The FSB bombing, rappers in service, and a lawsuit against VK

[music]

Hello, everyone. It’s 8:00 p.m. in Moscow, and that

means Alexei Navalny is in the studio

— either a seasoned PR man or a manipulator.

A seasoned PR man and manipulator, as

the newspaper *Argumenty Nedeli* called me. And

you’re watching the live program *Russia of the

Future*. Now let’s do a little PR and

manipulating together.

And while I’m doing that, please send me

your questions with the hashtag

#RussiaOfTheFuture, and I’ll be answering

them. A terrorist attack has taken place in Russia.

Yes, that is quite a significant event. It seems to me

it received less attention

than it should have, because, well,

there was one death — the terrorist

himself, in fact. Three FSB officers

were seriously injured. But what matters is that this was

a very real, genuine

terrorist attack — absolutely classic,

straight out of a textbook. This young man

made a bomb and wrote

under the pseudonym Valeryan Panov

a special message in a VKontakte group

saying that there would shortly be an explosion at the

FSB. He went there and, in fact,

carried out the explosion, died himself, and injured

several FSB officers. He left behind

a manifesto in which he wrote that

the reasons were perfectly clear: the FSB fabricates cases

and tortures people. That is why he decided to

carry out, uh, this kind of terrorist

act in order to draw attention to

his ideology, to draw attention to

this problem. And it later emerged that

this young man had previously, online as well,

left messages saying that he

was planning to blow up the FSB and hated this

organization. Well, many people hate this

organization, and there are reasons to view it

negatively. But when someone writes

that he wants to blow something up, then surely

within the framework of normal

operational and investigative work, not

in the framework of monitoring who insulted Putin,

but in the framework of what security agencies

are actually supposed to do — if

someone writes that they are planning to

blow something up, that person should attract

attention. And

if that person is making an explosive

device, then in theory he should

be caught by that very security

system. That is what sharply distinguishes

this terrorist attack from that

horrific school shooting in Kerch (Crimea). There

it was impossible to understand anything. A person

bought a shotgun legally, then lost his mind and

went out and started shooting with it. Here, by contrast,

the young man left messages saying that

he wanted to blow something up. He did blow it up. The FSB missed

a real, classic terrorist attack complete with

a warning and a note.

But the worst thing happening

around this right now is that,

naturally, we begin discussing

why this terrorist attack happened. What

the young man wrote is, well, extremely

painful for the authorities. And, well, there is

a specific criminal statute called

“justifying terrorism.” So

one has to choose one’s words

carefully, so to speak. But let’s be honest:

he wrote — and repeatedly said —

that he did not want to serve in the

army because he did not want to defend

the rich, who keep their money offshore

and privatize the nation’s

wealth. But I think quite a

large number of Russian citizens

would agree with that statement. They,

of course — like any normal people — would be

against terrorist acts.

But the fact that this teenager, 17 years old,

this young man, was, frankly speaking,

disillusioned with life and focused on

such things should, it seems to me, be

front and center. That is, there are two questions

that should be front and center. First: why do people

resort to terrorist acts

instead of

participating in some way in

political struggle, simply stating

their goals or taking part? If you’re

unhappy about something, then participate

in public life in some way so that

you can turn your dissatisfaction into action, rather

than blowing things up. That’s the first point. And second: what is

the cause of all this? And our authorities’ response is, of course,

quite astonishing.

First of all, uh, the governor of

Arkhangelsk Region, Igor Orlov, made an absolutely

disgusting statement.

He, naturally, was the first to

rush out and start talking about what?

About rallies, of course, of course,

naturally. Someone blew himself up in the reception area of the

FSB and said he did it

because the FSB tortures people. And then out comes

the governor saying: “Well, it’s no surprise

that people are blowing themselves up. After all, at a number of

protest rallies, participants include

schoolchildren.” Of course, a direct link between

terrorists and protest rallies of

schoolchildren. Not university students — schoolchildren.

This is done not for the sake of substance, but for the crowd,

so as to look good afterward in front of

the people who commissioned this kind of event. So

apparently I am the one who commissioned this kind of

event, and the governor sees no

other causes of this terrorist attack. And

the governor is not interested in why the FSB

missed this terrorist attack. They have long been

reading through everything on VKontakte. VKontakte

provides them with any, absolutely any,

information. A person writes on that very

VKontakte: “I’m going to blow up the FSB.”

There’s someone sitting there thinking, "Right,

I’m going to blow up the FSB (Russia’s Federal Security Service), no big deal." But if it’s Putin,

is a bad, corrupt official, then immediately press

the red button and send people to this

address, because this is where the danger is. Not

where someone writes, "I’m going to blow something up," but where they criticize

Putin. The governor isn’t interested in that.

The governor says the cause of everything is

protests.

But even more impressively,

my favorite weighed in — a man who,

well, is probably more sophisticated than

the governor of Arkhangelsk Region,

who, well, is not a very smart man,

when it comes to explaining

the real reasons why

this terrorist attack happened. And it’s absolutely astonishing

that one of the main participants in this

attack, one of the main people to blame,

excuse me, for this attack, was named as — you

would never guess — journalist Aleksandr Plyushchev of Echo

of Moscow (a Russian radio station), who,

apparently says the wrong things,

comments the wrong way, and wrongly

covers various events. I don’t mind giving Vladimir Solovyov

a little airtime at all.

Let me give 51 seconds of my live

broadcast so that you can

hear Vladimir Rudolfovich

Solovyov’s version — the owner of elite

real estate on Lake Como in Italy — of

why the terrorist attack on the FSB reception office in Arkhangelsk

Region

happened.

Wait, let me read you another one

right now. You’ll like it. You and I

both love this stupid man,

right?

This is a consumer of Gazprom money and

German taxpayers’ money,

a citizen by the name of Plyushchev. After

it became clear that the explosion in Arkhangelsk

was carried out by a 17-year-old schoolboy, it became

even clearer that in our country they successfully fight only

those radicals whom they themselves

created.

So that’s astonishing

— no, really. This scoundrel doesn’t even

understand

his own guilt. Vinokurova doesn’t understand her

guilt. Godkov doesn’t understand his guilt. You

held an unauthorized protest by mothers

outside which building? And at which

building did this

anarchist scumbag blow himself up inside?

Don’t know? I’ll tell you:

it happened not just anywhere, but at the building of the

FSB.

Do you understand? Yes. What a lying,

hypocritical scumbag.

You were the ones calling for some kind of

rallies outside the FSB building. So then this

terrorist went and blew up the FSB building. And

the fact that those rallies were because

the FSB tortures people, because they

fabricate criminal cases there — that

Rudolfovich somehow skipped over in

his wonderful radio broadcast. So it’s

Plyushchev who is somehow to blame. Not poverty,

not those offshore accounts this young man talks

about. Not the same

unjust state that is to blame, but rather

Plyushchev and the parents of those children are to blame,

who held a rally outside the FSB because

the FSB fabricated criminal cases

against children. And because the FSB

tortures people — excuse me, over the

past year, if you read

Mediazona (an independent Russian outlet) or whatever remains of the free

media in Russia, then you will absolutely, at the very

least, a couple of times a month

be reading articles about how FSB officers

torture people, because it has become

an entirely accepted practice. Right now,

it is their standard interrogation method:

to tie someone to one of those

cable reels and shock them

with electric current until they

confess. So maybe they shouldn’t

do that. Maybe then people in a

fragile mental state wouldn’t

be making improvised explosive

devices and running there to blow you up.

Again, of course, this cannot even remotely

be considered a normal method of

political struggle. This was a real

terrorist attack. The person who carried it out

is a terrorist, a murderer. But let’s

think about what the preconditions were,

what the causes were, and how our society views the FSB

and the people who torture others,

in general. How are they supposed

to react to all of this?

They have to react somehow to these reports.

And I think this was in

St. Petersburg,

when they first described how FSB officers

tortured people with electric current. They

ended up with these electrical burn marks

all over their bodies. And then the Investigative

Committee conducted a review of the

matter and said, "Mm,

these marks, these traces on the body." Well,

no, no, no, that’s not torture, those aren’t

electrical burns — you know what they are?

Insects in the cell bit these people,

that’s why they have marks all over their bodies, and

so there was no torture. And the courts stay silent,

the Investigative Committee stays silent, and everyone

stays silent, as if that’s how it should be. But it’s obvious

where this leads, isn’t it? To the radicalization

of radicals. Where a person was already

inclined that way — and, as we can see, quite

aggressively so — well, then he went off and

made a bomb. And the FSB even managed to miss that bomb,

showing its complete

inability to deal with real threats.

operational work. There you go.

By the way, I have

my own version of who is to blame for the fact

that in Arkhangelsk Region

there was a terrorist attack and this explosion happened. And I believe that

the one to blame is Governor Igor

Orlov. And I have

an explanation for why he is to blame. I

traveled through many regions during my

election campaign, but the Arkhangelsk

story of mine, yes, is the one I tell

and retell most often, because

nowhere else. I have been to fairly poor cities,

I have been to very poor cities, and almost

everywhere I saw ruined roads, some kind of

collapsed infrastructure, and very poor

people. But in Arkhangelsk I even specifically

wrote a post about it; I'll show

you a few photos now.

What struck me was Sovetskikh Kosmonavtov

Street; I think I may even have talked about it

on this program several

times, but I'll tell it again anyway—it's my

favorite story. Sovetskikh

Kosmonavtov Street.

People carry

water home in buckets. The city center, the center

of a regional capital. And there was this

Valeryan Panov.

He lived in Arkhangelsk and thought to himself: "Well,

I do live in a major city somehow."

There's a cosmodrome nearby.

In my city they hold meetings on

developing the Arctic. And officials of every

rank keep pulling the wool over people's eyes, throwing

dust in their eyes about how we

are conquering space, we are conquering the Arctic,

we're so great." But then this Valeryan

Panov, in order to have water

in his kitchen, takes buckets and with those

buckets goes out into the street in the 21st century and

fills them up. "Well of course, excuse me,

he's going to lose his mind, and in the end he'll go

blow something up." Because on top of all that

he sees the lying face of Igor

Orlov, who has been sitting there as governor since 2012.

He is incapable of

repairing this Sovetskikh

Kosmonavtov Street, which, well, I'm

telling you, I'm not lying, looks as if it had been

bombed. There is no asphalt there, there are these

houses there—this is the city center—and the street, or

avenue of Soviet cosmonauts, has houses without

windows, without frames, and people live in them. It

all looks like slums, some kind of

monstrous early-19th-century slums described in

books. This is the main city. And

that means this is the governor's true face.

And they tell us that rallies are

somehow to blame, that schoolkids are coming out,

that there are masterminds behind such events. Go

fix the roads in your region, go

build a water supply system in the 21st century. Then

maybe fewer people will go and

blow things up. And frankly, really,

someone ought to look into this Governor Igor Orlov, his

money, and whatever property he has.

If you live in Arkhangelsk Region and

know something about this crook, please send it

to us, because, well, in

reality, you are keeping your region in

poverty. Arkhangelsk Region is an impoverished

region. And on top of that, you even have the

nerve to reproach those who come out to

protest rallies against your

policies. Just utterly disgusting,

revolting people like this

Orlov, like Solovyov (a prominent pro-Kremlin TV host), with their

lies and hypocrisy. Just

imagine another person sitting there in a

fragile mental state, listening to

Solovyov talk about the causes of terrorist attacks.

Well, obviously he might

tip over from that fragile

state and also go blow something up.

That is exactly how it works. People

driven to despair, who are not entirely

well mentally, who have

read too many books of one kind or another and become obsessed

with an idea—left-wing, right-wing,

whatever kind—and they run into this

wall of injustice,

and then they commit their monstrous

crimes. Therefore the authorities, specifically

the governor, bear direct

responsibility for this terrorist attack. The FSB (Russia's security service) also bears

the same responsibility for it,

because they missed it. On the one

hand, they want more and more

powers. They want to read our letters,

read our emails, read your

Telegram; they want access to VKontakte (Russia's largest social network),

which gives them all the data. We'll talk

about that some more. Nevertheless,

the person was making announcements, and still they did not

stop him. And our next topic, oddly

enough,

I would like to defend Putin's team. Or rather,

not Putin, but specifically hockey player

Kulemin, who was simply

torn apart and crucified over the past

week, because this hockey player

decided to obtain Canadian citizenship. And he

went to a Canadian court, and they

asked him: "Hey man, so you want to join

our country? But why? You have such a

wonderful, beautiful Russia, and

everything is so good there, so

wonderful. So why are you running off to our

Canada? Especially since just recently you

were taking pictures with Putin, standing there like this

and looking very happy?" To which hockey player

Kulyomin said in court: "Well, I want to, uh,

because human rights are not respected in Russia,

because I consider Canada

my home, and my children deserve

the opportunity to live in a free

democratic country." Ah, we all would

wanted our children to live in a free

democratic country, preferably in

Russia, not Canada. And we all wanted

human rights to be respected in Russia.

But, really,

the complaint was that this

Kulyomin was a member of Putin Team and, at the same time,

was saying things like that. Honestly,

when I read it,

I thought I’d go and find out everything about

this Kulyomin, dig into

his real estate too, and just give him

an absolutely massive, massive dressing-down on

this program. But, guys, the truth

is, I don’t know why

no one checked this, but Kulyomin was never

a member of Putin Team, so I want

to defend hockey player Kulyomin. I don’t

know how he feels about Putin or

anything else. But let’s be honest: he

was never a member of Putin Team, at least

I found no real trace

of that. He’s not on their website,

not in any archived versions of the site,

not in any historical records. He was not

a member of Putin Team. And he moved to

Canada.

As I understand it, he plays in Canada, and

there can really be no complaints against him. He

is not renouncing his Russian

citizenship, as I understand it. He

continues to play for the Russian national team. And,

well, he’s just looking for a better life. He

wants his children to live in a

free, democratic country. He’s

just,

well, what complaint could there be against Kulyomin?

That he doesn’t want to make our country

free and democratic. He

stands next to Putin. Even if he isn’t in

Putin Team, he’s supposedly with Putin Team, he

keeps silent, and through that silence makes Russia

a little less free,

less democratic. But, really,

not everyone is obliged to run to the barricades.

Ah, they probably invited him into Putin Team. He

honestly didn’t join it, and now has honestly

received Canadian citizenship. In that

sense, well, it’s fairly hard

to make accusations against him. Although in fact, among

our Russian athletes, if we start going through them,

there are many, many

situations where you’d really want

the sporting community

including hockey player Kulyomin, or maybe even

members of Putin Team—Ovechkin and

all the others—to pay attention and

say that obvious

injustices are happening. For example,

there’s the well-known Olympic

champion who, by the way, joined

Putin Team—Anton Shipulin. He has a

sister, Anastasia Kuzmina, and she was not

taken onto the Russian national team. And she spent a long time

upset about it. And

there was some kind of scandal. She wasn’t selected for the

Russian team. She left for

Slovakia and after that became a three-time

Olympic champion. So, in other words,

here was a person who wasn’t allowed through, who was

pressured, not given the chance

to fulfill herself. She escaped, she left,

went to Slovakia and proved there that she

had every right to be on the Russian

Olympic team, and yet she really

was not allowed in, even though she was

the best—she became a champion. So,

perhaps Shipulin, as a member of

Putin Team, could have spoken about such

an injustice, appealed to

Putin or done something—but he didn’t

do that. And then there’s the well-known snowboarder

Yuri Podladchikov—he also was not

taken onto the Russian team. The man was

forced to leave for Switzerland, and

then in 2014 he won the

Olympic Games. And these are exactly the issues

you’d really want Russian athletes

to raise, because we understand

of course, how completely dependent

their position is. As they say—and they’ve said this to me too—

it’s like: “Alexei, what do you

want from us? I say two words and that’s it.”

“I’ll never be taken onto the national team again. I

spent my whole life preparing to do this,

to devote myself to this sport. All my life I dreamed

of my Olympics. And then I say

something truthful and honest, and that’s it. And they won’t

let me go anywhere.” But, guys, no one

can guarantee that tomorrow you won’t end up

like Podladchikov

or Kuzmina. You may have spent your whole life

preparing, and still not be selected.

So we will never end up in that

free, democratic country

as long as you keep silent. Dear

Russian athletes, this matters.

We understand how difficult your situation

is, but if you keep

silent, in the end you will lose. In the end

you’ll lose, and then you’ll go to Canada,

and there in court you’ll be begging for

citizenship, while people will mock you—all of you—

on social media. The only

person who might defend you

will be Alexei Navalny.

Let me take a couple of questions. Write with the

hashtag Russia of the Future. Unicorn

Herald. Unicornald asks me

how things stand with the registration of the party

Russia of the Future. How do things stand? We

are demanding registration, but they are not

registering us. In that sense, the law

is on our side. We are litigating,

and litigating, and litigating, and we will keep doing it

for a long time. Obviously, the decision

on whether to register the party is made by Putin. He

will say: “Well, register it or don’t

"register it." And we know that, so

we are handling all the legal work,

but we are demanding that Putin register our

party, and we are continuing this effort. Let's

move on to the next question. What do we have here?

So, what five steps in a future judicial

reform do you consider the most important?

Lurker asks me. Ah, well, first of all,

I believe that what we need is, of course,

independence in the appointment of judges.

who are now de facto appointed by

a special personnel commission of the FSB (Russia’s security service),

and the presidential administration. That should not

be the case. And we must change the system of—uh—

the courts’ dependence on the chief judge.

Because what is a judge now?

An ordinary federal judge—when you

meet one, he’s this pompous

man or woman in a robe. He seems

very important, but in reality he is a pitiful

slave of the chief judge. The chief judge assigns

cases, and an ordinary judge is simply

in a servile position with respect to his

boss. And this is exactly what we must

change so that judges

actually have some real

independence. And we must introduce, uh,

electability at least for justices of the peace. There are

many different measures; there is a whole roadmap,

but these three are the first ones. Akbar

Kadyrov asks me: 80 university rectors,

almost $28 billion, all the ministers.

What do you think that was? Putin’s visit

to Uzbekistan. Indeed, Putin’s recent

visit to Uzbekistan, which

all of us may perhaps remember

because that was where they caught

Zolotov in the corridors and asked him my

question about debates and satisfaction. And he

dodged the issue of that satisfaction. And it was

a very large-scale visit. A huge

number of people went to Uzbekistan.

And, well, there is really nothing

extraordinary about that. Uzbekistan is

a large country with a very large

population, located

in immediate

close proximity to Russia’s

borders. There are traditional ties. And

Uzbekistan depends heavily on Russia.

Russia, to a considerable extent, depends on

Uzbekistan as well, including politically.

By the way, notice this:

sometimes you open YouTube’s trending page and see

some videos at the top that are

completely incomprehensible, written in some kind of

strange script. Those are Uzbek

videos, and sometimes Kyrgyz ones too.

The number of ethnic Uzbeks

living in Russia

thanks to the visa-free regime

is so large that the Uzbek diaspora

and Uzbeks living in Russia, uh,

will in the near future have a fairly strong

impact on the political balance. And we

will quite soon see that

politicians will specifically appeal to

Russian Uzbeks, Uzbeks in Russia. There are

a great many of them here. They vote.

Right now they are still in a kind of

position where they are seen as,

you know, everyone thinks: "Oh, they’re migrants, uh,

just some people working

as plumbers or sweeping the streets." That

is already not quite true. That is not the only

reality. And they are all having children too. And

in that sense, we will fairly soon see

how politicians, and the authorities as well,

will start courting, among others,

Uzbeks living in Russia,

because there are clearly more than a million

of them here. Frankly, I think

there are even more than two million.

And so it is completely—well, it is entirely

normal that Putin goes there with such a

huge delegation and tries

to get on friendly terms with Uzbekistan’s authorities.

Why? Because, as I said, that was

the first reason—or rather, that was

the second reason. The first reason, of course,

is that the United

States, in various ways,

is courting Uzbekistan, and China

is courting Uzbekistan too, and everyone is

trying to draw it into some orbit

of their influence. I mean, I don’t want to—I

don’t like geopolitics. I consider

geopolitics a false science, but there is no

geopolitics here. This is simply

normal politics. There is a neighboring country, uh, with

a large population and a large market;

different countries are trying to establish themselves and

work with that neighbor. In that sense,

well, Putin did the right thing by, uh,

staging such a large-scale visit. He is

handling migration policy incorrectly

with regard to Uzbekistan, leaving

the borders completely open. But, in

general, substantial working relations with

this country are necessary.

And

from Uzbekistan, let’s move on

to rappers.

I was defending athletes today, but

rappers—well, not rappers in general, let me

criticize one rapper, because, well, I’ve noticed

this. Remember how once

the rapper Ptakha and Alisa Vox, after

the first anti-corruption rallies,

were used—they recorded

some kind of rap tracks where they

said that people shouldn’t

go out and protest, that some fools sit on

lampposts, and, you know, "sit down, kid, at your

desk, study, and don’t think about any

politics." A very interesting situation

is now developing in this respect in

Khakassia. You know that the governor there

he lost badly and was then forced

after the first round to withdraw altogether, to resign

from the race. And, well, the authorities are naturally

upset and furious about what is happening. And

they are, uh, against this young

man, Valentin Konovalov of the Communist Party (KPRF),

who even took first place in the first round,

and they are waging a pretty vile

campaign against him. They simply made all of their

token candidates withdraw.

And now Konovalov is alone in the election.

Alone.

Just completely alone. And here’s the strange thing.

He is the only name on the ballot, and he will become

governor if any number of

people show up and vote for him.

Accordingly, the authorities are now trying

to persuade all of Khakassia to come out, but

to vote against Konovalov. And

after my first broadcast,

when I urged people to vote

in Vladivostok for the Communist candidate, in

Primorye for the Communist candidate Ishchenko, several

people wrote to me: "Alexei, how can that be? You’re

openly campaigning for a Communist." Yes,

absolutely. And that is exactly what I am going to

do now. I am openly campaigning. I urge

everyone who lives in Khakassia—and if you have

relatives or acquaintances in Khakassia,

write to them. Come to the polls and

vote for the Communist candidate Valentin

Konovalov, because this is a vote against

the monopoly of United Russia. It is also, among

other things, a vote against this disgusting

setup. And now let’s move on to the rapper

and to the disgusting scheme that

the Kremlin created when it removed all the

candidates.

A short video. Let’s give Konovalov

44 seconds of my program. He

posted a short clip on Facebook.

Why should people come out and vote?

Valentin Konovalov, candidate for

governor of Khakassia, the one you should

vote for.

Dear fellow residents, United Russia has driven

Khakassia to bankruptcy. Now

temporary appointees continue to drive

the republic deeper into debt. But we know where

to find the funds to solve our urgent

problems. First, we must cut unnecessary

spending on the state bureaucracy, propaganda,

and the purchase of expensive cars. Second,

we must radically change the way

the regional authorities work with aluminum and

coal corporations. Our shared choice

is to change this situation together with you.

We made that choice on September 9, but for 2

months now the authorities have been trying to delay

just change. But we will not

give up. On November 11, come to the polls

and vote for a new page in the history of

Khakassia.

There you see him: a young man, an excellent

candidate, saying absolutely the right

things. We don’t care whether he is a Communist or not

a Communist. Come out and vote. So what

did the authorities do? Well, you probably read

there were many articles saying that the Kremlin

was sending in special teams of its best

political strategists, and the best of the best

political strategists went to Khakassia, and they

would now come up with something that would

convince everyone to vote against him in this

election. And the strategists found their solution.

It was rap. Rap, I would even

say. They found some MC HD or ND

or whatever, some MC—let’s just call him

for simplicity MC sellout [ __ ]

who released an absolutely astonishing

video against the backdrop of Khakassia’s beauty—real

beauty, in fact. He tells all of us

that, well, you guys, without thinking,

we all voted thoughtlessly

in the first round for the Communist instead of

the United Russia candidate. So now we must not

believe the sweet words of all sorts of

opportunists. Instead, let’s come out and

vote against him. Enjoy this

together with me. 0:51 seconds. MC

sellout [ __ ]

And they tell us there was no point in trying,

that now upheaval is unavoidable.

That everything must be torn down to the ground? Whoever

shouts louder is right—that’s the motto of the brazen.

They say I like just sitting there on

the couch while we rock this boat

for real. They say the risks are not

that great. We’ll build a new world now. Close your eyes,

but we see the truth. Winter

is coming. And this is the moment when we are all

against it—against those who supposedly care

about the people, who shake the air with flashy slogans

but in reality stir up

hatred, plainly, and apparently something even more.

Our voices merge into a current.

Together we are like the Yenisei River—you cannot stop us,

we will sweep through. Join in, make your voice heard, don’t give up.

We are flesh of the flesh of our land. Khakassia

is against it.

Well, clowns—disgusting clowns,

you understand? Recording some kind of rap, some kind of

completely idiotic rap. Well,

Khakassia. Do you know why the United Russia candidate

lost in Khakassia, while the Communist candidate in the first

round came in first? Do you know why

the entire population now hates United

Russia? Because of the pension age reform,

the average life expectancy of a man

in Khakassia is 63

years. There you have it. That means men in Khakassia

know for certain that they will not live to reach

retirement, because there is poverty in Khakassia,

because Khakassia is falling apart, because

every issue has to be resolved only from

Moscow. And getting to Moscow—go there, fly there—

ticket prices are unimaginable. Because

people in Siberia live in difficult

in those climatic conditions, life there is hard for them

to live, and the authorities only make their lives worse

with their theft. Because for Putin

they are building palaces in Khakassia (a republic in Siberia). Because

they organize some kind of elite

tourist trips for him, where he goes galloping around

on horseback. And all of Khakassia is occupied with this, the entire

leadership is focused only on that. And this

infuriates the poor residents of Khakassia. That is why

they voted against United Russia,

and in response they played them rap. And in that rap,

in trendy youth-style beats and

rhythms, they tell people that they need to

come out and vote against

the communist. So, come out and vote

for the communist, if only to

tell those outstanding political strategists

from Moscow: "Don't take us for

idiots. Cancel your pension

reform, and then we'll talk to you about

something." Start fighting corruption,

and then we'll have something to discuss with you.

Put forward a decent candidate, not

a United Russia one, and then we'll talk. But

you won't persuade us with rap. I very much hope

that when the election is held there on November 11

Khakassia will turn out and vote for

Konovalov, just to rub the Kremlin's nose in it

with all its political strategists and their

idiotic schemes. Since I've started talking

about Khakassia, I'll say a few words about Primorye (Russia's Maritime Province).

Well, the clown show is continuing there too.

Ishchenko,

the man who, really, should have

been governor for a month already, who

won that election—it is not even clear

whether he will be allowed to run or not.

Naturally, the Kremlin, as usual,

has brought in its usual freaks

to derail this election. They have already

announced that one

Maksim Suraykin is taking part. You probably remember him,

that hellish devil who, in those

presidential

elections, was putting on all sorts of

performances and causing scandals at the debates. And,

good Lord, they have hauled Oleg

Mitvol out of mothballs. They use him as a spoiler,

someone who prevents opposition candidates

from getting elected—they have been using him since the days of

the municipal elections in the city of Khimki,

where in 2012 he got in the way of

Chirikova. Then he tried to insert himself into elections

in the Moscow region. In other words, everywhere

the authorities feel there may be some kind of

problem, they pull out Mitvol,

dust him off, give him money, and

tell him: "Go on, Mitvol, and

pretend to be something over there." So that's Mitvol,

and, well, all sorts of other

utterly nasty tricks are being used in order to

stop Ishchenko from reclaiming his rightful

victory. What's interesting is that

today—literally today—

it was announced that the court had denied Ishchenko's

appeal of the election results

for those polling stations where

fraud had taken place. The Central Election Commission

acknowledged that there had been falsifications there.

So Ishchenko went to court and said: "Well, if

you admitted it, then overturn it." And the court told him:

"You know, there is actually no subject here

for appeal, because, well, the CEC

canceled it, the CEC said: 'You won.' Well, the

election was canceled, so there is nothing to litigate

over. It's as if the election never happened." Well,

I mean, it's just a wild situation. And

today I saw a truly astonishing quote

from a man whom I also

never liked, and certainly never

expected to hear something like this from. The former

head of the Central Election Commission, Alexander Veshnyakov. Even he

was outraged. There was a conference there

dedicated

to the 25th anniversary of the CEC. He came there and

said these were outrageous violations. I mean,

he stated the obvious: guys,

if you acknowledged a violation, then

open a criminal case.

You have to choose one thing or the other:

either a criminal case, or recognize

Ishchenko as governor. I mean,

you cannot just go ahead and cancel

an election whose results you did not

like. But that is exactly what they did. And

this same Veshnyakov—I took part in elections

back when he was still in charge; that shows how old I am—when he

was head of the Central Election

Commission, he was quite a character too; he also

pulled his tricks, and candidates were removed from

the ballot, and there was fraud. So

the first Putin-era wave

of election falsification was carried out

precisely by Veshnyakov. But what

Pamfilova is doing has outraged even him, and he

comes out and says: "At least

try to do it a bit more elegantly, guys,

make an effort."

Alexei, regarding the incident involving Novaya

Gazeta and Putin's chef. Dan Martin

is asking me. Well, I spoke about this in quite some detail

on the previous program.

Watch my last broadcast. Well, we

are demanding that a criminal case be opened,

of course. There is already

evidence from Novaya Gazeta, and we

believe this evidence that Putin's chef

was involved in the attack, in

particular the attack on the husband of our lawyer Lyubov

Sobol. But nothing is happening, and yet we

keep pressing the issue. And the fact that nothing

is happening, of course, shows that

our law enforcement system

is complicit in the attacks carried out

by Putin's chef. VKontakte.

I think most viewers of this

program use the social network VKontakte

and it continues: "I use the social network

VK, yes, our campaign offices use it.

The social network VK. That's a whole problem,

because on the one hand, VK is

the largest social network in

Russia, and a lot can be coordinated

through it. It's fairly convenient,

good, really. But on the other hand, this social network

sells you out —

all of us, completely. It

hands over everything the FSB (Russia’s security service) asks for

at the first request. And this week,

a very appropriate court case began. The head

of our election—our campaign headquarters,

and simply the head of our

current office in Ufa, in Bashkortostan,

Lilia Chanysheva. Her interests are being represented by

the human rights

group Agora Human Rights Center.

A wonderful organization — probably the best

human rights organization in

Russia right now. They filed a lawsuit against VK on,

basically, very simple grounds. Guys,

you do not have the right to hand over

any personal data to the FSB or the MVD (Ministry of Internal Affairs),

or the Center for Combating Extremism,

without a court order. What was VK doing?

These so-called extremism fighters sit there

and write to them: "There's some group there,

they criticize Putin in it, so

give us the IP addresses, emails, and

the names of the people who created it." And VK

says: "Sure, we provide that information

when asked." They have no right

to do that. We know all about Russian

courts. And without a doubt, those same

police officers could have obtained a court

order and then requested it from VK. And

VK would have provided it then. At least there would have been

a procedure. That court order could have

been appealed, and it would have been possible

to get some information. On what

grounds is any of this happening? You ask, and

that's enough? Nothing better to do? There would at least have been

some kind of paper trail. But it turned out they

were just writing by email. Like how you

write to your colleague: "Hey, Vasya,

what are you doing for lunch? Let's go

grab some shawarma."

That's how the operatives were corresponding with VK.

"Hey, VK, give us the data." And

VK gave it to them. I asked Lilia

Chanysheva to record a message and simply explain

to the program's viewers exactly what

information, as has already been legally

established, VK provided about her

and about the staff of our office. Forty seconds.

Lilia Chanysheva, coordinator of our office

in Ufa.

On January 18 of this year, officers from the

anti-extremism unit in Bashkortostan

requested by email from

VK information about my page,

the pages of our office staff, and also

our office's public page on VK. Specifically,

they were interested in the date and time the

pages were created, phone numbers and email addresses, as well

as the IP addresses from which

those pages were administered.

The police did not cite a single article of the

Criminal Code or the Code of

Administrative Offenses under

which this request was being

made. They merely referred to an inspection within the framework of

operational-search

activity, and 12 days later VK

provided them with all the requested data.

The case Chanysheva is bringing is absolutely

appropriate. It is very important for us, for

everyone, and it is important for VK itself.

But we hope that this social network,

well, at the very least, will stop

doing this kind of thing. They — well, well —

let them hand things over, we understand, they're in Russia,

they belong to Usmanov. They are going to

sell out and hand over some of our information,

fine — but at least on the basis of a court order, not

just on request.

What is Chanysheva, some kind of terrorist?

Why does the Bashkir police actually

want to get

her data? Is it because Chanysheva somehow

poses a threat to the city of Ufa? No,

quite the opposite: it's because Chanysheva is trying

to help the city of Ufa. In particular, they

abolished direct mayoral elections there. She

applied to become

the city manager of that city. You'll

laugh — she was rejected because she

supposedly lacked sufficient qualifications, despite

the fact that she had worked for several years at

one of the world's largest

companies, Deloitte, in its Ufa office,

where she headed the tax department. So

this is a highly qualified person

for that job. She was rejected precisely

because she keeps after the Bashkir authorities

and points out: "You did this wrong here.

You stole here,

you did this wrong here." So they

consider her an extremist. And on that

basis

they demand that VK hand over the data, and

VK does. And, well, we understand what

Russian courts are like, but it will be very

interesting to hear the arguments from these

VK people. They'll come to court, and

they will have to answer the question: "Why the hell

were you handing this data over to just about anyone

simply on the basis of an

email request?" That is absolutely illegal.

And I would simply draw your attention

to this — I would like all VK

users, right now,

to focus on this,

on the answer to this question. And, well,

to say to VK: "Guys, we're watching,

we all want to know what your

policy is regarding our data, our...

our correspondence, what we have stored there,

what phone numbers we exchange. Well,

you never know what one person might, uh, write to

another, or for whom, uh, you might be

posting some private, friends-only posts or

something else. And VKontakte should at least

care a little about our personal

data. And I really hope that in court

they will show up and say so. In Bashkiria (the Republic of Bashkortostan),

meanwhile, there are

uh,

monstrous things happening. And to be honest,

I was appalled that this was being perceived—here,

today this awful news, uh, seemed to me

to be treated in some kind of

comic, or rather ironic

context. There, at a police station, uh,

a female police officer, a

23-year-old police employee,

was raped by three of her, uh,

colleagues. Well, "colleagues," if you can call them that. And everyone,

of course, is sort of joking about it, saying the police

are raping each other. I saw

a huge number of completely inappropriate,

in my view, jokes. But

this is a huge problem. First of all, in

the police there are a huge number of

women working. Go in and look—who's

sitting there as inquiry officers, who's in the investigative

department of the police, yes, in the Investigative

Committee, and in the prosecutor's office—everywhere

there are huge numbers of women working. And

this is a whole issue

for their very existence there. No, well, not necessarily

a problem, but let's say there are

certain

uh, difficulties with their place in such a

predominantly male environment. I mean,

this should be discussed, and there should

be some special measures taken

to make it more comfortable for them

to work in this mostly male

workforce. And here we have, well,

this monstrous crime, namely

the gang rape of a colleague in a police

station. The whole country is watching this.

And naturally, quite a large number of

women are watching this—women who have

faced this or may face it.

And they think: "Well, wow—what if

this happens to me?" And, yes, a

man thinks: "And what if this happens to my

relative—to my female relative—

how am I supposed to go to this police

station where this kind of thing happens?" And, uh, well,

at first they said that those responsible

would be severely punished, up to and including

dismissal.

Fortunately, later, well, they at least opened

a criminal case. But in my view,

this absolutely deserves,

the resignation of the republic-level leadership of the

Interior Ministry, a comprehensive review, and explanations from

Kolokoltsev. Come on, guys,

seriously, let's just say it: this is

truly

a monstrous scandal for the entire Interior Ministry system.

the commission of a serious crime with vio-

there, with abuse of official

authority. A group of people, and drunk on top of that,

as it turned out. Of course, now they

will be telling themselves

and the public: well, yes, that, that

these things happen. Well, they got wasted and raped

some woman from the next

office. Sure, police. What's the big deal?

We're just here, uh, at the Ufa police

department, getting blind drunk, to the point

where we're running around,

dragging someone into offices and, and

raping her, uh, as a group of three.

I would like, and I think all of us

should demand that Kolokoltsev

come out and explain what is supposed to

happen now with the Ufa police, what

leadership there is being sent into

resignation, what kind of training there will be for

everyone, that people will be clearly told what

the policy will be regarding

the way they drink themselves into delirium tremens

at their workplaces. This

is happening everywhere in the Russian

police. Today I saw in the Russian

police news—today or yesterday there was a report

that somewhere in Yakutsk, a local police officer

left a man handcuffed to a radiator,

and then the radiator burst during the night, and he

died—the man who was chained there. And somehow,

you know, all of this, all of this is just the kind of news you get in

Russia: here someone was chained up,

there a gang rape. What

nonsense—nothing about it gets shown on TV.

And then we wonder

why someone comes along and blows up an

FSB building.

All of this is monstrous, but even more

monstrous is what I saw today in

Komsomolskaya Pravda, which is a kind of favorite

newspaper of Putin's,

and the main sort of political newspaper of the

Kremlin. They use it to push their

line. So today they came out with an

article saying that this young woman is

"Shurygina"

in uniform.

And in general it's this astonishing article about how

this female inquiry officer is supposedly

a "Shurygina in uniform." And then lower down in the same

article—go find it, read it—there's a

character reference for these

rapists. One is described as a good

comrade, another as an exemplary officer of the

Bashkir police, then a fair-minded

manager. That's what they were saying about

these men. And as for her, of course, they posted some

photos from her Instagram,

showing her in some short,

tight-fitting dress. Well, of course, well,

photographed in a short dress,

deserves to be gang-raped.

Then let's say Russian

police officers should have the right to rape

all women on Instagram who are wearing

short dresses. That would be 98% of

them. I mean, this is the country's main newspaper.

And this is the kind of position that is already

close to the state: it's her own fault,

she provoked it. I mean, what do you expect—you see

drunk men, a short dress, and you're

some local Shurygina (a reference to Diana Shurygina, a widely publicized Russian rape case victim). Well, sorry then. This is how

in this harsh way, in the Bashkir police

they deal with people who

post photos on Instagram, uh,

where you're in dresses, in sequins. This is

just, in my view, absolutely

unacceptable, right? This isn't even

a discussion about some kind of, uh, important

debate on sexual harassment

or anything else. Come on, this is rape—

gang rape. This isn't even a case of private

prosecution. As you know, under the criminal

code,

a rape case is opened only

if the victim comes forward and files a complaint herself. And

if she withdraws the complaint, the case

is dropped. But gang rape under

such, in these circumstances, cannot even

be terminated at the victim's

request. It is an especially grave crime.

Once again, the fact that there are these

little snickers about it—calling her Shurygina in

epaulettes, while the responsible managers

say it's her own fault.

There should be tough measures, an internal departmental review,

and the dismissal of those responsible. No, we should

fire everyone there. This is not the first time in Bashkiria (Bashkortostan, a republic in Russia)

this has happened. Back in

2010, police officers, operatives from

the anti-economic-crimes unit, formed a gang of three people.

Police officers—well, 14 people. Go ahead,

try putting together a gang of 14

people. You probably don't even know 14 people, and

there they had already involved 14 people in

a gang that was going to carry out

murders. That's some level of

secrecy. Well then, if there were 14

people in the gang, another 114 probably knew about

it, because things like that don't just

happen on their own. So in that sense, in

the Bashkir police, just like in the Tatarstan

police, where we knew—and know—there was

torture at the Dalny police station (a notorious police torture case in Kazan), and as in the Russian police in general,

something is seriously wrong

if things like this are happening. And most

importantly, the leadership is not sounding the alarm

about it and is not announcing any kind of

comprehensive review. Meanwhile, federal

newspapers, Putin's favorite newspapers, are writing

to us about Shurygina in epaulettes.

Governors—you know, it turns out some

governors are very bad,

very, very, very bad governors.

And Putin dismissed about 15 of these governors.

They were very bad.

They would have lost the upcoming

elections, so they were told: "Well, guys, you

didn't manage it, you're bad governors."

Despite the fact that each of them was getting

70%, we dismissed them." So,

what do we expect from how the authorities

will deal with bad governors?

Well, you'd think he'd say: "You're bad, get out. Here's

the minimum pension, 13,000 rubles. Or

fine, here's an increased pension of

25,000 rubles, now leave. You're bad governors,

officially you're bad governors." But then

Putin meets with them,

with these bad governors. And they just

lick each other all over. It's just an act

of mutual boot-licking.

Now let's watch 33 seconds of

this disgusting spectacle.

This is an enormous responsibility to the

region, and indeed to the country as a whole. I

want to wish you success and express words of

gratitude for your work.

I am sure that you will be able, at any

rate, and I will strive for this,

to make use of the skills you have,

your experience, both personal and professional, so

that they can be used in other

areas of work as well. And I suggest that now

we talk precisely about that. Once again,

thank you very much for developing the country.

So, to gather around yourself a bunch of

failed politicians, so

bad that you understand that even under

conditions of fully controlled

elections, under conditions of fraud, these

people you've gathered around you are

so bad that they would still

lose, and then gather them and say:

"I express my gratitude to you,

we want to make use of your life experience"

I mean, they failed, and he wants

to use their life experience. And then, of course,

at our expense, the handout of

rewards begins. Failed governor

of Zabaykalsky Krai, Natalya Zhdanova,

becomes a senator. Would you like a salary of

450,000 rubles? You failed, you're a very

bad governor. And yet we offer you

immunity, a personal

car, an apartment in Moscow, and a salary

of 450,000 rubles. Are you satisfied? Thank you

very much, Vladimir Vladimirovich, for

rewarding my failure. The governor

of Altai Krai, completely hopeless,

just awful—Alexander Karlin.

We've crossed paths with him several times, and

our штаб (campaign headquarters) dealt with him too, uh, during

our work—just a scoundrel and a bastard,

a failure, and he's already become a senator, already

driving past us in a black car and

counting his 450,000 rubles. And this

guy over in Khakassia,

who lost in the first round by some...

a 29-year-old Communist. So,

sorry, let me scroll back here. So, we have

Konovalov

it doesn’t say how old he is, very young indeed, he was

only about 30, I think.

So, he lost to a 30-year-old

Communist because he failed so badly

that everyone in Khakassia hated him that much.

So what does he get? After he

earned the unanimous hatred of the region?

He gets—31 years old, I’m being told here—

he lost to a 31-year-old

Communist, and then you get

a position at Russian Railways and will oversee

the Trans-Siberian Railway. Well, obviously,

with a salary of several million rubles a year

per year. We are supposed to pay all these

people, these failed clowns,

corrupt figures, bad officials,

whom the public rated so poorly,

so poorly that the Kremlin removed them.

But for some reason we are supposed to

put them all on the payroll, put them into

cars, dump them on our backs and

keep feeding them, these idlers, for

many, many more years. So this is the punishment,

apparently, for doing a bad job. But the most

striking thing I’ve seen on this subject

happened in Dagestan. It’s

amazing. I’ve even got it written down here on

my cup. There, you know,

there came

as governor this former deputy interior minister,

Vasilyev, who, in order to

bring Dagestan to heel, started

locking everyone up there. Basically, like, getting rid of the old

corrupt officials and appointing new

corrupt officials. And there they

locked some people up. No one really

understands by what principle he is

jailing them. Basically, he is clearing out some

clans and making way for other

clans. And an absolutely astonishing thing—

yesterday or today, Vasilyev said

this: he came out—well, he wants

to be loved in Dagestan. And

he says:

"We have a compulsory medical insurance fund

and just imagine, the whole thing

was looted. Let’s do 20 seconds. The head

of Dagestan, Vladimir Vasilyev, on how

everything was stolen."

Now I’ll explain using the example of the compulsory medical insurance fund.

Our fund was financed quite well,

quite well,

but you know that its head

has been arrested,

and very serious charges have been brought

against him.

As of today, the fund has, well, I would say,

been looted—simply looted.

They sent a special person from Moscow

to Dagestan. He studied the cases, figured

everything out, came out to us and said: "Everything

was stolen." He wants to say it like this:

"Really? No kidding? We didn’t know that about

Dagestan. You didn’t need to send

a special person from Moscow; you could have just

come to Makhachkala, found a random person

on the street, walked up to him and asked:

"Hey, friend, why are wages in Dagestan so

low, and why is life so hard?"

And he would tell you: "Everything was stolen. You

didn’t need to send

a deputy interior minister there to understand

this shocking truth." And what interests me most

is this: how is it that now everything

has been looted, so what was it before then?

So then, we’ve watched 20

seconds of Vasilyev; let’s play 38 seconds of

the previous head of Dagestan, who only

recently was hugging and

kissing Putin, just like

Vasilyev is doing now. Ramazan

Abdulatipov—38 seconds.

Ivanovich, of course we’ll talk about

the republic, the situation, how you

assess it,

what prospects you see, what has been

achieved in the short time since you

have been leading the republic.

The republic is undergoing transformation,

the republic is being cleansed and renewed in

all spheres. We have developed 10

priority areas for the republic’s development.

And accordingly, if these

priority programs are carried out,

then within 7–8 years we can effectively

triple the size

of the economy of the Republic of Dagestan.

There you go, there you go—that’s how good

everything was. Cleansing, renewal

of the republic, 10 priority programs underway.

And he says: "Vladimir

Vladimirovich, cleansing is underway." Yes, yes,

yes, yes. Cleansing is underway, Putin

replies to them. Vladimir Vladimirovich. The

republic is being renewed. Well done. Many

thanks. Keep up the renewal

of the republic. And then—bang—everything was looted.

So this was the renewal that Putin

was nodding along to. In Dagestan, the same

FSB officers, the chief federal inspector,

the presidential envoy, a huge number of

federal officials, Interior Ministry people,

all of them. And besides, the

medical insurance fund—you can’t, excuse me,

just loot it that easily. It’s not

a room with cash lying around. It’s not like

Ramazan Abdulatipov came in, opened it

with a key, and there was gold and diamonds inside. He

put them in a bag and carried them off. To

steal money from the medical insurance

fund, hundreds of people have to be involved

in it, including at the very highest

levels of leadership. And everyone must have known about it,

and everyone did know about it, but stayed silent. And

Now they’re telling us, as if it were some great revelation:

"People of Dagestan, rejoice, at last

it has been established that everything was stolen. Well then,

if it was all looted, don’t just jail the head

of the fund—jail everyone. Throw out

all the security and law-enforcement officials, all those who claimed

they were fighting corruption—then

throw them out. If everything was being stolen under the guise

of ‘renewal.’" And most importantly,

we probably need to throw Putin out too.

Putin just sits there and nods. Right in front of him

he sits in the same place. You know how

they show it in movies, in America,

when people are on a date and

keep changing seats. So a new

governor comes to him and says: "We’re

going through renewal and, uh, what was it,

purification." And he says: "Yes, yes, yes." Then

the next head of Dagestan comes: we’re undergoing

renewal, purification. And everything there too

was stolen. Yes, yes, well done. Then

the next one comes and says: "Everything

was stolen, renewal is underway." Well then

it turns out that apart from stealing everything

nothing else is happening—there has been no

renewal at all. There’ll be another one after

Vasilyev. He’ll be the same, you understand,

and some herald of revelation will come out and say: "Everything

was st—, ужас, everything in Dagestan

was stolen." And again, out on the streets, people there

will loudly say to him: "Really?

No way. If you’d just listened to us, we would have

told you anyway that everything

had been stolen." Since I started talking about

Dagestan, let me say a few words about Ingushetia,

since there are many questions. So, the Constitutional

Court has finally proved useful for something. For now,

the Constitutional Court of Ingushetia has issued

a ruling

that this law should be reviewed—the one

because of which protests and conflicts are now taking place there

over the transfer, uh,

what is being called a land swap between

Chechnya and Ingushetia, which in reality

is mostly the transfer of Ingush

land to Chechnya, because this is what

Ramzan Kadyrov very much wants, and he

worked it out with someone else there. And now

all of them together are feeding people a line

of nonsense. And suddenly the regional

constitutional court said that this cannot

all be done this way and that there must be

a referendum. That’s quite a bold and

unexpected decision. We’ll see what

happens next, because, well, Kadyrov is not

going to back down, Yevkurov is insisting

on his decision, and they’ll now run to the

Federal Constitutional Court. Well,

we’ll see what they decide. But unquestionably,

this is an extremely unpleasant situation for the authorities.

And we are seeing complete unity among

the people of Ingushetia, because Kadyrov has already gone there

twice. Well, in his usual

style—someone there insulted him on Instagram

or somewhere else, and he heads off there in his

motorcades. And in those

villages, uh, people immediately gather—both

the elders and a significant number of

people, uh, from nearby villages

in Ingushetia. In that sense, they do not

let their own people be pushed around. And fortunately, there

don’t seem to be any conflicts there. All of this

is unfolding, well, with this sort of, uh,

for now, with traditional

courtesy, the traditional code-based

courtesy that is customary in

the Caucasus. But, broadly speaking, it is

still happening in raised voices, and we hope that,

all in all, this decision will be reversed. And if

someone wants to exchange one piece of land for

another, the people of Ingushetia and Chechnya should be

clearly told why this is being done. It shouldn’t just be

some vague interests of

Ramzan Kadyrov. I’ve already gone a minute over

the program. 21,500 people are watching

us. For those who watched the program all the way

to the end, I want to cheer you up with a piece of news

that is just fantastic. This was

the best news of the week, because

it perfectly shows the very essence of

what is happening in Russia. The news was

that a Russian, uh,

a Russian businessman of American

origin turned out to be the owner

of an American company engaged in

the sale of marijuana. You know that in

some states, in some states

of the United States, it is now

fully legalized, and in some places

partially legalized. In other words, there

large companies are involved in the

production of marijuana. In Russia, this

is still an illegal business. It is

condemned. If you write on

your page, uh, on VKontakte about

marijuana, it will be blocked. You can also be

held administratively

liable if you use it

or sell it. And of course you’ll

be jailed for that. But here we have a Russian businessman

investing in it perfectly legally. They

raised $400 million in investment

for marijuana production. And who

is this businessman? It’s Boris Jordan. When I

read that,

that it was him, I was genuinely shocked. You,

probably—the younger audience, at least—don’t

remember how, in 2003, Putin

was destroying NTV. He actively

used Boris, Boris Jordan for this,

this sort of American businessman

who came here and spoke with this

accent, saying, ‘Helloo: “I am an American

businessman,”’ but what was distinctive about him was

that he was this kind of chief

super-Orthodox guy. Over here he was promoting

some kind of cadet corps

and organizing them, talking about how

He’s supposedly this great Orthodox believer and all that.

Moving on. We probably weren’t too lazy and

found a short video for you about this

most Orthodox-in-the-world Putin-era

figure, who was, back in

2003–2005

one of the embodiments of Putin’s

power. And they were constantly shoving him in our faces

and saying, "Look what a good

man he is, a true

champion of traditional values."

Family, cadet corps, and Orthodoxy."

A few seconds of Boris Jordan.

"It’s well known that you’re a religious man.

Why did you come to NTV on Good

Friday?" Marina asks.

You know, for me it was a very

difficult decision, because that

evening I was preparing to go to the service. I

had already attended the bringing out of the shroud (an Orthodox Good Friday rite), and,

which took place during the day, and, and

then I naturally wanted to go to

the evening Good Friday service. But the decision was

made because I received

information that evening that they had started

to switch our channel over to TNT, to

TV-6.

Did you pray before going to the channel on Good

Friday? I pray every

evening. I can’t tell you whether I

remember if I prayed immediately before

going to the channel, but I can

say that on Saturday morning, already at

5:00, when I personally came to the channel, I

worked until 10:00 p.m. And at 10:00

p.m. I went to matins with my

children and my wife.

That’s all there is to them. You see, they sit around in

back rooms, roll a joint,

smoke it, and then go out and tell

Russians about conservative values,

family, about how they pray 17 times a day

and all the rest of it. So basically,

there’s no

huge contradiction between being

a Christian and investing money in

marijuana production, really speaking.

And we can see that, broadly speaking, all

developed countries are moving toward

legalizing this kind of drug. It’s just that

there’s no need, once again, to be hypocritical.

Don’t come here telling us about how

you’re supposedly some great

supporter of cadet schools and a great

family man, while at the same time investing

money in something that Russia officially

considers an illegal business, something that

the Church considers a sin—the Russian

Orthodox Church—and something society regards as

a vice industry. You just can’t

do that. You can’t behave in such a disgusting,

hypocritical way. And Boris Jordan has once again

shown us what

Russian power really is. It’s crooks, hypocrites,

drug users, and liars. Thank you all very much.

See you next Thursday.