"Rolling protest ties up Moscow traffic" Associated Press, January 30, 2012
MOSCOW - Thousands of cars flying white ribbons or balloons circled central Moscow yesterday in a show of protest against Prime Minister Vladimir Putin.
The cars - ranging from luxury sedans and sporty convertibles to old, exhaust-spewing Soviet models - jammed the inner lanes all along the nearly 10-mile Garden Ring, which has as many as 16 lanes of traffic at its widest points.
More protesters stood along the side of the road waving white ribbons and flags as the vehicles passed, horns blaring. White ribbons became an opposition symbol in protests after a fraud-tainted Dec. 4 parliamentary election won by Putin’s party.
Related: Russians Reject Putin
Related: Russians Reject Putin
Putin is running in a March 4 presidential election to reclaim the job he held from 2000 to 2008. He is expected to win but is under pressure to do so fairly.
The action yesterday was aimed at building momentum for the protest movement, and it provided another outlet for the creativity that has been a defining feature of the protests.
I am going to start rushing through this post because that statement is a damn insult.
The fact is that the Occupy protesters in this country have never received such glowing praise from the agenda-pushing corporate media -- and that in and of itself is instructive, for it tells you how to decipher and decode the propaganda that passes for news in AmeriKa.
The protest movement has been driven by young professionals, cultural figures, and other members of the urban middle class, many of them connected through online social networks.
The same ones who have done well economically in Putin's Russia?
Although most drivers yesterday were content to tie ribbons and balloons to their cars’ antennas, sideview mirrors, and door handles, some decorated their cars with signs and banners....
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"Dueling demonstrations held in Moscow; Pro-Putin rally is organized by government" by Andrew E. Kramer and Ellen Barry | New York Times, February 05, 2012
MOSCOW - Antigovernment protesters managed to gather a third huge crowd in the center of Moscow yesterday, undeterred by arctic, bitter cold or by the near certainty that Vladimir V. Putin will win a six-year presidential term next month.
Whatever happened to global warming, 'eh?
This time, Russian authorities were prepared, organizing a simultaneous, and also huge, rally in defense of Putin where speakers issued dire warnings of the possible consequences of continued protest: revolution and the breakup of the country.
Huh?
By the end of the frigid day, it appeared that the demonstrations had not lost momentum and could continue into the spring, posing an unexpected challenge to Putin, who has never faced sustained opposition.
What this is really about to me is the USraeli empire and its covert forces making it difficult for Putin to come to Iran's aid after the attack.
“It’s clear that there will be no change now,’’ she said. “But we are a snowball, and we are rolling.’’
City authorities said yesterday’s antigovernment crowd was larger than either of the two large rallies in December, offering an estimate of 36,000. Organizers gave an estimate of 120,000. Police said the progovernment rally, made up mostly of government workers, was nearly four times the size of the opposition march, but journalists who were present said that seemed exaggerated.
Whatever, AmeriKan media.
With a month left before presidential elections, polls show that Putin, who is currently prime minister, is far ahead of his four rivals in the race and has a good chance of breaking the 50 percent barrier to win in a first round. If he falls short of that, he would be almost certain to win in a runoff three weeks later, though the process would cast further doubt on the strength of his public mandate.
And thus his call to defend Iran from USraeli aggression will be that much more difficult.
The protest movement, meanwhile, has not coalesced into a coherent political force. It lacks leaders willing or able to challenge Putin, still by far the country’s most popular politician.
Then they are Russia's version of Occupy, aren't they -- just more creative.
Maksim Trudolyubov, editorial editor of the daily newspaper Vedomosti, said the protests’ major impact is to broadcast a message that Putin cannot continue to rule in same style.
Isn't that also Occupy's message?
How come our politician$ and media do not hear us, Americans?
“We are standing at a really important threshold for this country,’’ Trudolyubov said in an interview. “Right now, if nothing extraordinary happens - a black swan, or something - he is of course the president in March. But in March, he will be a very different president, a president with a different level of legitimacy.’’
A series of large, peaceful demonstrations were set off by parliamentary elections on Dec. 4, which were widely condemned as fraudulent. Many participants say, though, that the upwelling of anger dates back to September, when Putin announced plans to return to the presidency in the spring, replacing his protégé, Dmitry A. Medvedev. He has already been Russia’s paramount leader for 12 years, and can legally serve two more six-year terms.
At the progovernment rally, a series of minor celebrities condemned the antigovernment protesters....
Some compared the rallies with the 2004 pro-Western “Orange Revolution’’ in Ukraine, which is widely seen here as orchestrated by the US government....
Seen that way here, too. When the media gives a revolution a color or name it means it's part of the agenda and not real.
Many participants acknowledged that they found it difficult to predict what would happen after the elections. Aleksei Navalny, the anticorruption blogger who has emerged as the most charismatic opposition figure, was thronged by admirers who shouted “Aleksei, we will follow you,’’ but he seemed to actively avoid taking any leadership role and did not address the crowd. Neither did Mikhail D. Prokhorov, a presidential candidate who marched arm-in-arm with his sister, as his supporters changed “Prokhorov, our president!’’
Amazing how the Globe can find bloggers when it wants.
The demonstrators’ goals still seem murky. Some marchers said they hoped new presidential elections would be called in a year or two, or at least postponed until the fall, and a few people held signs that read “Navalny 2014.’’ Sergei Berkovich, who heads a US oil company in Moscow and was in the crowd, said his goal was just to keep the protest movement alive.
“We’ve begun to have pride in ourselves again,’’ he said. “I think people have woken up, and I hope it will continue. I think this is the last chance for our country. If we don’t use this chance, our country will cease to exist as it does today.’’
That's the way Americans are feeling about ours.
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"Putin aide suggests protests tied to US scheme" by Ellen Barry | New York Times, February 04, 2012
MOSCOW - On the eve of a third major antigovernment demonstration, a trusted aide to Prime Minister Vladimir Putin said that Russian intelligence services reported “two or three years ago’’ that there were plans for the outbreak of street protests in Moscow, implying that a blueprint for political unrest was drawn up in Washington....
Yeah, it's kind of an open secret at this point.
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"Russian artists claim attack on police van" January 03, 2012
MOSCOW - A spokesman for the radical art collective Voina announced yesterday that its members had broken into a St. Petersburg police station on New Year’s Eve and used firebombs to incinerate a police vehicle used to transport prisoners as “a gift to all political prisoners of Russia.’’
Amateur video posted online showed a figure tossing lighted objects under a large vehicle, which was then engulfed in flames and spewed smoke into the night sky.
The St. Petersburg police responded skeptically to the Voina announcement, releasing a statement that described the fire damage to the vehicle as “insignificant’’ and noting that there were similar rumors of arson after a fire in August that forensics specialists determined had been caused by a short-circuit.
Voina, which was founded by a Moscow philosophy student in 2005, staged what it called a “Palace Revolution’’ five years later, in which teams of men ran up to parked police cars and flipped them over to protest police corruption.
The group’s activities dropped off in 2010 after two of its leaders were arrested on serious hooliganism charges; both men were released last spring on bail, with the assistance of $20,000 donated by the British street artist known as Banksy.
The charges, which could bring seven-year sentences, still stand.
All day, liberals bickered online over whether the arson attack on the police vehicle constituted “pure art,’’ as one commentator put it, or, as another maintained, “an act as idiotic as voting for United Russia,’’ the ruling party.
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"Former finance minister calls for rerun of Russian elections" by Vladimir Isachenkov | The Boston Globe, January 7, 2012
MOSCOW - A former Cabinet member close to Prime Minister Vladimir Putin yesterday called for a rerun of the country’s fraud-tinged parliamentary elections, an apparent bid to soothe public outrage as Putin seeks to reclaim the presidency.
Alexei Kudrin, former finance minister, said in his blog that the government must open a dialogue with the opposition on holding a repeat ballot under a revised electoral law. The statement appears aimed at stealing the opposition’s thunder to prevent a challenge to Putin in March presidential elections.
Amazing how the Globe can find bloggers when it wants.
Tens of thousands of protesters have rallied in Moscow to demand a rerun of the Dec. 4 parliamentary vote and urge an end to Putin’s 12-year rule. It has been the largest outpouring of public anger since the Soviet collapse two decades ago.
While Putin faces no serious rivals in the presidential vote, the protests signaled a sharp drop in his popularity that would make it hard for him to garner more than 50 percent of ballots to avoid a runoff.
Keep that in mind as we continue, readers.
Any evidence of fraud in the vote similar to the ballot-stuffing and other violations that helped Putin’s party hang onto its majority in the parliamentary polls could also fuel outrage that would make it hard for Putin to retain power.
“Without the acknowledgment that the parliamentary election was unfair, the fairness of the presidential vote will be thrown into doubt, irrespective of how honest it might be,’’ Kudrin said....
Sound familiar, Americans?
But, he added, the opposition push to unseat Putin could end in turmoil.
“An attempt to simultaneously reform two branches of power … would entail too big risks for the country,’’ he said.
Many in the opposition have warned that Putin would probably try to defuse the protests by trying to draw their leaders into talks or offering them government jobs and other perks.
“I’m convinced that the main strategy of the Kremlin in the coming months would be neutralizing protests by the usual deceit and bribes,’’ Alexei Navalny, a corruption-fighting lawyer and popular blogger who has become a leading figure in the protest movement, said in remarks posted on his blog....
Hey, that's how the protests got started!
And isn't it amazing how the Globe can find bloggers when it wants?
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"Negotiations still elusive as more big protests loom in Russia; Putin says swift political change is not possible" by Ellen Barry | New York Times, January 17, 2012
MOSCOW - A tentative attempt to set up dialogue between the Kremlin and organizers of street protests foundered yesterday, leaving little time for the groups to deescalate tensions before large demonstrations planned for Feb. 4 and March 11....
Some polls have shown a rise in Prime Minister Vladimir Putin’s approval ratings since late December.
AHEM!
Gee, just ten days ago I was told he was down.
I guess the truth just happens to be whatever day you catch the paper, huh?
In the article published yesterday, Putin is skeptical of the December mobilization, expressing irritation at the protesters’ lack of a clear agenda.
“Today people are talking about various forms of renewal of the political process,’’ he writes. “But what are we supposed to be negotiating about? About how our power should be structured? Whether it should be given to ‘better people?’ And after that - what? What will we do?’’
Putin says Russia will have to weather a period of prolonged and painful global turbulence, in which economic shocks have converged with bursts of social and ethnic tension, and other nations - presumably the United States - are fueling uprisings.
All part of the Neo-Con PNAC plan.
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"Brief opening of TV in Russia ends as March vote nears; Medium, long a tool of Kremlin, is reined back in" by Will Englund | Washington Post, January 29, 2012
MOSCOW - As thousands of protesters pushed toward Bolotnaya Square, crews from mainstream Russian television fanned out. Satellite trucks were ranged curbside, their engines running.
For six days after the parliamentary elections last month, TV ignored the street protests that were starting to shake the nation. Now the reporters and cameramen were ready. But still, not a peep.
Finally, at 3 p.m. on Dec. 10, say those who know, the word came down: You can put this on the air.
Putin has an election to win - he’s running for president, and the vote is in March - and after weeks of ambivalence and uncertainty, state-controlled TV has returned to its old and familiar ways....
So has my newspaper.
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"Putin says run-off may be necessary" by NEW YORK TIMES | February 02, 2012
MOSCOW - Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin yesterday admitted that he might not win the presidency in the first round of voting, but he also said that a second round would lead to political turbulence.
Putin’s mixed message summed up what is emerging as the main intrigue of the political season: Authorities could make a push to ensure that Putin gets more than 50 percent of votes March 4, thereby risking the impression that votes had been falsified to break the threshold, which could lead to rallies like those that followed December’s parliamentary elections.
Or they could accept a result short of 50 percent and endure three unpredictable weeks that would stretch out before a run-off, which Putin would be virtually certain to win. That period could offer encouragement to protesters, as well, and send the message that Putin was returning as a relatively weak executive.
Thus if he needs to rally the country to defend Iran and Syria.... you put the geopolitical pieces together.
“Obviously, I would not run for office if I didn’t expect to win,’’ he said. “I also understand, and think, that a second round implies an extended period of infighting, a destabilization of our political situation. But there is nothing terrible in this. I am prepared, if it is necessary, to run in a second round.’’
Thus if he needs to rally the country to defend Iran and Syria.... you put the geopolitical pieces together.
“Obviously, I would not run for office if I didn’t expect to win,’’ he said. “I also understand, and think, that a second round implies an extended period of infighting, a destabilization of our political situation. But there is nothing terrible in this. I am prepared, if it is necessary, to run in a second round.’’
That this conversation is occurring at all is a reminder of the rise in voter dissatisfaction that seemed to accelerate when Putin said he would seek a third term as president, replacing his protégé, Dmitry Medvedev.
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So who is he running against?
"Russian tycoon on presidential ballot" by Associated Press | January 26, 2012
MOSCOW - Russian billionaire Mikhail Prokhorov was officially registered as a presidential candidate yesterday, the only newcomer allowed to challenge Prime Minister Vladimir Putin for the Kremlin job....
Putin is under heavy pressure to show that he can win a fair election. Evidence that vote rigging boosted the results of his party in the Dec. 4 parliamentary election led to mass protests. Another demonstration to demand free elections is planned for Feb. 4.
Prokhorov, who owns the New Jersey Nets basketball team, is a 46-year-old businessman with an estimated fortune of $18 billion. His candidacy has been viewed as a Kremlin-supported effort to add a veneer of legitimacy to the election and channel the discontent among the urban middle class....
Why would the urban middle class be upset when they have benefited from Putin's oil economy?
Or are we once again just be shoveled a load of shit by the AmeriKan media, readers?
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Also see: Russian liberal blocked from race
"A Russian spacecraft designed to boost the nation’s pride on a bold mission to a moon of Mars came down in flames yesterday, showering fragments into the South Pacific west of Chile’s coast, officials said....
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Yeah, Russia a real wreck these days.
