Posted on 03/11/2007 12:58:42 PM PDT by JTN
GARRY KASPAROV, the former world chess champion, took a pen and notebook and diagramed the protesters’ march through St. Petersburg on March 3. Like a general reliving a battle or a player analyzing a winning combination, he sketched Uprising Square and showed where the police had gathered in strength, blocking the street leading to the governor’s office.
A tactical mistake! “This is typical for this government,” he explained. “They protect themselves.”
As a result, only a few police officers guarded St. Petersburg’s main commercial street, Nevsky Prospekt. And that was where Mr. Kasparov and thousands of others — as many as 5,000 by some estimates — poured through a barricade and marched into the city’s historic center, defying the government’s ban on the event and the country’s recent history of political apathy.
The whole thing lasted only two hours, ending with brief clashes with the police and more than 130 arrests, including those of several opposition leaders, though not Mr. Kasparov. Still, it was one of the largest protests against President Vladimir V. Putin’s Russia.
And to Mr. Kasparov, it was a first crack in the authoritarian political system Mr. Putin has created, one that he has committed himself to dismantling as presidential elections approach next March.
“We never saw such a protest,” he said. “Everybody recognizes it is a new page.”
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
He better put on an anti radiation suit every time he leaves the house.
He's an extremely high-profile figure in Russia - that won't save him if Putin decides to take him out, but it will make the task a lot harder. Even Putin's strongest supporters might resent the murder of a national sports hero.
May he continue in good health. Indeed, I would much rather have him and his adherents immigrate to the West, as they already are civilizational Westerners, at least to a major extent.
Hopefully, his notoriety will give him some protection. Kasparov's name is well known thanks to his highly publicized matches with IBM's Deep Blue, and if he were killed I think that would garner a lot of attention.
Another unfortunate "accident" in the making?
Kasparov is a radical kook whose popularity is in the single digits in Russia. He is a Cynthia McKinney figure in the Russian context. The fact that the NYT is a fan is all you really need to know about him.
Kasparov could wait out Putin's tenure and then launch a full fledged campaign of his own. Not sure how much protesting Putin at this point is going to help. He is the best and needless to say the smartest ally the west can hope for in the ex commie state.
# 2. In Chess everything is out in the open for you to see, not so in life. Kasparov may be a master of the Sicilian Defense, but if the thinks he can force Putin to resign he better think again.
Gary Kasparov is a very brave man. He will soon be murdered by the ex-KGB criminal elite than runs Russia.
Everywhere in Europe. Kasparov is bigger in Russia than Michael Jordan, Joe Montana, and Alex Rodriguez combined. And he had no qualms about speaking his mind even in the Soviet era. But his fame may not be enough to immunize him against the current dictator's wrath.
Kasparov got his butt kicked by a computer - I don't think Putin is too worried right now.
The chess players physically train for months before a world championship. Some players are so drained, they need hospitalization after a match.
Of course for us recreational players, it is not a sport, but at the highest levels, it is.
The same seems to be true for NASCAR, where the top drivers have to be in great shape too, and not so for the recreational driver.
There is alike person in the USA - Robert James Fischer. Mr. Kasparov is as much a sports hero in Russia as Mr. Fischer is in the USA.
Well Dirty Harry has a flat in Manhattan where he family lives. I wonder if he really pretends for leadership in Russia of any kind.
A guy who has always been something of an outsider. He is half Jewish and half Armenian, born in Baku, the capital of mostly Muslim Azerbaijan. He moved to Moscow in 1990 when tensions between Armenians and Azeris intensified.
Come one what connection does he have with Russia?
Those performing strip-tease in public better have REALLY attractive bodies, otherwise they merely demonstrate their ugliness, or barbarity - if one is to switch from the figurative mode.
Gathering together every possible opposition group, starting with the Communists and ending with Western-style liberals is Kasparov-style strip-tease.
A guy whose family lives in the USA isn't a good pretender for the national leadership. Wannabe Russian leader - show the public that you associate your future with Russia.
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