This coming Sunday is the presidential election in Russia, and Vladimir Putin is sure he is going to win. But who is Vladimir Putin? And why is he so sure to pull a win? Despite allegations of Putin’s political party’s widespread official fraud, the latest surveys show that Putin will have the vote of approximately 60% of voters.

Putin as a Russian politician served as president of Russia from 2000 to 2008 and is currently the Prime Minister of Russia. He also has a background serving in the KGB for sixteen years. Based on a law change, Russia’s running presidential term has been increased from four to six years. The current President, Dmitry Medvedev, has decided not to run for re-election.

There is much controversy and protesting going on against Putin coming back into power as President. Putin has maintained a very strong criticism of the United States yet contradictorily has stated that, “President Barack Obama’s policies of ensuring ties with Russia,” will “successfully negotiate Russia’s access into the World Trade Organization.”

Regardless of the massive protests against Putin, he has clearly stated that he wants to help Russia regain social and economic stability.

However, Putin’s certainty in his unquestioned win is not necessarily a reflection of reality. In Moscow, thousands have been protesting against re-electing Putin. This has been the most populated show of outrage and anger since the Soviet Union collapsed, nearly twenty years ago. Despite the massive protests, he is staying confident that he will pull through and gain his victory and has clearly stated that he wants to help Russia regain social and economic stability.

If elected, Putin will be eligible to serve twelve more years as the President of Russia. Even though he has not been elected as President yet, Putin is already talking about running for re-election in 2018. If he wins both the 2012 and 2018 elections, he would have served almost a quarter of a century, which is longer than any other individual in Russia’s history other than Soviet dictator Josef Stalin.

As Putin gets closer to becoming the Russian President once more, the Syrian government is crumbling. President Obama disclosed a statement that Syrian’s President, Bashar al-Assad’s “days are numbered.” Meanwhile, Obama is working hard to speed up the process of Syria becoming a dictatorship. Russia is currently blocking UN action in helping this happen.

The biggest question in the current political climate revolve around the long-term impact of Russia with a Putin-led government. Both in terms of the American-Russian relations and the repercussions of political complications on Russia’s chances of becoming a part of the WTO.

The Russian Presidential Election will take place this Sunday, March 4. Stay tuned in to see if Putin will be the President of Russia for the newly extended term of six years.

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Oscar Aubert, political scientist and expert on West Europe, Russia and CIS, has stated that Ukraine and Russia are in a good place to further bilateral ties.

Aubert said: “Russia and the Ukraine have a long shared history. Russia sees Ukraine as part of its own identity. But Russia’s political elite has no wish to restore the USSR, and it clearly understands that this would be impossible. However, the Ukraine remains the elephant in the room. Its closest neighbour and transit to mainland Europe, the Ukraine plays a major strategic role in Russia’s role in and relations with the rest of Europe.

“Meanwhile, the defining objective of Ukraine since the collapse of the Soviet Union has been to adopt a truly independent course from Russia and ‘return to European civilization’, whilst Russian interests in Ukraine remain manifold.

“In 2009 Russian President Dmitry Medvedev declared that for Russia, Ukrainians since the dawn of time have been and remain ‘not only neighbours, but a brotherly people’. Therefore he regarded it as an obligation on Ukraine’s part to maintain ‘tight economic cooperation’ and ‘solidly kindred, humanitarian ties’ with Russia.

“In more practical terms, Russia has not managed to construct a single coherent conception of how to bring its interests to bear on the reality that Russia and Ukraine are now two sovereign states.

“In a recent Chatham House paper, Alexander Bogomolov and Oleksandr Lytvynenko argue that for Russia, “maintaining influence over Ukraine is more than a foreign policy priority.

“Russia’s socio-economic model limits its capacity to act as a pole of attraction for Ukraine. As a result, Russia relies on its national myths to devise narratives and projects intended to bind Ukraine in a ‘common future’ with Russia and other post-Soviet states. These narratives are translated into influence in Ukraine through channels such as the Russian Orthodox Church, the mass media, formal and informal business networks, and non-governmental organisations.

“Russia’s soft power project with regard to Ukraine emphasises cultural and linguistic boundaries over civic identities.” ”This project they speak of underlines the importance of the Ukraine to Russia. Late year Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin met with Ukrainian Prime Minister Nikolai Azarov in Novo-Ogaryovo to discuss the need to develop the investment component in trade and economic cooperation between Russia and Ukraine.

“The return of Vladimir Putin as President will be positive in securing closer ties between the two great nations, with Mr. Putin keen to target energy as a key component of any future agreement. Mr Azarov has said himself that Kiev is ready to seek compromise and “win-win solutions” in the gas issue.” Oscar Aubert is a sociologist, political scientist, an expert for West Europe, Russia and CIS

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While most of Southeast Asia is experiencing economic growth and Westernization, one place remains a relic of a past political era responsible for the deaths of millions. The long shadow of Stalin manifests within history’s first and only patriarchal monarchy to enact the Communist Manifesto. Concentration camps dot the bleak landscape.

Ambitious highways remain empty of vehicles. Whole families are arrested, and hundreds of thousands toil in work camps as no other form of industry exists. Meanwhile, the entire country slowly starves to death. The world remains either unaware of such crimes against humanity, or is afraid of rousing North Korea’s powerful neighbor to the North, China.

No other country in the world has the same cult of personality as North Korea. Their leader, Kim Jong-il, is revered as nothing less than an omnipresent god. The Korean or ‘Forgotten War,’ of the early 1950s claimed 3 million lives and has never officially ended. The North, backed by the Communist powers of China and the USSR, fought the South, led by the Allied forces of the USA and Great Britain.

This was a ‘proxy’ war of opposing ideologies, a battleground for the world’s new superpowers to posture and display military might. North Korea has the fourth-largest standing army, and is the most militarized country in the world. A tense ceasefire remains to this day, and fire-fights occasionally burst along the 38^th parallel.

In 2009, Kim Jong-il launched missiles over Japan’s North Island, claiming he was testing new technology to launch satellites. North Korea fired upon a disputed island in 2010, sending 1,200 civilians scrambling to seek safety in bomb shelters. These are only recent provocations; there have been over thirty such incidents since the ceasefire of July 1953.

Under the rule of founding leader, Kim il-Sung, the country experienced a period of relative prosperity in the 1960s and 70s. The disintegration of a key ally, the Soviet Union, and agrarian mismanagement in the 1990s killed a million people, causing devastation and famine throughout the country. Accounts by escapees describe resorting to eating grass and boiling roots to survive.

This neglect of agricultural and commercial necessities are eerily similar to policies enacted by Stalin in the Ukraine during their massive Holodomor Genocide of the early 1930s. Collective farming and the arrest and murder of landowners led to the death of 8 million peasants as a result of the Marx-Engels manifesto.

Former leader Kim il-Sung wrote his thesis known as Juche,  a communist policy divergent from the Soviet style that is marked by an isolationist approach to all outside governments and strong North Korean nationalism. This ethos prohibits all contact with the outside world, thus very rarely is the voice of a North Korean heard.

The state-run media has no free press, and citizens are subject to ten-year work camp sentences if they are found to have tuned in to any broadcast outside the one and only state station. The few that escape and make it to the West tell of the most deplorable conditions imaginable.

Shin Dong-hyuk was born in a prison camp, tortured, and forced to watch the execution of his mother and brother after a failed escape attempt. He is now a human-rights activist, fighting for the liberation of his people. Refugees risk their life fleeing over the mountains north into China, and escape to South Korea is impossible.

A 160 mile long, 2.5 mile-wide fortified barrier keeps these two ethnically similar, yet politically opposed, countries apart. The only option is escaping into China, and eventually Mongolia where citizens can find refugee status. Many women become indentured servants or prostitutes.

China does not recognize North Koreans accordingly, and promptly return the captured back to North Korean authorities to face torture, starvation or execution. China’s actions have not gone unrecognized by the UN, which has condemned their policy.

Normally a very private dictatorship, conditions have become so dire that the regime allowed photographs of their children to be seen by the world due to a harsh winter and flooding of 2011. Analysts think this may be a last-ditch effort to garner money from the UN and South Korea, who have stopped their efforts after it was revealed that Kim Jung-il misappropriated such funds.

This October, UN undersecretary-general Valerie Amos claimed that 6 million North Koreans, particularly children, mothers and pregnant women, are at serious risk, and that wealthier countries need to put politics aside to provide aide.  ”This is about helping the people who are most in need.

It’s not about saying that this country has made a choice about spending its resources in one way rather than another. We don’t make those judgments in other countries, on humanitarian grounds. There’s no reason to begin to do it in,” Amos said, according to the AP.

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An area most people would be unable to point out on a map, the narrow strip of land bordered by both the Black and Caspian seas has been a point of contention for centuries.

Strategically located and historically known as where Europe fades into Asia, this mountainous region is reminded of policies enacted by Communist leader Josef Stalin twenty-plus years after the countries of Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Georgia (Stalin’s birthplace), declared independence from the Soviet yoke. But this region is not so easily divided.

There are more than three types of people here, with at least fifty different ethnic groups all trying to establish themselves.  With no Kremlin and powerful military to qualm nationalistic interests, tribal feuding emerges resulting in a multitude of regional conflict.

The Chechens, with their terrorist attacks in Moscow railways may be the most notorious of this lot, but are just one example of post Soviet problems presented in the 21^st century.

Societies that may be similar, but speak drastically different dialects crowd these narrow and ancient settlements, a region that harbors the most ancient forms of Christianity and churches. This small area has spent time being ruled by such superpowers as Persia, Turkey, Byzantium and Russia, but managed to keep their way of life alive against such odds.

Armenians have had a glorious history; only to have experienced such tragedy during their vast existence. A nation known to be passionate with the written language, their chronicles cover a range of history, and even translations of neighboring literature.

The holocaust of World War two even has ties to this enigmatic region. Hitler mentioned the forgotten Armenian genocide prior to his invasion of Poland in 1939. In the years between 1915-1918, 1.5 million Armenians would die from unnatural causes, and continue to suffer from the humiliation of denial.

By creating an ethnically Armenian exclave within the borders of Azerbaijan in 1923, Stalin caused conflict amongst both peoples claiming the area to be their own, creating internal strife that would in turn, weaken both nations of any potential cooperation against Moscow.  The plan worked and is still working nearly nine decades after it was initiated.

The Nagorno-Karabakh conflict of 1988-1994 was a result of borders created by Stalin to create disunity between the peoples of this region. The effects are still relevant today as both Turkey and Azerbaijan have a closed border policy resulting from Armenia’s victory in the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict.

The war ended in bitter peace and severed trade routes with the West. This currently strains Armenia economically, falling further behind her neighbors while oil-rich Azerbaijan bypasses  Armenia and routes their new pipeline from the Caspian, to Georgia, and out through the Black Sea.

War between Georgia and the territory of South Ossetia has been declared three times in the past two decades. The Ossetians are an ancient Indo-Iranian ethnic group that presently has both a north territory within Russian borders, and an adjacent southern province that is a continuing point of conflict with Georgia claiming ownership.

The first war was in 1991-1992 and would break-out again in 2004.

With the Georgian-Russian war over South Ossetia contained since 2008, the conflict lasted ten days and resulted in a cease-fire.  Presently, Russia and Venezuela are the only countries that recognize South Ossetia as a separate government from Georgia, who was receiving and implementing weapons provided by the USA and NATO.

With Ossetia backed militarily by Russia, comparisons can be made to the ideological cold-war conflicts in Southeast Asia. Poor host countries serving as the battleground for empires to show off weaponry.

The notorious Chechens still have animosity toward Moscow and are not afraid to hide it. After Stalin deported the entire Chechen population to Siberia or Kazakhstan, some returned home to the mountains and developed national identity once Communism fell. The Islamic Chechnyns committed jihad acts against their northern neighbor, and former ruler, Russia in recent history.

Numerous suicide bombs in and around Moscow, and the immensely tragic hostage situation at a North Ossetian elementary school in 2004 are just more examples of a region in strife.

The Armenian Genocide is a hotly debated subject to this day, as Turkey and the United States do not declare this loss of life due directly toward the Turkish Ottoman Empire. Many Armenians will agree on the contrary, and place the systematic slaughter off their people and culture on Turkish sabers and rifles.

Obama had addressed this issue during his campaigning, assuring the world that the tragedy would finally be recognized appropriately. The promise is left unfulfilled to this day, as the USA has a vested interested in Turkey’s strategic location, operating several air-bases in the most ‘western’ of Middle Eastern countries.

What can explain an area so small and isolated, yet, so full of war and conflict? The easy explanation is to blame communism as a failed social experiment, with Transcaucasia as a result of it. Or is it that diversity and multiculturalism doesn’t work? That when you have dozens of different peoples all vying for domination in a confined area, that such aspirations will turn violent toward your neighbor?

Either way, it is a tragic circumstance for a place that is used to being controlled by someone else.

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A serious presidential contender believes the Soviet Union still exists and, unfortunately, because Rep. Michele Bachmann will make 10 more verbal gaffes just today, the story is overlooked. In an interview conducted by Christian radio host Jay Sekulow on Thursday, Bachmann again proves just how far out of her league she is.

When asked on-air about what different people all over the country are telling Bachmann on her campaign trail, the GOP hopeful said that jobs and economy are obviously a big concern among Americans. That’s not all that’s on their minds, however.

“What people recognize is that there’s a fear that the United States is in an unstoppable decline,” said Bachmann. “They see the rise of China, the rise of India, the rise of the Soviet Union and our loss militarily going forward.”

Yes, the Minnesota Republican believes that the Soviet Union is a threat, the same Soviet Union that has been a democracy for over twenty years. The Soviet Union was dismantled by Bachmann’s own hero-Ronald Reagan.

It seems like something she would know.  I don’t know if this is Bachmann’s gaffe or the people attending her rallies are really saying this. Either way, it is frightening.

Bachmann also proclaimed to a South Carolina crowd that if she were president, gas prices would decrease. “Under President Bachmann you will see gasoline come down below $2 a gallon again,” she stated, pointing out that gas prices were $1.79 when President Barack Obama took office. Of course, she failed to mention that Obama took office during a massive global recession.

Many policies that would reduce Americans dependence on oil, Bachmann has been against. She may believe that an increase in domestic drilling will somehow magically lower gas prices but this is not correct.

The Energy Information in 2009 estimated that by drilling on America’s continental shelf — where so much of America’s oil is — would only drop gas prices by a few cents by 2030.

It is completely conceivable that Bachmann believes that the president sets the gas prices. She, so far, has proven that she does not understand world history; it is not hard to believe that economics is past her comprehension.

Even though she is a tax lawyer, she clearly did not understand the whole debt ceiling debate. So vote for Bachmann and gas prices will drop, income will rise, new roads will be built and you won’t have to pay any taxes!!!! It is a magical world!! (And completely fiction.)

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