aaus-list @ ukrainianstudies.org -- [aaus-list] Sources of news?

[Max Pyziur <pyz@brama.com>]

Greetings,

Just when all of the news-spin was winding down from apprehending
Karadzic - the masquerade as an AltMed doctor, complete with fluffy
beard, glasses and a pinned-up ponytail (I guess his next disguise,
courtesy of some spook organization, was going to be wearing
a red suit, standing next to a Salvation Army box, and ringing a
bell during the next Christmas shopping season), and the "he
said/he didn't/she maybe did" game referencing a possible secret
deal between Karadzic, Richard Holbrooke, and Madeline Albright,
you couldn't ask for a more perfect storm for the news cycle:
China's celebration of economic success by hosting the 2008
summer Olympics, the possiblity of a John Edwards love child
and the implications of that for the 2008 U.S. Presidential
Election, the death at 50 of Bernie Mac (who at one time used
former LA Laker power forward and Kyivan Slava Medvedenko as
a subject of his jokes), and Russia's bombing of Gori, Georgia
and the accompanying humanitarian fallout. The profound to the
pathetic to the trivial to the tragic.

Except that it's happening on a weekend.

Nevertheless, being news-hungry, I was wondering if there were
any recommendations on information sources and POVs on the
Georgia-Russia conflict

Is Georgia's South Ossetia akin to Serbia's Kosovo or Ukraine's
Rusyns?

Is South Ossetia's Eduard Kokoity a gadfly or someone to be
taken seriously? The same with Saakashivli?

Already, there are examples of the Dima and Vova echo chamber
saying, "II aamm iinn cchhaarrggee hheerree." Notice how Vova
cut his Beijing Olympic sojourn short and flew to Vladikavkaz
in North Ossetia to take charge and Dima is making pronouncements
in Moscow, dressed for traffic while sitting in a gold-leafed
dark wooden chair.(This constitutional miscalculation was more
publicly and correctly pointed out in a letter to the WSJ by
Garry Kasparov, Bela Liptak, and others in response to NY
Senator Schumer's really dumb Op-Ed piece. For those who
don't know, in his 6/3/2008 WSJ Op-Ed Schumer was petitioning
to let Russia, naming Putin as its leader, do what it wants
to do in its proverbial backyard in exchange for stronger
arm-twisting of Iran over Iran's creation of LEU. It looks as
though Russia is doing what it wants w/o any sort of deal. I
guess Schumer will have to try to engage someone else (Schumer's
call of IndyMac was correct, however; the score is tied 1-1, but this 
just might mean the New York State went from blue to purple).

I guess if Bush and Cheney and their gaggle are entitled to
their boy scout adventure in Iraq (with subtexts, sidetexts, and 
metatexts) to give reason to the MIC (Military-Industrial Complex) to 
bleed the U.S. taxpayer to pay for armor-piercing, body-piercing, 
civilization-piercing krieg-instilling gadgetry, the Dima and Vova 
dueling leadership team are certainly entitled to their foray in Georgia.

Already, the observant are watchful for signs of a new and
improved crackerjack Russian military machine, unwinding
its embarassing defeats in Chechnya. I guess that military
precision will have to wait due to between 1,500 - 2,000 civilian
casualties in Gori. Definitely a messy overshoot of South Ossetia.
I guess the Russian Air Farce wasn't using Google Maps; or was that on 
purpose?

In NYC, the Russia Today (RT) cable service is carried on Channel
135 in Time Warner Cable service areas (check your local listings, in the 
parlance of yesteryear, if looking for the RT channel). They have a 1/2 
hour show that keeps being repeated with some modifications, showing
video and some reporting from South Ossetia, Georgia, and Russia.
Oksana Boyko, an RT correspondent, (on the team, off the team, or
secretly in between?) offers reporting claiming that already there
are Georgian refugees trying to cross into Armenia (!).

The Georgian Association in the United States website offers
no information. Neither do American Friends of Georgia -
www.afgeorgia.org nor the America Georgia Business
Council - www.agbdc.com.

Anyone see anything else? What's Den' and Pravda saying?

And what about solidarity with the Georgians? Certainly got it from
them during the Orange Revolution. Should we gather in front
of diplomatic missions of the Russian Federation in our respective
areas on Monday so that the local Eyewitness News has a reason for
its existence? Boycott the 2014 Olympics in Sochi, Russia?

Gori to me, if confirmed, is an unbelievable tragedy. But so are
Darfur,the Bush-Cheney schoolyard bullying tactics gone awry in Iraq,
and a number of other ones.

MP
pyz@brama.com