ARGUMENT: student writers' co-operative owned by its contributors

Small Numbers

In 2004 Vladimir Putin, running for the re-election as Russia's president won 71.2% of the vote. 64.3% of registered voters cast ballots, which means that 45.8% of the electorate actively supported Putin.
According to the B.B.C. Medvedev won 70.23% of the vote at a 69.65% turnout, which means that 48.92% of electorate came out to support him - a higher proportion than Putin's four years ago. In any case, Western leaders should feel very unloved compared to their Russian counterpart.

P.S. This news clip was shown on the state television channel. As Putin is about to vote (have 39 seconds of patience) an old lady runs up to him, who ignores her and then puts his hand on her shoulder. Will we ever know what the lady said? Lev Rubinshtein, a superb Russian essayist, once rightly lamented about the president's patronising attitude towards Russian people.

P.P.S.  52,031,601 people voted (or votes were counted for, you may say) for Medvedev this year compared to a Putin's 49,565,238 in 2004. A steady increase.

Western Promises

Dimtri Medvedev, Russia's next president, made a surprise speech in which he talked about the importance of freedom, quoting liberal thinkers, and promised to reduce the role of state, tackle corruption, reform the judicial and taxation systems...
It must have sounded great and this correspondent wishes he was there.
But Medvedev missed the most important area, which has been begging reform for eight years - the media. If the media, including television and newspapers, are going to remain, as now, under state control, no one is going to hold Medvedev to account. His speech will not be repeated when another presidential contestant is jailed or a journalist is tortured in a psychiatric clinic. Unless the media are freed, Russia will struggle to imitate a Western democracy for much longer.

Khodorkovsky's Argument

Financial Times has a very rare interview with Mikhail Khodorkovsky and reports:

Mikhail Khodorkovsky, the jailed Russian oligarch, voiced doubts on Wednesday that Dmitr[i] Medvedev, Russia’s likely next president, would be able to undo damage to the rule of law inflicted during the Putin era.

Khodorkovsky, the former owner of Yukos oil company, has gone on hunger strike in jail a week ago to protest the Russian authorities' refusal to give treatment to A.I.D.S.-infected Vasily Aleksanyan. Russia continues to defy four decisions by the European Court of Human Rights to transfer Aleksanyan to a specialist A.I.D.S. clinic.
Khodorkovsky defends the view that Russia and its development are hindered mainly by its dysfunctional and corrupt legal system. He strongly believes that the legal system must have a political priority over economic development, citing examples of Singapore and South Korea. The opposite view, openly held the Russian government, is that people are only ready for democracy when they are rich enough. Despite a high correlation between rich countries and those with strong democratic institutions, the academic consensus on the causal effect has not yet been established (see this excellent article by Daron Acemoglu, Simon Johnson, James A. Robinson and Pierre Yared, for a recent example).
Finally, Khodorkovsky's pessimism about Dmitri Medvedev, as Russia's next President, is shared by Argument. Whether his pessimism is going to matter, it is hard to judge, because Khodorkovsky has to serve at least 1356 more days in prison.

Victory in the pipeline for Tadic

Boris Tadic won the Serbian election. It is not a surprise. Tadic was supported by the U.S. and the E.U., but 10 days ago he secured the crucial Russian endorsement by handing over control of Serbian energy supplies to Gazprom. Vladimir Putin, Russia's president, and Dmitri Medvedev, the first deputy prime minister and head of Gazprom, realised that the next president is irrelevant if they control Serbia's energy. Tomislav Nikolic, the defeated candidate, was in no position to make such an offer.
The future of Kosovo seems a little brighter now. But Russia can now use its energy control over Serbia to stop Kosovo's independence.

No one can argue with him

Dmitri Medvedev, Russia's first deputy Prime Minister, has kicked off his official presidential campaign. After he received Vladimir Putin's blessing in December, he led the opinion polls by a by around 50 percent.
However, the B.B.C. World Service reports that Medvedev has refused to participate in televised debated against his three feeble rivals: Communist Party leader Gennady Zyuganov, fervent nationalist Vladimir Zhirinovsky and almost unknown Andrei Bogdanov. Medvedev said his work in the regions does not leave him time for the debates. It is a shame no American presidential hopeful has ever used such a noble excuse.
This boycott echoes United Russia's refusal to participate in televised debates during the autumn Duma elections.
Televised debates have become an essential tool of democratic elections. It is an opportunity for voters to judge the candidates' competence. Medvedev, like the rest of Putin's corrupt government, is still afraid of public scrutiny. Until he controls the media, he will choose to ignore it.
Medvedev chose to undermine democratic institutions before coming to power. He is not at all a 'liberal' some observers make him out to be.