If as Kremlin Claims Sanctions are Hurting the West but Not Russia, Why is It that Western Leaders Aren’t Demanding They be Lifted? Russians Ask

Paul Goble

            Staunton, June 6 – Russian officials demand that the West lift its sanctions on Russia even though they insist that the sanctions are hurting the West more than they are hurting Russia; but if that’s true, Russians are now asking, why aren’t Western leaders demanding the end of the sanctions regime?

            That is just one of the new anecdotes Moscow journalist Tatyana Pushkaryova has assembled which highlight the ways in which Russian reactions to what is going on are very much at odds with those of the Kremlin (publizist.ru/blogs/107374/43110/-). Among the best of the rest:

·       By means of his special operation in Ukraine, Putin has achieved something no one thought possible: he’s succeeded in getting Japan to attend a NATO summit.

 ·       Russian media are trumpeting the fact that psychics and shamans are predicting the collapse of Ukraine. Are they really the best sources of political analysis the Kremlin has?

 ·       The Kremlin says that each day, Russia is gaining new experience in how best to conduct a military operation. One can’t dispute that, but it is entirely possible to imagine that Hitler and his aides said the same thing at the beginning of 1945.

 ·       A drunken Russian attacked a child on a train near Moscow for carrying a backpack with the colors of the Ukrainian flag. None of the other passengers defended the child, although they filmed the incident on their cellphones. That shows how successful Russia’s countrywide mobilization is.

 ·       Import substitution doesn’t mean that Russian firms will now produce what Russia used to import from the West; it only means that Russia will now import those goods from China rather than from Europe.