Chris Doss writes: Russians lived more poorly than people in any other of the republics or in the Eastern Bloc (except maybe Albania?). Moscow may have been a possible exception. It's one of the reasons why Russia junked them. Ironically, those losses of subsidies have resulted in the wealthiest of the republics -- like Georgia and Moldova -- into the poorest. Russians now live better than people anywhere else in the fSU, except maybe the Baltics, which is why you have so much illegal immigration from them into Russia.
There are lots of Soviet jokes depicting Castro as sucking at Brezhnev's teat. this part is what's generally accepted as valid in this thread. Jim Devine
