New Freedom House ratings

[Cubby]

I'm always suprised by how hard Freedom House grades Russia. They deserve a 4,4 or a 5,4 possibly I would hardly put them on the same level as Syria and Rwanda even if Putin is quite authoritarian. To put it into prospective Tajikistan has the same score and they haven't held an election since 1995. At least Russia goes through that formality and allows some opposition. They should be allowed to be a part of the partially free catagory not form a block with China and Syria.

I disagree. Russia does not tolerate dissent anymore. Putin's sucessor will be hand picked by him. Holding an election to validate a government-approved choice is not democracy. Also, having the provincial governors appointed by the Kremlin instead of elected is a step backward. Russia has been in a downward spiral as far as democracy is concerned since 2000.

[Cubby]

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Not really. Yeltsin was as authoritarian as Putin is, as we can see by his supressions during his first term, however by Yeltsin's second term his health was failing and his underlings were struggling to place themselves in the position to be Yeltsin's hand picked successor so he was not able to dominate the scene as much as Putin is. Yeltsin also had to deal with general discontent from the Russian people due to poor economic management whereas Russia under Putin has seen strong economic numbers stemming from high oil and natural gas prices.

Yeltsin was not authoritarian, compared to all of Russian History and Putin as well. I don't know why Russians act as if the 90's were so terrible compared to today. They may have more money now but they live in a fascist state.