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Kasparov Arrested By Russian Police

Posted by timothy on from the putin-on-the-fritz dept.

New submitter perdelucena writes "Former world chess champion Garry Kasparov was arrested outside a Moscow court, where the verdict in the trial of the Pussy Riot group members was being announced on Friday, Russian police said." Update: 08/18 01:14 GMT by T : Kasparov has written an account of the arrest.

39 of 374 comments (clear)

  1. Checkmate. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    Your move.

    1. Re:Checkmate. by SomePgmr · · Score: 5, Funny

      Uh, you wanna rethink that? ;)

    2. Re:Checkmate. by lexsird · · Score: 4, Insightful

      You can play it several different ways.

      Arresting a national hero like that probably wasn't the wisest thing to do. We are talking a Russian Chess Champion, something which is what we measure high end super computers against.

      Frankly, I don't think we should be concerned about Russian internal politics. We the People, of America don't seem to have our own government in control. Somebody's driving it, but damn it, it's not us apparently.

      It's not checkmate for anyone but Pussy Riot. Western decadence will not be tolerated I am sure.

      We have nobody to thank but ourselves. We win the Cold War, and then let them rot because we were gloating dicks. We have more in common with them than we can imagine, and damn far more to gain by working together than fighting. Why is that oligarchies, that really controls us, have such short sighted, fear-biting, knuckledraggers leading them?

      --
      Take the Red Pill.
    3. Re:Checkmate. by artor3 · · Score: 4, Insightful

      I was wondering how long it would take for someone to pull out the old "The US is just as bad" nonsense in response to the Pussy Riot trial. I never could have imagined that person would be so self-centered as to suggest that Russia's problems are our fault, as if the people over there are a bunch of children who couldn't possibly deal with their own problems and need a "grown-up" to come fix things. Yeah, I'm sure the world would be so much better off if the US had sent occupying forces over in the wake of the collapse of the USSR.

    4. Re:Checkmate. by AK+Marc · · Score: 4, Funny

      They wanted communism by having the government own all the corporations. We got communism with all the corporations owning the government. Republicans are communists! Wait, what was the question again?

      --
      Learn to love Alaska
    5. Re:Checkmate. by SplashMyBandit · · Score: 4, Insightful

      > Something I never understood was why the fuck the US cared about the polytical system in a far region.
      Well, the ideology was that global socialism was inevitable, but the USSR and China wanted to speed the process up (eg. encouraging and supply weaponry to the Chinese in their Civil War, the North Korean invasion, the North Vietnamese invasion, the communist Afghanistan government, invasions of Hungary and Czechoslovakia, arming insurgents and dodgy governments across the globe [Yemen, Malaysia, Angola, Ethiopia etc etc]).

      Then there was the massive Warsaw Pact tank armies poised to drive through Western Europe at a moment's notice. Some of this was "the best defense is a good offense" mindset in the aftermath of The Great Patriotic War (as the USSR called World War 2), but plenty of it was itching to get their hands on more territory too. Fortunately the US, despite its other flaws, had the 'minerals' (translation: testicles; for those in the US), the capability, and (most importantly) the will to contain communist expansion around the globe (since many other countries would wring their hands but then appease the Soviets).

      Even the Russians now acknowledge that the Soviet system was a mistake (although as time passes nostalgia is starting to take of the edge off the horrors for newer generations of Russians).

      It is an interesting period of history. You can't really understand the post-Cold War of today unless you understand the Cold War. Similarly, you won't understand the Cold War unless you understand the historical aspects of World War 2. It's not exactly "turtles all the way down" but if you want to understand why the US acts as it does (which, on a strategic scale, is usually quite rational) then I suggest you make an effort and trawl through the colossal masses of information available at all levels that describe the relevant history. Then you won't be forced to make statements on Slashdot from not knowing why the actors (US, Russia, Europeans, Israel, Iran etc) act as they do. Good luck.

    6. Re:Checkmate. by Opportunist · · Score: 3, Insightful

      One has to wonder...

      What makes Russia, or rather, the Soviet Union, such an enemy? Nukes? The USSR didn't have any nukes when the cold war started. And the US didn't cut all ties with England and France when they got their nukes. And the relationship with China even warmed up when they separated their "brand" of communism from Moscow, long after they got nukes at their hands.

      I think it's ideology.

      The powers that are seem to be terribly afraid that people might consider any social or economic system more favorable to their needs than the one we have currently running. As soon as anyone comes up with a society model that differs from ours, we vilify them. Why? What happened to our spirit of competition, have them compete and let's see which one works out? Instead we fight economy battles of proportions few people even know anything about, something that is actually anathema to our own economy model that allegedly enshrines free trade as sacrosanct.

      What are we afraid of? Isn't our system the best there was, is and will be?

      --
      We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
    7. Re:Checkmate. by Shompol · · Score: 5, Insightful

      to pull out the old "The US is just as bad" nonsense

      It is not. Very far from it, but we are getting there:

      - Mass media is a government's pet. They either lie (Fox News) or hide facts. There are a few exceptions, like NYT, but they are not read by an average Joe. This is the beginning of a disease.

      - We got a common enemy to keep populace in fear. "Look, the Terrorists, they are everywhere! Watch out for the terrorists!"-- This is an old Russian Stalin-era trick to grip power with iron fist =~ s/terrorists/imperialists/

      - Phones and other communications are eavesdropped, a-la 1970's KGB style.

      - Wall Street peaceful protest members arrested, media members arrested

      - Police requested Twitter to provide tweets by Wall Street protest organizers. WTF for? You gona charge them with "hooliganism" now?

      So the same shit is happening here, but it is more civilized and convoluted as not to raise too many red flags.

    8. Re:Checkmate. by Jane+Q.+Public · · Score: 3, Interesting

      "The situation in USSR, and then Russia, in late 80s to early 90s, was such that a lot of people clamored for everything even remotely Western, and especially American, solely on the grounds that it has to be awesome if it comes from people who live so great. You guys could have easily go in and do some actual good there, there was so much goodwill to fall back on it was insane."

      I don't dispute this. Maybe you misunderstood me. That's what The People wanted, but the powers that be would never let them have it. Any attempt by the US to help or educate or aid the Russian people was rebuffed -- with prejudice -- by the government.

      I have said this for many years: it is clear that what The People want is not what they're getting. And yes, to say that attempts to help from outside were "discouraged" is an understatement.

      "Instead you did the usual shit, which is to say, promote extreme rapid economic liberalization - "shock therapy" is what they called it - which resulted in this. And, eventually, people elected Putin, because "democracy" became a swear word associated with utter economic collapse and extreme poverty."

      Don't blame outsiders for what was engineered from the inside. I repeat: assistance was offered. Not only by the U.S. government but by many private organizations around the world. It was refused by the people in power. This is the ever-present problem with any kind of economic or political revolution: you have to be extremely careful who or what takes the place of the old power structure. Often, the result is disaster.

      But you can't blame that on outsiders. Nobody "conquered" Russia, to be able to impose their will from the outside. That isn't what happened here. And pretending that it did is not productive.

    9. Re:Checkmate. by metallurge · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Ideology was the rationalization, IMHO. You're right that it wasn't nukes. I think the Cold War is best understood as a sort of continuation of WW2.

      The US and the USSR were pretty much the only major powers which weren't gutted by WW2. The USSR nearly was, and probably bore the true brunt of the defeat of the European Axis powers. It was just big enough to absorb its losses, whereas Britain and France were not. The Soviet entry into the Pacific theater against Japan was probably at least as significant in the Japanese acceptance of unconditional surrender as was the use of atomic weapons by the US, which is not really understood by the public at large.

      Churchill was very conscious of Stalin's ambitions, and sought to position the West favorably for the postwar period for probably a year before the end of the war. But the British star was already waning and it was America which was already sitting at the head of the table. Truman and Eisenhower were looking more toward ending the war in Europe with fewer American casualties (looking to finally focus on the Japanese), and were willing to let the Soviets bleed Hitler from the East, and let the Russians pay the price in lives for doing so. Which made the loss of Eastern Europe into the Soviet sphere of influence inevitable.

      I give Stalin a lot of credit for quickly building the Soviet economy after the end of the war, despite grievous losses. While Americans were demobilizing and reaping the peace dividend and building the consumption economy, the Soviets were making sure their near-defeat never happened again. It took a while before the American public noticed there was a new global competitor, so it became necessary for American leaders to propagandize the matter, and make the public afraid. Which is where the anti-communist ideology and space race and nuclear arms race came in so handy. People who are afraid are more easily led.

      The Baby Boom generation has been rather non-introspective about these matters, as has America as a whole. We haven't really figured out what it all means and drawn mature conclusions because we just haven't bothered to examine it very closely. Godwin's Law is a great illustration of this.

    10. Re:Checkmate. by shutdown+-p+now · · Score: 4, Insightful

      The real problem is that from an outside perspective, it's almost insane to support Putin.

      On the contrary, it's very sane, just short-thinking.

      The way it goes is this. Under Putin today, a guy has an apartment, a family, a job with a decent pay - enough for good food and maybe even a car - basically, some sense of stability and security. He also remembers how, fifteen years ago, it was practically wild west on the streets, and jobs were few and hard to come buy and paid little. Now the government tells him that "those guys" basically want to rewind the clock back. And, indeed, when he looks, he spots some of the same figures in the opposition camp that led the country in the 90s. It doesn't matter that most there aren't, his attention is focused on those few. Then he's told that the rest are no better, and that they also want to "destabilize" everything. And he goes votes for Putin because, even for all the flaws that he can see around, he lives well enough that he has too much to lose - and he's afraid to lose more than he desires to win.

    11. Re:Checkmate. by BlueStrat · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Oh, and saying that corporations own the US government is like saying favored shop keepers own their local mafia. It is completely backwards and utterly ridiculous. This economic fascism(corporatism to use a newer definition describing the nominal private ownership of the means of production directed by the state) is a function of our government, the ones with all the guns, not those that pay off our government to point them somewhere else. Just imagine the power disparity between one institution and the other. Saying these insignificant corporations own the government is an obvious distortion of the truth to shift blame away from the violent actor(the state) to the one benefiting from the violence(the corporation). They are certainly not blameless, not because they own this vast state, but rather because they actively participate with it. That is a far more accurate description of events.

      Thanks for that.

      Good to see at least one other person commenting that grasps the reality. Government has the exclusive power to use violence and imprisonment, and writes the laws and determines who is breaking them. The government has the power to do a "Darth Vader" - "I have altered the deal. Pray I do not alter it further." and has done so in the past.

      As has been famously said, it is the nature of government to grow. A government "grows" by increasing the amount of wealth, capital, and property it controls, and it's power and control over the population.

      Corporations/businesses/industries sitting on all this wealth, property, and capital that the government wants ultimately to control (along with individual wealth/property/capital) are effectively forced to make "deals with the devil" because their competitors are attempting to do so, in order to gain regulatory/legislative advantage to force them out of business.

      This in no way excuses the behavior, but one can clearly understand the reasons for it without condoning it. It's sort of like trying to be "the last one killed" by helping the murderer(s) tie the other soon-to-be victim(s).

      It's predictable and one of the biggest reasons to keep the central government relatively small, domestically weak, and spending only a fraction of the total GDP is does currently. And a pox on both major US political parties. Both are equally guilty of expanding government, particularly after the '50s.

      Strat

      --
      Progressivism (aka US 'Liberalism'): Ideas so good they need a police/surveillance-state to enforce.
    12. Re:Checkmate. by Forty+Two+Tenfold · · Score: 3, Funny

      a failed philosophy that was communism

      You, sir, are an idiot.
      — written on a communist operating system (GNU/Linux) in a communist web browser (Firefox).

      --
      Upward mobility is a slippery slope - the higher you climb the more you show your ass.
    13. Re:Checkmate. by MrSteveSD · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Fortunately the US, despite its other flaws, had the 'minerals' (translation: testicles; for those in the US), the capability, and (most importantly) the will to contain communist expansion around the globe"

      The threat of communism was largely used as an excuse to target any left-wing/socialist government or even those that just wouldn't play ball. If a country started doing things the US didn't like e.g. nationalizing an oil company, angering a US company etc, suddenly they would be considered as a communist threat. In the case of Guatamala it was the Union Fruit Company. They owned 42% of arable land due to purchases and/or land being ceded by military dictatorships. When the government of Guatemala tried to free up that land, Union Fruit went crying to the US government. Before long there was a US-backed coup. The official excuse was that Guatemala was going to become a "Soviet beachhead".

      We have a similar story when it comes to the Iranian Coup in 1953. The government there wanted a better deal when it came to oil revenue from the AIOC (Anglo Iranian Oil Company, later it became BP), so they nationalized their oil industry. Although AOIC wasn't a US company, the nationalization was seen as a threat to US oil assets. An example that other countries in the region might follow. The US and Britain arranged a coup know as operation Ajax which replaced the democratic government with an unpopular dictator (the Shah) and a brutal CIA-trained secret police (SAVAK) to keep him in power. Again the threat of communism was used as a smokescreen.

      Here are just a few US-backed dictators from central and south America alone.

      • Nicaragua - Somomza Dynasty
      • Guatemala - Carlos Enrique Castillo Armas (and others)
      • El Salvador - Maximilliano Hernandez Martinez (and others)
      • Chilie - Augusto Pinochet
      • Argentina - Jorge Rafael Videla
      • Paraguay - Alfredo Stroessner
      • Bolivia - GEN. Hugo Banzer Suarez
      • Cuba - Fulgencio Batista

      We know the anti-communism crusade was an excuse, not just because of specific evidence in each case (Union Fruit etc), but because US policy towards left/socialist governments has remained largely the same despite the end of the cold war and break up of the Soviet Union. There has been continued interference in the governments of Central and South American states. e.g. Bolivia, through selective funding of parties opposed to Moralez and the coup attempt against Chavez (there is significant evidence of US involvement). Communism was used as a smokescreen during the cold war just as terrorism is used as a smokescreen today.

  2. Hmmmm by Immostlyharmless · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Me thinks if Putin and his thugs aren't a bit more careful, they could start the 2nd coming of democracy in the former Soviet Union.

    1. Re:Hmmmm by lightknight · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Nope.

      From the Russian's standpoint, they've given communism and capitalism a go, and neither has made them better off. From a purely academic standpoint, both implementations were so hopelessly banjaxxed that neither 'really counts' as an implementation of either ideology. Now, the younger generation, having heard stories from the older generation about how things were 'better' under the older regime, are falling back into a dictatorship (meet the old boss, same as the new boss). 'Tis Politics 101 -> actual change requires a vast amount of resources, while the appearance of change can be had for a whistle and some bubble-gum, and is often times seen as 'just as effective.'

      I imagine what they really want is for the people who've been holding power to 'disappear.' The absolute saddest part of it all is that by the time that happens, an entire new generation will have been corrupted; and thus, this is how this virus continues throughout space and time. Killing it requires a simultaneous attack from everywhere, all at once.

       

      --
      I am John Hurt.
    2. Re:Hmmmm by shutdown+-p+now · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Which is a grossly distorted viewpoint. There is no way their highly corrupted form of "democracy" or "capitalism", for that matter, was going to be their instant savior. Apparently many people felt that way, but it isn't even remotely realistic.

      Well, we had real democracy for a very brief time. I'd say that 1993 and 1996 parliamentary elections in Russia were really free. Of course it was still in the same naive/idealistic atmosphere, which is why a lot of freaks and cooks were elected; but people at least really wanted them there. Presidential election of 1996 was falsified to not let the commies win. From there it went downhill.

      We did have real capitalism for a while, too - a while longer, in fact. I know because my mom actually created her business back then. Her main headache was actually organized crime / racket, not the government, but that's what you get in a "wild west" capitalism. Other than that, people could make fortunes out of air with effort and cunning (and, often, with deceit and treachery - but again that's laissez faire for you), and did just that.

      The problem is that many people in the USSR thought that, if private businesses were allowed, then anyone could do it and be successful - themselves included. Turned out that's not how it works. A few people got insanely rich. A fair few people, like my mom, were stubborn and lucky enough to persevere and get a decent fortune out of it. Most people got nothing out of it, and their lives became worse, not better. It's why by '96 already more people were willing to vote for a commie president than for Yeltsin, and why they had to falsify those elections.

      And if you think their crime is down now, you just aren't looking high enough.

      It's certainly down from where it was in the 90s. Again, I would kinda know because I lived there before and after. It's still very high compared to most Western countries, sure, but it's all relative.

      Thing is, back then, the government was very inept, and corruption where it existed was local - so e.g. cops would be conspiring with the criminals. Which is why you had to pay to the criminals if you ran a business. These days,corruption still exists, but it's now streamlined and confined to the government & the ruling party. They don't deal with criminals anymore; they take it from you solely for themselves, and every bureaucrat who does it shares with his higher-up. It's a slightly better arrangement because there's no competition (which, in case of criminal gangs, often means burned shops and shot owners).

    3. Re:Hmmmm by shutdown+-p+now · · Score: 3, Insightful

      Even many Americans get this wrong. Coercion, blackmail, protection rackets and monopolies have NOTHING to do with capitalism. At all. Not even close.

      Capitalism is private ownership of the means on production. It's completely orthogonal to the existence or non-existence of coercion, blackmail, protection rackets or monopolies. You can have capitalism with them, or you can have something else without them.

      Their mistake was actually that they thought that capitalism was inherently immune to all those things. That if you just liberalize the economy, things magically get better because of the "invisible hand of the market" and such. It doesn't. The government still has to actively work to prevent coercion and blackmail, and regulate naturally arising monopolies. Of course, they made it even worse by themselves partaking in coercion and blackmail, and taking over monopolies while maintaining them.

      The problem was that they expected that this could happen OVERNIGHT without much effort. Without a lot of struggle and strife. It just doesn't happen that way. Nobody promised them a magical power that could cause this to happen THIS YEAR.

      The people were actually promised just that. The leaders... some of them knew they were lying. Others were naive enough that they actually believed it themselves.

      I realize that there are many people, like your mother, who bit the bullet and worked hard and got it done. And I am proud and grateful for such people. But from my understanding (and I know a lot of Russians who have come to the US), most people seemed to thing it was just something that would fall from the sky, and became angry when it didn't and they found that the same gangsters they had to deal with before were still running things, just under a different name.

      You misunderstand the source of the anger. It's not just that they didn't get what they thought they'd get. It's that other things were taken away from them before, and it was explained that only by taking those things away they can move on to that next better stage, which would be any day now. And the things taken away were things that people happen to value - things like having bread on your table every day, for yourself and your wife and your kids. Having clean water and electricity. Having open schools stuffed with teachers. The state provided them all in USSR, and as part of the reforms of that state they were taken away, and people grumbled, but they were told that they'd get much more and better from a flourishing private market than that if they only just persevere for a year or two. When the promised riches didn't happen, people treated that as theft - and I cannot really blame them for it.

  3. not the first time by Trepidity · · Score: 4, Informative

    Here's a 2007 /. story on a previous arrest.

    --
    10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
  4. Re:um... ok? by dkleinsc · · Score: 5, Informative

    3 reasons:
    1. He's a chessplayer, which necessarily makes him a giant nerd. Hence news for nerds.
    2. This is stuff that matters, especially if you're Russian.
    3. The potential for "In Capitalist Russia ..." jokes is obvious.

    --
    I am officially gone from /. Long live http://www.soylentnews.com/
  5. The importance of grouping by dkleinsc · · Score: 5, Informative

    The reporting on this mentioned protesters outside holding signs that translated to "Free Pussy Riot". They didn't comment on whether they meant "Free (Pussy Riot)" or "(Free Pussy) Riot".

    --
    I am officially gone from /. Long live http://www.soylentnews.com/
  6. Chess less relavent than politics by Relic+of+the+Future · · Score: 5, Informative

    His former chess level is less-relevant than the fact that he's a leader in the political movement opposing Putin.

    --
    Those who fail to understand communication protocols, are doomed to repeat them over port 80.
  7. Re:um... ok? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    People don't care about Kasparov being arrested half as much as the judicial farce that was just inflicted on Pussy Riot.

    The reason you should care is because the members of Pussy Riot that were given 2 year prison sentences are political prisoners (per Amnesty International and almost every other human rights organization). And if you don't care about political prisoners, then you suck at life.

  8. ISR by Altanar · · Score: 4, Funny

    In Soviet Russia, Czar Putin purges you. Wait... I did that wrong.

  9. Smart people are dangerous by iiii · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Smart people are a threat to those who hold power. Especially the subset of smart people who are politically engaged and willing to put themselves at risk to protest and demand change. And among them, the subset who are world famous and therefore have easy access to the press, well, they are just beyond dangerous.

    There is a long history of new dictatorial regimes wiping out, killing, or scaring away all of the educated class, thus making the general populace less likely to organize, garner international attention, or outsmart anyone in the regime. This fits the pattern.

    --
    Light cup, beer drink, thin so chain, neck turtle fat, man I won't say it again
    1. Re:Smart people are dangerous by SternisheFan · · Score: 3, Informative

      The Orthodox Church Patriarch who got caught when he had photoshopped his very expensive Rolex watches out of photos. http://freethoughtblogs.com/pharyngula/2012/04/06/who-needs-a-30000-watch/

    2. Re:Smart people are dangerous by shutdown+-p+now · · Score: 4, Informative

      The issue is that Christian faith generally teaches one to be humble and modest. Even more specifically, "it is hard for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven. Again I tell you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God". We kinda expect the clergy to live what they preach.

      And some do. For example, the late patriarch of the Serbian Orthodox Church, Pavle, would ride a bus or walk on the street, without fancy clothing other than what's required from him by his rank. Meanwhile, the current patriarch of the Russian Orthodox Church, Kirill, rides a black limo with a special flag and license plate (so that he doesn't get stopped by the cops when he goes twice the speed limit).

  10. Re:um... ok? by lexsird · · Score: 5, Funny

    The last time I saw pussy riot was when I changed cat foods.

    --
    Take the Red Pill.
  11. Video by Issildur03 · · Score: 4, Informative

    BBC video of the arrest:

    http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-19300149

    Rough transcription: "What are you doing? I'm being detained? What am I charged with? What am I charged with? What am I charged with? What am I charged with? What am I charged with? What am I charged with?"

  12. Re:THIS IS PERFECTLY OK by MightyMartian · · Score: 3, Informative

    How about the poisoning of Viktor Yushchenko? We can go on all day. Russia didn't become some nice delightful place governed by law abiding men just because the USSR collapsed.

    --
    The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
  13. Re:um... ok? by gaelfx · · Score: 5, Funny

    ...King checkmates you!

  14. Gentlemen, this is BIG by Penurious+Penguin · · Score: 5, Funny

    This is way bigger than you think. Big, like in SPACE. To understand, you should first affiliate yourself with the origins of chess, particularly from the view of former President of the Republic of Kalmykia, Kirsan Ilyumzhinov.

    Well, soon you will begin to see what started this whole affair in the first place. The President of the Republic of Kalmykia has powerful friends, and Putin is not at the top amongst them. These friends have spaceships and don't piddle around, especially with chess. In other words, Gary fucked with the Aliens by criticizing their Kalmykian friend, and Putin, the incredibly patient fellow he is, is finally closing in -- in service of the KGB (King's Gambit Bezopasnosti).

    Gentlemen, I assure you, chess is far stranger than Go.

    --
    Forward! -- Emperor Norton, 2012
  15. Re:um... ok? by Frosty+Piss · · Score: 3, Funny

    Every time I go out on the town there is a "pussy riot".

    --
    If you want news from today, you have to come back tomorrow.
  16. Re:um... ok? by pla · · Score: 5, Informative

    The reason you should care is because the members of Pussy Riot that were given 2 year prison sentences are political prisoners

    Well, yes, but no. Google "petukhi". Google "Mikhail Khodorkovsky". Google "Sergei Magnitsky".

    You should care because they will spend that time in the worst-of-the-worst "black" prisons. They will endure daily rape, by both fellow inmates and staff. They will leave (if they leave) with HIV and/or multi-drug resistant TB. They will most likely not leave... Or last a week, for that matter.

    The court didn't need to sentence them to any crazy-long sentence, because the court sentenced them to death and hell. Simple as that.

  17. Re:Russia or the US? by SplashMyBandit · · Score: 3, Insightful

    The US is getting worse, for sure. However, the US is nowhere in the league of current day China or Russia in terms of repression, lack of transparency, killings of journalists, bias against of minorities, bullying neighbours, etc etc. It is not even close.

  18. Boycot USSR WINTER OLYMPICS 2014 by cheekyboy · · Score: 3, Interesting

    A little threat by all of the western world would convince KGB agent putin to reverse the evil decisions.

    Also in the same city is the new russian grandprix so perhaps all the F1 teams should boycot that too, or at least do a protest 50mph race that would take 12hrs to complete. hahahhaha.

    --
    Liberty freedom are no1, not dicks in suits.
  19. Re:um... ok? by Opportunist · · Score: 3, Funny

    That's what you get for carrying Prada-Handbags!

    --
    We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
  20. Re:um... ok? by Havenwar · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Regarding 2:
    No. Not especially if you are Russian - more like especially if you're a human living in the world of today, where a Russia that reverts to old habits is a dangerous fucking thing. As someone who was actually alive when the soviet union broke up in '91 and have visited some ex-soviet states in the time since, I've seen both sides of the coin. Trust me, this one is better.

    Or was. It's getting bad again, and it's getting bad quickly. Putin sucking up to the church, smashing down on any political dissent... If this is allowed to go unchecked it's a matter of when not if russia will start the rearmament of their military forces, if they haven't already, and once more become a volatile player in world politics with their finger on the launch button.

    Now I live in Sweden, so I'm close enough that maybe I should be worried for my own sake, but I'm not. We've got Finland between us and the Russians, and nobody fucks with those guys and get away with it. But on a political scale and a global relations scale, this is worrying news indeed. The fact that other countries just wave it off, well... that's no surprise. But you can bet your ass their military advisers have started drawing up plans for the worst case scenario.

  21. Re:um... ok? by X.25 · · Score: 3, Insightful

    People don't care about Kasparov being arrested half as much as the judicial farce that was just inflicted on Pussy Riot.

    The reason you should care is because the members of Pussy Riot that were given 2 year prison sentences are political prisoners (per Amnesty International and almost every other human rights organization). And if you don't care about political prisoners, then you suck at life.

    I genuinely wish people were this upset when CIA was kidnapping people around the world, shipped them to Guantanamo, tortured them, then released them because they had no evidence.

    But no, let's get all upset about some punks getting jail sentence (which will be overturned soon anyway, they were just made an example of) in Riussia.