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Friday, May 04, 2007

Breaking News: Yushchenko, Yanukovych Reach Compromise; Parliamentary Elections Will Be Held Within 60 Days of Required Legislation's Passage

15 comments:

DLW said...

Thank God,

that's good news!

dlw

Taras said...

So much for that civil war business.

DLW said...

Now if the opposition can only make sure there is some money left in the Ukraine gov't prior to the election and use the media to let people know that the spending spree of PoR et al is fiscally irresponsible.

dlw

Anonymous said...

And the Ukrainian stock market reached a new record after two hrs of trading. (heavy sarcasm warning: Yes, Ukraine business needs help.) Sigh.

Will this mean that all legislation passed by the Rada will be codified into law as legal?

Where is Yulia?

Luida

Taras said...

David, the "consumer paradise" they have in store (or perhaps better, the "paternalistic paradise") certainly flies in the face of their supply-side policy of low wages for workers and low taxes for big business.

However, I wouldn’t call this inconsistency entirely irresponsible. We Ukrainians deserve every cent of it. After all, we’re the ones who built the economy — from WWI to WWII, from the Holodomor to perestroika. The oligarchs didn’t build anything. They simply bagged it.

Of course, inflation remains a huge concern. Still, the metals, Ukraine’s export mainstay, are trading well, and the elections are indeed our chance to get an ounce of that “better living today” Yanukovych promised. The idea being that the more prosperous we are, the less prone we will be to paternalism.

Taras said...

Luida, I’m sure you know that the Ukrainian stock market is a joke:) The current trading volume doesn’t affect the closely-held, pre-IPO economy at all. But whatever the Ukrainian stock market is, the election deal did give it a boost:)

Since our business and government suffer from the same disease, called crony capitalism, there’s no cure like competition. (One, two, the WTO’s coming for you;)

When business and government stick together, bad things happen. But when they learn together, good things happen.

A lot needs to be hammered out by the working group. Legislation is the bottleneck, and yes, that means taking a ride back to the old Rada. (We should be careful, though, not to let ourselves be taken for a ride.)

More on Yulia in my latest post.

Anonymous said...

Legislation's passing?

did the opposition MPs who left Rada work themselves out of a job? and can Constitutional legislation be passed (not 300 votes) without them?

Luida
--------------
"Verkhovna Rada Deputy Yaroslav Mendus (Socialist Party faction) says that people's deputies from the Yulia Tymoshenko Bloc and the Our Ukraine Bloc cannot return to the Rada, as they have surrendered their parliamentary mandates.

He said this from the parliamentary rostrum on Tuesday.

"The opposition cannot return to parliament without undergoing appropriate procedures, because they said they had abdicated their parliamentary responsibilities," he said. "

Taras said...

Happy Den Peremohy:)!

Luida, in the event BYuTies are barred from returning, NSNUzers, who haven’t convinced the CEC to relieve them of their MP status, will supply enough votes.

But I’m sure that BYuTies will have no problem finding their way back to the Rada, should the occasion arise. Regionalists would want the highest degree of legitimacy for a campaign they hope to win.

Anonymous said...

Happy День Перемоги - for whom?


http://russophobe.blogspot.com/2007/05/annals-of-russian-dark-ages-estonia-in_09.html

To Russians, the statue was a tribute to their overwhelming losses in World War II -- which they know as the Great Patriotic War. To Estonians, it was a reminder of a half-century of Soviet occupation during which the Kremlin shot thousands of Balts; sent hundreds of thousands to Siberia; moved hundreds of thousands of Russians in to take their places; and tried to eradicate their culture, their language and any memory of independence.


The trouble is that Russia has never acknowledged this history, and under Putin it grows less and less willing to do so. The passing of the Soviet Union is mourned, the old KGB is celebrated -- imagine if Germans continued to honor the Gestapo -- and the current independence of former Soviet states is treated as a transitory error. Neither Putin nor even his foreign minister has deigned to pay a bilateral visit to independent Tallinn. Virtually every neighbor -- Georgia, Ukraine, Latvia, Lithuania, even Finland -- has been subjected to bullying.

Taras said...

That’s a good question. WWII did not leave a single, uniform legacy. First and foremost, it was a victory over Nazism, a victory over Hitler’s Germany. And Ukraine, having suffered more human casualties than Germany, was among the nations that made the victory happen.

Unfortunately, this victory also gave a boost to a tyranny no less repressive — the tyranny of the Kremlin. Its ultimate collapse in the Cold War and subsequent oligarchization has left the veterans in chaos and poverty, longing for a past in which they felt victorious, a past they felt at home with. These folks didn’t grow up in the Information Age, and, even worse, the oligarchs have learned to play with their feelings. And as the gremlins from the Kremlin pump more oil and gas, rhapsodizing about Russia’s glorious past, they seem to be little concerned about Moscow becoming a haven for neo-Nazis. (I don’t want any progress in that direction for Kyiv or any other place.)

True, the Red Army, unlike the Wehrmacht, used its troops for cannon fodder. Does it mean that the Soviet soldiers gave their lives for an unworthy cause? I don’t think so. They fought for their families. They didn’t fight for Stalin, but against Hitler; they fought to free their native towns and villages from the invaders. And so did the UPA (Ukrainian Insurgent Army) — only its fighters targeted both Hitler and Stalin. Their struggle, too, deserves recognition.

We all know that WWII, inspired by two mustached -isms, resulted in brutal Soviet expansion into western Ukraine, Eastern Europe, and the Baltics. Let there be no doubt: If I lived in Estonia, I’d learn Estonian and pass my citizenship exam with flying colors. Still, I don’t understand why Estonia, secure under the NATO umbrella, should assist Russia in crowning Putin’s heir. I think two Putins is one two many.

Taras said...

Two Putins is one too many:)

Anonymous said...

Elmer here.

They didn't fight for Stalin?

Stalin, the "Father of All Nations, Our Father, Our Leader, Our Teacher"?

http://rep-ua.com/show/gallery.php?what=g&id=900&photo=900-2151119994.jpg


They are still carrying icons of Stalin today.

http://vkhokhl.blogspot.com/

It's unbelievable how people can glorify a murderer.

"Stabilnost"!

Taras said...

As you know, there weren’t too many slogans to choose from. They “fought" for Stalin to the extent that they associated him with the struggle. (“Za Rodinu, za Stalina!”)

Stalin’s portraits are a mixture of nostalgia and protest. Uncle Joe kept the communist dream alive, and stabilnist can barely pay their bills.

These folks come from a different era and are too old for re-education. They went through hell. We can’t blame them for being messed up.

I just want to say that the people who sacrificed their lives for their homeland must not be forgotten.

Anonymous said...

"I just want to say that the people who sacrificed their lives for their homeland must not be forgotten."

Amen for that. In the end, they fought for their solider in arms (comrades) and for their family and country (however they defined it.) And they include the many men, women, children and elderly who fought, suffered, died, as civilians. Not only the vets but all.

Anonymous said...

I'm not so sure that Stalin is not an "icon" and more just protest and nostalgia. I think for some he is a god-like figure and/or embodiment. He is an identifiable past, a connection, a figure despised, a figure revered, a locus of fear, a point of order and discipline. I wish someone would do a sociological study in connection with his name and image as it, I think, would be quite interesting. As Kuzio terms it - homo Sovieticus.

Luida