Russian Oppostion

As the BBC points out today, the Russians have a slightly different way of handling political opposition parties.  They want to hold elections that look democratic, but they prefer not to have a “loyal opposition” especially one that identifies corruption in the ruling party.  They really haven’t changed much in their approach, though they may have cut down on the shooting of political opposition figures in public places.  That was crude and got international attention in a hurry.

What they are doing instead is criminalizing behavior, then prosecuting the candidate for those “crimes”, then using that prosecution as a basis for denying them a place on the ballot.  You could ask Alexei Navalny how this works, since he is the latest target, though he has been for quite awhile.  He needs venues to speak to crowds, but to get a permit he needs permission from local governments.  Local governments won’t give permission, so he holds the rallies anyway.  He gets arrested and given a short jail sentence, or as the first case, a suspended jail sentence requiring him to avoid further such crimes.  Before our local politicians see this and say, “Gosh, I wish I had thought of that,” we need to condem this kind of transparent dictatorship for what it is.