I see Russia got to pretend that they are a democracy today. Congratulations to Vladimir Putin for winning a joke election in the fine tradition of Saddam Hussein. Remember when Dubya peered into Vlad’s soul and saw a man he could trust? That was awesome.
I miss Yeltsin. At least he was jolly.
“Remember when Dubya peered into Vlad’s soul and saw a man he could trust?”
Yup I do.
Kind of amazing how anybody can say “Obama is just like bush”, and keep a straight face, avoid dissolving into a puddle, or what-have-you.
dude was busing in voters to vote in every precinct in the Moscow burbs. Hilarious.
At least this proves they were actually counting the “votes” and not just engaging in computerised fraud. How many voters were completely disenfranchised as in the US? We send international election observers into dodgy democracies to report on the fairness or otherwise of the electoral process. Do we have any scientific evidence that such an objective observation process would find elections in Russia significantly more unfair than in the US?
IF neither countries allows independent international scrutiny of its electoral process, how can we be sure that US scorn at Russian elections is any more than chauvinistic guff of the “no ne does democracy as well as we do” variety.
Precisely.
We have been “doing” democracy since the early ’50s.
We’re really good at it now.
Bet on it.
AG
Putin is one scary dude.
The Russians could have had a democratic election if they let the US Supreme Court decide the winner.
Putin is corrupt and a bully, but he is vastly better for Russia and the world than was Yeltsin. Yeltsin had a beautiful moment on that tank, but he presided over the most disastrous economic collapse in, I stress, a nuclear power, there has yet been.
Putin wants a fairly realistic Russian great power in the world. He wants to control Russian nukes. His friends are clearly doing well, but it’s not in the least the same type of auctioning off of the economy to cronies we saw with Yeltsin, at the expense of the vast majority of people.
The problem with the shock doctrine economics we saw under Yeltsin is that political democracy becomes functionally equated with economic kleptocracy. This has happened in many if not most former colonies as well to some degree. Putin is to most Russians better than the memory of the 1990’s, even if they are certainly aware of his faults.
And we are not seeing anything like the political violence we saw under a Stalin, or even a Brezhnev. I do not say this to diminish his problems, but to rebut the right’s use of Cold War rhetorical strategies to hype Putin’s Russia as a Soviet-style enemy. That’s nonsense. Strategic competitor in great-power politics, yes, but hardly an ideological competitor on economic grounds.
Pretty much agreed. Yelsin was a disaster on a whole host of levels and russian went to shit under his leadership (the banks looting the country didn;t help of course). Putin is ruthless, but at least he has Russia’s best long term interests at heart and he is rational in his own way.
I read Smartypants’ bit on Iran just now, and it struck me that the list of national enemies the right has at the moment are full of, in a longer-term context, pretty rational actors. Even N. Korea seems to be sending rational signals at the moment. Yes, Ghadaffi was pretty hit-and-miss personally, but he’s not around now. There are no Gulags in Venezuela, and there never have been. Putin is not saying he’ll bury us, even in the economic sense that Khrushchev intended. I am no fan of Metternich, but his line is more or less what people like Putin are pursuing.
Our turn in November.
We’re a little more…sophisticated…about it. We should be. We’ve had lots more practice. But media mind control trumps old style voter fraud every time.
Watch.
Bet on it.
The fix is in. The media fix.
Watch.
Been in since the primaries began.
Watch.
AG
So, who’s winning in November? I mean, who is the “fix” for?
Whaddayou? Kiddin’ me or what?
Obama by just enough to keep things fluid. Just in case somebody gets a big head.
Watch.
AG
Yesssss! Cool, something to look forward to.
Yes. Something to look forward to.
The chickens of our murderous past coming home to roost.
Watch.
AG
What he really means is “Ron Paul LOOOOOSSSTT! NOOOO!”
Any other result is a fix, you see.
No Suranis, that is not what I mean.
The ongoing criminal conspiracy that we laughingly refer to as our federal government has been in operation at least since the assassination of John F. Kennedy. Just as have lower level gangsters, it has refined its criminal techniques over the ensuing 50 years or so.
Why rob banks or run a street loansharking operation when cybercrime is so much more profitable and so much safer?
Why murder presidents…or even try to impeach them or use electoral fraud…when by the use of the media you can effectively control who wins and who loses out front?
Really.
This is so obvious as to be laughable.
Except I ain’t laughing.
Bet on it.
Ron Paul?
The most obviously hostile to the PermaGov agenda of all the potential presidential candidates, thus the one most effectively blockaded by the media.
Your own take on my position?
Very shallow.
Just like most of the rest of the media-controlled American people.
So it goes.
Down like a motherfucker, eventually.
Karma’s a bitch, Suranis.
Watch.
Yes, it is long. Maybe several more decades long, maybe not. It is long, but it is also inevitable.
Watch.
AG
Naw. Aliens will annihilate us this year.
Naaaaahhhh…
That’s already happened.
Just not the way this fake vid says it will.
What?
You think that birth certificate thing is a crock?
Watch.
AG
But now they start to have an election that means they start to become democratic country.