Succinct & Informative Article | “Russian Democracy is Dying” by David Frum
David Frum, the former speechwriter for President George W Bush normally pounds the Kool-Aid a tad too excessively for my liking - BUT this article (entitled, “Russian Democracy is Dying“) is right on the money. Succinct, non-partisan and well-thought out - if you can spare five minutes, I’d highly recommend.
- We do know … over the past half dozen years, Vladimir Putin’s government has extinguished all of Russia’s independent broadcast media and severely curbed most print media.
- We do know that Putin has ended elections for local government and centralized all power in the Kremlin.
- We do know that he has used administrative powers to seize some of Russia’s largest corporations and transfer ownership to his supporters–and to confiscate gas fields leased to foreign investors.
= And now we have a clearer idea of how Putin has been able to get away with these dangerous moves toward dictatorship: The Russian people support him.
It’s as if they are saying: let Putin kill his enemies–there’s nothing we can do, and so it’s not our fault. As an institution, Russian democracy is dying. Inside the minds of the Russians, it is already dead.
We have no shortage of things to worry about in our troubled world: Islamic extremism, Chinese aggression, European weakness, American isolation. Now add one more. A potentially great power, endowed with vast energy wealth and inheriting a vast nuclear arsenal, is deliberately and with the approval of the majority of its people turning its back on democracy and freedom. Instead of joining the West, Russia is finding its way to dangerous alliances with Iran, Syria, China, and who knows what other sinister forces. This grouping of anti-democratic states is extending its reach around the world–even perhaps to the suburbs of Washington D.C.
The world has become more unpredictable and volatile than at any other time in history. More and more nations are clamoring to join the Nuclear Club and democracy is unraveling on every continent. Trouble is brewing and God help us if we fail to elect a strong non-partisan President and administration.
R
Posted on March 12th, 2007 under Bush, China, David Frum, EU, Iran, Natural Gas, Putin, Russia, Syria, nuclear, oil • 
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