Quote: (08-17-2012 06:23 PM)durangotang Wrote:
Quote: (08-17-2012 05:19 PM)Vicious Wrote:
How petty can you guys get? You are applauding the complete dissolution of rule of law in the world's biggest country, a nuclear power because it hits home at a couple of girls who annoy you? Pretty damn narrowminded.
Vic, I understand where you are coming from, however, I am afraid you are being misled. I don't understand why this represents the "complete dissolution of the rule of law". What these girls did was wrong and failure to punish it will just invite more of the same behavior. They should be punished. This is how it all starts and as you can see it was influenced from outside of Russia (one of the girls was a Canadian resident).
Punished they should be yes. By a court of law under the rule of law. Not from Putin holding a press conference and declaring what he thinks the punishment should be. If that is not the arbitrary rule of a dictator I don't know what is.
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After seeing all this, can you really say that Russia is cracking down on dissident groups? Or are they defending their sovereignty and culture from foreign influence.
But you have it backwards. Of course a "corrupt security state" will try to defend itself from foreign influence and keep itself in power. How is this in any way a mitigating circumstance?
The "attacks" on the Russian state are ultimately powered by interests under the boot of the regime. Regardless of funding, human resources is in the end the most important factor. If Russia didn't suffer under the repression of its leaders then there would be little fodder to mount these "attacks" with. Democracies are mostly impervious to these kinds of attacks due to the fact that they allow diversity of opinion and expression.