Last week a story appeared, tucked in the back pages of American newspapers that are concentrating almost entirely on our leap year election ritual. Vladimir Putin, the Frank Gorshin-lookalike, former KGB agent, and current Russian dictator, once again tried to grab headlines and to indirectly interpolate himself into the American foreign policy debate, along with the election itself. Mr. Putin proposed to reopen the long-shuttered Russian military bases in sub-Saharan Africa, Vietnam, and yes, in Cuba, thereby extending Russia’s global reach and turning up the dial in his personal Cold War against America and the West. Putin, who has never hidden his chagrin at the fall of the Soviet Union, and yearns to restore Russian power, self-satisfyingly argued that extending Russian military might to Southeast Asia and the Americas will have the salutary effect of curbing the hegemonic ambitions of the current superpower, the United States of America. Putin’s remarks...(Read Full Article)