Show Notes
On today’s show, “The Russia Guy” welcomes Michael Schwirtz, a journalist from The New York Times staff who just won a Pulitzer Prize for international reporting. The award was granted for “a set of enthralling stories, reported at great risk, exposing the predations of Vladimir Putin’s regime.”
The newspaper's winning work includes six articles and two documentary videos published in 2019. Now an investigative reporter with The New York Times, Michael has been with the newspaper for 14 years, having started in the Moscow bureau and then working at the Metro Desk, first covering the New York City Policy Department, then as part of Metro's investigative team, reporting about brutality and corruption in the New York State prison system and at Rikers Island in New York City.
The four winning works that Michael authored or co-authored are the following: “Russia Ordered a Killing That Made No Sense. Then the Assassin Started Talking.” ”Top Secret Russian Unit Seeks to Destabilize Europe, Security Officials Say”* “How Russia Meddles Abroad for Profit: Cash, Trolls and a Cult Leader”* “How a Poisoning in Bulgaria Exposed Russian Assassins in Europe”
You can read them all here:https://www.pulitzer.org/winners/staff-new-york-times Follow Michael Schwirtz on Twitter here:https://twitter.com/mschwirtz
Support this very podcast here: www.patreon.com/kevinrothrock
Music and audio: Ну погоди, episode 14, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ncHd3sxpEbo&t=7s Олег Анофриев, Бременские музыканты, “Говорят, мы бяки-буки,” www.youtube.com/watch?v=h-3wC7gkMDQ Support the show (https://www.patreon.com/kevinrothrock)
More from The Russia Guy
Kevin returns to run his mouth about recent events in the Russia-Ukraine world, and other stuff. Topics discussed here:
Today’s guest is Dr. Jade McGlynn, a specialist in Russian memory and foreign policy at the Monterey Initiative in Russian Studies and the author of two books: “The Kremlin’s Memory Makers” and “Russia’s War.” Discussed in this interview: the Kremlin’s claims that Russia is fighting an existential battle in Ukraine, how memory shapes that conversation, balancing dispassionate scholarly work and ethical advocacy, and more!
Today’s show features an interview with Jonny Tickle, a man with an incredible name and a controversial resume, given that he worked as a writer for Russia Today — RT — right up until Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February. He left the country shortly thereafter, but he’s since returned (like quite a few others), and he’s even resumed his YouTube travel vlog where he visits cities across Russia and talks about the local scene and attractions. Jonny agreed to come on The Russia Guy to talk about being back in Russia, what’s in store for him next, and what life is like in a country at war where you can’t even call it a war.
Today’s guest is Dr. Emily Holland, an assistant professor in the Russia Maritime Studies Institute at the U.S. Naval War College, where she teaches and researches subjects like the Cold War, Russia, energy politics, diplomacy, geopolitics, and more. Follow her on Twitter here. In the interview you’re about to hear, Dr. Holland describes her background and the nature of her job at the Naval War College before explaining the challenges and tradeoffs inherent in the West’s efforts to isolate Russia’s oil and gas industries.
Today’s guest is Dr. Marlene Laruelle, the director of Institute for European, Russian, and Eurasian Studies and the Illiberalism Studies Program at George Washington University. On this episode of The Russia Guy, Dr. Laruelle discussed her 2021 book, “Is Russia Fascist? Unraveling Propaganda East and West,” and its relevance to today’s crisis in Ukraine. We focused specifically on the book’s insights into Russian geopolitics and post-colonialism.