FRIDAY SEPTEMBER 23 CONTENTS
(1) EDITORIAL: Prokhorov in the Woodshed
(2) EDITORIAL: Drunken Russian Killers
(3) EDITORIAL: Does Britain Remember Chamberlain?
(4) EDITORIAL: An Open Letter to Donna Welles
NOTE: On September 22, 2011, the Russian stock market lost over 8% of its value on news of declining international demand for crude oil, and it is down over 30% since early April.
NOTE: Stalin on school notebooks for children! What will those Russians think of next?? (Hat tip: Reader “Garnet”)
NOTE: An American is dancing at the Bolshoi! Another sign of the apocalypse for Russia!
NOTE: The Russian website GolosRuNeta is holding an online straw poll for president. Way out in the lead is Russian Orthodox priest, actor, director, screenwriter, playwright, journalist, writer and all-around weirdo Ivan Okhlobstin. Who says Russians don’t take the future of their children seriously?? Vote now, and often.
La Russophobe 
Now we are watching big world wide stock plummet, it is promising to be more severe then 2008, as stocks are deeply red before anything really scary happened, Greece has not defaulted, nor did any other PIIGS country. When real thing starts, we’ll have a very good empirical answer to the question ‘Is Russia better prepared then in 2008?’ and ‘Is Russia better prepared then US and EU countries?’
Bid difference between Russia and developed countries is amount of stocks traded at stock exchanges. Relatively small volume of trade is good thing in bad times.
Falling ruble is often considered as sign of doom, but this is thing that had to be done long ago, cutting dependence on import goods by rising they ruble price is good thing, it is better to decrease import slowly within half year, then chopping it instantly when foreign trade stops dead in tracks.
Well, my bet is Russia will survive coming mess better then average western country. You’ll disagree of course, but instead of pointless arguing we can buy some pop corn and watch the starting storm.
Well, if you said that in August 2008 you were proved utterly, totally wrong. Russia did MUCH worse than the average Western country. Not only do you totally ignore recent experience, you offer absolutely NO evidence of ANY kind from ANY source to back up your gibberish (can you, for instance, name a Western nation which has seen its stock market shed 30% of its value since April?). In other words, you’re a fully-realized neo-Soviet man.
In our Soviet Russia stock market has less impact then in s.c. developed countries. I.e. compare amount of stocks in existence and amount traded at exchange.
Say there is 1.000.000 shares of GazPromOilUraniumSteelofRussia company.
Prices of oil, gas, steel and uranium fall.
Situation 1) All holders sell their shares for 50% of former price.
Situation 2) 1% of holders sell their shares for 50% of former price. Figures on stock charts will be same, but situation is different. Fat cats holding russian stocks have them as an instrument of their power, not as tool of speculation (buy low, sell high)
So Russian SE is way less serious then real SE in London or NY.
Parameters that determine Russian survival are unemployment, industrial production growth rate (GNP is less relevant), government ability to support social spendings and so on, reserves of food, ability to buy really vital import goods that can not be produced locally (pharmaceutics which is almost non-existent in Russia)
Auriga, you are most certainly delusional.
After all, Kudrin has now publicly stated that Putinist policies will destroy the Russian economy, and that it is completely reliant on oil and gas.
You opinions about the Russian economy are in direct contrast to those of the man who was minister of finance (and boss of my wife’s uncle…) for so long.
And as for economic figures in Russia, well they are about as reliable as crime statistics. Falsified by Putin’s oligarch and FSB cronies beyond all recognition.
Putin Russia. Before criticize Russia stop and look at the hard work of transforming USSR to Russia in 20 years .In nineties Yeltsin drop oil export tax duty,turning Russia in to a raw materials colony of the west.Russian budget could not exist because of broken economy -there was no tax base law.Russia began to borrow $ and issue bonds.It ended in default in 1998.In 1999 Putin introduced an export tax on oil,gas..For example today with the same amount of oil and gas export by Kazakhstan and Russia tax revenue to Kazakhstan government is $30 to Russia $300 Russia paid their debts of Yeltsin s and USSR era. And now provide credit to other country.Stabilize Ruble.From January 2000 to today’s date the exchange ratio of ruble to $ dont change. In 2010 GDP increased 8.34 times compared to 1999.The ratio of Per capita income wage growth from 1999-2008 1.81 times(same increase in real GDP). Minimum Subsistence Level for pensioners in the 4 quarter 1999 amounted to 521 rubles in 4 quarter 2009 6177 rubles growth of 11.8 times. Per capita income of Russian citizens in 1999 amounted to 3947 rubles in 2008 14940 rubles (3.79 times) and in 2009 19856 rubles(4.27 times)purchasing power of population by 2009 increased 2.55 times. Pension provide on time today.In nineties pension delay up to 9 months.The economy is not only regained all grounds that lost in 1990,but has created service sector,which hardly existed in USSR. Russia has accumulated the third largest gold reserves after China and Japan.Consumer lending has born and increased 170 times compared with 2000.Production of manufacturing industries grew by 77%,including machinery and equipment-91%,textile production by 46% food by 64%. Percentage of population with incomes below the subsistence minimum decreased from 28% in 1999 to 8%The life span of Russia population has increased from 65 in 2001 to 69 2010.In 2009, the first time in 20 years birth rate in Russia exceeded the death rate. In 2000s,Putin signed a series of laws that were amended tax legislation: it was established a flat income tax on individuals in 13%, reduced income tax rate to 24%, introduced regressive scale of the unified social tax lifted turnover taxes and sales tax, the total amount of taxes was reduced by 3.6 times (from 54 to 15)A number of other socioeconomic reforms: banking (2001-2004), the monetization of benefits (2005), the reform of labor relations, power and rail transport. Increased foreign investment in Russia from $11 billion in 2000 to $ 120 billion in 2007.Money flight from Russia in 1999 in amounted of 20 billion dollars,In 2007 it hase changed to capital tributary record of 81 billion dollars. Putin managed to stop the criminal lawlessness of 1989-2000 that was worst and more devastating then 1930 in USA. American Time magazine named President Vladimir Putin man of the year in 2007. ,,Putin showed exceptional skill in governing the country, which he received in a state of chaos and led to stability,, – Said executive secretary of Times Richard Stengel.
According to British historian, Head of Department of International Relations Bilkent University Norman Stone, “Vladimir Putin Managed to wrest from the historical trend of Russia, which for its continuation would lead to the disintegration of Russia as a state”
As the Newsru.com website wrote today (September 23), the situation in Dagestan, where insurgents have sharply increased the number of attacks, “is beginning to spin out of control and increasingly looks like a real guerrilla war.” In the suburbs of the capital Makhachkala today, the deputy head of the republic’s branch of the Federal Penitentiary Service, Magomed Murtuzaliev, was killed along with his daughter, nephew and driver. The incident took place in the village of Semeder when gunmen opened fire on the car in which they were traveling and it burst into flames (www.newsru.com, September 23).
That incident came on the heels on several other insurgency-related acts of violence in Dagestan. On September 22, two car bombs detonated in Makhachkala, killing one policeman and wounding 61 other people, 44 of them police officers. A spokesman for the republic’s Interior Ministry said that the first blast was equivalent to three kilograms of TNT, while the second – which went off about 15 minutes later, after police had arrived at the scene – was about 12 times more powerful than the first explosion. The Associated Press reported that most of the shops near the blast site were destroyed. Another explosion had taken place in Makhachkala late on the evening of September 21, when a bomb inside a VAZ-2109 went off, killing four people traveling in the car. According to police, the four were terrorists who were planning to use the bomb for another attack, but the device for some reason went off prematurely. Police said that weapons and ammunition were found inside the wreckage of the vehicle (www.newsru.com, September 23; AP, September 22; Interfax, September 21).
In yet another incident in Dagestan on September 22, gunmen opened fire on the head of the Buinaksk police, Col. Magomednabi Adilkhanov, as he was traveling from his native village of Aglan-aul to his office in the city of Buinaksk. Adilkhanov was not hurt in the attack, but two of his bodyguards were killed (www.kavkaz-uzel.ru, September 23).
Also on September 21, gunmen fired on a convoy of servicemen as it was traveling along the Gigatli-Urukh road in Dagestan’s Tsumadinsky district. The attack wounded a police colonel who is the first deputy head of the Russian Interior Ministry’s temporary operational group in the North Caucasus. The colonel was hospitalized (Interfax, September 21).
Pingback: 47. 📢Must Read 👉LETTER: Russians Outraged by Skewed Independent Reporting : the crude propaganda article which appeared in The Independent last month, praising 👉valentina matviyenko, the UNELECTED & CORRUPT governor of St. Petersburg👈, as
Pingback: 47. 📢Must Read 👉LETTER: Russians Outraged by Skewed Independent Reporting : the crude propaganda article which appeared in The Independent last month, praising 👉valentina matviyenko, the UNELECTED & CORRUPT governor of St. Petersburg👈, as