OK, now I have Jared's response and I'm sorry if I seemed peevish. FWIIW, I much
respect Jared's work so this is a comradely talk.
>Just read your long
> commentary, hjowever, and I think you miss the point - which is, arrest of
> Borodin is flagrant act of aggression by the Us and SWISS cohorts. It
> employs a new US weapon of choice - whom the US would make an example of, it
> first calls corrupt. Whether or not the charge is without foundation - as is
> apparently the case with Milosevic - or whether it may have foundation which
> you say is true with Borodin is irrelevant. The accusers are corrupt on a
> scale impossible for mere Russians to achieve - including creating the
> conditions of misery for most Russians today.
'Mere Russians' took the decisions to liquidate the Soviet Union, and no-one else.
It was an unforced move. They didn't have to do it. If Cuba can survive, so
self-evidently could the USSR. There were many forks which the postwar Soviet
leadership stumbled over and took the wrong turning, but the really critical one was
the decision by Gorbachev to surrender, to concede defeat in the Cold War. I know we
all know by heart Trotsky's famous lines on how the 'bureaucracy' was a bourgeoisie
in waiting, but there were and are always antidotes - *political* antidotes - to
Jekyll + Hyde transformations. 'Corruption' was not a kind of accessory, it was the
whole idea, the only game in town, and it wasn't long before 'mere Russians' like
Borodin and Yeltsin began to give lessons to their US (Harvard-trained) masters in
how it is done. They really took the best of the old and melded it with the best of
the new. Every minor form of bureaucratic self-enrichment and self-advancement
perfected in Brezhnev's time now flourished like cancer gone world in the brave new
world of Russian capitalism. And Pavel Borodin was amongst the grossest,
Roman-empire style, thieves. To say that we must line up in defence of him is
grotesque, and surely absurd. We cannot talk like this; it insults our own movement,
+ the huge historical struggle and sacrifice of the Soviet working class, and to the
whole tradition of Marxist and Leninist theory and practice.
Nor is it the case that this is simply the US employing a new weapon )to do what?
Terrorise corrupt plunderes and thieves? If so, it's NOT a new weapon and indeed it
is a very old weapon, often used by imperial nomenclaturas against quislings who
become a political embarrassment: to take just one example out of many, Noriega --
is he someone we should defend?). But in fact, in this case it seems clear that
their is collusion between the Kremlin and the Swiss and US authorities. But if it
is true that Putin is trying to establish his independence from Yeltsin (stooge,
criminal and quisling No. 1) and is trying to create a new 'strong' Russian state -
as the Bushites themselves now appear to be arguing, then you might expect that the
US would not be rushing to help him, you might indeed expect them to simply refuse
to act in a way which *supports* Putin and which pulls the rug from under their old
ally, Yeltsin and family. So it simply is not the case that the Borodin arrest is
another example of US state terrorism against foreign leaders.
As for theBelarus connection, Borodin's disappearance can only HELP the
strengthening of ties between Belarussia and Russia. His presence as secretary for
the Belraussian-Russian alliance was simply a guarantee that nothing woiuld happen
except the discovery of new forms of corruption and enrichment.
And I think that relations between Putin and Lukashenko are etxremely warm and are
developing strongly; nor have I heard one word of complaint from Lukanshenko about
Borodin's fate, only the same ominous silence as from Putin himself.
> Lukashenko of Belarus has offered his view - that this is calculated slap in
> the face to Russian and Belarus sovereignty and an attempt to sabotage the
> Russia-Belarus union - and I think he's right.
I haven't seen this. Can you provide a reference?
> As for the corruption of
> leaders, I say, let the Russian people - who with all due respect are not
> adequately represented by Internet polls - decide on that.
Internet polls? We are talking about public opinion polls tekn by VtSIOM and other
domestic Russian agencies.
>
> BTW Since we are quoting polls, Lukashenko is more popular than Putin in
> Russia. Also BTW isn't it an outrage that Putin has remained silent on this
> - calling Bush to congratulate him on his inauguration after Bush went on the
> Barbara Walters show 20/20 to read Russia a lecture about corruption after
> arresting a state secretary - and Putin calls to congratulate. And then
> there was that sub which rapparently was really rammed by a US vessel and
> which coincidentally had been helping the Yugoslavs during the bombing and
> Putin said nothing...Oh my.
There is no evidence that the Kursk was rammed, and it almost certainly sank as a
result of an onboard explosion.
Mark
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