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Notes -
Should include his twitter post today https://twitter.com/navalny/status/1627632098608644099?s=46&t=kZtdy_V5y071LA26Wuu8Nw
Personally I’m confused how he’s tweeting and in jail. If someone understands Russian police state better I would be interested. There’s actual a meme in the sports world that we can’t judge Ovechkin or Malkin for not speaking out since their families would be at risks. But Navalny is tweeting from jail against Putin?
Galeev whose the only Russophile I follow thinks Navalny is not neoliberal and just tailors his message for western support. He thinks Navalny is bad and just the guy who wants to be the new tsar but tells the west he’s a “good” Russian reformer. Galeev says he’s just Putin.
He is rabidly Antirussian.
Well nobody else is really debating him. And giving off other interpretations of events. As far as I know you have
Galeev
Meashemer who doesn’t really explain internal politics and economics as far as I know. Call this the “realist” camp
Some sort of “official” narrative western media. Which I don’t pay much attention to on anything
State and nationalist statements
The word "Russophile" means pro-Russian (dependent on definitions of Russia(n)). Calling Galeev a Russophile is incorrect. That is the only scope of my comment.
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I like everything he's saying there.
He has a team of people working for him, so presumably if he's able to communicate in any way with them, he can get them material to post on his behalf.
Russia does not appear to be an effective totalitarian regime. For example, in the documentary Navalny, his assassination is thwarted when the plane he is on makes an emergency landing. If he stayed in the air until his intended destination, they say he would have died. While initially guards at the hospital attempt to keep Navalny's people away from him, he does receive treatment even if it's not optimal. Eventually, enough pressure is exerted on the hospital or Putin that Navalny is released and is allowed to leave the country for treatment by doctors who are free to treat the actual cause of illness. There is not complete control of airplane pilots or doctors to make sure that nothing goes wrong with a nasty plan. I think this rather fits with my concept of how Russia operates: Limited malevolence tempered by the natural incompetence of the corrupt bureaucracy and not every one is on the same page.
The broader question to me is their a credible threat of protesting and being against the regime in Russia. To me this is a key question on whether the Russian people support the war or are just afraid to protest.
And knowing that answer has a lot of geopolitical policy implications. Is Putin bad or are Russian people bad.
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Surely even if he is just Putin it's still an improvement. I'd trade one ineffective, powerful autocrat for a less powerful one any time.
This the reasoning is he would be the same power as Putin. Well army destroyed. But he would say nice things to west and get to sell gas again and then same imperial Moscow elite backing him. Like how the neocons like Liz Cheney left the gop and became democrats. Same basic power but backer new top guy.
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Russophone, surely?
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