[Georgia Girl 2]

If you have been to Russia lately you would know that 50 miles outside of Moscow its oxcarts. Most roads are only passable in the dry season. Russia hasn’t produced a new product since about 1975. They export oil/gas and wheat. They have what is considered globally to be a modest economy. They have a conscript army. We track their boomers by the radiation leak trail they leave behind.

Krauthammer had it faily right when he said that Russia is a third world country with a 1st world military. Only the military is not that great. Russia has enough muscle to bully their immediate neighbors and thats about it. They are not at war with anybody for the simple fact that they cannot afford it.

[billakay]

If you have been to Russia lately you would know that 50 miles outside of Moscow its oxcarts. Most roads are only passable in the dry season. Russia hasn’t produced a new product since about 1975. They export oil/gas and wheat. They have what is considered globally to be a modest economy. They have a conscript army. We track their boomers by the radiation leak trail they leave behind.

I have been to Russia lately. I have spent a total of four months in Russia over four trips since 2009. I have traveled from Moscow to Krasnodar by car and Krasnodar to Moscow by train. I've been in Tula, Voronezh, and many other smaller cities along the way.

I have also traveled all over the Krasnodarskiy Krai by car. I have been in Timashevsk, Slavensk, Anapa, Dzhugba, Novorossiysk, Abrau-Dyurso, and innumerable small towns and villages along the way.

The conditions in the Russian countryside, at least west of the Urals where I have been are typically no worse than you might find in the backwoods of Pennsylvania or West Virginia here in the States.

Yes, Russian industry has been in the toilet since 1991, but they are steadily coming back. They do produce new cars, new consumer products, and new military hardware. Imported consumer products from cars to cell phones are readily available.

Russian education from elementary school to university is world class. Anecdotally, my perception is that the average Russian high school graduate is light years ahead of the average US graduate, especially in math and science.

Much of what we "know" about Russia is propaganda and misinformation.

[wetphoenix]

What about 1,500 miles east to the edge of Siberia? Not a Moscow or St.Petersburb, but Caterinburg - a mediocre industrial town in a class of Cleveland on the egde of Ural Mountains bordering West Siberia. Not an oxacart for sure. Kolyma highway: Not the first class, but paved. And just google map the place to learn what the freaking end of nowhere this place is.