Follow along with the video below to see how to install our site as a web app on your home screen.
Note: This feature currently requires accessing the site using the built-in Safari browser.
The Putin Visit: Germany's Left Declares Moral Bankruptcy
(By Ray D.)
Only 30 Demonstrators Protest Chechnya As Putin And Schroeder Sign Billion Dollar Deals
Few places symbolize the moral bankruptcy and hypocrisy of the German left more clearly than Chechnya. When US President George W. Bush visited Germany last February, tens-of-thousands of angry demonstrators turned out in Mainz and all across Germany to vent their outrage at the Iraq war and the abuses at Abu Ghraib and Guantanamo. Now, less than two months later, Russian President Vladimir Putin is in Germany. And a whopping 30 protesters showed up to demonstrate the bloody Russian war and widespread human rights violations in Chechnya. Putin and Schroeder were all smiles as they tipped champagne glasses and signed multi-billion dollar business deals for everything from Russian natural gas imports to German bullet train exports in Schroeder's hometown of Hannover. Naturally, with the cash registers busily ringing away, Chechnya never came up and the German media has all but ignored the topic.
Don't Worry Vladimir, Germans Only Protest Wars Involving America
For one, Chechnya offers a perfect example of asymmetric journalism. Since Russia is a relatively closed society, it is far more difficult for the international media to report on the widespread death and suffering taking place in the Caucuses. And atrocities that aren't seen and reported on are rarely cause for widespread outrage and demonstration in the West. How could they be if no one has heard about them? Iraq, on the other hand, is largely open to journalists because of the open nature of American democracy. Because of that fact, abuses are normally made public and discussed in the media. When a bomb goes off in Iraq, it is usually an international story. When a bomb goes off in Chechnya, it is usually never even reported on unless it is a mass casualty event. When a group of prisoners are abused in Iraq, it is a scandal that lingers for months and a source of worldwide anger. When thousands of people, many of them innocent, simply disappear in Russia, it is barely mentioned anywhere.
The German Left: Thousands of Dead in Chechnya War Not Even Worth Protesting For
This highlights the massive double-standard and hypocrisy that plague the German left. No one cares whether the thousands missing in Chechnya were treated in accordance with international law, were tortured in dark prisons, were raped or abused. Many missing Chechnyans likely were. But, for the most part, the German left simply doesn't care. Apparently, the so-called "peace movement" thinks that this just isn't cause to disrupt Gerhard Schroeder's caviar and champagne party with Männerfreund and former KGB agent Putin, who picked up his German by helping the Stasi beat down democratic forces in East Germany during the Cold War.
The entire charade clearly demonstrates how the so-called German "peace movement" has changed little since the days of the Cold War when thousands protested in outrage over US involvement in Vietnam, but gave the Russians a free pass during the brutal Soviet war of occupation in Afghanistan. The movement's unending attempts to seize the moral high ground have been repeatedly undercut and exposed by the same sort of left-leaning Doppelmoral time and again....
nosarcasm said:while we are pointing fingers, I would say the whole world
community is rather inactive versus the Russian lack of democracy
and the war in Chechnya.
They are on my shitlist if it helps
Falk said:I think war-crimes comitted by US are truely marginal in the history. Sadly enough (I am generally against war, and don't approve of the latest one either) these minor incidents gets far more attention than far more evil acts.
Why is this so? How come simple criminal acts gets to represent a whole political ambition? It is like media can't deliver information without names and faces on individual people.
