Fwd: Russian Manifesto, long and probably useless

[Tim May]

[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 at got.net>
> Date: Tue Dec 04, 2001  09:25:34 AM US/Pacific
> To: cypherpunks at 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