“The world's most popular leader”?

[blackbear]

Vladamir Putin: “The world's most popular leader”? By Mike Whitney

On Sunday, Russians will vote in their country's parliamentary elections. The results are a foregone conclusion. Putin's party, United Russia, is expected to win in a landslide. The only question is whether the margin of victory will exceed 70%. If it does, then Putin will continue to be the most powerful player in Russian politics even after he steps down from office next year.

Vladamir Putin is arguably the most popular leader in Russian history, although you'd never know it by reading the western media. According to a recent survey conducted by the Wall Street Journal, Putin's personal approval rating in November 2007 was 85% making him the most popular head of state in the world today.

Putin's popularity derives from many factors. He is personally clever and charismatic. He is fiercely nationalistic and has worked tirelessly to improve the lives of ordinary Russians and restore the country to its former greatness. He has raised over 20 million Russians out of grinding poverty, improved education, health care and the pension system, (partially) nationalized critical industries, lowered unemployment, increased manufacturing and exports, invigorated Russian markets, strengthened the ruble, raised the overall standard of living, reduced government corruption, jailed or exiled the venal oligarchs, and amassed capital reserves of $450 billion.

If there's a downside to Putin's legacy, it's hard to see.

Russia is no longer “up for grabs” like it was after the fall of the Soviet Union. Putin put an end to all of that. He reasserted control over the country's vast resources and he's using them to improve the lives of his own people. This is a real departure from the 1990s, when the drunken Yeltsin steered Russia into economic disaster by following Washington's neoliberal edicts and by selling Russia's Crown Jewels to the vulturous oligarchs. Putin put Russia's house back in order; stabilized the ruble, strengthened economic/military alliances in the region, and removed the corporate gangsters who had stolen Russia's national assets for pennies on the dollar. The oligarchs are now all either in jail or have fled the country. Russia is no longer “for sale”. .................

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article18817.htm

Putin's crime is that he rejects Washington's “unipolar” world model. As he said in Munich:

“The unipolar world refers to a world in which there is one master, one sovereign; one center of authority, one center of force, one center of decision-making. At the end of the day this is pernicious not only for all those within this system, but also for the sovereign itself because it destroys itself from within.… What is even more important is that the model itself is flawed because at its basis there is and can be no moral foundations for modern civilization.”

He added:

"We are seeing a greater and greater disdain for the basic principles of international law....We are witnessing an almost uncontained hyper use of force – military force – in international relations, force that is plunging the world into an abyss of permanent conflicts. I am convinced that we have reached that decisive moment when we must seriously think about the architecture of global security.”

Well said, Vladamir. Good luck in the election.

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[TmcMistress]

I'm sure bussing the same people to several different polling locations, arresting opposition leaders, severely restricting opposition publication and airtime, and making it much more difficult for smaller parties to get into parliament didn't hurt his chances either...

[conspiracy analyst]

[TmcMistress]

[conspiracy analyst]

[quote="TmcMistress"]

All parties were allowed to stand.
When Yeltsin was in charge and western crooks like Jeffrey Sachs were running the show and Russia went bankrupt all was well.

Now all 16 of the Oligarchs of the Yeltsin era have dissapeared from the scene the West babbles on about democracy.

Seen it in action in Iraq and in Florida.
A crook cant go round calling others crooks.

It appears that is what you seem to want to do based on false evidence.
If Putin wanted to ban them all he could have. He didn't. Get over it.

What you really want to moan about is this
http://www.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,,2222624,00.html