Introducing 'The Power Vertical Podcast'

good discussion! keep it up.

your blog has done a fantastic job covering the internal dynamics of Russian politics -- mine is still finding a voice, much less readership, but it may be of interest to you anyways: http://russcon.blogspot.com/

History tells us about two traditional forms of leadership and community in Russia:Tsar( autocrat ) and Pachan (criminal authority ).In transitional period this forms of leadership can coexist.

I completely agree with what David Satter said about the possibility of Putin returning, but not on ceremonial, much more on practical reasons. Let's identify the goals and the tools!

I think that the goal would indeed be some kind of "China-style" redressing of the economic and political system of Russia. For this, the economy and the society needs to be more open. But this, according to Putin, should be done in his cautious way, therefore not letting the likes of Dvorkovich and the libertarians have a say on it. Putin has to steal their show, that is why he is now trying to link the "civiliki" to himself, a solution that was dwelled on in Stratfor's 2009 analysis. Now look at who are calling for more political openness: Kudrin and Surkov, both close to Putin.

The siloviki now have a bone of contention to chew on: the assets of Moscow, the rising oil prices, etc. Sooner or later though, if politics really opens up, Putin will need institutional resources to keep the balance. And that's the presidency.

I wrote about this in more details at http://russia2012.blogspot.com/2011/03/all-roads-lead-to-third-rome.html

David will not see Russia's political awakening through our mass media. We have a lot of symptons of revolutionary thinking in Internet plus actions of non-systemic opposition. The potential of non-violence is the key factor of the coming (this Spring-Summer) uprising in Russia. Haven't you see results of popular hatredness in Tunisia, Egypt and Libya? The same really bad fillings to the ruling pair are in hearts and minds of millions of Russians and non-Russian citizens of our country. We may even culculate such an index of hatredness to show inability of the siloviki regime to cope with multiplied uprisings in many parts of Russia. But the NATO is afraid to loose ties with Rogozin and his bosses. So we'll get no support for such culculations, won't we? The USA is also afraid to be impolite with Putin. It's funny to ask him to retire for the highest position at the World Olympic comittee. Today Joe Biden is going to give him such an offer that Putin will not decline. It is a pretty smart decision bearing in mind billions of dollars for the Olympics in Sochi! Putin can go around the world witthout any obligations and control money from old and new investors to this "Winter Olympic Games" in the damn hot spot of Russia.
New paradigm of national security is riping in minds of citizens who are eager to unite in Third sector structures. One of such structures could be the Russsian Peace Corps and Public Security Sector. My ideas on these points you may see (all in Russian) on the web-site - www.chekist.ru in Fabruary and on the 3-d of March.