Very roughly speaking, and ignoring the rest of the former Soviet Union, Russiatoday is arguably where it might have been if it had avoided perestroika and the collapse of communism, choosing instead a Chinese path of strictly limited freedom.
When critics had the temerity to point out that Welch had no proof of his allegation about the September jobs numbers, he reacted with sputtering indignation making me wonder how much GE under Welch was like the SovietRussia that he sees in America today.
Legislator Vladimir Ryzhkov agrees Russiatoday is not the Soviet Union, under which Party officials decided even such matters as whether to allow husbands and wives to divorce.
Today in Russia, many people still lament the collapse of the Soviet Union and lay a lot of the blame for the resulting economic hardships on Gorbachev.
The Clinton Administration esentially capitulated to Russia's demands today, proposing instead of membership for newly democratic nations of the old Soviet empire an ambiguous "limited partnership" with NATO for virtually any country who wants one -- including Russia.