Russian Tyranny Rising

Dictator-kleptocrat for life Putin 

lying to Russian journalists a couple of weeks ago

The last remnants of democracy in Russia are being swept away as Putin crushes what is left of democracy and freedom in Russia. The Washington Post writes:

MOSCOW — As the Kremlin awaits what it fears will be a hostile Biden presidency, President Vladimir Putin is shifting course on two fronts — accelerating a drive to full-blown authoritarian control at home and escalating his defiant rhetoric against the West.

Domestically, a grudging tolerance for opposition and protest has been all but abandoned, while internationally, the Kremlin is taking particularly sharp aim at the United States ahead of the change of administration next month.

Russian-U.S. relations are going “from bad to worse,” Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov said Wednesday, adding that Russia doesn’t expect “anything good” from President-elect Joe Biden and suggesting it adopt a policy of “total deterrence” toward Washington, with minimal dialogue.

In addition to signs that Biden will pursue a tough line with Moscow, Putin has seen his popularity slowly decline even as parliamentary elections loom in 2021. The move to double down against both the West and opponents at home reflects a perception of them as enemies working hand in hand to undermine Russia.

In this view, critical journalists and bloggers are potential terrorists, extremists or spies, and civic activists and nongovernment organizations may be labeled foreign agents. The Russian heroes Putin extols are spies who hack into U.S. agencies and domestic intelligence agents whose main role, like that of Stalin’s secret police, is the repression of dissent.

A raft of new, repressive laws sees Russia moving from partial to all-out authoritarianism, said Andrei Kolesnikov, a political analyst at the Moscow Carnegie Center.

“There is an open war with civil society,” he said, noting the Kremlin’s concern that Putin — who could legally stay in stay in power until 2036 — may someday face protests like those in Belarus, where the August presidential election was condemned as rigged by the opposition and Western nations.  

A blizzard of recent legislation in the State Duma has made it harder to protest, easier to target opposition figures and activists and has given authorities broad scope to brand individuals as “foreign agents,” with five-year jail penalties for failure to meet reporting requirements. The government is also moving to curb foreign Internet sites such as Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube.  

Putin maintains his grip by allowing loyalists in the military, intelligence, bureaucracy and law enforcement to guzzle Russia’s resources, Inozemtsev said. “This is a situation where this elite gang owns the country like private property and actually uses it for its enrichment.”

The tyrant-kleptocrat Putin is now fully showing his vicious dark heart. All the lies and hypocrisy his rhetoric and politics has been based on for years are as clear as an be. His friends and enablers must be overjoyed -- Utopia at last!! The tyrant and state has even moved to protect itself forever, giving Putin and his key enablers a pre-emptive pardon from everything for life in new laws. For example, Putin now has immunity from prosecution for life from all acts. He really can go out in the street and shoot widows, orphans and his relatives with impunity. America's tyrant-kleptocrat president is no doubt jealous of such wonderful possibilities.

On top of that, new laws classify as state secret all financial and personal information of millions of members of Russian intelligence bodies, security agencies, the judiciary, law-enforcement and regulatory agencies, the Russian military, and their relatives. Even crazy pedophile uncle Igor and sadist aunt Natasha are safe to do their things in peace and freedom.

Just think if all of that applied to Melania, Ivanka, Jared, Eric, Don Jr., the president and all the GOP crooks. Yuck, to say the least.

One can only feel sorry about the hopeless misery, kleptocracy and brutality that most or nearly all average Russians will live their lives under. If he had his way, that would be Putin's plan for America and Americans.

A Wealth of Insight

 

At the campus of the University of California, Berkeley, social psychologist Paul Piff paired off approximately 200 undergrad students and sent them into windowless rooms to play the board game Monopoly. With a random coin toss, one of the players in each game was selected to be the “rich” player, which granted them myriad advantages: they received twice the initial game money; they were entitled to double the normal bonus for passing “Go”; and they were allowed to roll two dice rather than one.

The altered rules made it clear to most participants that they were part of some kind of behavioral study, but they were unsure of its purpose, so they just played as instructed. With the use of hidden cameras, researchers observed that within 15 minutes, most of the rich players began to exhibit involuntary dominant behaviors. They slammed their game pieces more forcefully upon the board, made open displays of celebration, mocked the poor players for their misfortunes, and ate considerably more of the free pretzels on offer. But when they were interviewed after the game, the majority of the rich players tended to cite their own playing prowess for their victories, giving little or no credit to the initial, overwhelming, and randomly assigned economic advantage.

A related study by the same group of researchers took place in California, where the law requires drivers to stop for pedestrians waiting to cross at a crosswalk. The study showed that there is a strong inverse correlation between the expensiveness of an automobile and its driver’s tendency to yield to pedestrians.

https://www.damninteresting.com/curio/a-wealth-of-insight/

GOP Cements Its Authoritarianism

The AP writes about GOP responses to the 20202 election. They want to clamp down on voting.

Republicans in key states that voted for President-elect Joe Biden already are pushing for new restrictions, especially to absentee voting. It’s an option many states expanded amid the coronavirus outbreak that proved hugely popular and helped ensure one of the smoothest election days in recent years.

President Donald Trump has been unrelenting in his attacks on mail voting as he continues to challenge the legitimacy of an election he lost. Despite a lack of evidence and dozens of losses in the courts, his claims of widespread voter fraud have gained traction with some Republican elected officials.

They are vowing to crack down on mail ballots and threatening to roll back other steps that have made it easier for people to vote.

“This myth could not justify throwing out the results of the election, nor can it justify imposing additional burdens on voters that will disenfranchise many Americans,” said Wendy Weiser, head of the democracy program at the Brennan Center for Justice at the NYU School of Law.

Nevertheless, Republicans in Georgia have proposed adding a photo ID requirement when voting absentee, a ban on drop boxes and possibly a return to requiring an excuse for mail voting, such as illness or traveling for work on Election Day.

Early supporters of the ID requirement include Gov. Brian Kemp and Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, Republicans who were criticized relentlessly by Trump for failing to back his fraud claims after losing in Georgia. A top deputy for Raffensperger has said the ID requirement would boost public confidence and refute any future claims of fraud.

This makes it clear that all the GOP has to do is claim something that could happen but doesn't as a basis to restrict civil liberties. That is how authoritarians routinely operate. The only reason there is any loss of public confidence is based on repeated lies by the president and radical right GOP crackpots about voter fraud. 

The tyrant GOP leadership and politicians are not fit to hold power in America's representative democracy. 

A Dart From Germaine to Mr. Haynes

Context

The Washington Post reports on the CDC's failure to rapidly develop and distribute a test for the CARS-CoV-2 virus. It took the CDC in Thailand several hours to develop a test based on the WHO test. It took a couple more days before the first person in Thailand was diagnosed with COVID-19. It took the CDC in the US about six weeks to finish developing its test. WaPo writes:

Another breakthrough came the next day, Jan. 13, when the WHO publicly shared a protocol, essentially a recipe, specifying the materials needed to build a molecular test.

The Thais used that protocol to make a second test to detect the virus. This redundancy would eventually become the model for developing a vaccine against the virus.

Using their version of the WHO test, Thai health officials within days found other cases, including a taxi driver.

“The early availability of the RT-PCR testing definitely helped to reduce transmission and save lives,” Pongpirul told The Post by email.

John R. MacArthur, a physician who had led the CDC’s Thailand operations since 2013, said that when PCR testing confirmed the first case there, “I immediately contacted CDC leadership in Atlanta to let them know what was happening.”

“Seeing the first case outside of China, I thought, was a big moment,’’ MacArthur said in a phone interview. 

“The test that the WHO used early on was quite successful,” said Le Duc, a former senior CDC official who still serves as an adviser to the agency. “I frankly don’t know why CDC didn’t accept it.”

“If we would have put [tests] out there quicker, could we have saved lives? Well sure,’’ said Peter C. Iwen, director of the Nebraska Public Health Laboratory in Omaha. “If we would have diagnosed quicker, we would have saved people.”

The dart

WaPo asked for an interview, but the CDC blew it off: 

Redfield and other CDC leaders declined to be interviewed or to respond to written questions about the agency’s handling of the test.“Appreciate the opportunity, but we are going to pass,” said CDC spokesman Benjamin N. Haynes.

Something about that blithe “appreciate the opportunity” response prompted me to write to Mr. Haynes. I wrote this: 

To: Media (Media@cdc.gov)

Regarding Benjamin Haynes' Washington Post comment (CC: Harmon, Bonds)

Dear Mr. Haynes,

I read your comment to the Washington Post regarding a request for an interview. Your response, “Appreciate the opportunity, but we are going to pass”, was disgusting and an insult to the American people. You and the CDC owe the American people an explanation, not smug deflection while you slither under a rock to hide from accountability. It is no wonder that so many Americans are hostile to the federal government. Your arrogant attitude directly feeds the hostility and distrust. Does this come mostly from you personally, the CDC or Trump?

You are derelict in your duty and should resign.

Sincerely,

My real name, PhD, JD

San Diego, CA

CC: Carrie Harmon, Michelle Bonds

Questions: Was Mr. Haynes derelict, or did I overreact? Does the CDC owe the American people an explanation, or should this story be kept a secret?