Friday, September 17, 2004
On Subverting Democracy in Russia
Boris Yeltsin, the previous president of Russia, is now speaking out behalf of Putin and his plan to create a pseudo-dictatorship in Russia. And I thought Yeltsin was alrerady dead, or at least too busy drinking to bother with politics anymore. Who knew??
David Ignatius says that we should treat Russia just as we do China, by letting them continue on their anti-democratic ways while deepening economic ties in the country.
President Bush has stated that he is "concenred by moves in Russia to undermine democracy" in that country. This seems fairly weak and inoccuous. If he really cared about democracy promotion, Bush would be frank, upfront, and forceful with not only our enemies( ie invading Iraq to spread democracy in the Middle East), but also with our friends. Bush shuld tell his soulmate that what Putin is doing in Russia is wrong and that the US would use what leverage, economic, political, moral, it had in Russia and in the international community to pressure him to reverse his authoritarian ways. Otherwise, Bush's democracy promotion efforts will be seen for what they are: a sham.
David Ignatius says that we should treat Russia just as we do China, by letting them continue on their anti-democratic ways while deepening economic ties in the country.
President Bush has stated that he is "concenred by moves in Russia to undermine democracy" in that country. This seems fairly weak and inoccuous. If he really cared about democracy promotion, Bush would be frank, upfront, and forceful with not only our enemies( ie invading Iraq to spread democracy in the Middle East), but also with our friends. Bush shuld tell his soulmate that what Putin is doing in Russia is wrong and that the US would use what leverage, economic, political, moral, it had in Russia and in the international community to pressure him to reverse his authoritarian ways. Otherwise, Bush's democracy promotion efforts will be seen for what they are: a sham.
# posted by N.D. Burnside @ 8:24 AM 
