In Moscow, another knock at the door

"In Moscow, unexpected knocks at the door can bear ill tidings," wrote Pulitzer Prize-wining journalist Hedrick Smith in The New Russians (Random House, 1990). The man at Russia's door is Vladimir Putin. It seems he's back. And this time, comrade, he's planning a long visit with you. Your permission is not required. Today, Russian President Dmitry Medvedev announced that he will not stand for reelection. Instead, Putin, the man he replaced in office, will now replace him. One Russian observer wryly told the NY Times: “They decided between themselves who will hold which job. It’s like a swap in chess — my bishop for your rook.” So it seems. Technically, the Russian congress must vote to make it official. "But that's already a foregone conclusion, as is his victory in a general election against underfunded and undercut opposition groups," New York magazine reported. Also noteworthy are recent constitutional changes that extend presidential terms from four years to six. If Putin serves two terms (a likely prospect), his total time in power will rival Stalin's 30-year tenure. It means the ex-KGB spymaster will have near Czar-like power. Hopes for more democratic reforms are bleak, not that there is a Russian groundswell for them. "[M]ost Russians feel no nostalgia for the chaotic political pluralism of the 1990s," reported the Times. Hedrick Smith observed that the Russian character "tend to make public life intractable and pose formidable obstacles to reform: their escapism, their impracticality, their lackadaisical attitude toward work and their vicious envy of people who try to get ahead." Indeed, the "flip side of Russian generosity and sentimentality is Russian irresponsibility and impracticality," he wrote. Alas, "it is the Russian soul," as the poet Andrei Voznesensky put it. The Medvedev-Putin Gambit is but the latest confirmation that nothing much has changed in Mother Russia.