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Mikhail Gorbachev has died

(www.reuters.com)
970 points homarp | 1 comments | 30 Aug 22 20:37 UTC | HN request time: 0s | source
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laserbrain ◴[30 Aug 22 21:13 UTC] No.32655155[source]▶
»A Soviet man is waiting in line to purchase vodka from a liquor store, but due to restrictions imposed by Gorbachev, the line is very long. The man loses his composure and screams, ›I can’t take this waiting in line anymore, I HATE Gorbachev, I am going to the Kremlin right now, and I am going to kill him!‹ After 40 minutes the man returns and elbows his way back to his place in line. The crowd begin to ask if he has succeeded in killing Gorbachev. ›No, I got to the Kremlin all right, but the line to kill Gorbachev was even longer than here!‹«
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insane_dreamer ◴[30 Aug 22 21:15 UTC] No.32655181[source]▶
This is not a joke. I was in Russia during the Gorby era (and early Yeltsin) and people indeed hated Gorby for his attempt to crack-down on drunkenness by limiting the purchase of vodka.
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negus ◴[30 Aug 22 21:34 UTC] No.32655427[source]▶
Have you heard about a single moment in time when people liked the leader of their country?
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1. MichaelCollins ◴[30 Aug 22 21:54 UTC] No.32655668[source]▶
I'm having a real hard time thinking of a leader who wasn't liked by at least some of the people, and it's surely impossible to find any leader liked by literally all people in their country. So clearly it's all shades of gray.

The worst leaders in history, the Hitlers and Stalins, have enjoyed substantial if not majority popular support in their time. Biden and Trump both have millions of Americans who like them. Even Caligula was popular with the general Roman population, if only because he lowered taxes and threw money around. Maybe Ceausescu was close to universally hated, but everybody was afraid to say anything until the preference cascade occurred? But probably even he had genuine supporters.