>People here _love_ Putin. The high point of my New
>Year's at my ex-girlfriend's dacha was all the little
>kida yelling "POO-TIN! POO-TIN!" during his televized
>New Year's address. He's done more for people in this
>country than any leader since forever. I don't see why
>people don't notice this. (I think part of it may be
>that Western leftists tend to base their opinions on
>Russia _one_ person, Kagarlitsky, plus maybe Cohen.)
It sure looked like Russia was going completely to hell in the Yeltsin years - towards absolute impoverishment and disintegration. And Putin didn't only stop it, he reversed it. That's a remarkable achievement, and we don't really know much about how it happened. Surely it had to be more than the strength of his personality - but what was it?
Renationalizing Yukos and selling 20% to the Chinese is a nice "fuck you!" to the U.S. Anyone who wants to see more constraints on U.S. imperial power should be applauding wildly.
Doug