Reply #16: Why is it so hard for people to understand...

[Union Thug]

This has just as much to do with the failure of capitalism in Russia as it does holdovers from the political environement of the past.

The fact is that the common people in Russia have gained little and lost much as the system changed from faux communism to gangster capitalism. They've lost free health care, free childcare, free education. In place of their former faux communist government, where corrupt officials acted only to benefit themselves, they get a corrupt system where the Russian mafia and its brethren have hijacked the economy in the interest of 'free enterprise' and private gain. Is it any surprise that they don't really give a damn whether or not Putin consolidates power. Doesn't surprise me at all.