MTRP(tm) wrote:
> KvekIT wrote:
>> ostap_bender wrote:
>>> MTRP(tm) wrote:
>>>> ostap_bender wrote:
>>>>> MTRP(tm) wrote:
>>>>>> Math and politics are two completely different guys. Or take chess
>>>>>> game. Just look how badly chess genius Kasparov lost his political
>>>>>> game against polit-genius Putin. But WTF? I suppose that at the
>>>>>> chessboard Putin is no math to Kasparov, too. Well, yes, politics
has
>>>>>> more to do with tricks. Usually good guys are bad politicians.
>>>>>> Especially in *a* democracy, which Putinism certainly is.
>>>>> Dear Trademark,
>>>>> You should familiarise yourself better with the keyboard, in
>>>>> particluar with the quotation mark key. The star key * is not the
same
>>>>> as the quotation key ".
>>>> lol(ing)@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
I claim that PUTINISM IS A FORM OF DEMOCRACY. An
>>>> authoritarian democracy, say. Try to disprove it if you can. BTW
Putin
>>>> used to be West's darling so long as he tolerated US control over
>>>> Russian economy, i.e. Russian natural resources - that is prior to
the
>>>> Yukos affair. And hey, GWB believes that Saudi Arabia is *the*
>>>> democracy!
>>> The term Putin's team uses is "sovereign democracy", coined by
>>> Surkov. So, let's look up the world "sovereign":
>>> --------------------------------------------------
>>> http://law.jrank.org/pages/6863/Feudalism.html
>>> Feudalism flourished between the tenth and thirteenth centuries in
>>> western Europe. At its core, it was an agreement between a lord and a
>>> vassal. A person became a vassal by pledging political allegiance and
>>> providing military, political, and financial service to a lord. A lord
>>> possessed complete sovereignty over land, or acted in the service of
>>> another sovereign, usually a king. If a lord acted in the service of a
>>> king, the lord was considered a vassal of the king.
>>> As part of the feudal agreement, the lord promised to protect the
>>> vassal and provided the vassal with a plot of land. This land could be
>>> passed on to the vassal's heirs, giving the vassal tenure over the
>>> land. The vassal was also vested with the power to lease the land to
>>> others for profit, a practice known as subinfeudation. The entire
>>> agreement was called a fief, and a lord's collection of fiefs was
>>> called a fiefdom.
>>> The feudal bond was thus a combination of two key elements: fealty, or
>>> an oath of allegiance and pledge of service to the lord, and homage,
>>> or an ACKNOWLEDGMENT by the lord of the vassal's tenure. The
>>> arrangement was not forced on the vassal; it was profitable for the
>>> vassal and made on mutual consent, and it fostered the allegiance
>>> necessary for royal control of distant lands.
>>> ----------------------------------------------------------------------
>>> Yes, that is indeed a perfect description of Putin's rule and that of
>>> his vassals and their vassals.
>>> Maybe the term "feudal democracy" would be even more descriptive.
>>> - Masquer le texte des messages précédents -
>>> - Afficher le texte des messages précédents -
>> That's quite an utopic view of feudalism described up here. As if
>> vassals had any choice. It is as utopic as saying that workers of
>> industrial era were on a free market of labor on which they were paid
>> the rightful value for their labor in compliance to a kind of social
>> contract to which they freely submitted.
>> Putin is liked by most Russian and gets sup****t from them, which is a
>> kind of democracy, although not liberal. I would be tempted to use the
>> term "plebiscitarian democracy", with im****tant shades of populism.
>> In the typology of Max Weber, Putin would be a charismatic leader.
>> Some requirements for a charismatic leader arrival are a situation of
>> crisis and the perception of particular gifts from an individual.
>> There is a large literature about Putin's charisma.
>> One particularity of charismatic leader****p is that it is tem****ary.
>> With time, especially when the leader's departure approaches, it tends
>> to turn either into a legitimity based on tradition, as monarchs,
>> either as a rationnal-legal legitimity. The former means more risks of
>> corruption for Russia and of the return of oligarchy (Yeltsin was
>> often labelled an electoral monarch). The latter means the path toward
>> a bureaucratic administration (in a positive meaning) based on clear
>> rules and institutions, rather than personnal authority. The reasons
>> for this would be too long to expose here.
>> Since Putin chose Medvedev as a successor, chances seems better for
>> the path toward rational-legal regime. The clan of the liberals will
>> hold the most powerful position. But it remains to be seen if siloviki
>> will accept this. And it is to be kept in mind that Medvedev, even if
>> he was the most democratic individual, could lead the country without
>> the sup****t of the security forces.
>> Siloviki, who enjoy im****tant positions in the administration and in
>> state firms, did not secure property rights for themselves, since
>> Putin would not allow it ad since it doesn't fit the pattern of
>> charismatic leader****p. All their privileges could fall instantly if
>> the power was to switch to another clan. That's an im****tant incentive
>> for corruption in order to secure property rights as Putin is about to
>> leave, or to seek to get the power back. They can use Kompromaty
>> easily to destabilize Medvedev's clan since they control intelligence
>> services of the country. Putin also used it when it was convenient.
>> The fact that Putin will remain PM helps to keep things more quiet for
>> now. But that is certainly no finished and Russia's politics will
>> remain very interesting for a while.
>
> Well, yes, this all sounds plausible. But. I suppose that Putin's
> "sovereign democracy" referred to Russia sovereignty in US-designed
> unipolar world. Such sovereignty is being Putin's main message since
> his Munich "cold war" talk. Russian polit-drama is not Putin's
> alleged anti-democratism, but idiotic anti-patriotism of his
> "democratic" opponents who falsely assume that democracy = pro-
> americanism. Given US permanent anti-Russian obsession these guys can
> only discredit democracy they are trying to preach at home. And they
> have neither brains nor courage to distance themselves from Yeltsin-
> style "democratic" nightmare.
Any analysis of Russia that does not take into account this basic fact
is not worth the time of day.
> Therefore the communists remain the only
> serious opposition. But they in turn represent ideology that has been
> completely discredited by their communist predecessors. And their
> leader is very anti-charismatic indeed.
Unlike the ex-communist parties in other states (some now in NATO) this
party is trapped in a useless timewarp. Zyuganov spends all his time
spouting conspiracy theories and not enough time proposing policy
alternatives.
> All in all there is no real
> democratic challenge to Putin in Russia. Which is hardly Putin's fault.
Putin and United Russia are centrists. Their opposition is on the two
extremes. If the so called liberal democrats like Yavlinsky did not spend
all their time on the foreign-paid lecture circuit ba****ng Russia maybe
there would be a centrist alternative. The bubbleheaded contempt that the
west has for the Russian electorate with regular browbeatings about
sup****t
for the wrong parties will never get the west what it wants. No matter
how
much wishful thinking the west wallows in, Russia ain't no banana
republic.
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