Vladimir Putin: “Power is a most addictive thing…”

Prime Minister Vladimir Putin (1952- ), former RF President 2000-08, pious Orthodox Christian and man of good-sense

Editor’s Foreword:

You hear much blather today concerning the “authoritarian” and “undemocratic” nature of the Russian leadership. I believe that the following from Vladimir Putin puts that canard to rest permanently. Would that we had such honest and good men as leaders in the West!

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Asked whether he had been tempted to go for an unconstitutional third term as president, Mr Putin fired back, “Never. Power is a most addictive thing, the most intoxicating thing. But, I have never been addicted to anything”, he said. He admitted, though, that he was now a bit tired and would like a rest. “Over the years I’ve been working my back off like in a salt mine”, he said.

15 February 2008

Luke Harding

The Guardian

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008/feb/15/russia.kosovo (in English)

Editor’s Afterword:

Russian paratroopers in a religious procession on the feastday of St Ilya (2 August), the patron of the airborne troops. If you hear nonsense about a “neo-Soviet Union”, remember this picture. It destroys every neocon argument in the book. 

You can believe George Bush or you can believe Dmitri Medvedev and Vladimir Putin. I believe that the above statements make it clear where the right stands. It stands in Christian Russia, not in Nihilistic Therapeutic America. God bless Russia, its leadership, and its people. They have come a long way, there is still a good way to go, but, they are on the right road. The American chattering classes are on the road to perdition. The rest of us need not follow them. Decency and good sense, let alone Christianity, tell us to reach out to our fellow Russian Christians. It is what God expects of us. We should do it, and right smartly.