Dead Souls: Not Just A Pop Culture Reference

George W. Bush may be a douchebag but Vladimir Putin is a devil of a man. In 2001, Genius George revealed that he had sensed Putin's sympathetic soul after a face to face meeting. At the time the flap was all about the Bush ability, obviously on loan from God via Limbaugh, to peer into peoples' souls. A claimed psychic insight seen foremost as a manifestation of the President's guileless religious quackery. Yet the day Bush marked Putin as his democratic kindred spirit was the day he cemented his legacy as moron extraoridnaire. In a spell binding Vanity Fair article, Masha Gessen highlights Mother Russia's own misreading of Putin. Talk about rich comedies turned to horror. The very idea that this tiny man from the KGB could have been the successor to the Yeltsin's democratic leanings is frightful and the consequences both mind boggling and heart exploding. The Family mistakenly thought they could manipulate Putin but like Bush they were victims of the ultimate oxymoron, their own faulty intelligence.

Vodka Baths and Secret Police Dreams

To get an idea of just how hard the Ruskies have been hit by the global economic slump, look at recent market statistics on the country's most vital commodity. Not oil. Vodka. Newly impoverished Russians can no longer afford their national spirit. Sales are plummeting and stockpiles are soaring. The government says that store shelves are stocked with six times as much unsold vodka as last year at this time.

"People are having to save money, including on drinks, and this is connected to the impact of the financial crisis on people's disposable incomes," Pavel Shapkin, president of the National Alcohol Association, told Reuters. It's enough to drive Russians to drink. And it has. Shapkin said that 1,458 people died of alcohol poisoning in September, most of them after drinking homemade or bootleg spirits that are cheaper than store-bought vodka. It was the first time that alcohol poisonings grew in Russia since 2006.

That prompted vodkamakers to call for an American-style solution: a government bailout."At times like this, any grandmother can collect some old bottles, fill them with whatever she wants, and sell them to the alcoholics that are trying to save some money," Shapkin said. "The government has to do something for these people trying to afford the most basic essentials in life."

This is one case where the Russians are luckier than us because our government is too busy helping out Banks and Cars to be looking out for Joe Alcoholic. But heck it's easy enough to make your own hooch. Be Still My Liver.

Ruck Fussia

After reading my prediction that Zimbabwe is doomed, Russian politico Igor Panarin counters with the assertion that the USA is done for and it will soon split into 6 parts. You know what this means? More government!

Asked why he expected the U.S. to break up into separate parts, Panarin said: "A whole range of reasons. Firstly, the financial problems in the U.S. will get worse. Millions of citizens there have lost their savings. Prices and unemployment are on the rise. General Motors and Ford are on the verge of collapse, and this means that whole cities will be left without work. Governors are already insistently demanding money from the federal center. Dissatisfaction is growing, and at the moment it is only being held back by the elections and the hope that Obama can work miracles. But by spring, it will be clear that there are no miracles." He also cited the "vulnerable political setup", "lack of unified national laws", and "divisions among the elite, which have become clear in these crisis conditions." He predicted that the U.S. will break up into six parts - the Pacific coast, with its growing Chinese population; the South, with its Hispanics; Texas, where independence movements are on the rise; the Atlantic coast, with its distinct and separate mentality; five of the poorer central states with their large Native American populations; and the northern states, where the influence from Canada is strong. He even suggested that "we could claim Alaska - it was only granted on lease, after all."

Governor Palin, can't you do something about this Russian incursion into the American pysche? How stupid could we have been to let those Michiganders have control of all our cars.