Although it didn’t make much of an impact in the United States, Vice President Joe Biden’s recent interview with the Wall Street Journal has gotten tongues wagging in Russia’s media as well as the Kremlin. It’s fair to say that the vice president has hit a Russian nerve. In this article from Russia’s Izvestia newspaper, political scientist Georgiy Bovt exhorts his countrymen not to give a damn about what Biden, Hillary Clinton, or anyone else says, about Russia. For...

Is the deadly rioting in China’s western-most provinces driving a public relations policy change in Beijing? According to this article from the state-run China Daily, just as in America, Chinese society is due for an open discussion on prejudice. Using the recent American controversy between Harvard professor Henry Louis Gates Jr. and a White police officer as a jumping off point, the China Daily’s Alexis Hooi warns readers that as China develops, it will have to shake off some bad habits....

It’s ‘Victory Day’ again in North Korea – or to be precise, the ‘Day of Victory in the Fatherland Liberation War,’ over the United States and United Nations. For those who have wondered how Pyongyang has come to call the 50-year standoff a ‘victory,’ South Korea’s Daily North Korea, staffed by people who have escaped the land of Kim Jong-il and work to alert the outside world to what’s going on there, offer this explanation. For the...

Like people the world over, the Russians are puzzling over how much attention to pay to the utterances of our own vice president, Joe Biden. Days ago, Vice President Biden gave what was, from a Russian perspective, an insulting if not alarming interview with the Wall Street Journal, during which he said that Russia is so weak that it would ‘bend’ to America’s will. This article from Russia’s Moskovskij Komsomolets looks at his comments – and Hillary Clinton’s...

There is something about Texan Lance Armstrong that tweaks French nerves like nothing else can. The seven-time Tour de France winner, after a three year retirement, returned to the ‘Great Loop’ this year, finishing third. Begrudgingly – and with more than a hint of suspicion that the Tour is somehow soiled by Armstrong – Mustapha Kessous of France’s Le Monde reaches the surprising conclusion that, ‘To exist, Lance Armstrong and the Great Loop depend on one another.’ And...

In seeking to return ousted Honduran President Manuel Zalaya to office, is the United States doing the right thing? The Honduran Congress and military, who ousted Zalaya for violating that nation’s constitution by seeking another term, certainly have tremendous support. And according to columnist Gloria Leticia Pineda from La Prensa of Honduras, those who support the new government have a bone to pick with the Obama Administration. For La Prensa, Pineda writes in part: “We have several...

Would the United States government deport a confirmed Nazi murderer to Austria, only to see him live out his life in a luxury apartment with 24-hour a day care? Those of you who answered yes win the prize. Hot on the heels of the case of John Demjanjuk, a former Nazi collaborator and naturalized American from Cleveland now standing trial as an accomplice to 27,900 murders, comes the case of Josias Kumpf. Kumpf, a former Nazi concentration camp guard, emigrated to the United States in 1956 and became...

Unfortunately for Iran’s Christians, post-election protesting and riots over vote fraud have resulted in increased suspicion and persecution. According to this article by Dr. Wahied Wahdat-Hagh, writing for Germany’s Rheinischer Merkur newspaper, efforts are afoot in Iran’s parliament to alter the nation’s legal code to impose the death penalty on people who convert to Christianity. Of the plight of Iran’s Christians, Dr. Wahdat-Hagh writes in part: “Up to now,...

Once again it’s nice to report that the free press in Russia is still alive and kicking. Days ago the Yezhednevniy Zhurnal, one of Russia’s boldest opposition newspapers, published this broadside against Russia’s ’self-decieving, self-deluded’ official media and the Kremlin for how they continue to interpret the world. This article examines the visit of Vice President Biden to Ukraine and Georgia, deriding the Kremlin for thinking he came to ‘remove,’ ‘dismiss’...

It’s a question that has been asked since manned spaceflight began: With all the problems down on earth, is it really worth the billions it takes to send human beings into space? At least as far as the editorial board of the NRC Handelsblad is concerned, the answer is an emphatic ‘yes.’ This editorial from the Dutch newspaper says in part: “Human spaceflight is a worthy end in itself. In a far distant future, humanity will risk journeying to nearby planets and perhaps beyond....

King Mohammed VI of Morocco One of the things we try to do at WORLDMEETS.US is bring to the attention of the American people stories and news sources rarely touched on by U.S. media – but that involve our nation. The situation in the Western Sahara is one such story, demonstrating once again that in all kinds of situations, what an American president says and does results in major repercussions. This article from Algeria’s Le Quotidien d’Oran highlights a conflict that has been going...

As any any news-obsessed individual knows by now, a war of words has broken out between Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and North Korea – after the secretary likened the Hermit Kingdom’s regime to small children desperate for attention. In response, the maniacally state-controlled Korean Central News Agency issued this retort from that nation’s foreign ministry, which says in part: “The Democratic People’s Republic of Korea has taken all necessary measures to protect...

Is President Obama more aligned with Russian President Medvedev and Prime Minister Putin than Bush was? And is Liz Cheney, the daughter of former Vice President Dick Cheney, a better advocate for the Russian opposition that President Obama? According to this intriguing article By Alexei Victorovich Chadayev for Russia’s Nezavisimaya Gazeta, the answer to both questions is yes. In fact, he writes, that the reason Obama-mania hasn’t broken out in Russia is that Russians see little difference...

America has extradited alleged Nazi guard John Demjanjuk to stand trial in a Munich court as an accomplice to 27,900 murders. So how do Germans feel about what is likely to be the last great Nazi trial? Columnist Kathrin Werner, showing little concern for 90-year-old Demjanjuk’s advanced age, writes for the Financial Times Deutschland, in part: “The trial of alleged concentration camp warden John Demjanjuk is an opportunity for the German state. It can show its citizens that it’s...

Polish Foreign Minister Adam D. Rotfeld After agreeing to the installation of an American missile shield on their territories, Poland and the Czech Republic are a bit jittery watching the Obama Administration ‘reset’ relations with the Kremlin. And after Moscow’s attack on Georgia last year and the setting aside of NATO membership for Georgia and Ukraine, the rest of East Europe is similarly affected. Which is why last week, 22 of East Europe’s most prominent present and...

When looking for articles about the United States in the foreign press, one often finds columnists quoting the founding fathers and preaching to their readers about the glories of America and its legacy. This article from Romania’s Cotidianul newspaper gives us both a peak into Romania and a sense of the esteem many people abroad hold our nation. Citing the election of President Obama as proof of a restoration of America ideals, Cristian Pirvulescu, dean of Romania’s National School...

Walter Cronkite: 1916-2009 Walter Cronkite, who died today at age 92, left a tremendous imprint on the lives of millions of Americans and generations of journalists, including myself. He stood for being the people’s tribune, he stood for a dispassionate accounting of the facts, he stood for all of the ideals that today’s journalists consider articles of faith, chief of these being reporting the news without fear or favor to those in positions of political or financial power. For practicing...

Blaming Iranian political reformers and the West for yesterday’s horrific air crash in northwest Iran, this article by columnist Kian Mokhtari of Iran’s state-controlled Kayhan lashes out at former President Khatami for seeking to replace Iran’s passenger fleet with Western aircraft – and the West for not selling them to him. On the other hand, he also blames the bad reputation of Russian aircraft on Western propaganda. Arguing that the West cares for protester lives but...

OBAMA’S BLACKBERRY: ‘AHMADINEJAD WOULD LIKE TO FOLLOW YOU ON TWITTER’ CAPTION: ‘AHMADINEJAD WANTS TO FOLLOW OBAMA’ Can the United States expect Russia to help Washington approach the Iranian regime – and if so, what can they do for us? In an attempt to answer these questions, we’ve posted this Iran-centric interview with Victor Kremenyuk, the deputy director of the Institute of the USA and Canada at the Russian Academy of Sciences. In regard to the election...

Swiss neutrality is an article of faith among the people of that country, which is why something of a civil war has erupted between Switzerland’s collective head of state and its judiciary over whether documents, which are rumored to show CIA meddling in Swiss national affairs, should be destroyed. In a nutshell, the documents involve Swiss nationals who helped Pakistan nuclear scientist A. Q. Khan develop the Islamic bomb – and whether the Swiss, in collusion with the CIA, have sought...

As all Moderate Voice readers are no doubt fully aware, this weekend, President Obama made his first visit to sub-Saharan Africa since becoming President of the United States. Below are a few of the best articles we found from the Ghanaian press about the trip. In an article from Ghana Web, headlined Mr. Obama: It’s Time for America to Give Back to Africa, columnist Kojo Tamakloe lowers the boom by reminding the president that the CIA toppled Ghana’s beloved first post-colonial leader,...

What do Russians think of the United States – and is this a problem? In offering this psychoanalysis, which is quite sympathetic to the U.S., political scientist Leonid Radzihovskiy tells readers of the Rossiyskaya Gazeta that if Russians ever hope to build a new relationship with Americans, they had better eject whatever they’ve heard about us from Russia’s state media, which he characterizes as ‘brainwashing.’ To illustrate his point, Radzihovskiy writes in part: “In...

After President Obama’s visit to Russia, it would appear that East Europeans are resting just a little bit easier. For Poland’s Rceczpospolita, columnist Jerzy Haszczynski writes in part: “We still don’t know whether plans to build components of an anti-missile shield in our country will remain plans and nothing more. But we know, pressure from Russia notwithstanding, that the project is yet to be buried, meaning that Obama didn’t offer Medvedev the greatest gift. If he...

With ousted Honduran President Manuel Zelaya and Venezuelan leader Hugo Chavez appearing to call for armed U.S. intervention in Latin America, this editorial from Venezuela’s Tal Cual seems to be asking proverbially, ‘has the world turned upside down?’ Referring to the two leaders as ‘Chacumbeles’, which is a Cuban expression that means roughly “people who do themselves in,” the Tal Cual editorial says in part: “For once in its long history of outrages...

Once again, the Russian newspaper Gazeta, which is partly owned by Mikhail Gorbachev, says what few other Russian media outlets will: that Russia today is little match for the power of the United States. This cold-eyed assessment by Gazeta, published Tuesday morning, says in part: “Russian-American relations, even without the anti-American hysteria that was consciously cultivated by the Russian government throughout the 2000s – is one of unequal powers not especially interested in...