[Lukasz]

This forum is communistic!

[notigar]

Totalitarian, not communist.

[Poohbah]

This forum is communistic!

Then find one more to your liking.

[GOP_1900AD]

I must give proper credit, in a begrudging way, to Putin. By moving from his old Soviet KGB roots to embracing Tsarist trappings, *apparent* Russian Eastern Orthodox Christian faith and *appearing* to side with the US in the War on Terror, he has managed to build an amazingly large amount of support amongst US conservatives. So now we have this dilemma. Here is a situation which, if it happened back when Reagan was president and Gorby running the old USSR, conservatives would have rushed to support Yushchenko. But alas, today, we have nothing but fragmentation amongst US conservatives. Brilliant moves on Putin's part led to all of this. I sure hope we don't see a worst case scenario. I think many Americans don't quite realize that that might look like.

[LibertyRocks]

I found this today regarding Putin's interests in the Ukraine. Lots of people here talking about Soros. I'd say Putin is the one whose done most of the interferring in the Ukraine....

Putin wants Ukraine back in the fold
Russia's President sees stronger ties with Kiev as key to new empire
http://www.canada.com/national/nationalpost/news/story.html?id=b9e8e0fb-597e-438c-82bc-e50487e80119

[snip] Mr. Putin has always argued economic ties between Russia and Ukraine are stronger than those among EU countries and he has repeatedly urged Ukraine's leaders to strengthen their links with Moscow.

But he intervened intensely and directly in the Ukraine election campaign and tried to manipulate the outcome.

Opposition politicians in Ukraine claim Russia supplied as much as US$600-million to finance Ukrainian Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovich's bid to become president.

They say Mr. Putin's top advisors worked for Mr. Yanukovich's campaign and note that Russian state television, which is beamed into most Ukrainian homes, campaigned unrelentingly for Mr. Yanukovich.
[snip]

I'd say $600,000,000 is 600,000,000 reasons not to trust Putin or Yanukovich. Russia wouldn't spend that much money on an outside election if not for some reason. Also, Putin is whining about Western interference in this election - what in the heck do you call his interference?