You are correct about living on borrowed time but you shouldnt look at these numbers in nominal terms. My grandfather payed 5 cents to take the bus. I pay 40 times more. Was my grandfather better off? Not necessarily. This is why people who think cash is the place to be will lose. It is inevitable for money to lose value and I am not saying that it's good or bad I am just saying it is.
Country going to tatters, weak President a clauset faggot giving away chip after chip to further weaken the psychology of the people, chaos and crime on the rise, intellectuals reporting that 'country has become unmanageable' and what does the glorious Red Army do? They stand mute like dumb dorks from village who came to the city for the first time and nearly got run over by a gas powered car that they encountered for the first time in their lives. If KGB, other top leadership including the VP have declared President to be unfit then the 'Loser' Red Army will have to take orders from the new leadership. Yeltsin was not a commie and he opposed Gorby all the way. Who is rooting for communism? The whole country wanted to get rid of it but not by breaking it away in more than a dozen pieces. When Yeltsin and others from Ukraine, Belarus and Khazakastan broke the USSR, then where was the 'Glorious Loser' Red Army then? What was the legal basis of walking out of the Union and leaving Gorby in a no man's land. Depressed, Low esteemed and selfish mindset of Russians, especially males, is very dangerous for their country. Putin did provide some firm hand but he had lots of help from oil prices. So pray that oil keeps on the bull run and stays there. Russia has not developed any other industry to provide alternative support when oil prices come down on average basis.
Furthermore, China did engineer its reforms by first providing a firm hand on the top and having its army support the transistion but in a lawful and organized manner. Why could not Soviet U do the same? Too much vodka or too much misconceptions about the West arriving with container loads of dollars to buy more vodka.
He was a member of the communist party. In fact, he was a member of Politburo, the executive branch of the Soviet Union. It was the highest rank achievable for a party official short of the "first secretary" post taken by Gorby. Only in 1987, when Yeltsin spoke out against Gorby and was promptly removed from his party posts such as first secretary of the Moscow City Party Committee (pre-perestroika equivalent of mayor of Moscow) and from Politburo, he started severing his ties with the communist party. In fact, it is widely believed he never officially quit the communist party. http://www.infoplease.com/spot/yeltsintimeline1.html What's your problem with "Red Army"? Did your ancestors suffer in the Russian civil war or during the invasion of Poland? Or are you a disgruntled red army serviceman?
Because China started reforms later, they had the example of the Soviet Union to learn from - so the Chinese communists tried to avoid the same mistakes (such as dismantling oppressive political police or allowing freedom of speech).
Get you facts straight: China started reforms in early 1980s and they had good organized game plan towards them. Stupid Russians did not learn anything from Chinese. They thought they will make Russia like USA in just two years. It took US 200+ years to become what it was in 1990s. Russians should have planned atleast 20 years. Trust me, Red Army was never glorious until it came under a firm hand. In WWII, there were series of losses, surrenders, retreats until Stalin woke up from his dream and Zhukov put in tough orders and rest is history. That was the only glorious moment of the Red Army. Rest of its involvements, it showed jokeful performance. Soviet Army was mired with corruption, bad training, bad organization so much so that during the Armenia earthquake it found itself not able to do much. Worst it did not do anything when its own country was broken apart. I call that Traitor's performance under Vodka influence. There is a Russian saying: A fish rots from the head. Why hamper over something that happened 20 years ago. However, if you do not learn from history and mistakes then you make yourself vulnerable and that's a good warning to Vodka drunk dreamers.
So did the Soviet Union. However, China started with giving local authorities more autonomy. The Soviet Union started with freedom of speech and legalising private enterprise sollowed soon. So, by all accounts the actual move to capitalism happened in the Soviet Union earlier.
Until recently our borrowing was done by bonds. We paid the interest. We could have just as easily printed more money. But we did not. The fact that we were the world currency sucked for U.S. citizens. My opinion is that demand seems to have allowed the Fed to put our dollars out all over the world in electronic form. Low and behold our dollar has been collapsing. Our dollar had no reason to go down in value, because our govt's spending was done by borrowing not printing. So it must have been the Feds action which caused the inflation. Yes there was demand for our currency. It should have made our dollar very very strong. So we can assume the "Fed" missed its targets, and flooded the world with dollars. In short it could be that the american people subsidized the private bankers who own the Feds massive profits with the massive loss of value of our dollar.
Red Army simply reflected the state of Soviet Union: corrupt and inefficient. Why do you assign any significance to the Army?
When political leadership fails to control the critical areas of the country then Army needs to step in set the shop in correct tune of things. Corrupt politicians like Yeltsin broke off USSR in one stroke of pen and Glorious Red Army stood watching with thumbs up the rear! Proved to be useless Army in the end, after all the money and attention spent on it.