Vladimir Golstein

Vladimir Golstein26.01.2026

There is a great Soviet joke about Americans mocking Russia’s lack of freedom of speech. See, says, American. I can stand in front of the White House and scream, down with Reagan, and nothing will happen to me. Big deal, says Russian. I can stand in front of the Kremlin, scream “down with Reagan” and […]

Vladimir Golstein13.01.2026

Long time ago I formulated a principle that I still follow: the opposite of crap, is not necessarily a candy, but most likely, a stinking crap, or total crap, or any other crap. Since then, I realized that it is just a version of an old Russian proverb, “horseradish is not sweeter than black radish.” […]

Vladimir Golstein09.01.2026

How woke liberals learned to love Nazi collaborators and murderers. One the surface of it, it all looks strange if not shocking. The most progressive of the Americans and consequently of the western world, providing moral and financial support to the ultra-nationalist thugs who idolize mass murderers of the Bandera type. They don’t idolize Dr. […]

Vladimir Golstein05.01.2026

By the End of the King Lear, the King Learns not Just Modesty in front of Men, but more Importantly, in front of Universe. In exchange with Cordelia, who returned from France in an attempt to save him from his two evil daughters, Lear learns that neither evil nor good of this world are the […]

Vladimir Golstein05.01.2026

People used to describe Soviet Union as the Kingdom of lies. In the words, attributed to Solzhenitsyn: “…the lie to us. We know that they are lying. They know that we know that they are lying. We know that they know that we know that they are lying.” And so on. But is it really […]

Vladimir Golstein19.12.2025

Dostoevsky’s Demons/Possessed is usually viewed as the satire of Russian nihilists of the 1860s, and their random acts of violence, including the murder of the student, named Ivanov, in Moscow. But Dostoevsky sets his novel not in Moscow or St. Petersburg, but in a small provincial town, and besides individual crimes and a set of […]

Vladimir Golstein16.12.2025

In the sixties, people were worrying about subliminal messages used for brainwashing. Fine, one can talk about it or write some journalistic exposes. But I suspect, that type of messaging requires some extra deliberation and sophistication, and therefore practiced less frequently than we imagine. What we have instead, and something much easier to accomplish, is not […]

Vladimir Golstein09.12.2025

So there are pragmatic political systems, when politicians are not restrained by sloppily or sophisticatedly concocted ideology. Such was the capitalism of the laissez-faire period, or today’s China, Russia and even Trumpism. And there are ideologically driven political systems. Nazism, Soviet Socialism and now Wokism that took over United States and EU. Since I did’t […]

Vladimir Golstein30.11.2025

Here is a dialogue in which I’ve participated thousands of times. Literally. — Ukrainian leaders are crooks and thieves. — No, they are building democracy in hostile circumstances created by Russia. — They are banning Russian language and Russian culture and bringing back ultra-nationalist hateful rhetoric. — No, they are building democracy in hostile atmosphere […]

Vladimir Golstein29.11.2025

Is it dignity — to see old men, who take care of their decrepit mothers — to be dragged into military precincts where they are “processed” and sent to the war? Is it dignity to see the buses which drag these men, attacked by their wives and daughters? Is it dignity to hear that one […]

Canada, Stop Lying to Itself

Binary Thinking, Politics, and Dialectics

Russophobia as a “Sacred Mission” of the Nazis

The Tragedy of King Lear

What is the Kingdom of Lies?

When Societies Go Mad… Or Become Possessed

A Triggered Society

The Tale of the Two Systems

New “Demons”

What Constitutes Dignity for the President of a Country?

The Michael Jackson Biopic is Missing its Most Controversial Story

Madama Butterfly and the Japan of the Western Imagination

The Spanish Civil War at 90: the Republic’s Response

Terminator Is about 80 Years Old