U.S. to receive "foreign aid" from Russia

[Filius Nullius]

Quoting from the Sunday, May 8, 2005, New York Times:

"In his speech on Saturday, Mr. Bush seemed certain to irritate Mr. Putin further when he warned him as he had in February about retreating on democracy. 'All free and successful countries have some common characteristics - freedom of worship, freedom of the press, economic liberty, the rule of law and the limitation of power through checks and balances,' Mr. Bush said.

"In the last year the United States has grown concerned over Mr. Putin's prosecution of business leaders, his increasing control over the press and his involvement in the affairs of Georgia and other neighbors.

"Mr. Putin has not reacted positively to such criticism from Mr. Bush in the past, and this week he told the CBS News program "60 Minutes" that Mr. Bush had little business lecturing him about democracy when the 2000 presidential election in the United States was decided by the Supreme Court.

"In a joint news conference with Baltic leaders in Riga earlier on Saturday, Mr. Bush put more pressure on Mr. Putin by calling for 'free and open and fair' elections in Belarus, the last dictatorship in Europe, whose president, Aleksandr G. Lukashenko, is backed by Mr. Putin. Mr. Bush also did not dispute the premise of a question from a reporter implying that the United States was behind revolutionary change in Georgia, Ukraine and Kyrgyzstan.

"'The idea of countries helping others become free, I hope that would be viewed as not revolutionary, but rational foreign policy, as decent foreign policy, as humane foreign policy,' Mr. Bush said."

When I read this, a recurrent fantasy of mine started bubbling to the surface, in which the leaders of Russia, Germany and France decry the massive electoral fraud and voter suppression that occurred in the 2004 American presidential election. Perhaps Democrats need to send a delegation to Russia, France and Germany to ask them to denounce the hypocrisy of Bush's platitudes about instilling democracy in Iraq and the Middle East, while he and other members of his party actively suppress it in his own country.

In the most recent incarnation of this hallucination, I imagine Putin holding a press conference for the purpose of excoriating Bush for his disingenuous criticisms of Putin's government over its failure to implement and promote democracy to the fullest extent at home and abroad, while actively engineering (or at least passively benefiting from) massive electoral fraud in the U.S.

Better still, wouldn't it be sublimely ironic if Bush's two-faced remarks prompted Putin to announce to the world on Monday when Bush joins him in Red Square for celebrations of the 60th anniversary of VE Day, <Aside from Putin to Bush: "Alright, you sanctimonious numbskull, here's a shot across your bow."> "Russia has taken President Bush's recent comments to heart. It wishes to help the people of the United States to become free and hopes this would be viewed as not revolutionary, but rational foreign policy, as decent foreign policy, as humane foreign policy. We have heard the desperate pleas of the American people on Internet Web sites for an investigation of a presidential election rife with fraud and irregularities and encourage President Bush and the American Congress to overturn the election results, begin an immediate and full investigation of allegations of electoral fraud and irregularities and hold new elections that are transparent, verifiable and free of the fraud, corruption and extreme unfairness that have so completely corroded the confidence of the American people in their government."

Probably not gonna' happen, but we can dream, can't we? Maybe, just maybe, if our cocky little rooster of a president keeps shooting his mouth off and pisses Putin off enough.... Does anyone have the email address of someone in the Putin Administration who could put a bug in his ear?

[whistle]

1. Ahaaa...

<snip>
'All free and successful countries have some common characteristics - freedom of worship, freedom of the press, economic liberty, the rule of law and the limitation of power through checks and balances,' Mr. Bush said.

Precisely what Putin says Bush is taking away from the American people.