Fragments of a blog
Fragments of a blog
President Biden stated the obvious in an ABC interview, as Bloomberg reports: After ABC News Chief Anchor George Stephanopoulos asked Biden if he believes Putin is “a killer,” Biden murmured agreement and said “I do,” without elaborating. By itself, killer…
Putin appointed Andrei Illarionov as his senior economic adviser in April 2000. Illarionov remained in that position until late December, 2005. Those were good years for the Russian economy. Simply put, it was growing, and would keep growing until 2007.…
Support for Putin’s “amendments” among the general public, according to all non-Kremlin polls, has never came close to 50% in the past couple of months. More like 30%, actually, or even less. The official “referendum” tally suggests a turnout and…
When the Kremlin releases its own “exit polls” from today’s, hmmm, “referendum,” they will reveal as much about the true results as these windows reveal about the inside of the house. (Check out a high-resulution photo for all the details.)…
John Walcott explains in Time: Why U.S. And EU Officials Are Worried Putin Might Make Another Move in Ukraine It’s good to know that someone is paying attention. I wrote about it earlier this week: Putin’s comments are fake history…
Seen on CNBC earlier today: As Russia holds massive show of military might in Moscow,Putin looks to cement power He first cemented his power years ago. Back in office in 2012. Crimea 2014. World Cup 2018. Cracks started to appear…
When Putin says, “We need to get on with work, not look for successors,” it’s a sign he fears being viewed as a lame duck and has good reasons for that. These reasons are not constitutional term limits but rather…
Jonathan Chait writes in New York Magazine: Most American politicians, Republican or Democrat, would take Putin’s perspective on handling hostile demonstrations as a cautionary tale. This is how Putin would respond to protests used to be, self-evidently, an indictment. Trump…
When in late March Vladimir Putin visited a Moscow hospital wearing a hazmat suit, he got ridiculed by Russian viewers for more than one reason. First, the full-body protective gear was obviously overkill. Unless his immune system had been damaged…
The Guardian reports from Moscow: Moscow woke up to a mandatory lockdown on Monday, as the 12.5 million residents of the Russian capital were told to stay indoors in order to slow the spread of coronavirus. The restrictions are some…
I’ll start by quoting myself (as of January 17, 2020): … if Putin remains politically active, the new setup will let him stay in charge for as long as he wants. It could even enable him to take a less…
One more thought about Putin’s hasty edits to the constitution. Let’s say under the current constitution the president may do A but not B. (Either B strictly belongs in the legislative domain, or it is out of reach of any…