Two-Headed Eagle Over Russia

Felix Gorelik

Boris Yeltsin changed the symbol of the USSR – the hammer and sickle – the symbol of workers and peasants – to a two-headed eagle symbol, the Czarist symbol. Putin with all of his policies supports and symbolizes this symbol. With what policy did he start his rule of Russia?

Putin made the statement that: "Privatization is a done deal!" This means that all the riches, all the natural resources, industries, land, gas, oil, gold and other minerals, aircraft industry and shipbuilding will remain privatized. That is why Putin, following Gorbachev and Yeltsin became a supporter and lover of the West. In his speeches Putin likes to brag that Russia is now stabilized and he is forcing a dictatorship of law. But in fact, it’s the opposite. Even over the state radio, press and TV the situation is portrayed much differently than Putin would like the people to believe.

In Moscow there are over 500 criminal gangs, 100,000 prostitutes who are forced to make a living waiting on clients. The former shyness and modesty of Russian girls has gone. The so-called "sexual revolution" started during the Gorbachev era has done its evil deed, it crashed and practically demolished all moral values. This is on top of unemployment, and practically impossible to get a free education. Thousands of beautiful young girls from all over Russia came to Moscow to hunt for work from the outlying areas. Here they became unwilling victims of their pimps. The Moscow militia was beginning to be envious of the super riches that these pimps and their gangs were reaping in. The decision was to take all these pimps under their "protection". They were told that if you want to be free, you must pay us.

Here is the present day scenario. The OMON police patrol the streets in police cars, visit every "pimp station" where the prostitutes wait for their clients. Why? Taking in a percentage from each pimp they take $500 to $1000. The pimps must make their quota of pay-offs to the police. The captain of each patrol squad gets his cut about $5,000 per month. Of course, not all money remains with the captain, part of it is taken to the "top" – to the Majors, Colonels and the General of the militia. And defending this rake-off from any public scrutiny is done by none other than the State Secret Service personnel. I do not know, whether part of this money reaches even the Putin’s Minister of Internal Affairs, Gryzlov!

Under the protection of the police, prostitution is growing. It looks as if this is the most profitable business of the so-called Russian industry! Now, as a result of this "sexual revolution" over 10% of Moscow population has venereal diseases and AIDS… which according to official statistics has the unsavory reputation as being in the first place in the world in AIDS.

Since we are talking about sickness, maybe it’s time to talk about the life of the people. According the UN, Russia is in 185^th place out of 192 countries in its lack of health care and prevention. What do we expect, all the riches and health institutions were privatized! But that did not stop Putin in ordering his own private jet costing over $300 million dollars!

But, if we listen to the official propaganda, Putin says that life for Russians is becoming better and better with each day.

"Who in Russia lives well?" the great Russian writer Nekrasov asked in his time. We can readily reply: today the capitalists live well as do their supporters in the government. The latest news is that these civil servants and government officials in total get paid 33 billions of dollars per year! This is more than the total sum of revenue of the country. Corruption has impregnated the country from top to bottom! Even if the Minister Gryzlov said that over 17,00 police have been reprimanded for crimes, pay-offs and breaking the law, this is just a drop in the ocean.

This phrase I heard from the mouth of a former "democrat". The newspaper "Literaturnaya Gazeta" continues to publish articles by those who formerly praised Yeltsin and Gorbachev, but who still had a conscious, like Igor Serkov whose article "Sentence and Action":

"One of the top Russian oligarchs V. Potanin said that his favorite toast is: "Let’s drink for today". No person can agree with him on this proposition. The whole economy and culture today in Russia is degrading of the human soul and understanding. These present oligarchs are siphoning money out of the country into foreign banks. In spite of the promotion of the false news that we get credits from foreign banks, the regime is filled with people who cannot govern, who do not know anything else but robbery, depravity, and laying their nest eggs in foreign countries when the time comes for reckoning from the people. This situation has demoralized and turned the many dedicated, educated, conscientious people into a mass of humanity, desperately trying to make a living.

Even the right wing elements are complaining that the present regime has brought the country to a stand still, stagnation and crisis. But if the healthy elements propose an alternative to privatization, they say that this means bloodshed and war.

The regime of the two-headed eagle that flies over Russia, this is a mutant of criminal banditry. There is no way that this regime will undertake anything that benefits the people.

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