And You Thought Our Politics Was Heated...

Don't know about you, but I think it would be rather amusing to see some eggs and smoke bombs being tossed around on the House floor.

FIGHTING broke out and smoke bombs were thrown as Ukraine's Parliament erupted into chaos as it ratified a bitterly controversial deal with Russia extending the lease of a key naval base.

The scuffles broke out after eggs were thrown at the speaker of the Verkhovna Rada, Volodymr Lytvyn, who then took cover behind two black umbrellas held by aides.

The first smoke bomb was then thrown from an unknown source and the chamber filled with smoke, making it difficult to watch proceedings. Some deputies covered their noses or put on masks as alarms sounded.

A second smoke bomb was thrown shortly afterwards, creating thicker smoke in the chamber as deputies nonetheless continued their rancorous debate, an AFP correspondent in the chamber reported.

The deputies in the notoriously fractious Parliament were taking part in a session debating a controversial deal last week to extend the lease on Russia's Black Sea Fleet naval base in Crimea until at least 2042.

The deal signed last week by Russian President Dmitry Medvedev and his Ukrainian counterpart Viktor Yanukovych had been slammed by the pro-Western Ukrainian opposition as a historic surrender of sovereignty.

Deputies also started fighting over a massive Ukrainian flag in the middle of the chamber, twisting and distorting the yellow and blue banner as smoke continued to billow in the chamber.

Amid the chaos, some deputies tried to push on with their business as if nothing extraordinary was taking place, with speakers taking to the floor.

With some lawmakers shouting "Shame, Shame!", the Parliament ratified the pact with 236 lawmakers voting in favour of ratifying the deal in the 450 seat chamber.

Meanwhile, thousands of supporters of Ukraine's previous pro-Western government protested outside parliament over the decision, shouting "Death to Traitors" and "Crimea is Ours".

My Kind of Protest

These ladies in the Ukraine know how to do a protest. They aren't some skanks like that motely crew from Code Pink or some hags from NOW. They actually bring out the hot babes. Who cares what they're actually protesting, they look good.

Four young women naked from the waist up barged into a Ukrainian polling station on Sunday and held a rowdy protest just before a candidate in the country's presidential election cast his ballot there.

The women, members of a small feminist group called Femen known for staging eye-catching protests, were hustled out of the Kiev polling station by security guards before Viktor Yanukovich showed up to vote, AFP journalists saw.

"Enough raping our democracy!" shouted the protesters, who held signs with slogans such as "Help! Rape!" and wore nothing except for jeans and strips of green electrical tape over their nipples.

The women told reporters they were protesting against "the end of democracy" in Ukraine and not specifically against Yanukovich or in favour of his rival, Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko.

One of the protesters actually makes good use of pink.

As to the election, opposition candidate Yanukovich appears to have won, although the outcome is going to be contested.

Ukraine May Fall Back Into Russia's Orbit

The Ukraine was once a member of the Warsaw Pact, also known as the Soviet Union, those countries over which the central government in Russia exerted control.

Since the demise of communism and the breakup of the Soviet Union they have pursued a more westernized democratic form of government. With elections just three weeks away, however, the pro-Russian candidate, Viktor Yanukovych, is leading in the polls. He wishes a return to good old days where the central government exerted more control and he is very friendly with Vladimir Putin's puppet Dmitry Medvedev.

He's advocating a tighter clamp on free speech, rejection of membership in NATO and instead joining a European Security Group championed by Russia and opposed by the rest of western Europe.

His main talking point is about corruption in the government. I don't know where he was when the Ukraine was a part of the Soviet Union, but if you wanted a model of corruption, there it was.

"So what did this Orange Revolution give us?," Yanukovych asked in an interview with The Associated Press. "Freedom of speech? That's very good. But what price did the Ukrainian people pay for this? For the development of this democratic principle in our country, the price was too great."

The Ukraine has the main pipeline for gas flowing from Russia to the rest of Europe. Earlier conventional wisdom said that Obama's attempt to normalize relations with Russia may imperil the pipeline because Russia would take military action to ensure that it stayed under their control. Now with their candidate leading in the polls, this scenario seems to be moot.

What will it mean for Europe's gas supply if Russia does indeed get an ally in Ukraine is anybody's guess at this time.

What is disturbing is that these emerging democracies from the former Soviet Union seem to slowly be drifting back into Russia's sphere of influence, trading stability for freedom.

I would hope that for all of its warts, the people of the Ukraine would rather live free than to once again live under the iron rule of a central government, but sometimes when a way of life is all you have known, experiencing something new which does not blossom as quickly as you would like leads you to head back to your comfort zone.

I hope this isn't the case, but only time will tell.

Quick, Someone Alert Jimmy Carter: Electronic Voting Not Secure

Can you believe it? Venezuelan thug Hugo Chavez would actually tamper with voting machines?

The CIA, which has been monitoring foreign countries' use of electronic voting systems, has reported apparent vote-rigging schemes in Venezuela, Macedonia and Ukraine and a raft of concerns about the machines' vulnerability to tampering.

Appearing last month before a U.S. Election Assistance Commission field hearing in Orlando, a CIA cybersecurity expert suggested that Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez and his allies fixed a 2004 election recount, an assertion that could further roil U.S. relations with the Latin leader.

In a presentation that could provide disturbing lessons for the United States, where electronic voting is becoming universal, Steve Stigall summarized what he described as attempts to use computers to undermine democratic elections in developing nations. His remarks have received no news media attention until now.

Stigall told the Election Assistance Commission, a tiny agency that Congress created in 2002 to modernize U.S. voting, that computerized electoral systems can be manipulated at five stages, from altering voter registration lists to posting results.

I'm sure Democrats would never try any such chicanery.

Stigall, who has studied electronic systems in about three dozen countries, said most countries' machines produced paper receipts that voters then dropped into boxes. However, even that doesn't prevent corruption, he said.

Turning to Venezuela, he said that Chávez controlled all of the country's voting equipment before he won a 2004 nationwide recall vote that had threatened to end his rule.

When Chávez won, Venezuelan mathematicians challenged results that showed him to be consistently strong in parts of the country where he had weak support. The mathematicians found ''a very subtle algorithm'' that appeared to adjust the vote in Chávez's favor, Stigall said.

Calls for a recount left Chávez facing a dilemma, because the voting machines produced paper ballots, Stigall said.

''How do you defeat the paper ballots the machines spit out?'' Stigall asked. ``Those numbers must agree, must they not, with the electronic voting-machine count? . . . In this case, he simply took a gamble.''

Stigall said Chávez agreed to allow 100 of 19,000 voting machines to be audited.

''It is my understanding that the computer software program that generated the random number list of voting machines that were being randomly audited, that program was provided by Chávez,'' Stigall said. ``That's my understanding. It generated a list of computers that could be audited, and they audited those computers.

``You know. No pattern of fraud there.''

Stoking Putin's Paranoia

Heh. This should cause some lefty pointy-heads to explode.

U.S. warship in Russian-patrolled Georgian port
POTI, Georgia (Reuters) - The flagship of the U.S. Navy's Sixth Fleet dropped anchor off Georgia's Black Sea port of Poti on Friday, where Russian troops have been patrolling since last month's war with Georgia.

The USS Mount Whitney, a sophisticated command warship based in Italy, is the third U.S. vessel to arrive on the Georgian coast with humanitarian aid for tens of thousands displaced by the conflict over Georgia's breakaway South Ossetia.

The oil and dry grain shipment port of Poti is patrolled by Russian troops, who Moscow says are carrying out peacekeeping duties. Georgia and its Western allies say their presence is part of an illegal occupation.

The USS McFaul and a U.S. Coast Guard vessel delivered aid last month at Batumi, Georgia's largest port south of Poti, prompting Russian accusations of a military buildup.

Russian forces say they will carry out regular checks of cargo coming in and out of Poti. They man at least two positions close to access roads on the outskirts of the town.

The delivery of humanitarian aid by a U.S. warship has angered Russia, which has its own Black Sea fleet based in the Ukrainain port of Sevastapol.

A U.S. Navy statement said Mount Whitney would deliver more than 17 tons of aid, including blankets, juice, powdered milk and hygiene products.

Given the vast amount of cargo that can be transported, it would be ironic - and quite fitting - if the Pentagon dispatched the USS Ronald Reagan to assist in the humanitarian mission in Georgia.

Via Reuters

Vlad Paranoid, Line One

Cheney slams Russia over Georgia
U.S. Vice President Dick Cheney vowed on Thursday to stand by Georgia in its showdown with Russia, calling Moscow's military push into the ex-Soviet state an illegitimate act that cast doubt on its reliability.

Cheney, one of Moscow's harshest critics, is the highest ranking U.S. official to visit Georgia since Tbilisi tried to retake the breakaway region of South Ossetia by force in early August and was overwhelmed by the Russian military.

His typically strong comments may rile the Kremlin which has accused Washington of fuelling tensions by emboldening Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili a U.S.-educated lawyer with close ties to President George W. Bush's administration.

"After your nation won its freedom in the Rose Revolution, America came to the aid of this courageous young democracy," Cheney told reporters, referring to the peaceful revolution in 2003 which brought Saakashvili to power.

"We are doing so again as you work to overcome an invasion of your sovereign territory and an illegitimate, unilateral attempt to change your country's borders by force that has been universally condemned by the free world," Cheney said, standing next to Saakashvili on his first visit to Tbilisi.

Russian officials did not respond to the criticism from Cheney and have been dismissive about his presence in the region. Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said on Wednesday he was not paying much attention to Cheney's trip.

Cheney, on a tour of U.S. allies in the region that started in Azerbaijan and continued in Ukraine late on Thursday, said Russia's actions had cast "grave doubt" on its intentions and reliability as a partner in the region and internationally.

Azerbaijan and Georgia are links in the chain of a Western-backed energy corridor bypassing Russia which the West fears could be in jeopardy following the Kremlin's military thrust into Georgia.

Read the rest at Reuters

PMS-NBC's petulant bitch, Keith Olberman, was unavailable for comment.

The Good Neighbor Policy Of Vladimir Paranoid

Russia Could 'Point Warheads' at Ukraine
Russian President Vladimir Putin told reporters on Tuesday that Russia could aim missiles at Ukraine if leaders in Kiev decide to join NATO and host part of the alliance's controversial anti-missile shield.

He made the warning at a news conference in Moscow after a meeting with Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko that settled a long dispute over the price of natural gas.

NATO membership has been a hot issue within Ukraine recently, and Putin waded into the debate with ambiguous language, saying the decision was Ukraine's business but might raise a "question for Russia of the need for retaliatory actions."

He went on: "It's frightening not just to talk about, but even to think about, that in response to such deployment, the possibility of such deployments -- and one can't theoretically exclude these deployments -- that Russia will have to point its warheads at Ukrainian territory."

The statement was the clearest warning so far that Russia would resist the march of NATO membership to the Black Sea.

Yushchenko countered by saying that Ukraine has the right to determine its own foreign and defense policies, adding that the Ukrainian constitution prohibits the deployment of foreign bases on its territory.

"You understand well that everything that Ukriane does in this direction is not in any way directed at any third country, including Russia," he said.

Power Games Old and New

Relations between Russia and its former Soviet satellites have been difficult since the end of the Cold War, and in recent years Russia's state-run energy monopolies, like Gazprom, have emphasized their power over its impoverished neighbors (more...) by ending a long era of cheap, subsidized oil and natural gas.

Two years ago Gazprom turned off gas supplies to Ukraine in the middle of a hard winter to insist on a steep price increase. European critics noted that the move looked political (more...), because it followed the pro-Western Orange Revolution that swept Yushchenko to power and steered Ukrainian politics away from Moscow.

It's not nice to dis kameraden Putie.

Kremlin leaders announced separately on Tuesday that Putin would accept an invitation to attend a NATO summit in Romania this April. By then he'll be out of office as president, but the missile shield idea -- a US project extended to allies in Europe under NATO auspices -- has made him prickly about western influence in Russia's former backyard. He's said the presence of missile-defense installations in Poland and the Czech Republic would be a threat to Russian security.

Vladimir Paranoid is more of a threat to Russia's security than any missile-defense sites.

A Kiev-based political analyst, Oleksiy Haran, said Putin's posture was anachronistic. "This (warhead) statement was made in the spirit of the Cold War," he told the Associated Press, adding that Putin probably wanted to stoke anti-NATO sentiment within Ukraine and possibly within Russia, where voters will elect a new president on March 2.

Stoke Russian anti-NATO sentiment prior to a free and democratic election; the same election with the guaranteed outcome of Dmitry Medvedev becoming the next president?

Classic paranoia, baby.

Via Spiegel International