America is richer than Russia. Whoopedy-do!
How long did it take you to work that one out? Anyway, has anybody been saying otherwise?

Yes, they have. For example, Russia was recently invited not merely to join the G-8 group of the world's wealthiest nations, but to chair it.

Moreover, many naive people think that because the price of oil has risen Russia is now some kind of economic "superpower."

If you read a little more (or at all) you'd know that. This blog is written for people with a preexisitng knowedge of basic current events. Sorry if it's over your head.

You can't be as stupid as your comments indicate, as they do at least show a quality of singularly rare low cunning. Which is the only way that you could contrive to argue that a country whose natural resources are of vital importance to almost all of the G7 should be shut out of talks on future of the global economy.

You know, you might want to take a look at the accidental russophile blog. It's existed six times longer than mine and yet most of the posts displayed have no comments, and those that have comments have very few, some of them from me. So if this blog is such a failure, that one is six times more of a failure. You really should go over there and laugh at that one.

LOL!

Another blog you could check is Russian Dilletante. Has existed for YEARS, very few comments.

If you got out into the real world, you'd know that many famous writers were rejected over and over again by publishers and were not well respected during their lifetimes. Many civil rights leaders were told they were crazy (Ghandi, King, etc.) but they just did what they thought was right. It's called character, energy and courage. But you wouldn't understand.

Coz you prefer your grimy little hole in the ground, don't you?

You can also check New Russian Corporatism's blog. Many posts, zero comments.

Are you going to visit them all and tell them what big failures they are, just like the USSR said to Bulgakov?

Good luck my little squirrel!

Kim Zigfeld is the new Bulgakov? The surreal lunacy of that inference is almost genius.
Just for the record, I'm the anonymous that posted the earlier remarks in this thread that you so conveniently disregarded, choosing instead to change the subject. I'm disappointed in you. You that hates it so much when people change the subject...

I never equated myself to Bulgakov and your attempt to say I did is the typical dishonest act of a blind Russophile.

Where's your blog, reith? Huh? Why don't you prove to me how bad mine is by showing me yours? Huh?

Could it be you're all talk and no action?

Did you check the blogs I referred you too? Make your assinine, mean-spirited comments there too?

Weasle.

Weasle (sic), me?
But I'm not the one changing the subject. And changing it to "I'll show you mind and you show me yours" at that. Anyway, what's the fun of starting my own blog when I can wind you up on this one?

Yup, not human enough to admit you were wrong about your Bulgakov remark or to show me that your website is better than mine.

Just a lot of talk. *yawn* what a boring childish little dweeb you are.

Oh did you think I forgot to address your bizarre statement about "a country whose natural resources are of vital importance to almost all of the G7 should be shut out of talks on future of the global economy." Well, it's just that it was so stupid. But OK, if you insist.

Saudi Arabia produces almost exactly the same amount of oil as Russia. Should they be in the G-8?

If Germany starts building gas chambers again and putting Jews in, should they stay in the G-8?

Can you think AT ALL or just blabber insane propaganda in support of a country in its final throes?

You're a complete moron and witless lackey of the KGB dictator who rules Russia. Congratulations!

"Are you going to visit them all and tell them what big failures they are, just like the USSR said to Bulgakov?"

By defending yourself from charges of being a failure you compare yourself to Bulgakov. Sure, it's a fruity thing to do, but who is privy to the inner workings of your febrile mind.

"Saudi Arabia produces almost exactly the same amount of oil as Russia. Should they be in the G-8?"

If they were as strategically important in the international sphere as Russia, yes. If Europe were one day going to rely for up to 70% of its gas on them, then yes. If they were a government that we didn't have to negotiate with, as we have to do with Russia (and this we can agree on), then yes. But given that none of these things are the case, then no. We have their oil, they couldn't give a fig whether they were in the G8 or not, and that's that. You imagine that the global community is in dialogue with Russia for what? For fun? To make up the numbers? I do wish you could enlighten us. As it is, you're acting all the enigma, wrapped in a mystery, shrouded in a paranoid, menopausal sociopath.
Let's see, what other crackers have we got here...

"If Germany starts building gas chambers again and putting Jews in, should they stay in the G-8?"

Tough one. I'll go for a yes on that one. Presumably the poor Germans will be the subject of your next blog, project once you've worn yourself out with all the Russia-bashing.
Incidentally, you have refuted your own dismissal of the fact that you may be a Kremlin stooge seeking to discredit critics of Russia. In any normal context, I would be confidently expressing my distaste for the Putin regime, but your vile brand of xenophobic drivel has put me in the peculiar position of attacking you, supposedly the arch-Russophobe. The only one kind piece of advice I can bring myself to give is to tone down the unabashedly racist quality of your writing. The foolishness of it makes bloggers attempting mature criticism of Russian government policy look ridiculous by association. People will say, "Don't listen to him, he's just doing a Kim Zigfeld. He's nuts". I daresay I can await the usual stream of vituperative abuse, "moron", "dweeb", "KGB lackey" etc., but all the hysterical arguments in the world will not change the facts that I have put to you.

I compared my SITUATION to Bulgakov, being attacked by maniacs. I did NOT say I had talent like he had, one doesn't have to have talent to be victimized by maniacs. What's more, you don't know WHAT my achievements are outside this blog. You have no idea WHO I am. You speak from pure childish ignorance. So your comment was TOTALLY BOGUS.

You never mentioned a WORD about "strategically imporant int he international sphere" before, only about oil. Now suddently you want to change the subject because you've been proven wrong. Nice try, won't work. America relies on Saudi Arabia EVERY BIT AS MUCH as it does on Russia, in fact much MORE, and America's voice is supreme in the G-8. Your comment is utterly ignorant. If Russia belongs on the G-8, so does Saudi Arabia. And China and India both dwarf Russia in strategic importance, but neither is on the G-8. All you are doing is spouting the propaganda of a failed regime.

Compared to Russians, Germans have done a GREAT job of coming to terms with their past, I congratulate and admire them on that.

If you'd keep Germans with gas chambers in the G-8, I hope you land in a gas chamber one day. That might change your mind, I don't even want to try. But I'll love having your words on this blog for all to see forever.

Such a habitual user of sarcasm cannot see it in other apparently. Of course Germany wouldn't be in the G8 if it threw people in gas chambers. Though only a goggle-eyed fanatic could resort to citing that eventuality in the context of a "serious" political debate. And to follow that up with "I hope you land in a gas chamber one day". To reprise my earlier remark, how charming. You claim you were thrown off previous forums like Bulgakov out of the USSR, but I can't remember the author of Master and Margarita ever coming up with anything as deliciously cutting as that.

"You never mentioned a WORD about "strategically imporant int he international sphere" before, only about oil. Now suddently you want to change the subject because you've been proven wrong. Nice try, won't work. America relies on Saudi Arabia EVERY BIT AS MUCH as it does on Russia, in fact much MORE, and America's voice is supreme in the G-8."

I didn't only speak about oil. Whatever remote troglodytic backwater you live in has obviously never heard of such a thing as gas. You know, the stuff comes out your mouth all the time. Europe does not rely on Saudi Arabia as much as Russia. Remember Europe, that place with four countries in the G7? Who's changing subject now? But, of course, all that's irrelevant. Russia's just been invited along for fun. For kicks. Some after-dinner entertainment.

"If Russia belongs on the G-8, so does Saudi Arabia. And China and India both dwarf Russia in strategic importance, but neither is on the G-8. All you are doing is spouting the propaganda of a failed regime."

Well, if those countries should be in the G8, why aren't they? It's not the Russian government that gets to decide membership, as much as you may want to believe it. But here we go, wrinkly fingers in your ears and "Blah , blah, blah, blah".

"What's more, you don't know WHAT my achievements are outside this blog. You have no idea WHO I am. You speak from pure childish ignorance. So your comment was TOTALLY BOGUS."

I'm afraid I do have some idea of who you are. You're a racist and your abusive and hysterical behaviour verges on the sociopathic. You spend waaay too much time giving vent to your irascible bile, which gives me some clues as to the quality of your social life. I am ignorant only insofar as I don't know who exactly you are, which I am happy to leave that way, but your voluminous writing gives more than enough grist for the mill of even the most amateur pschologist. You are, after all, the person who said that they hoped they would "land in a gas chamber one day". What more do you need than that?

"I'm afraid I do have some idea of who you are. You're a racist and your abusive and hysterical behaviour verges on the sociopathic. You spend waaay too much time giving vent to your irascible bile, which gives me some clues as to the quality of your social life. I am ignorant only insofar as I don't know who exactly you are, which I am happy to leave that way, but your voluminous writing gives more than enough grist for the mill of even the most amateur pschologist"

--- Note: this is how a person who feels hate is an unproductive waste of time talks. LOL! Can you imagine how this person would talk if they WERE a hater? LOL!!

Not going to show me your blog, are you reith?

Not going to go around to the other millions of blogs that have as many comments as me or less after four weeks and attack them, are you?

And not going to apologize either.

How sad. What a sad little jealous green-eyed life you lead.

I pity you.

REITH: It is totally outrageous of you to accuse me of being a "racist" without quoting ONE SINGLE WORD I have written that is racist. I demand a quotation or an apology.

"Russia is a nation of slack-jawed xenophobic simpletons."

As you might say, LOL! Talk about being childish.

LIAR!!!!

That comes from my post about La Language Hat and it is my CHARACTERIZATION of what THEY said about Russia, not my own view. I was MOCKING what THEY said after I said in my Twain post that Russia was the world's leader in literature.

You are a deeply dishonest person! A characterless, hate-mongering propagandist and a pathetic hypocrite.

Moreover, there is NOTHING in that statement about RACE. "Russian" is a term of NATIONALITY, not race. Slavic is the dominant race in Russia.

Wow. Most ignorant statement I have read in many a moon, and that's really saying something.

I said that what they said and I said... What the hell are you on about? Denigrating an entire nation on the basis of your menopausal prejudices is racist. Your whole site is racist throughout. Your attitude is racist. You. Are. A. Racist. Embrace the fact, and go and vegetate under a rock with all the other racists.
I await more of your sophisticated arguments: Liar, hypocrite, moron, KGB lackey, ignorant, childish, pathetic, dishonest, etc. What a sensible, level-headed person you are...

Russian is not a race.

Are people who are anti-Americans racists?

You are an uneducated, illiterate slob. Being called a racist by someone like you is a compliment.

My view as expressed by me was that Russia is the nation with the world's greatest literature. You TOTALLY IGNORE that fact in your disgusting attempt to sling mud at me. My comment you reference was a sarcastic jibe at Language Hat.

Your attempt to hide from your errors is pathetic.

"Uneducated, illiterate slob". This site is really keeping the art of sophisticated discussion alive.
The suggestion that an entire country is scum, which is the basic underlying tenet of your blog, is a racist position. Quickly, go get your dictionary, there's a long word coming up. Your wilfully procrustean determination to see everything that is bad in the Russians is ample evidence of your xenophobia. That you complain of xenophobia in the Russians through your own brand of intolerance is a bittersweet irony that you may one day, after a severe session of electroshock therapy perhaps, come to appreciate.
Don't bother answering. I know, I know, I'm a liar, hypocrite, moron, KGB lackey, ignorant, childish, pathetic, dishonest, pathetic, uneducated, illiterate slob. That copy of Roget's must be open on the one page. If only you were able to read some of the other pages of that book and your writing might, heaven forfend, start to sound vaguely normal,

REITH: by your "logic," anyone who writes the word "racist" is a racist. So YOU are a racist. And I'm a Nazi, because I wrote the word "Hitler" and I'm a communist because I wrote "Stalin."

Russian is not a race, you moron. How many times do you need to be told? Go to the dictionary and look up race. American is not a race.

Idiot. You are insensible to reason, just like all Russophiles.

The basic underlying tenant of my blog is:

Whoever votes for a proud KGB spy for president of a country the KGB just destroyed;

Whoever fails to oppose the abolition of elected governors, the destruction of the free media and the revival of the Soviet National Anthem;

Whoever fails to oppose the bloody war of imperialism in Chechnya;

is scum.

That has nothing to do with race. By your logic, the allies who fought against Nazi Germany were racists. If that's true, I'm a card-carrying racist through and through.

90% of what is written in this blog comes from mainstream media.

By the way, a reasonable person would have asked be about my views before making conclusions. The idea of YOU critizing ME for being extreme is truly bizarre.

You think the absolute majority of Russians are scum on the basis of your shallow premises. That makes you a racist. You hate all these people, that you don't know, you've never met, that you don't know how they live or what they think. All you know is that you hate them. You hate because you're a racist.

"By your logic, the allies who fought against Nazi Germany were racists."

No such thing. We fought against the Germans because they invaded Poland. And when I say we, I mean the people who were actually in the war from 1939, unlike the Americans and the Soviets.
The big giveaway of your oh-so-erudite riposte comes here:

"90% of what is written in this blog comes from mainstream media."

The mainstream media's coverage of Russia is ill-informed gibberish, written for excitable jabberjaws like yourself.
So let's recap on that list of decorum:

"Liar, hypocrite, moron, KGB lackey, ignorant, childish, dishonest, pathetic, uneducated, bizarre, illiterate slob, idiot, and insensible to reason."

So tell me, you oh-so-reasonable person, what are your views? Apart from your racist hatred of the Russian people that is.

Oh really? Did the "absolute majority" of Russians vote to bring back the Soviet national anthem? To continue the war in Chechnya? To abolish elected governors in the regions?

Did Vladimir Putin receive an "absolute majority" of all eligible Russian voters in either his two "wins"?

Please cite your source. Educate me, I love to learn things I don't know.

Again you resort to your disingenuous low cunning. Only by stint of willed myopia can you fail to see that Putin, a complete non-entity before 2000, was elected on the back of the Chechen question, not because he was handpicked by Yeltsin, who was hardly held in great esteem by his countrymen.
Again, like the slithering stooge that you are, you've changed the premise of the question. Earlier you said that those that did not oppose all the things you raise are scum (which constitutes the absolute of the country; a horrendously xenophobic statement). Now you want to know if they voted for the Soviet anthem and the abolition of governors, which is quite a separate matter.
What country gets to vote for its national anthem anyway? And do you have any polls to prove that Russians are against the anthem, anyway? I doubt it is the case.
To make a parallel with what you probably consider a model democracy, how many Americans voted for the Iraq War? Of course, it's a stupid question, but that's the way your mind works.
To recap, you think that the Russians are scum for not rising up with pitchforks because of the restoration of the Soviet anthem. Of course, if they did rise up, you'd write something to say what savages they were. Either way, they're never going to win your approval, because the Vicadin-induced stupor that you constantly inhabit has detached you completely from reality.

I asked you a simple question. Will you answer it? Did Putin get an absolute majority of the eligible Russian vote in either of his two elections?

If so, then I condemn an absolute majority of Russians; if not I don't.

Why are you afraid to answer a simple factual question?

Let me explain in case you don't understand (you're a bit dim):

If, say 65% of eligible Russian voters went to the polls in Putin's last election, and if, say 55% of those voters voted for Putin, that means that only 35% of eligible Russian voters voted for Putin.

Therefore, I'd be condemning not an absolute majority of Russians but only 35% of the population, and making no comment about the other 65% on this point.

See how it works? Math is fun, isn't it?

Now will you answer my question or not, you skeevy little coward?

"Whoever fails to oppose the abolition of elected governors, the destruction of the free media and the revival of the Soviet National Anthem;

Whoever fails to oppose the bloody war of imperialism in Chechnya;

is scum."

This is the statement you made, and as I observed earlier, they are based on utterly ridiculous presumptions.
The less said about your fatuous misuse of statistics the better. No Western leader that I can think of has passed the 50% mark of eligible votes, as if that were relevant to their legitimacy. How is Russia any different? What you don't seem to understand is the meaning of the word "majority"? It means you have more votes than another candidate. The simplicity of it would elude the sub-normal, but you're stumped by it. Let's start easy; 2 is more than 1, 3 more than 2. Get the idea?
Therefore, Putin, as if I had any time for him, has had a majority of the votes in both elections he has stood in.
Just to bring some sense to this exchange, the reason that Russians have voted for Putin and that he enjoys enormous approval ratings is that Russia is a managed democracy. Nobody is denying that. What doesn't derive from the fact that Putin is in power is that Russians are scum, as you put it so delightfully.

Keep that collection of sophisticated arguments coming. That aneurism is getting closer by the hour:

"Liar, hypocrite, moron, KGB lackey, ignorant, childish, dishonest, pathetic, uneducated, bizarre, illiterate slob, idiot, and insensible to reason, dim, skeevy little coward."

The point is that you accused me of condemning, to use your words, "an absolute majority of Rusisans."

I did no such thing. Putin was not approved by an absolute majority.

You're a boldfaced liar and propagandist.

Apologize if you have any honor.

"Public support for Vladimir Putin increased last month in the Russian Federation, according to a poll by the Yury Levada Analytical Center. 75 per cent of respondents approve of their president’s performance, up four points in a month." March 10, 2006

Therefore, 75% of Russians are scum. Squirm out of that why don't you.

REITH: You're the one who's squirming. Why is it that you want to talk about polls instead of election results? Why do you REPEATEDLY dodge the question?You're worse than the KGB.

It seems you don't read much. The polls said Harry Truman was a sure loser and several newspapers went to press saying he had lost, but he became president.

What's more, RUSSIAN polls are absurdly unreliable, since the government exercises so much control over them. Are you really so childishly naive as to believe that Putin can't control adverse poll information.

Your statment is wildly, outrageously dishonest. You are boldfaced liar. I have never said I condenm Russians based on transitory poll results, I base my condemnation on elections. If 75% of Russians vote for Putin, I'll condemn them. Until you prove that has occurred, your point is totally without merit and nothing but disgusting, transparent, idiotic, childish propaganda.

In the future, please hyperlink to all alleged facts of his kind. If you don't, you'll be denied access to the comments page. Please provide a hyperlink to the poll results you cite now so that all can see them for themselves.

You have evidently never heard of the Levada Centre, which is an internationally respected polling organisation. If you can stretch to the mental effort of googling that, you will find all kinds of uncomfortable confirmations of your xenophobia.
Putin has had high poll ratings for all the period in which he has been president, and no sane pollster, anywhere in the world would dispute that fact. You imagine this to be because the Russians who approve (or do not actively disapprove of) Putin are scum, whereas in fact it is because the Kremlin has manipulated the media resources of the country.
So these are the basic facts:
Putin has the absolute majority of eligible votes, because he got more votes than anyone else. That's what majority means.
Putin enjoys widespread support among the Russian population.
The Russians have failed to rise up, pitchfork in hand, against the abolition of elected governors, the destruction of the free media and the revival of the Soviet National Anthem, and the bloody war in Chechnya. Many have protested about all these things, many are unhappy about them, and many aren't bothered. That's the way it works with governments and populations.

Your basic position, deriving from all the above, is that Russians are scum.

So, what is this question that you wanting asked? Does Putin have 75% of the eligible vote? Of course, he doesn't. Even the best attended elections in the West only reach 80% turnout. I can only imagine what infantile claptrap you would spouting if Putin got a 75% vote with an 80% turnout. As I have said before, the premise is utterly idiotic.
But you wanted a link to the approval ratings, and here you go:

http://www.levada.ru/press/2006030303.html

REITH: You are an absolute moron. Before writing, I suggest you consult a dictionary to find out the meaning of the words you are using.

"absolute majority" means a SUPER majoritarian voting requirement which is stricter than a simple majority. It means that more than half of all the members of a group, including those absent and those present but not voting, must vote in favour of a proposition in order for that proposition to be passed.As an example, let's say that a member of a club of 100 members proposes a new bylaw. According to the club's practice, for the bylaw to pass, it requires an absolute majority. The results of the vote are 40 yes votes and 30 no votes. The rest of the voters either abstained or did not vote. Even though this arrangement is a simple majority, since an absolute majority for the club is 51 members, the proposed bylaw fails.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Absolute_majority

Where the election of Putin is concerned, I condemn all Russians who voted for him, something you would know if you had gone so far as to ask me before making your outrageously narrow-minded, dishonest attack on me.

Putin is NOT supported AT THE POLLS by an absolute majority of Russians, nothing even CLOSE to that. He got a SIMPLE majority of the vote cast, a mere plurality of the eligible vote, not an ABSOULUTE majority.

YET AGAIN, you fail to report the turnout and share of vote Putin received in his last two elections. THOSE are the people I condemn, and if you have a shred of character (which I doubt) you will set forth that number. If you want to then condemn my condemnation of THOSE people, I'll be happy to hear it and take it as a compliment. In fact, I believe those people are beneath contempt, just as were the Germans who supported Hitler and the Americans who supported FDR while he was building concentration camps for the Japanese.

Your rogue, petulant dishonesty and cowardice in the face of basic facts is the hallmark of the shoddy principles that characterize the classic Russophile and have brought Russia to its knees.

Your weaselly, scurrilous logic knows absolutely no depths. You know perfectly well what the data about turnout and votes in the 2004 presidential election is, so I don't know why you are so keen for me to provide it for you. The results are that Putin got more votes than all the other candidates combined. There is a quorum system in place, but that's not enough for you. To make Putin a legitimate president you want every voter marched to the ballot box, perhaps at the point of a bayonet. Over 65% of the electorate posted its ballot, which is actually a respectable turnout considering the compromised nature of the election campaign. No proper democracy that I know of has a supermajoritarian electoral system, for the very reason I have put forward. That you make your banal observations on Russia on that basis is utterly asinine.
Incidentally, you might want to include the voters for several of the other candidates as scum, as they voted for candidates that you would also probably not like. I’m assuming that among the last lot, only Khakamada would have passed your rigorous test of character. The maths shows that well over 50% of the eligible votes went to candidates that were either Putin, nationalists, communists and so forth. So, summing the votes cast with the opinions of abstaining voters (who are probably not all the pro-Western partisans you probably imagine), we have a provably massive constituency (an “absolute majority”) of Russians that hold views (or more properly, fail to do things) that makes them … wait for it, SCUM.
Again you have changed the premise of the question, because even a dunderhead can see that it is absurd to broadly vilify all those that do not oppose Putin, however it is that you propose that people do that. Putin has an over 70% approval rating according to credible polling agencies, a figure I mentioned earlier. Therefore, 70% of Russians are scum.
So let’s keep this easy – If we sum up the people that voted for Putin and the Russians that have failed to rise up against the abolition of elected governors, the destruction of the free media and the revival of the Soviet National Anthem, and the bloody war in Chechnya, would that make for your beloved supermajoritarian absolute majority of the country?

Just as I thought. Can't admit that you misused "absolute majority" can you? No character whatsoever.

Your attempt to characterize my views is so pathetic and inaccurate as to fully deserve the sobriquet "neo-Soviet." You are a classically dishonest neo-Soviet person, detached from reality, nearly unhinged and doomed to failure.

FACTS YOU ONCE AGAIN REFUSE TO PROVIDE:

In 2004, Vladimir Putin received 48,931,376 votes for president or 71.2% of the votes that were cast.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Politics_of_Russia

Obviously, the idea that the elections were genuine is utterly refuted by the 70%+ tally in a country where the average income is $300 and the population is expected to reduce by 1/3 in the next 50 years. Putin did not participate in debates or meaningful interviews. The election was criticized for fraud by the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe. Id.

Only 64.4% of Russia's eligible voters went to the polls in the 2004 election.

http://www.electionguide.org/voter-turnout.php?search_year=2004&submit.x=5&submit.y=6

Putin thus received 71.2% of 64.4% of the eligible vote in Russia, or 45.9.% of the support of the eligible voters IF we assume the election was 100% clean. Since we know it was dirty, his total was obviously even lower than that.

In other words, no more than 45.9% of the Russian population is "scum" as you say (not La Russophobe's word, which you dishonestly attribute in your typical manner).

These facts clearly show the ludicrous lack of substance in your utterly false claim that La Russophobe has condemned an absolute majority of Russians on the basis of votes for Putin.

You owe La Russophobe and apology.

So, at very least, you admit to calling 45.9% of the Russian population scum, which is the word that you used. This on the basis of some fictitious supermajoritarian system that neither Russia nor any Western democracy uses. Add to that all the people that failed to rise up against the abolition of elected governors, the destruction of the free media and the revival of the Soviet National Anthem, and the bloody war in Chechnya. Add to that the people who voted for other nationalist and communist parties. And, if it doesn't include them already, add the 70% of Russians that approve of Putin's performance, according to reputable polling agencies.
All these people are scum, in the words of La Russophobe.
Argument closed.

YES!!! I PROUDLY ADMIT TO IT!!! 45.9% of the Russian population is unquestionably guilty of facilitiating the rise of the Neo-Soivet Union, one of the great atrocities of world history, for personal motives. Scum is your word, but if the scum fits, wear it.

And YOU must admit that your claim that I did so in regard to an "absolute majority" of Russians was PURE GARBAGE and apologize for it.

Yet, you lack the basic integrity or courage do to so. I.E., you too are scum, perhaps even worse than the Putin voters

Putin voters

+

All the people that failed to rise up against the abolition of elected governors

+

All the people that have not opposed the destruction of the free media and the revival of the Soviet National Anthem

+

All the people that have not opposed the bloody war in Chechnya.

+

The people who voted for other nationalist and communist parties.

+

All the people that approve of Putin's performance, according to reputable polling agencies.

=

The absolute majority of Russians

I quote from you:

"Whoever votes for a proud KGB spy for president of a country the KGB just destroyed;

Whoever fails to oppose the abolition of elected governors, the destruction of the free media and the revival of the Soviet National Anthem;

Whoever fails to oppose the bloody war of imperialism in Chechnya;

is scum."

QED

You're quite insane.

I've never denied the other points, I proudly agree that the absolute majority of Russians have failed to oppose the recreation of the Soviet Union in many important ways in Russia AND THAT IS WHY I AM A RUSSOPHOBE. But I'd be only too happy to be proved wrong by future public action.

The fact that it has taken you so long to figure that out is really quite pathetic.

The only disagreement I raised was that as far as Putin is concerned I never said a majority of Russians had supported him, and YOU are the one who first used the word "scum," not me. But as I said before, if the scum fits, wear it. Seems to me, though, that the person who first uses the word is scummier than the person who merely repeats it.

And you are the scummiest of all, because you are defending the scum, and because YOU CAN'T EVEN APOLOGIZE FOR MISUSING THE TERM ABSOLUTE MAJORITY EVEN AFTER SO ARROGANTLY PONTIFICATING OR FOR GROSSLY MISCHARACTERIZING MY ELECTION POSITION.

PS: The fact that you use the expression "QED" is clear and certain proof of what a ridiculous fool you are, utterly detached from reality. People just like you were responsible for Hitler coming to power. In other words, you're a ridiculous coward.

"The fact that it has taken you so long to figure that out is really quite pathetic."

This is the funniest statement of all. It's long been evident you're a racist. But it's good that you've finally admitted it.

It's long been evident that you don't even know the meaning of the term "racist" just like you don't know the meaning of the term "absolute majority" and many other words.

QED!!! LOL!!!! What a weirdo!

This has to be the worst postings I ever read on Russia - and reading many US, Britisah, Jewish and W. Ukrainina Fascist knuckle-heads, this is not an easy achievement....my God! Imagine at the end of 2007 when Russian exchange rate GDP is well over a trillion - $1160-$1180 for 10th in the world, or PPP GDP is $1780 for 8th....this "la russophobe" - why french because of 1812? or 1940-1945?...or maybe it's a mask for a rabid Judaic-Fascist gutter propaganda? - will probably exlopde...if it is still there by that time....the best thing, I guess would be college and perhaps graduate school majoring history or political science, that is going beyond the western-paid newspapers and propagandists sometimes sitting in universities - BU has 2 or 3 of these, I know - dear "la phobe" best of luck...hang in there as Russia re-emerges and recovers....save your liver and nerves.

Yes...a weirdo...

Russia GDP: $1.723 trillion
US GDP: $12.980 trillion

Here are the official numbers for 2006 and the US is 8 times bigger than Russia economically speaking. But in terms of what you do with the money, I think Russians get a lot more out of their buck than the Americans. For example, the Russians spend less than the Americans on their military. Russians spend around 24 to 80 billion while the U.S exceeds 400 billion! However if you take into consideration that the average American soldiers makes way more money than a Russian soldier then this means that in some cases, Russia gets more out of their money than the U.S.

The same thing goes with gas as most Russians pay a lot less than the average European and American.