Bellingcat, a "WikiLeaks" for the National Security State

Bellingcat has named a second Russian military intelligence agent, a Dr. Alexander Yevgenyevich Mishkin, supposedly responsible for the poisoning of the Skripals. As the NYT dutifully reports,

Bellingcat said it would reveal a fuller report about Dr. Mishkin on Tuesday, when it is scheduled to present its findings to the House of Commons together with a British member of Parliament. The British authorities have so far been unwilling to confirm the suspects’ true identities.

Bellingcat is merely an extension of the state. In a post-WikiLeaks, post-Snowden world, intelligence agencies need a crusading online persona, sort of a Julian Assange for the Establishment, and that is Bellingcat's Eliot Higgins.

Bellingcat exists solely to bolster dominant, state-manufactured narratives.

Russophobia is everywhere these days. A recent Marvel comic book, set in the present, has the villains in Soviet track suits. It is as if the Soviet Union never disappeared. The track-suited Soviet thug is a staple in comic books. He has replaced the overcoated, fedora-wearing hoodlum from the Dick Tracey comic strip as the default, omniscient criminal.