>> but they can be overthrown, perhaps one way to understand what is
>> happening in Russia.
>
> Who's overthrowing them? The KGB gang around Putin? Or is there
> someone behind them? What is your analysis of all this, John?
i used to rely on the eXile's reports on the English language correspondents in Moscow, since reading someone's stuff on JRL was a wholly different experience after being told that she was usually drunk and didn't understand Russian.
take for instance now Conal Walsh. he turns up in today's Observer "in Moscow." Googling, he's been sort of a business reporter in the UK, with a particular interest in footy finance (though in today's Observer someone else named "Nick Paton Walsh in Moscow" writes the Abramovich-Chelsea -will the KGB end up in charge at Stamford Bridge?- piece).
so not real likely he knows Russian, but by US business reporter standards, sharp. pieces about Carlyle Group <http://education.guardian.co.uk/print/0,3858,4501261-108340,00.html> and McDos (knows more about it than i do by lots - probably knows they don't sell Whoppers) <http://observer.guardian.co.uk/business/ethics/story/0,12651,997084,00.html>
and i am totally prejudiced in favor of the Welsh, like Hitchensetc thing for the Bosnian Muslims (i like them too - many years ago drove with Inge & Auschwitz survivor Alex Szejman from Yugoslavia through Vidin in Bulgaria and took the ferry across to Romania. in Romania i started whinging continuously about the bad haircuts and general unappetizing appearance of the local youth as compared with my faves the Bosnian Muslims until Alex, exasperated, said: "now you finally understand what Trotsky meant by a 'deformed workers state'." sorry Joanna.)
anyway in this piece <http://observer.guardian.co.uk/business/story/0,6903,1075712,00.html> Conal Welsh summarizes and appears to adopt the common commercial wisdom as acknowledging that Khodorkovsky might very well be a gangster but that "[he] has adopted international accounting standards in recent years..." Unless of course we are dealing with a business reporter who can do irony. That's why i miss the eXile, like how many hours had he been up and doing what to whom before he wrote that?
in the same piece he writes:
> Many kremlinologists believe that Putin's commitment to market
> economics is more pragmatic than ideological. The growing influence
> of Viktor Ivanov, Igor Sechin and other advisers who, like Putin,
> rose to authority via the KGB, is also causing concern. When
> Alexander Voloshin, Putin's business-friendly chief of staff, stood
> down last week, it was taken as another sign that these 'siloviki' or
> 'hawks' are in the ascendant.
>
> They are, as far as anyone can tell, bitterly hostile to the
> oligarchs, believing them to be the undeserving beneficiaries of
> resources that belong to the nation.
ohmigod what an idea! - chekists! - thegulag! -theLubyankabasement! - cue to Pugliese (Chris&Peter if you see this - what's with 'siloviki' as 'hawks' - doesn't it mean more like bodybuilders, pectoralinternationalists & the Russia-California axis and all that).
Dima Medvedev just gave his first press conference and said that it would be wise to proceed very carefully, and that an administrative frenzy must be avoided. Couldn't agree more, the Chubais/oligarch/Mafia crew could well have a few nukes.
john mage