I am very happy to see Putin cleaning up the scum of society in Russia.
Recently, Mikhail Khodorkovsky (Russia’s wealthiest man) was arrested and is facing charges of evading 1 BILLION in taxes along with 5 murders linked to him and his oil giant Yukos.
This is another domino of Russia’s leeches being squashed under the mighty foot of nationalist Russians.
Well, I’ll avoid your assertions that the oligarchs are automatically “scum” and other such assertions you’ve made.
The why? Politics, plain and simple. Putin is looking for re-election and must show the “nationalist Russians” that he is in charge and running the show vs. the oligarchs.
Moderator’s Note:2Thick, I edited your post to remove that link to a picture of (I presume) Mikhail Khodorkovsky. It wasn’t a link to an article and didn’t really advance the discussion any. I guess you wanted to have his picture in your post, but we have image tags disabled on this board, so all it did was put in a link to the picture with a really long URL that made the original post in the thread look funny because it was too wide.
This is how it’s put around these parts: Elections are coming up. Mikhail Khodorkovsky apparently was supporting two rivalling parties, which was contrary to a voco soto agreement Putin made with the oligarchs upon his first move to power; that they should stay out politics in return for being left alone and keeping their wealth. Also these oligarchs are massively unpopular in Russia. Arresting him was a good career move. In any case Khodorkovsky obviously didn’t come to all this wealth by being a law-abiding business man, even were such a thing possible, so no tears here.
Why did Putin do it? Well, perhaps he’s cleaning up the scum, or perhaps Khodorkovsky just crossed him somehow, perhaps by refusing to make his protection payments. Given Pooty-Poot’s governing style to date, I know which way to bet.
As an auxiliary issue here–this arrest has delayed the acquisition of Yukos by foreign oil companies (Exxon and Chevron were competing, I believe).
How do Russians, and esp. Putin and his crew, feel about their country’s most valuable resource being controlled (at least in part) by foreign corporations? (Or would they be happy for the foreign dollars coming in from such a merger/buyout?) Perhaps the timing was a delaying tactic on the govt’s part. Although it’s playing hell with the stock exchange.
There are really no heros in this story, 2thick. All of the so-called oligarchs have some kind of dirt in their past; Khodorkovsky was picked out because he was not adhering to the unspoken pact of enjoying his wealth and not messing in politics, and because Yukos was planning on selling 40% to ExxonMobil, thereby making it more difficult to squeeze them/take them over should it become necessary.
Also, all of the old “oligarchs” are related in one way or another to the Family, one of the major clans in Russian politics (basically those who were close to Yeltsin). The Chekisty (ex-KGB people associated with Putin) are in the ascendent at the moment, after several years of a rough balance, and they want to get into the action.
This has nothing to do with “cleaning up the scum”. This is what the Russians call a “peredel sobstvennosti” or “divvying up the pie”.
Stupid way to do it, if you ask me.
I think Putin didn’t do it for the purely ideologic reasons you put forth. Putin did it because Khodorkovsky was backing the opposition. You won’t see the others go, because they’re smart enough to appease Putin. Russian Politics, plain and simple. Putin’s as dirty as the Ollies.
I see it as a dangerous development… he put that guy away for political… not criminal reasons. I know some of his methods are less than ideal… but Putin seems quite the autocrat himself.
