What’s amazing and absolutely unique about Gorbachev is that he relinquished totalitarian power. Have you met many people who give power away to do the right thing? Instead of moving us all towards liberty, he could have done what Andropov did almost right before and gone in the direction of more totalitarianism. It worked in Cuba, worked in North Korea, worked in Venezuela. These systems don’t fall apart until the leadership actually chooses to stop tyrannizing the poor bastard population. And even then it sometimes takes decades to make the bastard population leave their beloved jail.
Gorbachev could have been in power until today. Can you imagine it? Fabulous luxury, endless adulation, the delicious subservience of millions. And he let it all go to become a regular citizen.
Reagan, shmeigan. Other than grandiose, slightly embarrassing pronouncements, Reagan had absolutely nothing to do with it.
Gorbachev was a truly great man of history. The greatest statesman of the twentieth century. And a deeply decent person. May he rest in peace.
Clarissa's Blog 
Очень понравился пост и стих про Горбачева в конце —
https://lleo-kaganov.livejournal.com/574478.html
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This is really beautiful. And the poem is lovely.
Such an incredible, amazing gift that Gorbachev gave them. But the Russians looked at it closely and threw it away. This world that the poem describes as a nightmare 10 years ago now exists in Russia.
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It happened in SA too.
https://www.politicsweb.co.za/opinion/fw-a-good-man-hated-for-doing-the-right-thing
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This is a great parallel. The same historical era, the same impulse to give people freedom – and if they misused the gift, it’s really on them.
I grew up with an admiration of de Klerk. But as they say, there’s no prophet in his own homeland.
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An issue with de Klerk is that he freed white people as much as black people. This didn’t change the social order very much but does allow for some different opinions.
https://dailyfriend.co.za/2022/08/16/have-the-nats-been-proven-right/
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Decades/centuries into the future, Gorbachev will be very fondly remembered as a man that tried to bring Russia into the 21st century. People like Putin on the other hand will go down in history people that squandered amazing opportunities.
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Absolutely. Such an amazing opportunity to live well, build roads, schools, businesses. Finally create indoor plumbing for everybody. But instead they are burning up crazy amounts of money, sacrificing people in a war that they can’t explain why they wage. How incredibly, abnormally stupid.
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I was a child when it happened but I remember thinking exactly this. RIP.
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Even in death, Gorbachev affects me!
I’m now hungry for Pizza Hut. 🙂
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Imagine that a guy who could have lived until the day before yesterday as the dictator of the largest country on Earth willingly gave that up and had to appear in commercials to make a living.
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