You're tellin' me!
Putin, whom I like (I thought), is headed in the absolute wrong direction. He's had a ton of tough problems for quite a while, which may have caused him to secure his personal control, unlawfully, so that the several critical situations may be addressed, in his opinion, in the best possible way. There is logic to that, but putting the world on edge.
Now he's sent Russian troops into the Ukraine (Kiev), to forcefully support a regime that legitimately lost a democratically run election. Besides just being wrong, the only chance for Putin to survive politically seems to be in reestablishing some resemblance of the old USSR. That would insure his leadership, but not much else.
There are plenty of atom bombs over there, still. Political instability can be a dangerous condition. It just looks bad, to me, at the moment.
I wonder what John Kerry (who is not, incidentally, the president-elect), thinks of this? Was John Kerry a history buff? I wonder if history buffs of the future will remember John Kerry.
Ping
does anybody REALLY beleive Putin will in any way "honor" Kyoto?!!!!
<< It's not yet clear how Bush (who is not, incidentally, a history buff) ..... >>
Incidently, on whose, incidently, authority is he not, incidentally, a history buff, incidently?
The Moscow Times.com -- Opinion / Editorial
http://www.themoscowtimes.com/stories/2004/11/25/005.html
Thursday, November 25, 2004. Page 8.
Putin Can't Have It Both Ways
Editorial
As President Vladimir Putin and the new European Commission chiefs gather for a summit on Thursday in The Hague, disagreements over the Ukrainian election cast a dark cloud over their first meeting. Putin may have been planning to cash in the chips Russia earned by ratifying the Kyoto Protocol -- indeed, welcoming Russia's support for the environmental treaty was at the top of a to-do list for the summit as recently as Monday, according to an EU press release. Instead, it looks more likely Moscow will be playing defense.
Russia's relationship with Europe -- and with America -- was already under pressure, ever since Putin unveiled plans to do away with elections for governors and single-mandate Duma deputies. Even U.S. President George Bush took Putin aside last week at a summit in Chile to express concerns about the electoral changes. Putin reportedly offered a long, rambling response that reached back into Russian history and the country's experience with Stalinism. It's not yet clear how Bush (who is not, incidentally, a history buff) took it.
Regardless, Putin's stamp of approval on an election that has been uniformly criticized in the West won't help. In its relations with Europe and the United States, Russia has long been walking a tightrope: Western concerns over Russian democracy, Chechnya and Yukos were leveraged against improving economic ties, measured cooperation in the war on terror, cheery rhetoric, and a few other odds and ends like the Kyoto Protocol. But the Ukrainian fiasco, coming after Putin's proposals for changes to Russia's electoral system, reveals a widening gap between Russia and Western democracies.
Plainly put, Putin can't have it both ways. A patina of support for democracy isn't going to cut it in Europe -- not over the long term, at least. Moscow will be hard pressed to foster productive political ties with Brussels and Washington if it is perceived to be trampling democracy at home and abroad.
Putin should realize that his biggest geopolitical tool, Europe's dependence on Russian energy supplies, does not give him a carte blanche to meddle in traditional spheres of influence.
No matter whom Ukrainian voters actually chose as their president, Moscow cannot expect to win friends and wield its influence by continuing to insist that evidence of widespread fraud in the Ukrainian poll is inconsequential.
Russia should look hard at the situation in Ukraine and use the summit as a springboard for discussion of a peaceful, negotiated settlement to the standoff. It's not too late to turn a crisis into an opportunity. But that window is closing fast.
Why, one could wonder? In many if not the most of European countries there is a party system of voting to the Parlament and the local executives are nominated by the central government!
I wonder if in the next step EU starts demands that the exit polls run by the "impartial" EU observers should replace the secret ballot as the way of electing leaders in Russia (as it seems to be expected for Ukraine).