[Retransmission. Due to periodic problems with lne.com, I started sending my messages to ssz.com a few days ago. Alas, ssz.com has had an outage. Hence these retransmissions. Sorry for any dupes.] Begin forwarded message:
From: Tim May <tcmay@got.net> Date: Tue Dec 04, 2001 09:25:34 AM US/Pacific To: cypherpunks@einstein.ssz.com Subject: Re: Russian Manifesto, long and probably useless
On Tuesday, December 4, 2001, at 04:14 AM, Fyodor wrote:
<<Only in our country is it possible for such an ineffective, talentless government to exist.>>
Here we go again! I mean, I'm sure the Russian government is incompetent - but to decry that? Pray for more! The more incompetent they are, the more chances you have of developing an economy behind their backs.
Wrong. Having russian background I guess I have more clear understanding what these guys are trying to say: The government is definetely ineffective in protecting its citizen, providing the social wealthfare to them and such, but on the other hand the government corruption, deep involvement with crimilal circles and udertable deals with big foreign corporations bring the country into the situation when the rulling top of the country is having/sharing a huge amount (can't bring any number) of all the profits, while the rest of population (especially pensioners in russia (people of age of 50 and above, who are brought up in post-socialist environment and are totally incapable to adopt to new environment)) are thrown and maintained in poverty.
This matches everything I have seen about Russia. It simply is implausible that "corruption and inefficiency means more opportunities for economies behind their backs" (to summarize the argument).
What Russia shows is that privatizing a state-run economy is difficult indeed. Gazprom, the big gas and energy company, is a case in point. There was no "free market" to acquire the resources of this "privatized" company: the thugs and apparatchniks (sp?) grabbed the company. And they are willing to use former KGB, GRU, and Spetsnaz killers to enforce their monopoly.
What about non-heavy industry? Television, for example? Read about the ongoing shutdown of Moscow independent stations and networks, on flimsy grounds having the _language_ of capitalism (stuff about "loan default") but actually being just part of the thugocracy approach. (The U.S. is not blameless here. Our own FCC applies similar rules sometimes to block stations. And woe unto any Islamic broadcaster, where the new language is that the First Amendment does not apply to "hate speech" or "speech insulting to other religions." At this rate, the long-awaited convergence of Russia and America is not far off.)
Russia as a haven for Havenco? For digital money? For e-commerce?
Laughable.
--Tim May
--Tim May "If I'm going to reach out to the the Democrats then I need a third hand.There's no way I'm letting go of my wallet or my gun while they're around." --attribution uncertain, possibly Gunner, on Usenet
--Tim May "How we burned in the prison camps later thinking: What would things have been like if every security operative, when he went out at night to make an arrest, had been uncertain whether he would return alive?" --Alexander Solzhenitzyn, Gulag Archipelago