Do hurricanes and rainfalls herald change of power?
Good weather speaks well of the authorities and bad weather plays into the opposition’s hands. It’s as clear as day. There even is a sneaking suspicion of political preferences on the part of those high above – from weather bureaus chiefs to the ones they offer their prayers to. Whenever the Man Upstairs, in charge of the clouds, winds, and other elements, sends tornados, hurricanes, and floods to various points of the globe, He is putting His proteges to the test and helping their rivals to rise above. Who was Noah before the Deluge? A modest righteous man in the boondocks. But when the water subsided, he became the forefather of the entire humankind, including us. So it’s no use talking about diabolical forces when rivers seethe, lightning flashes, and news bulletins reflect the whole list of divine scourges. Alas, “a la guerre comme a la guerre” now also means “c’est la vie.”
Hurricane Katrina that hit New Orleans in the now distant 2005 also walloped, incidentally, the administration of Mr. George Bush Jr. The president had to answer for the appointment of Michael D. Brown, an expert on Arabian horses, as director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency and to explain to the Senate about lavish expenditures on fighting terrorism and negligible spending on flood relief.
Like an auditor who never takes bribes, the elements will always show where the shoe pinches and who is who. President Bush sank his reputation of a strong politician in the Mississippi marshes, while a strong actor, Arnold Schwarzenegger, distinguished himself as chief firefighter in the Los Angeles district. Vladimir Putin was also prepared to repeat the Terminator’s exploit, coming out on the fire line in 2010, but the Moscow wildfires were not exactly like those in the movies – with sky-high tongues of flame. It’s not exactly California… There was more smoke than fire, and Yury Luzhkov, who knows how to dispel clouds and create a good visibility, was away on vacation. For this reason, the president’s exploit was put on hold, and the mayor, who had made the capital famous, was shown the exit door from his party.
But it can also happen that the capital succumbs to the ravages of the elements but the city’s No.1 man defies them, even though he does not look like a Titan. There was talk in the snowbound Kyiv that Kyiv City Administration chief Oleksandr Popov would surely take the rap for traffic jams, high passions, and empty shop shelves. But he was lucky. The “right” roads were cleared in the “right” direction. As people who tend to trust their own eyes and ears rather than the media, ministers rode down the streets and refused to believe in gridlocks. And, incidentally, the spring came just in time and switched public attention from snow to water. In a word, what fell from the sky went up to the same place. I mean the Kyiv mayor problem.
By contrast, the Odesa mayor situation is clear. Mr. Kostusiev twice braved hurricanes. Back in the times of fighting in the opposition ranks, Kostusiev saw the hostile whirlwinds dispel the rosy haze of the previous municipal authorities and prove the mayor’s and his teams’ total inability to tackle the elements. The oppositionist Kostusiev, with a spade in hand and hopes for the mayor’s chair in view, spoke excitingly and convincingly about the authorities’ inefficiency in the face of nature’s whims. His dream came true – much in the spirit of a joke in which a guy asks the goldfish to make him Hero of the Soviet Union. Now Mr. Kostusiev, the mayor, is again in the center of a cataclysm. This time it is the brought-down lampposts and trees. But still it is true that when God vests one with power, He somehow makes him or her listen to reason. The tone of the man, who looks like an oppositionist with a spade in hand, is now free of the intonations of a quick-tempered youth who is going to command the winds. A city TV channel’s cameras are now showing a confused man who is aware of his impotence in the face of the powerful elements.
Can you disbelieve after this in a relationship between climate changes, people’s views, and the authorities’ behavior? It is always there. Probably, the riots of nature dictate the algorithms of the changes subject to human power – the simple ones, such as cuts in carbon dioxide emissions, and the complicated ones which will not fit in with a regulations text. In a minute of ever-growing dangers, some people show readiness to cooperate, whereas others can exacerbate the trouble with their egoism and panic. The latter need help and control. To leave them unattended is the same as to leave children with matches by a haystack. Politicians and bosses also behave differently, trying either to appear in whiter than white against the background of black clouds or to bypass the thunderhead. Katrina scared the US establishment so much that after the tornado in Oklahoma all the frightened political leaders arrived at the place of the disaster. Thank God, there was no need to travel from Kyiv to Odesa’s weather-beaten shores. It’s not Oklahoma here. The tornados are smaller, and the bosses are stronger: either they are not afraid of the elements or they have won over all the oppositional Noahs.
DEMOCRACY’S GIFT TO THE DYING VILLAGES
It has happened! Renaissance Foundation’s program manager Oleksii Orlovsky has told the press about “approval of the plan to develop local democracy until the end of the year, which is supposed to offer a systemic approach to the development of a civil society throughout the country,” a much-respected news portal reports. It is difficult and, at the same time, easy to grasp. At last, the years-long chaotic aspirations for local self-government have been positioned as a streamlined and finalized plan. You are really eager to have a glimpse of it, to peak beyond the horizons of today’s totally administrative and minimally effective system. What is there, in the annals of systemic creation and in the prospects of people’s developing self-awareness? Maybe, economic independence of the regions, including formation of their own budgets and electability of administration heads? A reduced impact of central offices on local bodies’ decisions? And, apparently, something is said about the elimination of oppression by the bureaucrats who have spawned all over the country?
But, either the newspapermen failed to grasp the essence or the authors planned their work for centuries to come, in 2013 we will be eligible, as if we were famine stricken, just for a handful of rice from the overall menu of European democracy. This means free elections of heads of villages with a population of 50 people or so. From the viewpoint of demographers, it is a typical electorate of desolate villages – just like a part of a Khrushchev-era-built apartment house. It is too little for a country. But since it was decided that self-government should develop from villages to the capital, it would be a good idea to draw up a plan for a period longer than a year. Or is there nothing planned – democracy-wise – for 2014?
TWITTER TO TAKE ALL THE BLAMEP
Oddly enough, authoritarian politicians are afraid of Jewish-sounding names – especially when it comes to expressing ideas on paper or in the air. The whole story began with Underwood typewriters invented by Mr. Franz Wagner. The American Jews created those dangerous machines under the pretext of making it easier to read. No wonder they were registered at people’s personal place of residence in the USSR and Nazi Germany. Later, the suspicion of the servants of the Soviet and post-Soviet regimes fell on the respected Printers, Lasers, and Xeroxes. These names aroused fear, even though high-placed officials did not have a clear idea of them. I once personally registered a Minolta copying machine at a Belarusian institution with a long name – something like a state licensing service. I bring them the technical certificate and request them to affix a seal.
“Is this a Xerox?” they ask me.
“No, it’s a Minolta,” I answer.
“Then we are a wrong place – we deal with Xeroxes and Printers only.”
We still managed to strike a deal, and they registered my Minolta. The name doesn’t sound Belarusian, you see… I thought this funny episode had put an end to bureaucrats’ suspicions about the origin of the printing, copying, and multiplying equipment that could bring down the regime. But then came Twitter and, immediately, the Turkish Prime Minister Recep Erdogan accused it of all the problems in his country. It’s easy to understand the premier. A purely Judean offspring, Facebook, has done so much fuss in the Muslim world that nobody can still come to. Oh these Jewish gizmos from America! Why don’t they call their inventions by Arab and Slav names? For Erdogan did not say even a word about VKontakte.
