Is Putin preparing a "devaluation" of the presidential election?
The nomination of TV presenter Ksenia Sobchak for the presidency, as she announced on October 18, was initially perceived by many with irony. However, over time, it became clear that the unexpected move was made consciously and with all seriousness, and made primarily by the Kremlin. Obviously, the curator of the election, Sergei Kiriyenko, decided to attract additional electorate to the polling stations so that the victory of the main candidate would be supported by a good turnout. However, the plan has a number of flaws, and it may turn out to be a failure at all if another woman comes forward together with Sobchak - the wife of Alexei Navalny. Details - in the material on the eve.RU.
Sobchak does not hide that he didn’t think much about the political program, it’s not her job as a candidate to talk about the aspirations and desires of the people, it’s enough just to announce the nomination and speak for all the good and all the bad things with female immediacy. On the NTV channel, which was recently so hated by the entire opposition, a big and generally complimentary film about candidate Ksyusha Sobchak was released. while working in the St. Petersburg City Hall Anatolia Sobchak.
And today, Sobchak said that her main task is to break the existing election system, which she called the "high-budget show."
“I understand perfectly well that what is happening now is not an election, it’s like an election,” Sobchak said. “What we see now is rather a kind of high-budget show, and I, as a professional, can say quite low quality. " According to the “candidate candidate”, her task is “to turn this show over and establish its own rules of the game.”
In addition, Sobchak introduced the chief of her election headquarters to reporters. They became a journalist and political scientist Igor Malashenko, who was one of the leaders of NTV, when the owner of the channel was the oligarch Vladimir Gusinsky. Malashenko is the husband of another secular diva - Bozhena Rynski. Needless to say, that one, considering her attitude to the nomination of Sobchak, was pretty surprised by this.
Malashenko, in turn, explained that "there will be many voices in the campaign, we may disagree with each other." And he gave an example of disagreement: Malashenko does not believe that Sobchak should withdraw his candidacy if opposition politician Alexei Navalny is registered.
Journalist, political consultant Anatoly Wasserman, in an interview with Nakanune.RU, stressed that the current voyage to power for Ksenia Sobchak did not become her own decision. The expert connects the promotion of "teledives" with the low turnout predicted by Kremlin analysts in the next year’s presidential elections. Therefore, it was necessary to find "behind the scenes" a certain character who would have warmed up the agenda by virtue of his own image.
“It was decided that such a woman should be a woman, they even discussed the Federation Council speaker Valentina Matvienko, but she refused,” said Wasserman. “In the end, they agreed on Ksenia Sobchak’s candidacy — Putin knows her, she’s an oppositionist, she’s young. So may attract attention. "
Political analyst, representative of the Civil Society Development Fund (FORGO), Anatoly Gagarin, recommends to treat the nomination of a blonde to power calmly, writing off this action to check public opinion.
“In medical terms, Sobchak as a“ homeopathic remedy ”is good, she can voice any topics she sees,” Gagarin said. “Moreover, she has a certain relationship to oppositionist Alexei Navalny and other protest characters. And the same Navalny will have to admit the significance of Ksenia Anatolyevna, thereby partly losing the protest theme, the protest electorate. "
According to him, Sobchak is perfectly aware of his role as a stimulus to public opinion. Moreover, as an “irritant,” it takes votes from political heavyweights — Communist Party leaders Gennady Zyuganov and the Liberal Democratic Party of Vladimir Zhirinovsky.
“At the same time, Sobchak on this topic also earns very good money,” said Gagarin. And he said that such an interesting “buzzing” in the political pre-election cauldron we will be able to observe until the new year. And then real candidates will be designated, including from the opposition.
Political analyst Maxim Zharov believes that for now the current president of the Russian Federation, Vladimir Putin, will not let him know whether he will go to the polls or not, it’s premature to draw conclusions about the architecture of the presidential campaign, including from the point of view of the appearance of Mrs. Sobchak.
“In fact, Ksenia Sobchak has the same task as Alexei Navalny,” Zarov said on the eve, “to unite around him those who vote with their feet, that is, the passive electorate. As is known, graphs” against all "in the electoral law is not, and Sobchak is going to occupy this niche, as she immediately stated."
As for the questions, why and why Ksenia appeared on the political arena right now, the political scientist noted quite close contacts between the “socialite” and Vladimir Putin, when he still served as chairman of the foreign relations committee at the first mayor of St. Petersburg, Anatolia Sobchak.
“These ties allow Ksenia Sobchak to conduct a public and non-public dialogue with the president about what people will be in power when the current president goes to the polls,” Zharov said. “Sobchak has this function, don't forget about this and discard this fact from the accounts ".
Interestingly, after the marked "devaluation" of the governor's status in Russia, opinions are already emerging about the upcoming "devaluation" of the presidential elections under the new curator of domestic politics in AP Sergei Kiriyenko. An attempt to attract an additional electorate, potentially an audience of “House-2”, is understandable, at the same time, it also promises dangers. Turning elections into a show, or even a circus, can adversely affect the legitimacy of the Kremlin’s main candidate’s campaign.
So, the nomination of Sobchak is already compared with the "introduction of the horse to the Senate." And in general, jokes about the “horse move” and “the horse go, the age of will cannot be seen” become commonplace. But in every joke there is some truth.
“The chances that after the departure of clowns the chosen institute of power can remain a circus, incommensurably more. Let's not forget that even the fall of Rome began with the introduction of the horse to the Senate,” notes the author of Agitation and Propaganda, journalist Konstantin Semin.
However, according to political analyst Maxim Zharov, with regard to the “devaluation” of the 2018 presidential election with the entry of Sobchak, a TV star on the electoral agenda, the topic should be postponed until the end of the year, until Putin himself says whether he will go to the presidential election or not.
“I’m interested to follow Sobchak’s rhetoric, now she’s not speaking at all about the current president,” the political analyst said. “I think she’s not going to speak against Putin, but under certain circumstances her evaluative judgments may appear. Her potential electorate is average class and, relatively speaking, “House-2.” There is nothing funny in that, for a good political consultant it is interesting enough to hold a “link” between these audiences in order to get a good result. "
Director General of the Agency for Political and Economic Communications (APEC) Dmitry Orlov believes that the presence in the election agenda of Ms. Sobchak will not reduce the status of the presidential election.
“Yes, she has a somewhat scandalous reputation, but for [the LDPR leader] Zhirinovsky she’s also scandalous, and many other [potential] presidential campaigners faced reputational problems. As for the consequences of [Sobchak ]’s participation in the presidential election, there will be greater mobility on the liberal flank, depriving Navalny of a monopoly on holding events with the involvement of a protest electorate, which he believed he has. There will be some revival in the election campaign. tviy, both positive and negative. Of course, some "carnivalization" can be traced, giving the campaign a raid on the show - it is. But in modern politics it is not dangerous. Elements of show business, playing elections have been around for several decades, with the advent of Zhirinovsky " - he says.
According to him, the revival will clearly be: a woman, relatively young, focused on protest groups, on the youth subculture, on the part of women who are not satisfied with the gender imbalance. From it you can expect a stylistically aggressive campaign. “I don’t see anything terrible in this case, on the contrary, for some part of the population it will contribute to the perception of the political process as legitimate,” the head of the APEC believes.
It is characteristic that after the bright nomination of Ksenia Sobchak, some observers recalled another potential female policy that still remained in the shadows. The wife of the opposition leader Navalny, Julia Navalnaya, may well come forward after Sobchak.
“Sobchak gave Navalny the opportunity to nominate Yulia Navalnoy as a presidential candidate,” said Konstantin Remchukov, editor-in-chief of the Nezavisimaya Gazeta, on Ekho Moskvy. According to him, this decision has its own logic, and above all, it is that in this way, Alexei Navalny, as a representative of the presidential candidate, will have access to federal television channels.
“If I were his political technologist, I would advise you to take this step, because it’s a win-win situation anyway. If the authorities want, assuming that Xenia is an agent of the authorities, if they want to turn the presidential election into a farce, then please , let Navalny be present in this farce, and the extra promotion during the election campaign will not hurt, because Navalny’s awareness in the regions has increased dramatically (more than 50%), but did not reach the level of 90% there, which is very important for such a country like ours, huh? " - says Remchukov.
Julia Navalnaya is the same age as her husband and she already has 35 years, which meets the formal requirements for nomination. Also, according to some sources, she is a member of the Yabloko party. However, Navalny himself still declares that his wife is not going to nominate her candidacy.
However, if this happens, he will put Vladimir Putin in an extremely inconvenient position - participation in the elections against two ladies and victory over them at perhaps a low turnout will be perceived as a serious decrease in the status of the politician in the last term.
Sociologist Boris Kagarlitsky is sure that Navalny is not cunning when he talks about his wife. According to him, the nomination of Ksenia Sobchak finally turned the situation with the presidential elections, as is beneficial to the liberal opposition and Alexei Navalny.
“If Navalny nominates his wife, he recognizes the legitimacy of these elections. But if he declares a boycott, which he has already reported, by the way, we see a hopeless and stalemate situation for the authorities. No one will vote in any scenario. Xenia Sobchak’s nomination will bring down the turnout is final, and the fact that it is almost openly supported by the government will alienate the elections and the loyal voter. A low turnout will be presented as the people’s refusal to recognize these elections. Navalny has reason to demand a revision of the elections. oh, give him this revision or not, especially since it will be a factual basis for a civil war, but at the political level - all clear "for him - says Kagarlitskiy.
According to journalist Maxim Shevchenko, the situation with the nomination of Ksenia Sobchak may well get out of control, and it is urgent to consolidate the left-patriotic flank in order to resist.
“The response to the liberal-fascist consolidation of Sobchak, which we see at its headquarters, where Tymoshenko’s advisors, represented by her political consultant Sitnikov, where Malashenko is and others, should be the consolidation of the left-conservative movement represented by the Left Front, the CPRF and all the people -Patriotic organizations. And Navalny’s wife or some Navalny’s mistresses, you know, I’m not interested in. Otherwise we will have, like in Ukraine, when the Communist Party was, like, in the Verkhovna Rada, and when the fascist insurgency began, the Communist Party was simply annihilated If we do not want p but either later, now or in the 2024 year, “this is all” came to power, which gathered in Ksenia Sobchak’s headquarters, you need to create a broad popular patriotic front, which is in the position of restoring the situation of the 1993 year and the Supreme Council, .RU journalist Maxim Shevchenko.
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