Vladimir Putin

Russia does not want confrontation of any kind. And we will not take part in any kind of ‘holy alliance.’

He who does not regret the break-up of the Soviet Union has no heart; he who wants to revive it in its previous form has no head.

[on Trump] We can objectively see quite serious achievements even during his short time in office.

Some say we need to help (billionaire Roman) Abramovich and other Russian businessmen who have ended up in a difficult situation… I wouldn’t want to speak right now about those people who have broken various laws. I am speaking about people who acquired their capital through legal means. The former and the latter are better off being in Russia.

The Eurasian union is a project meant to preserve the identities of nations and the historic Eurasian community in the new century, in a new world.

Russian democracy is the power of the Russian people with their own traditions of national self-government, and not the realisation of standards foisted on us from outside.

I’m eternally grateful to fate and the citizens of Russia that they’ve trusted me to be the head of the Russian government.

The educational system was a highly predictable victim of the neoliberal reaction, guided by the maxim of ‘private affluence and public squalor’. Funding for public education has sharply declined. Tuition has exploded, leading to a plague of unpayable student debt.

I am not a committed pacifist. I would not hold that it is under all imaginable circumstances wrong to use violence, even though use of violence is in some sense unjust. I believe that one has to estimate relative justices. But the use of violence and the creation of some degree of injustice can only be justified on the basis of the claim and the assessment-which always ought to be undertaken very, very seriously and with a good deal of scepticism that this violence is being exercised because a more just result is going to be achieved.

Comparing the EU to the Soviet Union is as unwise as it is insulting. The Soviet Union was about prisons and gulags, borders and walls, violence against citizens and neighbours. The European Union is about freedom and human rights, prosperity and peace, life without fear, it is about democracy and pluralism – a continent without internal borders and walls.

I have a very positive attitude to anyone who is protecting the environment, but it’s inadmissible when people are using it as a means of promoting themselves, using it as a source of self-enrichment. I don’t want to name any specific examples… but often, environmentalism is used to blackmail companies.

Chechnya is part and parcel of the Russian Federation.

I am not worried about the deficit. It is big enough to take care of itself.

As a research tool, the internet is invaluable.

Russia will not soon become, if it ever becomes, a second copy of the United States or England – where liberal value have deep historic roots.

Reparations – not just aid – should be provided by those responsible for devastating Iraqi civilian society by cruel sanctions and military actions, and – together with other criminal states – for supporting Saddam Hussein through his worst atrocities and beyond. That is the minimum that honesty requires.

You must obey the law, always, not only when they grab you by your special place.

Hamas is regularly described as ‘Iranian-backed Hamas, which is dedicated to the destruction of Israel.’ One will be hard put to find something like ‘democratically elected Hamas, which has long been calling for a two-state settlement in accord with the international consensus’-blocked for over 30 years by the US and Israel. All true, but not a useful contribution to the Party Line, hence dispensable.

There are growing domestic social and economic problems, in fact, maybe catastrophes. Nobody in power has any intention of doing anything about them. If you look at the domestic programs of the administrations of the past ten years-I include here the Democratic opposition-there’s really no serious proposal about what to do about the severe problems of health, education, homelessness, joblessness, crime, soaring criminal populations, jails, deterioration in the inner cities – the whole raft of problems… In such circumstances you’ve got to divert the bewildered herd, because if they start noticing this they may not like it, since they’re the ones suffering from it. Just having them watch the Superbowl and the sitcoms may not be enough. You have to whip them up into fear of enemies. In the 1930s Hitler whipped them into fear of the Jews and gypsies. You had to crush them to defend yourselves. We have our ways, too. Over the last ten years, every year ot two, some major monster is constructed that we have to defend ourselves against.,

I believe that President Trump of the United States does not need any advice because one has to possess certain talent and go through this trial to be elected, even without having the experience of such big administrative work. He has done this.

A consistent anarchist must oppose private ownership of the means of production and the wage slavery which is a component of this system, as incompatible with the principle that labor must be freely undertaken and under the control of the producer.