In March, there will be a single voting day. “Elections” will be held in ten regions. Then, at the end of 2011, there will be nationwide “elections” to the State Duma (the lower house of Russia’s parliament). We all understand perfectly well that these are not elections at all, but simply an unlawful procedure as a result of which representatives of the Party of Crooks and Thieves — United Russia will announce to us, “We received 65% of the vote.”
What should be done in this situation? I am forced to admit that my favorite idea — boycotting elections — has failed. It simply does not work. That is, of course, nobody goes to vote, but not because they are boycotting it; they just no longer pay any attention. I think the time has come for all decent people in our country to change political strategy. Our new concept should be: COME TO THE ELECTIONS AND VOTE AGAINST UNITED RUSSIA. That means for any other party — it does not matter which one. No need to explain to me that A Just Russia is no different from United Russia, that Zhirik (Vladimir Zhirinovsky) is bad, or that the Communist Party is ancient. None of that matters in the slightest. You are voting **against the Party of Crooks and Thieves. **We must destroy United Russia’s monopoly on power. ** **Why do this if they are just going to “cook up” 65% anyway? Elections are stressful for this vile government in any case. Falsification is a complicated process involving tens of thousands of people (election commission members, etc.). Regional administrations where elections will be held in March are doing practically nothing except managing the falsifications. Inflating a real 35% into 65% is fairly difficult. Inflating 20% into 65% will be even harder. We must increase their stress. Will it actually create problems? Absolutely. In reality, only 15–20% of the population goes to vote now. There is a very large amount of early voting (read: fake voting). So, put simply, United Russia’s votes are the votes of 7–10% of the electorate. If we bring 1% of people to the polls who did not go before, we will create a major problem. If 5%, a colossal one. If 15%, then
Why is this better than a boycott? Because all activists from other parties will support this kind of action, and we will not have to fight long, pointless battles with them over the subject of a boycott. In effect, we immediately gain hundreds of thousands of supporters for our campaign. ** The goal of the campaign is simple: to push two simple messages as widely as possible, both online and offline United Russia is the party of crooks and thieves. Be sure to come to the elections and vote against United Russia. Vote for any other party. ** We have no deadline. We have no technical metrics. No time frame. We are in no hurry. Strictly speaking, the current elections and their result mean nothing to us. And in general, all of this can be done without straining ourselves — while having fun and enjoying it. To begin with, I would suggest holding a trash-poster contest. There are three requirements: The poster must be A4 format, so that anyone can print it on a home or office printer and hang it in the building entrance, elevator, next to their desk at work, in the office cafeteria\restroom — anywhere. Take it to your grandmother and hang it on her door so the old lady remembers how to vote. The poster can contain anything, but it must clearly convey two basic messages: 1) United Russia is the party of crooks and thieves 2) Come to the elections and vote for any party, but against United Russia. How those messages are delivered does not matter — pictograms, holograms, whatever. By the way, you can also use the little verses from the spontaneous contest on Twitter. They can be found under the tag #er Things like: Want to place your relatives on a board of directors? Join the Party of Crooks and Thieves! Not ashamed to rob people in full public view? We need you in the party of thieves and crooks! In United Russia, everyone’s children are indigo kids (a Russian buzzword for supposedly gifted children): by age 20 they already have factories, yachts, and villas! and so on. I am not going to spend long inventing the contest format — I will simply steal it from tema Lebedev. Please post the images strictly in top-level comments. Then I will collect everything and organize a vote. There are no prizes yet. I wanted to personally present an iPhone to the winner, but then I thought the shrieking would start: “Oh, they are disgracing our party for iPhones and rocking the boat.” We will think about what to do regarding prizes. Later we will gather the posters in one place and invite everyone who wants to download, print, and distribute them. I am sure that in a couple of months we will definitely put up a million or two. And let the crooks choke on their Channel One (Russia’s main state TV channel). Many thanks in advance to everyone who takes part. If anyone has the ability to launch something similar on Leprosorium (a popular Russian online community) and other similar sites, that would also be excellent. UPD Just look for yourselves — aren’t these news items wonderful? The “Party of Crooks and Thieves” website has moved to a new domain