Section: The Atlantic (USA)
Photos of the Week: 11/21-11/27
Yves Herman / Reuters Winter weather in China, Europe, and the United States, a Martian panorama, a neighborhood in flames in Manila, demonstrations in Chicago, power outages in Crimea following an attack on power lines, the Thanksgiving Day parade in New York City, and much more. …read more Source: The...
The Real Danger of the Downed Russian Jet
A radar image released by Turkey shows the path of the Russian warplane shot down along the Turkish-Syrian border. Turkish Interior Ministry / ReutersFor clues to how the Syrian Civil War might finally end—or devolve into an even more nightmarish conflict—look to the congested skies over Syria. There, the air forces of countries such as the...
How to Beat Donald Trump
John Locher / APA new round of attack ads are heading Donald Trump’s way, some from John Kasich’s campaign and the super PAC backing him, and more in the future from an LLC created specifically to produce anti-Trump messages. New Day for America’s 47-second ad splices together some of the Republican front-runner’s most...
Is There a Method to ISIS’s Madness?
An abandoned watch outside the concert hall ISIS attacked in Paris Christophe Ena / ReutersIn killing 130 civilians in Paris—the worst such attack in France since World War II—ISIS has forced us to contend, once again, with the question of the “rationality” of self-professed ideologues. Since it wrested the world’s attention with its...
Can Thinking Like a Terrorist Prevent Attacks on Airplanes?
An airplane after taking off from Seville’s San Pablo Airport Marcelo del Pozo / ReutersOn November 28, 2002, al-Qaeda-affiliated terrorists aimed two shoulder-fired missiles at an Israeli commercial airliner as it took off from the Moi International Airport in Mombasa, Kenya. Though both missed, the event marked the first missile attack on...
Will ISIS Force Russia and the West Together?
U.S. President Barack Obama chats with Russia’s President Vladimir Putin at the Group of 20 (G20) leaders summit in Antalya, Turkey. Jonathan Ernst / ReutersHe wasn’t ostracized. He wasn’t isolated. And certainly nobody threatened to shirtfront him. In the space of a year, Vladimir Putin has gone from being the pariah of...
Is Accepting Syrians Worth the Risk?
This reader in Maryland thinks so: It seems to me that it’s the same old story of the “other.” My governor announced that he was asking the federal government to cease placing refugees in our state until security assurances could be made. When I expressed my disappointment with this decision, the counter argument I got (from another...
The Big Green Tent and the Subversive Power of Books
Angie WangT he big green tent revolves around banned books, a subject familiar to Ludmila Ulitskaya, one of Russia’s most acclaimed writers and, at 72, an outspoken protester against the Putin regime. Back in 1970, she was a young biologist who got fired from the Institute of General Genetics at the U.S.S.R. Academy of Sciences for...
Russian Media Veers Into Conspiracies on Egypt Plane Crash
A sculpture of a double-headed eagle, a national symbol of Russia, in front of a Russian national flag in St. Petersburg, Russia. ReutersThe crash of Metrojet Flight 9268 in Egypt on October 31, which killed all 224 people on board, was more than the worst aviation disaster in the country’s history. Once it became clear that the cause of...
Do Russian Athletes Cheat?
Russian runner Liliya Shobukhova had previously been suspended for doping. Paul Hackett / ReutersLast week, ahead of a major report by an independent commission of the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA), Russia banned five of its athletes for alleged steroid use and other biological irregularities. “Marathon runner Maria Konovalova received a...
