Georgia Cracks Down
As we all know, today is official Bash Contentions Day. There hasn’t been a lot of movement as far as Contentions bashing goes, but the day is still young. A few days ago, Max Boot wrote this gushing post about how awesome the Mikheil Saakashvili administration is, and more broadly, why Georgia is a shining hill of democracy compared to that stinking hole of authoritarianism to the north:
Saakashvili didn’t call out an army of riot police to bust up the protests. The police presence was limited to a few lightly armed officers who, for the most part, got along well with the crowds. Contrast that with Russia, where far smaller anti-government rallies have been broken up by club-wielding riot police who have assaulted some protesters and arrested others, including the former chess champ Garry Kasparov.
This is clearly a tale of two former Soviet republics going in different directions: Georgia toward liberal democracy, Russia toward autocracy. Whatever his mistakes, Saakashvili deserves credit for his efforts to create greater freedom, including the freedom to protest against the government.
The New York Times reports today, “Riot police officers used tear gas and a water cannon today to clear thousands of demonstrators from the streets of Tbilisi, the capital of Georgia, employing extensive force in the face of protests against the country’s pro-Western government.” So maybe just because the leader of a country with can speak english and went to Columbia, that doesn’t necssarily make him the Savior of the Caucuses.
