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Our Own Brezhnev

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Clarissa

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Ooh, just wait until they start editing our text messages “for our own good.”

There was this joke in the USSR. We had 3 TV channels in the 1980s and so, the joke goes, a guy comes home from work, turns on the TV and a speech by Brezhnev is on. The guy sighs in frustration and switches the channel. But on the second channel, there’s the same Brezhnev speech. The poor guy switches to the third channel. The Brezhnev speech is on there, too, but suddenly Brezhnev stops and says menacingly, “who the hell do you think you are to be switching over from me?”

Given the eerie similarities between Brezhnev and Biden, the joke is particularly relevant.

4 responses to “Our Own Brezhnev”

  1. Demotrash Avatar
    Demotrash

    As an ignorant American, what are these eerie similarities?

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    1. Clarissa Avatar
      Clarissa

      Brezhnev was senile, slurred his speech, acted confused. Everybody knew but pretended he was sharp. His daughter was a promiscuous drunk but nobody was allowed to notice.

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      1. cliff arroyo Avatar
        cliff arroyo

        “Brezhnev was senile, slurred his speech, acted confused”

        I remember when Cuban radio was beaming “Voice of Moscow” to Florida on AM radio around 1980 (give or take a year or so). Usually when someone would be speaking Russian the English voice over would begin right away but Brezhnev was too important to do that and so when they quoted him they’d play the whole thing and then translate….
        Now Americans at the time had no idea whatsoever what he sounded like as the media only ever showed visuals of him with no sound… (not unique to Soviet leaders it seemed to be standard practice for all foreign leaders).
        Even knowing no Russian I was shocked at how old and decrepit and sick he sounded (like death that’s not even worth warming over).
        As jaded as I am now I would assume he wasn’t really in charge of very much and was trotted out for official functions and left in a chair to dribble over himself the rest of the time.
        I was too…. conventional to jump that far at the time but the USSR became much less scary in a way (how formidable could it be with that wreck in charge?)

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      2. cliff arroyo Avatar
        cliff arroyo

        “Brezhnev was senile, slurred his speech, acted confused”

        here’s a sample (starts at 2:00)

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A conservative literary critic and college professor

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