All things Cold War are new again An old joke from the Cold War comes to mind this morning. At the risk of telling it badly, here goes: American: We have freedom of speech in my country. I’m free to criticize my president as much as I want. Russian: But is true in Soviet Union! I too am free to criticize your president as much as I want. Now let’s back up to another Cold War tale I recalled at the very beginning of the Donald Trump administration (1/26/2017). Programmers and scientists across the country were rushing to back up climatic data in fear that the new administration would delete it and other research that conflicted with the administration’s chosen view of reality. They hoped to head off a MAGA Dark Age. Oh, right. My other Cold War story (see update below): Hedrick Smith in “The Russians” (1984) recounted a visit to Moscow’s Lenin Library. (Memory must serve, as I cannot locate the text online.) Smith, the New York Times’ Moscow Bureau Chief from 1971–74, had gone to one of the world’s great libraries to do some research. He needed a back copy of Time(?) magazine. But viewing such subversive foreign material was restricted. He had to present a permission slip from some office, which he had. While the clerk went back into the restricted stacks to fetch the magazine, Smith began leafing through a copy of Life someone had returned to the counter. When the clerk returned, she became visibly agitated. Smith…