- cross-posted to:
- europe@feddit.de
- cross-posted to:
- europe@feddit.de
Russian President Vladimir Putin can choose not to hold presidential elections next year because he will “obviously” win re-election, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said late Sunday.
Look, I’m not arguing what I think makes sense for people to do, I’m thinking about how people in large groups tend to act, regardless of whether it’s logical. Competing for power is inevitable whenever a centralized system can’t maintain outright dominance.
It’s already started: that’s what Progozhin’s march was all about.
In Russia, leadership is ALL about the appearance of strength, and they have proven that throughout history with not only the leaders they have kept, but the leaders they have killed.
Putin is supposed to be a man’s man, the epitome of strength in leadership, unquestionable, unassailable, all-knowing and all-wise. This is his attraction to Russians, and how he came into power through the apartment bombings.
With a strong, wise leader in a strong, unassailable country, Progozhin should never have made it past the border.
Instead, he made it to the outskirts of Moscow itself – with a continued challenge to keep marching if that’s how Putin wanted to play it.
And meanwhile, the miles and miles of roadsides along the march were packed like sardines with all the invisible Russians who did NOT give a shit and stayed home to demonstrate their support of the Putin regime.
(Compare this to the invasion of Ukraine, where even unarmed babushkas were confronting the occupiers, offering them sunflower seeds to keep in their pockets so that when they died on Ukrainian soil there would at least be something good to show for their presence.)
Prigozhin didn’t march on Moscow to capture Moscow. He didn’t want Moscow. What he wanted, and got, was to reveal Putin’s massive weakness to the world.
That day was the day Putin’s regime ended, because it was the day Putin’s own country stopped seeing him as a strongman, and that was always the source of his authority. It’s gone now. Done. He’s still a crazy motherfucker cornered like a rat with nukes, he’s still living in the palaces, but it’s all superficial. He was already sick, and that was dangerous enough, but this put even the appearance of strength in his leadership permanently to rest.
There is literally no future for Putin in Russia anymore, and he can’t flee either, which is why he can no longer hold presidential elections, or allow any activity that further pulls back the curtain on his political vulnerability. It’s literally only a matter of time before he is killed or dies, and how many people he can manage to rob, imprison, and kill between that day and now.
TL;DR: Whatever happens now will not undo what Prigozhin did to lil’ man Putin on the road to Moscow on June 25, 2023.
Yes yes. The evil Putin has usurped all power alone and is standing up to the entire government like a real Russian. And he probably shot Nemtsov personally.
In fact, there are many interested forces in the government. People for war, people against war, people who don’t care. Everything is like everywhere else.
Prigozhin went on his march because Putin tried to legally ban Wagner by transferring all financial flows to the army. Prigozhin received the money and quietly left. probably literally everyone knows this. how fashionable it is to believe in the image of a strong old man is a mystery to me.
then you don’t quite understand how the Russian economy works. The regions do not have their own economic system and their own army either. Both money and people pass through Moscow. how to find resources for the collapse in such conditions is unclear to me. If only you believe in the people in a single impulse organizing their own government. This is also very unlikely.