How majority of Russians see the role of Russia today?

[mikeaverko]

Yeah, I saw that one Vanya.

Despite your being an orange punk, I see that you're willing to directly engage those ideas which disagree with your own.

You might be interested in subscribing to this site (it's free):

http://www.cdi.org/russia/johnson

Relative to it:

http://talk.guardian.co.uk/WebX?14@1...8@.77480649/99

Re: Anders Aslund - Aug. 9, JRL 9220 post 3

For openers, Aslund is being insultingly rude by using the word "regime" to describe the Russian government instead of "administration." (in modern day political jargon, the former utilized by Aslund is employed when describing undemocratically oppressive governments). Whether he likes it or not, Russia is a multi-party democracy with a vibrant media. Russians had ample opportunity to choose someone else as their president. It's a statistical fact that under Putin, the number of independent Russian news outlets have increased. As is true in America, a good portion of Russian media is unfair to Putin and Russia. It's obvious that some careerist minded Russian news outlets and journalists see a greater monetary kickback from those smug American foreign policy and media elites involved in nurturing politically correct Russians to suit anti-Russian prejudices. All one has to do is reference the sort of "Russian" views which get propped in the "free" press of the BBC, Washington Post, New York Times, CBC, NPR, PBS and ABC (among many others). This is reminiscent of when the Soviet Union would cite the American Communist Party organ Daily World as a source for the American perspective.

In fact, it's extremely difficult to get pro-Putin and pro-Russian views heard in the "free" press. More often than not, uncontested anti-Putin and anti-Russian views (the two are often one) receive the nod.

Aslund's citation of Freedom House as a credible source in measuring human rights development is absurd, given the heavily skewed anti-Russian biases of that organization. As of right now, Georgia and Ukraine aren't "freer" than Russia. For some like Freedom House, "freedom" is code for anti-Russian. This is the same organization which voted Kuchma their "Man of the Year" in 1996, as he overthrew the democratically elected Russocentric government in Crimea and closed down Russian language schools throoughout Ukraine.

Just as absurd is Aslund's parroting of Bush's siding with the Baltics on the matter of World War II. The Russian government renounced Molotov-Ribbentrop. Meanwhile, Latvia and Estonia openly honor those Latvian and Estonian misfits who served in SS units. There's no criticism from Bush and Aslund on this. Likewise, with the discriminatory manner in which Russian speakers are treated in those two former Soviet republics.

In slurring the Russian stance on Chechnya, Aslund overlooks that in the last decade, Chechnya was twice given the greatest autonomy of an ethnic enclave within a nation state (there's no example elsewhere which closely matches such freedom). Regretfully, this was taken advantage of. Russia had every right to take military action. It took years for Turkey to eventually subdue its enemy (Kurdish separatists). There's no reason to disbelieve that Russia won't achieve the same in Chechnya.

Aslund's characterization of the Khodorkovsky trial compliments his Carnegie Endowment employer having received a $500,000 donation form the jailed Russian tycoon. America jails its white collar crooks who grossly abuse the system. Russia should be no different.

Aslund's hypocrisy on jailing oligarchs for political reasons is shown in his non-commentary of jailed east Ukrainian oligarch and Yanukovych supporter Boris Kolesnikov, who is no where near as crooked as Khodorkovsky and the current Ukrainian prime minister Tymoshenko.

This leads to Aslund's one sided characterization of what has occurred in Ukraine. He trumps up Russian aid to Yanukovych, while muting out the large Western monetary support provided to Yushchenko. As time goes by, the amount Western aid becomes more well known and the Russian aid appears more exaggerated from what was originally claimed by Russia unfriendly sources. My contacts in Ukraine confirm what appeared obvious to me from New York. Yushchenko seemed to have the better funded campaign.

Especially disingenuous about Aslund's commentary on Ukraine is his suggestion that the Yanukovych campaign engaged in smear tactics unlike the Yushchenko side. Portraying a youthful criminal action as reflective of Yanukovych as a seasoned adult is political sleaze. Readily believing what orange fanatics said about east Ukrainian polling places is highly circumspect. Meanwhile, besides CIS observers, those from the British Helsinki Human Rights Group ( http://www.bhhrg.org ) and the Israeli based Institute for the Study of the Commonwealth of Independent States ( see http://www.frontpagemag.com/Articles...e.asp?ID=16387 ) documented large scale orange voting fraud, known to Western observers.

The great socio-economic problems facing Georgia and Ukraine explain why most Russians breathe a sigh of relief that they aren't as "advanced" to have their own color coded revolution. The Putin revolution of responsible liberal reform is a better model for CIS members to follow.

Aslund's commentary further highlights the need for a powerful worldwide English language Russian news network to express the views of mainstream Russians.

Michael Averko

[sunmoon_star]

Recent world history teaches us that presence of former ussr could play a vital role to counter balance usa pressure in third world countries.Liquidation of ussr has distroyed world balance of power.Now usa can do anything in any developing country whatever they like.May be former soviet people are benifited from the fall of ussr but the people of third world are looser.

[Alex_Ivanov]

Originally Posted by sunmoon_star

Recent world history teaches us that presence of former ussr could play a vital role to counter balance usa pressure in third world countries.Liquidation of ussr has distroyed world balance of power.Now usa can do anything in any developing country whatever they like.May be former soviet people are benifited from the fall of ussr but the people of third world are looser.

If there was something positive in death of SU, it was that we do not care about third world any longer. Loosers must count on themselves only.

[Michal_PL]

the other positive thing about SU collapse is that now you can write any lies you want and noone will put you in jail,Alex

[mikeaverko]

Anders Aslund, Fareed Zakaria and the Carnegie Endowment busted:

MORE COMMENTS ON ASLUND AND THE COMMENTARIOT
http://english.intelligent.ru/letters/index.html

http://averko.blogspot.com

[Marita]

HumanRightsMatter2005,
You are wrong. Russians have real reasons not to trust the West. It's all our history either Soviet or non-Soviet - the main threat came from the West. Numerous invaders came from the West in each century.
Yes, we are rather safe as soon as we possess nuclear weapons but it isn't a secret that since 1991 our military force has been decreased enormously. I am not sure Russian nuclear weapons will be in proper condition in a few years. Unfortunately the Soviet safety factor, the Soviet resources are not endless.
You looked on a map of German invasion - of what period? In 1942 the fascists occupied North Caucasus and even reached Elbrus. You should search more details.

[Lembitu]

Marita you can say same about Estonians - numerous of invaders have came from east over centurys. Main threat to our country have always came from east. Maybe you can understand us better after knowing it.