FROM FORBES NO LESS.......................
Farewell Putin
The scale and swiftness of economic deterioration indicates the wide gap between how Putin views Russia, through the rosy-pink lens of his cheerleading choir, and reality: The Russian stock market has collapsed, the ruble’s dramatic devaluation, massive capital flight (at least $120 billion this year alone), galloping inflation that is getting out of control, and a real economy that is dissolving, all may revert Russia to the bleak 1990’s images.
A major element explaining this reality-perception gap is Putin’s self-orchestrated personality cult. Recently, his close aide, Vyacheslav Volodin, made the Louis XIV like statement: “If there is no Putin there is no Russia.” Plain and simple. A contemporary exhibition in Moscow, celebrating his birthday, depicted Putin as Hercules, carrying earth on his back. The internal schisms in his circle are beginning to surface. Especially the one between the inner-circle Siloviki and the Oligarchs, compounded by the economic crisis and the increasing realization that Putin’s policies precipitated it. Both are beginning to realize that Putin, the asset that benefitted them so greatly, is becoming a liability that threatens them.
http://www.forbes.com/sites/na...2/08/farewell-putin/