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Leonid Bershidsky
For Leonid Bershidsky's latest contributions to The Japan Times, see below:
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Mar 7, 2017
Trump has already shifted the media landscape
For the first time in decades, centrist and left-of-center media organizations and individual journalists in the U.S. face strong competition from the right.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Mar 5, 2017
Putin invented this toxic ambassador game
Trump's critics in Congress and in the media are following in Putin's footsteps by turning Russian representatives in the U.S. into pariahs.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Feb 28, 2017
Why Dutch sentiment has turned against immigrants
Soon after she moved into her new neighborhood, Ijburg, on the eastern outskirts of Amsterdam, in 2005, Xandra Lammers started a blog about it. Ijburg is a curious place, an architectural wonder, built in the middle of a lake on reclaimed land and partly on water. She still keeps the blog alive, but...
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Feb 14, 2017
Think the U.S. election was dirty? Look at France
France's scandal-plagued presidential candidates will likely be showered with even more mud in the remaining time before the vote.
COMMENTARY / World
Feb 11, 2017
A new reason to avoid Google and Facebook
A Philadelphia court has ruled that U.S. authorities can legally access data from foreign servers as long as they do so using computers located in America.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Feb 7, 2017
Why U.S. tech must beat Trump on immigration
U.S. companies have good reasons to fight President Donald Trump's entry ban every step of the way.
COMMENTARY / World
Jan 31, 2017
America was hardly wide open before Trump
The U.S. has been refusing entry to many Muslims for years.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Jan 30, 2017
How print beats digital in the book world
The book industry is making a convincing case that the printed word remains profitable.
COMMENTARY / World
Jan 25, 2017
Russia has a new 'great game' in the Balkans
In one way or another, Russia is involved in every Balkan nation, and that involvement is increasingly active.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Dec 23, 2016
The U.S. is now a country that can be ignored
One of Barack Obama's most important legacies is a sense that the U.S. is no longer the dominant global power.
COMMENTARY / World
Dec 14, 2016
A new Russia policy needs Exxon CEO's skills
The moral satisfaction of not encouraging a dictator may be important, but the Obama administration's policy ended up enabling Putin's most reprehensible gambles and consolidated Putin's domestic support.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Dec 8, 2016
Elites must engage populists
Populists cannot be eliminated, but they can be co-opted.
COMMENTARY / World
Dec 6, 2016
Italy's was just the latest stupid referendum
Like David Cameron's Brexit fiasco, this didn't have to happen.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Dec 5, 2016
EU can lead on clean energy
Despite the European Union's caution on promoting renewables, Donald Trump's lack of interest is leaving the door wide open to global leadership.
COMMENTARY / World
Nov 30, 2016
How Russian propaganda works in the West
The 'crazies' that populate the alternative news sphere, those dismissed by the mainstream, consume pro-Vladimir Putin information with their general diet.
COMMENTARY / World
Nov 24, 2016
Vladimir Putin is winning the French election
Unless the Socialists can pull a rabbit out of a hat, France will get a Putin-friendly president next year.
COMMENTARY / World
Nov 18, 2016
Russia joins U.S. in denying international law
The U.S. has never accepted the International Criminal Court's jurisdiction, and Russia has now adopted the same stance.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Nov 10, 2016
A blow to U.S. exceptionalism
Donald Trump won by using a mix that has been effective in other nations for years: a combination of strong nationalism and an anti-corruption agenda.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Oct 13, 2016
I'm Russian, and Hillary Clinton makes me nervous
Hillary Clinton has declared war on dictators, but Russia can't be forced onto a democratic path.
Japan Times
COMMENTARY / World
Oct 9, 2016
Putin's ultimatum to the next U.S. president
The next U.S. president will need to decide what to do with a belligerent Russia.

Longform

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