The Moscow Times claims it was an accident. And maybe it was. In this world anything is possible, and even in Russia, a place where conspiracy is routine,the most awful things can happen for innocent reasons...

      In order to understand the "new realism" between Russia and America, you've got to understand the psychology that under-pins the ideology. Who are the Republicans really, and why do they seem to derive such thinly-disguised sexual pleasure from their Bismarkabee shtick...

      Hey, Vladimir Vladimirovich, your friend is in American prison, do you understand that? You are obliged to Borodin, he saved you, he introduced you to Yeltsin, who made you a president, so do something! Call Bush: he will say "No," then sort out most high-ranking American official on Russian soil and take him into custody...

      Western newspapers have many ways of savoring the victory of the Cold War. While corporations and politicians are busy colonizing the conquered territory, journalists function as the rear guard, surveying the burnt out husks of cities that dared confront American hegemony...

      Telling the truth is by no means a simple matter. There are important questions involved, such as, "When did you decide to tell the truth?" and "Why did you start telling it?" Both "when?" and "why?" apply to recent attempts to tell the truth about Russia. ... "Why?" - why has Klebnikov, a fervently pro-capitalist journalist, written such a vitriolic attack on the leading figure in Russia's transition to capitalism?...

This was going to be it, man. I was going all the way this time. I have been dying for a down home good bar to open up. All American, you know what I mean. None of this Irish pub shit - don't get me wrong, they've got their place too - but sometimes you just need a dose of the U S of A. ...

      This week, we ate at Khuan Khe, a Chinese restaurant far off the beaten track. It is near Sokol Metro station, but you may never find it if you don't take a car...

THIS WEEKEND

     ... eXile's 4TH ANNIVERSARY PARTY AT IKEA!, Duran Duran, No Smoking Orchestra...

Get your copy now at Shakespeare’s Books or order it from amazon.com before it goes bankrupt. “The eXile: Sex, Drugs and Libel in the New Russia”: the book they call “more fun than fucking a vacuum cleaner” and “the perfect Hannukah gift”!

    Just after the New Year I went to a morgue. I wanted to look at dead bodies. I wanted to experience horrible smells. I wanted to see a dead man's asshole. I'm thirty years old, and I've never seen one. It's about time...

    Comrades! The stewpot of history has come to a boil! Or wait, what's the right metaphor... The volcano of history has begun to spew warning-ash? The throbbing, uncircumcised member of history has begun to drip? Harden? Poke out of the beltline? Goshdarnit, what is that uncircumcised member doing?

     I met Paul Klebnikov for an interview in late October, 1996. I had no idea why he, a Forbes editor, would want to talk to me, editor of an annoying little Moscow paper called "Living Here". We met at what is now the Murena Bar on Gazetny Pereulok. Klebnikov didn't look like a typical frumpy journalist...

     It is the last week in January, and the Super Bowl is upon us. That's exactly the phrase to use, too, Òupon us." For this is a Super Bowl that has not arrived, it's not Òhere", it's not Òhigh time for", or anything else...