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Hi Rick - Yes I am a decent guy. etc. At least I think I am. The Latvians and Estonians and Lithuanians are nazis to the max - no argument. We could both tell stories for hours. The Lithuanians had a rally here with their new president. We went to heckle. We challenged them on their policy not to allow Russians in the hospital speaking Russian. Their response - well what if a Mexican came to a US hospital - you certainly wouldn't let him in if he didn't speak English - would you! They actuially wore brown shirts. They of course were unaware of the multi lingual nature of US meidcal care. My comment was merely to pass on what my wife's aunt tells us. She lives in Riga. My wife is Russian - born in Riga. Aunt Delores tells us that they can now become citizens. That's all. Merely passing on this simple fact - not trying to justify the unjustifiable. Regarding Bush - they don't come any lower. Regarding Gorbachev - In my opinion Gorbachev is an interesting and complex figure. To me he and Carter have a lot in common - idealists who did the wrong thing for the right reasons. I fully acknowledge the harm that came with the fall of the USSR - both to the citizens of Russia and the citizens of the rest of the world. Civil rights everywhere are going down as a result - income inequality is going up. I understand that Gorbachev is held responsible. In my mind that is a great oversimplification. I lived there during Brezhnevs time. In my view - of the leaders of Russia since 1900 Gorbachev ranks higher for me than any other - if you allow me to leave out Lenin because the pros and cons there are too much to try to deal with in parallel with trying to figure out my income tax. In my view, The Capitalist world brought down the USSR. Again I could go on for hours. Simply stated - capitalism uses greed as its engine. Greed is a hell of a motivator. Capitalism outproduced Russia - and was thus able to spend more on weapons. Russia was falling behind in the military area. Russian politicians were not able to convince the citizens that capitalism was as greedy as it is. People thought that they could have it both ways - better production and social services. They just didn't realize that in the US people sleep in the streets - since no one there did. As a result the Russian intelligencia bought the US propaganda. I really believed that Gorbachev was trying to reduce the corruption and dictatorial situation created by his predecessors - and it got out of control. When I lived there - and not disputing the free education, free medical, cheap rent, cheap metro tickets, no unemployment - nonetheless it was more corrupt than Mexico - where I have also done business and perhaps half as repressive as Indonesia - where I have also done business. You could not get anything done without paying a bribe. When we got married I had to buy $500 worth of gifts for the lady who managed the wedding palace - for example. And - people were still sent off to the boonies if they criticized the government. Many of my friends were afraid to be seen with me in public. I criticized my president - they were afraid that to be seen with such a person might imply that they criticized their president -and they did not want to deal with the consequences of that. Brezhnev's daughter and her boyfriend were the two top criminals in Moscow and the police were sure not going to move against them. etc. To me Gorbachev looked like a reformer who lost control. Certainly I could be wrong - just my impression. Richard. ==^================================================================ This email was sent to: archive@jab.org EASY UNSUBSCRIBE click here: http://topica.com/u/?a84x2u.a9WB2D Or send an email to: [EMAIL PROTECTED] T O P I C A -- Register now to manage your mail! http://www.topica.com/partner/tag02/register ==^================================================================
