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By William A. Rusher . ST. FRIERSBUBS, Russia based on observations that are both recent and direct. 1. Both countries have all the stig mata of disintegrated societies in which the previous central authority collapsed and its successor is weak. Thus, bribery will get fre anywhere. I saw whole busloads of tourists erase setereehceel borders with EU of ficials drafting the new constitution, told me that Russian liberals are as idiotic as their American counter parts. They are trying to turn the new constitution into a sort of wish-list, pledging the “right” to free health care, a free education, a pollution-free environment, etc. etc. to everyone, without the slightest hint of where the money for all this is going to come . Even a week will convince an ob server that Ukrainian nationalism is in the saddle there, and that it would ‘be quite a turnaround to unite the country with Russia again. There are Russian super-nationalists who don’t know this, or don’t care, and they had better seek out. 4. People who had been in Moscow Salis Sedat me that the cntire of freits steeie a the the breakfast ‘built taunt hotel would have been even two years ago. But of course, we were at the very top of the food chain. One could see a van from the countryside park on a Moscow boulevard be surrounded within minutes, and sell its whole load of cabbages (or whatever) before the ps could arrive to shoo it away won popular support by making the scheming politicians toe the line while the country pulled itself together. It would be a (temporary) setback for the ideal of New England town-meet ing democracy, but the rest of the world should try to avoid hysteria if it happens . Devout Communists are still around. I saw one rally on the steps of the Lenin Museum near Red Square, complete with bull-horns and hammer-and-sickle flags. It's too bad the whole country couldn’t have been de-Communized, as Germany was de Nazified, but that would have required an occupying power. In any case, the Communists aren’t taken seriousl, Russia may make many mistakes, but it won’t make that one again . Lenin still lies in his red granite tomb in Red Square, but the lines to see the old geezer are shorter these days. What nobody had ever told me was that behind his tomb, between and the Kremlin wall, are the grave of the whole top hierarchy of the Com munist Party — Stalin, Brezhnev, An dropov, Suslov, etc., each topped by larger than life-size bust — as well as those of scores of lesser lights. 8. The one truly pathetic sight in Russia today is the elderly. Born in communism's youthful heyday, they sacrificed their entire lives to the com munist vision of a better future. Now they have learned that it was all at best a blunder, at worst a fraud. The totter around the parks, trying to sur vive on pensions inflated into worth lessness, the men in shabby suits with their military ribbons stitched to their breast-pockets. God help them. 1993 NEWSPAPER ENTERPRISE ASSN THE CONSERVATIVE ADVOCATE RUSHER WILLIAM
Newspaper Details
Marshall Chronicle
Marshall, Michigan, US
Sat, Aug 14, 1993
Page 2
Full Page
Clipped by
Roger M.
USA 01 Jul 2026
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