Category Archives: Presidential Election

“I’m out of it for a little while and everybody gets delusions of grandeur.” Now I understand how Han Solo felt after being defrosted from carbonite. I go into the basement for two weeks and there are rumors of me being in a post-election hangover, or worse, murdered.  Well, I assure you dear readers that I’m alive and well.  Los Angeles may be ablaze (again) but I’m safe from the rings of fire, that is until I kick the bucket and meet the dark lord.

For the past few weeks I’ve been devoting my Bolshevik will and strength to finishing a dissertation chapter.  “Bolsheviks can storm any fortress” read the Stalinist slogan, and I did. I do have to finish this damn dissertation at some point. And well if I have to pick between you my dear reader and my career, well my petite-bourgeois sensibilities win out every time.  Just don’t ..read more

Oh, how the times have passed!  It seems like only yesterday that the Russian Presidential elections were in full predictable swing. Dmitri Medvedev was set to be President of all Russia.  Operation Successor was all coming together without a hitch.

This is not to say that there wasn’t any excitement in this rather dull political ritual.  There was . . . thanks to Vladimir Zhirinovsky.  He’s always ready to don his jester hat and provide the electorate with a taste of melodrama. One of Zhirik’s best performances was on that fateful day February 20, 2008.  Do you remember dear reader?  Zhirinovsky certainly will.  Now he’s paying for it.  Literally.

Yesterday, the Moscow Nikulinsky District Court ordered that Zhirinovsky pay Nikolai Gotsa 30,000 rubles ($1,200) for verbally and physically attacking him during a televised discussion on Zvezda.  During the “discussion,” Gotsa accused the LDPR leader of playing a double political game and betraying ..read more

A local branch of the Russian human rights group Golos Samara won a significant legal victory yesterday. According to Kommersant, the Russian Supreme Court ruled in favor of Golos in a suit filed by the Samara branch of the Federal Registration Office, FAS. FAS registers social, religious, and political organizations. The court ruled against the Samara office’s closure of Golos for six months in December. Local officials charged that Golos did not file documents describing its “activities, sources of finance, and election monitoring practices.” Liudmila Kuzmina, a Golos coordinator called the decision a “big victory.” “Chinovniki need to report that everything in the province is quiet and calm,” she said. “The Registration office, after having found imperfections in our documents, didn’t allow enough time for their removal. They immediately went to court forgetting about the notion of a legal person’s integrity.”

A victory for sure, ..read more

My latest contribution to Pajamas Media “Why Putvedev?” is up. There isn’t much new in it for frequent readers of this blog. Hopefully, it will give a wider audience a different opinion about the Russian Presidential Elections. Also I highly recommend Andrew Wilson’s analysis, “Russia’s Post-election Balance” on Open Democracy. It seems that we share some similar opinions.

Every genre of the entertainment world has its own award shows. Theater has the Tony. Movies the Oscars. Music the Grammys. Why not elections? I bet the Russian election is a cesspool of some classic moments. So . . .

For his role in “Take him out . . . And shoot the scoundrel!” the best actor award goes to . . . Vladimir Zhirinovsky!

If anyone else has any Russian Presidential gems send them to awards@seansrussiablog.org. Nominations can be text, video, audio, document, anything. I’ll try to organize a panel of Russia blogger judges. Maybe it is damn time to have an awards.

Here are the categories:

Best Actor Best Speaker Best Line Craziest Best Propaganda Best Whiner

Best Villain Best Hero Best English Article Best Russian Article Stalin Prize Lenin Prize