CORE ARTICLES

• Welcome to Da Russophile
• Reading Russia Right - My second post on this blog, and still as relevant as ever.
• Towards a New Russian Century? - First foray into futurism.
• Kremlin Dreams Sometimes Come True - Stagnation isn’t the future.
• Top 50 Russophobe Myths - A huge set of arguments against the anti-Russian consensus in the West (disclaimer: while I don’t fully agree with many of them, it would be a good exercise for the Kremlinologists to try to refute them). See original version with 10 myths.
• Responses to Common Russophobe “Arguments” - identifies some common red herrings and strawmen used by Russophobes to attack their opponents.
• Why Russians like Putin’s Russia
• Rosstat and Levada are Russophobia’s Bane - Why the data from Russia’s statistics service and opinion polls overturn practically every Kremlinologist canard about “repressive”, “declining” Russia. See The Kremlinologist Catechism for summary.
• The 5 Types of Russian American - Somewhat un-PC but true.
• Da Russophile Is Now Five Years Old

Proud KGB Spy (Putin)

•  In which I criticize Vladimir Putin - That is, praise by faint critiques.
• But Always, A Hero Comes Home
• Translation: Sergey Lukyanenko – I Will Vote For Putin - Russia’s bestselling sci-fi writer explains why he likes Putin.
• Hipsters And Democratic Journalists Might Not Support Putin, But The Middle Class Does

The Authoritarian Model (Democracy, Politics)

• Translation: Russia’s Phantom Tandem, Real Triumvirate and the Kremlin Clan Wars - Vladimir Pribylovsky on who’s who in the Kremlin and my own thoughts on the limits of “clan war” analysis. See Visualizing The Kremlin Clans constructed on basis of that.
• Are Russian Elections Rigged?: Opinion Polls Speak Louder Than Western Rhetoric - They actually are, somewhat, but you can’t tell that from opinion polls.
• Unraveling The Tandem Switch
• BRIC’s of Stability: Why Occupy Wall Street Isn’t Coming To Moscow Or Beijing
• Kremlin Oligarch Brutally Censors Long-Suffering Russian Media (From Printing Gratuitous Profanities)
• Measuring Churov’s Beard: The Mathematics Of Russian Election Fraud – By far the most comprehensive roundup of statistical evidence of electoral fraud in the 2011 Russian elections in the English language.
• List Of Estimates On Fraud In Russia’s 2011 Duma Elections - United Russia got about 7-9% more than it should have.
• The Provincialization Of Russian Electoral Fraud
• Why Golos’ Own Figures Support Only 3%-6% Fraud
• Quiz: Did This Happen In Russia Or A Democratic Country?
• Why Statistics Only Support 3%-6% Fraud
• List Of Estimates On Fraud In Russia’s 2012 Presidential Elections - Putin got 4-5% more than he should have.
• Seven Myths About The Russian Elections - As argued by Evgeny Minchenko.
• Russian Journalists Are Far Safer Than Mexican Journalists, Ordinary Russians, And Their Own Counterparts Under Yeltsin - Statistical analysis that demonstrates that Russian journalists are in fact much safer than their counterparts in a variety of acknowledged “democracies” like Mexico, Brazil, and India – not to mention their own tribe in the 1990′s.
• The Anti-Clan Revolution
• Natalia Zubarevich – The Four Russias - Sociological analysis of Russia and why Putin’s support will decline.

Dying Bear (Demography)

• Demography III – Faces of the Future - Demographic model on Russia’s future population trajectory. See part 1, part 2.
• Myth of the Russian AIDS Apocalypse - Russia won’t be overrun by AIDS.
• Myth of the Yellow Peril - Siberia won’t be overrun by Chinese.
• Rite of Spring: Russia Fertility Trends
• Through the Looking Glass at Russia’s Demography - Short summary of why Russia’s demographic “crisis” isn’t as bad as it’s cracked up to be.
• Russia’s “Abortion Apocalypse”: А был ли мальчик?
• Crisis Demography in Eurasia
• Ten Myths about Russia’s Demography - why Russia is unlikely to see significant population decline in the foreseeable future. See summary.
  
• Russia’s Brain Drain Abates, Just As Western Media Starts Hyping It
• Nikolai Starikov – How Russian Liberals Create Russophobe Myths - How the media created the trope that everyone wants to flee Russia.
• Maksim Schweiz – It’s Time To Shove Off To Belarus!
• Russia Demographic Update VII - On the various models and how my predictions have been vindicated.
• Translation: Sergey Zhuravlev – The Reversal Of The “Russian Cross”
• Russia’s Demography Continues To Improve Rapidly In First 3 Months Of 2012
• Was Russia In A Demographic Apocalypse In The First Place? - I compare Russia’s post-Soviet demographic trajectory to those of other CEE countries and find that it actually did relatively well.
• Russia’s Demography Continues To Exceed Even *My* Most Optimistic Predictions
• Major Misconceptions About The Dima Yakovlev Law - Clearing up the media BS over Russia’s orphans.
• The Russian Cross Becomes A Hexagon – Natural population growth in 2012, more or less.

Potemkin Russia (Economy)

• Russia Economic Crisis III - In retrospect was very wrong here.
• Reconsidering Parshev
• The Transition 20 Years On: The Reckoning - Belarus did surprisingly well!
• Why Russia is cemented to the Other BRICs - Why Russia’s economic prospects are more than bright enough to place it in the same group as China, India and Brazil. See similar.
• Russia Burning: Not Apocalypse, but its Prelude
• Russia’s Economic “Stagnation” In Global Perspective - 4% annual GDP growth for a country of Russia’s income level is actually pretty good!
• More Russians Vacationing Abroad
• Russian Wages Are Fast Converging To Western Levels - As measured by McWages.
• Russia Overtaking USSR, Converging With West, On Food, Housing Consumption - Let the stats do the talking.
• Russia Is Now An Internet Society - Passing the 50% barrier.

Mafia State (Corruption)

• The Red Slope to Caviar Road
• Corruption Realities Index 2010 - An alternative to the subjective and unreliable CPI from Transparency International.
• How NOT To Be A Whistleblower In Russia: The Case Of Yevgeny Starshov
• Names Of The Oligarchs On A Map Of The Motherland*
• Chinese Netizens Praise Russian Democracy, Accountability
• Russia’s Budget Is Getting More Transparent - It’s more open than that of Poland, Georgia, and Germany.

Democratic Journalists (Kompromat)

• A Gem (or rather, a Ring) from Lucas - The Economist’s Russia hand compares Putin to Sauron.
• Grenade Fishing on the Potomac, Or: The Idiocy of George F. Will
• Translation: Ksenia Larina – Radio Liberty, The Liberty of Mendacity
• Russophobe Hack Exposed, or: The Misadventures of Dorothée Olliéric of France-2
• Paul Goble, Promethean Propagandist - Uncovering possibly the most deceitful Russia “analyst” writing today.
• Guardian Censorship: Some Comments Are Freer Than Others
• Edward McMillan-Scott, Lord Of Western Tropes On Russia
• United Russia Steals Votes, And The WSJ Steals Others’ Work
• Far More People Protested FOR Putin Than Against, But You Wouldn’t Know It From The Western Media
• The World’s Sleaziest Magazine On Putin’s Election Victory
• Peter Savodnik: Portrait Of A Democratic Journalist
• Blast From The Past: What Andrew Miller Predicted About Russia In 2000
• The World’s Sleaziest Magazine Plumbs New Lows
• Alex Dryden, A Hack’s Hack
• Is Luke Harding Taking A Leaf From Figes?
• Blast From The Past: What Jim Rogers Said About Russia In 2003
• So Apparently Germany Is A Christian Theocracy (Michael Bohm)
• Triumphs Of Kremlinology (Michael McFaul and Kathryn Stoner-Weiss)
• Konstantin von Eggert: A Case Study In Democratic Journalism (part 1) - And see also part 2, part 3, part 4.
• The Guardian On China And Russia
• So Who’s The New Clown At The Economist’s Russia Desk?
• Andrew Ryvkin’s Strange Ideas About The Russian Economy
• The Guardian Censors You Even If You Don’t Overtly Disagree With Them - What the Guardian considers dangerous.
• Liberal Butthurt Over The Depardieu Defection

Hero Dissidents (Liberal Opposition)

• Comrade Kasparov – Charlatan or Bolshevik?
• Translation: Tatyana Korchevnaya – On Liberal Web Brigades - Disillusioned Russian liberal reveals how her comrades used oppressive “web brigade” tactics to quench pro-Kremlin voices (even as they accused the Kremlin of doing it to them).
• Translation: On Liberasts and Liberasty
• The Boris Bombshell. Two Years Later. Still a Dud. - Boris Nemtsov’s lies on Russian demography.
• Boris Berezovsky: Godfather of Strategy-31 Abroad? - How Sidelnikov and Goldfarb are plotting in London.
• And The Wheel Spins On
• Prokhorov, President Of Londongrad
• Liberals Can’t Be Appeased - An eternal constant.
• Boris Releases His Eighth (?) Dud

Neo-Soviet Revanchism (Foreign Policy)

• The Western Media, Craven Shills for their Neocon Masters - How the Western media systemically lied about Russia invading Georgia.
• Twitter Terror: Unraveling the Unrest in Moldova
• The People’s Choice, or how Ukrainians are learning to stop worrying and love Eurasia
• Russia isn’t hated by (most of) its neighbors - Going by opinion polls.
• Why Russia And China Won’t Fight - Necessary reading for all the Bear vs. Dragon fantasists.
• A Response To Vadim Nikitin’s Arguments For The “Liberation” Of Khodorkovsky And The Kuriles
• The Russophobes Were Right… (About The Wrong Country)
• Potemkin Georgia: Exposing The Lies Of The Saakashvili PR Machine -
• Jaan Kaplinski – From Confrontation To Reconciliation - One of the best and most balanced accounts of Russia-Estonian relations.
• Edward Lozansky – America Hates A Russia Of Its Own Invention
• Quick Impressions On Ukraine Elections 2012

Stalin Worship (History)

• Victory Day Special: The Poisonous Myths of the Eastern Front - explains how popular views of the Eastern Front are dominated by the memoirs of self-serving former Wehrmacht officers, who glossed over German war crimes and wrongly attributed the Red Army’s victories to its manpower superiority.
• Translation: The Case of the “Stalinist” Textbook - many commented on the infamous chapter from Filippov’s textbook that apparently “glorifies” Stalinism. Only I bothered translating it so that you can make your own judgments. See summary.
• Manipulating Russia’s Manipulation of History
• The Nazi-Soviet Pact as Second Munich
• Reconciling Stalin with Victory - explains why Russians have ambiguous feelings towards Stalin on the basis of their wartime experience.

Vicious Repressions (Litvinenko, Khodorkovsky, etc)

• Lying Liars and their Lies
• Trolling The Liberasts About Khodorkovsky
• Exercises in Banality: The Moral Preening By Khodorkovsky Apologists
  
• Given Free Publicity On NTV, Khodorkovsky Only Incriminates Himself Further
• Is Khodorkovsky A Political Prisoner? Read The ECHR Judgments Before Quacking - So he was guilty.
• The Guardian’s Pussy Worship
• It’s A Culture War, Stupid

Whataboutism (International Comparisons)

•  The End of Western Freedom (and why Russians should ignore their hypocritical lectures)
  
• Wikileaks As A Mirror On The West - The persecution of Assange and what it says about the Western commitment to human rights.
• National Comparisons – Systematic comparison of life, media, politics, and traditions in Russia, Britain, and the US.

The Russian Slave Soul (Semi-Mystical Musings)

• Putvedev is Russia’s White Rider
• Categorizing the Russia Debate - Dated but of historical interest.
• Russia’s Sisyphean Loop - My huge essay on a “unified theory” of Russian history drawing on geography, cultural traditions, imperial cycles and belief dynamics. See a defense of the theory.
  
• The Struggle between Europe and Mankind - An exposition of Nikolai Trubetzkoy’s 1920 essay Europe and Mankind, in which he argues that the notion of European supremacy is born of a misguided egocentricity.

Kremlin Mole (“Russophobe” Posts)

• Russia’s Bizarre Preoccupation With The Idea Of The “National Idea”
• A Genuine Case Of Miscarried Justice
• Translation: A Hell Of Their Own Making - Perhaps my biggest complaint about Russians, right up there with their kowtowing to the West.

Index Librorum Prohibitorum (Book Reviews)

• “The Prodigal Superpower” (Steven Rosefielde) - 4/5.
  
• “Behind the Urals” (John Scott) - 5/5.
• “Moscow War Diary” (Alexander Werth) - 4/5.
• “Death of An Empire: The Byzantine Lesson” (Tikhon Shevkunov) - This is a documentary.

Kremlin Trolls (Interviews)

• My Interview at Siberian Light - my first interview.
• The Russia Watchers In Their Own Words…
• Interview with Kevin Rothrock (A Good Treaty)
• Interview with Peter Lavelle (Russia Today)
• Interview with Craig Willy (Letters from Europe)
• In Which La Russophobe Interviews The Russophile Sociopath Blogging At Sublime Oblivion - Possibly the most entertaining creation in the history of Russia watching: “This is like matter and antimatter coming together.”
• Interview with Mark Chapman (The Kremlin Stooge)

Russophile Cabal (US-Russia.org Expert Panels)

• Should The US Fight A New Cold War With Russia, Or Cooperate With Russia To Integrate The Gap?
• In Which I Become A Liberast: Criticism Of Russia’s Expulsion Of USAID
• What Happened In Georgia Was An Oligarchic Coup
• Putin’s Birthday, Birth Of A Legacy
• The Flight From Reason – The West’s Cold War Against Russia
• Obama, Romney, And The Reset
• A Chess Game To The Death

Voice of Propaganda (My Russia Journalism)

• I Appear on Al-Jazeera
• The Kremlinologist Catechism (Russian Life) – Summary of how Rosstat and Levada disprove multiple Russophobe claims.
• My Article On The Russian Elections At Al Jazeera - There were falsifications, including major ones in Moscow.
• Al Jazeera On Elections And White Ribbons
• My (Second) Article On The Russian Elections At Al Jazeera - Protests aren’t going to amount to much and Putin’s win was legitimate enough.
• My Piece On Pussy Riot At Al Jazeera - They’d have probably been imprisoned in Germany too.

Active Measures (Real Life Events)

• A Meeting With A Demographer
  
• The World Russia Forum 2012: How To Counter Media Bias Against Russia?
• Books I Will Be (re-)Reading While Writing My Own

Other Flotsam and Jetsam

• Russia’s Sex Traditions
• A Short Guide to the Top 10 Russia Blogs
• Whiskey Trickles Into Russia’s Drinking Culture - How a niche market is developing around whiskey in Russia.
• Sex, Scandal, And The Russian Opposition