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Russia is not a good nation. Russia is an evil tyranny and is America’s worst enemy in the world. KGB Putin is a terrorist mass murderer and a war criminal.

What evil? What tyranny? The USSR is gone. Over. Done with. The nation that exists on the territory is NOT THE SAME. Is the USA considered Great Britain simply because we exist on formerly British territory?

In the USSR, citizens couldn't leave without permission. In Russia, this is not the case.

In the USSR, citizens couldn't own property. In Russia, this is not the case.

In the USSR, citizens couldn't even change cities without permission. In Russia, this is not the case.

In the USSR, citizens couldn't hope to rise above their circumstances. In Russia, people do this every day.

Russia has a lot of problems with corruption, but it is still very much a land of opportunity.

My in-laws (Armenians) had to leave Kirovabad, Azerbaijan, in 1987 or 1988 because of Azeri pogroms against Armenians. They had to leave within days, without time to bring any of their property. They lost everything, including their house. They arrived in Russia essentially penniless.

Today, they own their house and their car (no debt). They have a successful business in the Krasnodar Krai. My wife was able to make money (working herself) to put herself through four years of college, then travel to the USA to study more. Her family regularly comes to visit us. They travel to Istanbul to import merchandise for the store every quarter or so. My wife's youngest sister just finished high school with high honors and was offered one of a very small number of full scholarships to the #2 university in Russia. Keep in mind they are not ethnically Russian, but rather a racial and ethnic minority.

I have spent months in Russia very recently. I understand a bit of the language. I have experienced what life is like there...There is no tyranny, there is no dictatorship. Individual tax rates are 13%. Small business tax rate is 0%. There are many idiosyncrasies, but no tyranny. People tend to be patriots and support Putin and Russia. Russia is the #2 immigration target in the world behind the USA.

Before this experience, I also felt that Russia was this huge bogeyman, simply out of ignorance. I imagined oppressed people with oxcarts on rutted roads.

Perhaps I am biased by my own experience, but I simply don't see a reason to oppose this country simply on principle. In many ways, opportunity there is better than here in the USA.

Russia is America's enemy. If the Russian people really support the mass murderer Putin then they are complicit with his crimes like the Germans who supported Hitler. Russians are like those in the Gaza Strip who vote for HAMAS. Don't tell me you are a democracy when everybody had to vote for HAMAS. Russia is no more democratic than the Gaza Strip. Sure you can own property, unless you own an oil company and want to sell it to a western buyer, then the gangster thug Putin will nationalize your company and send you to Siberia. They changed the USSR to “Russia” and they changed the KGB to the FSB, but the same rotten thugs are still in charge.