> 1 in 6 Russian entrepreneurs are in jail, 1 in 3 prisoners are businessmen
The title is pure FUD.
The title is pure FUD.
Would you care to elaborate?
The biggest nightmare in the minds of the ruling class in the anlgo-saxon world (chief US and UK political and business powers) is that Russia might create an Eurasian political and economic union with Germany and France (and EU generally), with high mutual economic, political, military and cultural benefits.
That would mean huge loss of markets, power and influence for Washington and London. There are such tendencies, no matter how improbable in the short-term they look to the casual political observer who doesn't follow closely what's really going on.
So in a certain way the Cold War is needed (if not required) to continue, even after pretending it is something of the past.
One PR-related nasty form of this war - only bad news or no news allowed from Russia in the mainstream western media. The less people think Russia, Russian, (or even just Russians) are notions you could attach nice, friendly, good-minded connotations, the better!
The president Putin really pissed-off the western state and big-business powers that in a period of rising petrol/gas prices in 2000s they couldn't extract the tens of billions $ they used to do easily in the 90s - back then with the help of the local oligarchs enriched overnight by criminally grabbing ownership of state economic base and infrastructure they themselves had not built in the preceding decades.
Putin even had the temerity to use the extra-profits for increasing the country's living standard and modernizing the armed forces - one of the 3 to 5 really formidable military organizations in the world.
And he started doing the really unthinkable - gently probing EU, Asian and African (think Libya) countries for this disgusting idea of selling energy resources for currencies other than the $. (And this in times of this self-inflicted financial crisis.)
On the [re]New[ed] Cold War - just a few points of thought or questions for someone to ponder over, if really interested:
How come NATO still exists when its mirror-antagonist military organization of the former socialist EE-countries from the soviet block has gone to history, dissolved peacefully and voluntarily?
Why are there still US military bases (old and new) across the EU-countries today since Gorbachev retreated back the Russian/Soviet armed forces from East Germany and Eastern Europe?
Why was the Gorbachev's 80-year jubilee held in London? If he was uniformly acknowledged as such a good doer to humanity and democracy why wasn't that an event held in his home country and among his own people proud of him?
What does the average ordinary Russian think of Gorbachev? Actually who was robbed and who profited from the neo-liberal economic policies he had been instrumental to be installed in Russia?
(continues...)
(... continuation from above or below in this thread ...)
Why is Gorbachev today so rudely harsh towards modern China - the possible future N:1 economy in the world - when expressing his opinion about this country?
What's the purpose of NATO today - fighting terrorism? Who trained and armed the dead-officially-now Bin Laden in the first place in the 80s, and against whom?
How come Turkey is considered a country worthy of pondering about if and when to invite for EU-membership, while the same idea and attitude towards Russia - historically a truly European country with undeniable historic and cultural influence on Europe and the world - countless world-renown writers, poets, composers, scientists... you name it... plus a huge territorial span till the Pacific with all the resources, people, and real economic potential - is something highly exotic? (And this put in best possible terms.)
P.S.
I do not deny that Russia has a corruption problem and also, in the years ahead, huge-impact policy decisions and measures are needed in the economic sphere.
But this is something skillfully used in the practice of the western variety of propaganda called PR, the part of it that serves governmental strategy goals of US and UK. (BTW, A pair of most powerful countries in a "special relationship" as Her Majesty the Queen so rightly stated during the recent Obama's visit in the Buckingham Palace, London).
P.P.S.
" - But isn't the media really free and independent in the western world? How come ever such a FUD possible - serving international state policy strategic goals and forming popular western mass perceptions? "
" - Well, this is really a Hacker-News after all... I have a suggestion for you - you do your own homework research on the topic and report back if you're really intrigued. For starters - check topdocumentaryfilms.com."
Turkey has been much more successful in maintaining multiparty democracy internally and peaceful cooperation externally with EU countries than Russia has been in the relevant time period. Turkey has its problems, and Turkey has yet to gain EU membership, but the distinction is meaningful to me (as an American who knows people here in the United States from both Russia and Turkey).
After edit: This may result, over the last century, from Kemal Atatürk being a much better statesman than Vladimir Lenin. It appears that Atatürk did a much better job of leading his country through the tough fall from having an imperialist system before World War I than Lenin did.
I'm from Bulgaria and, for example, one of the most incapable senior manager-expatriate I've ever saw in my country is British. I guess somebody in UK might have been really happy to have him overseas.
But I don't hold this against the Brits ;) They are truly a great nation.
On Turkey and EU - I can't say they deserve more or less the EU-membership. It's really a complex topic and AFAIK both France and Germany, have huge reservations. (BTW I don't think slogans about multiparty democracy really mean anything in the real geopolitical play between the world powers. Your own American experience shows that just two parties are enough and they are both at the mercy of the Federal Reserve - a private banking money-printing institution! - internally, and do more or less the same thing as international state policy, externally).
It even might amuse you that Russia and Turkey currently are in very good international economic and political relations (despite some rethorics). Russia is building several! nuclear power reactors in Turkey and they enjoy also huge mutual benefitial trade in other sectors - construction industry, tourism, gas, agriculture, etc. However strange it might seem to you, actually Russia plays a certain interesting role in the modern economic development of Turkey.
Things are just not black-and-white and defy simplistic explanations.
It's really an interesting line of thought to compare both leaders and draw some analogies - same historic time, post-imperial after-war revival and consolidation of the states, including massive social change, setting new economic policies, etc.
But I find it dubious that there is a direct link between some comparatively superior statesmanship back then - even if there really was such, I don't know, to be frank - and Turkey's relatively recent economic upturn and regional political aspirations. (It is yet to be seen if Turkey's growth and development won't be just a temporary miracle - just like Ireland's or some other proclaimed "tiger"-economies.)
And especially dubious it is in the perspective of the whole 20-th century. In those decades Russia gained such high points which Turkey can only dream about - just think the space/rocket sector as one example (back in the Gagarin's times, and also nowadays).
The really state-wise thing Turkey did in the 20-th century is that they stayed out of the World War II that devastated the main rivals in continental Europe. Russia didn't have such a chance - they were invaded.
After WWII Turkey was a strict American/US satellite, not so European-centric in its international politics, and, until recently, the US/NATO-backed Turkish chief-of-staff generals were the real guarantors for a seeming democracy.
P.S.
BTW, you can check the wikipedia page on Lenin's NEP (New Economic Policy) at en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Economic_Policy.
From it is clear that originally socialism/communism wasn't entirely hostile to private businesses and entrepreneurship - this had its fine economic policy results at the time when Lenin was still in charge.
Translation: Turkey has been an obedient muppet state.
Russia is far from a perfect place, but that doesn't mean we should support far from perfect media coverage of it.
And I am not talking about the whole article, only the dubious "1 in 6, 1 in 3" statement.