Russian Liberal Opposition

Putin's cronies

kvs wrote:

Putin's cronies

Quote of the century. Putin putting the oligarch wannabes into line makes them his cronies. I guess these "experts" would
prefer that Putin was the crony of actual oligarchs such as in Ukraine. Or the USA for that matter. Because we all know
that popularly elected leaders have less legitimacy than unelected star chambers.

The mind boggles at the inanity.

Backman wrote:

kvs wrote:

Putin's cronies

Quote of the century.   Putin putting the oligarch wannabes into line makes them his cronies.   I guess these "experts" would
prefer that Putin was the crony of actual oligarchs such as in Ukraine.   Or the USA for that matter.   Because we all know
that popularly elected leaders have less legitimacy than unelected star chambers.    

The mind boggles at the inanity.

You just have to accept some of that with John Helmer's writing. He's just a grubby investigative journalist. Anyone who is rich is a crony to him.

Putin is a statesman keeping big business out of politics. And this somehow means that they are his "cronies".

Backman wrote:...The free press of Russia which existed in 2014 is now regimented by information warfare...

Backman wrote:...I'm starting to think that Putin doesn't actually have any major assets at all. He's the president. He has the presidential helicopters , cars and jets. And the presidential retreats. He doesn't need money. And he will get a good pension and lots of perks after he retires. As all X presidents do....

Backman wrote:I'm starting to think that Putin doesn't actually have any major assets at all. He's the president. He has the presidential helicopters , cars and jets. And the presidential retreats. He doesn't need money. And he will get a good pension and lots of perks after he retires. As all X presidents do.

This is a very positive development, Russian press back in 2014 was a rat's nest of traitors, commies and liberals

That shitshow has been finally regulated somewhat, ironically thanks to Uncle Sam

He does not need a stupid brothel-like palace..

..he would not even have time to make use of it...

Backman wrote:
I'm starting to think that Putin doesn't actually have any major assets at all. He's the president. He has the presidential helicopters , cars and jets. And the presidential retreats. He doesn't need money. And he will get a good pension and lots of perks after he retires. As all X presidents do.

PhSt wrote:
Since Analnus' pathetic attempt to foment insurrection didn't work out well NATzO's plan B is to start murdering people to keep the charade rolling.

Russian doctor who treated Navalny after poisoning has died 'suddenly'

Backman wrote:

PhSt wrote:
Since Analnus' pathetic attempt to foment insurrection didn't work out well NATzO's plan B is to start murdering people to keep the charade rolling.  

Russian doctor who treated Navalny after poisoning has died 'suddenly'

Jesus Christ. Why is the Russian press so quick to report this shit ? At least investigate first and provide some evidence as to what happened. The FSB should have had everyone within 10 feet of Navalny on survailance. Maybe they did and this was just bad timing. But maybe not. The CIA would have to knock off more than one doctor to keep the truth down. There is records of Navalnys visit presumably.

Now the opposite will be said in the Western media. That it was Russia who killed him

miketheterrible wrote:its ctv news, Canadian news.  So they are already making it clear they are pushing the "Russia" Did it.

Even though the doctor made it clear that Navalny wasn't sick with "Novichok" and that they were discrediting him in the west, left right and center.

Yeah, it is either he died of something else, or he was knocked off by foreign units.

Backman wrote:

miketheterrible wrote:its ctv news, Canadian news.  So they are already making it clear they are pushing the "Russia" Did it.

Even though the doctor made it clear that Navalny wasn't sick with "Novichok" and that they were discrediting him in the west, left right and center.

Yeah, it is either he died of something else, or he was knocked off by foreign units.

yeah i know that's canadian news. But I am assuming that it was officially reported by Russia and then was picked up by the international news.

kvs wrote:The whole "we won the cold war" claim is pure hubris flatulence.   It is the same as the claim that Reagan bankrupted the USSR.
A command economy was "bankrupted" by some clown spending dollars.   Command economies become "bankrupt" when they
run out of human and material resources and not money.   The vast majority of the people in the USSR were not diverted to
work on military activities during the 1980s and clearly material resources did not run out.    Ergo, no bankruptcy.  

The USSR "lost" the cold war because it underwent an internal elite coup to remove the command economy and replace it
with filthy lucre generating capitalism.   The racket was going great until 1999 when the "siloviki" staged a counter coup
and deposed Yeltsin with Putin taking command.   Yeah, that actually happened.   Yeltsin would run through Prime Ministers
like used toilet paper, but all of the sudden he started following Putin's orders and voluntarily gave up the presidency to him.

At the end of the day, Russia's fate is more about its internal processes than any western meddling ambitions.   Navalny
is a worthless turkey since he has no grip on the hearts and minds of Russians.    The west can't orchestrate the conditions
running up to 1917 and 1990.

MOSCOW, February 2. /TASS/. Moscow has reasons to believe that the Alexey Navalny incident was a sham, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said at a joint press conference with his Swedish counterpart Ann Linde on Tuesday.

"As for the Navalny case, no information has been provided to us to prove accusations against the Russian authorities," Lavrov pointed out. "If you make accusations against someone, then prove their guilt. And if you say: ‘I won’t tell you anything because it’s a secret,’ we have reasons to believe that it’s a sham," he added.

"Today, I once again reminded the Swedish side that since a Swedish military laboratory conducted an analysis and the conclusions of German experts were publicly confirmed, we expect our Swedish colleagues to show transparency and honesty in this case," the Russian top diplomat noted.

GarryB wrote:The main problem for Putin in Russia is that he is seen as too pro west. Navalny dying in prison... from a heart attack (a western intelligence special I might add) and he will get an extra 20 percent of the vote if they had an election straight away.-no, & it'll only confirm to those indifferent & the intelligentsia who support Putin that the liberals r right to be against him.

It doesnt matter who Navalny really is, what matters is what mass media paints him as.

The west has been painting Putin as hitler and the devil all mashed into one character... western media means little to him now.- but not what the West can do with stolen $ & assets abroad; if the elites have more to loose by Putin in power, they'll turn on him. With their$, they can buy Army/RG generals before they get orders to shoot protesters.

And I think having Navalny arrested and in prison, was just following your oponents's plan for Russia.

Navalny being released because he is an American and British tool of intelligence would have gotten Putin replaced overnight, ..-I doubt it; he now put himself in the corner & will think twice before leaving too far from his bunkers.
I understand as a master bond villain  that for every court decision in Russia the Judge phones Putin to confirm the verdict before giving it, but in the real world they probably don't bother...-no, they were told to out him behind bars for 2y8mo. this time, & that's what happened. There's another trial now on unrelated case.

- I'll let this article to be my reply:

New York Times... wouldn't give them the internet traffic... they simply don't deserve it.-then don't acuse me again of not presenting any evidence confirming my assertions, since u refuse to see articles just because they r from certain sites.

- not if they his opponents r barred from challenging him, as was the case up to now.

There are normally over a dozen candidates each election, which is what... six times more than in the US...-they r all approved & have no chance; Navalny was not.

- a former KGB (NKVD/OGPU/MGB successor that cost her Ms of lives) under colonel shouldn't rule Russia, period.

So you have been opposed to him being president since he was in the KGB. And it was because of all the Russian lives the KGB took... yet it is Russian people who voted for him...-I & the Russians gave him the benefit of the doubt, but now he has been exposed of who he really is. Once a KGB agent, always a KGB agent.
Except you don't care, you are being manipulated by your government and your media..- no, u r being manipulated by the pro-Putin's propaganda, while I read from all sources, unlike u.

I remember living under Andropov police state, & it was no fun nor normal.

In a cold war against the wealthy powerful west of course it was not fun or normal for the Soviet Union...-this former KGB head acted like Pinochet, stressing coercive & intrusive methods to deal with USSR internal problems, w/o addressing the root causes of the decline. Gorbachev tried it with perestroika (economic restructuring) & glasnost (openness, freedom of expression) but it led to the breakup with criminal clans & KGB taken over the economy. What u call democracy there is mafia/Mussolini-style democracy.

- not formally his, but under his control, & the FSO with restricted zones around it r there to welcome him while keeping others that have no business there away. Calling it by its proper name, it's a $1B bribe.

He is Russian president and it is in Russia... if he decrees a national emergency and any particular building needs to be used in the interests of the Russian state then of course it is under his control, but he hasn't and it isn't, so you are wrong.-flimsy & thinly stretched reasoning; it was built far relaxation with a bunker for emergencies. It has no defense value for Russia at all; in fact, it costs extra $Ms to operate & guard. How did Roman Emperors' villas on Capri help defend the Roman Empire?
Do you think Bill Clinton didn't visit Epsteins island during and after his presidency... you can guarantee he would want one of his own...-Putin has A. Kabaeva & probably other women, but will be lucky if gets formally charged & tried for his crimes. 

-after renovation, it wasn't going to stay empty. If some1 is given a bribe but doesn't use it for a long time, it doesn't mean that he wasn't bribed.

If you never receive a bribe it is not a bribe.- he visited it & was going to use it. If the Russians don't prevent him from doing so, he won't hesitate coming there again.

-1 day u'll have a rude awakening.

..I realised what I read and hear might not be 100% true in the west.- but now u say that 100% is not true; then, in ur judgement, pro-Putin media is correct 100%?

-he may add more years to his term, depending on the situation. Putin isn't very smart, but very cunning, like Stalin was.

If he wasn't very smart Russia would not be in the position it is today.- he is smart compared to other leaders since Stalin, but that's hardly a complement & something to be extremely proud of. The oligarchs that pay him a tribute r a lot smarter than he is. But Navalny, the Russian Assange, is even smarter for exposing that "the king is naked" & succeeding in forcing Putin to defend his reputation.

-no, the FSB, Putin, & the RF gov. r now discredited; his plane made an emerg. landing & he was brought sick into Omsk hospital (see update on his Dr.) which under pressure didn't say he got poisoned;

He was in a coma... even a pillow would have done it.... if the Omsk hospital didn't say he got poisoned they would say anything they were told... brain haemorrhage... remove the tiny brain and then cremate the body and hand his ashes back to his family... the west could bleat all they liked but what could they do?-then, they would be discredited even more, & lose all claim to legitimacy at home. Putin is smart enough to do what he did, but that won't help him in the long run.

Putin didn't have a choice but to let him go to Germany to stay clean from attempted murder accusations.

But why murder him in the first place, he is a nothing, a nobody.-then why claim that the FSB was guarding him against the West's assassins? Was Nemtsov a nobody too? A "nobody" doesn't get his plane diverted to a different airport so he can be detained easier w/o his supporters' interference.
BTW after murdering an Iranian General and multiple Iranian scientists not to mention covering up the Saudi murder of Kashogi... America and the west really don't have a leg to stand on when it comes to murdering people... Obama was killing thousands of people a year with armed drones for goodness sake.- by the same token, the VKS killed many civilians in Syria. Navalny's treatment is a very good excuse to blame Russia, irrespective of what the accusers do.

Then he was in rehab; the court pretends it didn't know his whereabouts, while Putin himself did.

It does not matter if the court knew his precise whereabouts down to the bed he was in... he was violating his parole conditions and had been for the previous 8 months before that.- if true, why wasn't he arrested then? the only reason is that the FSB & Putin, would then have no alibi if he died in jail/prison instead of on his "illegal" travels.

Indeed, this "independent court", whose judge had to be replaced before hearing this artificial politically motivated Navalny's case , must be included in the Guiness Record Book.

As the least important case blown out of all proportion by the murderous western governments and the media who serve them.- even then, it's now grown out of proportion & become the bullet that Putin shot at his own foot & the boomerang that will hit his head.

.- I do understand them, but they r being imposed by pocket judges, & vigorously prosecuted on orders from above, in violation of all procedural norms, they have no legal standing.

There is no reason to believe there was any need for Putin to get involved. -w/o his involvement, the poisonings wouldn't happen at all.

- wait, its only the start. The Russians will resist injustice , & I feel it in my own bones.

Of course because Putin has been so bad for them and Navalny and his western supporters have been so nice. -the elites treat them as colonized subjects; that state of affairs won't last long.

N. Mandela spent 27 years in prison but become SA president .

But Mr Mandela was not a coke snorting asshole who does not give a shit about poor people... Russian or otherwise.-if Navalny didn't care about Russians being fleeced, he wouldn't get into trouble he is now.

Lenin, Stalin, Hitler, Valeca, Havel, NEHRU, BACHELET, &Moon_Jae-in also were imprisoned/exiled but still made it to the top.

Much more understandable comparisons... Stalin and Hitler and Lenin... that is more like it... probably lenin the most because he was a foreign funded Trojan Horse intended to destroy Russia...-no, to take her out of WWI. The West failed to destroy her, but Putin may succeed, by plunging her into civil war.

-even if so, the Russians who r not Ethnic Germans wouldn't be speaking German at home. Even Yiddish (a German dialect of E. European Jews) is a dying language.

They would probably adopt the German language in celebration at their mechanisation and industrialisation with the help of Germany...-even with all borrowed terms/words, the Russian is too rich to be traded for quaking German, or any other language, for that matter.
The Russian Tsars preferred French to Russian.... why wouldn't the peasants prefer German to Russian?- the Tsars had more foreign than Russian blood & couldn't culturally relate to Russians. Catherine II was German but learned Russian to better understand them, & she didn't push German or French on them.

.-Putin has bunkers & tunnels to hide/escape; "when the going gets tough, the tough get going". But in the end, he may be caught as a rat in a sewer like Khaddaffi was.

Of course... proud of your barbarianism you are. Murder  Gaddafi and destroy his country because it would not do as it was told.... now do the same to Putin for the same reason with the same result and then wait for the fighting to finish and steal their stuff.... I think it is pretty clear why your opinion on this should be ignored by anyone who does not wish for the destruction of Russia or any other rival to western hegemony.- too many assumptions! remove ur prisms: I don't condone nor justify what happened in Libya; removing Putin sooner rather than later may be the best thing what happens to Russia & Russians.

no, he would stand up for Russia's interests, & he won't give Crimea back, "as a half eaten sandwich."

He said that while he was in the Ukraine, and he said stupid stuff in Germany about German ministers and their policies on migration... the guy is a tool and not a good politician at all.-I beg to differ. He uses judo against Putin himself, using his opponent's strength & stupidity against him. So far all the indications r that it works. Putin ratings r falling, & soon he'll have no friends/partners/donors left. W/o them, he'll be a nobody in Russia. Saddam too had $Ms but died at the end of the rope, as well as Najib who made many enemies as head of the Afghan KGB.

Again, the best ruler is the 1 whose name isn't even known/easily recalled to the people he rules.

Do you apply that to any other country on the planet? -yes, the less gov. interference in people's affairs, the better.
I would think Americans know exactly who is in the White House...-we do, but we r Judeo-Christian nation, not the Taoist like the Tang China was.

-did Yeltsin have a party that made him a president?

Yeltsen won the popular vote in actual elections... did he ever get less than 2% like Navalny in any election?- Navalny may also win, not as any party's head, but as the 1 who got rid of Putin & his cronies.

-that fact will empower the opposition more.

Like you care.- how do u know that I don't, & what do u care about?

-by then, it was in the works for years; if it was ratified & legalized, on the bottom things could be as before. Crimea isn't much smaller than Belarus.

Luka was never going to give up power... and Russia really doesn't actually gain that much by absorbing Belarus.  Better access to the baltic states? Who cares? to what benefit? Certainly not Russias benefit.- she'll gain by controlling the buffer state directly, outflanking Ukraine, and increasing her population. Learn Russian geography & mil. history again.

- by then, there was a lot of rumbling in the army as it was clear that the war was being lost.

It was being lost, but it was not because of anything Hitler did or didn't do. Germany simply didn't have the strength to defeat the Soviets.-true, but if Hitler was killed then, they hoped to end the war sooner & save what still could be saved.

.- to make $, 1 must have $. Russia got better off to an extent, enriching Putin & his circle, at the expense of ordinary citizens. As the Comanche chief said: don't tell us to give up buffalo for sheep!

And that is the real reason Putin must go... he has said no to the US dollar and it is hurting...-no, Russia with her economy which is < than the state of TX can't hurt the US.

US empire baby wrote
they r all approved & have no chance; Navalny was not

GarryB wrote:

-wait till nationwide strikes r called.

“There will be street actions. It takes time to prepare ": Shaveddinov on the action plan of Navalny's associates FYI, Navalny tried to register his party since 2010, but was prevented by technicalities.
Call away... after all this disruption of covid and lockdowns what idiot is going on strike for that-time will tell!

-I know it better than u.

You live in the west, you know how ruthless the west is when it comes to money... murder bots in the sky, funding terrorists in Syria and Libya and even Iraq and Afghanistan and Iran and Venezuela and China and Russia... but of course call them freedom fighters for the video...-the Putin regime is no less ruthless.

-the EU protesters can deal with its riot police;

French yellow jacket protesters lost hands and eyes and lives... but you claim the Russian police are much worse.-in some ways they r. FYI, the RG now has the legal right to shoot, & it was given long before Navalny went to Germany.

.-there rn't worthy places left to invade w/o loosing politically, so not anytime soon, u can sleep well!

No external place... home it is then...- yes, there r too many problems to sort out; 1 of them Putin's FSB paying Trump since 2007.

- where did I try to shut any1 up?

You said:

-If u can't see the truth staring in ur face & comprehend it, perhaps it's better that u stop repeating the same shallow mantra above like a stuck recording.
- u have a very idealistic view of the RF realities. keep ur rosy glasses on, but stop lecturing me.-

I had to say it to rdirect our discussion to a more intelligent level.

.-if it was, we wouldn't have any elections.

You didn't. That wasn't an election... it was a joke.- the sad joke would be if Trump won again.

Ms of Russians want him to go; it's him now grasping at straws, as he can only rely on his media, security services, courts & police. Until last week, downtown Moscow subway stations weren't closed since 1941 with Germans only 20 km away.

If you are making up numbers why not say billions instead of millions... surely Soros and Gates and Bezos count as well...- ur sarcasm thinks! even if only 10M watched that clip, they said nothing & didn't report it to be removed, & their silence speaks louder than words.

- I know where Russia is with her Ruble, at 1 RUB = 0.01322 USD.

Fantastic... I makes Russians buy Russian stuff because it is affordable, and traitors wanting to buy foreign goods have to pay a fortune to get them... brilliant.- while the oligarchs who work with Putin hand in glove convert Russia's wealth to $ to be kept in Western banks & real estate.
You would think an ex Soviet person living in the US would be smart and use his knowledge of the language and potential to find contacts in Russia to set up an import business to import Russian stuff and sell it on the US market with a huge margin increase in price that the Americans wont notice because it will still be very very cheap, and of course probably much higher quality than they are used to from China.-easier said than done; all those market segments r taken over.

-wrong: there'll be be more legal immigration & naturalization of those here, damn the local racists & bigots with their statues of Columbus & slave owners; they will renew & remake the USA to be better for all.

But they need the cheap labour... they can't afford a full price nanny to look after their children... that would cost too much... they need an illegal they can threaten so they barely have to pay them at all.Who is going to pick fruit?-legalized temporary workers.

-wait till the next poll; only a toddlers & retards don't know who he is now.

The poll is CIA paid propaganda and even they couldn't lie and say all Russians know who he is...- if they don't lie, than don't dismiss them next time.

.-not true: most recent immigrants since 2000 came from Asia.

You mean legal immigrants...- those Latinos still don't out# them.

$ were paid to several teenagers bloggers to post anti-Navalny & anti-protests videos. 1 refused & posted a written script offered to read from. After it was noticed that they all sounded almost the same, it was changed.

You should find out who was paying because that would be a good way to earn a few extra dollars...- my integrity isn't for sale.

Folks have nothing to lose except their fear & will come out for free.

Yeah, like the people of the Ukraine had nothing to lose either... where are they now after listening to the CIA and the US... it is just raining money on those people... yah gotta feel for them getting so wealthy so quickly without support or understanding of what actually happened. They might need counciling... and more cookies.- Under the right leadership, Russia can buy Ukraine many times over.

Building prisons & camps to house them all will bankrupt Russia-

There are plenty of new infrastructure projects in the far east and the far north... there might be 5K at most... hell, there is probably enough novachok left over to have an accident...-now I know that u r a genocidal maniac like Hitler, Churchill & Truman were. & u call urself Russia's friend?

Putin doesn't subscribe to this normal person logic- he has that palace because he can & is entitled to use it, being on top of the pyramid of power.

Then why not show it off?- it's too late now, Navalny has done it; while Putin wanted to avoid ?s about the source of those $1B used to build it. who wants to be seen as a bribetaker?
Wouldn't be the first leader of a country to have a palace built for himself.- he could be forgiven if the Russian people were a lot better off than they r now.

he will find time- every1 needs some rest to recharge, at least once or twice a year; it'll take time to renovate it, so he may use it later & say that his friend Rotenberg, its declared owner, invited him there. "It's good to be King!"

You know for certain it is a bribe and you know for certain it is his... why don't you know for certain when he will visit?- I'm not a prophet.
Obviously the only way Putin can now save Russia from western election influence and just general interference is if the west is too busy with something else... maybe give Iran a nuclear bomb they can sail in to New York Harbour and detonate perhaps, or just support Trump and start a proper insurrection... spread a rumour Creepy Joe wants their guns... an assault rifle ban would do it...

Backman wrote:It is curious why Russia released the video of Navalnys henchman meeting with a MI6 agent when they did. They had the footage all this time. Why didn't they release it the day after the fake Navalny poisoning ? The FSB must have more dirt like this one him. They should send some of this dirt anonymously to Wikileaks. Let them release it. Then it will get more traction.