The sad and perhaps tragic thing about Vladimir Putin is the opportunity lost. Following the collapse of the Soviet Union and his rise to power, it was widely accepted that there would be an economic integration with the West and that Western institutional norms, in terms of the criminal justice system and democratic processes, would follow. In the United States, governmental accommodations were developed to facilitate cultural and commercial exchanges. Chamber of Commerce affiliates offered workshops, and universities and colleges developed special programs with their Russian academic counterparts.
I was a member of the staff at Mount Wachusett Community College at the time and recall our vice president and members of the criminal justice staff visiting Russian colleges. In exchange, Russian professors arrived at the Gardner campus. They sat in on classes, toured area grammar and high schools, had lunch engagements with faculty and staff, and friendships developed. But Putin’s poisonings and killings of rivals and journalists, and his crimes against humanity with genocidal wars in Chechnya, Syria, and now Ukraine have sealed his fate. He is an outcast on the world stage and no amount of outsized yachts or palatial estates will repair his reputation or fate.
Genevieve Fraser
Orange