Russian electoral type event: 2011 (Duma)

[Insula Dei]

Please tell me I'm not utterly wrong when I believe the LDPR to be nothing but an excuse for Putin to do as he pleases, because the West 'may not like us, but I guess they wouldn't like Zhirinovsky any better'.

[Insula Dei]

Uhm, I think Teddy is referring to himself?

[Insula Dei]

BTW, are the National-Bolsheviks running candidates? Is Limonov still in jail anyway?

[Insula Dei]

BTW, are the National-Bolsheviks running candidates? Is Limonov still in jail anyway?

Running candidates for what? For prison council representative? I doubt. They aren't a registered political party, they can't run candidates.

No, Limonov isn't in jail, AFAIK

Weren't they involved with 'Other Russia' or something like that a while back? I don't really follow the Russian opposition, and certainly not the more weirdish parts of it, but Limonov at least had some merits as a poet/writer, which I doubt are to be found in Zhirinosky's oeuvre. And then of course there's the Karadzic video, so I take a bit of an interest in what befalls Limonov. (Also, appearantly there now is an Emmanuel Carrère book about him that's been described to me as quite good).

[Insula Dei]

I found this gem on RIA Novosti's page about the result in Chechnya particularly endearing:

With a 99.5 percent voter turnout at 456 polling stations, United Russia received support of 607,909 voters in Chechnya.

This is just amazing!

In Canada these days if you can get 50% of the voters out it is a really big deal.

So to be able to get a 99.5% voter turnout is really pretty incredible.

I congratulate all of the voters of Chechnya for their support of the Russian election.

It would make for an interesting RIA Novosti article to learn why the Chechnyains are so passionate about their right to vote.

It is inspiring to see so many people in Chechnya supporting their democratic freedom to vote.

Even more interesting that 99.6% of the vote went to the United Russia party. Normally there is more of a variation in how people vote.

Arnold Vinette
Ottawa, Canada

Maybe we should replicate Chechen democratic culture in the West.