COWBOY FRIENDS (Russian article slams Bush & Putin)

A "New Gazette" correspondent attends the London premier of this year's film sensation "Fahrenheit 9/11"

Certainly this is an anti-Bush film, and in this sense from time to time it is excellently filmed. Everything is extremely clear: Bush is skillfully separated from all his words and self-confident facial expressions and shown to be the greatest eccentric of our times. The London theater at first laughs loudly, then in unison sighs: "my God..." while the appearance of silly Britney Spear's talking head, with words of support for "my president" is encountered by a collective shuddering...

The anti-Bush emotions aren't everything, however. After letting us laugh awhile, the camera presents documents whose content cannot but shock the audience. For example: after the tragedy on September 11th, the running commentary explains, all flights over the US were cancelled, and even Papa Bush was forced to land somewhere. But look: here is the flight clearance of the only aircraft permitted to fly at that time... It turns out that this was the departure from the states to Saudi Arabia by numerous relatives of Ben laden. By order of Bush, whose family has old petroleum connections with that family...

The author's basic theme is clear: to Bush, petrodollars count more than American lives, this means that as president, Bush is America's biggest calamity in a decade. Try to detract from the proofs in the film: in the Summer of 2001, a time just before September 11th, when it would have been be worthwhile for the president to attentively read the intelliegence services' alarming reports, and Bush, annoyed that many were dissatisfied with him, departs on a long vacation to hunt rabbits, play golf and cowboy, and ranch... And doesn't even touch the special reports.

So September 11th comes - and we see how Bush, ever the comedian, swimming through his shock and making patriotic speeches, each more military than the last. And then, bombing in Afghanistan, later - in Iraq. The Islamic world is driven into a corner and snaps... But what could they do? Return to the favor to Bush?

Stop. Englishmen are ardent in their mass anti-Americanism - that's why they laugh so hard in the cinema, seeing picture after picture from Bush's life. But what if you just flew in from Russia?

If you just flew in, it's not very funny. The military-political parallels are already too obvious. From words to deeds. From all these "pissing on them" and "to call up the army" as a means for this pissing - to the thousands of victims caused by the "anti-terror war." One and a half hours with the English, gathered in the film auditorium to laugh at Bush, and you increasingly realize that Moore's film was modelled on us. The deeper that the director immerses himself in Bush's twisting of anti-Islamic hysteria throughout the world, with his so-called the "coalition of the willing", the less our thoughts are strictly about Bush and company, and more about our own (president).

Moore certainly doesn't show us that Bush wanted September 11th to happen... But... it came at just the right time. On the eve of September 11th, Bush wasn't legitimate in the eyes of Americans (he received less than a majority of the votes in the elections, and even that was revealed only in Florida where the governor is Bush's brother). Bush's pride is hurt - and Bush needed something like this urgently, something to prove his strength and support his legitimacy. What would this be? War.

But how was it with us (in Russia)? Yeltsin appointed his successor, they showed him off to the nation, and he seemed a shadowy person - lacking charisma, lacking ideas, lacking a an explicit record of service to the people. This "Russian Bush" is also unprecedented, semi-selected, with a flawed legitimacy, strategically weak, with strange advisers who come from who knows where, accidental... Where could we go from here without war?

The demonstration of a patriotic fist to the (Russian) common man makes journalists on (Russian) government-run television channels squeal with enthusiasm - the nation adores the fist. The demonstation of a patriotic fist to the American common man makes journalists on US government-run television channels (as figuratively shown by Moore) squeal with with enthusiasm - and this nation adores the first.

There is a theme on which Moore barely reflects: how exactly did Bush come to power? But question also requires an answer: how did two gentlemen come to occupy the highest post in two superpowers almost simultaneously, and after their arrival to these highest of positions, found it necessary to reassure themselves, and thus drew closer to each other and lashed out at the world?

Everything complex is usually explained simply. The two main reasons are obvious.

First, personal: those suspected of crimes are always drawn to each other in order to support each other and more effectively take vengeance against their enemies. If this were to happen in kindergarten, revenge is limited to sandbox. But if the field for self-assertion is a nation and government, then bombings start, thousands of refugees are displaced, guerrilla warfare begins in reply, blood, ruin, hunger, and the desperation of millions. Director Moore demonstrates that it is important for the avenger to "correctly" select the tool for the realization of his plan - so that as a result the avenger would be accepted as the First and Only.

For Bush this tool was Bin Laden, nurtured by the personal efforts of the Bush family, "one of their own" that is to say. And just as Bin Laden is to Moore, more persistently we recall (Chechnyan terrorist) Basayev. Let's not to forget that Basayev was molded in his present form exactly by two Chechen wars, when Putin held the post of the director of the FSB.

After creating Bin Laden, the Bushes undoubtedly attempted of to get rid of him as compromising evidence. So too Putin. The FSB in those days - at the end of the 1990s - was the service obligated to neutralize Basayev's actions, the same agency which was run by Putin, who diligently created him (Basayev). But in 1999 the time came to get rid of Basayev as compromising evidence, but at the beginning he was used as a tool for unleashing a war.

This is not a paranoid spy story - like those primitive, all too often used plot twists we know from crime stories. History knows of many similar examples during the days of monarchs, emperors, and their servants. Today this primitive twist will have to perish in part due to us. Their number is in the thousands. Among the thousands - are not just loyal soldiers, but women, children, old men. Cruel film pictures of mutual suicide, taken by Fahrenheit's group in Iraq, knock one from their feet not just by themselves, but by the impression of deja vu. This is all to familiar in Chechnya. It's just that it hasn't been going on for as long in Iraq as in Chechnya. And there are more Iraqis. And the territory there as greater.

There's a hint by Moore of the second reason for Bush's proximity to Putin. Both of them are from the "Cold War" generation. They were brought up in this style, the traditional "a bash on the head and keep it in your hat" is nearer and dearer to them than tolerance. Certainly, this is the plague of that generation, which is lost without opposition. They have no culture of creation. And, after a decade of dancing with joy at the fall of the Berlin Wall, it's suddenly boring without an enemy. The most improvised material in this sense was the Islamic world. First - (changing) the face of its individual representatives. Later, the exclusion area began to be enlarged. They began to convert the Islamic world into the strategic enemy of the Christian world. But in reacton to this transformation, and in connection with the methods used in this fight, even those Moslems - who had nothing against non-Moslems and lived in the tradition of tolerance - became the supporters of fight against Bush and Putin.

Already the planet feels a movement in the collective Moslem consciousness, akin to the shifts of the earth's crust in the course of earthquake, and a third world war doesn't seem so far away anymore.

...Almost at the end "Fahrenheit", Bush is just like the Messiah. The arbiter of peace. Remember Putin. He's already sitting on the golden throne, and isn't ashamed, doesn't call anyone to stand by him. Alone at the summit. But chosing a flawed messiah makes is a loss for the world.

It doesn't seem that there will be any problems renting Michael Moore's film in Russian. The parallels are too obvious. The conclusions are too precise.

From tomorrow's Novaya Gazeta:

ANYA

Anya

On Saturday, October 7th,
Anna Politkovskaya,
correspondent of Novaya Gazeta
was killed in the stairwell of her home

        She was beautiful, and through the years became only more beautiful. Do you do know why? At first we merely receive our countenance from God, and then the rest we make of it ourselves - in the way that we live.
       Still, they say that in maturity the soul begins to appear on face. Her soul was beautiful.
       She was feminine. She knew how to laugh and joke and cry from injustice. Any injustice - no matter with respect to whom - she took as her personal enemy, and she fought it with all her strength.
       She was amazing courageous, much more courageous than those many macho types in their armored jeeps, surrounded by bodyguards.
       They threatened her, they tried to intimidate her, and arranged shadows and searches. She was arrested in Chechnya by "our own" airborne forces, and they threatened to shoot her. They poisoned her when she flew to Beslan. She clawed her way back to life, and, though afterwards she was never really as healthy as before, her conscience was all the stronger.
       Many people, even well-wishers of Novaya Gazeta, now and then said: "Well, your Politkovskaya - she's too much already..." Not too much! She always wrote the truth. It is another matter that this truth was frequently too terrible, that many people's consciences refused to accept it. And so, as a protective reaction, they said she was "too much already." Sometimes even our editorial staff.
       For the average person, probably, the most difficult thing is to turn away from a terrible fact. But, if we were to look evil directly in the eye, it cannot remain; it will pass. Anya looked evil directly in the eye, and, perhaps, she remained the conqueror in the worst situations. Perhaps she remained alive where her lowered eyes would have meant her death.
       For us she is still alive. We will be never accept the death of our Anya. Whoever undertook this brutal murder - in the center of Moscow, in broad daylight, we ourselves will search for the killers. We have a good idea where they can be located...
       In Europe, and in America, right now the question is being discussed: what is the state of the independent media in Russia? Novaya Gazeta in recent years has had three of its leading journalists murdered.
       Igor Domnikov. His killers - because of the efforts of honest detectives and this newspaper - were brought to court.
       Yuri Shchekochihin. Even the authorities in his homeland refused to look at the results of his autopsy... but we are continuing our investigation, and his killers will be punished.
       Now they have taken our Anya Politkovskaya... They killed not just a journalist, not just a human rights advocate, or a citizen, they killed a beautiful woman and mother.
       While there is still a Novaya Gazeta, her killers will not sleep quietly.

       Novaya Gazeta
        09.10.2006

You can express your condolences here:

http://politkovskaya.fastbb.ru/

From the condolences weblog:

Aleksandr Usachev:
Who is behind this and the earlier murders?
Who wishes to stand with one foot in Europe, and with the other leg kick the objectionables in the rear and tries to keep his balance in the process?
Who is next?
Who will be the last?
God grant that the last victim of this undeclared war on the truth is Anna Politkovskaya...
Eternal is her memory, and condolences to her loved ones.

Serg:
It seems to me that we are living in '1984' of George Orwell, or during the time of the inquisition. If they are killing journalists, it means they are afraid of their words, and seriously afraid. But why do why allow ourselves to be silent? To kill a lot of people is more difficult.
I kneel down before Anna Politkovskaya, such honest and fearless people are unfortunately very few.
Sergey, Krasnodar

MTV:
They have extinguished yet another ray of light in this dark empire.

Mihail:
Thank you, for the truth! For freedom! For the example!
You are a hero!
Rest in peace.

Mihail Bogomolov:
Anna Stepanovna, forgive us! But we do not say 'farewell!' You remain with us, as one of the few people who didn't just look upon the government scum, but called them exactly what they deserved: scum.
Don't say with sorrow: 'They are gone!' But with gratitude: 'They were!'

Yurii:
SUCH news from Russia already doesn't suprise us, we all felt the sharp pain when we knew of Anna Politkovskaya's death. There are fewer and fewer people who aren't afraid to 'take to the streets', and Politkovskaya was the brightest light among them.

Marina:
It's hard to be an honest person in a bandit land...

Lev:
She gave us all strength...

Olga:
My tears choke me, it's hard to write, such an honest person, so close to my heart.
These reptiles are killing the last people, hoping that a society of beasts remains. They hope to frighten everyone, to make us stop thinking. Let the earth be your pillow, Lord protect her bright spirit, Amen.

Sergey:
Today Russia has no conscience. They killed it.

We mourn with you!
Government of force, stupid government, without brains,
Do you think that dying in her flower of life
She leaves, that the country is all like a prison,
Not ruled by law, but by a pistol?
But a bullet is a weak argument,
Obviously the truth is simple, like two times two:
Though Anna Politkovskaya is no more,
Her Novaya Gazeta is alive!
A.N. Kapitonov

Vika:
They feared her!!! The men revealed by authority and money! Fear this, you cowards, Anna from the skies will reveal all your meannesses, from there even more easily... But they did not count on one thing, yes, we were shaken by this murder, but we were not lost, we didn't scatter, we balled up our fists. If this brittle woman could resist this steam roller, this evil, then I can. Glory to you Anna, the fearless hero! You have it much better up there in heaven, than we do here in Russian, you have much more pleasant company. We remember everything, and this means that you live on, and evil will fall upon all the killers!
Glory to you, hero!

Good bye, my friend, good bye.
My dear one, you are inside my breast.
This predestined parting,
Promises a reunion ahead.
Good bye, my friend, without a handshake, without a word,
Do not get sad or furrow your brow,
Dying is nothing new in this life,
But living, of course, isn't novel either.
(S. Yesenin, ‹1925›)

Bela:
Dear Anna,
Thank you, for loudly saying what many feared to think,
Thank you, for going ahead, when many lagged behind,
Thank you, for trying to save the innocent who were condemned,
Thank you, for treasuring human life so,
Thank you, for telling us the truth,
Thank you, for your life,
Thank you,
A bright memory of you.

Kira:
Sincerest condolences, I am crying... as if one of my own had died. Maybe I can say that it is so. Anna was at 'Nord-Ost', there where my closest person in the world was, ... Her whole life she tried to help those who had it bad. I always trusted her. Eternal is her memory...

Svetlana:
Bitter. Unmeasurable sadness. Shame for our nation, for all of us. Anna Politkovskaya was fearless. Her readers feared for her. It happened anyway. How THEY master us! How we allowed THEM to master us!
Thank you, Anna! All these years you showed us how we should live. Thank you, and forgive us.

Balakar:
99% corruption, 99% stupidity, 99% lies and meanness, and 1 % honest people. They are shooting and forcing out of the country the last of this percent. My condolences to all those close to Anna. And I'm very sorry for myself and my children.

Leonid:
Shame and fear for the country in which I was once born. Judging for everything, anything goes, and it's a frighteningly long time until the dawn. Hang in there, like Anna hung in there, and don't lose hope, we are with you. Let the earth be your pillow!"

(October 7th, 2006, in memory of Anna Politkovskaya)

Don't listen for her respiration, and don't summon the physicians -
Her soul already walks barefoot along the celestial lawn.
God takes away the good by the hands of bastards.
Idle neighbors stare out from their windows.
What is it to her, spending time in spite with praise and disparagement?
She is already away from this bloody suffering.
The quivering reflection of a candle is like a halo overhead.
And the next on the list places flowers on her coffin.
Viktor Kagan

A few more comments from Anya's condolences weblog:

Mimoshla
Anna annoyed the authorities, like a bone in their throat, and they killed her. They will stop at nothing! Power corrupts.

Natasha
How awful it is to live in our country... This grief is impossible to put into words. We were so proud that there could be such journalists - courageous, fearless, brave. We are many more than they authorities think, and together we'll set things right.

Rustam Kersanov
Goodbye, Anna! You were a talanted journalist and a fearless person. I hope your courage helps to awaken the sleeping conscience of the average man and nourish the fighters.

Yakov
I feel as I did once when I heard of Galich's death. And if the government was involved, you'll never know. A bright memory of her!

Ingushetia
I hope that these curs answer in this life. Anna was an honest, brave person.

Sergey
A terrible death. I'm very sad for this remarkable person. I'm very sad for all the people who have no rights whatsoever, including a right to life. The pomp of holidays and fireworks in their honor - that is all the authorities are interested in. They kill people and go unpunished, homes are falling apart from age and disrepair, people are buried alive while asleep. And there is no end to this, no limit. Forgive us, Anya!

Jefff
Poor Russia! Really you need another 300 years to understand who is manipulating, scaring, and killing you. If you can mourn Anna today and then leave her in peace, then she wasn't needed by you in life. Today it's too late, however. Anna knew what she was doing and you should too. Condolences to both of you.

Katerina
The murder of any journalist is terrible. It is a gag, by which they shut our mouth. I am sorry for Anna, such a talented and purposeful person. It is pitiful and terrible that deeds such as this are still possible...

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