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the death of alexei navalny 16.2.24

Isambard said:
Not sure who mistakenly tripped him on some icy Arctic stairs. "Puťĺer" probably won't be crying a huge bunch of tears.

But as UA seems to be losing the key fortress of Adiivka near Donetzk and the Munich security conference on where Navalny's wife and UA President Zelenskyi are gracing the red carpet, he was also possibly today worth more dead than alive to Western interests.
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The disingenuous bastards are loving it that he's finally dead.
 
How unfortunate that he's not pure enough to count, despite his efforts to expose Putin's corruption. Yanno, sometimes people are not wholly good or bad, and they do progessive things while having (or having had) appalling beliefs, though that may do your head in.
 
bluescreen said:
How unfortunate that he's not pure enough to count, despite his efforts to expose Putin's corruption. Yanno, sometimes people are not wholly good or bad, and they do progessive things while having (or having had) appalling beliefs, though that may do your head in.
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Oswald Moseley was quite good at condemning corruption.

Condemning corruption is a theme that reactionaries often follow.

Osama bin Laden was pretty scathing about the corruption in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, and Khomeini about the corruption of the Shah of Iran.

One of the most stinging criticisms that can be made of someone in the bourgeois mass media in the US sphere of influence is that someone is supported by "the Russians", but it never seems to occur to such propagandists that being supported by the USA is pretty damning for many people in Russia.

I have not forgotten that ol’ Vlad Putin was himself promoted by leaders such as Tony Blair, even as he was bombing flat Grozny, the capital of Chechnya. The political leaders of the USA, the UK et al want someone in power in the Russian Federation who is more sympathetic to their interests than Putin turned out to be, who will allow their capital a free reign, but they care not one whit about the interests of the people of that country.

I am old enough to remember when the British government was denying that the Saddam regime in Iraq had used chemical weapons in its war with Iran, even though some of the victims had been brought to London for treatment.

Nelson Mandela, of course, was a great proponent of democracy in the Republic of South Africa, but he was seen as a threat to imperialist interests, which is why the US Central Intelligence Agency played a role in the events that led to his arrest and imprisonment.

If a left-wing opponent to Putin were to come to prominence, then you can bet your bottom dollar that he would not receive the approval of the occupants of the White House and Number 10 Downing Street.
 
Pickman's model said:
apparently he died today: but yesterday he seems to have been in good health. no windows were involved
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Death was caused by overexertion whilst trying to cut through the bars of his cell window using a file that a mysterious well-wisher in the Kremlin had sent him embedded in a 🎂 to congratulate him on his articulate and witty performance during his court appearance the previous day.

Tragically, he was only a few minutes from a glorious act of self-defenestration.
 
Idris2002 said:
Just looking at RTE's coverage of Navalny's death this evening, it's still the same vibe as there was with Khodorkovsky - somewhere out there is the plausible westernising liberal, or liberal westerniser, who is going to save Russia from itself. I think that's delusional, and if there are Russian liberals who could delude themselves that way, so much the worse for them, though you'd have to sympathise if they feel like all hope is now dead. As for the stuff further up the thread about N moderating his views and trying to do missionary work among the Russian nationalists, to me that reads like flim-flam to keep his western admirers onside.
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There is definitely a salient point here about the archetype of the "reforming, pro-western liberal democrat" who looms large in the minds of western politicians and journalists but almost never actually exists in real life. See also Aung San Suu Kyi, and even Putin himself 20 odd years ago.

I think this image also comes from the post-Cold War belief in the inevitable march of liberal democracy and the eager search for the avatar of the next wave and for new secular saints.

The flipside of this is the problem of demanding secular saints. People aren't saintly and any political figure will always be problematic in some way, e.g. Ghandi, Nelson Mandela, MLK are kind of secular saints in this mould too but Ghandi was racist, Mandela wasn't really the model of peaceful resistance that he is imagined as in the liberal imagination, and MLK was a womaniser... likewise Navalny may have represented something positive, but he also appears to have been something of an opportunist and chameleon who was probably primarily interested in power and was not the liberal Saint he was sometimes portrayed as.

Also I feel like the west is a bit gullible and underestimates non-westerners quite a bit. Navalny at some point seems to have tried to embody this kind of role as a means to gain support in the west, Aung San Suu Kyi did the same and China also sometimes knows how to play this game as well and successfully convinced the west that there were in the process of reforming to become a democracy in order to gain western investment and technology. It is quite interesting seeing how Orban and Putin are also playing a similar game in courting US conservatives who are apparently as oblivious as liberals.
 
That also reminds me of how the West reported on a string of Serbian "pro European, liberal" politicians.

In the latest Polish elections Tusk was pushed as progressive as opposed to the conservative PiS party, like he was some big hope for a modern democratic Poland. That he is a big player in the EU/NATO neo-liberal, imperialist-militarist camp was somehow blurred out behind the LGBT+ flags, Womens' marches and anti-racism photo,-opps.
 
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What I never really understood was the fact that whilst in prison that not only were his court appearances broadcast but he was also allowed to to make statements to the media and release videos. Prisoners in the UK, even if they have not been convicted and are being held on remand do not have that freedom.

Prizoghin in the aftermath of the coup, before his assassination was given a similar amount of latitude.
 
tim said:
What I never really understood was the fact that whilst in prison that not only were his court appearances broadcast but he was also allowed to to make statements to the media and release videos. Prisoners in the UK, even if they have not been convicted and are being held on remand do not have that freedom.

Prizoghin in the aftermath of the coup, before his assassination was given a similar amount of latitude.
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Helps to bring out supporters onto the streets to make further arrests easier?
 
Russia is not a beacon for democratic civil rights, but I don't think the West needs to be getting in their high horses other. The police attacked women demonstrating for their safety on Clapham Common for example.

Nawalny did have a small supporter base that was / is willing to take the risk to openly support / mourn him. Just funny how the BBC had the story ready to run to try and pluck your heart strings on the telescreen at 6.
 
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It wasn't that "funny". the BBC like everyone else were aware that it was quite probable that he would be murdered by the Russian state and would have made preparations for such an eventuality.

As to Navalny"s supporter base, what evidence do you have to say that it was small?
 
rubbershoes said:
That's the type of batshit stupidity that we've come to expect from the American right
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It isn't batshit stupidity. It is a recognition of the current reality of the US political landscape. The legal action currently being taken against Trump is motivated by the concern that he will win the Republican nomination and stands a good chance of winning a second term as President. If he wasn't a threat, he'd be left alone to fulminate like Nixon was.
 
tim said:
It isn't batshit stupidity. It is a recognition of the current reality of the US political landscape. The legal action currently being taken against Trump is motivated by the concern that he will win the Republican nomination and stands a good chance of winning a second term as President. If he wasn't a threat, he'd be left alone to fulminate like Nixon was.
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Nixon left office in August 1974 and was pardoned by Ford in September 1974. Nixon won a second term and was therefore ineligible to run again. So there was little more he could do than fulminate. The legal action being taken against Trump is because he has committed a fuckton of actual crimes like fraud and rape and insurrection
 
rubbershoes said:
That's the type of batshit stupidity that we've come to expect from the American right
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The American right can be nuttier than a squirrel's breakfast indeed, but almost getting to the point here of realising how much bullshit elections in "Western Democracy" can be.
 
tim said:
It wasn't that "funny". the BBC like everyone else were aware that it was quite probable that he would be murdered by the Russian state and would have made preparations for such an eventuality.

As to Navalny"s supporter base, what evidence do you have to say that it was small?
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I fucking hope it was...he was more in favour of annexing Ukraine than Putin was. A number of my virtue signalling leftist friends have changed their fb profile pic in memory of this bloke..I fucking hope they don't do the same should Tommy Robinson have an accident next time he's nicked. Just coz this guy had some guts in criticising Putin doesn't make him a good guy...depressing fact is the voices critical of Putin in Russia the ones that would be more palatable to Western ears are either in nick or keeping their head down (understandably)
 
Pickman's model said:
Nixon left office in August 1974 and was pardoned by Ford in September 1974. Nixon won a second term and was therefore ineligible to run again. So there was little more he could do than fulminate. The legal action being taken against Trump is because he has committed a fuckton of actual crimes like fraud and rape and insurrection
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Most of that fuckton of actual crimes were committed before Trump won the election in 2016. An election his opponents expected him to lose, just as they assumed that he wouldn't win the nomination in the first place. He was protected from legal action by his wealth. The difference now is that he is seen as a real political threat that needs to be dealt with.
 
Yepp gosub, getting spammed by liberals, greens and supposed progressives having a collective pearl-clutching over Navalny. Even had ones from LGBT activists, ones with rainbows!
 
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tim said:
Most of that fuckton of actual crimes were committed before Trump won the election in 2016. An election his opponents expected him to lose, just as they assumed that he wouldn't win the nomination in the first place. He was protected from legal action by his wealth. The difference now is that he is seen as a political threat that needs to be dealt with.
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While he might have been left alone-ish if he hadn't run again, the real shame for democracy in the US is that the Senate didn't stand up to him and convict him for the insurrection in 2021. If they had done that, he wouldn't be standing this time. His other crimes from his time in office, such as conspiracy to overturn the election with threats to Georgia etc, are also real enough.
 
tim said:
Most of that fuckton of actual crimes were committed before Trump won the election in 2016. An election his opponents expected him to lose, just as they assumed that he wouldn't win the nomination in the first place. He was protected from legal action by his wealth. The difference now is that he is seen as a real political threat that needs to be dealt with.
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Weird how these opponents apparently haven't noticed that prosecuting Trump makes him more popular with Republicans, DeSantis looked like he had a good shot at the nomination before the first indictment
 
gosub said:
I fucking hope it was...he was more in favour of annexing Ukraine than Putin was. A number of my virtue signalling leftist friends have changed their fb profile pic in memory of this bloke..I fucking hope they don't do the same should Tommy Robinson have an accident next time he's nicked. Just coz this guy had some guts in criticising Putin doesn't make him a good guy...depressing fact is the voices critical of Putin in Russia the ones that would be more palatable to Western ears are either in nick or keeping their head down (understandably)
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Clearly his death wasn't an "accident" anymore than Prizoghin's was.

Now he's dead your hopes are rather irrelevant. He was an intelligent charismatic individual who was willing to take the risk of standing up to the regime and was able find and disseminate compromising material about the leadership. That's enough to have garnered him a substantial support base. His being an irredentist and an Islamophobe might also have attracted more followers than it alienated
 
littlebabyjesus said:
While he might have been left alone-ish if he hadn't run again, the real shame for democracy in the US is that the Senate didn't stand up to him and convict him for the insurrection in 2021. If they had done that, he wouldn't be standing this time. His other crimes from his time in office, such as conspiracy to overturn the election with threats to Georgia etc, are also real enough.
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The real shame for democracy is the fact that he was elected by an electoral college in 2016 despite having lost the popular vote.
 
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