Merry Merry

This year, we spent Christmas in Chicago (which is so lovely there's even a song about it). Driving in from the airport, I was impressed with the holiday decorations, and for some reason I thought of Moscow - another city administered by a politician who is self-enriching but beloved by city residents. The Christmas decorations in Moscow are truly spectacular, I have no idea what they've done this year, but here are a few photos from 2005 (there are a few more in this photoset):

On Kutuzovsky Pr-t.


Pushkin Square (on the southwest side
of Tverskaya, where the McD's is).

Mayakovsky Square, with a "Liberte" sticker that looked to me like it was done in holiday colors.

Pushkin Square, the Rossiia movie theater, and
Aleksandr Sergeevich himself.

Across the street from Luzhkov's office - Yuri Dolgoruky
dressed up like Santa (see this interesting article from a couple
of years ago about the Santa/Ded Moroz distinction as part of
the cola wars between Coke and Pepsi).

Best holiday wishes to everyone!

Adjusting reality and spinning the spin

This is the way VVP is portrayed on the cover of the "Person of the Year" issue of Time Magazine:

[image source]

And here is the image accompanying one of the RIA Novosti stories about Putin's "award":

When you mouse over the photo on the RIAN website, the text that pops up is "Vladimir Putin, Time (c) collage RIA Novosti." Collages with mastheads of Western newspapers and misleading or fabricated headlines have become a commonplace element in the works of Russian "political technologists" (see, e.g., here, and also this fabrication). This example does not, of course, rise to that level, but it is interesting to note RIAN's role in conveying to Russians a certain view of how the West sees them through the InoSMI project.

This BBC article provides a good discussion of how InoSMI (unlike InoPressa, another website that presents Russian translations of Western media) allegedly presents an unbalanced selection of Western coverage, designed to create the impression among Russians that "the Western media are full of negative articles about [Russia]...that a new propaganda war is being conducted...that Western correspondents will do anything to make Russia look bad." The website even has video from foreign TV - for example, this recent CNN report on Russia - dubbed into Russian.

InoSMI's editor naturally has a different take on things, and it is true that the website provides what should be a valuable service and has generated a loyal community of commenters debating the contents of the translated pieces. The website also recently won a RuNet award, though since the awards contest was set up by the Federal Agency for Print and Mass Media and RIAN is state-run, the award to InoSMI may have been more of a promotional action than a contest.

I don't spend enough time reading InoSMI to be able to tell for sure who's right, though my first impression is that the BBC correspondent is onto something (one problem is that InoSMI mostly translates op-ed pieces and not straight news pieces, creating the impression that all Russia coverage in the West is opinionated; and another problem is that InoSMI doesn't carry enough translations about topics other than Russia), but wouldn't RIAN want to show the sinister-looking Putin cover if their mission was to tell Russians that the West views them negatively? Perhaps they are smart enough to realize that the line should be drawn at negative portrayals of Putin, who after all built at least some degree of his support (especially during the first term) by creating the impression among Russians that he is respected abroad.

Anyway, Putin's interview with Time is quite interesting. I think this was one of the more telling parts:

What do you think are American misconceptions about Russia?
Well, you know, I don't believe these are misconceptions. I think this is a purposeful attempt by some to create an image of Russia based on which one could influence our internal and foreign policies. [1] This is the reason why everybody is made to believe, like, it's O.K. to pinch the Russians somewhat. They are a little bit savage still, or they just climbed down from the trees and probably need to have their hair brushed and their beards trimmed. [2]

Looks like Vova reads InoSMI.

[upd] Actually, his unedited answer to that question (from this full transcript of the interview) has a bit more texture than the edited version that (presumably) was what went into the print edition. Here are the phrases that were edited out; I've included brackets above to indicate where the edits were made:

[1] Russia has demonstrated that we don't want simply to be a partner, we want to be a friend of America. Sometimes one gets the impression that America does not need friends. Sometimes we get the impression that you need some kind of auxiliary subjects to take command of. We cannot build our relations on such grounds and this creates frictions now and then, and this is precisely the reason why they always seek to find some problems inside our country.

[2] That's the civilizing mission to be accomplished out there. But I believe this is a tool to affect others, which is a wrong way to go. The right way would be to find common ground and take account of each other's interests in the first place.

Pretty substantial edits.

BTW, here is my earlier post about Putin as "POY."

"Saving the Relationship"

This is one of the more pragmatic and thoughtful op-eds about the troubled US-Russian relationship that I've seen in some time. It's by an American Russia expert whose background is in non-proliferation (one of the few areas of security policy where no one was ever able to say "Russia doesn't matter anymore") and who, among other things, was once brave enough to go on a Russian TV talk show without a translator. I especially like the discussion of the differing "scripts" - conflicting narratives of events which bedevil the bilateral relationship:

Moscow Times
December 18, 2007
Saving the Relationship
By Rose Gottemoeller

After President Vladimir Putin said last month that Russia would not allow other countries "to poke their snotty noses into our affairs," we should face the fact that security relations with the West are in a shambles. Putin, who is fond of tough-guy slang, used the colorful phrase when he accused the United States of pushing the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe to decide against sending observers to the State Duma elections on Dec. 2. Never mind that the OSCE did not receive visas in time. In Putin's view, the United States must be behind the decision, and it should be told to get out of Russia's business.

Now Russia has suspended its obligations under the` Treaty on Conventional Armed Forces in Europe. The government-controlled television channel Rossia announced the news at exactly four minutes past midnight on Dec. 12. This issue had long been on the table. Putin first explicitly attacked the treaty in his February Munich speech, which criticized the United States for pushing the enlargement of NATO and making plans to deploy a missile defense system in Poland and the Czech Republic. According to Putin's script, the United States had for years failed to take into account Russian security concerns in Europe.

Washington of course has its own script, which stresses that Russia is included in Europe through the NATO-Russia Council and European Union organizations. The problem is that now the Kremlin team is fed up with these methods. From their perspective, when they raise an issue, the United States and Europe acknowledge it and then ignore them.

Read more...

Who's the man?

In case there was any doubt, Time Magazine has confirmed that this year, it's Putin:

Is it me, or does this photo not look much like Putin
at all? Ah, but wait - it looks very much like Don Putin...
[image source]

A Tsar Is Born
Adi Ignatius
Time Magazine
Tuesday, Dec. 04, 2007

No one is born with a stare like Vladimir Putin's. The Russian President's pale blue eyes are so cool, so devoid of emotion that the stare must have begun as an affect, the gesture of someone who understood that power might be achieved by the suppression of ordinary needs, like blinking. The affect is now seamless, which makes talking to the Russian President not just exhausting but often chilling. It's a gaze that says, I'm in charge.

Read more...

In the same package of articles is a piece called Choosing Order Before Freedom.

All the news on this latest bit of international fame/infamy for VVP. Brace yourselves for a wave of commentary and opinion pieces with this selection as a "hook," all of which will no doubt note that the honor - once known as "Man of the Year" - has in years past been bestowed on people like Stalin (twice!) and Hitler...

[Update 12/20] Since it's been discussed in the comments, I wanted to mention that commenters on the Russian LJ written by drugoi have (in the midst of making a fair amount of funny cracks - e.g., that the photo was taken by Medvedev while on his knees, or by Putin's dog - have identified the photographer as this guy. The post is currently in the Yandex list of top blog posts (as drugoi's posts often are), and I have no doubt the discussion there will be extensive and mostly interesting. Maybe Global Voices will do a summary translation...

Some of the funnier short comments so far:

The only thing missing for a full picture of how this newspaper [sic] portrays him are tattoos on his fingers [characteristic for Russian organized crime figures]

Is that really him? It looks like a lot like that guy who Berezovsky put in charge of his party a long time ago.

In that pose he looks like Snoop Dogg or someone [Actually, I had exactly the same thought and even did a Google search for pictures of Snoop looking hard in a suit - was hoping to do a "separated at birth" juxtaposition, but I couldn't find anything with a quick search]

His [thumb]nails are of different lengths!

It's OK, we portray Bush an idiot all the time, too.
- Ha! It's not just us. The Americans do, too.

I wonder, can you sue someone for photographing you with a wide-angle lens?

And someone has already posted a distorted version of the Time cover (no doubt to make the Time editors look like even bigger meanies for making VVP look so bad), as well as a link to an earlier cartoon referring to "Putin's Clan" as opposed to "Putin's Plan" and using Sopranos-type imagery.

RIA Novosti created a special "collage" rather than use Time's actual cover image.

Nash Feminizm?

OK, so this is quite visually arresting:

[image source]

The young lady - or at least part of her - is proclaiming, "VOVA! I am with you!" This was part of a Nashi-sponsored fashion-show-cum-rally (at least, that's what it looked like, judging from other pictures, which are replete with Nashi's alarm-clock logo, something the Nashisti casually appropriated from their ostensible ideological opponents, Ukraine's Pora). Commenters on the post where I saw the picture above had a variety of reactions, including:

Is MTS rebranding again? (in reference to the red-and-white color scheme shared by Nashi and a major Russian mobile telephony provider);

I get it, I get it! They're a mixture of pioneers and cheerleaders.

Nice panties, what does Putin's wife think of this?

Our answer to Uggs. (in reference to the young lady's striped valenki)

Other commenters noted that it's time to change the label - to Dima, or to Medved - or responded with variations on the olbansky word песдец - and one noted that the placement of the label was "If we consider the symbolism....not very proper."

The antics of Nashi can hardly startle one anymore, but this is sort of a new level of tastelessness, fetching though the ladies involved may be. It got me thinking about feminism, truly a dangerous road for me to go down, so I'll admit right away that I'm out of my depth in such topics and apologize ahead of time in case I offend anyone.

The thing is, feminism is one of those "Western" ideas that many Russians condemn based on a flawed understanding of the concept. The Russian stereotype of feminists can probably be summed up as "manly-dressing, unattractive women who get offended when you try to open doors for them." Now, much of this has to do with the wonderful fact that Russian women are brilliant at maintaining dignity and power even while observing certain gender roles and playing along as though they really believed it were a man's world.

But I would venture to say that at least some of it has to do with the fact that many people are uncomfortable with this "foreign" idea - feminism and female empowerment - and the changes it might represent, the aspects of essential "Russian-ness" it might leave behind, and therefore feel the need to discredit such a threatening, new, "Western" idea. In fact, I would go so far as to say that the idea of feminism* in Russia may even be as discredited as the idea of democracy.

Thus, while "feminism" in Russia conjures up (false) images of militant, asexual shrews, who in actuality represent an extreme and perhaps imaginary fringe of the movement, "democracy" also conjures up (false) images of people who mainstream Russians have been taught by the mainstream Putin-era political discourse to refer to as the "demshiza" (democratic schizos), "dermokraty" (shitocrats), or "demokrady" (demo-thieves) - in other words, the people who allegedly** brought the country the collapse and poverty of the 1990s.

As I said at the outset, I'm out of my depth here, and perhaps it's a fool's errand to try to turn a T&A pic with a suggestively placed label into some kind of pseudo-thoughtful discussion. But I figured I'd give it a shot.


*Not that there's just one "idea of feminism" in the rest of the world. Actually, this Nashistka's choice of outfits, which might get her blackballed from some feminist circles in the US as a traitor to the sisterhood who allowed herself to be objectified in the service of a male-dominated political system (I mean, talk about "the personal is political"!), might also be hailed by "stripper feminists" - no doubt this Putinista was thinking, while freezing onstage in that bikini, "By deploying femininity as a tool I [am] exposing it as a construction."

Seriously, though, I have no idea about these ideologies, and probably not much room to speculate on as a guy, even as a "sensitive, caring, romantic 90s kind of guy" (anyone else remember that funny turn of phrase?). So I decided to ask Natalia Antonova, the first person I thought of when I pondered who a reliable source about post-Soviet feminism might be. I've emailed her and asked her to respond in the comments here. We'll see if she can take time away from her own writing, commenting, and general saving of the world with the written word to pontificate in this space.


**I say allegedly because in fact the initial collapse and poverty of the 1990s was largely a carryover from the overprinting of rubles and price controls which were in effect in the USSR right up until 1991. What happened later in that decade is often blamed on people like Chubais, but why then is someone like Medvedev - who policy-wise seems like basically a market liberal like Chubais (actually, an ultraliberal like Chubais, according to Maxim Kalashnikov :-) ) - being designated Putin's heir?

Seriously, is it just me or is it kind of funny to hear Gryzlov talk about the Chairman of Gazprom being the "most socially oriented candidate" (I wonder if he meant, "from among the group acceptable to Putin"?) leading a government focused on raising people's quality of life. It's almost as funny as the idea of that famous "statist with a US passport" (and founder of a "youth movement" that's both less famous and less Soviet than Nashi, one with pre-Soviet roots) Boris Jordan "consider[ing] the life of an average citizen" from his near-oligarchic height.

Preved, Medved - the new apparent heir apparent**

VVP makes Dima an offer he can't refuse.*
[image source]

Much as Putin called for a resounding victory for United Russia in the Duma elections, he has arranged a resounding endorsement for his apparent heir-apparent, Dmitry Medvedev. At a televised meeting between involving four of the parties that participated in the recent elections - party of power United Russia, Kremlin creation Fair Russia, the Agrarian Party, and the Civil Force party - as well as Putin himself, Medvedev received an endorsement from all present.

There is, of course, lots of reaction to this news already. The Russian stock market has surged - Gazprom, where Medvedev is Chairman of the Board, is up 3% - and I have to say that in the imperfect world of Russian politics a smooth transition to a Medvedev administration may be the best possible outcome for anyone concerned about continued growth and stability in Russia. Medvedev's involvement in corporate Russia predates his involvement with Gazprom - he was head of legal affairs at SPB-based timbercompany Ilim Pulp for most of the 1990s - and fits with his the "moderate liberal / technocrat" label generally applied to Medvedev's politics.

The market's favorable reaction to this news may also reflect a sense of relief that the succession process is moving forward. There have been a lot of rumblings about unseemly "under-the-carpet" battles taking place among top officials lately (with baffling and disturbing public manifestations like the affair surrounding the Shvartsman interview, and the arrest of Storchak), and perhaps having a successor-designate in place reduces the sense that Putin's departure is leaving a huge vacuum.

Who will be leading the way after March?
[image source]

Looking ahead, this may also be good news for the future of the US-Russian relationship, both because making money is one thing both countries agree on and because of who Medvedev is not - a hawk like Sergei Ivanov. But who knows - the past few months have been all about surprises and the expectation of more surprises, so this apparent outcome (an anointed successor from among the two candidates who have been in play for at least a year now), because it's one which might have been expected six months ago, is in itself a bit of a surprise.

On the other hand, there's still plenty of time for more twists and turns as the "2008 question" works its way to a resolution. And perhaps Medvedev in the Kremlin would be ideal - young and easily packaged for voters, palatable to big business and to the outside world, and apparently very manageable. According to Limonov (not that he's an unbiased, or even sane, source):

It is well known that within Putin's entourage Medvedev is called "son," apparently, because of his obedience to Putin. The fact that he has practically been appointed president means the continuation of chekist-oligarchic rule in Russia.

From the Moscow Times profile of Medvedev, titled "A Soft-Spoken, 'Smart Kid' Lawyer":

None of Dmitry Medvedev's friends can remember hearing him bark an order. If he ever did, it would sound forced, they said.

Soft-spoken and a full 10 centimeters shorter than the diminutive President Vladimir Putin, Medvedev is a far cry from what the public expects in a leader, political consultants said.

Lenta.ru recalls the shifting fortunes of Medvedev and Ivanov over the course of 2006 and 2007 in this commentary - perhaps we shouldn't be to quick to pronounce Medvedev the successor, since he already looked to have it in the bag in 2006, only to seem surpassed byIvanov earlier this year. But time is running out another twist of fortune. From the Lenta piece, which is titled, simply, "The Successor" (my translation):

Observers by now were expecting all sorts of surprises. Few believed any longer that the successor would be from the group of long-discussed candidates. Some thought that Zubkov would become a "technical" president, who would stay in office for a year or two and then resign so that Putin could once again head the government. But as it turned out a different scenario has played out. [...]

If nothing extraordinary happens, Medvedev's victory in the presidential elections is, of course, guaranteed. Experts agree that this would mean the very continuation of the course of Russia's development that Putin and the members of United Russia have been talking about so much. Gryzlov called Medvedev the "most socially oriented" of the potential candidates, and United Russia representatives had earlier said on multiple occasions that in the Fifth Duma they plan to focus on social issues. Economic analysts call Medvedev a liberal, which, in theory, should be appealing to Western investors.

The New Times asks, "Who is Mr Medvedeff?" in an article which headlines his intelligentsia background and traces his rise to power in 1990s St. Petersburg and later in the Putin administration (my translation):

According to many accounts, during those years [the early '90s] people often thought Medvedev was Putin's personal secretary and did not take him seriously. According to Stanislav Belkovsky, "Dmitry Anatol'evich, who is pliant, soft, and psychologically dependent, was psychologically always absolutely comfortable for Vladimir Vladimirovich, and for [Putin] that is extremely important." [...]

Medvedev's new life begain in November 1999, when he became the deputy head of the government administration while Putin was Prime Minister. Immediately following Boris Yeltsin's historic speech and his "abdication of the throne," Medvedev became the deputy head of the Presidential Administration, with the idea that he would later replace Aleksandr Voloshin. Voloshin and Roman Abramovich, according to Stanislav Belkovsky, proposed Medvedev for the job, and when Voloshin was stepping down three years later as head of the administration (in large part in protest over the Yukos case), he insisted that he be replaced by Medvedev (who also talked about the authorities' actions in the Yukos case as "not thought all the way through").

Putin himself has admitted that he planned to make Medvedev head of the Federal Securities Commission (according to some accounts, he wanted to have Dmitry Kozak head up the administration). If that had happened, Dmitry Anatol'evich could have gotten his hands on some "real" work, like his friend and partner Anton Ivanov did. It's no accident that Medvedev resembles a young top manager or financial director... And then today there wouldn't be the official Medvedev, there would be Medvedeff, the head of a division of some large Western investment bank. And he would have parted ways with Putin once and for all, not counting Christmas cards sent from Moscow to London and from London to Moscow.

But Putin needed a reliable person in the Kremlin, moreover Medvedev did not irritate the Yeltsin-era elite either. That's how the idea emerged to make him the president's heir: Medvedev was chosen as a compromise and practically ideal figure, acceptable to everyone. By many accounts, the idea took shape in the fall of 2005. By November of 2005, Medvedev was appointed first deputy Prime Minister, and in the spring of 2006 he was supposed to become Prime Minister. However every action, as is well known, leads to an equal and opposite reaction.

New Times then talks a bit about how Igor Sechin and his allies in the administration worked against Medvedev, but that part of the story is not very well developed. No doubt there will be copious speculative accounts about how this is a "victory" for this or that faction of the Kremlin elites.

Other internet resources about the apparent heir-apparent (I like that phrase, can you tell?):

Vladimir Pribylovsky's Anticompromat has a thorough bio and a clippings file. Just yesterday, Pribylovsky had speculated that Valentina Matviyenko might be the designated successor.

Robert Amsterdam has posted excerpts from Medvedev's "most official 'keynote' address."

NewsRu.com has an interesting agglomeration of stories about Medvedev, including his comments on the use of "olbansky" (a corrupted version of Russian used on the internet) and his affinity for Deep Purple. It also cites a fresh joke from the website Dirty.ru, which also has this picture of a stunned Medvedev:

"Independent observers from Turkmenistan, Belarus, and Kazakhstan have already declared that the Russian Presidential elections were a free and open expression of the will of the Kremlin."

Indeed, the news did not take long to make it on to the Kremlin's website (which, interestingly, does not seem to have a text of Putin's scathingly anti-Western Luzhniki speech) and United Russia's website (which does have the Luzhniki speech), with both accounts including Putin's comment:

As far as the candidacy of Dmitry Anatol'evich Medvedev, I can say that I have known him for more than 17 years, we have worked very closely together for all of those years, and I wholly and entirely support this choice.

*Believe it or not, I wrote this Godfather reference before seeing Sean's similar reference in his post about the anointing of Medvedev - I guess it's not a surprising reference, given the context.

**Upd 20 minutes later - This story seems to be generating unoriginal thoughts - I just saw that Mr. Shedd, the Accidental Russophile, beat me to the punch in using the "Preved, Medved" headline in his post about the news, although I think we were both beaten by hundreds or thousands of Russian bloggers. Sorry to step on your toes, Wally! By the way, in case there's anyone on the internets who still doesn't know the "Preved" story, Wikipedia seems to have it covered.

***Upd another 30 minutes later (clearly poking around on the internet in the guise of "following a breaking story" is more fun than studying for exams) - I had forgotten about this story, but maybe Medvedev's designation means that Putin has worked out a way to stay in power, and it will be as the head of a new Russia-Belarus Union, which could be announced while Putin is in Belarus this week. That is just one of the versii put forward in Reuters' speculative "fact box" about what job(s) Putin might find for himself once he has removed the monomakh's hat of the presidency.

Actually, regardless of the details, if the announcement Medvedev as successor turns out to be the last word, and Dmitry Anatol'evich takes the Kremlin in the first round of elections, it's pretty likely that today's announcement was the consequence of some deal finally being struck - just like big-time politics anywhere else, right?

Also, I can't not post this reaction to the news, apparently created back in 2006, the last time that Medvedev was heir apparent:

[image source]

Speechless

The text says:
"Vladimir Putin, let's continue to work together in the future!" and
"Chief Teddy-Bear, take care of the little children!"
[image source]

Speechlessness - or a brief, shocked (resigned?) obscenity - has been the response of many Russians and Russia-watchers to the latest brick in the pro-Kremlin wall.

The good news? "Restless Bears Have Found a Job for Putin," reports Moskovsky Komsomolets. The bad - or at least profoundly questionable - news? Those "bears" are children aged 8 to 15, who will now have the chance to be involved in a nationwide movement called "Teddy Bears" ("Mishki"). The new organization has been rolled out in the midst of a circus-like frenzy of pro-Putin demonstrations in Moscow. According to the Nashi website (all of the quoted texts in this post are my translations):

On the 6th of December over 35,ooo commissars and activists from the Nashi movement, the "Our Election" (Nashi Vybory) all-Russian youth program, the All-Russia youth education project "Cadres for modernizing the country," the interregional child-youth movement "Mishki," the "Shapovalova" designers' project, and the federal programs Our Army ("Nasha Armiia"), Friendship Lessons, Blood Group, Voluntary Youth Militia, Our New Education, and Hiking, came [to Moscow] to congratulate the President, and also to present their plans for the future.

Actually, it would seem that the powers-that-be initially positioned the busing of provincial youth to Moscow for several days and kitting them out in Putin ponchos at least in part as a way to have a bulwark against the "orange infection" - at least, that motivation is expressed in a Nashi flyer that came out just before the elections. Another funny thing about Nashi's version of events in the paragraph quoted above is that nearly all of these groups and "programs" are parts of or organized by Nashi. But I guess there is strength not only in numbers (and official sanction!) but also in lots of bombastic names.

One thing officials should remember - people care less and less about slogans and politics, but Muscovites always care about anything that will impede traffic. And apparently Nashi's antics throughout the city in recent days have caused lots of probki. Gazeta.ru's story about this was titled "Teddy Bears Lock up the Center" and was illustrated with a picture of a traffic jam and a map showing road closings. Kommersant had a story about the traffic-diverting meeting involving Mishki:

Yesterday on Bolotnaya Square the childrens' movement "Mishki" made itself known for the firs time. The movement is for children from 8 to 15 years old, and their counselors [вожатые - for which my dictionary actually gives "young pioneer leader," so strong is the association] are Nashi commissars. According to the organization's internal hierarchy, a counselor who is able to organize ten events with children is called a "Restless Bear" ["медведь-шатун" - a term for a bear which has woken up for hibernation], and one who unites children from ten apartment buildings is a "Polar Bear." The most senior counselors carry the title of "Brown Bear."

According to the movement's organizer, Yulia Zimova, "Mishki" have organized mainly in the regions [i.e., not in Moscow or SPB], and the parents of the children involved have nothing against their children's participation in public life. On Bolotnaya Square "Mishki" recorded a video message to Vladimir Putin. In it, they called on the president to head up their group, "since he is the most important Teddy Bear in Russia," and asked him to "assign the group a developmental vector."

"I would like to note that any forced participation of schoolchildren in political life is prohibited by law in this country. Especially considering that this took place during the school day," Moscow City Council Deputy Evgenii Bunimovich told Kommersant. "Russia always had enough good sense not to get children mixed up in politics. And today this is happening, and it is horrible."

Representatives of the parties and movements which, according to Nashi, had planned to foment an "orange revolution" in Moscow, told Kommersant that the actions of the pro-Kremlin youth was just bewildering. "The authorities have dishonestly won this election, and no children will make them any more legitimate. [...]" thinks SPS's Boris Nemtsov.

"I would be interested to talk to the city authorities, who swore that they would never permit mass events in Moscow that would cut off traffic downtown," added Denis Bilunov, executive director of Unified Civil Force and a co-organizer of the "Dissenters' March" that was dispersed on November 24.

Kremlin-friendly (or so it seems to me, at least on the CIS issues that I follow) news portal RosBalt.ru had the following to say about Mishki:

Little Teddy Bears Ask Putin to Be Their Megasuperbear

The Mishki movement appeared in September and unites children from 8 to 15 years old. The counselors - high school students - have their own "positions"... the apex of the hierarchy is the "brown bear."

"That is a megasuperbear, who can with his skill and experience solve children's problems in a particular city - for example, someone who can organize the construction of a playground," said the organizer of "Mishki," who is also a Nashi commissar, Yulia Zimova, in an interview with Trud.

"We expect to succeed," said Zimova. "Even if the President doesn't become the leader of Mishki, we hope that he will still support us one way or another."

Mishki already participates fairly actively in pro-Kremlin demonstrations organized by Nashi. For example, they were present at the demonstration celebrating Putin's birthday [Mishki's LJ identifies this as the source of their first press mention] with posters reading "Thanks to Putin for our stable future."

One blog commenter responded to that last quote by recalling a phrase from the 20th century: "Thank you, Comrade Stalin, for our happy childhood!" At least one other commenter on a different internet forum had a similar thought:

"We've already been through this, and it was thanks to Comrade Stalin for our happy childhood. Except that then it was much more sincere, and now it's done to order and for money."

Another commenter questioned the age bracket involved:

I also remember that they used to accept people at age 14 into Komsomol, i.e., into a totally adult socio-political organization. And here it's "plush teddy bears" until age 15. This is some kind of retarded infantilism.

Yet another commenter on the same forum went off:

Can't you see where this is all headed? I support the right of any party to freely campaign. BUT NOT A MONOPOLY!!! What difference does it make - teddy bears, jerboas, or baby crocodiles? If you pound something into a child's unformed head from the age of eight, he'll accept it uncritically as the truth. This is straight-up zombification of children.

Others took a more humorous tack, and tried to come up with nicknames for this new organization (all based on puns that aren't really translatable) : "путинята" or "едросята," proposed one commenter at that same forum. At another forum, proposals for pejorative nicknames were "Putin's Hamsters," "HitlerJungend" (rather unoriginal, since Nashi has already been slapped with this somewhat over-the-top label), and "Медвебрята", "Медвеонеры" and "Медвемольцы" (puns using the word for "bear" with the words for "recruit," "pioneers," and "Komsomol"). On both forums, people lamented the fact that children so young are apparently the subject of a political "hearts-and-minds" campaign.

Would you trust this man with your children?

Most likely, Russian parents have new Minister of Youth Vasily Yakemenko (ex-Nashi head commissar) to thank for the expansion of Nashi's ambit to include the pre-teen set. A Radio Svoboda interviewer got one of the participants to say a few embarrassing things about the way they got kids involved (not-very-good Google translation), and that account suggested that the "Young Russia" group might also have been involved in organizing Mishki's Moscow meeting.

I decided to see whether this new "movement" has a website. Mishki.ru got a "server not found" message, but then I thought that maybe this group uses the same cringe-inducing top-level-domain as Nashi's website. Sure enough, punching in Mishki.su got me to the freshly-baked website of this teddy bear of a youth group, says it has been online since November 21. The website, though, looks like it's still in beta. The front page has impressive, appealing graphics of bears cavorting in red neckerchiefs (a la the Soviet-era Young Pioneers), but the "contact" page lists just some nonsense characters - here's a screenshot, since that's likely to change:


On the section of the site called "Media about us," the only link at the moment is to what appears to be Mishki's official LiveJournal blog, the profile page of which provides an abbreviated mission statement:

We are the All-Russian [sic - even though it's called "Interregional" elsewhere] Child-Youth Movement "MISHKI" [Nashi also likes to write its name in all-caps sometimes, not because it's an abbreviation, but just 'cause, I guess]. We invite you to connect with the future of your country, to touch the creation of the history of Russia - to not allow the loss of the young generation.

Every generation can make a contribution to the country's development. Today, practically a whole generation of Russian citizens has grown up not feeling responsible for the future of their Motherland. At best, they will leave behind graffiti in courtyards, at worst, nothing at all will be left after them. We are people who believe in the future generation and who think that their fate is in our hands. The fate of Russia is in our hands.

The LJ itself has an odd header with what looks like a cartoon version of the Sydney, Australia, skyline; and a couple of posts like this one with photos of children doing wholesome-looking things and not much text. And although that "mini-manifesto" is a bit bombastic and self-important, I certainly can't argue with the principle of raising kids to be conscious of their debt to their society and country. It's a different matter whether this type of consciousness-raising should be a task for a political party that already dominates the public discourse.

At the moment, there's something wrong with the text spacing on the page describing the organization's "Manifesto," but it's nothing a quick edit by a good web designer couldn't fix. The Manifesto itself - or the document on the page labeled "Manifesto" - offers a lot of nice thoughts on values - volunteerism, physical fitness, etc. - and how to inculcate them, but toward the end it depicts something so involved that I can't imagine much of it ever being done in real life by volunteers. It also offers a lot of insight into what values are most important to the people who have set up this organization, and what kind of citizens and country they hope to create (strange numbering as in the original, though I have introduced line breaks for clarity in some places):

III. Once you have earned their trust - start building a state: the Courtyard Democratic Republic
1. The building of a state can start with having the children do what adults do in real life. Children always want to try themselves out at adult tasks.
The children can be actors and play in a theater, or anchors and cameramen and film the courtyard news [...]

1. When you start to build a democratic republic, it doesn't necessarily have to function as a state economically at first. It all depends on what the children want.

The economy should involve around 100 people. Every child should know that, for example, in stairwell 5 of building 7 between the first and second floors, every day between 19.00 and 20.30 the Courtyard Bank, Employment office, and Tax Inspectorate will be open. If he wants to earn Mishkarubles, he can go to the Employment office, where someone will give him a job. For example, if there's going to be a play the next day, then he can set up the chairs for 15 rubles, make the set for 40, or for 30 Mishkarubles take a role in the play. The child takes on the job, gets the money on the day after he works, pays a tax, for example, one Mishkaruble. At the end of the week or month the Leading Mishki conduct an auction, where the little Mishki can buy theater or movie tickets, flash-drives, picture frames, etc. - it depends on the interests and age of the children.

When the children get used to this system, you can build a real state - the President and government of the Courtyard will plan the budget for the month, based on which one or another ministry will conduct events in the courtyard, government employees will get a salary, and some will even be able to open their own companies, for example a firm that does homework assignments, or open their own private bank.

1. When the republic grows to include several courtyards, you can set up a big parliament, buy up land in the courtyard, found an inter-courtyard state television station, hold beauty contests, set up advertising companies, walls of honor for Mishki and Little Mishki.

Before the launch of any courtyard democratic republic, a seminar will be conducted with all organizers who are Leading Mishki in your city.

IV. The Unique thing: the city becomes a single united state of children, where they are the main citizens and are responsible for everything. Now your children have opened real companies, they defend in election campaigns their projects to improve life in the courtyard, they earn money and pay taxes. They are learning management, learning to think independently and make decisions. Now your task is to introduce their projects into the system of regional government. Teach them not to be afraid to live in the adult world, to achieve the goals they have set. [...]

Based on a successful small model, any child, and then teenager and adult, will build a larger model. The model of his city, his state. And even if in that model not everyone will be a government employee, the rest will one way or another be representatives of nationally oriented businesses, or socially responsible entrepreneurs. A country where the children are occupied and involved is assured to have great success. To be the best. To be beloved.

It struck me that a lot of these things - having a "government" and even sometimes a "TV station" are things that kids experience through their schools in the U.S. Strangely, this document says nothing about using the school as an organizing principle.

"Chief Teddy Bear - Take Care of the Children!"
[image source]

Confusingly, the section of the website titled "For Mishki" also has a document that is labeled a Manifesto. Maybe they just accidentally swapped the two texts when they put the site together. This document must be the actual manifesto, for it contains principles rather than a specific plan of action:

Why Now?

A country's prosperity, as a rule, is accompanied by a the mass development of a children's movement. The wise ruler ["Мудрый правитель" - I'm not making this up] wants to know into whose hands the country for which he is responsible will fall, and the residents want to be sure of what will happen tomorrow. Today, we have something to pass along to the next generation - the ability to cope with difficulties, achievements, experience, knowledge, faith in Russia. We can instill much in the generation that will follow us: tolerance, collegiality, the ability to empathize and survive, independence and responsibility. And most important: the ability to be a human being and a patriot. This is not simple, as we know. But it is necessary. After all, this will allow us to create the Russia of our dreams.

The manifesto document talks about developing creative talents, promoting a healthy way of life and charitable work, patriotism and professional preparation, and other worthy things for a youth organization to do. And then it ends with a bang (my translation, italics in original):

A child-youth courtyard movement is something that has never been done before. Perhaps a children's courtyard movement is the very path which will lead us to the development and consolidation of not just new traditions, but also an interesting, kind mass culture. It's possible, that we will raise the sort of citizens, who will be able to take to the streets nationwide and demand that TV shows which degrade the personalities and minds of their children be taken off the air. The Little Mishki who grow up and become Mishki, will preserve the country, the people, history, and culture.

We will raise the sort of citizens who will be a source of pride not only to us, but also to other countries.

Fascinating indeed. But for a post titled "Speechless" I've gone on at great length about this embryonic children's organization - who knows if it will go anywhere? I'll end the post with a bit more info from the MK article I mentioned above:

One of the "Restless Bears" is 18-year-old Masha from Sochi. But she spoke in a way not entirely appropriate for her age: "Sood Uncle Putin will resign, he won't have anything to do, and he'll accept our offer!"

The counselors plan to politically enlighten the children in their charge: "At eight years old it's pointless, but we'll tell the older ones about the 'orange' threat."

As far as Mishki's funding, people in the organization say that the counselors are volunteers and that parents help out with the supplies. But it's doubtful that transporting a thousand citizens to Moscow was within the parents' means. We have heard that the "Restless Bears" are sponsored by large banks and regional businesses.

Can the pro-Kremlin enthusiasts at least leave children alone? If things keep going in this direction, soon the members of "Teensy Bears" [“Медвежулечки”] will be rolled out onto the street in strollers, and after them we'll have pregnant women as members of "Clumsy Embryos" [“Косолапые эмбриончики”]...

Kaluga Kitsch

When we lived in Moscow, we were lucky enough to have a friend who had a house on the outskirts of Kaluga which she used as a dacha. One of my favorite parts of visiting the city was going to the central market. Here are a few photos - focusing on some of the cool signage - from July 2005:

The boat in the picture is named "Chernomorets"

The painting at left could easily be sold at any number of
Moscow galleries as nostalgia-inducing, Soviet-kitschy art.

More photos from that day - including lots of the painted products on mirrors like the cabbage in the image above - in this Flickr set.

On to the next episode

It's always hard to come back from a hiatus of a few weeks, especially in such eventful times. One builds up so many things to say which have remained unsaid for so long...

But happily others have had much to say about last Sunday's Duma elections - SiberianLight has a few posts with pretty-colored graphics; Moscow Rules gave his impressions from ground zero; Wally Shedd weighed in; PutinWatcher has had some interesting posts on the elections, including this one; Jesse Heath at Russia Monitor put up a valiant effort in the face of law school finals; Robert Amsterdam's blog had wall-to-wall coverage as usual; Veronica at Global Voices Online wrote a couple of roundup posts and posted a link on her own blog to a fantastic article that I hope to have time to translate; TOL's dedicated elections blogs covered events in English and in Russian [UPD - engrossed in that orgy of link love, I somehow neglected to mention the kingpin of Russian election coverage, Mr. Guillory]; and of course the izbircom LJ community had lots and lots of reports about what went down last Sunday at the polls.

Speaking of the ties that IzbirCom (that's the Central Electoral Commission, or TsIK) has to the blogosphere, it looks like the powers-that-be at TsIK have realized the power of the internet. The LiveJournal community represents TsIK's first attempt at a blog, although they don't seem to have put a link to the community anywhere on the main TsIK website. Here's what one member of the electoral commission had to say about the effort in an interview:

This electoral cycle is the first time that TsIK has set up a blog. Is this a faddish thing or a real instrument to increase voter turnout and popularize the institution of elections?

Fashion and popularization are inextricably connected, but to be more specific, we understand perfectly well that the Internet is a very important instrument for communicating and broadcasting information. Therefore, Russia's TsIK cannot ignore this method of communicating with and receiving feedback from the citizens of our country. We are of course interested in ensuring that active Internet users (first and foremost, the younger generation) know about the elections and in giving them a chance to state their position and to ask us questions, and in having the chance to search together with them for answers which are important to everyone.

TsIK's effort at mastering the blogosphere is being trumpeted on the Vzglyad-, Kremlin- and Zaputina-affiliated "internet TV channel" parked at the posh "Russia.ru" domain, which has a very nicely produced video clip titled "Our Man in TsIK":

The clip (nestled in among other classic Russia.ru content - clips with titles like "Bondarchuk is for Putin," "30-year-olds are for Putin," "The Crisis ofLiberalism," "Day of the Jackal" (featuring Nemtsov) and "Nizhnii on the Rise") is shot in black-and-white, with one of the songs from the classic spy thriller "17 Moments of Spring" as part of the soundtrack.

Prominently featured in the nearly nine-minute video are two fairly widely read bloggers from the RuBlogosphere - Sholademi and Casualmente (who also has a friends-only journal here) - who are the "curators" or moderators of the electoral commission's LJ community. I can't help noticing, though perhaps it should be irrelevant, that neither of these bloggers is an ethnic Russian. The bloggers are shown helping TsIK Chairman Churov learn to surf the web, and it is suggested that they will have regular audiences with Churov and may have exclusive scoops for their readers.

The LJ community looks like a way for the authorities to demonstrate that they are attentive to potential complaints about the elections. On an LJ community, any blogger can sign up and post material (subject to the moderators' approval), and according to the izbircom community's profile, Churov and/or his colleagues read the postings there regularly.

And the nice publicity given to the bloggers involved looks like a kind way for the government to reward and encourage its helpers, sort of like the "Golden Hundred" rating of journalists on the Press-Ministry-sponsored Mediacratia website. I don't necessarily want to criticize the bloggers involved - after all, they really did provide a good vehicle for feedback - e.g., this open thread calling for reports of ballot-rigging - much of which was critical of the elections. However, it's another matter entirely whether the authorities cared to read that feedback, and it's certainly possible to see this foray onto the Internet as just another bit of legitimizing window-dressing for Putin's Plan.

I may have a few more retrospective posts about the Duma campaign when I get some more free time, although the issues may start to seem stale fairly quickly - lord knows I've stored up lots of interesting links over the past few weeks on issues like election observers, western-oriented "jackals," and the like.

The only thought I had when I saw the poll results - and I've read enough to know that it wasn't a unique reaction - was that the result for "Fair Russia" seemed awfully high for a party which had been hemorrhaging high-profile members for months before the elections.

For now, Russia is on to the next episode - the Presidential race (or whatever form of succession the next few months have in store) is already gathering steam, although even VVP expressed a sense of weariness about having to go through another round of elections.