For me, an important lesson in the "four writers about Russia" is that we need to gather our information from several sources. Not sources that just parrot each other, but take different approaches. When the same results come out from these different approaches, that's probably a good indication of where the truth really lies.

Unfortunately, the mainstream media cannot deliver this multi-approach very well. They tend to parrot each other or come totally different conclusions. I'm not sure how to move the mainstream media in a multi-approach way.

Recently, one of our residents pacifists proclaimed that people did not want to debate him on Medium. So I gave him a little lesson on the point-counter-point approach to conducting a debate. Then I gave him four succinct debating points for him to counter in a debate format. He did not respond.