Russian Election Watch 2012

Dear ATS Society

I have failed to see much interest and many threads about the Russian Presidential elections of 2012 so I decided to start this thread.

The election booths open in far East Russia in about two hours and they will open in Moscow, where I will vote in ten hours @ 0800 local time. There have been a lot of accusations of our elections being unfair and non-transparent but I would love to start a discussion that it is not so. ANother topic off this discussion are the five Presidential candidates, their chances to win and what Russia's future will look like with each of them.

I can address the non-transparancy issue with this link Vybory 2012 this is an online facility for live web-camera translation from each Russian voting booth all around the largest country in the world. One web-camera at each place points to the booth itself and the other one to the Election Commission people who oversee the voting. I do not believe registration is necessary to view the feeds, but if it is you better hurry it closes in less then two hours.

All throughout the election day I will try to post preliminary results and my thoughts about the whole election issue. I wish you all a most pleasant evening. So far I am excited to vote and I do hope that my vote will be placed and counted correctly as well.

Perhaps I should list the five candidates and which party they were nominated by.

1.) Gennady Zyuganov - 'Communist Party of the Russian Federation' (KPRF)

2.) Mikhail Prohorov - Independent

3.) Sergei Mironov - 'A Just Russia'

4.) Vladimir Putin - 'United Russia'

5.) Vladimir Zhirinovsky - 'Liberal Democratic Party of Russia' (LDPR)

I have good affinities for Mikhail Prohorov, since he is a young and innovative businessman. His company is behind Yo-Mobil (A revolutionary hybrid vehicle with a rotary vane type engine running on natural gas and gasoline that powers electric motors.) I also enjoy Mr. Zyuganov, since my grandfather was a communist and a man I highly respect. Mr. Zhirinovsky is often seen as the clown in our politics. And Mr. Mironov is in my eyes just another front-end for Mr. Putin, whom I highly despise.

From Pre-Election Russia with Love.

reply to post by RumET


Why watch the russian election when there is days more corruption and drama in the one here in the US?
Heres the kicker, were "the good guys"!!!
Well, that's what I was told anyway.

reply to post by RumET


So are your presidential candidates as dishonest and war mongering like ours? Keep in mind, I'm not throwing Ron Paul into this mix. Whether or not people like his stance on issues, he's the most honest out of the pack. Unfortunately, a lot of people still feel our country needs to make a presence in the middle east and police the world.

So what would a Russia be like with your candidates?

I'm not a Putin fan because he was a hold over from the old Soviet Union. Not only that, George Bush JR., said he liked him, so all the more I wouldn't be able to trust him. Bush said of Putin when he looked into his eyes..."I was able to get a sense of his soul." More moronic quotes from a president that could have published a book on his stupid one liners.

We here in the United States are secluded from "real news". All we hear about is Putin, but to tell you the truth, the reason nobody has talked about it here is because the other candidates are never talked about. Now if Paris Hilton, Linsay Lohan or Snookie was one of your candidates, it would be headline news! The majority of people here in the United States are clueless on anything outside of our country. In fact, the majority of people here probably don't even have a grasp on the location and politics of many of the countries in this world. Yet, they jump on the band wagon when our government starts saying we need to occupy or start a war with another country.

Please by all means, educate us all about the possible changes to Russia based upon your candidates position on Russia and its foreign policy. I think the internet is great for listening to people from other countries like yourself, so we can get a better perspective of the real climate in your country instead of relying on sound bites from our governments.

Just on this subject and sort of related, I recount a thread made here somewhere (I have tried to find it to no avail) that we should look at for the assassination of Putin blamed on Chechen rebels. Well didn't that almost happen?

Anyway, the entire thing is a fix for sure. there are reports of people being paid to vote.

I think if we made a bet on the outcome, you would not get very good odds.

reply to post by WeRpeons


I will do my best. I never had my way with words anyways.

If Mr. Putin wins I believe the relationship to 'The West' will sour. He is portrayed as a hard-liner compared to Mr. Medvedev. While our people see his 'Stability' through over twelve years of reign as a negative thing. Most of the population believe he is against the US and NATO blocks and that he will increase military spending. On the other hand, not without his help has a NATO base been allowed to root itself down near Ulyanovsk. That is a downright act of treason. He remedies it all as a 'simple intermodal goods transfer base from Afghanistan to Europe'. He did not participate in pre-election debates, as opposed to everyone else listed below. He will probably win in first round, getting more then 50% of the votes.

Mr. Zyuganov actually won in elections in the 90'ies but it is rumored that he got a phone call from Mr. Putin's office (The FSB) and stepped down in favor of Mr. Putin. He wishes to integrate socialism into capitalism and I do think he holds Norway (or perhaps China?) as an ideal. Most Scandinavian countries run on a successful hybrid of State Regulation and Free Markets. He would re-nationalize factories, plants and other assets thought of as unfairly sold for 1 ruble to the 'right men' in the chaos after the Soviet union fell. Including those owned by foreign companies. But I'm not sure he won't back out like a coward if he wins, like he did in the past. And he is rather old. There is a slight chance he would try to restore the glory of the Soviet Union.

If Mr. Zhirinovsky as unlikely as it is becomes our president he will go ultra-nationalist. Restore the glory of Russia (not the multi-ethnic Soviet Union) and probably plunge us into another Cold War. Mr. Zhirinovsky openly gets drunk and tells that Russia have super-weapons unheard of to bring down the USA. Most probably tectonic, since he mentioned something about 'tipping the Earth axis'

Mr. Prohorov seems like a liberal politic very eager to tighten bonds with the US and Europe. He owns many factories and other businesses. I have little opinion and information on him sadly.

All in all no worthy candidates are present in my opinion, as Yabloko (Apple) and other candidates have been denied in running for elections by the present Government. They seem to be the optimal choice for me, grown up in a democratic country. This is actually my first Presidential Election in Russia? I look forward to it. And at the same time I hope there will be huge protest that will sweep our country clean of all kinds of lowlifes and give The People the opportunity to realize our dreams.


Addendum one.
And at midnight Moscow time the first election booths opened in Kamchatka and Chukotka. That is in the far East Russia. And as such this Election Day is open. Lenta.ru news article to confirm my words. Oh I do hope the Russian People vote 'en masse', so nobody would be able to say that we are not interested in the future of our country. And I would like to think that if Mr. Putin wins and there aren't any protests against it, then I should find myself a new country. Twelve more years of Mr. Putin's rule would be absolutely devastating. But how can we protest when the army and police are strong in every town? Special Forces ready to crush anything they get orders to crush?


Addendum two.
The elected President will step into his new (or perhaps old) Office the seventh of May. And the election results should be known around fourteenth of March Moscow time (GMT +4) I'm sitting here, feeling like a huge wave is washing over me. Mostly anticipation, a little sadness over the probably rigged outcome and a huge drive to do something and it is over midnight here in Moscow, 00:22 to be exact (Damn those number 22's.)

reply to post by RumET


Thanks for informing us about what is going on with the election in Russia. It really sounds like they're all against peace. The last candidate sounds like the U.S. candidate Ron Paul. He's the only candidate that wants to stop the occupations and wars over seas and bring our troops home. The political system has been trying to keep him from gaining any kind of momentum because they fear they will lose their hold on power if he's elected president.

You're sentiments about politics and the ruling party parallel with a lot of the people here. Nobody is comfortable with any of the presidential candidates running in the U.S.. It seems like the deck is stacked against candidates that want peace and better relations with countries around the world. The people of the world need to band together, our sons and daughters who serve in the military should lay down their arms and demand peace and an end to all wars.

It seems like all of our leaders are hell bent on flexing their muscles and saber rattling. They sacrifice our children for their lies, hate and fear mongering propaganda. Why do we allow this to happen? Why do we justify killing? Maybe if paupers of the world were allowed to govern, the world would be a much safer and peaceful place.

The people of the world have more in common with one another than they think they do.

Dear ATS Society.

And as the sun sets at 1911 above Moscow I just want to post a little update on the elections. I just returned from voting and wish to share some experiences. Sadly the web camera on my voting booth timed out, so I didn't record what could have become a great and historic moment. On my way there I met quite some people, most of them young heading the same direction I was, and there was some patriotic music playing all over the town's loudspeakers.

The locale was clean and well-lit. The election commission was friendly and consisted mostly of scientists that worked in the building elections were held. The policemen guarding the voting booth looked awfully bored, but friendly. And my voting bill seemed legit with the correct marks and stamps. I had absolutely no issues voting. Even my Grandmother of over ninety years went to vote, since she does want a change from the usual Russian political life. So far the total percentage of voters nationwide has passed fifty percent which is above fifty million people all around Russia. The preliminary results will be available around 2100 Moscow time which is in around two hours.


And at 2100 the preliminary results have begun to come in. They can be followed on Vesti.ru 's video translation. So far M. Putin has 58% of the votes, with Mr. Zyuganov trailing behind with around 18% of the votes. This will last pretty much all night.


The election seems to have gone mostly well, besides results from one voting booth in Daghestan being invalidated due to multiple people voting multiple times as caught on web cameras. Daghestan is Muslim territory by the way. They tend to have a huge vote for Mr. Putin.