Sentencing 44-year-old Putin critic and poisoning victim Alexi Navalny to two-and-a-half-years in prison, a Moscow judge gave Russia’s anti-corruption activist 12 month for time served, showing that 68-year-old Russian President Vladimir Putin has mellowed over the years. While Navalny’s sentence seems harsh to the Western press but he received a far lighter sentence than 57-year-old former Yukos Oil oligarch Mikhail Khordorkovsky who May 30, 2005 was sentenced to nine years in a Siberian prison. Once Russia’s richest man, Khodorkovsky got too big for his britches trying to run against Putim, but, more to the point, like Navalny served as Putin’s biggest critic. Navalny has openly accused Putin of egregious corruption, posting an Internet video of mega-milllion dollar estate on the Black Sea Navalny claims is owned by Putin. Putin denied Navalny’s charges.
When you look at Navanly’s anti-establishment activity in Russia, it parallels what Democrats and the U.S. press accuse 74-year-old former President Donald Trump of, trying to subvert the U.S. government. Newly minted 58-year-old Secretary of State Tony Blinken slammed Putin and the Russia government for sentencing Navalny. Yet Blinken wholeheartedly backs the U.S. House to convict Trump of “incitement of insurrection” on Feb. 8 when the House plans to prosecute the case against Trump. While there’s no jail time or fine for conviction, Blinken and his boss 78-year-old President Joe Biden see Trump as more dangerous to the United States than Navalny.is to Russia Yet Blinker thinks it’s good diplomacy to slam Putin for Navalny’s sentence today for violating his probation. Blinken could not have started on a worst foot, condemning Putin and the Kremlin for Navalny’s sentence.
Foreign governments, especially Russia, have weighed in on what looks like extreme retaliation against Trump, weaponizing the House’s Article 1 authority to impeach Trump for a second time. Last time around, Trump was acquitted in the U.S. Senate Feb. 5, 2020 for (1) abuse of power and (2) obstruction of Congress. Navalny faced a light sentence today compared to Khordorkovsky, given time off by the judge for time served. “The United States is deeply concerned by Russia’s actions toward Aleksei Navalny. We reiterate our call for the Russian government to immediately and unconditionally release Mr. Navalny, as well as hundreds of other Russian citizens wrongfully detained in the recent weeks for exercising their rights,” Blinken said. Bliken and Biden break new ground for hypocrisy. Can you imagine if Putin demanding that Trump not be tried for “incitement of insurrection?”
If you listen to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) and other Democrats, you’d think Trump was guilty of fomenting revolution, something equivalent to their impeachment article. Yet with Navalny openly calling for revolution in Russian streets against Putin and the Russian Duma [parliament], how can Putin or anyone at the Kremlin view Navalny as anything but a Trotskyite revolutionary? Blinken and Biden have set U.S.-Russian relations back to where they were at the end of the Obama administattion: To 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis lows. What kind of common sense does Blinken have to condemn the Russian President and government one week after confirmed as Secretary of State? When you look at the lynch mob mentality in Congress, accusing a Russian court of unfairly convicting Navalny is the height of hypocrisy.
Blinken has no problem condemning Putin and Trump, both in Democrat minds have been equated for years. Trump endured four years of FBI investigations for bogus charges that he was a Russian asset. Yet Congress found anything possible to impeach the former president, despite a lack of evidence. When it comes to Navalny, Blinken made clear he sees the 44-year-old anti-corruption activist as victimized by the Russian court system. Trump hasn’t been victimized by House Democrats because he deserved to get impeached from the day he took office Jan. 20. 2017. Blinken acts like he has all the facts on Navalny’s case, when he knows nothing. What most foreign observers know for sure is that Navalny wants to overthrow Putin and the Russian government. “I have deeply offended him [Putin] simply by surviving the assassination attempt that he ordered,” Navanly said sarcastically in court.
When it comes to Navalny there’s no doubt that he seeks the violent overthrow of Putin and the Kremlin. Yet if you ask Blinken, Biden, Pelosi, Schumer and other Democrats, Trump was guilty of a coup d’etat Jan. 6 when some rabble-rousers in his audience stormed the Capitol and vandalized government property. Had the FBI done its job with the Capitol and D.C. police, like they did at the inauguration, no one would have breached the U.S. Capitol. Yet unlike Navalny that’s a known revolutionary out to topple the Russian government, Democrats have said the same thing about Trump. When Trump’s trial gets underway Feb. 8, it won’t take long for Trump to win another acquittal. Yet Blinken thinks that Navalny is an innocent boy, just trying to help democratizes the Russian Federation. Thanks to Blinken’s big mouth the next four years will push the civilized world back to the brink.
