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Russia asks Google to clamp down on Navalny′s ‘Smart Voting′

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Re: Russia asks Google to clamp down on Navalny′s ‘Smart Voting′

#41

Post by tomerv »

ParoxysmalVigor wrote: post #31
hamburgerwah wrote: post #13

Lovely theatre to pretend the outcome isn't rigged already.

Election rigging is a finite resource. After certain amount regime loses it's legitimacy. This in turn creates a regime phase transition, which in certain scenarios could be not fatal (as Belarus and Venezuela examples shows us), but very painful for the elites and increases all sorts of risks, especialy for current incumbent. Also there are investors, external and internal, which are too all over risks, this damages…

Election rigging is a renewable resource. At the start, you can tilt the results a bit in your favor. As you gain power you also gain more influence and popularity, and then you can build deeper structures of corruption, which enable further election rigging. The cycle continues until it implodes with a revolution. Then the citizens are left with a broken government - after removing the corrupted parts - and must rebuild everything. The lack of structure allows more corrupted players to enter, and that's why a single revolution us not always enough to move a country from a fake democracy to a functioning one.

Re: Russia asks Google to clamp down on Navalny′s ‘Smart Voting′

#42

Post by plugger »

Jyaif wrote: post #39
cik wrote: post #32

Eventually there's a time where corporations, like individuals have to decide what's important, putting their money where their mouth is as it were. What matters more to Google, profit or accessibility of information. Issues like these highlight those choices.

In this case, profit and accessibility of information go hand in hand: if Google does not comply with the government, Google does not get to exist in Russia.

Yea, I kinda thought the whole idea of corporations, especially the big multinationals, was that profit was ALWAYS the number one priority. When you view them with that lens it helps a lot in terms of attempting to understand their decisions.

Re: Russia asks Google to clamp down on Navalny′s ‘Smart Voting′

#43

Post by selivanovp »

trhway wrote: post #4

a bit of context - the network of Navalny's organizations "The fund to fight corruption" has been officially designated as an extremist organization, and any association with it after such a designation is a crime, and Navalny is facing additional charges for creating an extremist organization. (The organization supposedly acted against foundations of Russian state, and there is no joke lost that corruption is the fo…

I like how you missed the part, that this fund operated for years on legal terms, but Navalny started to use this non profitable organization to fund his political activities and to launder money. That’s why it was shut down.

Re: Russia asks Google to clamp down on Navalny′s ‘Smart Voting′

#44

Post by buran77 »

ineedasername wrote: post #24
LAC-Tech wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not assuming anything, I'm just enjoying the frankness. "I support corporations against the governments I don't like" is a really refreshing piece of honesty, and not what most people would be brave enough to say. I'm trying to become less principled and more pragmatic myself when it comes to politics.

How is it less principled when just about any principle at all will require a variety of actions depending on circumstances? Most notably, that you go about things normally when the principle isn't being violated, (a country isn't authoritarian) and take appropriate action when it is (The country murders journalists and political opponents)

Is the principle strictly "murdered journalists"? What about "Guantanamo"? Or "bombing schools and hospitals"? If you find a "but" in there you can already tell what "less principled" means.

Sure, Google doesn't intervene directly in any of this but they would certainly cooperate if asked. And they keep working with that government. What's the common principle besides profit and allegiance?

Re: Russia asks Google to clamp down on Navalny′s ‘Smart Voting′

#45

Post by trhway »

selivanovp wrote: post #43
trhway wrote: post #4

a bit of context - the network of Navalny's organizations "The fund to fight corruption" has been officially designated as an extremist organization, and any association with it after such a designation is a crime, and Navalny is facing additional charges for creating an extremist organization. (The organization supposedly acted against foundations of Russian state, and there is no joke lost that corruption is the fo…

I like how you missed the part, that this fund operated for years on legal terms, but Navalny started to use this non profitable organization to fund his political activities and to launder money. That’s why it was shut down.

please point me to Russian criminal code or precedent where laundering money is an extremism charge instead of criminal. As far as i know laundering money is a criminal charge and the government would have no problem charging and "proving" it in the Russian "court of law" if there were any minimal sniff of it. Especially given how Navalny's and the Fund's activities were under total permanent observation - official at that at least from the moment they got designated as "foreign agent", and the government hasn't been able to dig up any, even minimal, irregularity.

>to fund his political activities

the same crap. The government couldn't bring up any irregularity here, despite having them under total microscope.

Re: Russia asks Google to clamp down on Navalny′s ‘Smart Voting′

#46

Post by qwerty456127 »

This is not Russia asking, this is the Russia's ruling party which has nothing to do with the people whose vote it seeks to suppress. Given the fact in the title the vote is clear - against this specific party, for anybody who can stand against them.
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