The nec plus ultra of corruption strikes again. I swear, it's like someone took a man-shaped cookie cutter, took in over to a bull of cow shit and -- voila! -- you get Boris "Feel Sorry for Poor Me, the Saintly Martyr" Berezovsky. He is relying on Western ignorance of and prejudices about Russia to fan the belief in evil neo-fascoid Putin oppressing Defender of Justice Berezovsky. My comments are inserted below. I am not going to be a Putin apologist, but this is just a hack job (of the sort Berezovsky's "Facts? What are facts?" NTV network specialized in.
Financial Times - May 28, 2002
COMMENT & ANALYSIS: The problem with Putin By Boris Berezovsky
Vladimir Putin is everything the west always wanted in a Russian president: the democrat who believes in order; the strongman who has put the criminals and corrupters to flight; the man of sober habits and sound judgment whose behaviour shines against the drunken antics of his predecessor. But is he good for Russia?
Mr Putin is a product of the Tsarist-Soviet security machine, a traditionalist who believes authoritarianism is the only way to preserve order and defend the state. Thus his political, military and legal reforms - his "dictatorship of the law" - have rolled back the progress made by the Yeltsin administration. They have been implemented at the expense of important freedoms that a progressive state would consider fundamental to liberty.
CD: "Progress of the Yeltsin administration." Hmmm. The most corrupt government in the history of Russia, quite possibly in the history of the world as a matter of fact. Presumably, Boris Abramovich is refering to the progress of the Yeltsin administration in filling his Swiss bank account with the pensions of old people.
Mr Putin has centralised control over the government by curbing the powers of regional governors. He has also expanded the bureaucracy inherited from the Soviet era - at the expense of accountability.
CD: The regional governors are gangsters who get in power in large part through rigged elections.
Living off a high oil price, but with no sustained programme for economic reform, he has courted popularity by failing to introduce measures that, while involving short- and medium-term economic sacrifice, would restore credibility to the state's long-term financial commitments. The effect has been to build expectations that Mr Putin will not be able to meet.
CD: Unlike the magnificent economic reform of the Yeltsin era.
Moreover, he has restricted freedom of speech and destroyed the independence and credibility of the media. He has prosecuted a hard war against Russian citizens in Chechnya when he might have made peace by recognising the legitimacy of their leaders.
CD: Perhaps Boris Abramovich should be reminded how his and Gusinsky's media outlets engaged in vicious smear tactics against each other and against any political opposition to the Yeltsin regime. I wonder if his war propaganda during the first Chechen War has somehow disappeared from memory.
Look. I will tell you what the real danger to freedom of speech in Russia is. About a year ago, a large Russian company headed by a prominent oligarch approached the English-language media source where a Russian friend of mine works as a PR guy and asked them to do a story on them. He gave the task to a guy who, well, he's an idiot, but anyway he wrote the story. My friend read the published article (or glanced it over, his English is pitiful) and recognized words like "corruption" and "bribe." He was literally terrified there would be some guy waiting at his apartment to beat the crap out of him or worse. His hands were shaking. I had to read it and reassure him by explaining that the article said that BEFORE the company had problems, but today it is getting better.
All this suggests that the image Mr Putin has cultivated abroad is as false and unprincipled as his programme at home.
CD: Berezovsky accusing anybody of being unprincipled is pretty amazing.
There is an alternative to all this: the genuine democrats who believe that freedom and progress depend on three strategic priorities, all rooted in a concept I call essential liberalism.
The first of these is the liberalisation of the individual and society. A new generation of middle-class Russians has come of age. They love Russia and they have ideals. They believe in self-reliance and opportunity and they have a strong work ethic.
CD: Berezovsky is rich exclusively because he got state handouts. He has produced nothing. He has created nothing. He also neglects to mention that this new generation of middle-class Russians wants him to rot in jail.
These are the new "free citizens" of Russia and it should be the first priority of a liberal government to encourage the conditions in which these citizens can flourish. That depends on leaving people alone - letting them build companies, open stores and cafэs and travel abroad.
CD: Is he trying to insinuate Putin is reestablishing limitation of the ability to go abroad? It would be a lot easier for Russians to build companies and open stores and cafes if they had the money Berezovsky stole from them in the loand-for-shares scam.
It depends on encouraging them to accept, and to cherish, personal responsibility. It depends on encouraging institutions that promote citizens' desire to be independent.
CD: Berezovsky. Personal responsibility. Need I say more?
The second priority is the liberalisation of the state - in principle and in structure. In principle, this means revoking all decrees and laws that conflict with the constitution of the Russian Federation, reaffirming the individual's supremacy over the state and the separation of powers.
CD: Making laws that break the Consitution is supposed to be good?
Both principles are enshrined in the constitution but Mr Putin has subverted them by decree, establishing his "dictatorship of the law", and his "vertical power structure" which has created seven federal districts, their powers ultimately residing with the president. A liberal government would immediately reverse these decrees.
Structural liberalisation of the state means fundamentally reordering the relationship between Moscow and the regions. It is not Moscow that should decide which powers to exercise, and which to delegate to the regions, but the other way round. This reordering would grant the regions more freedom and flexibility in their interaction with Moscow and among themselves.
CD: Lord God. Many of the regions are virtually autonomous states.
As its third priority, a liberal government would realign Russia's foreign policy around a new organising principle I think of as "control, not capture". Russia must abandon its ancient policy of capture and possession, which has led us into such hubristic misadventures as the occupation of eastern Europe, the invasion of Afghanistan and now the destruction of Chechnya. Instead, it should adopt a policy of control through influence.
Based on these principles, Russia should restore a unified economic and military zone across the Confederation of Independent States; integrate itself into the European community through the European Union and Nato; understand the leading role of the US in world politics; define what that means for the Russia-US relationship; and give China a long-term interest in a strong, liberal Russia.
These priorities are a natural external dimension of the programme that Liberal Russia, my party in Russia, would pursue at home and abroad.
CD: This party has about a 0.0000000000000000000000000000000000000001% chance of getting into power. Allying yourself with Berezovsky is political suicide. It is conceivable that Berezovsky has a deluded opinion of how people view him, but he is HATED. And I mean hated. True, visceral contempt. This is way, waaaaay beyond Clinton-hating US Republicans.
This is the course that Boris Yeltsin, in spite of his flaws, began but from which Mr Putin, in spite of his deceptive charms, has strayed. If we do not return to that original course, we Russians will irretrievably lose our way.
The writer is a businessman and former adviser to Boris Yeltsin. He lives in exile in London
CD: "Businessman." What a joke. Berezovsky is a thief and nothing but a thief (well, mainly a murderer too).
Chris Doss The Russia Journal