John H. wrote in
:

Larry, you can't include Belarus in generalities about the 'whole
region'. Belarus is still your basic Communist dictatorship without
many of the freedoms found elsewhere in the region.



Oh that's pretty easy to see, even in Russia, where just a different set of
Mafioso warlords run the country than the Soviet warlords.

Nothing much has changed. They all still rattle those sabres....