Riots, Revolutions, and Russia

Preface / Introduction
Oppression will never suppress a Nations Right to Freedom 1. The Spider of the Kremlin and his cunning webs. The man who would be tsar and the Ukraine he covets to distraction. Vladimir Putin. The situation in Kiev. Some thoughts on a great people determined to be truly free. 2. Russia's most famous band hasn't released a single song. Why then do we admire what Pussy Riot is doing and need to support them?

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Table of Contents
1. Russia's most famous band hasn't released a single song. Why then do we admire what Pussy Riot is doing and need to support them? 2. The Spider of the Kremlin and his cunning webs. The man who would be tsar and the Ukraine he covets to distraction. Vladimir Putin. The situation in Kiev. Some thoughts on a great people determined to be truly free.

Riots, Revolutions, and Russia

Russia's most famous band hasn't released a single song. Why then do we admire what Pussy Riot is doing and need to support them?
by Dr. Jeffrey Lant Ordinarily Russian punk rock girl bands aren't my cup of tea. Call me old fashioned but my knowledge of and interest in Russian composers and their music ends with Prokofiev. But I am making a strenuous exception in the case of what is now Russia's most celebrated band, Pussy Riot. In fact, consider me amongst their most enthusiastic fans... for all that I have never heard a note of their music... and neither have their fervent adherents back in the old USSR or anywhere else. Notwithstanding this admitted drawback, don't be surprised to find me outfitted shortly in their trademark balaclava with a lurid t-shirt with their name and logo. I shall be wicked cool for sure. Even more importantly, with this garish garb I shall be reminding not just the powers that be in the Kremlin but everywhere on Earth that injustice somewhere empowers injustice everywhere. And as long as I have breath in my commentator body, I stand against injustice... I rise against the big guys who trammel the rights of the little guys... and I shall never accept the proposition that because we cannot solve every outrage, we should do nothing to remedy a single outrage. That is why I am taking this opportunity to tell you about three young women in Moscow whose right to be outrageous, bombastic, uncivil and rude has been crushed by a man who never met a single form of free speech that he liked, approved of, or tolerated, except of course his own. This man's name is Putin, and he is reason enough for constant scrutiny of and grave doubts about the "new" Russia... for in such matters as this it looks remarkably like the pernicious aspects of the defunct Soviet Union itself and the tsars who preceded it. In short, this is a thoroughly Russian story which could have taken place at the court of any ancient grand prince and where Mr. Putin's views would not only have been understood but appreciated, and that is yet another reason why I must write this story today, for the grand princes of Muscovy were masters of evisceration, eradication, and execution... liberty, save only for themselves, was never part of their dark rule. The players. To understand this event, you must know the players. There are essentially four of them. First, Vladimir V. Putin, president of Russia, shop-worn, re-elected in May, 2012 under questionable circumstances, a man determined that his views shall prevail, never mind detritus like bills of rights, constitutions and other paraphernalia of a democracy he disdains and subverts at his pleasure. Make no mistake about it, Putin understands power and never fails to use it, no matter the injustices that thereby ensue. So long as he gets his way, it matters not how many of these injustices he engenders. That is a mere detail of interest only to sentimentalists and cranks. The Russian Orthodox Church. It is important to remember that in the days when consecrated tsars ruled all the Russias they did so with the ardent support of the Russian Orthodox Church. Indeed, tsardom without the church was unthinkable. Thus when the tsars fell forever, the Communists despoiled the church. But they could not kill it and so the bearded patriarchs bided their time always believing that they would return to the Third Rome that is Moscow and prevail. After all, they were God's elect. In Putin they found a man who would assist them; never mind he believed only in Putin, not the Eternal Father or anything else. They could, they both discovered, work together and profitably for all. It was an understanding the church had satisfactorily had with even the most http://www.TheHomeOfficePeople.com Copyright Lisa Martiniuk - 2013 4 of 10

Riots, Revolutions, and Russia profitably for all. It was an understanding the church had satisfactorily had with even the most barbaric and murderous of tsars. The members of Pussy Riot. Nadezhda Tolokonnikova, 23, Yekaterina Samutsevich, 30, and Maria Alyokhina, 24, are three earnest young women dedicated to "revolution", a word which has caused Russia unbearable suffering, dislocation, miseries virtually unmatched in the calendar of human crimes and brutalities. It is against these women that President Putin has hurled the unmitigated apparatus of the Russian state, unknown when he did so... now heroines, if only for an instant. You. The fourth group is a heterogeneous hodge-podge of protesting Russian citizens, fellow travelers, human rights organizations, and Western governments, including the United States... and, after reading this article... you, a person who must believe in the widest latitude for political free speech as an essential element of our freedom and thus stand firmly against its diminution as inimical to the most robust and challenging of human expression...for all that you may disagree with what is said, done, and promoted. Here is where Vladimir Putin and the civilized world part company, never the twain shall meet. The incident. The matter began in February when the women infiltrated the Cathedral of Christ the Savior. There they wore their colorful balaclavas and pranced around in front of the golden Holy Doors leading to the altar, dancing, chanting and lip-syncing for what would later become a music video of a profane song in which they beseeched the Virgin Mary to rid Russia of Putin. And this was perhaps the key fact of all... for surely a man more powerful than the Romanovs rightly took umbrage at any act of lese majeste'. Such incidents must be dealt with, swiftly, thoroughly, with maximum punishment. It was only right. And so three women who had no resources, no powerful friends, no standing were immediately jailed under the noxious conditions a by-word in Russia. In due course, they faced their ordeal... and a verdict that staggered the world, for in no way did the punishment fit the crime. It did, however, make a mockery of the "justice" of "new" Russia and the vengeance and vindictiveness which have always been Putin's own. While they might have faced seven years in prison, prosecutors had urged a three- year sentence; in fact they received two years. Moscow Judge Marina Syrova said in her sentencing the three women were a danger to society, their crimes "grave", insulting and humiliating the Christian faith, inciting "religious hatred." The fact that every word from the judge's mouth was wrong, a deliberate lie was irrelevant. It was what the regime and the church wanted... and they, not the hapless women, had the means to get it. When the verdict was announced the awaiting crowd howled angrily, then fell into a stunned silence that suggested how terribly far Putin's Russia has to go and how hard the opposition must work. All over Russia that evening there was sadness, profound, haunting, despairing at all that must be done and how long it must take. As for Putin, there was no compassion in his victory. Pussy Riot and the verdict had given him what he wanted, the opportunity to extol the church while excoriating his opponents as obscene, disrespectful rabble-rousers, liberal urbanites backed by the West standing against the great verities of Mother Russia as exemplified, of course, by Putin himself. It was Putin at his most hypocritical, master of a cynicism that has no superior and which delivered him of all people the plaudits of revered religion. As for Pussy Riot, they will soon be forgotten and shunted aside unless they are able to turn this outrageous matter into a soul touching song that rekindles hope and inspiration in the downtrodden everywhere. Friends, I give you Woodie Guthrie's immortal song "This Land Is Your Land" (1944) with its sharp assertion that "this land was made for you and me." "This land" now means our planet http://www.TheHomeOfficePeople.com Copyright Lisa Martiniuk - 2013 5 of 10

Riots, Revolutions, and Russia itself and that includes Russia. It was all made for you and me. Go now and find it in any search engine. Let its soaring declaration ring out, even unto the Kremlin which so needs to hear it. Sadly, it is unlikely anyone will ever hear such a song from Pussy Riot. Why? Not because they are persecuted but, far worse, because they have no talent and hence no adoring audience of fans and devoted listeners... and never will. How do I know? You see, they have never recorded a single number or sent samples of their oeuvre to such major artists as Madonna and Sting who have offered to help them gain a worldwide hearing and following. Any ambitious, talented folks would have seized this opportunity to rise high fast, victims of an outrage that gave them e'clat forever. But Pussy Riot cannot... because the fickle Muse doesn't speak to them or inspire... and that is the most ironic and sad aspect of this case, for it only makes Vladimir's smile the broader and more sardonic. No wonder the opposition is chagrined today and sad, for while Putin and his message are clear, they have only a small band whose members cannot sing or raise up the people... and that is cause enough for their great despair.

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Riots, Revolutions, and Russia

The Spider of the Kremlin and his cunning webs. The man who would be tsar and the Ukraine he covets to distraction. Vladimir Putin. The situation in Kiev. Some thoughts on a great people determined to be truly free.
by Dr. Jeffrey Lant Author's program note. In 1866 Tsar Alexander II of All the Russias came to visit the greatest city in his restive province of Ukraine... and there he almost died at the hands of an assassin determined to prove that progressive thinkers are the most tempting targets of all. Tsar Alexander had liberated the serfs and so gained the opprobrium of the Left for not going far enough and of the Right for going too far. Thus he supplied any number of stealthy killers with grounds for murderous action. And so what came to be called the "Event of April 4, 1866" took place. This time, however, his imperial majesty survived... and he wanted that fact commemorated in the most public and grandiose of ways. A design competition was decreed. Hundreds of ideas poured in from inspired loyalists sincerely grateful Father Romanov had survived... and from starving artists who would have taken a commission from the Devil himself, whatever strings were attached. However one design stood out from the rest, artist Victor Hartmann's majestic vision for The Great Gate of Kiev. It was a great structure for the capital city of a great people, and Hartmann poured himself and his artistic distinction into a work designed to amaze the world and thrill Ukrainians everywhere, the supreme manifestation of how they saw themselves despite every vicissitude and how they wanted everyone else to see them. The sketch for stone gates to replace the wooden gates of Kiev incorporated a cupola in the form of a Slavonic helmet. In the design, the archway rested on granite pillars and its peak was to be decorated with a huge headpiece of Russian carved designs including the Russian state eagle, the very symbol of Ukrainian subservience and despair. But it wouldn't be an authentic story of Ukraine unless there was heartbreak and woe, for here is lamentation indeed. Upon reconsideration the Tsar decided to cancel the competition. A memorial seemed to be tempting fate, motivating any of the numerous opponents to his reign to try again... and again... until at last in 1881 they succeeded in blowing him and his entourage to bloody fragments, the very steps of the palace smeared with gore and death. As for Hartmann, he died prematurely, just 39... his friend Modest Petrovich Mussorgsky (1839-1881) devastated but determined to commemorate the one gone before. And so he composed a classical piano suite of genius ("The Great Kiev Gate") as part of his magnum opus "Pictures at an Exhibition", memorializing Hartmann's final exhibition of over 400 works demonstrating mastery of line, form, light, and color. The work commenced in sorrow and profound grief was finished in triumph... then neglected by all, thrust aside, unheard until the great French musician Maurice Ravel in 1922 took the matter in hand, arranging the music so that ignoring it was no longer possible. It was grandiose, soaring, stately, bombastic, at once as intimate as prayer and as adamant as God's will... a work of insistent hope for each, hope for all, hope for the nation that still was in bondage, patient, biding its time, expectant, sure their day of deliverance would come... the resounding bells, audacious, bold, majestic, surely meant that if they meant anything at all for this land, this charnel house of centuries, a chimera, so rarely a country and never for long. Gloria in excelsis Deo... http://www.TheHomeOfficePeople.com Copyright Lisa Martiniuk - 2013 7 of 10

Riots, Revolutions, and Russia house of centuries, a chimera, so rarely a country and never for long. Gloria in excelsis Deo... Go now to any search engine and play it at once. Listen as the great bells call you to action, for if you believe in freedom then you must heed this tocsin. There cannot be freedom until there is freedom for all. And that is why the actions of the Ukrainian people in recent days are so important to us. No matter where we are, we are all Ukrainians today, hearts beating for a single goal: Freedom here! Freedom now! Freedom forever! Geography is destiny. This is the first rule of international politics, and there is no better example on Earth than Ukraine, rich, accessible, disorganized, ineffectual, internally divided. To look at the history of Ukraine is to see God at his most ironic. Pick any time in its checkered history, and you will find the same tragic tale, repeated over and over again; the theme established long ago. You will see a numerous people (46 million today) of intelligence, ingenuity, hard work and solid habits. A massive territory of some 233,000 square miles, making it the largest in Europe. And you will find above all the good earth, incomparable, fertile, productive, a treasure trove which enables Ukraine to be the third largest grain exporter on Earth. >From this blessed asset has come every good thing... and every bad, for the good earth promised everything but ensured it would be stolen by others, near at hand, voracious, rapacious, masters of avarice and thievery and every attendant toxin. Ukraine has had, has now every element necessary for greatness... except the secret to building and sustaining a nation, the coherence of a united people fiercely dedicated to one overriding objective, united to produce one nation under God. This is, of course, just the way their greatest enemy likes it. That enemy is Vladimir Putin, president of the Russian Federation, the Spider of the Kremlin, working day and night to subjugate Ukraine to his will, not to the silly notion of the people's will. Thus every step towards Europe Ukraine takes is automatically perceived by Putin as a thrust against him and the good old days of robust Moscow- driven Communism, the good old days he cannot forget and which he yearns to have again. He has the drive, the resources, and the resolute determination to make it happen. We must never forget this... for Putin is our most dangerous, most energetic opponent, without moral limits, without scruples, with nothing to lose and an empire to (re)gain. He remembers Moscow is just 450 miles from Kiev; it is a statistic constantly on his mind. The saddest day of Putin's life: December 26, 1991. On this day the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR), the gravest menace to human rights, personal freedom, capitalism and private property collapsed forever; it was the biggest Christmas present the West and its peoples have ever received. There was literally dancing in the streets and near universal joy. "Near" because people like Putin sat in morose darkness nursing cheap liquor, wondering how it all went so very wrong... vowing revenge and restoration, a vow that they made over and over again as they watched all the former Soviet Republics leave like so many rats from the sinking ship; once comrades, now renegades, contemptible, budding antagonists. Nowhere was this more true than with Ukraine, once the jewel in the Red crown, now Putin's chief obsession in whatever office he currently condescends to adorn. Of course this was known to every notable Ukrainian politician and every such politician played the game of centuries. They were more pro-Russian in eastern Ukraine; more pro-European in western Ukraine. This was the formula for survival, and as every Ukrainian knows survival is the most important thing of all... until now... http://www.TheHomeOfficePeople.com Copyright Lisa Martiniuk - 2013 8 of 10

Riots, Revolutions, and Russia Time for history. For months now the Ukrainian government, headed by President Viktor Yanukovych has been engaged in serious negotiations to integrate the nation into the European Union. It had been expected that these far-reaching policies would be released to the world at an EU summit meeting in Vilnius, Lithuania, just the other day But the Spider of the Kremlin had other ideas...and so Ukraine President Yanukovych had to make very different arrangements, including being summoned to Putin for his instructions thereby showing the world just how little power he had, how much a puppet he was. Really, it might have been 1956 all over again. I expect Yanukovych demurred on this point or that; tried to argue for a less public humiliation. But that is not the Spider's way and after all the Spider is just 450 miles away... Thus did Yanukovych choose to do the Spider's bidding, the interests of Ukraine and its valiant people be damned. Riots, a people incensed, determined, provoked. The Events of November 21, 2013. As news spread of how Yanukovych had betrayed his nation and kow-towed to the Spider in the Kremlin, nefarious webs suddenly starkly apparent, the people of Ukraine exploded with wrath, mighty and long suppressed ire, and a purpose pure and exalted. It was the majesty of the people... and it was glorious to behold. The Spider no doubt offered his pathetic servant every soothing bromide but both must have soon known that this was no ordinary event... this was the fury of a great people... and it was directed at them. "I want the authorities to know that this is not a protest; this is a revolution!" said former interior minister Yuri V. Lutsenko on December 1, 2013 as he addressed a crowd of over 300,000 people in Kiev's Independent Square; a crowd demanding the fall of Yanukovych and new elections. And so it was... "Worse than a crime. A blunder." What did Putin do? He told his minion in no uncertain terms to disperse the people by any and all means. And so the police weighed in with force majeure, truncheons augmented by lethal chemical gas.This is the Spider's way, for he fears just one thing... a determined, united people... no spider, however poisonous can endure against that. And so he made it clear to his toady of Kiev that the severest methods be applied to disperse the protestors, all of them, wherever they meet, for all that these are a calm and reasonable people seeking nothing more than their right to assemble and to petition their government for redress of so many grievances, including their clear and unmistakable desire for the closest relations with Europe. However, as Napoleon's foreign minister Prince de Talleyrand once quipped on another matter, "This is worse than a crime. It's a blunder", for now the naked truth has been exposed for all the world to see, and it will continue to be seen so long as the people of Ukraine are determined to prevail, for they too have earned life, liberty, and the pursuit of their too long delayed pursuit of happiness. Now is the moment to seize your future. It is waiting for you in the streets of Kiev...

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Riots, Revolutions, and Russia

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About the Author Harvard-educated Dr. Jeffrey Lant is CEO of Worldprofit, Inc., providing a wide range of online services for small and-home based businesses. Services include home business training, affiliate marketing training, earn-at-home programs, traffic tools, advertising, webcasting, hosting, design, WordPress Blogs and more. Find out why Worldprofit is considered the # 1 online Home Business Training program by getting a free Associate Membership today. Photo Credit to New York Times. Republished with author's permission by Lisa Martiniuk http://TheHomeOfficePeople.com.

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