Spy lessons

To John le Carré, Russia and America are "two huge continents out of control drowning together in the oily waters of capitalism." He suggested in The Guardian that neither side can give its spies a cause worth fighting for. Once revealed, the latest spy scandal was treated as a model of how the two countries can cooperate. Rapprochement will benefit both countries, we were again reminded, by making it possible to confront common enemies and rivals, such as Iran and China. Yet the U.S. has gone mad, wrote le Carré during the Bush era, and Putin's Kremlin is kleptocratic, he added last week. Le Carré seems to be suggesting that for the rapprochement to be truly beneficial, it needs to be based on shared values that are loftier than what either side is espousing today. For countries stuck in the middle, it means watching the U.S. and Russia as they jointly rise ... or jointly sink into more farce and tragedy.