Posted on 12/27/2014 6:12:17 AM PST by Kaslin
In his annual year end press conference, Russian President Vladimir Putin showed beyond the shadow of a doubt that he is in fact mentally unhinged. For three hours, by turns he demonstrated signs of schizophrenic paranoia, pathological dishonesty, deep seated passive-aggressive tendencies, woeful ignorance of world affairs and economics, and delusional confidence in Russia’s future prospects.
Putin evokes the national self-image of the Russian bear. Putin’s bear is a natural hunter contentedly chasing pigs and boars, but otherwise minding his own business in his own sovereign forest. But somebody wants this bear to have a makeover, and to give up manly boar hunting for meekly picking berries and eating honey. But even that won’t be enough for this bear’s implacable adversaries. No, they want to chain up this proud bear, and remove his teeth and claws. And once he’s been defanged, he’ll be stuffed and put on display by the mantle.
Putin makes clear that as long as he’s in charge, the bear’s going to keep his teeth and claws - otherwise known as nuclear weapons. And if the bear didn’t have nukes, his enemies would take over his forest, with all of its oil and gas. Putin is the only world leader other than Kim Jong-un to so blithely menace the world with nuclear Armageddon.
And if that doesn’t unnerve you, Putin’s display of full blown paranoia should. He sees shadowy conspiracies against Russia everywhere. After fighting an appallingly dirty war against separatists in Chechnya, Russia has been plagued by low grade conflict and terrorism in its North Caucasus. According to Putin, these entirely home-grown domestic terrorists are supported by the West, “an established fact” that “everyone knows.”
And what about the Sochi Olympics? This was supposed to be Putin glorious moment in the sun (and incidentally a massive $50 billion boondoggle for his friends). Criticism of the Olympian graft and Russia’s repression of gays were all part of a “clearly orchestrated” campaign to discredit Russia. “This is an undeniable fact!” (Having myself written several op-eds criticizing Sochi, if there was such a campaign I’m still waiting for my paycheck.)
These same devious foreigners (read: “Americans”) want to steal Siberia. Putin repeats a long debunked urban myth that a high level American official once claimed it was “unfair” that “the whole of Siberia with its immense resources” should belong to Russia. Russian security agencies ascribe this avaricious sentiment to former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, based on a mind reading apparatus that can tell a person’s inner thoughts based on their facial expressions.
And Putin is bitter and angry that a country as peaceable as his is surrounded by warmongers. He repeatedly claims that NATO’s eastward expansion “right up to our borders” is some sort of dirty trick that fundamentally infringes Russian rights. He seems unaware that after the end of the Soviet Empire, every single former Warsaw Pact member (and three former Soviet republics) made membership in NATO a national priority to protect themselves from the above mentioned bear.
He’s also indignantly self-pitying. He whinges that Russia only has two foreign military bases, in strategic Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan, while “U.S. bases are scattered around the globe.” And then Pentagon’s budget is ten times that of Russia’s military budget. It’s unfair, and obviously proof that it’s American and not Russian aggression the world has to worry about. Never mind that American troops are stationed around the world with the sovereign consent on our allies, and are there to protect them from rogue leaders like Putin.
Putin lies with such ease that it is hard to be sure he doesn’t actually believe his own lies. He breezily denies that Russia is fomenting a war in eastern Ukraine. Russia hasn’t been shipping arms and anti-aircraft rockets, it’s only sent “humanitarian convoys.” And annexing Crimea, territory of a neighboring state, wasn’t an infringement of Ukrainian sovereignty, it was a defense of Russia’s right to exist.
Even as the ruble collapses and Russia heads into the teeth of a severe recession, Putin paints a rosy economic picture. The decline in the ruble is “primarily” due to “external factors,” such as sanctions, falling energy prices, and “profiteering” by shady currency speculators. But Russia will easily “adjust” to sharply lower energy prices, despite the fact that oil and gas make up half the government budget and a quarter of GDP.
Putin expresses confidence that lower energy prices are actually a benefit, because it will be a reason to diversifying Russia’s economy away from dependence on energy exports. Putin has made this a promise regularly for the last 14 years. But Putin has a glib explanation why there’s been zero forward progress under his reign, it’s because businesses only want “fast and easy profits” from natural resources instead of investing in "unprofitable" sectors like technology and manufacturing. Putin seems utterly ignorant of the fact that it's only in his inefficient and kleptocratic state that technology and manufacturing are unprofitable.
Putin is anyway confident that energy prices will “inevitably” rebound, because the “global economy will grow.” The global economy is growing, but energy prices are falling anyway because more sophisticated Western technology is bringing more and more supply into the market.Again, Putin seems unaware of basic trends even in energy markets.
In one of the dumbest moves imaginable, earlier this year Putin decided to respond to Western economic sanctions by banning food imports from Europe. The ban marginally hurts EU food producers, but fueled a substantial increase in food inflation as those imports now have to come from far flung producers such as Brazil. And now with the ruble worth half what is was six months ago, inflation will really rip loose. That doesn’t worry Putin, as the government plans to “talk to producers” and convince them not to raise prices dramatically.
Interestingly, one word nobody mentioned in the talkathon was “corruption.” Russia has been for decades tied with the likes of Nigeria in global corruption rankings, and everyone and his dog knows corruption is Russia’s number one problem. But Putin merely expresses his confidence that the government and the central bank have been “taking all appropriate measures” and have the rapidly crumbling economic situation under control.
Putin proudly points to Sochi and the 2018 World Cup as proof of his successful governing strategy. It’s widely estimated that half of the $50 billion sunk into the Sochi Olympics was stolen outright, and the other half is a white elephant that will never recover its costs. But as Putin gloats, Sochi hosted a Formula 1 race for the first time in Russian history (and the one Russian team finished last, by the way). And by expenditure of $20 billion to host the World Cup will have the happy result of encouraging the populace to join sports clubs.
And Putin is casually dismissive of the few domestic critics that dare express any dissent against his regime. As he puts it, “there is afine line between domestic opposition and (traitorous) fifth columnists.” And in any event, his critics are mere “bander-logs,” the chattering monkeys of Rudyard Kipling’s jungle tales.
Thanks to the gross incompetence and greed of Putin and his Kremlin cronies, Russia is heading into economic disaster. And his internal repression, nationalistic posturing, and policy of foreign aggression are turning Russia into a pariah state. But to listen to Vladimir Putin’s version of affairs, none of this is his personal responsibility. And maybe more scarily, most of the Russian public accept his paranoia, lies and delusions with nary a sign of criticism. The rest of the world should be more skeptical of this vicous tin-pot autocrat, and deeply worried about what Putin is capable of doing next as the Russian economy begins to fall apart at the seams over the next few years.
So in 0bama in a different way - doesn't make for an ecouraging 2015.
I do not think people realize how very vulnerable we are to Russian nuclear blackmail.
I do not think any leg of the so called nuclear triad is secure.
I doubt the land based missiles would/could be launched in time or could survive a preemptive attack by Russian MIRVs.
I believe traitors and spies in Obama’s administration keep the Russians updated on the exact position of all our ballistic missile submarines. Knowing those exact locations the Russian could easily take them all out.
Without the other two legs of the triad and with Russian air defense on full alert; it would be suicidal to use our bombers against the Russians.
In simple terms if Putin demanded the immediate total nuclear disarmament of the US and it’s Allies, there is nothing we could do but surrender.
Given who is President and his true feelings about America; simply the threat of any of the above would sufficient for him to surrender our nuclear weapons.
Once those weapons are gone, we would be defenseless and for all intensive purpose under Russian control.
When still a Senator Obama gave speeches and and offered his support to groups advocating unilateral total US nuclear disarmament, and the naive idea that at some later point the Russians and Chines would voluntarily follow our “wise” lead.
What really scares me is this may have been Obama and his Communist supporters endgame plan all along.
IOW, Putin is acting like a typical liberal.
Does anyone believe Russia should be governed by saints while our own country is governed by a bunch of monsters?
How come when someone writes that Obama is mentally unhinged, FReepers don’t flock to the thread exclaiming, “but what about Putin?” Ever think of that?
Imagine if those people happened along an Obama thread. Yes, I know that they are rare here.
I believe we are subject to Russian blackmail because of who we have in the White Hut. 0bama is clueless, easily manipulated, does not see a larger strategic or diplomatic picture, and because of that does not pursue a consistent or coherent policy, and most importantly, in a crisis, he will hesitate and back down. Because he’s a wimp.
Putin knows all of this. Oddly enough, it’s really the Saudis who are giving Putin’s Russia the most grief, not us. But the Saudis cannot do it without our support, and despite that 0bama has moslem leanings, in a crisis he’s going to fold. No doubt in my mind.
Putin is evil.
Now Putin’s unhinged?
When the propaganda gets to that level, expect a war soon.
The increase in oil prodcution and decrease in price is because of fracking, mainly from the US.
SA has not increased oil production. They have decreased oil production.
Russia produces more oil than any country in the world. Why should SA and the US decrease their oil production to save a Putin mismanaged country that produces more oil?
Poor honest Putin, the victim of such mean propaganda. Can't an honest guy get a break.
LOL @ Putin being the victim of propaganda.
You want to try and interview me?
And both are anti American.
Huh?
Russia should be governed by "saints" regardless of what's going on here and of course the opposite holds true.
BTW, this is a Putin thread.
BTW, this is a Putin thread.
OK, how about this then:
...while our own country is governed by a bunch of monsters COMMUNISTS.
Putin’s not the target of the propaganda - you and I are.
They also have a charlatan pretending to be a psychiatrist.
My only thinking here is that some one is saying a lot of things that I have no idea is fact or just opinions, or worse just something to sell.
And are they worried that Russia is going to fail? or could it be they are afraid it is going to be a success.
They mention Putin’s view on homosexual marriage, seems to me he is not mentality unbalanced on that which any sane person understands and would agree with.
How could any one but an imbecile criticize some one for opposing same sex marriage?
But we are supposed to believe he is unbalanced on more complicated matters we do not even understand ourselves and have proven it?
We don`t seem to even know that a man is not supposed to marry another man, who are we to cretisize some one else.
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