Dick Cheney, 46th Vice President of US (2001-2009)

The New York Times informs that the Central Intelligence Service of the United States has been successfully hiding from Congress the counter-terrorist program designed after 9/11 events for almost 8 years. CIA kept it secret on the order of Mr. Dick Cheney, a Vice President under George Bush Jr, who ruled the country for 2 terms, 8 years. Mr. Cheney was a great secret keeper, and NYT confirms it writing that “[he] was the Bush administration’s most vehement defender of the secrecy of government activities, particularly in the intelligence arena.”

Mr. Dick Cheney is one of the most hated people in Muslim communities being accused of plotting “anti-Islam campaign around the world” and giving speeches that have subtexts saying Muslims are threat to US security. I bet this news will catalyze more rumors and conspiracy theories around the world that Mr. Cheney and Mr. Bush Jr., the latter actually equalled the campaign against terrorism with crusade in September 2001, plotted various programs against Muslim world during the ‘War on Terror‘, and kept them secret from Congress and the whole world.

So… waterboarding, secret counter-terrorist program… what else is CIA hiding from us?

Medvedev: Personal and business relationships must be in harmony

Today was the first official meeting of US president Barack Obama with president of the Russian Federation Dmitry Medvedev. Political experts and journalists talk about a fresh start in a relationship between Russia and US (Well, I fully agree with it, taking into consideration that during Bush the relationship worsened much). On-line and print mass media is packed with headlines like “Medvedev and Obama to make a nuclear deal” or “Obama and Medvdev: new foreign politics?” or “Eyes on Moscow: Medvedev’s first meeting with Obama”.

However, here in St Petersburg, it seems majority of ordinary people do not really care about what is going on in high echelons of politics in their country. Today I walked a lot in St Peterburg and a took short trip to Peterhof. I was curious, but I did not see anyone reading a newspaper or talking about their president’s meeting with president of US Barack Obama, not even in metro where people do read a lot. It was strange, as I did not know that people are so apolitical here. I wonder what the situation is like in other parts of Russia.

In Kyrgyzstan, things are a little bit different. Majority of people, especially aged 35+, are highly politically educated. If there is something big happening in politics of Kyrgyzstan, you can see people reading or talking, no, arguing about it. I personally had cases when I found talking to elderly persons about the death of Medet Sadyrkulov more interesting (well, biased and not-based in facts, but still fun ) than reading about the same news in some Kyrgyz online news web sites

Briefly about the base: Manas airbase, aka Ganci, was opened in 2001 to support the military operations ongoing in Afghanistan. It is an important hub for US and NATO forces in their campaign in Afghanistan. Its importance rised after the closure of Karshi-Khanabad airbase of US in Uzbekistan in 2005, after US severely criticized the Uzbek governments actions during Andijan events. In February this year, the Kyrgyz parliament made a decision to close the base. And it coincided with the announcement that Russia would give 2 bln USD in credit and investment to Kyrgyzstan, which made many think that these two decisions are somehow connected..

Majority of experts and political scientists had been expecting that Manas base would stay anyway. Even on the eve of Jogorku Kenesh‘s (Kyrgyz parliament) decision to close the airbase, some PM’s from the ruling party Ak Zhol made statements that there was a big chance that Manas base, as a military base, would be closed, but if changed in terms of usage and objectives, could stay. And it was obvious that US would work hard to win it back, especially after the announcement of Obama’s plan to focus efforts on Afghanistan.

And cha-ching $$$ – more than 170 mln USD payment, huh? Time will show if the Kyrgyz government gets this money or not.