Review: I Knew Stalin, by Anatole V. Baikaloff
No, he didn’t. The author of this short book, a former Bolshevik, apparently met Stalin briefly before the 1917 revolution, and says that the man didn’t make much of an impression. The remaining 90% of…
Articles by admin
Review: Stalin: Czar of all the Russias, by Eugene Lyons
This is how history books used to look: no index, no footnotes, no bibliography. Life for historians was easier in 1940. Eugene Lyons, a journalist, was the first Western newspaperman to interview Josef Stalin in…
Review: The 8-week Blood Sugar Diet: Lose Weight Fast and Reprogramme your Body, by Dr Michael Mosley
Dr Michael Mosley, who sadly died last year, was one of the great communicators about science and medicine. His radio shows and podcasts taught millions of us about things we could do to improve our…
Georgia at a crossroads – and what Britain can do.
My first article to appear in Progressive Britain – click here to read it.
US unions: In unity, maybe, there is strength
Twenty years ago, some the largest unions in the United States broke away from the AFL-CIO claiming that it was not doing enough to organise workers. Everyone understood that the labour movement was rapidly shrinking,…
Who rules Georgia?
The pro-Moscow ruling party in Georgia, billionaire Bdzina Ivanishvili’s “Georgian Dream,” is growing increasingly desperate in its attempts to hold on to power following the 26 October elections. First, they bungled the attempt to steal…
The Georgian Uprising – August 1924: European Social Democracy at the Crossroads
The following is the text of a speech I gave today in Newcastle at the 50th annual conference of the Study Group on the Russian Revolution. It is an abridged version of a paper I…
Review: Dead Head, by C.J. Skuse
If you’re looking for a book about Grateful Dead fans, this is not it. But if you want to continue following the increasingly strange adventures of the female serial killer Rhiannon Lewis, this is book…
Review: In Bloom, by C.J. Skuse
A pregnant woman, her boyfriend in prison accused of murder, and on the run from police and nosy journalists — well, that’s one way to describe this delightful book. The other way is — a…
The Georgian crisis deepens
Georgia’s increasingly authoritarian and pro-Russian government has made a major miscalculation. Protests against the fraudulent elections on 26 October were showing signs of dying down. When the Georgian Parliament met — with all the opposition…