"The same things happened under Alexander III": election results - in opinions and assessments

The three-day elections, quite expectedly, ended with a victory for United Russia, which, apparently, will gain a constitutional majority, that is, more than 300 seats in the State Duma. The Communist Party of the Russian Federation, according to preliminary data, is gaining about 22% of the vote. Also, the LDPR and "Fair Russia" pass to the State Duma; the political force, the New People party, retains its chances and heel. The rest of the parties at the moment do not overcome the five percent barrier to enter the State Duma. Including the only democratic party "Yabloko", which gained about 1% of the vote.

Of course, the main expectations of the experts were connected with the fact whether the tactics of "Smart Voting" will be able to resist the hegemony of "United Russia"? I couldn't. True, at the same time, experts are sure that the victory of United Russia was helped, as always, by the so-called "administrative resource" in the form of stuffing, carousels and other types of falsifications, of which this time, judging by the reports of observers, there were a lot. But this resource has always existed, so there is not much to be offended at.

Nevertheless, political scientist Abbas Gallyamov is sure that in reality the result of United Russia is completely different from what official sources show:

“We have already spoken about this several times on different broadcasts, I will duplicate it here: the society has no reason to believe in the result of“ United Russia over 30 percent. Two thirds of voters did not support the ruling party.

With this we all have to enter a new political cycle..."

On the air of the international TV channel RTVI, political scientist Ilya Grashchenkov spoke about the falsification of the elections and said that 3 days of single voting is an unprecedented story, and also answered the question about the "dirty" elections:

“It all depends on what is considered a“ dirty ” election: at the beginning of the 2000s there was a practice of massive ballot stuffing, buying up votes, and now everything is very technologically advanced: undesirable candidates are simply not allowed now, and on election day a person comes to vote for himself and, between times throws another ballot. 3 days of voting is truly an unprecedented story. And, for now, they are trying to convince us that it is convenient. But, this maximally generates distrust of the elections. Thanks to telegram channels, we see areas in which double-walled booths, for example. After all, the more technologically advanced the elections become, the easier the falsification technologies become” .

Political analyst Yekaterina Shulman spoke live on the air about her opinion on the electoral rights of citizens and methods of falsification:

“The legal framework has changed in a number of ways: a three-day voting has appeared, the norms of home-based voting, which has always been a falsification tool, have been extremely simplified. I cannot call electronic voting another falsified tool - I do not have the necessary technical knowledge for this, but I see, that it is a vehicle for mobilizing a loyal electorate. Based on my competence, I suspect that the expectation is not that this result will be easily 'redrawn', but that people who are forced to register will think that their vote is being monitored, so they will vote in a more loyal way".

Another political scientist Roman Popkov reminds with sorrow that the only more or less opposition to the ruling party for many years in Russia has been the communists:

“Progressive youth sighs on Twitter that they had to vote for the Communist Party. This is not the first generation of progressive youth to vote for the Communist Party and sigh. The story has been going on since the 90s. Decades have changed, but ballots with tick marks for the Communist Party and / or Zyuganov remain the same. In the 2000s or in the 10ths, the term "zyuganut" was even born, and there was nothing joyful and hooligan in it. That was a special sad term. A statement of the imperfection of being and one's forced involvement in this painful whirlwind. "Oh, let's go vote for the old weirdos?" "Eh, let's go".

But okay 90s and zero, God bless them. But how you can vote for the Communist Party after the cannibalistic 2014, in which they had plenty of jaws, I absolutely do not understand. I'm not so pragmatist and cynic, although many consider me as such..."

Analysts on the popular Nezygar channel believe that despite the victory of United Russia, the legitimacy of the new State Duma has dropped even lower than the previous one:

“The change in the constitutional powers of the State Duma did not lead to an increase in popularity and public approval of this political institution.

According to Levada (an organization that performs the functions of a foreign agent on the territory of the Russian Federation), the level of public mistrust in the State Duma is the highest among the country's main political institutions. According to Levada, its parameters are fixed at the level of 57-62% throughout the year.

The level of subjectivity of the State Duma in society is assessed low.

In the structure of public sentiment, assessments of the State Duma as an institution dependent on the executive power prevail, and the factor of high salaries of State Duma deputies and the opinion about the insufficiently high efficiency of people's deputies give the negative connotations of its activities in the public consciousness.

Another effect is the low level of expectations from the new composition of the State Duma.

The structure of perception of political institutions in Russia is formed and reproduced, most often, in an inertial aspect, which makes it possible to project current expectations into the short and medium term, experts say.

Qualitative sociological studies in the regions show that the bulk of expectations from future people's choices has a tendency to decrease and is increasingly being transformed into requests for solving local problems.

A State Duma deputy, regardless of party affiliation, is perceived as an agent of power communicating with society.

The main request from the regions to the deputies is in the direction of improving the quality of communication between society and the authorities.

Sociologists note that these already crystallizing public perceptions, coupled with the state of the party system, which is causing less and less public confidence, determine apathetic and absinthe moods on the eve of the Duma elections..."

Political scientist Dmitry Mikhailichenko fully shares this opinion:

“The turnout at the elections is 3% higher than in 2016, which was achieved due to the electoral sultanates and electronic voting, which is very convenient for the System. There are many electoral violations, but the media dominance of the System localizes their discussion by a narrow segment of society.

The next composition of the State Duma is the next stage in the formation of a controlled, controlled society, in which civic subjectivity will continue to be leveled. Given the lack of clear prospects for the growth of the welfare of citizens, the next convocation of the State Duma will be antipopular.

The system has to solve two complex, post-electoral problems. Neutralize the protest and convince the West of the legitimacy of these elections..."

Another political scientist, Igor Drandin, is especially happy for the New People, although it is not yet a fact that they will pass the 5% barrier:

“New People” entered the State Duma. It's a good news. Yes, this project cannot be considered independent, but this party behaved decently. During the campaign, New People did not make wild statements, did not criticize Navalny, and ran a strong election campaign.

As I predicted, the Yabloko party failed miserably. Yavlinsky's appeal to Navalny's supporters worked. Almost no one voted for "Yabloko".

Network analyst Dmitry Milin is confident that the volume of fraud in these elections was such that their results should be canceled:

"Night comes, peaceful townspeople who go to work tomorrow, fall asleep, the mafia wakes up, the electoral mafia!"

Overnight, out of a quite decent 42% of votes (with 30-37% of the all-Russian rating according to different sociology), the United Russia “drew” 48.61% of the votes after processing 71.56% of the PEC protocols. And this even without the participation of the "king of falsifications" Peter, where even traces of shame and conscience have long disappeared.

In addition, there was an enchanting large-scale failure (2 million voters at 95 +% turnout) with the DEG experiment in Moscow. There are still no DEG results, which means that these results are "redrawn" in favor of the EP already electronically.

In the current situation of complete loss of adequacy by the political bloc of the Kremlin and discrediting of the country's electoral system, it is not possible to recognize the results of the counting of votes in the elections to the State Duma".

Publicist Anatoly Nesmiyan is surprised at the hopes that the supporters of "Smart Voting" had:

“With great interest in the morning I looked through the channels and accounts of supporters of “smart voting”. Despondency and menacing clenching of fists: all around deception, manipulation and falsification! And the logical conclusion: well, next time we will definitely show them!

These people are completely unteachable. As well as the power against which they allegedly oppose, call and fight. Which leads to a very obvious idea: if there is no difference between them, then how to distinguish between the supporters of Navalny and Putin? On what basis? If some are so stupid that they destroy any feedback mechanisms, creating an insoluble contradiction that will bury them, and the latter are so stupid that over and over again they call to break through concrete walls and fortifications with a head start?

What, then, is the difference between different types of stupidity?

Calls to participate in elections that are completely controlled by the regime are something that cannot be called rational. They do not solve anything and do not lead to anything. Energy that cannot be converted into useful work is entropy. People who are stubbornly engaged in only one thing - processing the useful energy of the people into useless - in this case only support the regime, working to prolong its existence. Fighting inferno with the help of entropy is a less rational task, I can't even imagine".

Historian Yevgeny Ponasenkov generally attacked all voting participants:

“Well, what, fuckers, took part in the farce? Now you are not just participants in the shameful setting of the regime, but also accomplices! And the responsibility for all the abominations is not only on the regime - but also on you. For 15 years old, only turnout is important to the farmers, and you are happy to try. For the most moronic of you, the owners invent fake options like "newbies". You can write "goat" on your forehead with a felt-tip pen..."

But the popular writer Boris Akunin (Chkhartishvili) calls on all opposition forces to moral resistance to the authorities, as to the only worthy and possible in this situation:

“Now that the elections are over and my statement will not harm Smart Voting, I want to explain why I consider this venture a mistake. I’m not talking about the practical results, not about whether the“ UG ”will work or not. some places - fine; fail - the importance is not great.

In 2021, a significant change took place in Russian life: any political activity became impossible. This is a natural stage of evolution, or rather the degradation of the regime of a lifelong dictatorship.

The time of politics - election campaigns, demonstrations, rallies, legal opposition organizations - is over and will come again under completely different circumstances.

There is nothing new or unique here. More than a hundred years ago, under Alexander III, the same thing happened: the revolutionaries were imprisoned or squeezed into exile, Russia was under the "owl's wings", the autocracy seemed to have won - it crushed everyone, controls everything.

But the end of the political struggle only means that the confrontation is shifting to another territory, and one where the dictatorship is very weak. The main struggle will now be not for deputy mandates, but for the minds and hearts of the majority (and mainly for the hearts).

In this type of competition, the Putin regime is completely helpless. He is deceitful, rude, stealing, corrupt, ideologically sterile. One can be afraid of him, but it is impossible to respect and even more to love him - at least for free.

The struggle is moving from politics to the realm of ethics and aesthetics. Honesty and decency are against lies and meanness, beautiful deeds are against disgusting ones.

When Alexei Navalny returned to go to jail, it was a very beautiful act that earned respect even from people who did not have strong political views. In them, in these people - and this is the majority of the population today - the key. And any actions that increase the number of supporters of democracy in Russia are the right actions, and any actions that make an ordinary, non-politicized person frown, creating in him a feeling of something unscrupulous, is to the detriment of the cause.

The problem with Smart Voting is precisely this: it made a lot of people frown. It gave the impression of some kind of unsympathetic fraud. Vote for a Stalinist to annoy Putin? No rational argumentation will convince an ordinary, non-partisan person that this is a worthy act. Rather, it will alienate from those who are campaigning for this. This means that even if successful, smart voting has done more harm than good.

Let's leave politicking and political technologies to the Kremlin. In this respect, they still cannot be surpassed. This is their native sport: they will burn, inflate, ride a goat.

The supporters of democracy should have other methods against which the dictatorship has no weapon: decent behavior, beautiful deeds, generation of attractive ideas and the consolidation of attractive people..."

Of course, the representatives have opposite assessments of the elections.

On the air of Sputnik radio, Anatoly Shirokov, a member of the Federation Council Committee on Federal Structure, Regional Policy, Local Self-Government and Northern Affairs, commented on the preliminary election results.

"These elections are very open, fair, transparent and highly competitive. These elections prove the fact that the Russian Federation has a capable, democratic and open electoral system, the results of which cannot raise any doubts. ...As for the first results, I would like to say, that this is a confirmation of the openness and effectiveness of our electoral system. Because it shows a real spread of political opinions in society. It is quite expected that the whole Russian Federation will win "United Russia" - a responsible political force that is the backbone of the policy pursued by the President RF, our undisputed national leader. But this does not exclude that people may have different opinions. We can see the results not only in Yakutia, where the Communist Party of the Russian Federation wins, but also, for example, in the Khabarovsk Territory, where yes - a protest vote. But this is also there is direct democracy", - said Anatoly Shirokov.