17.
Cf. Anatoly G. Vishnevsky, Russkiy ili Prusskiy? Razmyshleniya perekhodnogo vremeni (Moscow: Izdatelskiy dom GU VShE, 2005), 325: “The history of the emergence of the
LDPR is surrounded by rumours according to which this party would be a creation of
the KGB.” Cf. also Dimitri K. Simes and Paul J. Saunders, “The Kremlin Begs to Differ,”
The National Interest no. 104 (November/December 2009), 42.
18.
Owen Matthews, “Moscow’s Phoney Liberal,” Newsweek (February 26, 2010).
19.
The party program can be found at http://www.patriot-rus.ru/#partyProgramm.
20.
“Attacks of the Clones,” The Economist (March 19, 2011).
21.
Politkovskaya, Putin’s Russia, 282.
22.
Cf. Roland Oliphant, “Another Blow to Russian Democracy,” Russia Profile (October 13, 2009). According to Oliphant, “VTsIOM’s General Director Valery Fyodorov
tried to anticipate the discrepancy in a press release, citing the experimental use
of SMS technology and saying that such differences are ‘normal,’ because ‘the goal
of the exit poll is not to check the work of electoral commissions, but to capture
the general trends of the vote and report them to the public as soon as possible.’”
“That may be so,” wrote Oliphant, “but a 20 percent margin of error is well beyond
the generally accepted standard, as some commentators have already pointed out.” In
the exit polls the Communist Party got 17.7 percent, Yabloko got 13.6 percent, and
A Just Russia 8.4 percent. The two last parties were above the 7 percent hurdle and
should, normally, have been represented in the city council. Cf. also “Oppozitsiya
budet protestovat protiv itogov vyborov v Mosgordumu,” Newsru.com (October 16, 2009).
23.
Oliphant, “Another Blow to Russian Democracy.”
24.
Mikhai Tulsky, “Falsifikatsii: narusheniya i vbrosy v tsifrach i faktakh,” Novoe Vremya no. 37 (October 19, 2009).
25.
“Mikhail Gorbachev: Na glazakh u vsekh vybory prevratili v nasmeshku nad ludmi,” Novaya Gazeta no. 116 (October 19, 2009).
26.
“Regional Elections Go According to the Kremlin’s Script,” RFE/RL Newsline (October 12, 2009). http://www.rferl.org/articleprintview/1849659.html.
27.
According to Gazeta these elections were no cleaner compared with those of October 2009. Pressure was
exerted on state-sector workers. There was also manipulation of absentee voting and
early voting. (Cf. Kynev, Aleksandr. “Preodolevaya Vertikal,” Gazeta (March 15, 2010).)
28.
Julia Ioffe, “A Happy Defeat for the Kremlin,” Foreign Policy (March 16, 2010).
29.
Robert Coalson, “Victory in Defeat,” RFE/RL (March 15, 2010).
30.
There is a Russian joke that the only political alternation the country has known
is between bald and not bald leaders. This is, indeed, striking, if one considers
the following succession: tsar Nicholas II–Lenin (bald)–Stalin–Khrushchev (bald)–Brezhnev–Andropov
(bald)–Chernenko–Gorbachev (bald)–Yeltsin–Putin (bald)–Medvedev–Putin (bald). As a
matter of fact, this kind of alternation worked well over the last century.
31.
It was the result of a Kremlin-inspired merger of three parties: the liberal Union
of Right Forces, Civilian Power, and the Democratic Party of Russia.
32.
Yekatarina Vinokurova, “Yo-Partiya: Mikhail Prokhorov gotov vozglavit ‘Pravoe Delo,’”
Gazeta.ru (May 16, 2011).
33.
Maria-Luisa Tirmaste and Natalya Bashlykova, “Mikhailu Prokhorovu pora zanyatsya svoim
delom,” Kommersant (September 16, 2011).
34.
Pavel K. Baev, “Moscow Dithers over New Scandal and Forgets the Old Tragedy,” Eurasia Daily Monitor 8, no. 171 (September 19, 2011).
35.
Cf. “Rogozin’s New Rodina Registered,” Moscow Times (August 22, 2011).
36.
Cf. Robert Coalson, “United Russia, Putin Prepare For National Elections,” RFE/RL (May 12, 2011).
37.
“Ignatov: Narodnoy front: modernizatsiya ‘Yedinoy Rossii,’” Yedinaya Rossiya ofitsialnyy sait partii (May 10, 2011).
38.
Andrey Kolesnikov, “Tea with Putin-2,” Novaya Gazeta (May 12, 2011).
39.
Cf. Ilya Kharlamov, “Court Refuses to Register Russia’s PARNAS Party,” The Voice of Russia (June 23, 2011).
40.
Cf. Jadwiga Rogoza, “The Kremlin’s New Political Project,” Eastweek, Centre for Eastern Studies (March 20, 2013).
41.
“All-Russia People’s Front Organising Committees to Be Created in All Regions by May
20,” Itar Tass (May 6, 2013).
42.
“Putin izbran liderom Fronta,” Interfaks (June 12, 2013).
43.
