When Putin took power in the winter of 1999-2000, his country was defenseless. It was bankrupt. It was being carved up by its new kleptocratic elites, in collusion with its old imperial rivals, the Americans. Putin changed that. In the first decade of this century, he did what Kemal Atatürk had done in Turkey in the 1920s. Out of a crumbling empire, he rescued a nation-state, and gave it coherence and purpose. He disciplined his country’s plutocrats. He restored its military strength. And he refused, with ever blunter rhetoric, to accept for Russia a subservient role in an American-run world system drawn up by foreign politicians and business leaders. His voters credit him with having saved his country.
No one tells me “How To Think About Vladmir Putin” I can decide for myself.
And what about Poland ?Just as bad as Hitler but switched sides when attacked . Hardly anything to be admired .
Yeah it’s a fair bit like the ‘tragedy of the commons’, ain’t it?
“Like him or not Putin is the by-product of 70 years of communist rule collapsed overnight.
For those that hate Putin but love Communism there’s no helping you, yes Liberal Progressives that you. For those that hate both Putin and Communism, you need to go back and study the conditions that allowed Communism to take hold and what 70 years of it does to a nation.”
Well said, but be warned that you will be branded a Putin lover. He is not doing anything different than Czarina Catherine II and her successors, including First Secretaries did for the last 250 years.
Caldwell wrote this right, as did Kate with her comment ‘Caldwell didn’t say “what”. He said “how”.
Exactly!! It’s easy for people whose families have lived in North America since the 1600s and 1700s to be critical of Putin from their perspective. He is a product of Russia as much as they are products of the US & Canada. Other than perhaps the Brits, no other culture and people are closer to North Americans than the Russians.
Freedom is not free
free men are not equal
Equal men are not free
“Oh, and nobody loves communism anymore (OK, maybe 200 in the whole country).” Plus darn near every other university professor, all the Saul Alinksy types in the US and Canada, thousands of brainwashed students, and as well our prime minister.
Ken (Kulak) >
“Well said, but be warned that you will be branded a Putin lover.”
Yup I know, I’ve clearly stated that I’m not a “Putin lover” at all on many threads, but you can’t get that through to people with the depth perception of one line comments, and never will.
Cheers.
“Other than perhaps the Brits, no other culture and people are closer to North Americans than the Russians.”
Pray tell more. Apart for hockey and cold winters how are we similar exactly? Is it the famous russian love for individual freedom and human rights? Our their respect for Magna Carta/constitution? Or is it that we never conquer others and the only land we demand is one where bury those who fought for their freedom? Or is the respect for people regardless of their skin color, ethnicity, sex, sexual orientation, etc… ? Or maybe it is our belief in democracy and checks and balances, in holding our representatives accountable?
“It’s easy for people whose families have lived in North America since the 1600s and 1700s to be critical of Putin from their perspective. ”
It is also easy for those of us who grew up on the other side of Iron Curtain to see Putin and Russia for they are. But you and others like you do not want to listen to us. You want to maintain the vision of Russia as a natural Hegemon and all those stinky people living from Estonia to Georgia should learn to love Russians telling them what to do and forget what Russia has been doing to them the moment Russia got a chance to do it. You and others will sneer at the expansion of NATO (the single greatest humanitarian act in post WWII history) because real freedom to hundreds of millions of people (who are much closer culturally to you than Russians ever will) is inconvenient and collides with the simplistic jovial vision of the Russian bear you believe in.
How about advanced technology and love of alcohol for starters… and don’t forget Christianity.
Plus the inherent joy in poking fun at people just to watch them explode into mindless accusatory rants.
the Nazis were going down with or without Russia.
Agreed. Putin is an ex KGB thug and most likely a murderer who has opponents killed, and as such I have never defended him or his actions. Also, he has enriched himself at the expense of the Russian people by selling protection or whatever you want to call it. I find him repugnant and all I have ever said is that he is behaving no different than than all his Tsarist and First Secretary predecessors. He did rescue, to loosely use the term, Russia from the verge complete economic and political collapse at the turn of the century. A Russia that would have gone the way of today’s Libya would have been in no one’s interest.
Like you Knight, I find it disheartening that a few here brand us as Putin lovers simply because of a realistic assessment of Putin’s role in Russia’s history.
I was born here in Canada, as was my wife, but both our parents were born in Russia in families of German heritage and that had lived in Russia since the late 1700s. While both our sets of grandparents escaped the communist hell in the early 1920s, their siblings did not, and almost all the males died in the Gulags, with a few of them shot in the 1930s.
The Russian people have never known democracy except for a brief period of seven months in 1917, so it is easy to throw stones at the Russians for supporting Putin. We in the west have had eight hundred years of the growth of democracy and now, because of the free lunch and immoral mentality of our corrupted people, we are increasingly electing leaders who want to take away our freedoms. Our current prime minister openly muses about his admiration for communism, and the former US president came from a communist minded family and consorted with the likes of anarcho-communists like Alinsky, Ayers, and Soros.
Btw, the main White Army leaders, Kolchak and Deniken, have been “rehabilitated” and honoured. However, while the bulk of the White political or military leaders, except for the few liberals among them, would not have pursued the political policies that resulted in the deaths of tens of millions of Russians, never mind other peoples.
Ken (Kulak)>
Very well summarized.
I liked that you included the wests massive growth in communism and it’s special interest support.
It could also be said that our wonderful Progressive modernization especially Open Borders has brought us massive state surveillance, militarized police forces, and plenty of government scandals too numerous to mention. None of which serve the citizen taxpayers of the west.
Yes Putin’s a brute, so what was Obamba called using drones on wedding parties in foreign countries, or crippling political opponents like Tea Party members with the IRS?
Libya was destroyed by the use of Obambas Air Force and ISIS was allowed to take Gadhafi’s armories. Today Libya is a murderous hellhole as is much of the region – after it was well understood what would happen, including Millions of illiterate Islamic refugee’s flooding the west. Still today Obamba is a Noble Peace Prize winner getting kick backs for book sales that no one reads or buys.
Yet many here waste time pointing fingers at Putin while supporting their own repressors including the doctrines of the Progressive Left. They are nothing but Putin hating Arab Spring lovers to me, who support Obamba, the EU, and their own repression like useful idiots.
It’s a sad state of affairs.
I never understood the strongman problem. It seems we in the west prefer pussywillows and women, mass muzz immigration and gay pride.
In Russia, 0% corporate tax, can carry a gun for self defense, and it’s not a crime to insult Islam, or gay folk, or black folk, or whatever. In Russia, one can distill ones own booze without having to worry about the Gestapo, and can drink while fishing and hunting.
We in the west have a “free” press too, right? LOL.
McCarthy was right, and by shooting and jailing seditions progs, Putin is doing what McCarthy failed to do in the US.
YeahWell >
“In Russia, 0% corporate tax, can carry a gun for self defense, and it’s not a crime to insult Islam, or gay folk, or black folk, or whatever. In Russia, one can distill ones own booze without having to worry about the Gestapo, and can drink while fishing and hunting.”
Damn, what’s airfare cost, what are property tax’s like?
Naw just kidding I can’t move anywhere yet, to many people like UnoMe to f*ck up around here for a long while. I’ll pay the extra for the privilege of doing it 🙂
“Naw just kidding I can’t move anywhere yet, to many people like UnoMe to f*ck up around here for a long while. I’ll pay the extra for the privilege of doing it :)”
Agreed.
I’m hoping that the great game of cowboys and libtards starts sooner rather than later.
Watch Europe, it’s the Canary in the Coal mine.
Europe is facing 2 choices in it’s future, continued “Islamification” or mass civil unrest leading to Civil War.
Either way the left losses. That’s not a prediction, it’s global historical fact.
In Russia, 0% corporate tax, can carry a gun for self defense, and it’s not a crime to insult Islam, or gay folk, or black folk, or whatever. In Russia, one can distill ones own booze without having to worry about the Gestapo, and can drink while fishing and hunting.
If you pay the requisite bribes, you can do anything there…
“If you pay the requisite bribes, you can do anything there…”
Sounds like Washington.
“Sounds like Washington.”
Yes and the short bus you travel on is just like a regular bus.
Except in Washington they still hide it.
“can carry a gun for self defense”
citing after wiki:
“Guns may be acquired for self-defense, hunting or sports activities only. Russian citizens can buy smooth-bore long-barreled firearms and pneumatic weapons with a muzzle energy of up to 25 joules. Rifles allowed after five years of ownership of a shotgun. Handguns generally are not allowed. Short barrel rifles and shotguns (less than 800 mm) are prohibited as well as suppressors. An individual cannot possess more than ten guns (up to five shotguns and up to five rifles) unless part of a registered gun collection, guns that shoot in bursts and have more than a ten-cartridge capacity are prohibited.”
Details here: details form the Library of Congress: http://www.loc.gov/law/help/firearms-control/russia.php to confirm wiki
“Individuals are not allowed to carry guns acquired for self-defense; a license only serves as a carrying permit for hunting and sport firearms when these guns need to be transported.”
“can carry a gun for self defense”
citing after wiki:
“Guns may be acquired for self-defense, hunting or sports activities only. Russian citizens can buy smooth-bore long-barreled firearms and pneumatic weapons with a muzzle energy of up to 25 joules. Rifles allowed after five years of ownership of a shotgun. Handguns generally are not allowed. Short barrel rifles and shotguns (less than 800 mm) are prohibited as well as suppressors. An individual cannot possess more than ten guns (up to five shotguns and up to five rifles) unless part of a registered gun collection, guns that shoot in bursts and have more than a ten-cartridge capacity are prohibited.”
Form the Library of Congress that confirms wiki summary, also (links omitted because they get caught in the filter easy to find):
“Individuals are not allowed to carry guns acquired for self-defense; a license only serves as a carrying permit for hunting and sport firearms when these guns need to be transported.”
“In Russia, 0% corporate tax”
http://www.cfe-eutax.org/taxation/corporate-income-tax/russia
“Corporate income tax in Russia is the largest source of regional revenues. The total tax rate is 24 % and:
• 6.5 % is remitted to federal government
• 17.5 % is remitted to the regions”
“In Russia, 0% corporate tax”
More information here: http://www.tradingeconomics.com/russia/corporate-tax-rate just out of curiosity where did you get your information from?
There is a lot more that can be added to the list. But since specific examples work best, how about the fact the tens of thousands of families who had their houses bulldozed for the Sochi Olympics, still haven’t been compensated and continue living in slums often without running water or electricity. That is how property rights are respected in that free market capitalist utopia these useful idiots sing hosannas for.
“We in the west have a “free” press too, right? LOL.”
Knight’s short bus to Order of Magnitude is about to leave. Be sure to be under it.
http://www.smalldeadanimals.com/2017/04/how-to-think-ab.html#comment-1100449
LOL
agendas change. leadership changes. in the event Nazi Germany came out on top and stayed there for a couple decades, it is entirely plausible and in my opinion they would have expanded their gaze to every corner that offered any sort of technical, political, economic advantage. ie a world power. gee, has *that* ever happened before?
nuff said.