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Oleksandr the Grater
October 11, 2006 07:26 AM
Readers of this blog will recall that the gradual rupture of the so-called Orange coalition began last year with the resignation of Oleksandr Zinchenko - a Tymoshenko loyalist - as the president's chief of staff. At a press conference, he dramatically charged three of Yushchenko's top lieutenants, including security chief Petro Poroshenko, with unspecified "corruption."
Well, the allegations have fallen away, but Zinchenko has not. This week, he was brought back into the cabinet by Yushchenko as a top advisor. And you might say the move has not exactly delighted officials from the president's party (Our Ukraine), as the following report suggests. (Bear in mind that the translation from Ukrainian is not precise. "Persuades" ought to be "urges," for instance.)
Our Ukraine Persuades Yushchenko to Sack Zinchenko
translated by Irena Yakovina, 10.10.2006, 13:05
Our Ukraine Bloc (NU) pushes the President to sack Olexandr Zinchenko from the post of the President’s advisor.
It followed from NU Presidium statement, which reads:
“The Party Presidium considers that such an irresponsible politician who failed to cope with his task as head of the President’s Secretariat, has no moral right to counsel the President.”
Moreover Zinchenko has spread rumors that plunged Ukraine into crisis, split the ‘orange camp’, wrecked the state’s image and consequently caused outcomes of this year’s parliamentary elections.
Ukraine’s courts as well as the Special Inquiry Commission of the Verkhovna Rada have not found any evidences of Zinchenko’s allegations thus completely disproving them.
On Monday President Yushchenko appointed Olexandr Zinchenko his advisor. At that the President’s freelance advisor Olexandr Tretyakov unwilling to work with Zinchenko submitted his resignation.
Ukrayinska Pravda
Mykola Martynenko, one of the Yushchenko aides accused by Zinchenko, was somewhat more circumspect, telling Pravda, “Viktor Andriyovych (Yushchenko) is a great humanist and gives a chance even to people who made many mistakes."
Then he ate a stick of butter.
Ukraine
A middle-aged Ukrainian woman told me last night about her experiences as a member of the Komsomol, the Communist Youth organization during the Soviet era. On Christmas and Easter, she and other members of the group were ordered to the local churches, where they were instructed to form two concentric rings around the buildings by locking arms. These rings were intended as a defense perimeter that would keep people from going to church on religious occasions. This peculiar Soviet abhorrence of religion is one reason that in Ukraine gifts are not exchanged on Christmas, but rather (last night) on New Year's Eve. In 2007, let's all of us, and especially us Americans, make a little more effort to keep in perspective our astonishing good fortune, and be grateful for what some sacrifice to preserve it. America may not be perfect, but it's the closest thing we've got.
January 1, 2007 06:51 AM · 
Kofi Annan has stepped down at the U.N. - at least a decade too late. I predict future historians will find it difficult to judge whether this ineffectual dupe was the puppet of genocidal regimes and autocrats or just their indispensable enabler. It is tough to fully enumerate the sins and consequences of this repugnant figure, but this WSJ editorial begins the grim task.
December 17, 2006 05:59 AM ·
I am often asked what it's like living in Ukraine. Well, yesterday afternoon I heard some hammering, and it sounded pretty close, so I went to se what was up. Looking out from a living room window I found two men in a cherry-picker, and they were hacking away at the rim of my balcony with sledge mallets, breaking away the concrete and tearing up the tiles. I figured the owner of my apartment must have forgotten to tell me she was having work done. Today I found out this wasn't the case. Alarmed, she phoned the Zhek - the state agency responsible for, but rarely inclined to undertake, the upkeep of public property. Their response was basically, News to us. We are now facing the prospect that we may never learn who these men were and why they were attacking my balcony, which now needs extensive repairs. It is not beyond the realm of possibility that I have been victimized in an act of serial vandalism by two men with sledges and a cherry-picker. That, my friends, is what it's like to live in Ukraine.
November 15, 2006 04:23 PM ·
Help, I'm on crack!
Oops - I mean, Help, I've been hacked! Not sure how long it was there, but someone managed to place an unauthorized link in Ethanistan. If anyone clicked on it, I apologize for not catching it sooner. Unless it linked to something cool. In which case, I'm glad I could open your mind to new exotic experiences, man.
August 23, 2006 12:05 PM ·
REVEALER, REVEAL THYSELF
Hmmmm. You can read through the entirety of Tony Judt's defense of the Mearsheimer/Walt paper without ever learning that Judt has called for the dissolution of Israel. Yet it's a not-unreasonable assumption that this argument, which was (of course) very controversial when it was aired, was what led the Times to Judt's doorstep in the first place. Bad copy editing?
April 19, 2006 08:29 AM ·
Blair: Contra the "Doctrine of Benign Inactivity"
Britain being home to some of earth's most cynical and repugnant twits -- George Galloway and Harold Pinter, to name just two -- it is easy sometimes to forget the heroic moral fortitude its leaders have demonstrated at critical moments across history. Tony Blair reminds us why he deserves mention alongside Churchill and Thatcher.
March 22, 2006 10:08 AM ·
Greg Gutfeld answers one of the blogosphere's great quandaries: How do you even begin to satirize a Web site that presents Alec Baldwin, Deepak Chopra and other B-list dinner guests as deep thinkers? It's the funniest thing in cyberspace at the moment. Don't miss Greg's "bio" -- and definitely do not miss the comments left below his entries by HuffPosters, confused and angry, who came for the wisdom of Cindy Sheehan and got rabbit-punched by this smartass.
March 1, 2006 10:58 AM ·
A true gentleman of the Blogosphere has learned he must battle more than just Moonbats in the months and years to come. Stop by GM's Corner and give George a shout -- and maybe leave some change in the bowl on the way out.
February 16, 2006 05:29 AM ·
Fight Fascism - Eat a Butter Cookie. Wikipedia provides a handy list of Danish companies here. Hey, if all of us here band together and buy Danish that would be like ... four or five bucks. But it's the principle that counts!
February 9, 2006 08:13 PM ·
