EDITORIAL: Putin is Drowning in his own Sewage

EDITORIAL

Putin is Drowning in his own Sewage

For the Russian Kremlin to balance its annual budget this year, the price of crude oil must average $123 per barrel.

It’s an astounding fact.  No other member of the G-8, and no member of BRIC, depends for budget solvency on the price of a commodity which is set abroad. Russia is, quite simply, not its own nation.

But there’s an even more horrifying reality for Vladimir Putin to face:  So far this year, the price of crude oil has actually averaged $78 per barrel — and just $75 per barrel this month.  That’s a whopping 40% less than the budget requires.

Vladimir Putin is drowning in the fetid sewage of his own economic mismanagement.

EDITORIAL: Another Day, Another Nemtsov Arrest

EDITORIAL

Another Day, Another Nemtsov Arrest

Once again last Tuesday, the former first deputy prime minister of Russia was arrested and accused of “provocation” by the Putin Kremlin for daring to challenge its authority.

Before we discuss the latest incidence of jaw-dropping barbarism from the Putin Kremlin, though, let’s take a moment to reflect on amazing photograph shown above, an image captured by a Novaya Gazeta photographer at the scene of the crime.  It ought to strike sheer terror into the hearts of the loathsome reptiles within the Moscow Kremlin.

Putin openly Threatens Peaceful Protesters with Violence

So-called law enforcement officers following Vladimir Putin's advice in Moscow on August 31

Oleg Kozlovsky, writing on the Huffington Post, reveals how Vladimir Putin has declared open, violent war against peaceful protesters (just for daring to march without a license, not for defying an order to disperse) and his own presidency-for-life:

Today’s Kommersant publishes a fresh interview with Vladimir Putin, where the dictator comments on opposition rallies:

Look, all our opponents support a Rechtsstaat. What is a Rechtsstaat? It is obedience to the existing law. What does the existing law say about [Dissenters’] Marches? You need to get a permission from the authorities. Got it? Go and protest. Otherwise you don’t have this right. If you go out without having the right, get beaned with a baton. That’s it!

Putin manages to lie three times in this short passage:

Amsterdam interviews Ponomarev

Robert Amsterdam interviews Lev Ponomarev:

Russia-watchers are no doubt aware of the recent arrest of my good friend Lev Ponomarev. Lev is one of the leading lights of the Russian human rights movement, part of the original perestroika-era generation of human rights advocates whose courageous efforts ensured that democratic reforms were an integral part of the changes that followed the collapse of communism. These reforms have been steadily and vigorously eroded over the past decade under Vladimir Putin. Several days ago, for example, Lev was arrested in Moscow on Flag Day – while walking with a Russian flag. The irony is all the greater because Russia’s Flag Day commemorates the day in 1991 when the tricolor was raised for the first time over the Supreme Soviet building after the failed August Putsch, a time when Lev was a deputy to the Congress of People’s Deputies of the RSFSR and a key figure in the fledgling democracy movement.

I spoke with Lev by phone after his release, and here is what he had to say:

“Russian NATO” Collapses in Humiliating Failure

Aleksandr Golts, writing in the Moscow Times:

Practically every hospital-themed television show has an episode in which doctors attempt to revive a dying patient without noticing that the person is already dead. Something similar happened at the Collective Security Treaty Organization summit held this month in Yerevan. Even noting that the meeting was riddled with disagreements would not go far enough to describe the confusion that reigns in the CSTO today.

CARTOON: Putin doesn’t need Eyes

Putin doesn't need eyes. On the stick is written: "Channel One." That's the main national broadcast TV network, owned and operated by the Kremlin.

Source:  Ellustrator.