Posted on 01/01/2013 4:46:39 PM PST by MinorityRepublican
Edited on 01/01/2013 4:56:50 PM PST by Sidebar Moderator. [history]
Hard times: Eighteen-year-old prostitute Katya scours the street for work as a police car drives past in Moscow in 1991 shortly before the collapse of the USSR
These shocking pictures may look like something out of the Great Depression - but in fact they show life in the last years of the Soviet Union, less than three decades ago.
Shop shelves were often bare, it was normal to have to join a long queue if you wanted to buy groceries and many of the people looked ground down after a century of desperate poverty.
The dismal state of the USSR's economy, during a time of rapidly improving living standards in the West, was a result of its dogmatic Communist political system, which stifled free enterprise and stopped the country moving on from its feudal past.
As these images show, by the 1980s that system was close to collapse, as Mikhail Gorbachev's liberalising reforms did little more than open the door to ever louder clamours for change - and on Boxing Day 1991, just a few years after these photos were taken, the Soviet Union was finally dissolved.
The same is true for most of the younger Obama voters in America. For the most part those under 30 have never accomplished anything and never had much ambition or so it seems. But, what the heck - they've got an Iphone 5 and a new tattoo, Kim Kardasian is pregnant and Obama is hanging out with a new trainer named "Physical Cliff".
I know a young pregnant woman in that position (here) at this very moment. One long block away from me. We help but can't finance her whole life. She is a good person and not an abuser in any way. She also is chronically ill and can't work. There are tough stories everywhere. She gets a very small amount of help from the state but most of it was cut off until the divorce is complete (husband lied on TANF applications and so forth -- she has to wait until it gets straightened out). Oh, and the clothes washer just quit.
“All them cornfields and ballet in the evening.”
Peter Sellers - “I’m Alright, Jack”
But hey, at least they made the “rich” pay their “fair share.” /sarc /obastard
Karpov vs. Kasparov
I believe our Great Depression was worse.
As far as I know, standing in line with baskets hoping
for a shot at some dwindling, poorly distributed cornucopia of “goods” had been going on through ALL regimes prior to Gorbachev’s.
Remember, The Soviet Union had reached the end of its rope,
and a reformer named Gorbachev was soon in power.
While this probably didn’t revolutionize productivity, it
did give Russians a sense of new possibilities.
Our Depression virtually BEGAN with a statist BIG Gov President who
stayed in power for a 12 full years.
And OUR Depression was in black and white!
question for the military frees:
look at the tank picture, with the guy standing on it. by his left leg are four tubes pointing upward. what are they?
question for the military freeps:
look at the tank picture, with the guy standing on it. by his left leg are four tubes pointing upward. what are they?
Regardless, but with regards,
They were and are an admirable foe.
I fear that we will not fare as well, as we have become a nation of pu***’s.
I was in Moscow in 1991 (just in time for the Revolution) and saw first-hand how awful things were.
“Her mom came with her. The first time they entered a supermarket, her mom started screaming. Manager, et al came over to see what was the matter. Mom was overwhelmed at all the food available and freaked out..”
I saw this same thing with two Polish guys the first time they entered a supermarket over here in the mid 80’s. They stood in shock at the front door and had to compose themselves before entering. One started to weep. Then they were like two kids in a candy store.
launchers for smoke grenades.
The people were cool. The government not so cool.
On the lighter brighter side the USSR showed us how well income redistribution works - how 'from each according to his ability, to each according to his need...' really rocks.
Communists even had an early version of "ObamaCare" and totally disarmed their citizens. Progressives before our time... CNN would of loved them - the old New York Times really did... won a prize for covering their brilliant farming techniques that killed millions of Russians.
Of course Russian leaders did have to build walls to keep citizens in because everyone grew to hat the place... A cautionary tale to our 'leaders'....
On the lighter brighter side the USSR showed us how well income redistribution works - how 'from each according to his ability, to each according to his need...' really rocks.
Communists even had an early version of "ObamaCare" and totally disarmed their citizens. Progressives before our time... CNN would of loved them - the old New York Times really did... won a prize for covering their brilliant farming techniques that killed millions of Russians.
Of course Russian leaders did have to build walls to keep citizens in because everyone grew to hate the place... A cautionary tale to our 'leaders'....
=
As has been played out in Marxist regimes time and again: As individuals, Marxists never believe that they will be rendered expendable in the new People’s Paradise. They will never catch a bullet in the head. They will remain among the unassailable elite. It will always be the enemy, the opposition, the other guy; what they fail to understand is that as the criteria for acceptable thought and speech narrows, they become the other guy.
The delusion that it will never happen to them is simply narcissism, a quality Marxists possess in spades.
ping
US depression began with gov money printing to fund WWI. This falsely jacked up farm, crop, industrial labor wages and more causing a false boom. European agriculture recovered and food exports, prices, farm land collapses in early 1920’s, not recovering until WWII. Coolidge clearly saw Depression commingle. Hoover started near every FDR big gov intervention program. FDR ran against Hoover big gov. Until he got in office, then in best bucket of warm spits difference, FDR carried on Hoover’s central planning.
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