Boris Yelstin

Boris Yeltsin died Monday.

I remember back to the end of the Reagan years when all the neocons thought that the end of the Soviet Union heralded "the end of history"; there wouldn't be anything more to get excited about. The cold war was ending and the world was entering a period of democratic capitalist utopia.

Yeltsin to me was emblematic of that naivete. He tore down the Soviet system and replaced with a free-wheeling (and free-drinking) openness. The childlike belief was that destruction of the old world was all that was necessary to create a new world. (Sound familiar Mr Rumsfeld?)

What actually occurred in Russia was the dawn of a chaos that fostered a environment of criminality and corruption.

So twenty-odd years on from the Reagan era and where are we?
Russia has veered off into semi-authoritarianism; the radicalized Muslim world is making us nostalgic for an enemy we could understand; China hasn't exactly eaten our lunch yet, but they are setting the table...