Russia — A Democracy That Works?
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With a 75% voter turnout, 87% of the turnout voted for Putin.
No, the election was not rigged.
Americans are so accustomed to their elections being rigged that they think all other countries’ elections are rigged also. The whore American media instantly began the required chant: “a fishy election.”
Of course, American elections are never fishy, not even when under cover of darkness vote totals are suddenly reversed.
The election turnout is high in Russia because Putin, like Ronald Reagan and unlike Biden, is a leader who focuses on unifying the country. From a Russian national perspective, there is little, if anything, about which to disagree with Putin. His recent address to the Russian people shows his concern as well as the active measures he is implementing to support families and soldiers. It is rare for a country to have a leader who is not trying to survive being in office or using the office for his personal benefit.
There is no hope for US/Russian relations. The budget and power of the US military/security complex, a powerful lobby encompassing the armaments industry, the Congress elected by campaign contributions, and the CIA and FBI, depends on having an enemy. Russia is the enemy of choice. Americans were trained by decades of Cold War that there is a “Russian threat.”
Another reason is that US foreign policy in the Middle East is controlled by the Israel Lobby, second in power only to the US military/security complex and often united with it. Israel’s interests in the Middle East differ completely from Russia’s interests. Israel’s interest is the destruction of Iran, which would open a pathway for CIA “jihadis” to flow into the Russian Federation and the former Central Asian provinces of the Soviet Union. Instead of one Ukraine, there would be many.
Putin has the concept of good and evil. He is learning that in the West he faces evil. The Russian Church sees it as well and supports him.
Some Russians are still influenced by the American propaganda from “Voice of America” and “Radio Free Europe” during the Cold War of the 20th century. But as the previous lack of political support for Alexei Navalny and the absence of support for Putin’s challengers demonstrate, the Russian people understand that they face a threat from Washington’s empire, the response to which requires national unity.
Meanwhile in the US the Democrats and the corporations have the borders wide open in order to replace higher cost American employees and Republican voters. Unity in America and throughout the Western World has been destroyed by Identity Politics. In the Western World no government represents the ethnic base of the country. Governments only represent the elite ruling interests. President Trump tried to change that, and we have seen what happened to him.
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Paul Craig Roberts is a renowned author and academic, chairman of The Institute for Political Economy where this article was originally published. Dr. Roberts was previously associate editor and columnist for The Wall Street Journal. He was Assistant Secretary of the Treasury for Economic Policy during the Reagan Administration. He is a regular contributor to Global Research.
Featured image: A woman casts a ballot at a polling station located in the school gymnasium during a presidential election in St. Petersburg, Russia, Friday, March 15, 2024. Voters in Russia are heading to the polls for a presidential election that is all but certain to extend President Vladimir Putin’s rule after he clamped down on dissent. (AP Photo/Dmitri Lovetsky)