Ничего святого

Прелестная, в своем роде, статья в Аль-Гардиан: Vladimir Putin's world is falling apart
авторства Маши Гессен.

Избранные места:
Экспонат # 1, Маша Гессен пытается выдать себя за философа истории: The thing about harsh authoritarian regimes is it's not laws, or courts, or the rigid government hierarchy that makes them run. It is fear. And once the fear is taken out of the equation – suddenly, for the vanishing of fear is always sudden – it becomes clear that these courts, laws and hierarchies do not work.

Экспонат # 2, Маша Гессен пытается описать события 1991 года в России: And ordinary people, including college students, professionals, and former army military men, flooded into the streets to protect the Moscow white house where Boris Yeltsin sat, personifying democracy.

Экспонат # 3, Маша Гессен пытается выдать себя за кремленолога: He / Putin - T./ has appointed his old friend, the FSB general Sergei Ivanov, as chief of the president's staff /.../. He brought back Dmitry Rogozin, Russia's odiously aggressive nationalist envoy to Nato, to serve in his cabinet in Moscow. In the coming days, he is likely to make more appointments that will show that his is a harsh, nationalist, authoritarian government.