The truth about Putin

Another  day, another e-mail from my dear friend, the scurrilous chain mail  forwarder. Today's is a gem, lauding Vladimir Putin for.... well here's enough to give you the picture:     

Vladimir Putin on Citizenship,

I would suggest that not only our leaders but every citizen of USA should pay attention to this advice. It is a sad day when a Communist Leader makes more sense than our LEADERS here in the U.S.A. but here it is!

 "Putin, addressing the Duma, (Russian Parliament),  gave a speech about the tensions with minorities in Russia:  "In Russia, live like Russians. Any minority, from anywhere, if it wants to live in Russia, to work and eat in Russia, it should speak Russian, and should respect the Russian laws. If they prefer Sharia Law, and live the life of Muslim's then we advise them to go to those places where that's the state law. "Russia does not need Muslim minorities. Minorities need Russia, and we will not grant them special privileges, or try to change our laws to fit their desires, no matter how loud they yell 'discrimination'. We will not tolerate disrespect of our Russian culture. We better learn from the suicides of (US of)  America, England, Holland and France , if we are to survive as a nation. The Muslims are taking over those countries and they will not take over Russia. The Russian customs and traditions are not compatible with the lack of culture or the primitive ways of Sharia Law and Muslims.........."

At which point the original sender of the e-mail adds: "If you keep this to yourself, you are part of the problem!"

        I love the way this ends with "you are part of the problem!"    Really? What/which problem,? No US legislator has ever suggested the things such as instituting Sharia Law or changing a national language, so other than anti-Muslim bigotry​, obviously the writer's problem, what are we talking about here? Oh wait, I get it. We now love Vladimir Putin. Get off the obvious political bandwagon and consider how ludicrous that really is. So we now want an "elected" (in quotes 'cause it ain't so) "President for life" who is so deep in the pockets of the Russian oligarchs he has to look up to kiss their balls?  Donald Trump, alone, would "get" this, because that's all he values, himself.

        Of special interest is the implication that Russia has been more effective combating the insidious effects of sectarian Islamic violence. Of course, maybe Putin's  tough talk have been effective in limiting deaths in Russia due to Islamic terrorism, no?  A quick look shows that in just two incidents, the Moscow Theater attack and the "apartment bombings, Russia lost 430 persons to Islamic terrorist acts.  

        There are some obvious considerations to be made here: First of all, over Putin's reign ("term" is simply too ludicrous to consider for an emperor for life) the rate of Russian deaths per million by terrorist acts has been 1.01 fatalities per million population. In the US during the terms of President Barack Obama (the unmentioned but implied "slammee" of this piece of whatever it is) the US death rate from terrorist acts has been .012  fatalities per million, which is 1/84 th of that in Russia. Now tell me again how Putin's tough talk and bare-chested swagger have kept Russians safer? No?  Didn't think so. Of course the US did have the one great act of terrorism on 9/11, but at the time there had been none of the issues Putin speaks of related to  circumstances in the US. Of course, the President did have a warning, but, as it was prepared by the Clinton administration, it was essentially ignored due to a multitude of screw-up's involving CIA, FBI and Bush White House refusal to take it seriously, all also established facts and on the public record. 

        What this diatribe also conveniently omits is the fact than much of what Russia faces is due to their insistence that Chechnya, historically Muslim, must now be Russia, and Russian in essence. Many (by no means all!)of the "Russian" deaths attributed to terrorism either happened in Chechnya or were perpetrated by Chechens. These actions aren't due to  Chechens trying to force their religion down the throats of Russians, but rather the opposite; historical Muslims trying to hold on to their religion in their own land. 

       From the 13th century, Chechens have been primarily a Muslim people of various sects,  although the Russian incursions beginning in the 16th century spurred massive conversions to Sunni Islam, as Sunnis were seen as the resistance to Russia. If this sounds distressingly familiar, it should, as the US 2001-2007 destabilization of Iraq also offered the proposition that only the Sunnis (now united as ISIS) were the true resistance to western incursions.    

        Putin is a thug. He is Stalin without even the thin veneer of political principle.  Period. Discounting 9/11,  His policies have been responsible for massively larger amounts of terrorism in Russia that we have seen in the US.

      In fact, Timothy McVeigh, homegrown fine young Christian that he was, killed more Americans in one day that the entire Obama administration death toll from terrorism.