What's Going on in Russia

I've been pretty happy lately. This feeling has extended to my political interests. While I don't really care much about the upcoming Presidential race, my candidate for Louisiana Governor did win in the primary election. So it seems that I have been looking for a cause.

Thanks to Audible Mind, I seem to have found one.

http://audiblemind.blogspot.com/2007/10/gary-kasparov-speaks-out-against-putin.html

In this post, Audible Mind shows an interview of Chess Grandmaster Gary Kasparov by the Wall Street Journal. This is extremely interesting since he is giving an extremely unfavorable description of Putin's Russia. I encourage any readers of this blog to view the video. Watch until the end where Kasparov is obviously aware that even in today's Russia, dissent can be punished by death and how he acknowledges and accepts that risk. This is a truly great act on the part of Kasparov. He has taken the role of intellectual revolutionary and could possibly bring about much needed reform in Russia.

I was jaded about the Russian government until recently. Rather than being the first look at a secretive and authoritarian regime, this is in fact the culmination of the secrecy of that regime. The secrecy provided the doubt and Kasparov is providing the affirmation of that doubt.

My man of the year is definitely Gary Kasparov.