. Sweet Home Alabama
2. Swamp Music
3. Gimme Three Steps
4. Double Trouble (Outtake Version)
5. Free Bird (Outtake Version)
Side B
1. Saturday Night Special
2. What’s Your Name
3. That Smell
4. Don’t Ask Me No Questions
5. Call Me The Breeze

By Max Diamond, RealClearInvestigations

After Jessica Lynn Kanya attempted to sexually abuse a 14-year-old child, she was sentenced to 36 months in prison last March. But Lynn served none of that time behind bars when District of Columbia Superior Court Judge Hiram E. Puig-Lago decided to suspend her sentence.

Such leniency is common in Washington, D.C., RealClearInvestigations has found, because of the difficulty of making cases and the alternative to jail presented by the sex-offender registry. Since 2000, almost half of sex offenders convicted in the nation’s capital — the vast majority child-sex offenders — have had their sentences cut in half or suspended altogether. Judges do not comment on their rulings, but an analysis of the records of 364 D.C. offenders convicted since 2000 shows that such sentencing is a pervasive practice by more than a dozen judges, who are appointed and not elected.

Sentences are often suspended not just for crimes such as sexually touching a child, which carries jail time of 180 days. In dozens of cases, adult offenders facing years in prison received suspended sentences. The case files, in which the sex of the victims and other details are commonly withheld, include:

• Alfred Jerome Dockery, charged with sexually penetrating a 14-year-old, was sentenced to 42 months in prison. Judge Geoffrey M. Alprin suspended the entire sentence.
• Dominique Anthony Annice, in her early 30s at the time, charged with sexually abusing a 6-year-old. After being sentenced to 30 months in prison, Judge Robert E. Morin suspended her sentence.
• Melvin L. Cromer, who according to the charge “engaged in a sexual act” with a 14-year-old and was sentenced to 60 months in prison. Judge Erik P. Christian suspended his sentence.
• John Anthony, who according to the charge had anal sex with a 10-year-old girl, was initially charged with first-degree child sex abuse. After pleading guilty to a lower charge, he was sentenced to 60 months in prison. But Judge Wendell P. Gardner suspended almost the entire sentence, and Anthony only had to serve six months.

Although there is no national database recording the resolutions of alleged child-sex crimes, experts say Washington faces the same challenges in prosecuting such crimes as everywhere else. The reduced sentences reflect the difficulties and peculiarities of prosecuting crimes involving children and sex.

Unreliable Little Witnesses

These include the challenges of using children – notoriously unreliable as witnesses and prone to trauma – in prosecutions that often lack physical evidence. And, unlike most other offenses, the penalty for sex crimes cannot be measured just through the length of sentences. Almost always there is an additional sanction that can shadow offenders for life: placement on a jurisdiction’s sex offender registry.

James Marsh, a New York-based lawyer who specializes in representing child victims, said there is a tension in such cases “between re-traumatizing the victim through the criminal justice system and obtaining the strongest possible sentence against the perpetrator.”

Deborah Tuerkheimer, professor of law at Northwestern University and a former prosecutor in the Manhattan district attorney’s office, said a further complication is the relationship built up over time between child and adult. Sometimes the adult has threatened the child, and other times the adult has been good to the child.

“Sometimes the child will even cover up for the abuser,” said Tuerkheimer. “There are psychological reasons why sometimes the children ally themselves with the abuser. Those behaviors can be used against the child and undermine the child’s story.”

But even if a child can testify, that does not entirely solve a prosecutor’s problems, especially given the unlikelihood of there being much solid evidence, like DNA, said Marsh.

Sometimes the prosecution is able to get evidence such as text communications “that the offender might have with the victim, or images that they took of the victim that shows criminal activity,” said David Finkelhor, director of the Crimes Against Children Research Center and a sociologist at the University of New Hampshire. “But physical evidence is often not available.”

Given this difficulty, the prosecutor has to ask himself, “Can I win before a jury?” said Marsh. And, “If I can’t, what is the best I can get from this in terms of a sentence, plea deal, and long-term outcomes?”

Such complications help explain why sex crimes against children – like most crimes in the criminal justice system – are resolved by a plea deal rather than trial. The prosecutors cannot be sure of conviction, and the accused, even if they believe they are innocent or can win at trial, have a powerful incentive to make the case go away.

Prison or the Registry?

Except, of course, it doesn’t, which is the unique complication of such sex offenses: Even convicts with a suspended sentence get placed on a sex offender registry – sometimes for years, but often for life. The FBI lists 55 such registries encompassing the 50 states, the District of Columbia and U.S. territories. Their existence forces lawyers, judges, and activists in the criminal justice system to ask: How do we want to punish offenders — through prison or through the registry?

“If a prosecutor can get a plea bargain that places [the convict] on the sex offender registry, that is viewed as a good outcome,” said Marsh.

If a judge is looking at a first-time offender, and there has been testimony from a psychologist or psychiatrist that the accused not likely to re-offend, “a judge might say, ‘I’m not going to lock this person up,’” said G. Allen Dale, a criminal defense attorney in D.C. who has handled many sex offender cases.  “What purpose would that serve?”

But some criminal justice activists worry that while the registry can keep offenders out of prison, it is also a mark that prevents convicts from getting on with their lives.

It “makes it impossible for people to reintegrate. It’s like social banishment, social death,” said Emily Horowitz, professor of sociology and criminal justice at St. Francis College in Brooklyn Heights, N.Y.

“The registry publicly outs people,” she said. “Once your picture is up there, you can’t get most jobs, you can’t live a lot of places. You won’t get over whatever it is you did.”

Being a registered sex offender not only creates problems for the convict, but also for his or her family.

“If you have children of your own, it’s a nightmare,” said Dale. “Sometimes you have to have supervision of your own children.” Plus, an offender can’t own a firearm, regularly has to pass polygraph tests, has to clear vacation plans with local authorities, and has to get permission to move from a probation officer, said Dale.

“I’ve had clients whose kids have been picked on by other kids – ‘Your daddy’s a pervert,’” he noted.

But the registries are deeply entrenched because the public considers them necessary, legal experts say.

A Public Demand

“The policies exist because the public feels that it has a right to know, and they need to know” about offenders, said Andrew J. Harris, a professor in the school of criminology and justice studies at the University of Massachusetts, Lowell.

William Dobbs, a lawyer and criminal justice activist, attributes this attitude to the “can’t stop, won’t stop mythology” – the idea that such offenders are almost guaranteed to reoffend.

“The truth is the reoffense is among the lowest of any category of offenses,” he said.

Marsh disputes this, calling the claim “absurd.” He argues that studies showing low recidivism rates among sex offenders are due to the fact that “it is a crime that is underreported.”

As for the 10 percent of offenders who officially do tend to reoffend, “there’s very little evidence to suggest the sex offender registry reduces recidivism,” said forensic psychologist Liam Ennis.

Finkelhor, on the other hand, notes that sex offenses have declined 60 to 70 percent since the registries were introduced in 1992.

The registry is just one of the many factors — along with the difficulties of child witnesses and scant evidence — that judges and prosecutors have to weigh in such complicated and incendiary cases.

Judges are “typically very concerned about protecting the rights of the accused” in an atmosphere that often demonizes them, said Finkelhor. Striking the right balance is not easy.

“Judges across the board are very worried about being maligned in the public eye as being soft on crime,” said Horowitz. “There’s always so much blowback when the media runs with a story about someone getting a light sentence for anything – but anything with sex is like radioactive, and child sex is radioactive times 10.”

Indian technology firm Infosys Ltd said Tuesday that it will hire 10,000 American tech workers over the next two years, following Trump’s order to review the H1-B visa program.

The hiring change comes as Infosys came under fire for abusing the H1-B visa program to bring in cheaper foreign tech workers instead of hiring locally. President Trump blasted the practice saying that there had been “widespread abuse” and signed an executive order in April seeking to overhaul work visa programs that favor foreign workers.

Infosys employs 200,000 people globally and will expand U.S. hiring by 10,000 over the next two years. The company will also be building four research hubs in the United States with the first to be completed by August in Indiana. The Indiana facility will create an estimated 2,000 jobs for American workers by 2021.

“In the fast-changing world of today, we need the ability to be local. We need to be trusted by our customers as being local,” Chief Executive Officer Vishal Sikka said in an interview. “To work with a mix of global and local talent is absolutely the right thing to do.”

The review of the visa program falls in line with President Trump’s ‘Hire American’ strategy that seeks to increase jobs in manufacturing, mining, and technology.

The Justice Department recently warned employers applying for the to consider U.S. workers first, while the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services issued a memo laying out new measures to combat “fraud and abuse.”

By Joseph Hammond

Sgt. Tara-Lyn Baker is the first woman to become part of the frozen few.

Over six grueling weeks, Sgt. Baker demonstrated a range of combat skills in snow and ice to complete the winter mountain leaders course at the Marine Corps Mountain Warfare Training Center near Bridgeport, California.

A video published by the U.S. Marine Corp Times shows the 150 pound Marine executing maneuvers and training exercises. These include carrying a 60 to 90-pound backpack while skiing up steep mountains carrying heavy packs, shooting with deadly accuracy in the snow. Only the most “gung-ho” Marines are up to the challenge.

During the course Marines learn how to fight, survive, and maneuver in sub-zero temperatures and is one of the most physically demanding training programs in the U.S. military. Military operations in mountainous areas add the challenge of verticality.

Like some of her fellow Marines, Baker said suffered from frostbite and hypothermia. “We learn how to overcome it,” she said.

Baker came to the school – located  6,800 feet above sea level – as a Marine Mechanic.

In the video, Baker says she’s proud of her accomplishment.

The Marines is the last branch of the U.S. armed services that still enforces gender segregation in boot camp but, in January an integrated a Marine training battalion was formed of one male and five male platoons for the first time.

Lt. Marina Hierl, 24, became the first female Marine to lead a platoon last year after becoming the first woman to complete the Marines’ 13-week Infantry Officer Course in 2017.

The Marine Corps Mountain Warfare Training Center is located at a higher elevation than Camp Ethan Allen Training Site used by the U.S. Army (1,200 feet elevation) or US Navy Mountain Warfare Training Camp Michael Monsoor (3,500 feet elevation). Though at all centers actual training operations are often conducted in the surrounding areas. Specialized American soldiers also attend similar programs in allied countries.

The facility was opened in 1951 to train U.S. soldiers for the Korean War. During the Cold War, the facility was used to train soldiers to protect Norway and the rest of NATO’s Northern Flank. The facility had taken on increased importance since September 11, 2001, when it was used in pre-deployment training for U.S. soldiers involved in Operation Enduring Freedom in mountainous Afghanistan.

In one training scenario often used by the Marines, the trainee is meant to jump with their skis, poles and a give gallon pack into a hole cut into a frozen lake.

“When you jump in, you lose your breath, you kind of lose your head,” said Sgt Aaron Jensen, a student of the school in a 2015 interview.

The Marine has to throw the pack out of the water and swim to the edge. Once there, the Marine must verbally request permission to get out of the water.

Then the training kicks in – participants roll in powdered snow to get the water off their clothes before a final sprint to warming tents to change and dry themselves.

“You learn how to survive, you learn how to deal with the cold,” Baker said in a video posted on the service’s Twitter.

Photo Cred: A version of this photo was posted by the U.S. Marine Corp Twitter account here https://twitter.com/USMC/status/1084253698186854400

The Washington Compost (not exactly a bastion of conservatism) has just published an utterly ridiculous screed by former State Dept. official and historical revisionist Jack Matlock Jr. Therein, Matlock blames the current crisis in the Crimea, and Russia’s entire hostility towards the United States, solely on America, falsely claiming that Moscow is hostile solely because “the United States has insisted  on treating Russia as the loser” since the Cold War’s end. Matlock falsely claims that since 1991, Russia has time and again tried to be a cooperative partner, only to receive “swift kicks to the groin” from the US.

(Only a congenital liar would make such claims.)

And like other liberals, Matlock also claims the US did not really win the Cold War or cause the USSR’s collapse. Furthermore, he claims in his book that Ronald Reagan’s sole (and secondary) contribution to ending the Cold War was supposedly abandoning the hawkish policies of his first term.

I will refute these other lies later. But first, I will utterly refute Matlock’s lies about the source of Russian hostility and about Moscow supposedly trying to be a cooperative partner.

Matlock: Blame America First

Matlock blames Moscow’s hostility solely on the US, claiming that the US invited it by bombing Serbia without UN Security Council Approval in 1999, invading Iraq without UNSC approval in 2003, withdrawing from the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty in 2001, expanding NATO to include Poland, the Czech Republic, Hungary, the Baltic Republics, Romania, and Bulgaria; with supposed “plans” for US bases in the Baltics and the Balkans; by somehow “supporting” the democratic revolutions in Ukraine and Georgia; and by passing the Magnitsky Act, designed to punish Russian officials who violate human rights.

Matlock is essentially saying, “Russia under Boris Yeltsin and Vladimir Putin tried to be a good partner and to follow a pro-Western orientation, but we alienated it with our aggressive actions.”

That is absolutely false, just like the rest of Matlock’s anti-American screed, and it comes straight from Moscow’s and its liberal American sycophants’ propaganda playbook. Matlock is merely repeating the same old anti-American lies for the umpteenth time.

Russia Has No Legitimate Grievances Towards The West

So let’s look at the issues he claims invited Russian hostility:

• Serbia: in 1999, that country’s then-dictator, Slobodan Milosevic, was murdering thousands and thousands of innocent, defenseless civilians in Kosovo (where over 80% of the population is Kosovan, not Serbian) for nothing but the fact that they were Kosovan – just like the Germans murdered 6 million Jews for the mere fact they were Jews. We were witnessing a repeat of the Holocaust in Europe (albeit on a much smaller scale). The US was ABSOLUTELY RIGHT to act to stop this, and it was supported in this by ALL of NATO and the entire civilized world (to which Russia does not belong). Milosevic was a war criminal wanted by a UN tribunal in the Hague, was eventually handed over to it after losing power, and was tried for war crimes. The fact that Russia supported such a bloody war criminal only shows what an immoral country it is. As for “UN Security Council approval”, apparently Mr Matlock believes that the US should not act anywhere in the world unless it receives permission from that august council… where his beloved Russia, of course, is a veto-wielding member.
• Iraq: say what you want about the wisdom of invading Iraq, but any claim that that invasion somehow threatened Russia’s interests in the Middle East is utterly preposterous. What Russian interests did it threaten? None. It actually undermined US interests as it replaced a Sunni dictator with a Shia, pro-Iranian government.
• The Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty: I guess Mr Matlock would’ve preferred for the US to forever remain vulnerable to even the smallest ballistic missile attack and for the US never to develop adequate defenses against such an attack… because that’s exactly what the ABM treaty prohibited. A treaty, by the way, signed with the USSR – a country that no longer existed by 2001. Considering how fast (despite all arms reduction treaties signed to date) ballistic missiles and nuclear weapons are proliferating (thus making a total mockery and failure of those treaties), the decision to withdraw from the ABM treaty was absolutely right. And it had no real impact on Washington-Moscow relations. Might I add that Russia – while strongly opposing America’s efforts to build ballistic missile defense systems – is quietly building such systems of its own?
• NATO expansion: to say that this threatened Russia’s security is also a blatant lie. None of NATO’s new members (except Poland and the Baltics) even have a border with Russia; and all of them had and still have very good reasons to fear Russian subjugation and aggression. They spent half a century under the Soviet yoke; in the 1990s, Russia still tried to meddle in their affairs; and now Moscow is threatening them again. It was morally and strategically right to bring them under NATO’s defense umbrella. Moscow has something to fear from their accession to NATO ONLY if it intends to attack them. Moreover, the post-1991 NATO entrants (especially Poland and the Czech Republic) have proven to be among the staunchest allies America has anywhere in the world, participating heavily in operations in Iraq and Afghanistan (Poland sent thousands of troops to both countries). What’s more, Poland is one of the few NATO countries that spend the agreed benchmark of at least 2% of GDP on defense and has more mechanized Army brigades than the UK, France, and Germany combined. Romania and Bulgaria have access to the Black Sea and have recently held exercises with the USN. Such allies are worth having.
• The early 2000s’ revolutions in Ukraine and Georgia saw utterly corrupt and criminal pro-Russian dictators (and in Ukraine, President Kuchma’s hand-picked successor Viktor Yanukovych) ousted by their people. Contrary to Matlock’s lies, the US did not extend anything but rhetorical support for those revolutions.
• The Magnitsky Act: contrary to Matlock’s lies, the US did not single out Russia with this Act as the worst human rights abuser in the world. But Moscow is one of the world’s most egregious human rights violators, and this act, named by a whistleblower murdered in prison by Putin’s prison guards, instituted targeted sanctions against Russian officials who violate human rights.

So all of Matlock’s excuses for Russia’s hostility have been utterly refuted, one by one. They’ve collapsed like a deck of cards.

And so will, in a minute, Matlock’s myth that Russia has tried to be a cooperative partner whom the US has needlessly antagonized. In fact, since Vladimir Putin’s ascension to power, Russia has been increasingly arrogant and hostile towards the US and the West as its power has grown since the nadir of the 1990s. It has started a new Cold War against the West and is the biggest threat to US, European, and world security.

Russia Is Behaving Aggressively In Cold-War Style

In recent years, Russia has:

1. Repeatedly flown nuclear-armed strategic borders into US, allied (Japanese), and even neutral (Swedish) airspace and said the Russian Air Force was “practicing attacking the enemy.” What on Earth have SWEDEN and JAPAN done to Russia? For that matter, what has America done to Russia? Nothing.
2. Repeatedly (on 15 separate occassions) threatened to aim or even use its nuclear weapons against the US and its allies.
3. Invaded two sovereign countries that dared to try to break out of Moscow’s sphere of influence and align themselves with the West (Georgia and Ukraine) and continues to occupy both countries.
4. Repeatedly violated several arms reduction treaties, including the Conventional Forces in Europe Treaty and the INF Treaty, the latter being violated by Russia by repeatedly testing and deploying nuclear-armed missiles banned by that treaty.
5. Deployed nuclear-armed ballistic missiles in the Kaliningrad District, next to Poland, threatening that loyal ally of the US, while the US has no nuclear weapons anywhere in Eastern Europe.
6. Backed America’s enemies around the world – North Korea, Iran, Syria, Venezuela, Cuba – to the hilt, with diplomatic protection at the UN Security Council, weapons (including the advanced S-300VM air defense system), nuclear fuel (Iran), and nuclear reactors (Iran), thus also threatening the existence of Israel.
7. Stationed a spy ship, the Viktor Leonov, in Cuba (it’s still there).
8. Conducted, and continues to conduct, a wave of hateful anti-American propaganda in domestic and foreign (e.g. RussiaToday) media.
9. Sent an Akula-class nuclear-armed submarine close to the US submarine base in King’s Bay, GA.
10. Domestically, assassinated high-profile dissidents (Anna Politkovskaya, Alexander Litvinenko) and jailed hundreds of others.
11. Just recently, began negotiations with Cuba, Nicaragua, and Venezuela on opening bases for Russian ships and nuclear-armed bombers there.

Yet the US is somehow to blame for Russia’s actions? For Moscow’s hostility? Who is threatening whom with nuclear weapons, Mr Matlock? Who is flying nuclear-armed bombers close and sometimes into US, Japanese, and Swedish airspace? Who is stationing spy ships close to the other party’s shores? Who is now reopening naval and bomber bases on the other party’s doorstep?

Are you a paid pro-Kremlin propagandist, Mr Matlock? Or are you just on drugs?

Matlock also falsely claims that the current West-Russia spat we’re witnessing now is not a new Cold War but the result of “misunderstandings, misinterpretations, and posturing to domestic political audiences” – as if Russia’s ultra-aggressive behavior against the US, its allies, and even neutral countries like Sweden was the product of mere “misunderstading.”

He’s completely wrong. Russia’s behavior is the result of resurgent, renewed Russian imperialism, of the Kremlin’s imperial ambitions, and of the hatred of the West which Vladimir Putin and his fellow KGB thugs imbued when trained by the KGB.

We didn’t see that behavior in Putin’s first years because at that time Russia was still too weak to try such actions. But as Russia began to rebound militarily and economically under Putin, it also began to be increasingly aggressive towards the West and towards Moscow’s former Warsaw Pact vassals.

Matlock also falsely claims that Russia has cooperated with the US on Afghanistan, Syria, Iran, and North Korea.

This is also false. Moscow has backed, and continues to back, Syria, Iran, and North Korea to the hilt, affording them diplomatic protection at the UNSC, weapons (except North Korea, at least so far), and, in Iran’s case, nuclear reactors and nuclear fuel – which Iran will use to produce nuclear weapons.

Moscow has absolutely opposed any but the weakest sanctions against Iran, and continues to back the genocidal, anti-American dictator Bashar al-Assad.

Matlock also falsely claims the New START treaty was a significant achievement, but the converse is true: New START was an utter failure and a treasonous treaty. It requires unilateral disarmament on America’s part: only the US required by the treaty to cut its nuclear arsenal, while Russia is allowed to increase its own. Even worse, the treaty doesn’t count Russia’s 171 Tu-22M strategic bombers as such, contains a pathetically weak Potemkin-like verification regime, and imposes restrictions on US missile defenses.

As Congressman Trent Franks (R-AZ) has rightly said, the US should immediately withdraw from that treaty.

Finally, I will refute Matlock’s also utterly false claim that the US didn’t win the Cold War or cause the collapse of the USSR.

The fact is the US did both, no matter how hard Matlock and other revisionists try to deny it.

The Soviet Union lost the Cold War, and collapsed in 1991, because of the fatal blows Ronald Reagan dealt to it. In his eight years, President Reagan:

• Dramatically increased US defense spending, to levels not seen in real terms before or since, and US defense programs to a pace the Soviet Union could not keep up with.
• Began the development of a missile defense system the USSR could never match.
• Convinced Saudi Arabia to increase oil output dramatically, thus cutting oil prices from $30/bbl to $12/bbl in 5 months, and thus dealing a fatal blow to Moscow’s oil-revenue -dependent economy.
• Instituted a bevy of sanctions on the USSR, including an embargo on drilling, pumping, and construction equipment, and successfully pressured West Germany to reduce the planned Yamal Pipeline from 2 lines to one, and to delay that project by many years (as a result, it wasn’t completed until 1999).
• Supported anti-Soviet proxies around the world, most notably in Afghanistan, where they defeated the Soviet Army in a war that cost Moscow hundreds of billions of dollars (if only the US had learned from Moscow’s mistakes and had not gotten mired in that country!).
• Deployed Pershing and GLCM missiles in Europe to counter the USSR’s deployment of SS-20s.
• Successfully used the tons of secret Warsaw Pact documents stolen by Col. Ryszard Kuklinski as leverage in negotiations with the Soviets.

These are the fatal blows that brought the Soviets back to the bargaining table, forced them to make major concessions, and eventually caused the Soviet Union’s collapse, as the USSR was unable to continue the Afghan War, the arms race, or counter US missile defense development with its sclerotic, stagnant economy, especially not after the Reagan-induced late 1980s oil glut. And not with the Yamal Pipeline delayed.

As Professor Robert G. Kaufman has rightly written, “the Cold War ended on Reagan’s terms, not Gorbachev’s.”

Matlock is wrong on all counts. All of his claims are utterly false. Not one of them is correct – not even one. Russia has NO legitimate grievances towards the West, it has never been a truly cooperative partner in the last 25 years, and its hostility is due to the revival of imperialist ideology and ambitions in Russian political circles (greatly enabled by KGB thug Vladimir Putin’s ascent to power). Russia is now waging a new Cold War on the West. How the West, led by the US, will respond to this challenge, remains to be seen.