We are hurtling back into a Soviet abyss, into an information vacuum that spells death from our own ignorance. All we have left is the internet, wher… - Anna Politkovskaya

Tragically, our most active democrats are on the Left. I cannot bring myself to vote Communist because the distance between their progressive and repressive instincts is too short, but Putin's regime is a great recruiting ground for the Left, particularly among the young.

Anybody trying to do anything worthwhile in Russia at the moment is moving toward the left. [Mikhail] Khodorkovsky is correct, although all the democrats condemned his thoughts from prison. Russia's Left March is a fait accompli, which also rules out any Russian Orange Revolution. There will be no splendid revolutionary breakthrough with oranges, tulips, or roses in Russia. Our revolution, if it comes, will be red, because the Communists are almost the most democratic force in the country, and because it will be bloody.

My heroes are those people who want to be individuals but are being forced to be cogs again. In an Empire there are only cogs.