That is not to say that there is no reason for being disappointed in previous governments, but that's the USA for ya.
I beg to differ on this one, Bart. That's by far not just "the USA for ya", it's everywhere. The guy in the video is a Brit (and he always talks about US
and GB), and I can also assure you that in Russia it is exactly the same way.
Who "created" Putin? "Liberal" (yes, in quotes; read on) scumbags and their media; look no farther.
Media, media, f*** media. Screwing reality 7/24. And then, of course,
everything comes as a huge freaking surprise!
Crimea has about ~90% Russian-speaking population, about 7% Crimean Tatar, and 3% Ukrainian. What did Ukraine do? First, they banned Russian in Crimean cinemas, all movies had to be translated to Ukrainian. All shop names etc. in the streets etc. had to be in Ukrainian only. Then then-president Uschenko visited Crimea and noticed road signs in Russian -- those also had to go.
Then president Yanikovich (an unspeakable crook, but that's not the point) made concessions, and introduced the notion of a "regional" (as opposed to "state") language. What was the
first thing done after the coup? They scraped it. This followed by nightly parades with torches (looking exactly like those in Germany of 30th), with slogans like "Moscovites to the gallows"... Russian journalists filming that got severely beaten.
Did many Westerners hear about any of that? Did they see those night Nazi-style parades with oceans of torches? If not, then
of course subsequent Crimean events, including the overwhelming vote to join Russia, would come as a huge freaking surprise ("Brexit 0").
But when Russian government shuts down radio station run by the group behind "Crimean blockade", it's all over the news on BBC and elsewhere. Speaking of that "blockade": they shut down water supply to the peninsula, then blew up electricity supply lines, leaving ordinary people with scarce water and almost no electricity. What did all those "liberals" and "human rights" groups say? NOTHING. They are first to defend Khodorkovsky, who amassed $15
billions in just few years, allegedly ordering assassination of the major of Nefteyugansk in the process, but ordinary people? Nah, that's not interesting, that doesn't draw enough attention to them...
And guess what, those "ordinary people" still get it, everywhere. I remember that, when I visited UK in early 200th, I came to a small hotel (a dozen rooms above a pub, near Cambridge), and
second thing after greetings an old lady at the desk said to me was "That Abramovich, he is a crook, right?". Yes, mam, he is. And yet if Putin ever touches him as he did with Khodorkovsky (unlikely, as what triggered crackdown on Khodorkovsky was his presidential ambitions; he wanted to own the whole country), "liberal" media will cry foul, aloud.
Berezovsky buys votes, wholesale, and makes Mikhail Evdokimov (a standup comedian!) governor of Altai Krai. That's somehow OK -- democratic process etc., no objections. But people saw what was happening... So when Putin scrapped the right to elect governors and started to appoint them, that went down pretty well with the majority.
Berezovsky... Ah, that a huge story in itself, but suffice to say that portraying (and supporting!) that beast as Putin's opponent by Western media was way better than open endorsement of Putin! Berezosky and Abramovich arguing in High Court about
how exactly they stole the money from Russian people... Heck, Martha Stuart went to jail for 1/1000th of that!
Recently, one of the "human rights" groups got purged out of the building (central Moscow) they rented because they could not pay their bills. That's a bad thing, right? Well, right. But all I've seen from them so far is protecting oligarchs, gays, etc. They cannot be more detached from the reality, from what this country's biggest issues are. So I would not go as far as the guy in the video with his "No sympathy whatsoever", but I do have very little sympathy indeed.
Detachment from reality: this is where it all starts; in the US
and elsewhere.
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