Bent Notes

Georgia severs diplomatic relations with Russia.

He does something like not show solidarity with his friend Joe Lieberman when Joe is trying to give him some tremendous help.  John McCain - the embodiment of Reasonable Gentleman Syndrome.

The town of Gori, which was essential for Georgia to hold if the country was to remain unified, has fallen to Russian forces.

I’ve been trying get a handle on the mind of Vladimir Putin.  It’s not a Marxist-ideology motivation that drives him, certainly.  He probably feels unencumbered in the pursuit of his ambitions not to have that leviathin bureaucracy circumscribing his maneuvers.  It doesn’t lok to me like it’s really a KGB / police state mindset, either.  I think he basically thinks like a gangster.

What of his acceptance by W, who so famously looked into his eyes and took the measure of his soul, or the G-7 leaders generally, who let him into their fold?  Well, they were anxious to foster - or at least be seen as fostering, a new, flexible, post-Soviet Russia, in which a dynamic economy and ample resources would yield lots of trade and openness.  For his part, Putin liked the legitimization, much as when Mafia dons brag about friendships with mayors, senators, or civic leaders. 

Non of this had any intrinsic significance, it turns out.  It was all strategy, putting everything in place for the moment to maximize his empire.  Apparently he sees that moment as having arrived.

Georgia’s president weighs in on the op-ed page of the WSJ.  His point dovetails with one I’ve made here and elsewhere: the West, at this late date, is really a set of principles and values more than a geographic bloc.