The up side of The Depression

Pooty, despite his soulful eyes, is looking over his shoulder.

As Wall St. 24/7 puts it:

The sharp drop in oil has moved Putin from being a man who could invade his neighbors at will and carry on war games with Chavez in Venezuela to a fellow who is fighting to keep his job...

...Russians like to take to the street from time-to-time in a attempt to overthrow those seated in the Kremlin. It is a sort of blood sport filled with vodka and killings. But, it has a way of bringing about reform even if the new bosses look the same as the old ones.

There is a great deal of irony in the fact that the one global economic event which could help pull China, the EU, and US out of a deep recession--a sharp drop in the cost of energy--could cost the Russians a significant part of their power base. Oil is no longer good currency for holding adversaries hostage.