Well said. The game played here is calling anyone you dislike a ‘Communist’, when there haven’t been true believer Communists in Russia in at least 30 years. The Communists, or if you like Marxist-Leninists are all at American Universities and in the media, and not only American, but everywhere that Communism has not been experienced. Marxism-Leninism is spent in Russia and in Eastern Europe, and has been for a long time. The ignorance and name calling when it comes to Putin is astounding. No, he isn’t a clone of Mr Rogers, and neither is he a Stalin, but as someone asked above, who else in Russia can lead the country? Where is their Thomas Jefferson?
In the meantime, a true believer in some secular version of Marxism-Leninism, that he’ll never call by its name, sits as we speak in the Western White Hut on the island of Oahu.
No, communism is still very much a thing in Russia, it’s just not Putin. The Russian Communist Party has 92 seats in the DUMA, the second largest party.