Dispatch by Joshua Kucera from South Ossetia (before war) "Why Can't We Live Together?"

Slate ^ | May 19, 2008 | Joshua Kucera

[Tolik]

Michale J. Totten: If you want some solid background reading about the hell that broke loose in Georgia a few days ago, take a look at this dispatch by Joshua Kucera from South Ossetia that Slate published a few months ago. You’ll learn a lot more reading that than you will from wire agency reports that focus mostly on tank movements and body counts

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TSKHINVALI, South Ossetia—The first time I enter Tskhinvali, the capital of South Ossetia, the hotel staff immediately calls the police. They tell me that no one can process my journalist accreditation until Wednesday. It is a Sunday afternoon, and the following Tuesday is the May Day holiday, making it a four-day weekend. Can't I just stay until then and see the town as a tourist, I ask? Nope.

....

I'm visiting South Ossetia as part of a tour across the southern edge of the former Soviet Union, looking at the wildly different directions the newly independent countries have taken since 1991. In the case of South Ossetia, a self-proclaimed independent country that is, in fact, neither independent nor a country, "nowhere" is probably the best way to describe where it's gone. It's perhaps the closest you can get today to experiencing the old Soviet Union, as well as a good place to get the flavor of a good old-fashioned, Cold-War-style proxy war between the United States and Russia.

 

Billboards around Tskhinvali show Vladimir Putin with the legend "Our President." (This is during the summer of 2007.)

[Alia]

The So Ossetians have had a very rough road, caught in the cross tides of many and varying revolutions; used as tissues, as it were. That is bloody awful; and no way to live.

And it doesn't sound as tho Russia gives two basic squats about Ossetians. So. Ossetians have no economy (of their own), no particular skills, no way to being self-sufficient. What they had was centuries old fealty to Russia. In a like note: AFL-CIO Teachers Unions throughout CA are destroying Pub Ed from within, continually producing and increasing disastrous curriculum, but fealty to the "Union" is likewise, old. But certainly not as old as the history between So. Ossetia and Russia.

To more current times, had So. Ossetia chosen to try out the new Georgian ideas, free democracy, etc., instead of hating Georgia, and using their time and energies to fight the Georgian Government, they, too, might have tasted the flavor of achievement. Of that personal sense of achievement which can only come from producing or manufacturing or being self-sufficient. Some sort of self-sufficiency.

But it appears to me that through the hundreds of years, Ossetians became culturally indoctrinated with feeding off the open hand of Russia while also enduring its harsh backhand. That, as long as Russia "fed them"; they would uphold Russia.

That's the law of the jungle; and I know it. However, they had a good shot at changing this with Georgia, particularly through the 2000s.

So. Ossetians chose a bitter path, fraught with more of the same.

A tragic situation.

[rmlew]

Georgia has done a poor job of getting the truth, or at least its side, out.

[rmlew]

Freshman year (1995), I wrote a papr for my IR class talking about the different foreign pressures and ethnic conflicts in the region. I dusted it off last week and find that I still know more just from that old research than is presented in virtually every news story today.

[JerseyHighlander]

This situation is different, usually the bias is in the Western media’s newsrooms, here the newsrooms were without enough understanding to develop a bias, and they just parroted the Russian state media propaganda.

abb has the lamestream media deathwatch, but here we see the downside, American media organs have cut foreign bureaus so far they no longer have working newsroom knowledge on the background of Russian and ex-Soviet affairs.

[rmlew]

Not to worry. Fox News has joined everyone in doing a stand up job of covering the non-news on Kaylee whatever. (Actually, Fox today also ran pictures of the chupacabra.)

I'm actually getting better news from Russian TV on the conflict, just assuming taht it is 90% lies, instead of 90% stupidity. I DVRed the BBC America newscast and am starting it now. They are horrible liberals, but actually cover news.

[Tolik]

They can’t drink all bear by themselves, can they? So they will have to sell and you will be able to buy. :^)

[Tolik]

Nothing is ever easy or straightforward, I guess. I see your point. I am talking about free associations of people, freely choosing their way. There was a case made that it was better when Tito controlled Yugoslavia - less violence. But they still flew apart as soon as the force keeping them together lessened. Same with the USSR republics. I still think that free and separate is better than forced together.

[Alia]

lol! Port Costa is right on the Delta, in the SF Bay Area. It used to be an active port, usually involving grains. Stories of pirates, and illicit smuggling. RAVE parties rent the entire old hotel across the street, coming from San Francisco. Last time I was there, and entire RAVE party in full regalia was there. My guests and I didn't just pick beers by name or label, we picked by export and from what country. Outstanding conversation concerning the country's whose beer we were currently drinking. ;>

My point in bringing up this "asidem"? This town voted in majority to secede from California.

If it had been given it's head (no pun in re beer), all Californian's would have been paying welfarian benefits to keep this town afloat ;> in its secession from CA.

These people didn't realize their vote to secede from CA was a marketing ploy; a PR stunt. They really believed they could and should secede.

[Tolik]

BBC does sound sober, but after seeing their Israel coverage, I can’t trust them, and simply can’t tell where they lie and where not when covering other areas of the globe.

[Tolik]

Not my business, but for a Californian you have strange working hours being up at 5:00 am and active on FR.

Anyway, if that town left, why others need to pay “welfarian benefits to keep this town afloat”? Isn’t it their own business?

[Alia]

I am not on the West Coast, at current.

A town, country or otherwise wishing to secede should be able to be self-sufficient by more than one or two means. Port Costa has ONLY that microbrewery and maybe a car garage here and there. Other than that, everyone in that town commutes elsewhere to make their living. Meaning, they use "publically paid for highways, roads", rely upon County Emergency services and hospitals, etc.

I suppose the wise thing would be to just let Port Costa, for example, secede, but ensure their cars have no way to leave the town, and abuse the rights that others have paid for. I was trying to make my point using humor. I failed.

[Tolik]

“I was trying to make my point using humor. I failed.”

Sorry for being dense, its my fault: I am upset our guys lost to Nigeria in Olympic soccer :^(((

[Alia]

Last night was the first I was able to watch in re Olympics. WOW! I grew up in a family of rabid Olympic fans. Got disinterested when “politics” became too political in re Olympics. But yes, I can relate to your sentiments. I was there for the US Swimming Win! And the women’s 26-mile marathon gave me nightmares last night. I am SO thrilled for Romania!