Around the world the number of democratic nations has slipped in the last years. Blaming the unattractive Bush Administration is the first thought, but more likely its growing tension under poverty and, not oddly, a weakening of organized protest while governments equip with militian suppression – much exported by the USA too oddly, really.
Russia should be a study in America. We wasted much of a Century on it and hoisted a living infrastructure of hierarchy over our democracy to knock down only a wall or two and sundry silo.
I enjoyed the earnest translation in this analysis of Putin:
More than …being a Stalin to oneself.
The right for committing a crime has become a part of privileges granted to the official. The state has become an instrument for satisfying needs of any of its public servants – from president to district police officer. Well, the needs are rather primitive: oil, impunity, and praising.
States are attractive posits.