If you blame Russia for nearly everything you're a xenophobic bigot.
There’s an entire sub-genre of political commentary devoted to pointing out the intolerances and hypocrisies of self-described ‘liberals’. So it’s not a new observation that some of the people who take most pride in being ‘broad-minded’ actually harbour the deepest, most implacable prejudices. In fact it’s been a vintage year for liberal illiberalism, fuelled by anger at the outcome of the Brexit referendum and Donald Trump’s victory in the US election. Some commentators attribute those election results to a rise in xenophobic or racist attitudes. In other words, they allege that voters are currently more inclined to feel negatively toward entire groups of people, based on nationality or perceived background. A worrying development, most would agree. Except that some groups of people, indeed some nationalities, are subjected to sweeping generalisations by the same commentators , sometimes in the same articles. These types of inconsistencies have ...