Yushchenko was poisoned

Link

Over the past few days I had been putting together a post about the possibility that Yushchenko was poisoned prior to the Ukrainian elections. I was really fascinated by the subject (and the Ukrainian phenomenon as a whole), and I was ruminating on what I thought the truth of the matter was.

You see, we hear this kinda junk from all sorts of third-world populists... the Man is trying to keep him down, and will go to any length to silence him. Such dark rumors can help strengthen and spread the populist perception, so there are often motives for this kinda of tripe.

But Yushchenko was another matter... one of the reasons is the stakes involved concerning Russia. This wasn't some little African nation squabble where the guy in power could ruthlessly put his boot on the neck of the populist in order to hold on to some scrap of land and not really fear US involvement... the historic, economic, and military fall-out would have been pretty significant. Plus, a lot of eyes were watching, so something more subtle like the poisoned dagger would have been more appropriate for the situation.

The other reason was pretty obvious: his face is now a mess. If you haven't checked out the link above yet, go look and you will see what I am talking about. Sure, he suffered nerve problems and pancreatitis, but some visual effect is of the upmost importance to get the public to believe.

However, I don't think many people in the west could really bring themselves to believe in it... it is all too James Bondish. I was on the fence as well (hence my fascination for the subject). As a result, I don't think the story got much play in the media in the western countries... I'll wager that most people who knew about the Ukrainian situation didn't have a clue about the possible poisoning.

So what is the fallout from this? I don't think it is going to help him much with the orange revolution camped out in front of the Ukrainian Parliament... those folks are already sold. Who it will help him with are the fence-sitters from the first election who fell to the other side, and probably more than a few Yanukovych supporters who will abandon the guy with this information.

I can't imagine him losing the re-election at this point... this is a clear violation of one of the first rules taught in Bad Guy School: if you are in a dog-fight and are going to try to off the other guy, you'd better make damn sure you kill him. Otherwise, he's going to come back stronger and cause even more problems for you.

Side note: I can't imagine that Putin didn't have a little something to do with this... after all, Kuchma and Yanukovych are his bitches, and the stakes in play here are Russia's to lose. If so, don't you think this represents even more mud on Putin's face? I mean, the guy is ex-KGB for Pete's sake... what sloppy work!