[DeaconBenjamin2]

I don't know anyone who would argue that nothing has changed since 1991. However, there are extensive arguments whether the raison d'etre of Putin's presidency is the re-establishment of the Soviet Union.

[John Will]

Putin is seeming more like a Czar than president

[DeaconBenjamin2]

Do you think this is the US government's position?

[GSlob]

"I don't know anyone who would argue that nothing has changed since 1991. "
In 17th century there were "kaftans", in 18th - "kamzols", in 19th- "syurtuks" and in 20th - jackets. What one needs to seek the changes in is NOT the clothing fashions, or the name under which the not-so-secret police operates - from Ivan the Terrible's "Oprichnina" to the most current "FSB" - but the underlying sociology, like the role the coercive state organizations play in the state and society. Thus one could argue that nothing sociologically essential has changed, and even if it did change, the change was merely cosmetic.