Michael J. Totten's Blog, page 28

An Opposition Newspaper in Cuba?

Dissident, author, and blogger Yoani Sanchez is starting an opposition newspaper in Cuba. I’d like to say that’s terrific and that the Castro regime is finally beginning to liberalize politically, but several of her reporters have already received warning calls from State Security, so let’s not get excited just yet.

One of two things is happening here. Old habits die hard and State Security can’t help itself. Or the regime plans to allow a token, bullied, and censored opposition paper so it ca...

The Last Communist City

My final dispatch from Cuba is now available online at City Journal . Here's the first part.

Neill Blomkamp’s 2013 science-fiction film Elysium, starring Matt Damon and Jodie Foster, takes place in Los Angeles, circa 2154. The wealthy have moved into an orbiting luxury satellite—the Elysium of the title—while the wretched majority of humans remain in squalor on Earth. The film works passably as an allegory for its director’s native South Africa, where racial apartheid was enforced for nearly 50...

The Rise of Boko Haram

Boko Haram—the Taliban of Nigeria—finally seized the world’s attention this month, first for kidnapping hundreds of little girls and threatening to sell them, and again for indiscriminately massacring 336 people last week in the town of Gamboru Ngala. A ramp-up in attacks actually began back in February when its suicide bombers and gunmen struck 21 times, but we’re not yet numb to the kidnapping of hundreds of children, and last week’s atrocity was the deadliest yet.

Noah Rothman at Mediaite t...

Instapunditry

NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC ON BOKO HARAM: "The death toll is usually claimed to be in the thousands, but no one has an accurate tally, in part because the Nigerian government misreports incidents and in part because in its hapless pursuit of Boko Haram, the government has killed so many people itself, many if not most of them civilians. The Nigerian armed forces claim that they kill only terrorists, yet the terrorists' ravages become more frequent and more vicious with every such claim. So vast and...

The Conspiracy Theory Capital of the World

Conspiracy theories exist everywhere in the world, but they’re especially common in the Middle East and are rampant in Egypt even by regional standards. They’re generally harmless when only crackpots on the margins believe them, but when they go mainstream and infect the highest levels of government and the media—watch out.

National Geographic has the story on the latest ludicrous theory making the rounds in Egypt, this one put forward by the governor of Minya province.

Local mobs looted a muse...

Guest-Blogging at Instapundit

Instapundit's Glenn Reynolds is taking his annual vacation and I'll be filling in for him (along with a handful of others) while he's away. So I'll see you there and here for a while.

OG Image: 

RESURRECTION Optioned for Film

My new novel, Resurrection, has just been optioned for film.

Writer and director Chris Robert (Another You, 2014) has read the book four times and hopes to send me a draft of the screenplay by Memorial Day.

Resurrection is a zombie novel, but it belongs more to Post-Apocalyptic Science-Fiction than to the Horror genre. It’s a character-driven story about a group of mismatched survivors struggling with themselves and each other after the collapse of civilization—Lane, who stops at nothing to ass...

Thanks to All Kickstarter Donors

My Kickstarter project for Vietnam is now funded, so I'm officially going.

I have some prep work to do before I can head out and I still need my visa from the Vietnamese Embassy in Washington. Most likely I'll fly to Hanoi in June, spend some time there, then take the train down to Ho Chi Minh City (Saigon).

I sent everyone a thank-you email, and I also want to thank my biggest donors here on the blog.

Nick Wade

J.M. Heinrichs

Van Q. Tran

Larry Boeskool

Paul Bailey

Mark Garbowski

Matthew Berger

William...

Egypt's Jewish Problem

Egypt is by far the most anti-Semitic country I’ve ever visited. It’s off the charts even compared with the rest of the region.

Everyone who posseses even a passing familiarity with Egyptian politics knows this is a serious problem, but the reasons why aren’t as widely understood as they should be. The three main theories—that Egypt’s Jewish problem is a result of the Islamic religion, the Arab-Israeli conflict, and state propaganda to deflect anger away from the government—are partly correct,...

Vladimir Putin's Next Move

If Vladimir Putin invades Poland, I’ll eat my hat.

It’s not going to happen.

Even so, American ground troops are being deployed there as a response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and annexation of Crimea. This is the West telling him STOP. He’s not going to invade a European Union or NATO state either way, but we’d end up sending a crazy-weak signal if all we did was collectively shrug.

Ukraine still isn’t in NATO, however, and probably never will be, so it’s still vulnerable. Putin can slice i...