@Vonzales: It's wild to me how many people, from randos on the internet to people I have known for years/decades, until lately really believed that Russia and the former Soviet Union were some sort of workers paradise. (I wish I was kidding.) Or they thought Russia was "like the US and Europe" but just Russian.
Many are having a hard time ignoring what they're seeing in real-time, but they're trying, at least to have it both ways somehow.
@Vonzales: Things under Putin have been the way they've been since Stalin and earlier, just even less honest.