Since Russia’s barbaric invasion of Ukraine commenced in late February, opposition media and protests have been shut down and the country’s citizens have been living in a propaganda bubble that lets few dissenting voices in. And it works. Faced with a choice between the basic facts about the war against Ukraine and a self-contradicting fantasy most are choosing the later even over the firsthand testimony of Russian soldiers in the field or their own siblings, friends, and former neighbors living abroad.
I spoke to a number of immigrants from Russia living here in Maine about their distressing experiences trying to communicate with deluded family and friends back at home. They all said they think there’s no chance of a popular uprising against Putin. The lies have won. The story is in this week’s Maine Sunday Telegram and online here.
COLIN WOODARD is a New York Times bestselling author and award-winning journalist. He is the author of six books that have been translated into a dozen foreign languages and inspired an NBC television drama. He is currently Director of Nationhood Lab at the Pell Center for International Relations and Public Affairs at Salve Regina University. As State and National Affairs Writer at the Portland Press Herald and Maine Sunday Telegram he won a 2012 George Polk Award and was a finalist for a Pulitzer Prize in 2016. He is a contributing editor at POLITICO and his work has appeared in The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Economist, Smithsonian and dozens of other major publications.