Putin - nearly puked

[Moodyman]

Putin is a shrewd nationalist....helped by Russias natural resource stregnth, allowing Americans to use their space rockets for astronauts etc... 40 yrs on, he's won the cold war

That's why he's made out the bad guy in Western press. Yeltsin was a good for us whereas as Putin is bad.

We like pliable foreign rulers.

 

[ASC1951]

Tsar Nicholas: hair. Lenin: bald. Stalin: hair. Kruschev: bald. Brezhnev: hair. Andropov: bald. Chernenko: hair (and how!). Gorbachev: bald. Yelstin: hair. Putin: bald. Medvedev: hair.

A little known fact.....

Tsar and Czar are from "Caesar" which became the generic Roman term for an emperor. Originally it was the family name of Gaius Julius Caesar and meant 'hairy'.

 

[Mad at urage]

A little known fact.....

Tsar and Czar are from "Caesar" which became the generic Roman term for an emperor. Originally it was the family name of Gaius Julius Caesar and meant 'hairy'.

Kaiser too of course ...

A hundred years of the Punic Curse
And Rome will be slave to a hairy man,
A hairy man that is scant of hair,
Every man's woman and each woman's man.
The steed that he rides shall have toes for hooves.
He shall die at the hand of his son, no son,
And not on the field of war.

The hairy one next to enslave the State
Shall be son, no son, of his hairy last.
He shall have hair in a generous mop.
He shall give Rome marble in place of clay
And fetter her fast with unseen chains,
And shall die at the hand of his wife, no wife
To the gain of his son, no son.

The hairy third to enslave the State
Shall be son, no son, of his hairy last.
He shall be mud well mixed with blood,
A hairy man that is scant of hair.
He shall give Rome victories and defeat
And die to the gain of his son, no son—
A pillow shall be his sword.

The hairy fourth to enslave the State
Shall be son, no son, of the hairy last.
A hairy man that is scant of hair,
He shall give Rome poisons and blasphemies
And die from a kick of his aged horse
That carried him as a child.

The hairy fifth to enslave the State,
To enslave the State, though against his will,
Shall be that idiot whom all despised.
He shall have hair in a generous mop.
He shall give Rome water and winter bread
And die at the hand of his wife, no wife,
To the gain of his son, no son.

 

[Jezston]

If we get away from the tabloid mentality, we'll appreciate that Putin's leadership transformed Russia. Under his tenure Russia paid off its crippling debt and amassed sizeable foreign exchange reserves.

He brought stability to Chechnya (brutal though it was) and invested huge sums of money to that war-torn province.

Russians no longer have to queue for hours to get a loaf of bread. This is the sort of thing that a leader of a country is supposed to do.

Whereas our leaders take us to wars in far-away countries to 'help' people who've no relation with us. Whilst our own are struggling to pay their heating bills and putting food on the table.

Democracy mean j8ck sh1t if you can't do right by the people you represent.

You could have said the same about Hitler and Mussolini.

Since taking power, Putin's ex-KGB buddies now make up 77% of senior roles in the Russian Government, all over the country.

Read this fascinating article at the weekend, that describes what happens to foreign journalists living in Russia if they write anything critical of the administration:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2011/sep/23/luke-harding-russia

Imagine how the FSB treat ordinary Russians who try to proffer dissent.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2007/apr/15/russia.chess

 

[ASC1951]

Kaiser too of course ...
[A hundred years of the Punic Curse...]

You are Robert Graves and I claim my £5!

 

[swee'pea99]

You could have said the same about Hitler and Mussolini.

Since taking power, Putin's ex-KGB buddies now make up 77% of senior roles in the Russian Government, all over the country.

Read this fascinating article at the weekend, that describes what happens to foreign journalists living in Russia if they write anything critical of the administration:

http://www.guardian....-harding-russia

Imagine how the FSB treat ordinary Russians who try to proffer dissent.

http://www.guardian....15/russia.chess

Indeed. Making the trains run on time ain't the be all & end all.

It's not Putin that's saved Russia from total ruin, it's an unprecedented commodities boom. Despite which a country largely built of valuable minerals, virtually afloat on oil, still has (alongside a handful of staggeringly wealthy individuals) near universal poverty and third world levels of life expectancy.

 

[BSRU]

[quote name='swee'pea99' timestamp='1317079330' post='1858946']
Indeed. Making the trains run on time ain't the be all & end all.

It's not Putin that's saved Russia from total ruin, it's an unprecedented commodities boom. Despite which a country largely built of valuable minerals, virtually afloat on oil, still has (alongside a handful of staggeringly wealthy individuals) near universal poverty and third world levels of life expectancy.


[/quote]

Yeltsin was in power when universal poverty was a huge problem, when people were not paid for months and basic food was scarce.
In general the average Russian is not poor, they are not wealthy either, the situation is probably no worse than can be seen in the US where 46 million people are classed as living below the poverty line and many US citizens only survive because of free food.

Life expectancy of Russian men is low, just 59, mainly due to Vodka and heroin abuse.

 

[Chromatic]

How many of them are on heroin then?

 

[slowmotion]

Putin sinks to new depths.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/06/world/europe/putins-diving-exploit-was-a-setup-aide-says.html

 

[Zoiders]

Beyond caring.

It's Russia and trying to project out own morality into that political sphere is an excercise in futility as it simply is not the same world or society that we live in and different rules apply.