{"id":7034,"date":"2015-04-02T05:51:46","date_gmt":"2015-04-02T10:51:46","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=7034"},"modified":"2015-04-02T05:51:46","modified_gmt":"2015-04-02T10:51:46","slug":"why-putin-doesnt-need-to-pander-to-the-west","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/?p=7034","title":{"rendered":"Why Putin Doesn\u2019t Need To Pander To The West"},"content":{"rendered":"<h3><a href=\"http:\/\/oilprice.com\/Energy\/Energy-General\/Why-Putin-Doesnt-Need-To-Pander-To-The-West.html\" target=\"_blank\">Why Putin Doesn\u2019t Need To Pander To The West<\/a><\/h3>\n<p>It\u2019s quiet on the eastern front \u2013 as quiet as a conflict between world superpowers can be. Since February\u2019s cease-fire agreement, relative calm has prevailed in Ukraine and world events elsewhere \u2013 Iran and Yemen \u2013 have shifted the global focus. Still, the West\u2019s frigid relationship with Russia is no less chilly and antagonism, not cooperation, remains the modus operandi. Long-term, the stalemate looks to continue, but can either side afford such a result? And if not, who cracks first?<\/p>\n<p>The prevailing judgment is that Russia cannot. And at surface level it\u2019s a fair assessment. The Bank of Russia\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.cbr.ru\/eng\/publ\/ddcp\/2015_01_ddcp_e.pdf\">predicts<\/a>\u00a0the economy will contract by between 3.5 and 4 percent in 2015 and by another 1 percent in 2016; the ruble, while stable, is still\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.xe.com\/currencycharts\/?from=RUB&amp;to=USD&amp;view=1Y\">down<\/a>\u00a0approximately 40 percent since June of last year. In all, former Finance Minister Alexei Kudrin\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/slon.ru\/posts\/49928\">believes<\/a>\u00a0the events in Crimea will cost the Russian economy as much as $200 billion over the next three to four years. The political and economic situation is fraught with grey area however, and no one turns grey to green quite like president Vladimir Putin.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/oilprice.com\/Energy\/Energy-General\/Is-Warren-Buffett-Wrong-About-Oil-Stocks.html\"><strong>Related:\u00a0Is Warren Buffett Wrong About Oil Stocks?<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n<p>As Putin embarks on his 16th year at the helm \u2013 I\u2019m counting 2008-2012 \u2013 he faces a situation not too dissimilar from his first year in office: a sluggish economy, falling standard of living,\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.cbr.ru\/eng\/statistics\/print.aspx?file=credit_statistics\/capital_new_e.htm\">high capital flight<\/a>, and low foreign direct<a href=\"http:\/\/knoema.com\/OECDFDIS2014\/oecd-foreign-direct-investment-fdi-statistics-2014?country=1000480-russia\">investment<\/a>. Russia\u2019s\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.forbes.com\/sites\/markadomanis\/2015\/03\/30\/10-charts-that-explain-russia\/2\/\">demographics<\/a>\u00a0look good and its equity market is a\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.cfainstitute.org\/Survey\/gmss_2015_report.pdf\">top pick<\/a>for 2015, but in the short-term, the country\u2019s macro indicators don\u2019t yield much hope.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&#8230;click on the above link to read the rest of the article&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Why Putin Doesn\u2019t Need To Pander To The West It\u2019s quiet on the eastern front \u2013 as quiet as a conflict between world superpowers can be. Since February\u2019s cease-fire agreement, relative calm has prevailed in Ukraine and world events elsewhere \u2013 Iran and Yemen \u2013 have shifted the global focus. Still, the West\u2019s frigid relationship [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[1067,179,441,694,821,857,965,901],"class_list":["post-7034","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-geopolitics","tag-bank-of-russia","tag-crimea","tag-iran","tag-russia","tag-ukraine","tag-vladimir-putin","tag-west","tag-yemen"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7034","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7034"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7034\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7035,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7034\/revisions\/7035"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7034"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7034"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/olduvai.ca\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7034"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}