|
|
Home | Switchboard | Unix Administration | Red Hat | TCP/IP Networks | Neoliberalism | Toxic Managers |
| (slightly skeptical) Educational society promoting "Back to basics" movement against IT overcomplexity and bastardization of classic Unix | |||||||
| Pathological Russophobia of the US elite | 2017 | 2016 | 2015 | 2014 | 2013 |
Due to powerful anti-Sochi propaganda attack it was clear that something brewing on. See MSM Sochi Bashing Rampage
|
|
Switchboard | ||||
| Latest | |||||
| Past week | |||||
| Past month | |||||
 |
 |
 |
The Kremlin Stooge
cartman says:marknesop says:Ah, the EU has nothing to say about these Nazi cookies or the people who made them. These were the people who were invited to join Latvia's ruling coalition to prevent the Russian-speaking party, Harmony Center, from gaining power after they won a plurality of the elections.
Brussels has very selective choices of outrages, and is willing to tolerate Nazi rehabilitation in some of its members. The Harmony Center party brings together the country's Russians, Jews, Ukrainians, Belorussians, and even Latvians.
kirill says:I'm sure there will be some charming folksy story about them, such as that they are "priest chokers" like the dumplings of the same name, meant to prevent the parish priest from regularly taking dinner with the family or something like that, so as to invest them with a prosaic and harmless charm. The Anglospheric press is the master of "nothing to see here, move along". That's if it is picked up at all. There was a story just the other day on The Moscow Times, I think it might even have been Michael Bohm's latest effort but I can't remember now, in which the rising of Ukraine's Galician Division of the SS was glossed over by suggesting that Russia was so horrible and savage that joining and supporting the Nazis was just the civilized thing to do.
It's clear that the NATO elites feel that the ends justify the means. So using some Nazis against Russia is perfectly OK. They though the same back in 1939.
|
|
|
December 20, 2013 | theguardian.com
A very merry Christmas to Pussy Riot, Greenpeace and Mikhail Khodorkovsky, not to say to Vladimir Putin. At his somewhat bizarre annual press conference, with 1,300 journalist waving flags to capture his attention, Putin announced that Khodorkovsky, like the others, would be released from prison. Putin may not be a very lovable or gentle creature, but yet again he has shown himself to be unusually cunning, for all that he has been not only derided but consistently underrated.
Since the implosion of the Soviet Union, more than 20 years ago, the west has made every conceivable mistake in dealing with Russia. In what was meant to be the End of History, with the universal triumph of liberal democracy and market capitalism, American zealots attempted to impose free markets on Russia after more than 70 years of what had passed for socialism. The unhappy outcome should have been no surprise.
This is not a defense of Putin's in many ways unlovely regime. No journalist can feel much fondness for a country where troublesome investigative reporters have a habit of turning up dead. But external policy is a quite different matter, even if the inability to distinguish between the internal character of the Russian regime and its foreign concerns is a very old story. Successive generations of starry-eyed people in the west were enchanted by the Soviet myth, and then disenchanted by what Malcolm Muggeridge sarcastically called "the left's stations of the cross": the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact in 1939; the Czech putsch in 1948; the suppression of Hungary in 1956.
Now it may be little consolation to Poles, Czechs and Hungarians, but on each occasion Russia was behaving like a great power. Beating up smaller neighbours is what great powers do: see the US record in Latin America. On Friday Putin said that Stalin was no worse than Oliver Cromwell, which may seem a little quaint, but it was Stalin who almost apologised for bullying demands on Finland with the words, "I am not responsible for geography."
Every attempt by Russia to safeguard its national interest has been seen as a provocation, when in truth the provocations have come from the west, for centuries past. When the Russians are called paranoid, I recall the writer Delmore Schwartz's wise saying that paranoiacs have enemies, too. A Russian army did not burn Paris in 1812, and Russia did not invade Germany in 1941.
Nor did Russia increase its alliances in the 90s; the west did, with an eastward expansion of Nato that was as stupid as it was disgraceful. It was a betrayal – George Bush the elder had given Mikhail Gorbachev a clear promise that the former eastern bloc countries, let alone the Baltic states newly independent of Russia, would not join Nato, on which Bill Clinton then reneged – and it was an insult.
"We have never thought of acknowledging the 'right' of Cuba or Haiti or the Republic of Panama – all of them independent sovereign states – to contract alliances which were inconsistent with the concert of the whole North American region." Thus said Walter Lippmann in 1944, and quite so. How would the Americans have reacted if Russia had invited Cuba to join the Warsaw Pact?
Even if Russian policy seems cynical and ruthless at times, it often turns out to be wiser than ours. In the 2008 crisis over South Ossetia, it was the Georgian government that picked the fight with Russia. The mind still reels at David Cameron's absurd arrival in Tblisi to demand the immediate admission of Georgia to Nato, which would have precipitated full-scale international war.
If that was what Cameron was like as opposition leader, what might he do as prime minister? Well, for the answer, look at Syria. Just as Gorbachev was stitched up over Nato, so was Putin over Libya, when he agreed to support a security council resolution ostensibly for "humanitarian" reasons, and then found it was a blatant intervention to destroy Gaddafi's regime, with predictably woeful consequences. Since then, Putin and his foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, have refused to support the dazzling piece of statecraft by which our government has tried to topple Bashar al-Assad's regime, in order that Syria can be handed over to al-Qaida.
So, yuletide greetings to those newly freed in Moscow. And then perhaps a new year resolution, to leave Russia alone.
Taku2A very cogent article. Politicians, whether they are in the East or West, are hypocrites and not to be trusted. Yet, for all his weaknesses and faults, I do believe that Putin and Lavrol are better Statepersons/diplomats than any of their counterparts in the West.
The West, consciously or otherwise, still wants to emasculate Russian. NATO and the EU have come to institutionalize this goal - like the concept of God, in that,if it did not exist, it would have been created by humankind, which has been the case, so must NATO and the EU justify their existence by creating and fomenting 'enemies.'
We now have a situation whereby the objectives of the EU and NATO are being promoted ruthlessly, irrespective of whether Europe is being led by Rightist, Left-of -Centre and/or Leftist governments.
We are being governed by The Machine/Bureacratism.
Don9000
What a pathetic excuse for an article.
The mistakes made by the US and the rest of the west don't justify the reign of Putin or his conduct, and the charge that &quo ree markets on Russia" is simply absurd. Moreover, the expansion of NATO occurred almost entirely because of former eastern block nations' developing fears in the mid to late 1990s make it as a democracy. I'd say by then that they were right to worry.
My recollection is that America largely stayed out of the transition process that took Russia from communism to capitalism. At the time the USSR collapsed, I believed my nation's reluctance to get involved was a huge mistake. In fact, I favored a massive Marshall Plan style operation on multiple fronts in order to implement a few minor details like a robust independent judiciary, and a sensible economic plan to help Russia move away from Soviet-style industry. I was hardly alone. Plenty of people on this side of the Atlantic were calling for this kind of thing back in the very early 1990s.
As for Russia's Second World War doings, I find Mr. Wheatcroft's comments extremely strange. First, while the USSR did not invade Germany in 1941, it did sign a non-aggression pact with Germany in August of 1939, and it did round up and kill over twenty thousand Polish military officers, law enforcement officials, and members of the Polish intelligentsia in 1940, not long after it joined in on Germany's invasion of Poland on 17 September 1939 and then divvied up the spoils with the Nazis.
Personally, I think Mr. Wheatcroft needs to rethink his simplistic account of reality.
BarnetisBack -> Don9000
I'd say yours is a more simplistic account that Wheatcroft's. The US didn't stay out of Russia in the 1990s if you consider their role in the horrendous economic experiment which left traumatic memories for contemporary Russians: http://fair.org/extra-online-articles/harvards-best-and-brightest-aided-russias-economic-ruin/
Yes, on its own the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact was a blow to anti-fascists throughout Europe but this was a year after Munchen. Stalin's Soviet Union in 1939 acted with the cynicism of a great power but it's not as though Britain or France acted otherwise.
The expansion of NATO begun almost immediately - even in the early 1990s the west's promises were being broken. The idealism of Gorbachev was basically answered with opportunism.
None of this justifies Putin's internal repression. All the same Whearcroft is essentially right in his perspective of foreign policy towards Russia.
minsredmash -> Don9000
while the USSR did not invade Germany in 1941, it did sign a non-aggression pact with Germany in August of 1939
You either forgot or perhaps never new of what happened between GB, France and Hitler in 1938 (hint Chechoslovakia). There was absolutely nothing wrong with trying to protect our country from German invasion by signing a non-aggression pact. In fact, it was one of the best diplomatic victories of the 20th century. Speaking of the illegal expansion of NATO – it is one of the same trends that lead to Hitler's invasion of USSR in 1941. We know who we are dealing with, after all.
"American zealots attempted to impose free markets on Russia" is simply absurd phrase is not an absurd it is absolutely true.
American "advisors" set up offices in the government buildings and directed Russian officials on how to "convert" soviet industry into "private". This of course resulted in a disastrous looting of the economy and savings, creation of oligarchs etc. It is slear now that it was a deliberate attempt to ruin what's left of our country. And this will never be forgotten.
minsredmash -> Thestinger
That's only their own fault. USSR proposed to join forces against Hitler with GB, France and Poland in 1938 and was snubbed with a great deal of arrogance. Poland bit a chunk of Czechoslovakia and hoped to grab a bit of Russia with Hitler's help as well. But it didn't play that well.
spiralpad -> minsredmash
"[The Nazi-Soviet Pact] was one of the best diplomatic victories of the 20th century."
No no no! It was a disaster for the Soviet Union (of the same kind as Munish was from the British). It allowed Hitler to defeat the French and drive the British off the Continent with the consequence that the Red Arrny had to face the Germans alone. The loses in dead to the Soviet Union were huge: 9 million combat personnel and 27 million civilians. If you include the unborn children then the Nazi-Soviet Pact cost the Societ Union 46 million people. Not a victory at all.
theharper -> CaltonHill
So how about putting your own house in order before slinging muck at a country so massive and diverse few can truly contemplate it's size. One still evolving from the chaos and turmoil resulting from the collapse of the Soviet union. One where away from a tiny minority of wealthy, cosmopolitan, Moscow socialites much of the population is still steeped in religious conservatism hence the backward stance on Gay rights.
So yeah by all means exercise your right to make ill informed criticisms of a foreign leader. But what do you hope to possibly achieve in doing so? For even if Putin were listening to you, do you honestly think he would respect your opinion as you're clearly so utterly clueless about Russian reality?
Ragneur -> CaltonHill
The difference is that the evil empire accused others of using war crimes as a pretext to go to their country and commit war crimes:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m7ijP78Uaow
Bewarned that is a hard watch people. I'm very squeaming and had to look away when they showed the dead bodies.
THIS IS UNBELIEVABLY HEAVY. MENTALLY PREPARE YOURSELF FOR THAT BEFORE WATCHING.
I couldn't even watch this after witnessing the first. I had to look away and just listen. They are chemical weapon inflicted birth defect which I read are more common that flu in that city.
5abi Don9000
The Soviet Union signed the non aggression pact with Germany after Stalin's repeated attempts to forge a united front against Germany failed because of Chamberlaine's continual appeasement of Hitler resulting in handing over Czechoslovakia and Spain to the fascists and the British attempts to encourage Germany invade the Soviet Union .
The non aggression pact was not only the only option left with Soviet Union but also was instrumental in ultimately forcing Britain to be part of anti fascist forces.Lysicamus -> minsredmash
It is slear now that it was a deliberate attempt to ruin what's left of our country
I suspect it was just another example of the hubristic stupidity of the neo-liberals. After all, their policies have also done a lot of damage to Western economies.
minsredmash Lysicamus
You may be right, it's hard to get inside those heads, but considering the ill will towards Russia I believe that it was deliberate destruction.
minsredmash spiralpad
You don't' understand my friend. Neither France no GB wanted had any intention to join forces with Russia - I already explained. Stalin overplayed the French and British whose policy of Hitler's appeasement was designed to stir him to attack Russia instead of going West. It gave us almost 2 years and hundreds of extra territories to prepare for the war. That in the long run ensured our great victory. After all dust is settled this move will go to the text books as one of the most brilliant diplomatic victories in history.
minsredmash Mkubwa
Not sure what are trying to say. Germans killed 6 MILLION poles and would keep killing them to the end if not us saving them from total instinction. Russians lost 600,000 men just liberating Poland alone. And instead of a simple gratitude we get all kind of bs from them. Thanks.
When poles are claiming "soviet occupation" it may be embarrassing to them but we didn't kill them like Germans did, They had their own government (not independent but at least of their own nationality), courts, army, police, education, language and culture - none of which they would ever get under Hitler. So, I'm not buying any of the criticism.
Don9000 BarnetisBack
First, from where I was watching events unfold as the USSR began imploding, what you call Gorbachev's idealism looked a lot more like realism.
The involvement of a number of Harvard types, or Wall Street types, as advisers during the early years of Yeltsin's rule doesn't exactly measure up in my book to much. Yes, yes, I'm sure they made plenty of mistakes and were at times more or less delusional about what would happen as they tried to bring capitalist-style market reforms to Russia, but the same can be said of the Russian government under Yeltsin. My point remains: there was a vacuum of good governance and practical experience of democracy and capitalism in Russia after the end of the USSR, and the west should have recognized this fact and reached out much more effectively to guide the Russian government. Leaving it up to private enterprise, which is effectively what happened, was a recipe for what followed.
Don9000 minsredmash
Seriously?. Get real. The pact was welcomed by Stalin because he knew it gave him access to territories he coveted. You can read the pact in translation here: http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/1939pact.html. As the actual pact makes clear, in the secret part of it, the USSR fully intended to use it to justify a vast political power and territory grab (and the USSR denied this part of the pact up until its collapse):
"Secret Additional Protocol.
Article I. In the event of a territorial and political rearrangement in the areas belonging to the Baltic States (Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania), the northern boundary of Lithuania shall represent the boundary of the spheres of influence of Germany and U.S.S.R. In this connection the interest of Lithuania in the Vilna area is recognized by each party.
Article II. In the event of a territorial and political rearrangement of the areas belonging to the Polish state, the spheres of influence of Germany and the U.S.S.R. shall be bounded approximately by the line of the rivers Narev, Vistula and San.
The question of whether the interests of both parties make desirable the maintenance of an independent Polish States and how such a state should be bounded can only be definitely determined in the course of further political developments.
In any event both Governments will resolve this question by means of a friendly agreement.
Article III. With regard to Southeastern Europe attention is called by the Soviet side to its interest in Bessarabia. The German side declares its complete political disinteredness in these areas.
Article IV. This protocol shall be treated by both parties as strictly secret.
Moscow, August 23, 1939.
For the Government of the German Reich v. Ribbentrop
Plenipotentiary of the Government of the U.S.S.R. V. Molotov "
minsredmash Don9000
I read this a few times before :)
What is wrong with returning our land back? Polish territories that Stalin got were occupied by Poland as a result of the Polish aggression in 1920 war and belonged to Russia for hundreds of years. They were populated by Ukrainians and Byelorussians, not poles. Same goes to the Baltic territories.
One interesting moment:
"In this connection the interest of Lithuania in the Vilna area is recognized by each party." Vilna was the capital of Lithuania and was stolen by Poland from them in 1920. Stalin gave it back to them for which they should be grateful for eternity. But of course they are not JThis was a very sweet icing on the cake - not only averted the imminent war but took the territories back. Absolutely brilliant.
BarnetisBack
A very good article in its central point. Wheatcroft gets it right in his distinction between the internal and the external. Russia as a country is not a threat to Europe (and, historically, it has been the other way round). The Russian power elites are often, however, a threat to its own people (as are the elites in most countries- even certain things differ country by country- I'd say there is more arbitrary, rather than regular or structural, injustice in Russia).
It's hard to establish how everything will play out (both Khodorkovsky and Pussy Riot were due to be released pretty soon in any case - and far from all the Bolotnaya prisoners have been released yet). So it's too early to say how this is going to develop - Khodorkovsky in any case has confirmed that he asked for clemency and maybe he won't play any particular political role now anyway. Still hard to tell. All the same interesting times.
Alice Ponomareva BarnetisBack
Surprisingly, as a Russian, I always feel the same. Rarely ashamed of Russia's foreign policy, and, most of the time - of the internal life.
Paul Davies
The west is fearful of an emerging Russia - particularly as it becomes more transparent and open. They cannot allow the demon to become an angel. Such a Russia would secure or attract, for certain, the Ukraine and other satalite states.
This is anathema to the west. Meanwhile, cockahoop by winning the battle for ukraine with his master ace card of a loan and cheap gas to ukraine, Putin confidently pokes the west in the eye by pardoning 25,000 prisoners including Khordokovsky, Pussy Riot and the Greenpeace protestors and takes the bullets out of western guns just in time for the Sochi Olympics.
UralMan
Wow. A measured and clever article on these pages for a change. Kudos to the Guardian!
KhusroK UralMan
My thoughts as well. Pleasantly surprised.
KhusroK KhusroK
1. I should add that in my opinion, for it is worth, Mr Cameron, Mr Hollande and THE POTUS, that is Mr Obama, simply do not have Mr Putin's skills when it comes to statecraft.
2. Mr Cameron, Mr Hollande and THE POTUS, that is Mr Obama, with due respect, seem to practice statecraft much like stockbrokers do their trade in shares and commodities; looking at prices from nanoseccond to nanosecond (poll ratings) and buying and selling (shifting policies) accordingly with little thought to the future consequences.
JamesValencia
Convincing.
The anti Russian rhetoric has always puzzled me a bit. Not because they're nice, because they aren't, but because1) They don't seem nastier than anyone else. Journalists assassinated, people imprisoned on dodgy grounds. Still, what's Guantanamo, and what are Drones, and what are wars in Iraq and Afghanistan?
2) The criticism doesn't sound honest, or objective, or something. Partly as a result of (1).
Could never put my finger on it. One of Obama's first successful policies, contributing to his nobel prize, was about cranking this down a bit. A shame it seems to be going into reverse.
Despite that: it doesn't seem right that Putin is still there. Yet what am I to be saying this, am I a Russian now ? Well no.
So what Geoffrey says, in amidst this confusion, is salutary.
Ragneur JamesValencia
While the west cuts off it's nose to spite it's face china know exactly where their priorities lie.
Beckow
Good article. It also cogently devalues the stuff that Guardian has been writing about Russia for years.
Russia has re-emerged as a strong, resource-rich economy with an attractive and growing market. This is happening only partially thanks to Putin's policies, but mostly because it is just naturally a very rich country with few people. I like to remind people that Russia sits on about 1/4 of global resources, from minerals to water, from energy to forests. And they do have nukes and can do math well.
The insane anti-Russian phobias that have been so nicely epitomized by the Guardian's articles, by Cameron in Tbillsi and Milliband in Kiev, this hysteria is a dead-end street.
All it has done is to exclude UK business (and US), from Russia. It has never had a snowball's chance in hell of achieving any tangible results, other than irritate people. And that is costly. This article is a sign of some sanity.
I don't think the professional Russia haters can ever change, but if UK and Guardian can let these dead-enders go off to some asylum where they can play Pussy Riot music, hire Saakasvilli as a bodyguard, and Khodorkovsky to run the cafeteria - well, they might be happy after all. May I suggest that they bring ear-plugs and watch their wallets....
Ragneur Beckow
It hurts Russian buisness far more.
MCJ39 Steve Back
Cameron when faced with Putin sees someone immeasurably more powerful than him, a lot smarter, far more ruthless and also someone who'd win a fistfight between the pair in about 0.2 seconds. He simply has absolutely no ammunition with which to back himself up, and knows it.
Ragneur MCJ39
He's a master, principled politician. The world needs more like him.
When US favourite Prince Bandar threatened to organize a terrorist attack at the winter Olympics unless he withdrew his objection to the Syria war he laughed in his face.
AlbertaRabbitRussia has more clout now than it has in a while. It's antics in the Ukraine and Syria are examples.
But in the long term it's a country on the wain. It's population, now less than half of the U.S., is falling (it has flattened out recently, but this is temporary). Alcholism is a serious problem. Its GDP is flat. Its economy is dependent on petroleum as the rest of the world is getting highly inventive developing new sources. And it's just not as good as America at this "capitalism" thing.
Putin might be Russia's last hurrah.
Steve Back AlbertaRabbit
But in the long term it's a country on the wain.
Haha, I think Russia's too big to fit on a wagon! I think you mean "on the wane", unless this is a form of Canadian English.
I agree though - one thing Russia has got to sort out is its low life expectancy - particularly for men, which has led to a gender imbalance.
FredinSpain
I am not surprised that Russia is like it is. After communism collapsed the west were gleeful which is fair enough but they kept rubbing Russia's nose in it for years and it's a country with a lot of proud traditions and history.
Now they have oil and gas and are using to get their own back. Handled differently without the childish triumphalism that emanated out of America and Britain mainly it could have been a different story, we might have been good friends.
pincion FredinSpain
.."Now they have oil and gas and are using to get their own back"
Who is the 'they' here. It most certainly is not the common man in the street in Russia. Russia is not in any way a democracy it is ruled by a ruthless oligarchy made up of the former and current KGB/FSB bigwigs who are rich beyond avarice since everything in Russia including all the organs of state is their private possession. No different then to the Soviet Union under the Communist Party and Imperial Russia under the Tsars.
FredinSpain epincion
Which was my point. If the west had offered genuine friendship at the start instead of "yah boo we won" it might have been a different class of people in charge and friendly proper democracy.
But they were surrounded by enemies on all sides and became paranoid allowing the oligarchy to seize power. It could have all been so different.
But "The moving finger writes ....."
exCaptain epincion
Rich beyond avarice? You don't mean rich beyond Haliburton and al-Yamamah, do you?
DrSigmundFraud FredinSpain
"without the childish triumphalism that emanated out of America and Britain mainly it could have been a different story, we might have been good friends."
America would not have been good friends with a country it had spent decades telling people was the enemy, and Britain was never going to be friends with a country America does not like.
5abi epincion
'Democracy' in common usage means a government elected through multiparty electoral process. Nothing more, nothing less. Otherwise all 'democratic' governments are actually controlled and run by people who are never elected - oligarchs, corporations, feudal lords or whatever.
MannyGoldstein
Well done. The USA, in particular, seems to always view Russia through a lens provided by people with ancient grudges against it. Putin's regime has done better for the average Russian than the free-market disaster of the 90s.
MayerLansky
The Western ruling class never found a better game for itself than the "Great Game" which began (I am sure I will be corrected if I am wrong) in the 17th Century. The US has no politics of its own but has taken over the methods of the 'sceptered Isle' - hypocrisy; piracy and the ethics of a drunken stoat.
MayerLansky
A very fine article by Wheatcroft. This is the Guardian I subscribed to forty years ago.
Thank you Sir for your insight maturity and moderation.
But please. No more salacious BLT stories about the olympics by biased agents like Reenie Stubbs and no more graphic inquests on the vagina.
If the Guardian plans to survive by pandering and demagogy it will find itself without any real long-term support. I know I do not speak for myself alone.
Prologstudent MayerLansky
biased agents like Reenie Stubbs
You mean a gay woman standing up for the rights of gay people in Russia? Is it just gay people you believe don't have rights, or are there any other groups?
MayerLansky Prologstudent
"No talk of rights without talk of responsibilities". Simone Weill.
GodsDrone
Yes, the Anglo world in particular has long had rumor-mongering as its first line of attack. I don't think future generations are going to be any more impressed than we are with our shoddy behavior.
|
|
|
kp.ru
The main driving force pulling Ukraine to Europe are Ukrainian nationalists. To answer this question, a special correspondent for "KP " Daria Aslamova went to Maidan.
Here is what she reports:
" That's imagine the driver named Yanukovich, who speed the car called the Ukraine towards the western border, and at the last minute slammed the breaks and hit the border post. Completely smashing the front, them whole hood, passengers hit the windshield, the international community is in hysterics. All ran to the crash site and give tips on what to do. And Yanukovich himself, pale, keeps saying I am not guilty, car mechanics are guilty, I'm driving it for only three years and for all this time did not notice that brakes were completely disabled by infiltrated hostile elements. I've saved all the last moment. Galichina is shocked -- the man who turned on a giant propaganda machine to brainwash the population for joining the EU, went to Europe and changed his mind at the last moment. East was long offended Yanukovich betrayal but is silent -- they mistaken still thing that he is one of them and represent their interests. Tribalism, tribal consciousness , In short, Yanukovich managed betrayed and confused everybody."
Ukrainian writer Oles Elder is ironic, take no prisoners in his judgments, but pragmatic, as a true citizen of Independent Ukraine:
" And then came Putin with 15 billion dollars. And once it became clear that cheap Ukrainians ended. Ukrainians rednecks are now expensive."
How Ukraine again reached Maidan
You are still going to laugh till you drop, as people from Odessa used to say, but essentially nobody ever read the famous Ukrainian Association Agreement with the European Union (by the way , written in English). Or rather, it was only read by completely zombified, from college bench nurtured by Americans fifth column who served as experts from Ukrainian side. Or let's call them agents of influence . Actually, when Yanukovich babbled in terror that it would be good to find out who so blatantly betrayed the national interests of Ukraine in the negotiations on the Association with the EU, and that it smells like treason - he was absolutely right .
"People who prepare documents for initialing, unfortunately, are not paid agents of influence. They are unpaid volunteers, and it's really scary - the Oleg Havic expert told us. - With paid agents it's pretty understandable. But here are ideologically brainwashed zombies, fluent in English and German, who got an excellent education in the West and they sincerely believe that those conditions of full capitulation and betrayal of national interest is what Ukraine needs. Yes, bottom three quarter of population will suffer and starve, an economic will collapse , country become a colony, but Ukraine will be forever cut off from Russia."
"In our country about 10 thousand employees of non-governmental organizations - says Ukrainian Parliament (Rada) deputy Oleg Tsarev . - More than Ukraine, Soros spends only in Africa. We can hardly find any minister or administration official who did not spend some time in training in the NGO or was not at some time an employee of the NGO . These are people who for twenty years were prepared for the task: to change the matrix Ukrainian people. And they almost succeeded."
Here is what Oleg Tsarev, the leader of the Party of Regions stresses: " We're already Europe , we are its center, so in no way will perish without European Union -- "
But there were also true patriots in Ukraine, which this summer became alarmed and demanded to translate text of the agreement into Ukrainian and post it on the government website. This despite the fact that part of the Russian-speaking deputies does not fluently speak Ukrainian, and that this economic agreement has the size of the Great Soviet Encyclopedia . Somebody hurried up. Later our people from the Customs Union were not to lazy and managed to translate the text into Russian as a gesture goodwill.
However, summer, hot, singing birds , MPs and businessmen are leaving on vacation. The mood was, why you are bothering me with you f**n Association ? But then came the "the trade war between Ukraine and Russia " ( as Ukrainian media called it) . And in fact , Russia has shown that in the case of sighing of a trade agreement between Ukraine and the EU and the abolition of customs duties it will protect its market and erect strong customs barriers to the flow of goods from the West, which will transit through Ukraine. This means that the window of opportunity closes for Ukrainian producers. Local businessman has had a stroke , and the business instantly appealed to the President of Ukraine to postpone the Association at least a year.
As the representative of the Government of Ukraine in the Eurasian Economic Commission Viktor Suslov noted
"Business was initially inert: we say, do not study the projects we will studying law when it will pass. Business is not accustomed to participate in government - says ex-Minister of Economy of Ukraine. When the serious decline in the volume of trade with Russia happened, it became clear that the inevitable consequence of signing will be the de-industrialization of the country, the loss of manufacturing, and possible death of agriculture. And that this is not a horror story, but pretty realistic scenario.
But the problem is that most of the media and most experts in Ukraine is paid by Western funds. There was a massive brainwashing of public via MSM, which all claimed that the Association with the EU is a huge plus for our state. And any government is dependent on the MSM. In essence, the government was misled by people who have entrusted to negotiate with EU."
The best way to lose independence ("nezalezhnost" in Ukrainian)
By October, the Association Agreement became a hit , the most popular detective reading matter among politicians in Ukraine . And there really was something to read . It suddenly became clear that Ukraine is committed to follow the instructions of the EU in the field of its foreign and security policy (without the right to vote and the possibility of future membership in the EU) , to participate in all civilian and military EU operations in conflict zones , to cooperate with the European Defense Agency ( I mean to abandon the remaining military technologies , which, incidentally directly affects Russia ) . With regard to moral standards the Orthodox part of Ukrainian population in the spirit of political correctness was ordered to follow certain directives. But were even curious people who tried to read very directives that Europeans do not even dare to publish in English in order to avoid scandal.
" In fact, we impose common European homosexual dictatorship - said the deputy of the Verkhovna Rada Kolesnichenko . - Protection of the rights of sexual minorities and in the future legalization of gay marriage. In addition, abolished the presumption of innocence in the employment relationship . For example, if I did not take a gay to work for some reason, he does not have to prove in court that he was discriminated against because of his sexual orientation, its me who need to explain and justify that gay was not discriminated against."
It turned out that the West does not plan to giving anything to Ukraine for free and that 25 percent of foreign trade of Ukraine already lost. And that money in the treasury is enough only for three months.
But it's just nuisance. The real deal was the establishment in Ukraine EU economic dictatorship.
"These trade agreements the EU has with many countries in North Africa , but none of them had the enslaving demand, which does not allow Tunisia or Algeria to join whatsoever trade agreements with third countries with which the EU will not agree - says economist Michael Kuhar . - In fact, the treaty of Association of Brussels gave authority to decide whether, for example, sovereign Ukraine can join any trade agreement with Russia or China or not. This is a dishonest approach. "
But the main jewel of the Association Agreement - the introduction of European standards . The word " European standards" sounded so beautiful (almost as high quality home renovation using best European materials ) that local Liberasts were awash with happiness. But ...
"This document , which is physically impossible to comply with , - assured us the analyst Rostislav Ishchenko . - In order to prevent the market to sell grandmothers homemade pickles and jams, you need to occupy Ukraine with at least half-million army. No, theoretically grandmother can produce coleslaw, but she can not sell it. Not because the coleslaw can not be made , but because it does not meet European standards. Even Lithuanians, who entered EU long ago and on more decent conditions, almost lost their agriculture, as they never managed to fit to rules."
"Yes, Ukrainian grandmothers did not produce chicken and bacon according to EU standards . And you know why ? Because they make it to a higher standard - said Ukrainian writer Oles Elderberries . - And to lower standards they can just go to Western technology and this pump chicken with hormones and water. The most striking example of European standards : express train number one Kiev - Moscow, which consists entirely of Polish wagons. I rode on it from Moscow during really low temperatures. So their clever eurowashers sensors did not work because Russian low temperatures are not Euro Low temperatures. And how conductors solve this problem ? They are pore boiling water into a bottles and pour it into the toilets to unfreeze them .
We can assume that German tanks that invaded Russia in 1941, were made by European standards. They have narrow tracks and run on petrol. But they all became a useless pile of metal near Moscow when temperatures dropped in winter of 1941. In France, the tank worked, but in Russia it ceased to start. You see, we have ( ha ha!) quote different isotherm for January"
The signing of the Association means not just operetta Maidan protesters, but real hungry and angry crowd of unemployed on the streets next year
What is EuroStandart and how much it cost to convert Ukraine to them?
According to conservative estimates , the conversion to euro standard will cost Ukraine about 160 billion Euros. After the conclusion of the Agreement with the EU all that Ukraine has - all the infrastructure, railways, roads , businesses and even the Ukrainian soil (best in Europe) ceases to comply with the technical regulations of the European Union. As economist Michael Kuhar noted:
"The basic difference between agriculture in Europe from Ukrainian that the certification of land there , that we do not have. It is necessary to make a chemical analysis of the soil, in order to determine how much herbicides it contains, and whether it is suitable, for example, to grow tomatoes. This is an expensive procedure, which costs 800 Euros per each hectare of land. And in Ukraine, 33 million hectares of arable land -- That is billions of Euros. I'm not talking about the requirements for infrastructure , on the chemical and metallurgical plants, all of which do not meet the emission standards. "
EU condescending recommends Ukraine to pay special attention to "micro enterprises and craftsmen (!)" This despite the fact that Ukraine can produce nuclear stations equipment, aircraft, rockets, military vessels, engines, railway cars, etc.
As the representative of the Government of Ukraine in Eurasian Commission Viktor Suslov noted:
"There are two key points in the agreement with the EU. First, the Ukrainian economy is not competitive with European and when imposed on a free trade zone and mutual zero custom duties. It will inevitably perish in this struggle, . - Zero custom duties calls into question the existence of entire industries . For example, Ukraine is the largest producer of sunflower seeds and sunflower oil. Export seeds we set the export duty, so we are making it more economical to process seeds within the country, and Ukraine has one of the most powerful oil extraction industry. When you abolish custom duties, the same EU will directly procure seeds and will process them outside of Ukraine. Therefore, local oil extraction industry will die.
Generally, few people understand that when you cancel the import duties, incentives for foreign investment might not increase but actually decrease. Contrary to common opinion it might be that for foreign companies it does not make sense to build new factories in Ukraine and create jobs. In this case Ukraine is becoming just a new market for EU goods. Investments in the country are often made only if they serve as a means of overcoming trade barriers when the country can not enter with the goods, and with the investment company organized in its territory. ( For example creation foreign car assembly plants in Russia. )
And the second important point: the introduction of the EU technical standards, Yes it is a revolution. Let's assume that they are the best in the world, but who will pay for such a transition ? This way a unique situation is created: the more competitive European manufacturers come here not just free of duties, but also by dictating their own rules of the game! So all Ukrainian companies do not comply , for example, environmental standards , must be shut down and give up their market share -- And again, very few people saw in this the additional problem: the introduction of European standards means cutting the whole body of the economy of the former USSR in two parts. It breaks existing economic ties and in some cases (railways) make standards incompatible with the rest of former USSR.
Destruction of cooperation means a sharp weakening of Russia as Ukraine still has some enterprises that are part of the former USSR military-industrial complex, including Russia's nuclear shield. Missiles that carry Russian nuclear armor are made by famous Ukrainian YUZHMASH factory. Engines for military helicopters are produced by Ukrainian "Motor Sich" plant. And the newest fifth-generation fighter " T-50 " will not fly without Ukrainian details. These are the key things for Russian military-industrial complex . In addition, we have lots of joint major projects : the resumption of production of aircraft type "Ruslan" , the construction of a bridge between the Kerch Crimea and the Caucasus .
Yes, Ukraine is now got between Scylla and Hayrides. When the West felt that fish can let off the hook , it made unprecedented pressure on our elite , and now actually provokes the creation of the EuroMaidan . It is time to call a spade a spade . It's not just about money . Former Polish President Aleksander Kwasniewski said it absolutely correctly: there is a geopolitical battle for Ukraine! "
Who is behind the Maidan
EuroMaidan - is a giant business project, the furnace in which hundreds of thousands of dollars are burned every day. Need to transport people from the West of Ukraine, feed them , clothe them, give them accommodation, to provide them with toilets and comply with the minimum standards of hygiene, to compensate for daily expenses. It is necessary to monitor their health, protect them, constantly entertain them, so they do not get bored and do not melt away, led them dance and walk on any pickets and demonstrations. For "Not Yet Perished" crowd (from the Ukrainian national anthem " Ukraine Has Not Yet Perished ") sing and dance well-known artists.
To understand where the money for such a huge, multi-day show come from, we must understand the system of government in Ukraine. This is an oligarchic republic in spirit Russian 90s. Ukraine is like Yeltsin's Russia in miniature with local variants of Khodorkovsky, Berezovsky, and Gusinsky running the snow.
But there is a difference between the current Ukrainian and current Russian oligarchs. As Oleg Havich noted:
"Current Russian oligarchs are more or less like technocrats. Well, they have their money, but they have provide some vital service. Much like people who work as custom officer, or policemen. Similarly some people work as oligarchs. Such people proved that he is capable to run particular business. This is quite in the tradition of the Russian Empire.
That's why Ukrainian oligarchs are so afraid of Russian oligarchs. First of all, the scale of enterprises is quite different, with Ukrainian much smaller. Secondly, the Russian oligarchs , who will come to Ukraine and will buy this company or that company, are not simply "new rich" personalities. They are simultaneously representatives of the Russian state. They might be not be Russian by nationality, but are all Russian in their actions."
As Member of Ukrainian Parliament (Rada) Oleg Tsarev noted:
"In Russia there is powerful administrative apparatus, the presidential model of republic, and the president is still the strongest player. But Ukraine is the country were the oligarchs won the political power. To explain the difference , let's assume that some sheiks from Saudi Arabia come to Russia with bags of money and ask Putin to hand Syria to them. They will be rejected as in Russia there are things that are not for sale, period. . Sheikhs will be listened politely, their money will be rejected and Russian will not surrender Syria to them.
And in Ukrainian politics such a decision is hard to imagine . For oligarchic capitalism ideal system of government is a parliamentary republic. In this case Parliament works simply as a negotiating platform between the oligarchs . Each of them have their own media , their elected representatives, which perform the function of negotiating their interest in their name: who would be given which state property, what is the cost of energy resources, and what is the level of taxes. That is, we have a basis in the form of oligarchic capitalism and superstructure in the form of a presidential republic. It's clear that there is a contradiction between two. From the point of view of oligarchs, the President has too much power"
No wonder a few days ago opposition deputy Yatsenyuk said that the opposition will fight for a return to the old Constitution , restoring Ukraine parliamentary republic in which the president is a figurehead , and actually cementing the polyarchy in the country .
As journalist Alexander Chalenko noted:
"Why oligarchs advocate signing the Association Agreement with the EU? Their business entities are all in south- east Ukraine, but the money, children, wives, mistresses, villas, accounts - are all in Europe. Everything was mover their , you know? Now if they misbehave, the Americans can closed and/or arrest them account and deny visas.
Russia began to move from this dependency in the summer. Prior to this, the oligarchs were thinking that they can settle things with Putin. But now became clear that Russia was not joking: it might close the market for Ukrainian goods. This means that there will be terrible losses and huge unemployment in the 2014, which is the election year. And that means that the opposition comes to power and will be forced to release Tymoshenko. And then Tymoshenko will put Yanukovich in the same prison were she used to be jailed. "
Politolog Rostislav Ishchenko made the following point.
"Experts and the whole Yanukovich entourage tried to convince him that in the fall of the IMF will give a lot of money without any conditions, and that he do not need to release Tymoshenko , that Putin is bluffing and will never close the Russian markets. But then it became clear that the West will give no money with pre-conditions and that 25 percent of foreign trade of Ukraine already disappeared and that the treasury has money just for three months, Yanukovich at last understood that came the signing of the Association Agreement with EU this is not an operetta Maidan, but real hungry crowd of unemployed on the streets the next year. Really angry masses who will sweep everything. That is, he will have nothing: no pants , no hat, and no horse. And the only solution exists. Even if you hate mortally Russia , no treaty with it does not obligate you to love her. Enough to stabilize the situation, to sign certain agreements, and then you can argue with Putin as you want , as it does Lukashenko . "
But once Yanukovich said that Europe can wait, oligarchs entered the game .
Oleg Havich:
"Maidan is not three heroes who are standing on the podium: Klitschko Yatsenyuk Tyahnibok . All of them are puppets. Behind them stand really serious people like Dmitry Firtash, Poroshenko , Viktor Pinchuk , and Rinat Akhmetov . The way oligarchs controlled MSM cover events on Maidan proves that their owners are the co-conspirators of the action or at least implicitly support it. That means that we see a classic scenario of palace coup attempted by oligarchs. "
writer Oles Busina:
"There is a " family " - Yanukovich , son and people close to them. Old oligarchs fear the family who in recent years has greatly increased its share . Their goal - not to destroy the family, but to limit its appetites. I.e. drive Yanukovich into more controllable limits . Why they do not want to remove Yanukovich? Because there is no good alternative to replace him. If they get rid of Yanukovich , then radical extremists like Tyagnibok will climb out of the woodwork"
How West Ukraine launched and is winning the offensive against east Ukraine
Since Soviet times, it happened that the south-east of Ukraine worked ( there were all major enterprises ), and west mainly taught and was responsible for the culture. I. e. it was West to which ideology was farmed out. After the collapse of the USSR it was the Western Ukraine which raised and promoted the Ukrainian nationalism, Ukrainian national idea, because the east had nothing to say on this subject : the people there did not feel the Ukrainians , and most importantly there never were opposed to Russian .
Oleg Havich:
"There is the expansion of the west to the east of Ukraine. Galicians are all slaves of size, they think "Bigger is better". I'm tired of shouting after them : " Dude , you should not go there -- You can't digest all of Ukraine -- "
journalist Alexander Chalenko
"As soon as a team there are two Western Ukrainians Nationalists ("zapadentzi") , they all begin to remodel for themselves, - says . - This totalitarian mentality that if you're not with us, you Western Ukraine Nationalists Moscow. To the whole of Ukraine zapadentsy are associated with the name of Bandera. And we have to admit honestly : Ukrainians are simply afraid of them. Why ? Bandera led nationalist ("banderovets") were a terrible people real beasts in Soviet time . I remember that my grandmother told me that the Soviet government sent to teach the west. (Incidentally, the Ukrainian school appeared in the West only with the advent of the Soviet Union. Before there were only Polish schools . ) Her stories struck me with unimaginable cruelty of Bandera fighters. For them it was not enough to shot people dead, they beheaded man, they cut open stomachs in women, they burned babies , that is, they committed terrible inhuman crimes...
Before the collapse of the USSR the power of central government protected us from Western Ukraine extremists. They were always for us as for you Chechens . That is, you can kill a Chechen , but then come ten Chechens and cur your throat . And our people are cowardly intellectuals . And now all of Kiev and all Ukraine is infected with Stockholm syndrome. This is when the victim begins to play along with the terrorist. We hate them so to speak conditionally: if we have an opportunity to eliminate them, we would eliminated them long too. We have way too different culture codes. And the current Maidan is Ukrainian Nationalist Maidan. On TV show only cheerful, happy faces of students and not the Bandera Gopniks, who come in large numbers from Galicia.
On Independence 2004 Yushchenko did not behave as a nationalist. He spoke of his friendship with Russia. What Bandera ? I do not even know his followers. Then you can speak in iether Ukrainian or Russian from the podium. And now, if you speak Russian, they shout "Shame! " ("Ganba! ").
Why Maidan is not a Revolution
Maidan consists of four groups of people:
- Marginal intellectuals from Kiev, who damaged their brains on the previous Maidan and who want to move to Europe ( as if somebody is waiting for them in EU)
- People brought from Western Ukraine
- Those whom you rightly call Gopnik and homeless ,
- A small amount of Kiev students and radicals, to put it bluntly , the neo-Nazi
Kievites morally support Maidan, come there for just to see the show , but do not believe the opposition . They have completely "give me decent life style" perceptions about Europe . As a security guard in the parking lot told ne: I want to finally live like human beings. People here are somehow convinced that Europe will feed them , clothe , shoe .
Now we have a paradoxical situation : there is a rebellion, called the revolution, which has one hundred times could win. And there is a power that can the same hundred time to crush them . But neither the government does not disperse the rebellion, nor the opposition is ready to takes power . Existing leaders have exhausted their moral capital . The only person who could make a revolution - Tymoshenko , but she in jail. Like all sociopath she does not have self-preservation instinct, she does not believe that she can be killed, and is therefore able to lead the people into fire.. Such people without moral brakes in such a situation feel like a fish in water. That is why she is equally dangerous for the authorities and the opposition. But with Tymoshenko for current revolutionaries situation will be much worse. She will not stop at half-measures like Yanukovich . She will strangle them all or send them to jail for betrayal. "
The fact that the leaders of Maidan do not have guts , is now clear to everyone. That's what I told people close to the government: "When one of the three opposition "heroes" was asked why they are not going to storm the building of the presidential administration, he said in dismay :" What do you mean ? They can jail me for that -- "
It can not be the leader of the revolution who is afraid of jail (a revolution - it is always a violation of the law ) , which fears to make a move for which he/she can be jailed. It would be helpful if vandals who crashed the statue of Lenin read his works. Type "Marxism and Insurrection ." in Google. And you instantly come across the famous slogan by Lenin " Procrastination in such situations is equal to death ."
Maidan now turned into idle people and crazies asylum paid by the USA. Because they does not have a leader who understands the theory of revolution . No Lenin-level figure capable of directly from the armored car to announce the "April Theses". But truth be told now in Ukraine there is no public demand for great people. It's just a cockroach races where everyone is running for their shallow goal. "
With whom Russia can speak ?With no one. And we have ourselves to blame . That's what I was told on condition of anonymity, people from " Party of Regions ":
" Our government and our oligarchs panic fear of awakening Russian reunification movement. They are willing to finance fascist Tyagnibok, but in any case will not allow Russian reunification movement to at the East. That's a night horror for Yanukovich that someone will work with his electorate. And as long as your Putin will meet with Yanukovich and enter with the gentlemen's agreements that you do not interfere in the internal affairs of Ukraine, you will lose here.
Americans working here for twenty years. For them to make a step forward , they need to spend a thousand dollars. And Russia could spend a dollar and make the same one step forward, because it is an enormous affinity with Russia in the heats of people. And now you've lost the Ukraine, because total propaganda of hatred will always be successful. People even in the east are already embarrassed to talk in Russian. Nevertheless, they still can raised against West Ukrainian fascists"
I will never forget the intensity of hatred on the evening on Maidan Square when the news came that Russia is ready to give $15 billion to save sinking Ukrainian economy and decide to lower gas prices by one third. As people shouted : "No Taiga Union -- " ( So here mockingly called the Customs Union ) . How to know that I am from Moscow, Western Ukrainians shouted at me : "You can't buy us! We are not selling Motherland your thirty pieces of silver -- We'll take your money, spend them and then spit in your face -- "
writer Oles Busina:
"And what do you want? Pro-Russian organizations in Ukraine today simply do not exist -- But there are way too many thriving grant-sucking gangs. A new generation is oriented to the west, for which the word "three fraternal nations" an empty phrase for them. Why do young people believe Liberasts? When I was a student I was also for Perestroika, and you also was for Perestroika. And we both now know how that ended.
None of us could expect that the next Russian president will be an alcoholic, that the Soviet army unconditionally withdraw from Europe that Russia will survive a demographic catastrophe, there will be first and second Chechen wars . Well we did not know that the Liberasts can not do anything.
And Kiev students also do not know that. But we need to explain that to them. We need to create a support group . Russia is trying to act through diplomatic channels and negotiate directly with officials , but this tactic does not work anymore . "
Political analyst Rostislav Ishchenko:
"On the political field, where Yanukovich is dancing , now there is no other politician. This is a trampled field. In the near future you have no one to talk to Ukraine. Americans themselves have created their partners for twenty years. You have a huge pro-Russian population in the east and in the Crimea, but you do not want to talk to them. Why ? Because it is your position : we will only work with the current legal authority. We do not want to upset Viktor Yanukovich .
If we work with the pro-Russian opposition to his course , Yanukovich will be offended us. Well, now, he likes your behavior. It's all good with him now, until his next betrayal. It's just with Ukraine you are in deep shit."
|
|
|
RC
ToivoS ---
I too have been more than a bit stumped as to why so-called liberal progressives are not more critical of all the vilification of Putin in the MSM. For example, I've found the coverage of Putin/Russia over at sites like Commondreams & Huffpo no different than what you get in the corporate MSM. It's BS. I've heard them sit back and pontificate about how "stupid" the Russian people are for supporting an "ex-KGB leader" while being oblivious to the fact that he has eliminated a majority of poverty in the country and taken the middle class from a meager 8% in 2000 to over 65% today - higher than it is in the US - which is trending in the OPPOSITE direction as the middle-class continues to dwindle. Raised the average life-expectancy from 58 to 71, made the country a G8 nation and a major power with its OWN INDEPEDENT foreign policy debt free and with cash reserves - something the west finds intolerable. When you point these facts out to these so-called US progressives that the Russian public just maybe isn't so stupid and that just maybe THEY are the ones being kept in the dark over these general facts, they don't want to hear it (just ask Mark Adomanis over at Forbes, who regular comes under attack for providing hard data on Russia from the World Bank). Hence we get exaggerated yarns about Pussy Riot, the fifth-column opposition, the ever omnipotent "Russian mafia" and Putin's dream to recreate the Soviet Union because he's the reincarnation of Stalin.
I've found that as I've aged that I've gravitated away from the usual progressive watering holes and now get my information from a wide-range of sources like antiwar.com. I don't care if it's run by libertarians or extraterrestrials, what's important is the information presented from all sides of the political spectrum. Justin Raimondo and I can agree on much even though I'm not by any stretch a fan of Ayn Rand. I've found that we have a lot more in common with others than we usually care to think.
rkka
RC"The theory of "shock therapy," with its echoes of creative destruction economics and electroshock lobotomising psychiatry, was designed to ruin Russia by people who believed that ruining it was good for it, and that purging every trace of collectivity out of society would strengthen it for the struggle of life."
Precisely. By 1994, US demographers were reporting sharply higher death rates for people in their -30s-, to say nothing of older age groups. And after a decade of it, deaths in Russia were exceeding births by a million a year.
And no one in the USG was particularly upset about it.
Now, births in Russia exceed deaths, and Russia has population growth of ~300k/year due to immigration. And the USG are deeply upset that the Russian state has taken an increased role in the Russian economy.
You read that right. The USG are more upset about how Russia got out of its demographic death spiral than they ever were about Russia's demographic death spiral itself. :
rkka #71
Yes, I think Putin is hitting all of the right "chords" which is why he's so vilified. I think the west has lost Russia (not that they really ever had it)for good and that's something they can't accept, especially after all the grandiose schemes they envisioned after the collapse of the Soviet Union. The reality is that the west does NOT like strong dependent leaders of sovereign nations, only stooges they can control. Things are changing as the empire enters its twilight. They will soon also have to accept defeat in Afghanistan and an Assad victory in Syria.
rkka
RC@73 I think the West coulda had Russia, if they had delivered serious assistance in the 1990s. Instead they left Russians to die. And sane Russians know this, which is why the Russian government have their compradore 'Western-oriented' minority, and the West itself, on 'Ignore'
bevin
rkka @71
What was done to Russia's vulnerable people by the US and its allies was genocidal.
Other nations should take warning: those pitilessly left to die had been the objects, over decades, of pretended concern and oceans of crocodile tears. These were the people who, mere months before being reduced to selling their war medals and personal effects for kitchen scraps, Radio Free Europe used to agonise over because supermarket shelves were empty or Levis unavailable.
The people of Russia must never forget what was done to them, never forget how the "west" applauded as its old people and children died of want. And they must always tell the world what western imperialism means by its sympathy for the victims of its trade boycotts, sanctions and abuses of its powerful place in the economy.
Iranians would do well to note what awaits those who surrender to the imperialists.
|
|
|
...some pro-Kremlin journalists praised the reshuffle as a long-overdue move against fifth columnists.
"The destruction of RIA Novosti is a welcome step from Putin. The systemic nest of anti-Russian information forces has been destroyed," Maxim Shevchenko, a pro-Kremlin TV host, tweeted.
Employees said they were given no warning of the announcement, and that they were waiting to hear if they would be fired or hired into the new agency.
Agnes Maria
From my perspective, from online, the copy-and-pasted articles, quoted directly from Western media, did very often times contain language inappropriate for one to use to speak about oneself, such as Russians about Russia. There would be anti-Russian and anti-Soviet jokes and language too subtle for everyone to notice, and they do get published via RIA online all the time. It does not look good and you cannot take it seriously, though it is not usually intentional. I hope we will see all straight up reporting and no sensationalised nonsense from now on.
|
|
|
A rumor Ukraine's president had agreed to join a customs union with Russia provoked fury in Kiev, where protesters are calling for a million people to demonstrate Sunday. "Twitter is like striking matches and throwing them into the dark."
|
|
|
Dec 07, 2013 | vzglyad.ru
One of the major news Saturday in Ukraine and Russia was the twit of a British journalist , which eventually had to refute both Russia and Ukraine . In it he stated that that Yanukovich at a meeting with Putin in Sochi allegedly signed an agreement obliging Ukraine to join the Customs Union. Who injected this dezo and to whom it may be beneficial ?
" The eventual accession to the Customs Union of Ukraine was achived during the meeting did not specify... The agreement includes a one-time Ukraine tranche in the amount of $ 5 billion , as well as the conclusion of a new contract for the supply of gas at a price of 200 dollars per thousand cubic meters of gas instead of serving from 2009 rate of $ 500 ."
This twit message was published Saturday in his "Twitter" employee magazine The Economist Edward Lucas . According to him, Western governments shocked by such developments .Journalist insists that his information obtained from reliable sources. However, for some reason, he published such a sensational information on Twitter, not in the media and on his page on the social network.
This Twitter message was picked up by the media who actually passed it as news. It immediately aroused very strong reaction among the Ukrainian opposition. Not surprising, since some of the headlines sounded extremely provocative - "Yanukovich sold Ukraine to Putin."
For example, one of the leaders of the Ukrainian opposition Yatsenyuk said in an interview with Reuters, that the signing of the President of Ukraine of any agreement related to the entry into the Customs Union, will lead to a new protest . His colleague in the party "Fatherland" Mykola Tomenko Yanukovych demanded unveil text of the agreement with Russia, which he allegedly signed in Sochi.
... ... ...
On Saturday, President's press secretary , Dmitry Peskov, Russia was forced to officially declare that Vladimir Putin and Viktor Yanukovych at a meeting in Sochi on Friday did not discuss the possibility of Ukraine's accession to the Customs Union .
He added that in the context of the forthcoming meeting of the interstate commission Russia - Ukraine presidents of the two countries " exchanged views on the possible continuation and development of cooperation in industry and high-tech fields , particularly in the aerospace and shipbuilding, rocket and space industry ."
According to Peskov , the presidents discussed bilateral cooperation in energy, closer positions on this issue , but did not reach a final agreement .
" The eventual accession to the Customs Union of Ukraine during the meeting did not specify . No documents to be signed during the meeting was not planned and have been signed ", - assured the administration of Ukrainian President also . Earlier, a source in the Ukrainian government said that the signing of the documents would be impossible as documents did not passed a standrd Parlament discussion process.
|
|
|
Lucas writes that Yanukovych signed a strategic agreement with Russia in Sochi today. The agreement comprises $5bln with advanced payment, $200 gas price and joining the Customs Union. In addition, he reports, Yanukovych may receive $15bln from Moscow.
Lucas writes that western governments are shocked. This is unconfirmed information but the sources are good, he adds.
Voice of Russia, RBC
|
|
|
A secret meeting between Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych and his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin in Sochi on Dec. 6 has fueled speculation as to whether a deal was made for Ukraine at a later date to join the Kremlin-led Customs Union.
Yanukovych stopped in Sochi on his way back to Ukraine from a three-day working visit to China, where he met with officials in hope of shoring up investment deals in order to stave off serious economic problems in Ukraine.
He and Putin met in the Black Sea resort city to discuss new agreements on "trade and economic cooperation in different economic spheres and preparation to the future Strategic Partnership Agreement," according to a statement released by the president's press service.
But the fact that the meeting was the fourth of its kind in recent weeks further fueled speculation that a plan had been hatched for Ukraine's accession to the Customs Union, which includes Belarus, Kazakhstan and Russia. Armenia in recent weeks agreed also to join.
Prime Minister Mykola Azarov told journalists previously that the president would at some point soon visit Moscow, where a "major agreement" would be signed.
That "major agreement", according to a Kyiv Post source within the Ukrainian government who asked to remain anonymous because he was not allowed to speak publicly about the presidents' meeting, confirmed that a money deal was reached, but provided no specifics.
But Edward Lucas, a senior editor at The Economist, said via Twitter that the results of the meeting between the two presidents were much bigger than a deal for Russia to supply cash-starved Ukraine with much necessary financing.
"Wow! Hearing Yanukovich in Sochi today signed strategic agrt w Russia includes $5BN+ up front, gas price $200 + agrt to join customs union," Lucas said, citing his own sources.
The details of the agreement to join the Customs Union, which reportedly include billions up front for the country, as well as a huge price cut on gas, were being hammered out in Moscow late on Dec. 6, Lucas wrote.
The Kyiv Post could not independently confirm Lucas' news. A Kremlin official contacted by Kyiv Post denied to comment and said only to look for statements on the Kremlin's official website. As of 11:40 a.m. on Dec. 7, the only statement posted to the site confirmed a visit by Yanukovych to Sochi.
However, RIA Novosti, the Russian state-owned news agency, quoted Putin's head spokesperson Dmitry Peskov as saying that "Putin and Yanukovych at a meeting on Friday in Sochi did not discuss the possibility of Ukraine joining the Customs Union."
"Putin and Yanukovych did discuss the current state and prospects of bilateral cooperation in the financial sphere (between Russia and Ukraine)," Peskov added. "On all these topics in the near future negotiations will continue at the expert level."
Whether true or not, the news of a potential deal for Ukraine to join the Kremlin-led trade bloc is certain to incite anger on the streets of Ukraine, where tens of thousands have protested for more than three weeks the Ukrainian government's decision to abandon long-anticipated agreements on association and free trade with the European Union.
Ahead of Lucas' news, Arseniy Yatseniuk, leader of the Batkivschyna faction, warned that the signing by Yanukovych of any agreement aimed at joining Ukraine to the Customs Union will cause a second wave of mass protests here.
"Their attempts to sell Ukraine to Russia will not lead to anything except one thing, and we are officially warning you: if Viktor Yanukovych tries to sign any agreement aimed at joining Ukraine to the Customs Union, it will cause another wave of protests in Ukraine," he said. "No one will let Yanukovych sell the country."
Kyiv Post editor Christopher J. Miller can be reached at [email protected]
|
|
|
December 8, 2013 | NYT
With the police nowhere to be seen in the city center, protesters in Bessarabia Square toppled the Lenin statue using steel cables and cranks as a crowd gathered to watch. "People were waiting for this for decades," said one man in the crowd, Leon Belokur. "Now it's happened."
He pulled from his pocket a chip of granite. "This is a piece of Lenin's hand," he said.
Once the statue was down, men took turns smashing it with the sledgehammer. Onlookers chanted, "Glory to Ukraine!" and cheered the hammerers with cries of "Good job, guys!" as they shielded their faces from flying splinters of stone. One of the hammerers wore his hair in a Mohawk; another was a priest in black vestments. The protesters mounted a Ukrainian flag on the empty pedestal.
... ... ...
Heightening the tension is a severe and urgent economic crisis, along with Ukraine's need to secure a financial aid package worth $18 billion or more. At the moment, that help seems most likely to come from Russia, but any agreement with the Kremlin is likely to spur further public fury.
Bill Appledorf, British Columbia
Looks like a rock and a hard place to me.
Russian oligarchy is obviously worse, but social democracy in Europe has long been teetering under the weight of neoliberalism.
Bill Appledorf, British Columbia
Looks like a rock and a hard place to me.
Russian oligarchy is obviously worse, but social democracy in Europe has long been teetering under the weight of neoliberalism.
DHK, Canada
> The blackmail of Ukraine
Can you please bring up specific examples of Russia blackmail.
Ukraine has been an independent country for 20 years. The voters elect freely the president and the parliament.
Once again, the revolt of the minority creates illusion of their deeply rooted problem - an unbridgable division inside the country. Of course, it is easy to blame an external force for your own troubles.
John
This article has absolutely no context. It assumes that a the majority of the country is interested in the rule of law and capitalism. They are being held in check by rigid authoritarian leaders who prefer to look backwards towards isolation and dictatorship.
The reality is that Ukraine is a confused country. About half of the people live in the western half of the country. They are Catholics and consider themselves Europeans. The eastern half of the country is Orthodox and considers Russians to be allies.
In this situation, having a cohesive political culture is almost impossible. Half the country will always be at odds with the other half. Simple "majority rule" politics do not make sense in this context.
SAK, New Jersey
Hard to understand why Ukranians are so hung up on joining EU. Look at Greece and Portugal. Do they want to be like them?
I don't think they have many products that Europeans are dying to buy from them. The great benefit probably will be that they can go to London and Paris and work their in restaurants and bars just like Romanians and poles.
Marla, Geneva, IL
NYT Pick
It seems that Mr. Yanukovich has mis-calculated. He may not have expected this level of protest when he announced that he would not sign the Vilinus accords and the actions of the Berkut have given the protest an additional urgency.
In 2004, people did not want him as president because they feared he would bring the country closer to Russia.
The disappointments of the Yushenko administration (economic conditions and corruption) led the people to elect Yanukovich. A mistake on their part, but now they know that Yanukovich cannot be trusted to bring the country closer to Europe.
This is a second part to the Orange Revolution. And it is a wake up call to the U.S. on the dangers of our increasingly unequal society. We may not consider our 1% to be oligarchs, but they do have the ear of many of our politicians.
augustians, Chicago
Yanukovich miscalculated? Even if he did, there is another election right around the corner, throwing bricks at police and taking over state property is not the brightest idea that turns all of the protest into violence.
Somehow EU and US trying to inflame it more, by throwing some gas on fire instead of trying to calm the situation, where political process can take place instead of street skirmishes.
David, Brooklyn
Do they really want to become a member of a club that would have them as members? It's won't be as economical as they think with Putin's sanctions in place.
Market decisions are about timing, not impulse buying. Can the EU handle yet another Greece? Predatory lenders: On your Mark...Get Ready...Nyet!
Judyw, Cumberland, MD
Nothing is gained by mob violence egged on by the EU. The EU felt slighted at Vilnius and is now using street mobs to restore its position.
While this violence is all about western Ukraine,. nothing is wirtten by Easter Ukraine. And deal with the EU will disadvantage the east with its coal plants and coal workers. The selfish people in the streets of Kiev care nothing about those in the Donbass section which will be hurt the most by the EU.
The better economic deal is with Russia. The EU is smoke and mirrors and a lot of pain - look at Greece, Spain, Portugal etc. and you will what the future of Ukraine will be. The populace's view of a brighter future with the EU is based on the false promised the EU makes to every country - only with membership does the harsh reality set in -- that they are 2nd class countries and the EU is two tier zone and they are in the lowest tier in which Economic progress is a promise not a reality. The reality is AUSTERITY. Their view of the EU is a mirage and they need to take off their rose-colored glasses and see the reality of the EU.
Yanukovich is making the right deal for the WHOLE country and the people need to understand that and not be swayed by rabble rousers like Klitschko. This whole think reads more like the failed Orange Revolution trying to get control again despite the fact that it was a huge failure.
augustians, Chicago
Ukraine is not Russia, not first nor the last. It is not urban, nor cosmopolitan. Somewhat more educated than your average third world country.
There is a distinction between protesting against war, and throwing capital city into chaos because of a political decision, that could easily be reversed during the next election cycle. Ukraine is on the brink of the civil war, need we have another Syria?
bruce, nara, japan&greensville, ontario
Vitali Klitschko.....hmmm. if he was in the states, he'd probably be afraid of sticking his neck out. might lose endorsements from 'blue chip' companies.....
brooklynforchange, New York City
So, basically, when protesters throw rowdy raucous, gets violent, decapitates a Lenin's statue destroying history, and U.S. media finds continuous top-of-the-news coverage, we already know what's going on.
And I am not even a leftist.
Now that Syria didn't work out, maybe, it's Ukraine.
Simon, Tampa
The tone of the Times' articles on the Ukraine protests are so hopeful that this is another Western instigated "Orange Revolution." All Yanukovich has to do is out wait the protesters as winter hits. Our politicians/corporations did the same with the Occupy protesters. However, it is good to see that the Times cares so much about the Ukrainian protesters because it certainly never did about the Occupiers.
Jim, Paris
Occupy never raised the crowds and the sympathy of the American people like this Occupy never really knew what it wanted And it withered away for just that reason
Thomas Zaslavsky, Binghamton, N.Y.
Police power also had a lot to do with eliminating our Occupy movement.
TJS, New York
The Lenin statue in central Kyiv opposite the main market almost had the status of a historical monument. It was part of the background of daily life in Kyiv. When my wife and I served in the Peace Corps (1994-96) we walked past the statue each day. That this statue has been toppled is a rather ominous sign for the regime. The statue had survived Independence, the Orange Revolution and numerous Nationalist protests. Times have changed. During my last visit to Kyiv I drank my Starbucks coffee while seated below the statue. I suppose that scene itself was a revolutionary one. This current protest, the toppling of the Lenin statue, I suspect marks a change in the quality of Ukrainian political life. I suspect the gloves are off.
Ladislav Nemec, Big Bear, CA
You prefer to spell Kiev 'Kyiv'? Closer, I think, to the Ukrainian spelling but, I think, there are no generally accepted rules how to transcribe words written in Cyrillic.
Gloves may be off but, hopefully, real weapons will not be used. Ukraine is not Egypt, Syria or Lebanon. Will it become a real battleground? Not impossible
Perfect Gentleman, New York
I too walked past the Lenin statue, and spent time in Independence Square after the Orange Revolution. I hardly think the freedom to drink Starbucks coffee is revolutionary. Rather, I think it symbolizes replacing totalitarianism with the forces of corporate capitalism and greed, a different kind of totalitarianism. Meet the new boss ...
|
|
|
zn.ua
Жители Львовской области должны устроить экономический бойкот компаниям, которыми владеют члены Партии регионов, заявил на пресс-конференции депутат Львовского областного совета от ВО "Свобода" Иосиф Сытнык.
"Нужно призвать людей бойкотировать бизнес Партии регионов, нужно активно начинать такие действия относительно их торговых марок, магазинов и их предприятий. Возле них ежедневно должны проходить пикеты, участники которых должны раздавать листовки с призывами не покупать их продукцию, возле гипермаркетов "Шок", "Рио", возле магазинов "Родынной ковбаски" - пусть эту колбаску ест только "Беркут!" - заявил он.
ннн
Смотрю я на все это и думку гадаю...Вот прошелся сегодня по центру Киева, посмотрел на это жрущее и поющее и гоцающее быдло..Все с западной Украины, коротко - запукры, смотрю как они козьи морды относятся не к своим быдлякам...Похоже надо делить Украину минимум на три части. Киев и центр, восток и запад. Запукров к ляхам нахер, восток в Москву, а вот центр будет РУСЬ или Киевская Русь.
ннн
И эти люди называют себя демократами? Эти люди собрались в Эуропу?....Без комментариев. То что делаем мы и то, что выбирали мы - демократия и то є добре...А что не наше - розстріляти, повісити...?
Ирина
А как же свобода слова, толерантность, свобода политических взглядов? Евроинтеграторы хреновые.
Киев
Да уж западная толерантность так и прет
олег
UFOвосток под властью гитлерюгенда жить не будет.
Будешь:)))) Ой как будешь:))) Под зеком живешь? А если такой смелый, так выходи на свой Майдан:))) Собирай однодумцев на своих площадях:)))
А то вы такие гордые! только комменты можете строчить без перерыва на обед:)))) Если только на это и способны, то сидите и ждите развития событий:). Видимо без востока будет решаться судьба Украины:(
олег
галичанский тоталитаризм в действии-мочи несогласных!чем эти деятели отличаются от коммунистических террористов начала 20 века?Ничем.Террор,еще раз террор.Недалеко и до концлагерей с газовыми камерами.
Игорь
игорьправильно! молодцы! Львовские регионалы это мерзкие и ублюдочные приспособленцы. Нельзя идти против своих. Во львове не должно быть партии регионов. А у нас партии Свобода. это нонсенс.
они не гитлеровцы.они нормальные люди. просто не любят русских и русскоязычных. имеют такое право.
Прохожий
Циник
"В ответ будет адекватная реакция в отношении бизнесменов из оппозиционных партий на юге и востоке Украины. такие методы приведут только к расколу. Благими намерениями вымощена дорого в ад"
"Адекватная" реакция уже продолжается три года...
Dok
Эксперты не исключают, что Евромайдан может привести даже к расколу страны. Добавите сюда фактическое отсутствие внятных вооруженных сил и абсолютную, как показали недавние события, профессиональную неготовность к подавлению массовых беспорядков - то картина получается совсем удручающая.
по сутиМайдан-1 разделил Украину на плохой юго-восток и прекрасный запад, Майдан-2 довершит этот раскол. Возможно даже ценой гражданской войны. Оппозиция явно готова на такое развитие событий и не особо скрывает свои задумки. Провокации будут ежедневно. Сейчас уже власти нужно все провокационные попытки снимать на видео и отдавать в ЕС. Блокада украинских товаров от юго-востока уже началась, об этом должны знать в Европе и во всем мире!
Циник
В ответ будет адекватная реакция в отношении бизнесменов из оппозиционных партий на юге и востоке Украины. такие методы приведут только к расколу. Благими намерениями вымощена дорого в ад
|
|
|
tussilev
"Москали - они хохляцкий век заели и в прошлом, и в будущем. З'їли все сало, затиснули весь газ, Бандеру замучили, прокляті!
Европа - прекрасна, свободна, вечно благоухает весенним барвинком. Там из волшебных фонтанов дивными струями бьют нескончаемые потоки горилки, а кому любо - тому и немецкого пива. Там белоснежно сияют озера, полные сметаны, в которых плещутся тучные галушки и вареники. По в берегам из нежнейшего сала, гуляют праздные европейцы, из карман которых сыплются золотые червонцы высочайших зарплат, пенсий и социальных пособий.
Их просто некуда девать - и щедрые европейцы дружеским мановением руки призывают к себе украинских братьев и сестёр, чтобы те облегчили им невыносимую сладость бытия.
О, свобода! О, волшебный сон! Для совершенства этого блистательного мира Парижу, Лондону, Риму, Мадриду и Берлину не хватает только безвизовых хохлов."
los_oxuenos
Хотят безвизовой Европы...
А Европа-то хочет?
zmeika_gadyka
Трусики кружевные хотят? Лучшее кружевное белье получается при длительной носке и регулярной штопке. И таки мечта сбудется.
|
|
|
Russian President Vladimir Putin has said that riots in Kiev have no direct relation to Ukraine and the EU deal, but rather it's an attempt by the opposition to undermine the country's legitimate government.
"As far as the events in Ukraine are concerned, to me they don't look like a revolution, but rather like 'pogrom'. However strange this might seem, in my view it has little to do with Ukrainian-EU relations," Putin said.
Speaking in Yerevan during his official visit to Armenia, Putin argued that the protests in Ukraine had been prepared by the opposition in advance to undermine the legitimate government of the country. However, it is "apparent" that the opposition had meant them to take place during the Ukrainian presidential campaign in March 2015, the Russian President said.
"What is happening now is a little false start due to certain circumstances… This all has been prepared for the presidential election. And that these were preparations, in my opinion, is an apparent fact for all objective observers," Putin stressed.
He has said that now the Ukrainian opposition is either not in control of the protests, or it may serve as a cover-up for extremist activities.
The footage from Kiev clearly shows "how well-organized and trained militant groups operate," the Russian President said.
Nobody seems to be concerned with the actual details of the Ukrainian-EU agreement, Putin said.
"They say that the Ukrainian people are being deprived of their dream. But if you look at the contents of the deal – then you'll see that the dream may be good, but many may not live to see it," he argued.
Putin then explained that the deal offered to Ukraine by the EU has "very harsh conditions".
The Russian government presumes that the situation in Ukraine will be back to normal, and that the Ukrainian government and the Ukrainian people will determine their future on their own.
"I want to stress that, regardless of the choice of the Ukrainian people, we will respect it," Putin said.
'Kiev riots show signs of coup' – Ukrainian PM
The Ukrainian authorities see "signs of a coup" in the attempts to block the government agencies by the protesters, but are exercising restraint, Prime Minister Nikolay Azarov said during a meeting with ambassadors from EU states and the US in Kiev.
Azarov said that some political forces have "an illusion" that they can topple the government, adding that the opposition is developing a plan, which involves taking the Ukrainian parliament building by force.
"Things have changed. On the one hand, we aren't exonerating the law enforcement agencies, but on the other hand, politicians who are joining the action now are dramatically radicalizing the situation. The mass character of the action became uncontrollable or rather controlled by certain political forces," the Ukrainian Prime Minister was cited as saying by RIA Novosti.
He then assured the diplomats that the government guarantees that force won't be used against peaceful demonstrators in the capital, and that the necessary orders to the police not to use such force have been given. The Ukrainian authorities are expecting that the opposition will also abstain from provocation, he added.
Azarov told the diplomats that Ukraine has proposed some changes to the association agreement with the EU.
"We'd like to discuss the provisions, which bother us. We'd like our initiative to be treated attentively and maybe we'll be able to achieve compromise," the Ukrainian Prime Minister stressed.
He explained that some of the Ukrainian industrialists have appealed to the government with request for the changes, as the deal would otherwise "make the Ukrainian market too open".
As the Ukrainian officials assured the EU that they had not given up on the bilateral deal, President Viktor Yanukovich on Monday stressed that he "was, is, and will be a supporter of European democratic values and standards."
Yanukovich stressed that Ukraine wants more favorable conditions for the deal because the country's economic interests are at stake. He said that a public debate must be held "so that society can give its evaluation of what we want to achieve, on what terms and why we put the problem as it is… It must be made clear that we are protecting our interests."
|
|
|
ИноСМИ
- Иван Помидоров:
По ее словам, с возвращением Владимира Путина в Кремль усилилась тенденция винить во всех российских бедах Запад, который, якобы, инспирирует деятельность оппозиции и пытается морально разложить Россию.
01/12/2013, 17:53Улыбнуло.
Белые и пушистые друзья с той стороны холма есть не могут, так хотят добра России!Помнится, они деятельно желали добра для СССР. А потом гордо и надменно пинали поверженную империю. И рассказывали, как мудро завлекли в гонку по СОИ, как вооружали душманов и взращивали аль-Каиду, как обрушили цены.
Известные доброхоты!
|
|
|
Moscow Exile says: And the Moscow metro's got bigger!Not bad for a state described as Upper Volta with nuclear weapons.
The newest station to open is Zhulebino, as reported here in KP: "Метро пришло в столичный район Жулебино: здесь открылись сразу две станции" [Metro arrives in Zhulebino region of the capital, where two stations have been opened at the same time].
It'll all end in tears, though, when he oil runs out because Russia is a typical third world state that relies on the export of raw materials and its politicians are all gangsters creaming off the gains and the USA is soon to become the number one world gas and oil exporter and Russians don't like Halloween and homosexuals and the Olympic facilities are not ready and it should be boycotted not only because all Russians are homophobes but also xenophobes and Nazis and what about Pussy Riot and and Magnitsky and Khodorkovsky and Russian orphans and freedom, goddamit!
Has nobody noticed how of late there have appeared some very vociferous critics of Russia in the MT comments to their "opinion piece" tirades against all things Russian who follow the line that those that don't automatically criticize Russia (namely Mark) are in the pay of the Kremlin AND that they are in their own way the polar opposite of LR, in that both such parties are wrong? This gives the impression that such commentators are speaking objectively, but then they go on to criticize Russia – anthropomorphized as Putin, of course – in the same, tired old way.
Misha says:
Concerning intelligently presented English language pro-Russian advocacy: the problem is that the available perks aren't as great in contrast to those with a different take.One example is the RIAN link that Karl posted further above this thread.
Meantime, Al Jazeera America has hired at least 12 big name American mass media TV reporters and hosts. From the looks of things so far, RT's hiring of Larry King is a put mildly questionable move. Apparently, there wasn't enough money to keep the US edition of VoR as available to the US market on AM radio.
kirill says:
The west is one giant Potemkin facade. Here in North America the wealth is really only skin deep. The trick is to sweep the poverty under the rug like they did in New York a few years back. Pauper Russia is putting the west to shame with these infrastructure projects. Canada can't even afford to set up a high speed rail link between Toronto and Montreal (its two premier cities). You can go about 150 km/hr on the rickety track while the Sapsan does 250 km/hr on tracks I have heard being dissed by western drones as inferior to the what one finds in the precious west. If Russia wanted, it could upgrade the track and have the Sapsan do 350 km/hr.As for oil. Harper is trying to make Canada some Saudi Arabia of non-conventional oil. When I read business articles on the tar sands expansion all I see is adulation. But Russia is bad, bad, bad for doing what Harper can only dream of. Misha has posted a link to an article about the slaughter of Christians in Syria. It sums up the scum that is the western media. Naturally, it will pour excrement on Russia while boosting local regime achievements. It has no substance.
peter says:
The Sapsan is a German train.Moscow Exile says:
And it seems that the Russian government could afford to buy Sapsan off Siemens. I travelled in a new luxury train this summer to Anapa and neither the locomotive nor the carriages were made in Germany. The toilets on board were all vacuum operated and the whole train was air conditioned. it was a very comfortable 36-hour journey to the south that my family and I enjoyed and far better than any that I have experienced in my native land.peter says:
And it seems that the Russian government could afford to buy Sapsan off Siemens.
Spain bought it too, so what's your point again?
Moscow Exile says:
Idiot.marknesop says:
The USA was looking at it, too, for a rapid-transit network in Florida, and there was speculation that it could replace AMTRAK if it proved out. I don't know what ever happened to that proposal, though.The Streetwise Professor, much as I dislike most of his Russophobic sniping, made a good point people often do not get about high-speed rail. It was a massive success in Europe, and was very nearly the death of commuter aviation because it was nearly as fast and a fraction of the cost. But destinations in Europe typically are not separated by enormous distances as they may be in both Russia and the USA. This makes it less economical, and as he also correctly pointed out, people have become irrationally enamored of it and tend to see it as a savior for every situation when it has its limits like any other mode of transport. For instance, I used to argue that high-speed rail might help stop the dying of outlying towns in Russia as the population draws in to the large cities, but he quite correctly suggested just because there was a rail link to a town did not mean there would be any practical reason to go there, and that high-speed rail was being increasingly touted as a miracle it was not. High-speed rail does not necessarily imply infrastructure and civilization are going to spring up everywhere it goes, and the global movement to cities is a common phenomenon in the sense that it is common to every developed country.
marknesop says:
Misha says:Most at the MT are not much of a challenge, you may have noticed, although the one calling himself "Joe Hill" (which might be his real name or might be a riff on the legendary "Man Who Never Died", writer of protest songs and labor union organizer Joe Hill) appears very knowledgeable of both current affairs and world history, not to mention having the view of Russia of a resident, although a very contemptuous one in many respects. But not entirely unreasonable.
What about the flip side?
http://us-russia.org/1907-four-cultural-misconceptions-russians-have-about-americans.html
Moscow Exile says:
Well, my children often ask me why Americans hate Russia and the Russians. I try to put them right about this, namely about the danger of making universal statements, and also inform them that very many from their daddy's country seem to have a pathological dislike for Russia and the Russians as well, which saddens them greatly.
They don't think that all US citizens are rich, though: they're old enough (the two eldest, of course) to realize that there are rich and poor in all societies and are very aware of the fact that there are very many stinking rich in Moscow as well as drunken, homeless men and women and low paid people: in fact, they have begun to ask me why I don't get paid more.
As regards obesity in the USA, my children have heard rumours of this, but the only US citizens they see are actors on TV shows or in films. I ask them to recall an American colleague of mine who used to visit us when they were very small: she's from Manhattan, from an old, posh Manhattan family now resident in Connecticut, and she's really petite.
Russian kids' attitudes to the USA may be revealed by this "anecdote" that I found my 12-year-old daughter chuckling over. Somebody had posted it to her on vKontakte (the biggest social network site in the Evil Empire):
Приходит Обама к гадалке и спрашивает:
- Скажи, пожалуйста, что будет через 10 лет?
- Через 10 лет будет война с Россией.
- Не-е-е, это не интересно. А сколько через 20 лет в Нью-Йорке будет стоить хотдог?
- 15 рублей.
marknesop says:
Another one who says don't smile at Russians in Russia because being friendly is not appreciated, except she expands on it to suggest Russians get the misconception that Americans are stupid because they are too smiley. I'm damned for my virtue, in other words. Try walking around any large American city and directing a big sunny smile at everyone, see what kind of response you get. Or any big city anywhere, really. People are more cynical because a stranger smiling at them often suggests they are seeking an excuse to engage you in conversation, which may not be welcome f Or a hard-luch story, which will end much the same way.or a variety of reasons, not least of which is you fear them making you a business proposal which will involve you giving them some of your money, never to be seen again.
|
|
|
Я уже писал, что Бжезинский никакой не последний самурай Запада, а тот ещё флюгер.
Читаем. Сначала это:
"Россия - обанкротившаяся во всех отношениях страна, которая должна в ближайшие годы погрузиться в хаос, нищету и беспрерывные этнические конфликты.Россия - это "черная дыра", не обладающая никаким геополитическим выбором в своей жизни, потому что по сути речь идет только о ее физическом выживании в чистом виде. Россию необходимо разделить на части, она тогда будет состоять из рыхлой конфедерации европейской России, Сибирской республики и Дальневосточной республики, которым бы по отдельности было бы гораздо легче устанавливать тесные экономические отношения с Европой, новыми центральноазиатскими государствами и с Востоком. Однако какая-либо интеграция России в расширенный мировой порядок Запада невозможна, Россия слишком отсталая страна, экономически доведенная коммунизмом до нищеты, и поэтому более-менее подходящим демократическим партнером для США она стать не в состоянии. Россия - побежденный геополитический конкурент, и занимает место ослабленной, отсталой, проблемной и окруженной со всех сторон страны, которой отказано в роли сколько-нибудь уважаемого геополитического игрока."
З.Бжезинский, "Большая шахматная доска", 1997 г.
А теперь это:
"Если Западу не удастся заключить долгосрочный стратегический союз с Россией, то это может обернутся для него глобальной изоляцией. Тем более это важно, учитывая нынешнее сближение Китая и России. Мировое доминирование одной единственной державы – США в мире больше невозможно, вне зависимости от того, насколько она сильна или слаба. Особенно это касается ситуации, когда на мировую арену вышли новые региональные державы. Запад всё же может избежать участи мировой изоляции и международного оттеснения на вторые роли. Но для этого нужно вдохнуть в него новые, живительные силы и разработать новую стратегию и план действий. Для Запада эта Новая Стратегия, должна заключаться в том, чтобы суметь интегрировать Россию и Турцию в международную систему Запада."
З.Бжезинский, "Стратегическое прозрение", 2012 г.
|
|
|
August 16, 2013
Mark wrote in The Sucking Sound of Receding Credibility: MSNBC's Chris Hayes Drops the Ball
Posted on by marknesop... ... ...
The first was the media pillorying of Russian pole-vault 3-time gold medalist Yelena Isinbayeva, for her broken-English remarks which were solicited by a reporter at the world championships in Moscow. Isinbayeva was asked – indirectly – for her opinion on the new law which prohibits the dissemination of "homosexual propaganda" to minor children: more specifically, she was asked for her thoughts on the action of two of the Swedish athletes, who had painted their fingernails in the colours of the rainbow, either to demonstrate their defiance of Russian law or to show their support for gay rights. She replied, in part, "If we allow to promote and do all this stuff on the street, we are very afraid about our nation because we consider ourselves like normal, standard people. We just live with boys with woman, woman with boys…everything must be fine. It comes from history. We never had any problems, these problems in Russia, and we don't want to have any in the future."
It's never a good idea to respond to a complicated and controversial question, especially one with such loaded international implications, in a language which is not your own, because the press will decide what you meant. And, sure enough, the wires lit up immediately with "Isinbayeva Condemns Homosexuality!!!!"
... ... ...
Anyway, two points – Isinbayeva's remarks were instantly characterized as a condemnation of homosexuality…but the actions of the Swedish athletes were not portrayed as an endorsement of homosexuality. No; they were cast as the far more noble "support for gay rights".
... ... ...
Next up, Chris Hayes, the headliner. Chris Hayes honchos a talk show for MSNBC, called, "All In". Although he has been so partisan lately in his attempts to out-gay the gay that it might as well be called "All Out". But we'll leave that up to the MSNBC programmers.
So, just yesterday, Chris started his show with a short video clip which showed a skinny older man being roughly handled by a beefy younger-looking man in a white polo shirt. The younger man holds the older one so he is helpless, and a blonde woman enters the frame. She slaps the older man hard in the face, and shouts imprecations at him – she may even have spit on him, it's hard to tell. A container of water is thrown over the man, and he stumbles away to derisive laughter. Freeze frame – enter our host. Adopting a tone of solemn outrage and making chopping and pointing gestures to emphasize his thoroughgoing disgust, Chris intones, "That video is one of the more disturbing things I have seen in a very long time. And it's just one of the many like it posted to the web depicting gay men in Russia being lured on the internet into meeting up in person, only to be accosted, harassed, insulted, humiliated and beaten for the cameras. It is a sickening illustration of what is happening in modern-day Russia…"
Is it, Chris? I'm afraid not. The beefy guy in the white polo shirt (thanks for the tip, Peter) is one Maxim "Tesak" Martsinkevich, a former neo-Nazi who currently occupies himself as leader of a vigilante group which hunts not gays, but….pedophiles. The skinny guy in brown is not gay – well, he might be, but that is not the offense which has attracted their attention. He is a pedophile, a diddler, a sexual predator who preys upon children. The blonde woman is the child's mother – as she approaches, Martsinkevich introduces her in a cheerfully conversational tone; "Eta mama malchik" (this is the boy's mother).
The clip has nothing whatsoever to do with the gay issue, and was merely pressed into service because it shows the desired degree of physical violence to backdrop Chris's hyperbolic proselytizing ("Deeply, deeply, deeply evil", in case double-deeply evil did not quite get the fabricated point across). However, nobody said a word about it not portraying violence against gays. Notably, not self-proclaimed Russia expert Julia Ioffe, who has lived in Russia, can say "Sheremetyevo" and speaks fluent Russian. Wouldn't you think the phrase "This is the boy's mother" would have been a little jarring in a video which purports to show violence against homosexuals? Is it possible a person who has lived in Russia as a journalist and can say "Sheremetyevo" and considers herself an expert on Russia does not know who Maxim Martsinkevich is?
Or is it simpler than that? Have we entered an era in which the press no longer cares about journalistic accuracy, and the news has just become a farcical carnival of push-polling bullshit in which no technique is too low as long as it sells the product to the rubes and sends 'em on their way happy that they have their finger on the pulse of world events? Just like the BBC's use of a grisly photo of windrows of shrouded dead little bodies to showcase the sickening murder of civilians in the Syrian town of Houla, at the hands of government forces. It was revealed within hours to be a fake, a photo actually taken in Iraq nine years previously. The BBC apologized, but if it had not been pointed out the impression would have been allowed to stand, and decent people the world over would have shaken their heads in dismay and muttered, "Something must be done about that fucker Assad". Just like now, when those people must be muttering "Something must be done about those gay-hatin' fuckers in Russia".
"Russia is where the USA was (on gay rights) 30, 40, 50 years ago", Ioffe burbles confidently. And she knows, because she is an expert on Russia. She told us so.
I hope not, Julia. Because here's where the USA was on gay rights 40 years ago. In 1973 in New Orleans, a "troubled individual" named Roger Nunez started a fire in the stairwell of The Upstairs Lounge, a gay bar. It rapidly spread to the bar itself, and in 16 minutes 29 people were dead. Three more died of their burns shortly thereafter. One man flung himself, blazing, to the street, where he died. Reverend Bill Larson, unable to escape a barred window, clung to the frame and slowly burned to death in terrible agony; his charred body remained visible from the street for several hours.
But that's not the story. The real sense of where America was on gay rights was revealed in the public's reaction. A cab driver was quoted in the newspaper as saying "I hope the fire burned their dresses off". Radio talk show jokesters cracked "What will they bury the ashes of queers in? Fruit jars". It remains the largest massacre of LGBT people in American history – yet national television networks covered the fire for one night, immediately after it happened, and never mentioned it again.
kirill:
Naturally no mention of children. And I'd like some examples of legal harassment of gays in Russia. Sorry but gay pride parades are not a litmus test. Cases of actual abuse by law enforcment of gay individuals has to be shown.
marknesop:
Here's one of the comments from that article, which hits enough of the high points of self-righteous assholery to be regarded as a sterling example of the discipline. The article does, I mean; not the comment. The comment fills me with hope.
"As a gay man, I take no issue with Russia prohibiting sexually explicit material and sexually oriented "advocacy" of any kind from being directed at minors.
What I do take offense to is having my sexual preference used as a commodity by social engineers to undermine the values and basic religious, familial, and social cohesion of the society I live in, and wielded as a political weapon against the people in lands abroad, in this case as a form of anti-foreigner propaganda.
I am also over the irony of an organization like the ADL being the biggest purveyors of hate in this world."
Are you interested in running for President, Bogart Brezinski?
kirill
The only one who bothered to point out the fact that the law is aimed at protecting minors from sexual advocacy aka peddling in the whole pile. The western media is in a sorry state when the comments to articles have more content than the articles themselves.
MilesN says:
Intersting opinion piece here
http://www.odnako.org/blogs/show_27210/ (Russian) Although it's broader in scope than just assesing media reponse.
marknesop:
SFReaderThat is interesting. I noticed also in the comments "Do not be in too much of a hurry to abandon the Eurasian Union". True. An overlooked effect of an attempted Sochi boycott is economics and reduced investment in Russia over ersatz outrage. It also points out the reverse of the reality that the United States cannot boycott anything else of much significance from Russia, because Russia has its energy exports and they are a globally-traded, stateless commodity. But the reverse is that Russia cannot use energy exports to strangle the USA, for the same reason – if there were a way to make just the USA pay triple or quadruple for its energy imports without affecting the rest of the world, the gay campaign would fizzle out in a week or two, there just would be no stomach for it. But that can't be done.
Russia would likely be best served to increase its relations with China, because the Chinese economy is going to be in direct challenge to the American economy sooner rather than later, and to continue modernizing its pipeline arrangements with Asia, so that it can be sure of steady income from reliable customers. Outside that, Russia might as well abandon any attempt to patch things up or explain on the gay issue, because every word it says is being spun to get it in deeper. The country should just nod and smile every time a western journalist asks a question, and say nothing.
Incredible post at DailyKos from purported Russia "expert"http://www.dailykos.com/story/2013/08/12/1228471/-Understanding-Russia-s-homophobia
marknesop:
I'm afraid I stopped fairly early, at the point he referenced Miriam Elder and opined, "Elder got most things right". I'll try and force myself through the rest, but there are quite a few flags that it is going to be the same old slop, complete with that popular canard about the two different terms for "Russian" indicating a class society complete with untermenschen.
Many who attempt to capture the whole gay-rights thing in Russia make the same mistake, or perhaps it is deliberate; confusing people's private opinions established by polls about homosexuality with publicly-expressed prejudicial behavior against it. People are entitled to their own opinion, and it is true that a majority in Russia – according to polls – believe homosexuality is unnatural and an undesirable social deviation. Yet many of those people, probably most of them, are prepared to keep their opinions to themselves and follow a laissez-faire policy on it. Surveys suggest populations in western democracies are much more tolerant of homosexual behavior in public, but this is not generally reflected in the laws governing public behavior and in reality there is little difference between the legal environment in Russia and the west on this subject.
Western societies are prepared to believe that the private opinions Russians hold on homosexuality translate directly to intolerance expressed on the street for it.
kirill:
So much of the behaviour of the west vis a vis the rest of the world and Russia in particular is what I term "guilt transfer". All of the things that westerners are guilty of are ascribed to foreigners multiplied by some factor. Those Russian "untermenschen" are not obsessed with foreigners (at least not the minorities from Central Asia which are in their neighbourhoods and associated with trouble) as much as westerners. The west has no history of foreign (non-west) invasions and aggression, but Russia has a rather bloody history of invaders from the east and the west.
kievite
Mark,I think that this recent provocation (and this is a provocation, with the expectations that Russians do something stupid in the heat of the moment, increasing the damage) can be called a "Deranged Pussy Worship Syndrome. stage II". There is probably a pipeline of such things actively "developed". So this is not the first, not the last and we need to see it as such.
Same script, same financing, same eyes and ears pleasing uniformity of Western MSM, which make former staff of Pravda and Isvestia just approvingly nod for compete assimilation of the "party line" meme ("Journalists are frontline soldiers of the Party and pen is equal to bayonet").
One thing that should be noted is that Chris Hayes is just a sock puppet. Handlers are much higher up.
Looks to me like a two-move chess combination:
- Move 1 (attack under false pretenses) http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/othersports/athletics/10245582/World-champion-Yelena-Isinbayeva-criticises-Swedish-athletes-for-supporting-gay-rights.html
- Move 2 (Semi-retraction, after damage as done): http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5jlrmKlRBdLBlRucQtm-zHM1L1v2Q?docId=CNG.8d91d5cc30cb443769a27edeaf4441db.931&hl=en
http://news.yahoo.com/isinbayeva-says-she-may-misunderstood-091508029.htmlWith Pussy Riot BBC was heavily involved in organizing and staging this provocation. Now looks like the US MSM take the center stage. And BTW sodomy laws were active (albeit not enforced) in many USA states as late as 2003 ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sodomy_laws_in_the_United_States ) and general attitude in southern states and Utah is probably very similar if not less tolerant then in Russia.
I wonder what is the net benefits for the USA and their Western allies in supporting this "protest". Sure this is a distraction for Russian government, but it is a pretty minor one. They get used to worse.
In my view this will just generate an new wave of anti-Americanism in Russia. It is already common to call Europa "Gayropa" and Americans "pindocy" (neoliberal fifth column became "pod-pindosoviki", which have definite negative connotations).
kirill:
This was the point I made earlier, the west is cultivating a backlash in Russia. I think it is all down to imperial arrogance. In the west this propaganda campaign pushes the right buttons: western denizens feel good about themselves and the moral superiority of their countries and societies. At the same time, the western deciders think that Russian public opinion is of no consequence. This seems related to their belief that with enough theater and BS they can install clowns like Navalny into power. Basically, they think that Russian opinion of no consequence. Perhaps they think this since it is so easy for them to manipulate the public in the west. Well, Russia is the "unwest" so they better buy a clue.
marknesop:
Yes, I mostly agree. The Anglosphere really does not give a tin weasel for gay rights in Russia, and except for a few well-meaning activists this latest action is merely a cynical push to abort or ruin the Sochi games as payment for Russia offering asylum to Edward Snowden. Significantly, though, the USA appears not to notice that the baying pack of support has largely gone silent – much of the world agrees Russia had little choice under international law, and that the same law had been used many times to forestall Russia, often with much less grounds to compel belief. All that stupid flapdoodle about Boris Nemtsov being a prisoner of conscience, my, yes, the west is perfectly willing to buy that and sell it on, but it will not even refer to Snowden as a whistleblower in print, insisting on calling him a "leaker" instead. It's all about image management and message control. The NSA snooping was broadly unpopular in the world as well. That all said, the rest of the Anglosphere seems quite ready to jump on the "anti-gay" bandwagon, at least the UK is right there ready to take orders as before, so perhaps the USA sees a joint benefit; create another problem for Putin, with the potential for more yelling about repression when the inevitable anti-gay backlash hits as more people become resentful over the trouble brought to their door by the gay minority, plus an opportunity to regain its standing in the world after an embarrassing stumble.
Russia will be able to ride it out, and it's even possible the rainbow excitement will run out of gas before 2014 although the Anglospheric media will do all it can to keep it alive and fresh. But it's important to remember that every day is a new day, and there is lots of time, too, between now and then for the USA to step on its own dick and make a horrible mistake or for there to be some new scandal which will put it in a negative light itself. I just wish Russia was better at PR.
kirill:
Yes, Russia does not have the skilled spin meisters of the west. This is a much less developed "political technology" in Russia. But I also think it reflects the rather crude Russian approach. The sensitivity to appearances is much lower than in the UK and its derivatives. I don't think this reflects IQ but some sort of cultural divergence.
I think you meant Khodorkovsky as Nemtsov is free to engage in liberasty. Yes, it's pathetic when a oligarch crook and quasi-mafioso is deemed a "prisoner of conscience". It's an insult to all the existing an previous prisoners of conscience.
|
|
|
The American Conservative
"There have been times when they slip back into Cold War thinking," said President Obama in his tutorial with Jay Leno.
And to show the Russians that such Cold War thinking is antiquated, Obama canceled his September summit with Vladimir Putin.
The reason: Putin's grant of asylum to Edward Snowden, who showed up at the Moscow airport, his computers full of secrets that our National Security Agency has been thieving from every country on earth, including Russia.
Yet there are many KGB defectors in the United States, and Russia has never used this as an excuse to cancel a summit.
The Washington Post and Wall Street Journal are delighted, hopeful that cancellation presages a more confrontational policy toward Putin.
But is a second Cold War really a good idea? And if it is coming, who is more responsible for it?
From 1989 to 1991, Mikhail Gorbachev agreed to let Eastern Europe go free and withdraw his troops and tank armies back to the Urals. The Soviet Union was allowed to dissolve into 15 nations. In three years, the USSR gave up an empire, a third of its territory, and half its people. And it extended to us a hand of friendship.
How did we respond? We pushed NATO right up to Russia's borders, bringing in Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Rumania, Bulgaria, even former Soviet republics Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia.
European objections alone prevented us from handing out NATO war guarantees to Ukraine and Georgia. Was this a friendly act?
Would we have regarded post-Cold War Russian alliances with Cuba, Nicaragua, Venezuela, and Mexico as friendly acts?
To cut Moscow out of the Caspian Sea oil, we helped build a pipeline through two former Soviet republics, Azerbaijan and Georgia, and, thence, under the Black Sea to our NATO ally Turkey.
In the Boris Yeltsin decade, the 1990s, U.S. hustlers colluded with local oligarchs in looting Russia of her natural resources.
In the past decade, the National Endowment for Democracy and its Republican and Democratic subsidiaries helped dump over governments in Serbia, Ukraine and Georgia, and replace them with regimes friendlier to us and more distant from Moscow.
George W. Bush sought to put an anti-missile system in Poland and the Czech Republic. Neither country had requested it. We said it was aimed at Iran. When my late friend, columnist Tony Blankley, visited Russia in the Bush II era, he was astounded at the hostility he encountered from Russians who felt we had responded to their offer of friendship at the end of the Cold War by taking advantage of them.
Putin is a former intelligence officer, a patriot, a nationalist.
How did we think he would react to U.S. encirclement of his country by NATO and U.S. meddling in his internal affairs? How did American patriots in the Truman-McCarthy era react to the discovery that Hollywood, the U.S. government and our atom bomb project were riddled with communists loyal to Josef Stalin?
Why cannot we Americans see ourselves as others see us?
Why is Russia still supporting the brutal regime of Bashar Assad in Syria, the Post and Journal demand to know.
Well, Russia has a long relationship with the Assad family, selling it arms and maintaining a naval base on Syria's coast. Did we expect Russia to behave as we did when our autocratic ally of 30 years, Hosni Mubarak, was challenged by crowds in Tahrir Square?
We ditched Mubarak and washed our hands of him in weeks.
Russia stood by its man. And does not Putin have a point when he asks why we are backing Syrian rebels among whom are elements of that same al-Qaeda that killed thousands of us in the twin towers?
Is the Syrian war so clear-cut a case of good and evil that the Russians should dump their friends and support ours?
If the Assad family is irredeemably wicked, why did George H.W. Bush enlist Hafez Assad in his war to liberate Kuwait in 1991, a war to which Damascus contributed 4,000 troops?
There is another reason Russia is recoiling from America.
With the death of its Marxist-Leninist ideology, Russia is moving back toward its religious and Orthodox roots. Secretly baptized at birth by his mother, Putin has embraced this.
Increasingly, religious Russians look on America, with our Hollywood values and celebrations of homosexuality, as a sick society, a focus of cultural and moral evil in the world.
Much of the Islamic world that once admired America has reached the same conclusion. Yet the Post is demanding that our government stand with "the persecuted rock band" of young women who desecrated with obscene acts the high altar of Moscow's most sacred cathedral.
Upon what ground do we Americans, 53 million abortions behind us since Roe v. Wade, stand to lecture other nations on morality?
Afghanistan, Iran, Syria, trade, arms reduction-we have fish to fry with Putin. As for our lectures on democracy and morality, how 'bout we put a sock in it?
Patrick J. Buchanan is the author of "Suicide of a Superpower: Will America Survive to 2025?" Copyright 2013 Creators.com.
|
|
|
I wonder whether this guy should undertake a psychiatric evaluation after publishing this opus.
AUGUST 8, 2013
Moreover, the compromises the Obama White House has made are consistent with the administration's overall policy preferences: avoiding foreign interventions wherever possible, and putting "diplomacy" before security on missile defense. But a better test of realism is when it requires compromising core tenets of either principle or policy.
Handing over Syria's rebel leadership so Assad can consolidate his grip and "end the human suffering" of that civil war would be a realist move.
Or, on the flip side, agreeing to write off Georgia's western aspirations for Moscow allowing a U.N. intervention in Syria would be a realist move.
Or, on the flip side of the flip side, arming Caucasian separatists to aggravate Russia's security problems would be a realist move.
|
|
|
|
|
|
5:11 pm080808
Есть много аспектов в самой войне, и в событиях предшествующих ей, которые не полностью прояснены и о которых можно дискутировать. Скорее всего "туман войны" в некоторых вопросах так и не развеется. В войнах редко бывает так что ответственость за их начало полностью лежит на одной стороне, а другая - абсолютно невиновная. Позиция России, конечно же, не была безупречной. Россия поддерживала сепаратистов ("повстанцев", "борцов за независимость") в Абхазии и Южной Осетии, так же как США и западноевропейские страны поддерживали сепаратистов в Косово, до этого - развал Югославии, до этого - иракских сепаратистов-курдов, и т.д. Такие ситуации не бывают однозначными.
Но один аспект войны не вызывал соменний, и в его отношении не было никакого "тумана". А именно - начало крупномасштабных военных действий, момент эскалации конфликта, перехода от вялотекущих эпизодических перестрелок к настоящей войне. Начало войны - массированный артиллерийский обстрел жилых кварталов Цхинвали(а) ночью с 7 на восьмое августа и последующее за ним наступление грузинских бронетанковых и мотопехотных сил. Это - вполне однозначный факт, непротиворечиво согласующийся со всеми остальными событиями до и после ночи и раннего утра 8 августа.
Как я писал в то время, в то утро я находился на даче у родствеников в дальнем подмосковье, без интернета но с большим количеством каналов спутникового телевидения. Я мог сравнивать освещение раворачивавшегося конфликта на основных российских и западных каналах.
Так вот, этого главного события дня - обстрела из "Градов" и атаки грузинской армии - на западных каналах просто не было. Не то чтобы "преуменьшалось", "не заострялось внимание" - а вообще отсутствовало как факт. Никакой атаки на Цхинвал(и) для западных СМИ просто не существовало. На российских каналах уже несколько часов был виден горящий Цхинвал(и), уже мелькали картинки с первыми подбитыми грузинскими танками, показывались кадры стреляющих "Градов") - военной пропаганды самого грузинского телевидения. На западных каналах в первые часы атаки на Цхинвал на эту тему просто царило молчание, а затем, когда появились первые сообщения о движении российских войск - почти непрерывно мелькал отчаянно жестикулирующий Саакашвили (и иногда другие грузинские официальные лица), который сообщал о том что Россия неожиданно напала на Грузию.
Я не припомню такого ощущения зазеркалья как в тот день. Российское телевидение не было обьективным, в частности оно намного преувеличивало число жертв среди гражданаского населения ЮО. Но это не шло ни в какое сравнение с тотальным враньём основных западных СМИ. На БиБиСи, например, можно было увидеть прямой подлог: кадры горящего Цхинвала, взятые с российского телевидения, выдавались за результаты бомбардировки Гори российскими самолётами (что случилось позже).
Западные СМИ в тот день продемонстрировали что они могут тотально врать, а западная публика - что ей можно скормить любое пропагандистское говно, и она будет тупо жрать и не поморщится. Я не представляю себе подобного в российских условиях - в случае явного вранья официозных СМИ есть немало альтернативных источников (не то чтобы они лучше, но они другие), подобная информационная блокада просто невозможна. Ничего кроме отвращения и брезгливости к этой глобальной машине вранья, в которую превратились тогда западные СМИ, и к тупому плебсу, потребляющему её продукты, у меня тогда не осталось
dark_beer
August 9 2013, 21:22:57 UTC link Collapse
. Я отлично помню, как в тот день, днем по Московскому времени (уже больше 12 часов шла война), решил посмотреть новостные сайты ведущих американских СМИ. На сайте Fox News, например, важнейшей новостью была новость о принудительных общественных работах, которыми за что-то наказали Бой Джорджа. Вот это партийная дисциплина, подумал я. Главред "Правды" времен Сталина и то более свободен был.
diman24
"Война Грузии и Осетии – версия для домохозяек. Ни те этим, ни эти тем на фиг не нужны. Это война Америки и России. Пробный шар. Разведка боем. Тест на вшивость. Чужими руками? Да. Массовые жертвы с обеих сторон? Для большой политики это мелочи. Ну, а как непосредственно начались боевые действия? Как обычно, с военного преступления – артиллерийско-ракетного удара по Цхинвалу." http://www.segodnia.ru/content/17192
Если исходить из этой версии - то в принципе понятно, почему было такое освещение темы..
anti_b0b
Alexandre SorokineAugust 9 2013, 22:40:15 UTC Edited: August 9 2013, 22:58:46 UTC link Collapse
. Помню визжание этой дуры Кондолизы Райс Символично, что сегодня она себя проявила опять полной дурой: Интервью сегодня CBS :Rice told Rose,
"The Russia of today is a diminished power. It still has nuclear weapons. It still has a security council veto. But it is, on any given day, the 14th, 15th or 16th largest economy in the world, in a world in which economic power matters."
Но вообще интересно как работает вся эта механика синхронных фильтров/сливов в западных СМИ. Я несколько раз замечал такую ситуацию, когда вдруг из всех рупоров и утюгов, включая самые приличные газеты, телеканалы, и информагенства, одновременно начинает переть какая-то совершенно несустветная ахинея. И война с Грузией это далеко не единственный случай. Примерно то же самое происходило во время климатгейта, отравления Литвиненко, убийства Политковской, ну и некоторых менее крупных событий. Я не представляю как такое может происходить при наличии всяких редакторов, служб фактчекинга, и пр. То есть ясно, что журналисты это наименее морально отягощенная когорта образованных людей, но как они добиваются такой одновременности?А что касается невозможности такого в России, то тут у меня сомнения. Думаю, что современные СМИ могут впарить любую ахинею кому угодно, когда угодно, и как глубоко угодно, но за единственным исключением: такая информация не должна близко касаться слушателя. Человек полезет перепроверять информацию только если она ему нужна для совершения каких-то действий лично. Все остальное --- художественная литература, и действие должно развиваться по правилам жанра, т.е., деления на плохих и хороших, победы добра над злом, и в.п.х.
lapsus88
. Плебс и сейчас охотно заглатывает западную пропаганду, в том числе посредством т. н. оппозиции, которая ему навязывается в качестве избавителя от личных проблем.
trf413
>ощущение крайней мерзости
это не мерзость. это информационная война. а на войне надо воевать, а не взывать к морали и совести нападающего. ну и воевать нужно умеючи. а вот с этим у нас не очень пока.
ded_port_sam
Да, атака была массовой... Но бывали проколы. На один из каналов пригласили в прямой эфир девочку и ее тетку, только что вернувшихся из ЮО. Ведущий лепетал о мерзких русских, внезапно напавших на миролюбивую свободолюбивую Грузию... А женщины эти сказали, что они спали в гостях у родственников в Цхинвали, и ночью ГРУЗИНЫ обстреляли город, что все горело, люди гибли, и они бежали из города в чем были, и хорошо, что ПОТОМ пришли русские войска и всех спасли... Но CNN продолжала гнать вранье нон-стоп...
|
|
|
August 7, 2013 | The American Conservative
I'm not sure that Obama's decision to "snub" Putin at the G-20 meeting will be all that important in the end, but Jacob Heilbrunn is right when he says this:
The more Obama seeks to challenge Putin, the stiffer Russian resistance will become.
This is a point that is often lost on Americans and Westerners that demand that their leaders "stand up" to Russia, since many people in the West seem to think that the Russian government would behave in a significantly different fashion if only more Westerners did more to shame or "punish" it. We wouldn't expect our political leaders to respond to a foreign government's pressure by making concessions and heeding its demands, so it's strange that so many people seem to think that Russian leaders are going to be impressed by increased pressure. If the goal is to get Russia to make changes or concessions on any issue, we have seen over the last decade that this isn't the way to do it. There are some issues, especially domestic Russian ones, where foreign pressure is not just ineffective, but can be genuinely harmful to the causes it is trying to aid.
As rebukes go, Obama's cancellation of the bilateral summit meeting with Putin isn't that strong, but it could and probably will be used as a pretext for greater antagonism on some issue. It goes without saying that the decision to cancel will have no positive effect on Moscow's internal conduct, its asylum decision on Snowden, or any other outstanding disagreement between Washington and Moscow, but then it isn't intended to have that effect. This is a decision primarily meant to placate American critics of Russia, who predictably won't be satisfied with this gesture, and to save Obama the trouble of a meeting that would likely have been fruitless anyway.
Fran Macadam:
"The only thing he seems enthusiastic to discuss in Russia is gay rights…"
And don't forget, in gay marriage rights (the single civil liberty issue in the whole wide world now that the US actually upholds) like everything else he does, he was against it, before he was for it.
cecelia :
I think this is a mistake – we need to get beyond this petty stuff and think bigger – newer – as if we had some confidence.
Putin does Obama a favor keeping Snowden in Moscow – no trial – no congressional hearings – the whole thing goes away.
Meanwhile – Obama should act as if the Snowden thing is no big deal – not to a confident US – and get on with Putin re: substantial stuff like arms control – Afghanistan – world wide terrorism etc.
Grumpy Old Man says:
This decision stems from a classic misapprehension in US foreign policy – that refusing to recognize or talk to foreign régimes is an effective sanction. Especially when taken from our moral high horse, the effectiveness of such tactics is illusory. It stems from an exaggerated view of our national specialness and virtue.
Moreover, we take in Russians all the time, including Chechen murderers. That's part of life in international relations. Tell Obama to take a Valium and call Putin in the morning.
Fran Macadam:
"… if Republicans want democratic accountability … "
It appears irrefutable, from their embrace of the mass surveillance turned inwards upon the American people, and now revealed to be shared with other agencies, who then fake the evidence trail to maintain unaccountability, that most of both of the political duopoly don't favor accountability. After all, elections are a nuisance – and they make it "legally" impossible to break the stranglehold away from them.
Obama has gotten a great deal of bipartisan support for his intransigence – the latest attempt to try to reign in rampant domestic spying for any purpose at all, was only rebuffed by the extra support he sought, and got from Republicans.
WorkingClass:
We have an American seeking political asylum in Russia. It used to happen the other way around. An American is fleeing tyranny. Putin knows what the whole round world knows. If Snowden is returned he will become a political prisoner in the American gulag along with Private Manning. Obama has made a fool of himself with his petty and vindictive persecution of whistle blowers. Now he makes it worse by his childish snub.
Obama should make a gift of Snowden to Putin in a gesture of good will.
cecelia has it right.
kievite
This situation has become really worrisome. But for a different reason.
While Russia should be a natural ally of the USA, there are powerful forces in both countries (and first of all in the USA) which do not want that. And recent events give them a new ammunition, especially strong for Russian side (after all it was the USA which implicitly tried to break into Medvedev's correspondence via its UK poodle.)
As Putin recently remarked the USA does not need allies, it needs vassals. The imperial policy makes cooperation very limited, if possible at all. At the same time antagonizing Russia has its own costs, although they are much higher for Russia, then for the USA: nationalistic Russian forces now openly claim that the USA is a fascist state, bent on the world domination which wants to partition Russia. They revived the slogan '¡No pasarán!' and push for rapid remilitarization at all costs, which would be a disaster for Russian economy.
In view of this, discussions of popularity of Putin above look to me somewhat detached for reality. He is in the position of TINA in Margaret Thatcher's words, or Obama on steroids, if you wish :-). In other word his power is in the ability to balance forces that would be at each other throat instantly, if Putin is gone. There is no other alternative acceptable to more or less wide faction of Russian elite.
Transnationally-oriented part (aka Russian fifth column ;-) , which would support somebody like Navalny, is too afraid of the Russian society (which remember Yeltsin's years) and even more afraid to lose everything (including probably freedom, if not lives), if it gambles on a wrong person.
Nationalists would prefer somebody more anti-Western, but have no any candidates with national standing. For then Putin is too a pro-Western and, especially, pro-German. They want a new Stalin. So you can imagine the political views of a politician who can come to power, if they win.
kievite
WorkingClass says:
> We have an American seeking political asylum in Russia. > It used to happen the other way around.
Actually one of previous cases was Lee Harvey Oswald.
Andrew
@Kievite
nationalistic Russian forces now openly claim that the USA is a fascist state bent on the world domination which wants to partition Russia.
Man, you overshot by about 15 years. This theory was in rotation in the so called "patriotic" media, together with mythical Dulles speech and Thatcher's "partition and depopulation" dreams since….oh my….1996-97. Then, of course, Yugoslavia happened. I also have huge issue with "nationalistic forces".
Kievite
>Man, you overshot by about 15 years. This theory was in rotation in the so called "patriotic" media,
> together with mythical Dulles speech and Thatcher's "partition and depopulation" dreams since….oh my….1996-97.
> Then, of course, Yugoslavia happened.>I would say that The Grand Chessboard has more influence. And Yugoslavia was a huge red flag, a game changer. That's when most of Russians really became hating NATO. And after that their views were reinforces by Cheney flirt with Khodorkovsky (who almost sold his properties to the USA), Iraq, war with Georgia, to name a few. Senator McCain is also a huge help. See http://www.foxnews.com/on-air/your-world-cavuto/2013/06/27/sen-mccain-russia-refusing-turn-over-snowden
And if you just search the term "Russia" on "Foreign Policy" website you will see from the titles that weakening of Russia is still on the agenda.
> I also have huge issue with "nationalistic forces".
I feel your pain :-). Of course this is more complex phenomenon them "we want Stalin back". But a part of then do want that and there is campaign of reassessment of his role. See http://cuamckuykot.ru/stalin-kept-russia-and-the-church-11944.html. At the same time there is no question that they want to eliminate most of Yeltsin-created oligarchs.
|
|
|
Aug. 4th, 2013
Прямо таки разрыв шаблона
Tags:
|
|
|
- alex
- edmonton canada
....You see Putin is looking for a good man. He's surrounded by mediocrities such as Medvedev & Surkov, and frankly after-what will be eighteen years- being in power for so long..he's tired. He's looking for a good, strong man to replace him. He's studying Navalny, testing him..
Navalny's mission is to win-'run or else'- the mayoral election. Energize the electorate.
Putin can't throw this guy under the bus. Look at him. This is no craven oligarch or born again crook. This is one of Mother Russia's sons.
- Cody McCall
- Tacoma
Why do I get the impression Russian 'justice' is arbitrary and capricious, pretty much whatever Putin says it it? And if Navalny walks today, will Pussy Riot walk tomorrow? And if not, why not? I have to admit, though, Putin is a lot more entertaining than Brezhnev.
NYT Pick
- Sandy Reiburn
- Brooklyn, NY
Two brave men who've been willing to be the David(s) to the super-powers Goliath(s). Navalny and Snowden have been willing to put themselves in harm's way.
Mr Navalny (and Pussy Riot) has courageously resisted the apathy which has allowed Putin to steal back Russia's Democratic process. Mr Snowden, by his whistleblowing (with no personal monetary gain!) has heroically exposed the theft of our guaranteed rights to privacy and our failed so-called representatives: Congress which has been asleep except when asked by their lobbying buddies to legislate on their behalf.
To see apathy countered by men such as these...to watch less "evolved" democracies...Turkey...Egypt...amongst others... rile up citizens who refuse to abide business as usual is heartening. It is also embarrassing to contrast our own shams as they play out. Let's not forget how Occupy Wall Streeters got tear gassed...pepper sprayed and water cannoned.
One only needs to look at the Selma to Montgomery civil rights marches to know that NO ONE-NO GOVERNMENT will hand over powers to be shared. We get the government we deserve.
- ian rutherford
- Monaco
The fact you are desperately trying to hide is that Mr Navalny's (and Pussy Riot's) attempts to steal back Russia's Democratic process has been courageously resisted by the Russian People, overwhelming majority of whom always did always will support Putin.
NYT Pick
- mobocracy
- minneapolis
It's easy to typecast Putin as a run-of-the-mill totalitarian thug, getting rich on cronyism and corruption while suppressing dissent through imprisonment and the occasional extrajudicial killing. While it's hard not agree, I occasionally wonder if it's may more nuanced than that.
Prior to taking over, Russia was a post-Soviet train wreck -- rotting Stalinist industries that made shoddy products no one wanted, a nearly failed state dominated by organized crime and corruption with little hope for improvement.
I sometimes wonder if keeping that mess together and trying to make any headway doesn't take all the totalitarianism he can muster. It's got to be difficult to stay one step ahead of political rivals (differentiated from democratic rivals such as Mr. Navalny), organized crime and while still trying to project an image of Russian power despite the decrepit state of the military.
- moskvich
- USA
This is, indeed, very strange. Perhaps, even worrisome. Should Navalny fear for his life while out of prison? Would Putin's cronies go so far as to arrange for some thugs to attack, cripple or kill Navalny and make it look like bad luck?
- Paul
- White Plains
The train to the Siberian gulag is waiting at the station in Moscow, and the engine is running.
- makhanko
- Vancouver
In the bizarre word of politics, Snowden's presence in Russia probably influenced the turn of events with Navalny. Putin is putting on an anti-American show for Russian voters and at the same time trying to not piss off "our american partners" too much. As another reader pointed out letting Snowden stay in Russia and jailing navalny would be too much even for Putin to handle. Obama already signalled that he may pass on the G20 meeting in Russia - that would have been a big black eye to Mr. P. So he thinks he outsmarted everyone by giving a temporary reprieve to Navalny until his appeal is pending, letting things calm down and after that still locking him up for 5 years.
- HKGuy
- NYC
Wait, the Russian people actually won a round. Pinch me, I must be dreaming.
- Missouri Reader
- Missouri
I assume that Navalny is now expected to flee Russia and surrender his investments to a Putin crony. Win, win for Putin.
- Yulia
- Russia
If he was to flee, he could have done it before the trial. Why would he wait till the bail?
- George in SOCAL
- Southern California
Pussy Riot and Magnitsky? Give me a break.
When flaming, broken-heart liberals want to complain to Mr. Putin, he readily responds with "I thought you were here to talk about Iridium."
In an increasingly economically interdependent world, it's about Resources. Read up on F. Buckminster Fuller, then maybe I'll grade your paper.
- junius
- Brutus
Come on! The point was to get him off the ticket. His conviction does that. He can go to Venus, now, for all Putin cares. As long as he doesn't run for any Russian political office there.
- junius
- Brutus
Sometimes I think that much of the current disarray of Russian society was aided and abetted by American businessnmen being allowed in to the stricken USSR first, back in 1991, before European, American, Japanese and UN agencies could determine what was most needed.
I always remember how the Post Great War epidemic & famine in Russia, druing the Civil War , was completely cured by Herbert Hoover and his band of true believers, Got a Nobel, didn't he?). The Reds stole much of the food and all the credit for saving the people, and thus, the future GOP President aided and abetted the USSR's rise to power, making more than a half century that much more bloody and miserable.
Nevertheless, taking a page from the history book, when it was clear that the Communists had ridden the Soviet Union , almost to death; rather than send in diplomats and statesmen and maybe a Marshall type plan, we lent money to the broke, and made bad deals with criminals. None of our people had read "The Gulag Archipeligo" by Solzhenitsyn.
Now we are back in the bad old days and we have no leverage. So, to top it, our first black President chases our last hero to earth in Russia, threatening them, unless the remand him, that we will sanction them, which will hurt us as much, or more than them.
It reminds me of :
"We have to defeat the Communists in now Vietnam! Otherwise, if we give up Vietnam we'll have to fight the Russians on the beaches of California!"
- Robert
- Palo Alto, CA
"...our last hero..."? Give me a break! Snowden is a thief who betrayed his country. The materials he stole will now wind up with an enemy government. He wants to have it both ways: steal the secrets and be immune from prosecution for doing so. Sorry, doesn't compute
- Jack
- Illinois
After Aleksei Navalny's release he was asked if he would now assist the efforts of Edward Snowden. Mr. Navalny then said, "Who?" You know, they tried to tell him, that American at the airport with national secrets. "Well, I don't know about any American tourists but please excuse me, I have a lot of important work to do."
- dannomusic43
- Michigan
Almost everyone on planet earth is Alexsei Navalny.
If he is imprisoned then we are all imprisoned.
- Adrianne
- Massachusetts
Putin couldn't possibly lock up Navalny and give Snowdon asylum at the same time. Even he couldn't sell that lie with a straight face.
NYT Pick
- C T
- austria
I'm extremely happy for you, Mr. Navalny! I have been following your ordeal the entire time in great distress and your freedom means a great deal to me and to all those in Russia and around the world who believe in you. This was happy news in what is daily happening as our world spins in chaos, injustice and despair. It is indeed quite rare these days to find a man of your integrity and courage.
I have always been a voracious reader of Russian poetry and literature. I have always wanted to visit Russia because I want to be in the country who bore men like Tolstoy, Dostoyevsky, Chekhov, Bunin, Gorky, Pushkin, Pasternak ( whom I proudly share the same date of birth with!).
Sadly, I can't do that right now. When people such as yourself are put through an ordeal and given a sentence in prison, when those women of Pussy Riot who are mothers of young children who need them are taken away from their children and severely punished, when people are oppressed I can not travel and expose myself to a country whose values are so vastly different than my own.
Your freedom is something I celebrate in my heart! I hope your courage is strengthened and just know that people all over the world have a deep admiration for you.
One day I will have my Moscow Nights!
- MJT
- San Diego,Ca
Putin the terrible, shows flexibility and releases Navalny.
The question arises?
Would we ever see that happen in the USA
- Robert
- Palo Alto, CA
The key is whether his sentence is revoked. I suspect it will not be, all in the name of protecting "the integrity" of the Russian judiciary. This just calms the public just as the protests were gathering force.
- Chaetoons
- Idaho
Daniel Ellsberg comes to mind. And Ellsberg wasn't given a temporary reprieve, but received full exoneration.
- Sandy Eggo Scott
- Spring Valley, CA 91977
And Snowden seeks asylum in this land of Putin repression? Looking into the face of that Russian former KGB head, I do not see the eyes of a man whom inspires trust; too bad, Dubya, but I sure don't see in him what you seemed to have noticed when you first met Vladimir face-to-face.
Mr. Snowden, think twice about choosing Russia for shelter; there are at least three South American nations which seem willing to give you aid and comfort; anyone of which seem a much safer option than that land ruled by the iron fist of "Vlad the Impaler."
- RLS
- Virginia
- Verified
How do you propose that Edward Snowden gets to Venezuela, Bolivia or Nicaragua when just last month the US pressured four European countries into barring the plane carrying the Bolivian president from flying over their airspace due to concerns Snowden was on board – an unprecedented action? The US, France, Spain, Portugal, and Italy are violating international law by denying Snowden his unassailable right to asylum.
USA Must Not Persecute Whistleblower Edward Snowden
http://www.amnesty.org/en/news/usa-must-not-persecute-whistleblower-edwa...Before we start judging the actions of Russia (and other countries), we should examine the record of our own government:
- Guantanamo
- torture
- renditions
- the drone program and targeted killings, including civilians and American citizens
- indefinite detention without due process, including American citizens (the NDAA language is so broad it could include journalists or peaceful protesters)
- a war on whistleblowers who have exposed government waste, fraud, abuse, and illegality
- spying on all Americans and citizens of other countries
- an illegal war in Iraq and an unnecessary war in Afghanistan
- RGH
- Washington, DC
If the Czar only knew.
- George in SOCAL
- Southern California
Discretion being the better part of valor, he'll have plenty of time to ponder before once again opening his mouth.
Vlad's got the stones and the muscle to back him up. Unlike our mis-Administration, he's not singing Kumbaya or getting touch with his feelings.
He's got one thing on his brain: making Russia the strongest country on the planet. And Nothing and Nobody will get in the way of his Cogent plans.
You don't have to like him to Respect him, which is more than many can say about the newest lawyer in the White House.
- RLS
- Virginia
- Verified
"We call on the Russian government to cease its campaign of pressure against individuals and groups seeking to expose corruption, and to ensure that the universal human rights and fundamental freedoms of all of its citizens…" – Press Secretary Jay Carney
Does anyone else see inconsistencies here?
When Russians expose corruption the US sees that as a good thing. When US citizens (Snowden and other whistleblowers) expose government wrongdoing they are charged with "aiding the enemy."
The administration talks about protecting universal human rights, but the US sets a different standard for itself. Asylum is an unassailable right under international law. It should not be impeded. Yet, the US has revoked Snowden's passport, used bullying tactics to pressure and intimidate countries into denying asylum to Snowden, and a plane carrying the Bolivian president was barred from flying over the airspace of several European countries over concerns Snowden was on board – an unprecedented action – and rerouted to Austria.
Our constitutional law professor, Nobel prize-winning President has morphed from Candidate Obama who promised transparency and to change the way Washington works in to an unrecognizable figure. Sad.
Whistleblowers Blast NSA Programs, Award Edward Snowden for Truth-Telling
http://www.accuracy.org/release/whilstleblowers-blast-nsa-programs-award...
- jeff
- New York
Bravest man on the face of the earth. His wife is probably 2nd bravest.
- Bignightsky
- San Francisco, CA
Clearly the purpose of this temporarily release is to encourage Navalny to flee the country. That is the outcome Putin seems to prefer with anyone who opposes him. Khordorkovsky's fate was clearly meant to be a warning to others.
While brave Russians like Navalny deserve great respect and support during their campaigns against Putin, it would also be perfectly reasonable and probably even intelligent to just flee at this stage along with so many others. At this points it's just about self-preservation.
- Neweryorker
- Brooklyn
If it was purely about self-preservation, he would not have put himself in this position in the first place. He's a braver man than that. Leaders and revolutionaries do not put their own needs before that of justice and freedom, my friend.
- Bignightsky
- San Francisco, CA
@neweryorker
You are absolutely right. It would just be such a shame to see Navalny go to prison for so many years as so many have that came before him. But there is no question that he is a great man who puts his country ahead of himself.
- Petunia
- Ontario Canada
I was ecstatic to read this news this morning. Hopefully he can stay out of jail but unfortunately doubtful. I am still in shock about the rules for homesexuals not being allowed to exist. ..even tourists are arrested for just holding hands! Makes me glad to be a Canadian.
- atolstoy
- Maryland
In Russia it is perfectly legal to be homosexual.
You can do whatever you want privatly, but not in public or in the media, where children can see it.
- Petunia
- Ontario Canada
To me that's the same as illegal....imagine ur walking with ur friend of the same sex and ur mannerisms give someone the right to arrest u? No thanks.
- Sofianitz
- Sofia, Bulgaria
Leading Putin critics exist primarily in the minds of American propagandists, on US Special Forces budgets. Putin enjoys the enthusiastic support of the great majority of Russian citizens.
- Socrates
- Downtown Verona NJ
I'm sure Kim Jong-un polls very well in North Korea also, Sofianitz.
Decades of oppression, tyranny and political legerdemain have a tendency to warp one's civic outlook.
- Jack
- Illinois
I will have to tell you. I very much enjoy to see Vladimir Putin also. His unique swagger, with one arm pumping as he walks. How he communicates with animals, proving very strongly his manhood. I tell you, I like that, as do the Russian people.
Vladimir Putin reminds me so much of ChickenHawk in the FogHorn Leghorn cartoon series from Warner Brothers and Bugs Bunny cartoons. I am also a big fan of the Warner Bros. cartoons and am so happy to see ChickenHawk come to life in Vladimir Putin.
Don't worry, Putin has friends in America, only not in the way you might think.
- ITGuy
- Northeast US
Sure "Putin enjoys the enthusiastic support of the great majority of Russian citizens."...what OTHER choice do they have?
Criticize him, and end up just like Mr. Navalny...or even worse...dead. As MANY of his critics already have...and many more will...as long as that thug and his cronies remain in power.
- Patricia
- Pasadena, CA
Maybe Putin has finally pushed the Russian people too far. After Pussy Riot and Magnitsky, perhaps people are remembering why they turned their backs on the system in August 91. Putin is only able to do these things because the public supports him. I have a feeling that his polls are getting lower every day.
- Aredee
- Madison, Wi
Theorem: power is what you can get away with.
- filosurfer
- Oakland, CA
It's good to hear that Navalny was released but how long will that last? Unfortunately, I see Navalny going back to prison when Putin grows tired of him again.
Why put on any pretense of a representative government or following the rule of law at this point? After all the nefarious ways in which Putin has held on to power, they should just call the government as it is - a dictatorship.
- Abby S
- Vancouver, Canada
Amazing news--it's wonderful that Mr. Navalny has been released--but freedoms in Russia still are dearly bought and still may be revoked at any time. Still, for now it's a good news story.
|
|
|
|
|
|
June 28, 2013 | The Natest
Regular readers of The Natest would not be at all surprised by the reaction of Vladimir Putin and the Russian government to the latest requests of the Obama administration-to cease its support of the regime of Bashar al-Assad in Syria (and facilitate Western efforts on behalf of the anti-government forces) and, most recently, to detain the NSA leaker Edward Snowden in the transit area of Sheremetyevo Airport and return him to face charges in the United States.
In the May/June 2007 issue, Alexey K. Pushkov (who is now the chairman of the International Affairs Committee of the Russian State Duma) outlined Putin's frustrations with the actions of the U.S. government and chronicled the Russian leader's growing disillusionment with the prospects of ever establishing a real partnership with the United States. Putin's narrative describing how the U.S.-Russian relationship has unfolded in the years since the end of the Cold War-something Pushkov discussed in that essay-is critical to understanding why he has not been particularly eager to do any favors for the Obama administration.
Last year, in the January/February 2012 issue, Fiona Hill and Clifford Gaddy specifically warned U.S. policymakers that if they wished to successfully engage Putin, "they would be well-advised to pay attention to and play to his sense of history." Americans are perfectly free to disagree with and challenge Putin's view-but ignoring it altogether is not an effective approach.
Putin, along with many current Russian officials, believes that the United States deliberately exacerbated Russian weaknesses during the 1990s in order to geopolitically profit at Russia's expense, that commitments made when the Soviet Union still existed (such as not expanding NATO eastward as a price for German reunification) were thrown out the window once the USSR collapsed and could no longer contest the West. Russian officials accept as axiomatic the premise of the Melian dialogues-that the strong do what they want while the weak do what they must-and concluded that U.S. humanitarian rhetoric about spreading democracy and securing peace and freedom was just that-talk to cloak the achievement of geopolitical objectives. (Russians today will cite how U.S. concerns about freedom and regime change in Syria, where Russia has vital strategic interests, don't seem to apply to Bahrain, whose Sunni minority monarchy is a vital ally for the U.S. in the Persian Gulf.)
Putin had thought the 9/11 attacks changed the U.S. strategic calculus, and he was prepared to offer a series of quid pro quos that would, in his mind, enhance both Russian and American interests. Facilitating the U.S. arrival in Central Asia and closing Soviet-era facilities in Cuba-even over clear opposition from many parts of his own government-fit into his view that a new U.S.-Russia relationship could be based on the principle of ruka ruku moyet-one hand washes the other. Over time, however, he began to feel that Russia was giving but not receiving. Indeed, Pushkov identified the perception that the United States had torpedoed the efforts by Putin's aide Dmitry Kozak in 2003 to broker a settlement for the frozen conflict in Moldova-which would have created a loose federal government between the central area and the separatist regions and kept Moldova in a permanent "neutral" status-as the start of Putin's disillusionment. While his personal relations with George W. Bush remained friendly, Putin was far less supportive of U.S. requests and was no longer inclined to make significant Russian concessions for the vague assurances of American goodwill.
Putin was prepared to give the "reset" between presidents Dmitry Medvedev and Barack Obama a chance; he put no obstacles to Medvedev attempting to forge a new relationship. But he never dropped his skepticism-and he believes events have proven him right. Medvedev cancelled key defense contracts with Iran, allowing new sanctions to move forward there, and did not instruct his UN ambassador to veto the resolution that authorized a no-fly zone over Libya in 2011. But Russia was not compensated, in his view, for the Iranian cancellation; and when it came to Libya, the Russians thought what they were abstaining on was an effort to create Iraq-style safe havens for refugees, which served instead as the pretext for active measures to be taken against Muammar el-Qaddafi. Proposals for a negotiated settlement were set aside in favor of using Western combat power to overthrow Qaddafi.
Civil unrest broke out after Putin's announced return to the presidency and the way in which the Duma elections were conducted at the end of 2011. He seized upon the U.S. role in funding some civil-society organizations, as well as statements made by then secretary of state Hillary Clinton in favor of the protestors, to once again see an effort, under the guise of promoting values, to weaken Russia.
The frosty first meeting between Obama and then prime minister Putin never warmed up to a closer personal relationship, and the growing divergence over a variety of issues-from missile defense to Syria-has not improved matters. Some conservative critics of the Obama administration cite some of these policies as proof that the United States has, in recent years, been overly deferential to Russia. Washington dropped objections to Russia's entry to the World Trade Organization and did not use its leverage to pressure for further change or to agitate for Russia to withdraw its support for the separatist regimes in Abkhazia and South Ossetia that declared their independence from Georgia. The Obama administration cancelled the proposed deployment of a missile-defense system in Poland and the Czech Republic, and as administration spokesmen themselves have noted in recent days, sent back to Russia people accused of crimes who had fled westward for attempted refuge.
But from Putin's perspective, the U.S. did these things not as a favor to Russia but to further U.S. interests. WTO membership benefits American companies-and at any rate the old Jackson-Vanik legislation was promptly replaced by the Magnitsky Act. Obama may have cancelled specific items of a Bush missile-defense program, but he has not abandoned missile defense for Europe, but merely shifted the emphasis to seaborne platforms, with components still scheduled for deployment in Romania and perhaps even Poland by the end of the decade. The United States sends some criminals back to Russia but has also given shelter to others-including Chechen separatists Moscow views as terrorists.
On the other hand, those areas where the U.S.-Russian relationship works are the ones where there is a clear balance sheet. The Northern Distribution Network for NATO forces in Afghanistan works because the Western presence in Afghanistan has served Russian security interests and the network itself has led to lucrative contracts for Russian businesses. Allowing a major U.S. oil company like Exxon access to the Russian Arctic enhances the competitiveness of the Russian oil industry and in return, Rosneft, the Russian state oil company, has been given access to projects in the Gulf of Mexico.
Putin is simply not inclined to do any favors for the United States. On Syria or on Snowden, he will not change Russian policy unless he can be shown how a shift towards the American preference clearly benefits Russia. Washington cannot expect altruistic sentiments to guide Putin's assessments-and it will have to decide whether it wants to bargain or not.
Nikolas K. Gvosdev, a senior editor at The Natest, is a professor of national-security studies at the U.S. Naval War College. The views expressed are entirely his own.
Image: Wikimedia Commons/kremlin.ru. CC BY 2.0.
|
|
|
According to accounts that first appeared in Ronald Asmus's 2010 book A Little War That Shook the World: Georgia, Russia, and the Future of the West, the U.S. National Security Council's "principals committee"-which includes the president, vice president and other senior national-security officials-considered the use of military force to prevent Russia from continuing its assault on Georgia. Officials discussed (but ultimately rejected) the option of bombing the tunnel used by Russia to move troops into South Ossetia, as well as other "surgical strikes."
The fact that officials at the highest levels of decision making in the U.S. government even discussed military action against the world's only other nuclear superpower is profoundly disturbing.
|
|
|
Xinhua English.news.cn
BEIJING, Dec. 7 (Xinhuanet) -- It seems a forgone conclusion that Russia's ruling United Russia party, led by Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, has won the State Duma elections.
However, the result, as well as the earlier announcement that Mr. Medvedev asked the ruling United Russia party to support Mr. Putin's run in next year's presidential election, while Mr. Putin backed Mr. Medvedev to head the next government, has since met with caricature-like description by the Western media; and the Medvedev-Putin tandem is finger pointed by the West as "pseudo-democracy", only in a break with its historical tradition of one-man or one-woman autocracy.
Perhaps, were democracy merely defined by the Western examiner and measured by the only yardstick of American model, Russia could not be portrayed as a "pure" democracy.
Frankly speaking, Russia has already paid a heavy price for its "transition to democracy". To build up a brand new society, Soviet Union broke up in early 1990s, then the whole country went through a so-called "shock therapy" in a wide range from political skyline to economic sphere; further, the new Russia underwent the Chechnya war, and Moscow has since been constantly hit by terrorist attacks, with many Russians struggling on the brink of starvation.
Unfortunately, the "goddess of democracy" dressed up in the Western style never descends upon the Russian soil. Rather, the Russian people, having reeled from "confusion" and "shock", have received some other unwanted fruits, say, scorn and even hostility from the West world.
Is it that democracy is still an alien term to Russian people? Obviously not, they already have the "standard" democratic election featuring 'one person, one vote', the 'standard" multi-party political system, and the "standard" media privatization. At least for the form only, Russia has done what it ought to do in its process of seeking democracy.
But, democracy with Russian characteristics can hardly convince the Western examiner, who is so accustomed to wielding the handy sticks of democracy and human rights to drive others onto a path of democratization defined only by the Western standards.
Russia, however, remains always a unique great power in all directions. Its tanglesome past records and cultural memories, along with its obsessive state will and ideal, makes Russia most of time act of its own accord and, even if it would like to act on the Western practice, it could not be a precise docking.
Thus, it will be naïve to believe that "democracy reform" will definitely win the warm applause from the West.
U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton hit out at Russia's parliamentary election immediately afterwards saying it was a rigged one, when Speaking to the election-monitoring Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe.
"Russian voters deserve a full investigation of electoral fraud and manipulation," Clinton said.
As expected, Moscow dismissed Clinton's criticism. "With regret, we are forced to say that Washington holds onto long-outdated stereotypes and continues to hang labels, not even trying to understand what is really going on in our electoral system," stated Russia's Foreign Ministry.
Putin's world view is said to be "anti-western." He doesn't believe western countries are genuine democracies. That's perhaps why the west, in particular, American politicians have no interest in seeing the "tough guy" at the apex of Russian power. The Obama administration put out a bland statement confirming that its "reset" with the Kremlin will go on. Privately, however, the White House will not be delighted at the prospect of dealing with "prickly" President Putin again.
The authentic interest of the West has long proved not really in promoting democracy and freedom across the world, but in the fact that the West will hereby expand its interests globally. Russia's election is just in line with its own interest, far from echoing the true need of Western countries. Ms. Clinton's reaction seems understandable.
Regardless, a genuine democracy is not merely a campaign slogan, but a living force to vitalize the human society. Russia's democracy should be designed to benefit its people, not to please the West.
Manufacturing Consent The Political Economy of the Mass Media - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The Engineering of Consent - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
|
|
|
Valdai Club
But then, just when the Moscow-Washignton tango is getting to be noticed - and there are other signs too such as Obama's meeting with the visiting Russian secretary of the national security council Nikolai Patrushev - the US administration introduces a discordant note by announcing the nomination of Victoria Nuland, former state department spokesperson under Hillary Clinton's watch, as the new head of European and Eurasian Affairs at Foggy Bottom.
How come? Nuland has many virtues. Married to the well-known neocon thinker Robert Kagan, she would have acceptability among the Republicans (although Kagan has since walked into the Democratic camp.) Two, she is Russian-speaking and an old Moscow hand. Three, she is reputed to be a competent diplomat. So far so good.
But what is jarring in her career graph is also that she was the hand-picked aide to Strobe Talbott, the then all-important point person for Boris Yeltsin's Russia in the Bill Clinton administration. To cap it all, Nuland is also a former US ambassador to NATO - and, indeed, NATO's eastward expansion is the legacy of Talbott to the US's post-cold war diplomatic history, ignoring the prescient warnings by such iconic figures like George Kennan against such a move that would inflict lasting damage to the ties with Russia.
Neither Clinton nor Talbott is particularly liked in Moscow, to put it mildly. Suffice to say, at a time when Moscow is agonising whether Obama in his second term would finally show the audacity of hope to make a clean break with the post-cold war triumphalist Russia policy that successive US administrations through the past two decades more or less pursued with remarkable consistency, Nuland's appointment would create some angst in the Russian mind.
With an ambassador in Moscow, Michael McFaul, whom the Russians consider to be an expert on "colour revolution" and, now, a confidante of Talbott as the assistant secretary of state in Washington, Moscow faces a formidable challenge on the diplomatic track.
Having said that, Russians with their sardonic humour insist that in real life it is far easier to deal with the clear-headed hawk than with the self-styled dove who tends to be myopic.
|
|
|
May 20, 2013 | FT.com
There is a huge crackdown under way in Russia on corruption by state officials. The Khordorkovsky connection may be a completely irrelevant attempt to cover this. Also note, that state officials are no longer allowed to have undeclared assets abroad. Some officials may be more attached to their assets and families on the Cote D'Azur than their careers in Moscow. Why does the FT need to constantly spin such stories into Russophobia? More such officials will be flushed out. Most will try to claim a connection to some misunderstood cause celebre in Russia.
... ... ...
"He is a witness in the Yukos case," his lawyer Ruslan Kozhura said, referring to Mr Khodorkovsky's oil company. Mr Kozhura said he was prohibited from talking about the case but added that no charges had been filed against Mr Guriev. He said Mr Guriev was questioned about the circumstances surrounding the testimony he gave in Mr Khodorkovsky's defence during the former oligarch's second trial in 2010.
... ... ...
Philip Owen www.volgatrader.com
There is a huge crackdown under way in Russia on corruption by state officials. The Khordorkovsky connection may be a completely irrelevant attempt to cover this. Also note, that state officials are no longer allowed to have undeclared assets abroad. Some officials may be more attached to their assets and families on the Cote D'Azur than their careers in Moscow. Why does the FT need to constantly spin such stories into Russophobia? More such officials will be flushed out. Most will try to claim a connection to some misunderstood cause celebre in Russia.
Suspicios
It does seem that it continues to be firm interest from FT to highlight Mr Khodorkovsky's imprisonment and all the wrongdoings in relation to this. Whilst indeed there are dubious legal conduct sending him to prison it would not be hard to prove equally dubious that Mr Khodorkovsky's conduct in acquiring the control of Yukos, even though not from a legal point of view but from a moral.
This set aside it would have to be questioned if this otherwise eminent newspaper has a skewed angle when they insist in pushing an issue which otherwise have left the attention of the world, especially considering that a large part of the(now worthless) Yukos shares have been left in custody with an institution that also have a link to this paper.
Matrox 918
Let me guess
he's hiding in UK? with billions on his name right.
|
|
|
EconoSpeak
kievite... A couple of corrections: 1. Navalny is not in jail, he is on trial for creating a phony intermediary between a state company and its customers by abusing his status of the region governor adviser.
2. Guriev is accused of taking money from Khodorkovsky fund while writing his "friends of the court" evaluation of the case.
A couple of observations:
- 1. Relationship with people like Lawrence Summers protégé does not represent anything positive; moreover they suggest that Guriev might have been a member of Russian "fifth column" -- neoclassical economists who tried to sell Russia to the the west and get some change for their services. If so, escape to West is a typical development. He is not the first, London is full of such people.
- 2. Late Boris Berezovsky managed to get to the level of Correspondent member of the Russian Academy of Sciences. That does not make him less criminal, then he was.
- kievite,
... ... ...
1+, On the matter of Shleifer and Guriev's advocacy of pretty straight neoclassical economics, you have more sympathy from me, and I hinted as much in my post, and I expected somebody to bring up Shleifer, whose worst crime is not being an associate of Summers, it was the attempted coverup by Summers of his favoritism towards Shleifer after Harvard had to settle with the US government for $22 million that brought Summers down from his presidency. Shleifer is of course of Russian origins, and it was his involvement with a misuse of US AID funds in Russia in the 90s that got him in trouble.
- As it is, the closer link between Shleifer and Guriev is through the wife of the latter, who was a student of Shleifer's at Harvard. I am not at all a personal fan of Shleifer's, but he happens to be the most cited living economist and very original and inventive, despite his clouded personal history. Those who study with him tend to become excellent economists, and it is to Guriev's credit that he has hired some to be on the faculty at RESH.
Regarding Guriev's neoclassicism, most of his research is not on macro, where I would prefer to see a less neoclassical apparoach, but on micro, contract theory, industrial organization, corporate governance, and some other areas, with much of his research relevant to trying to overcoming corruption in the corporate state sort of regime that currently is running Russia.
I think we should separate flies from cutlets. It's one thing to disagree with me on points that I mentioned (and I can be incorrect as I have nothing to do with modern Russia, and all my information is from open sources) and the other to get emotional.
First of all I am not a fun of "Putin regime" as it is too much a continuation of criminal Yeltsin regime. But I respect Putin for (inconsistent and weak) efforts to put an end to Yeltsin's style kleptocracy (which both Berezovsky and Khodorkovsky so aptly represent, please read Klebnikov's brilliant book). Funny thing is that kleptocracies can be viewed as an ultimate neoliberal model implementation in "lesser" countries.
I am protesting against one sided presentation, and you try to name me with all kind of things, demonstrating in the process very little understanding of the nature of "Putin regime" as people like you like to call it.
In reality Putin's has very little to do with Soviet regime. It is more of some variation of Latin America regimes, as unfortunately it is a variation on neoliberal theme. In the USSR Putin would be promptly put in jail or shot for betrayal of his former member of CPSU principles (he is a "contra" in the USSR jargon; ask your wife what it used to mean at the time).
And if you see Putin regime as Soviet-style dictatorship, you are unbealbably naive. As "Putin regime: is to a large extent legacy of Yeltsin rule, his regime can be called neoliberal. And from my point of view this is legitimate reason to hate Putin regime, so in a way I agree with you.
There is, unfortunately, too great continuity with Yeltis-installed kleptocracy. And it does recognizes the role of market forces way too much, and not so much externalities the "free market" creates, and the natural role into which it pushes Russia. Putin is a very skillful diplomat, a mediator between Russian social forces that are, to a certain extent, at each other throats. Here is one apt comment about who in reality Putin is (http://www.thetimes.co.uk/tto/opinion/columnists/davidaaronovitch/article3778022.ece)
LaContra Odessa
Articles such as this unleash the tendency to equate Putin with all manner of evil despot or KGB mastermind worth $100 billion, a gangster extraordinaire. The reality is much more mundane
The relationships between the factions of Russian elites are opaque (which is why Kremlin watchers usually analyze what has occurred and rarely predict anything of substance correctly). Broadly there are 3 main factions plus the Military.
- Technocrats: Powerful bureaucrats and administrators of State assets such as GazProm, Rosneft, or Transneft.
- Reformers: Western educated or inspired liberals, academics, economists, and advisers.
- The 'Siloviki': A heterogeneous group of former Soviet security and intelligence operatives committed to, first and foremost, keeping Russian natural resources and wealth in Russian hands
Putin does not rule by decree, he is nowhere as powerful as Stalin or a Tsar. Putin is a ringmaster acceptable to all the factions because he instinctively knows when to apply pressure and when to reward competing claims. He balances atop this fractious mix never really controlling anything but never putting a foot wrong. The 2008 Georgian conflict is a prime example. The Military wanted to invade, the Reformers didn't, the Siloviki largely didn't...but the Technocrats from Transneft and Gazprom sided with the military and thus Putin invaded.
Putin is a front man, powerful and canny but no dictator. When he is gone, if Russia is as it is today it will be ungovernable.
And believe me, if Putin tomorrow disappear, the most probably scenario is that the reformers will be exterminated (and that does not exclude physical extermination), because nobody will forgive them Yeltsin privatization. You will instantly have Weimar Germany situation with much more aggressive "Bürgers" demanding final solution for this neoliberal "scum" (reusing you favorite word ;-). So in a way they should go to the church and light the candle for Putin health, not to write silly articles about "Putinism" for a couple of bucks for western think tanks.
The allergy to Putin personality that you so vividly demonstrate does not change this fact. And in no way Putin has anything to do with the Soviet regime. He just tries to navigate the country between Scylla of becoming a US vassal and Charybdis of technological and cultural isolation from the West. I think he at least on intuitive level understands that neoliberalism after 2008 is a zombie and tries to balance state power with the power of "free market" in a more flexible way. Exactly the same what Obama is trying to do.
Actually Russia has around a hundred of billionaires (way too many for my taste) only one former billionaire is in jail. And if you think that this particular one is a saint put in jail by evil Putin just to crush green shoots of Russian democracy, then probably you should speak to your wife more often, as no person who know Russian language reasonably well can support this view (unless money are involved ;-). Google about his plan of selling Russia oil holdings to US companies to see one possible set of reasons for investigation of his criminal appropriation of the large part of Russian oil industry (and Yeltsin's privatization was all criminal, just ask your wife).
So those matter are much more complex that are typically presented in Western press and that's the key thinks that I try to convey. As I am not an expert and have no connections with modern Russia my understanding is of course limited.
And I think your wife can explain you an important difference between people and institutions as it is understood in Russia and is reflected by famous Prince Kropotkin saying.
|
|
|
Times
Mr. Guriev's flight comes amid investigations that focus on Moscow insiders who, investigators believe, have offered support to the opposition movement.
...Mr. Guriev has been questioned repeatedly in a case stemming from the 2011 report on Mr. Khodorkovsky's case. Investigators have scrutinized several experts, contending they had received money a decade ago from a fund linked to Yukos, Mr. Khodorkovsky's company.
Commenting on Mr. Guriev's case on Wednesday, the pro-Kremlin analyst Sergei A. Markov wrote that institutions like Skolkovo and the New Economic School had been used to funnel funds to demonstrators. "The sudden departure of Guriev is connected to the attempt to keep out of the hands of investigators these secret channels, through which oligarchic and federal budgetary funds went to support the revolutionary anti-Putin opposition," Mr. Markov said. "The goal was, of course, not direct revolution, but for Putin to give up his intentions to return for a third term."
...his wife, herself a prominent economist, moved to France several years ago
David Brisbane, Australia
One cannot be a well-connected member of the Moscow elite and not a criminal. The corruption is not just widespread there but universal - everyone could be charged with and convicted of some crime.
Mr. Guriev left because protection was withdrawn from him. What did he expect? To openly oppose the government and still to keep his protected status?
He is either extremely naive or, more probably, caught that decease common among Russian criminal elites - the false sense of self-importance and impunity. They were allowed so much for so long that the very concept of consequences is totally beyond their comprehension.
LaContra, Odessa
Articles such as this unleash the tendency to equate Putin with all manner of evil despot or KGB mastermind worth $100 billion, a gangster extraordinaire. The reality is much more mundane
The relationships between the factions of Russian elites are opaque (which is why Kremlin watchers usually analyse what has occurred and rarely predict anything of substance correctly). Broadly there are 3 main factions plus the Military.
- Technocrats: Powerful bureaucrats and administrators of State assets such as GazProm, Rosneft, or Transneft.
- Reformers: Western educated or inspired liberals, academics, economists, and advisers.
- The 'Siloviki': A heterogeneous group of former Soviet security and intelligence operatives committed to, first and foremost, keeping Russian natural resources and wealth in Russian hands
Putin does not rule by decree, he is nowhere as powerful as Stalin or a Tsar. Putin is a ringmaster acceptable to all the factions because he instinctively knows when to apply pressure and when to reward competing claims. He balances atop this fractious mix never really controlling anything but never putting a foot wrong. The 2008 Georgian conflict is a prime example. The Military wanted to invade, the Reformers didn't, the Siloviki largely didn't...but the Technocrats from Transneft and Gazprom sided with the military and thus Putin invaded.
Putin is a front man, powerful and canny but no dictator. When he is gone, if Russia is as it is today it will be ungovernable.
Listen Tome, Washington, DC
The world's oligarchs are laughing all the way to the bank. Well actually many of them are banks: The Morgan's, Rothschild's, Citi, UBS etc. And Big Oil, McDonalds, Wal-Mart, Pepsi, Apple, Altria, Mars and all the tycoons of America and Europe. They are all in it together.
It's the global economy and everybody is just jockeying for a bigger piece of the pie. It is always good for laughs to criticize Russia as long as it doesn't hurt business. Nobody is really that interested in democracy and human rights in Russia or anywhere else.
This is just a feel good story for us to cheer us up from the sad state of democracy, civil rights and human rights in America today. We really do miss the Cold War don't we?
|
|
|
www.slate.com
The debate took place at Cooper Union in New York City and was captured by ScribeMedia on behalf of the London Review of Books.
John Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt published an article in the London Review of Books.
Entitled "The Israel Lobby: Does it Have too Much Influence on US Foreign Policy".
|
|
|
|
|
|
Walter M. Lipman:Give me a break. The Russians now have to draw a map so the geniuses in our "intelligence" can find their own hindquarters?John Drury:Plain English: The FBI blew this one right out its collective rump, and no amount of backing and filling is going to ameliorate that fact.
"What difference at this point does it make?" Heard that before somewhere, recently in another context but it slips my mind, How is that Russian reset button doing, Queen Bee?John Drury :Ridiculous comments populate the blogs, the op eds and the comment sections of most sites. But what unsettles me more is the rabid Russian phobia (call it "Russophobia") which populates the American press (liberal/conservative). We never see things from the Russian side. It is always Putin who is up to no good, Vladimir, the monster, the balding fool with no shirt flexing his muscles. This is not the Cold War, yet we have not shed our Cold War biases.Teresa DeMaio:
The Russian people today are not so different than Americans. Most of them, like many of us in the US, do not reflect the same face as their own cold war ideologues in government. They just want to live and work without the iron hand of big government.Ralph Siegler:Russia went above and beyond any obligation it had to contact our FBI with its concerns about the bomber. The only fault is with the FBI and DHS, which once again has failed to prevent any real attack, all the while making headlines in the last two years by setting up loser patsies with fake bombs and arresting them in lieu of actually lifting a finger to find real terrorists.FREDERICK SMITH:The United States has morphed into the mind set - "It's always someone else fault". The Country is a "victim", along with the population as a whole.Richard Coshow:
And that began at the top. It's never "his" fault.Steve Redmond:
Wow so the FBI and CIA blame the Russians for their errors. Shame on them as they seek to shift the blame for their failures. Perhaps the public is gullible but this dog won't hunt.George Hoffman:
It seems the American government agents dropped the ball on this one, and no amount of finger-pointing will absolve them.Nancy Smith:
Interesting piece about CBS reporter, Sharyl Attkisson. Evidently, one of the talking points editor, Ben Rhodes, is the brother of the president of CBS and CBS has not been happy about her "aggressive" coverage of Benghazi. There is talk that CBS is retaliating against her. What is also interesting is that Ben Rhodes majored in fiction at NYU. How appropriate.http://www.politico.com/blogs/media/2013/05/the-posts-sharyl-attkisson-piece-163496.html
Thomas Bal:
When I saw the headline for this article my immediate thought was, 'can I believe what our government says?' Sad! Am I the only one?John Sliwka:
when they say something you can believe they lieSteve Illyes:
You are not alone!GUSTAVO LUZARDO:
No u r not. This is an embarrassment. We failed, period. After this article... we failed again.
|
|
|
May 11, 2013 | Antiwar.com
Late on May 8, 1945 – May 9, Moscow time – remnants of the Nazi regime surrendered to the Soviet forces in the ruins of Berlin. The "Thousand-year Reich" had barely lasted a dozen. A week earlier, Hitler had committed suicide, lacking courage to face defeat and blaming everyone but himself for it. The European nightmare, second in a generation, was officially over.
Almost seventy years hence, however, there are grounds to wonder as to who had really won.
Fetishes and Fantasies
All participants in the war exaggerated their own contribution, while diminishing that of others. The British romanticize North Africa, where it took them two years to finally defeat a handful of under-strength German divisions. Americans play up "D-Day", the campaign in France, and the Lend-Lease material aid. The Soviets would dismiss the Lend-Lease and glorify Stalin's alleged strategic genius. The regime of Marshal Tito in Yugoslavia maintained for decades that the brave Communist partisans tied down 25 German divisions and thus somehow turned the tide of the war.
Another fantasy, propagated many years later, was that the Allies fought to stop Hitler's genocide of Jews. The general public was entirely ignorant of it till the end of the war, while the governments kept whatever information they received under wraps. While modern Western Holocaust narrative makes sure to note the murder of Roma and homosexuals, Slavs – also targeted for mass extermination – are not mentioned at all.
Few in the West today realize that "Nazi" was short for "National Socialist." The Soviets got around the awkward bit about "socialism" by calling the Nazis "fascist" instead.
At Nuremberg, Nazis were not prosecuted for their genocidal endeavors, but for starting the war – "crime against peace", as the verdict put it. Today, however, the West believes starting a war not a crime – so long as they do it. Imperial policymakers angrily condemn "appeasement", then replicate Munich and call it law. Every ruler of a country they wish to invade is compared to Hitler, every ethnic conflict to the Holocaust, and every skirmish to D-Day, to the point where all perspective and meaning are lost.
Specters of 1942
The European Union is an eerie echo of what Nazi slogans described as the "European family of nations" working together for the prosperity of all and against the "scourge of Bolshevism". It isn't just the slogans: the whole endeavor has roots in National-Socialism.
Modern managerial state lives up to Mussolini's definition of fascism: "Everything in the State, nothing outside the State, nothing against the State." Yet anyone who opposes the wholesale destruction of national sovereignty or social engineering is dismissed as "fascist". Meanwhile, unelected EU commissars claim powers to do anything, from bizarre – regulating the circumference of carrots and curvature of cucumbers – to revolting, such as declaring Fascism, Nazism and Communism the same.
"Human rights" groups don't object when Waffen-SS veterans march in Latvia – now a member of the EU and NATO – but are bothered that Russia, a nation grievously harmed by Communism, refuses to dishonor the banner under which it bore the brunt of the fighting against Hitler.
The map of Europe today looks eerily like the one from 1942. May 9 has been designated "Europe Day". And all of Hitler's allies in the Balkans are now members of NATO, allies of the American Empire. Not surprisingly, in the sequel to WW2 fought in the 1990s – and continuing still after a fashion –, the Luftwaffe and the panzers were re-cast as the "good guys".
Walk in Hell
The first Great War began when Austria-Hungary's decision to invade and crush Serbia escalated quickly. Four years later, there was no more Austria-Hungary, Germany was on her knees, and the Bolsheviks had overrun Russia. Serbia foolishly invested its victory into a country later called Yugoslavia. Driven by grudges from the previous war, Hitler had first gone after Czechoslovakia – the Czech declaration of independence began the collapse of Austria-Hungary. By 1941, it was Yugoslavia's turn.
The regency government that had signed the Tripartite Pact under great pressure from Berlin was overthrown on March 27, between massive popular protests and a British-backed military coup. In April 1941, Hitler made it a personal mission to "wipe Yugoslavia off the map."
Parts of its territory were annexed directly to Germany, others given to Italy, Hungary, Bulgaria, and Albania (an Italian protectorate until 1943, a German ally thereafter). An "independent" Montenegro was set up as an Italian protectorate, while most of today's Croatia and Bosnia-Herzegovina became the Independent State of Croatia (NDH). The remainder was dubbed "Serbia" and placed under German occupation.
While the Serbs in the NDH faced wholesale extermination (the visceral brutality of which appalled even the Nazis), the brutality of the occupation forces in "Serbia" rivaled that of the Eastern Front. In June 1941, royalist guerrillas (commonly mislabeled "Chetniks") launched an uprising. The Germans responded by executing up to 100 civilian hostages for every one of their soldiers killed, and 50 for every wounded. The royalists soon had another problem: a Communist insurrection, launched after Hitler invaded the USSR, and as hostile to the royalists as to the German occupation. Communists and royalists fought each other as well as the Axis forces, waiting for the Allies to arrive and tip the balance.
In the end, the Communists prevailed. By 1944, they had secured British backing and successfully lobbied the Allies for massive air strikes against cities in Serbia, which did little damage to the German war effort but caused great loss of civilian life in royalist strongholds. The British betrayal of the royalists is well chronicled in "The Rape of Serbia" by Michael Lees. In September 1944, Soviet forces – reinforced by Bulgarian troops, who had switched their allegiance from Hitler to Stalin – entered Serbia and drove out the Germans.
Insult to Injury
The territory of Nazi-occupied Serbia thus had to deal with four years of brutal repression, a civil war, tens of thousands of refugees fleeing Croatia's genocide, heavy bombing by the Allies, and a Bulgarian "liberation". Then the Communists took over.
Long before the war, the Yugoslav Communists had declared Yugoslavia's destruction as their objective. To them, it was a "prison of nations," in which the "Greater Serbian bourgeoisie hegemony" oppressed everyone else. Understandably, once they took over Yugoslavia, they were reluctant to destroy it entirely. So they did the next best thing, and made Hitler's dismemberment more or less official, dividing Yugoslavia into Soviet-style "republics."
Official history claimed that the multiethnic Communist partisans were the only real resistance movement, which single-handedly defeated both the Axis and the "domestic traitors", the worst of which were the bloodthirsty-Greater-Serbian-nationalist "Chetniks". Any suggestion that the royalists had actually -> helped the Allied war effort was suppressed – and the West went along with it, because Tito was an asset in the Cold War against Stalin.
But the insult to injury was the imposed moral equivalence between the royalists and the Ustasha, the NDH regime that murdered close to a million Serbs in an effort to "purify" Croatia. As one Croat leader later argued, that made the Croats two-time winners of the war – and the Serbs doubly vanquished.
History Repeated
The only thing that held Yugoslavia together for 35 years was its supreme leader, Marshal Josip Broz "Tito". After his death, the system set up to be dysfunctional performed as intended. With the end of the Cold War, Yugoslavia lost both Western credits and Eastern markets. The newly reunited Germany, the nascent European Union and the rising American Empire all saw an opportunity to profit from Yugoslavia's demise.
In a ghastly re-run of the 1940s, Hitler's former allies now sought sponsors in the West, and succeeded where their Waffen-SS forebears failed. Worse yet, they excused their actions by smearing the Serbs as Nazis (!) reborn. The judgment at Nuremberg was made mockery by "judgments" at The Hague. Fifty years after the Nazi surrender, American bombers, German tanks and Communist propaganda came together in service of one of Hitler's goals: to crush the Serbs as an example to others.
No wonder, then, that only Russia still celebrates Victory Day. Elsewhere, Hitler's ghost rejoices.
Read more by Nebojsa Malic
- Consenting to Rape – April 25th, 2013
- An Unexpected Refusal – April 12th, 2013
- Lawless: An Oddly Exceptional Empire – March 28th, 2013
- Illusion of Triumph – March 21st, 2013
- Commanding the Tides – February 28th, 2013
|
|
|
What about the situation with Navalny and Kirovlesom I have the opinion formed.
When Navalny & Co got into some position of power in the regional government, they began to search everywhere topics where you can earn. They found a subject with ineffective Kirovlesom. On jerks (usually lawyers and financiers who believe that the wood-processing plants work morons, and that's why they have losses, but with their managerial genius now everything will be cool) I've seen enough (worked in the trenches at the site lesozagatavlivayuschey and woodworking industry several years). Well, now Navalny & Co decided to "help". For the start they coerce general director, in order to have a monopoly on distribution (well, at a discount for "bread & butter").
For retail that sounds almost normal, of r a mere 7-10% to increase sales for the enterprise in trouble. The problem is that the timber is prices almost like the commodities exchange goods. All profits from timber industry (even in a normal enterprise, not to mention a destroyed by series of "savors" enterprise like Kirovlese) is around 5%. And to earn additional 3-4% percent you need to work really hard, to learn, to make mistakes and to establish working relationships with dozens of people, from foresters and local railroad, ending in some buyers China, Egypt, Finland, etc. It takes several years. Fu*ers, faced with the fact that this is a complex long term think and profit is marginal either leave, or switch to outright theft.
I have no doubts about the damage inflicted to Kirovlesu by Navalny. To take 7% from a timber industry enterprise is to kill it with a guarantee. And this is clear even without digging into details. There are a lot of nuances that no transparently and democratically posted on the Internet accounting basis will ever show.
Price of $40 per cubic meter with self-delivery (when loading, payment for cars and railway fare paid by the buyer), and let's say the price of $80 with delivery to given port (all paid by the seller) depending of the situation can such that $40 is more profitable.
But the key is payments. I'm sure that Navalny & Co took timber without paying – such personalities never work with their own funds. To get money from customers in this industry is not an easy and very slow task. The delayed, say, 10 million rubles means for a timber enterprise spending minimum additional 150 thousand per month just to ensure that the delay in payments not to paralyze the production If you do not believe me, ask and financial director you know. It's only the biggest, not including shady and difficult to prove moments when the invasion into established sales channel (although the established sales channel is probably not about Kirovles) unskilled guys make such a mess, that to clear it takes a couple of years because of the fact that buyers see lack of clarification and go to other suppliers permanently (despite the discount given to them by the enterprise those intermediaries usually try to increase the price over the top to get at least 10%, which means for the buyers that they are insane. Moreover as a result of their activities stability of supplies often suffer, so real price is even higher, but this is a separate topic)
|
|
|
April 18, 2013
To get back to some of these domestic problems, the U.S. Congress has always been interested in human rights issues in Russia, going back to the days of the Jackson-Vanik amendment, which linked trade with Jewish emigration. What do you make of this Magnitsky Act, which has caused a big strain in relations?
It is, in principle, very wrong to single out one country, which is what the Magnitsky Act does. It speaks of human rights abuses and people who do it in one country only. Is Russia the only country guilty of these abuses? Among the abuses that it names are torture, and we just had a bipartisan commission saying that Americans were involved in torture during the Bush administration--but they have not been prosecuted.
Putting this in a law directed at a single other country when even our own hands are not necessarily clean is simply the wrong way to go and totally counterproductive in achieving the ends it is supposed to achieve--a better observance of human rights. Indeed, it simply puts us in a political tit-for-tat situation, which doesn't do either side any good.
Why has Putin been so tough on the United States? In late 2011, he blamed the protests against him during the Russian presidential campaign on then secretary of state Hillary Clinton.
I don't think U.S. influence had much to do with the domestic opposition to Putin. His actions may have been driven by a mindset that the United States was out to bring him down, to bring Russia down, to impinge upon what he considers Russia's natural sphere of influence.
What do you think will happen with the Navalny trial?
It's very hard to predict these things. It looks as if they're going to throw the book at him. We are seeing a reaction to what Putin has viewed as a subversive influence. But the United States should understand that this is really not good for Russia--but for us to think that we have any real leverage on this issue is a mistake.
This crackdown on nongovernmental organizations in Russia that have U.S. ties and, of course, the recent ban on U.S. adoptions of Russian children, which is a response to the Magnitsky Act--how deeply felt are these issues? Are these just political acts?
Deeply felt by whom? For the people at the top, these are essentially political issues, as Putin as others have said: "They insulted us and we have to return that insult." That's the way they look at the Magnitsky Act. If the law had gone after those involved in these human rights limitations in all countries, I don't think that would have created a problem. But to single out Russia and no other country was a very big mistake. And what we have seen from Russia is an emotional reaction, one that is used to justify practices that are going to be very harmful to Russia, particularly to the open society.
|
|
|
Kremlin Stooge
kievite:marknesopIt looks like standard coverage of Navalny court trial in Western press can be summarized as "Liberasts can't do wrong, and prominent Liberasts are above the law. If court finds otherwise that's political prosecution by Putin, an attempt to silence brave fighters for the rights of international corporations in the country." Which is an interesting Bolsheviks-style twist: Bolsheviks cliché was "nepodsuden".
Looks like West finally adopted most of Trotskyism and Bolshevism meme as for the attitude to legal system .
See nice sample at:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/apr/17/alexei-navalny-russia (Miriam Elder in Kirov )
JLoThe stories in the sidebar are illuminating as well – "Putin's Most Vocal Critic, Alexey Navalny, Faces Revenge in Court", and "Trial of Corruption Crusader Divides Russia". We don't need any reality, we'll just make it up. Great shot also of austere, intense-looking Navalny surrounded by a crush of clamoring press – doubtless the arrival of his train was leaked well in advance to allow maximum press coverage.
He was accompanied by his wife and "dozens of journalists from the country's struggling independent media". Really? What sort of struggle does Latynina undergo to get her foolishness transferred from her mad brain to print? Yevgenia Albats has to demand to be arrested. Not at all like real democracies, of course, where reports of danger to public health are never suppressed and bogus claims supporting economic falsehoods are promptly refuted.
The worst possible spin was put on the delay, as well – Navalny's team was not given sufficient time to prepare his defense, while the state likes the delay because it "seeks to dampen attention on the case". All spin, no win where the state is concerned, complete with a complaint from The Leader Of The Opposition himself about all the to-ing and fro-ing, just as if the delay had been the state's idea and not at the request of his own lawyers.
Navalny's popularity was surging, we learn, on the impetus of "mass protest", but receded because of the "Kremlin crackdown". Welcome to fact-free journalism. And no high-profile trial in Russia would be complete without a comment from he of the curly mane, Boris Nemtsov. In a Latyninaesque leap from reality, he assures the world that Khodorkovsky was tried to "frighten business". I doubt it frightened as much business as Nemtsov's own determined efforts to frighten away investment with his calamitous and annoyingly frequent "white papers". I imagine he is secretly rooting for Navalny to be sent down the river for a lengthy term, so he can reoccupy his previous leadership role in the opposition, plus reap some free face time with the press during the trial.
Haste the day when the Russian state makes Elder persona non grata in Russia just as it did Tin Tin Harding. I can't think where else she could go to post such outrageous lies without attracting global ire. Of course, she would likely keep her Russian reporting responsibilities for Russia, and just file them from London – her accuracy would not suffer at all from not being there.
Alexander Mercouris"Yevgenia Albats has to demand to be arrested."
Would you want to put the cuffs on that nasty skank? You can tell just by looking at her that she smells like cigarettes and "old lady" perfume. As for Nemtsov, he's going to have his day in court soon too:
Dear Kievite,
You have put your finger on it precisely, It is indeed a case of "liberals can do no wrong". I have not yet come across a single article in the mainstream British press that actually tries to get to grip with the charges against Navalny or the nature of the case against him or which even tries to report the actual facts of the case at all. It's just taken as read that the whole case is a sham.
The same of course is true of the allegations against Browder and Magnitsky and of the case against Khodorkovsky. What is extraordinary about the Khodorkovsky case is that it continues to be written about by the western media and even by the US Congress in the actual text of the Magnitsky law as a sham even though the European Court of Human Rights has now delivered four judgments that say the opposite. As they say, never let the facts get in the way of a good story.
|
|
|
Investigators have charged Hermitage Capital head William Browder in absentia over alleged violation of the ban on selling the gas monopoly Gazprom's shares to foreigners. The Russian Interior Ministry said Thursday the notification of the charges was handed to the British Embassy in Moscow. On Tuesday, the ministry said that its Investigative Department was examining a criminal case concerning the "illegal purchase of Gazprom shares by legal entities that were majority owned by foreign nationals, notably William Brower." Russia's losses due to 29 transactions concluded by Browder's firms have been tentatively estimated at 3 billion rubles (over US$97 million), it added.
|
|
|
Апр 15, 2013 @ Латвия, Россия, Русский народ, Справедливость
Известно, что русский народ - самый многочисленный разделённый народ в мире. После демонтажа СССР за границами Российской Федерации осталось более 20 млн. наших соотечественников, преимущественно в бывших союзных республиках. Несмотря на все данные на словах Горбачёву обещания, блок НАТО стремительно расширился на Восток. Особое внимание наши "союзники" обращают на те страны, где живут сотни тысяч русских людей - страны Прибалтики. Именно в них при полном попустительстве коррумпированной Западом элиты проходят марши бывших легионеров СС, запрещают в День Победы ветеранам ношение заслуженных наград, запрещают называть детей, как того хотят родители, а огромное количество русских людей десятилетиями не может получить паспорта.
Именно об этом мы сегодня и поговорим с Андреем Бобцовым, проживающем в Латвии читателем блога.
Беляев Дмитрий: Добрый день, Андрей. Тема, о которой Вы хотите рассказать читателям блога крайне важна. Мы, русские люди, всегда должны помнить, что нам обычно обещают западные "друзья", и что получается на самом деле. В истории тому есть масса примеров и подтверждений. В случае же русских в Латвии и других прибалтийских странах мы видим, что без защиты русского государства они подвергаются не только попранию тех самых общечеловеческих прав, которыми заманивает всех условный Запад, но и зачастую мягкому геноциду.
Бобцов Андрей: Добрый, Дмитрий. К сожалению, российские СМИ, насколько я смею судить, не уделяют должного внимания этой проблеме. В послании Федеральному Собранию Президент предложил подумать над тем, чтобы вернуть русских людей в Россию. Это крайне важный вопрос хотя бы потому, что никакие иные разделённые народы не подвергаются такому унижению, как русский народ.
Беляев Дмитрий: Каково сегодня положение соотечественников в Латвии?
Бобцов Андрей: После распада Советского союза в приобретенной независимости Латвии произошло разделение общества по типу: первоклассная нация - титульная (то есть Латыши), и второсортные (все остальные, в том числе и Русские, Украинцы, и Белорусы, для коих русский язык является родным, а их численность не менее, чем 40 % от 2-х миллионого населения страны). Упразднение равноправия между нациями началось с того, что после обретения независимости все, кто иммигрировал на территорию Латвии в период с 1940-1989гг, а так же их дети были лишены гражданства, а это 700,000 человек на 1991-ый год. Со временем эта цифра уменьшилась в силу естественных причин, эмиграции и т.д. Сегодня число неграждан - 300,000. Если сказать по-спартански-лаконийски,то сегодня в одной из стран Евросоюза 40% населения в той или иной степени поражены в правах по национальному признаку, а 15% полностью лишены политических прав и имеет ограничения на энное количество профессий.
Sergej Stepanov:
А еще был случай. К бате моему на работу пришла проверка по лат. языку. У нас такой закон: чтобы работать, нужно сдать экзамен на знание лат.языка и получить корочку. Каждой профессии прописана категория (раньше было 3, сейчас их еще раздробили), на которую должен знать работник. Ну, батя мой в 2000 г. напрягся и на вторую катег. сдал. Но есть еще фишка - налюбое предприятие может прийти проверка (плановая или по сигналу) - проверять соответствие профессии, категории в корочке и собственно знаний(проводится беседа). 1 человек уволился, а батя сказал: - Не пойду проверяться, идите в баню, я честно 13 лет назад учил и сдавал(а это так и было), а теперя мне за 62, я на пенсии, хотите- увольняйте по статье, за эти копейки, что вы платите квалифицированному электрику вы хрен кого найдете. А чего ж вы мой диплом с технаря не проверяете? Посмотрим, чем закончится. Батя жестко троллит наше языковую комиссию :)
Сергей из Москвы:
Да, как раз был в Латвии, летом 2011 года, когда была предвыборная агитация и американский флажок на пиджаке Домбровского у меня, в центре Риги, вызвал гомерический смех. Даже сфотографировал на память ))) На малой родине у жены, в Скривери, столкнулся с латышским национализмом. Дама в годах, продавщица в местном магазине, отказалась отвечать по русски, но потом поняв что мы не из местных всё же ответила. Мне на тот момент казалось что латыши уже как то успокоились в этом плане, да и в других бывших странах СССР, вкусив всё западное "хлебосольство", оказывается нет.
Местное население всё переехало работать в Швецию и Англию. Местная работа малооплачиваемая. Внутри налоги и цены вполне европейские. Медицина платная, при чём низкого качества. На дорогах сразу бросается, что большая часть автомобилей 10-15 летней давности. Русские, с которыми приходилось общаться, настроены очень пессимистично.
Sergej Stepanov:
Я родился и живу в Латвии. Да, в основном все так, но кое с чем не согласен. Я считаю, что образование должно быть на лат. языке. Я живу в 90% русскоязычном городе, отдал ребенка в русскую школу только из-за того, что в лат. школы детей, окончивших русские садики не хотят брать. Обучение лат. языку в русских школах плохое(!!!!) Кроме элитных школ, куда оч.трудно попасть.
Пропорция преподавания 60% - на лат. языке в моем городе - фикция, большинство выпускников рус.школ не смогут свободно говорить на гос.языке, соответственно они не смогут занимать должности в госструктурах, а промышленности в Латвии почти нет.
Такое впечатление, что русскоязычных детей после школы хотят просто вытолкнуть из страны работать на английских фермах. Все разговоры о том, что надо сделать рус. язык втотым государственным, ИМХО - из серии "надежды юношу питают", это нереально. Т.е., кто возбуждает силы общества на этот вопрос, отвлекают от того, что нужна реальная поддержка молодежи по свободному освоению лат.языка. Тогда они смогут остаться в Латвии, идти в политику, выстраивать добрососедские отношения с Россией.
А интерес у латышей к рус.языку, я уверен, что очень возрастет лет через 10, когда латыши захотят узнать обстоятельства деятельности Запада в начале 90х. Ну и у России я вижу начало восстановления суверинитета.
Google matched content |
Society
Groupthink : Two Party System as Polyarchy : Corruption of Regulators : Bureaucracies : Understanding Micromanagers and Control Freaks : Toxic Managers : Harvard Mafia : Diplomatic Communication : Surviving a Bad Performance Review : Insufficient Retirement Funds as Immanent Problem of Neoliberal Regime : PseudoScience : Who Rules America : Neoliberalism : The Iron Law of Oligarchy : Libertarian Philosophy
Quotes
War and Peace : Skeptical Finance : John Kenneth Galbraith :Talleyrand : Oscar Wilde : Otto Von Bismarck : Keynes : George Carlin : Skeptics : Propaganda : SE quotes : Language Design and Programming Quotes : Random IT-related quotes : Somerset Maugham : Marcus Aurelius : Kurt Vonnegut : Eric Hoffer : Winston Churchill : Napoleon Bonaparte : Ambrose Bierce : Bernard Shaw : Mark Twain Quotes
Bulletin:
Vol 25, No.12 (December, 2013) Rational Fools vs. Efficient Crooks The efficient markets hypothesis : Political Skeptic Bulletin, 2013 : Unemployment Bulletin, 2010 : Vol 23, No.10 (October, 2011) An observation about corporate security departments : Slightly Skeptical Euromaydan Chronicles, June 2014 : Greenspan legacy bulletin, 2008 : Vol 25, No.10 (October, 2013) Cryptolocker Trojan (Win32/Crilock.A) : Vol 25, No.08 (August, 2013) Cloud providers as intelligence collection hubs : Financial Humor Bulletin, 2010 : Inequality Bulletin, 2009 : Financial Humor Bulletin, 2008 : Copyleft Problems Bulletin, 2004 : Financial Humor Bulletin, 2011 : Energy Bulletin, 2010 : Malware Protection Bulletin, 2010 : Vol 26, No.1 (January, 2013) Object-Oriented Cult : Political Skeptic Bulletin, 2011 : Vol 23, No.11 (November, 2011) Softpanorama classification of sysadmin horror stories : Vol 25, No.05 (May, 2013) Corporate bullshit as a communication method : Vol 25, No.06 (June, 2013) A Note on the Relationship of Brooks Law and Conway Law
History:
Fifty glorious years (1950-2000): the triumph of the US computer engineering : Donald Knuth : TAoCP and its Influence of Computer Science : Richard Stallman : Linus Torvalds : Larry Wall : John K. Ousterhout : CTSS : Multix OS Unix History : Unix shell history : VI editor : History of pipes concept : Solaris : MS DOS : Programming Languages History : PL/1 : Simula 67 : C : History of GCC development : Scripting Languages : Perl history : OS History : Mail : DNS : SSH : CPU Instruction Sets : SPARC systems 1987-2006 : Norton Commander : Norton Utilities : Norton Ghost : Frontpage history : Malware Defense History : GNU Screen : OSS early history
Classic books:
The Peter Principle : Parkinson Law : 1984 : The Mythical Man-Month : How to Solve It by George Polya : The Art of Computer Programming : The Elements of Programming Style : The Unix Hater’s Handbook : The Jargon file : The True Believer : Programming Pearls : The Good Soldier Svejk : The Power Elite
Most popular humor pages:
Manifest of the Softpanorama IT Slacker Society : Ten Commandments of the IT Slackers Society : Computer Humor Collection : BSD Logo Story : The Cuckoo's Egg : IT Slang : C++ Humor : ARE YOU A BBS ADDICT? : The Perl Purity Test : Object oriented programmers of all nations : Financial Humor : Financial Humor Bulletin, 2008 : Financial Humor Bulletin, 2010 : The Most Comprehensive Collection of Editor-related Humor : Programming Language Humor : Goldman Sachs related humor : Greenspan humor : C Humor : Scripting Humor : Real Programmers Humor : Web Humor : GPL-related Humor : OFM Humor : Politically Incorrect Humor : IDS Humor : "Linux Sucks" Humor : Russian Musical Humor : Best Russian Programmer Humor : Microsoft plans to buy Catholic Church : Richard Stallman Related Humor : Admin Humor : Perl-related Humor : Linus Torvalds Related humor : PseudoScience Related Humor : Networking Humor : Shell Humor : Financial Humor Bulletin, 2011 : Financial Humor Bulletin, 2012 : Financial Humor Bulletin, 2013 : Java Humor : Software Engineering Humor : Sun Solaris Related Humor : Education Humor : IBM Humor : Assembler-related Humor : VIM Humor : Computer Viruses Humor : Bright tomorrow is rescheduled to a day after tomorrow : Classic Computer Humor
The Last but not Least Technology is dominated by two types of people: those who understand what they do not manage and those who manage what they do not understand ~Archibald Putt. Ph.D
Copyright © 1996-2021 by Softpanorama Society. www.softpanorama.org was initially created as a service to the (now defunct) UN Sustainable Development Networking Programme (SDNP) without any remuneration. This document is an industrial compilation designed and created exclusively for educational use and is distributed under the Softpanorama Content License. Original materials copyright belong to respective owners. Quotes are made for educational purposes only in compliance with the fair use doctrine.
FAIR USE NOTICE This site contains copyrighted material the use of which has not always been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. We are making such material available to advance understanding of computer science, IT technology, economic, scientific, and social issues. We believe this constitutes a 'fair use' of any such copyrighted material as provided by section 107 of the US Copyright Law according to which such material can be distributed without profit exclusively for research and educational purposes.
This is a Spartan WHYFF (We Help You For Free) site written by people for whom English is not a native language. Grammar and spelling errors should be expected. The site contain some broken links as it develops like a living tree...
|
|
You can use PayPal to to buy a cup of coffee for authors of this site |
Disclaimer:
The statements, views and opinions presented on this web page are those of the author (or referenced source) and are not endorsed by, nor do they necessarily reflect, the opinions of the Softpanorama society. We do not warrant the correctness of the information provided or its fitness for any purpose. The site uses AdSense so you need to be aware of Google privacy policy. You you do not want to be tracked by Google please disable Javascript for this site. This site is perfectly usable without Javascript.
Last modified: August, 15, 2018
