Originally posted by sparassid
Yeah there are a lot of Putin apologists and paid trolls shovelling and polishing Putin's sh*t in the comments.
Unfortunately they are wrong. While Russia's national debt isn't too bad (~20% of GDP - which is not "virtually no debt"), their GDP growth since 2011 has averaged around 1% per year - shocking, especially for an emerging economy that should be growing fast.
Russia had some great growth years from around 1999 - 2011 (a lot of it fuelled by high oil prices) but they are in serious trouble now. Putin has done a terrible job diversifying the economy and has mostly just succeeding in embezzling as much of people's money for himself and his mates as possible.
I beg to differ Spara.
Have a look at what has been achieved by Putin since the fall of the USSR.
The country was going absolutely nowhere - precisely what the US wanted, IMO.
Putin has quietly made Russia great again - from a military point of view. They could not compete with the Americans on all fronts and went for offensive weapons. While it is difficult to gauge, I would place them in the super power category along with China.
The US was the sole super power- now there are three. So IMO the US has already lost and with idiots like Trump at the helm surrounded by madmen there is only one way for them - sadly, further south!
Yes sure, economically the Ruskies might be battling largely because of "sanctions" but I think this will lead to new alignments and a more resilient economy.
OK there might be corruption but, IMO, the scale of corruption in the US dwarfs those of most other countries. IMO it is a different type of "corruption" which is camouflaged by "democratic processes" - a bit like Mighty Rome - ensure the masses have bread and circuses and we can do whatever we like!!
