Cossack supporters

The first to appear on the stage of the Tver Drama Theater was the deputy ataman of the Great Don Army, Vladimir Voronin. “We, the Cossacks, have decided on the Don,” Voronin announced, “we will worry, we will worry, we will shout and make noise until we understand what the configuration of power will be.” Then the chairman of the Krasnodar Regional Veterans Committee, Mikhail Shibanov, took the floor. He said that, together with his comrades, he would support the creation of a social movement in support of Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin: “We will support and wish him not only success in his presidential career, but also good health, happiness and prosperity.” Actually, they don’t glorify this way, but rather say goodbye.

The Don Cossacks did not have long to worry, shout and make noise. Newsweek sources close to the Kremlin say they can clearly see that Putin already has a plan. He already knows how to play the endgame - who to make president, and where to go after his resignation. There are less than two weeks left until the intermediate finish - the Duma elections. In a matter of days. Time for the final decisive push. And no matter what configuration of power Putin comes up with, he needs the most convincing victory possible in the elections. The time has come to act. Movements in support of Putin are probably useful here, but they won’t make a difference. Therefore, Putin began to campaign for himself.

DRAMATIZATION-1 AND DRAMATIZATION-2

By the beginning of last week, sociologists agreed that United Russia's rating either stopped growing or even fell slightly. The Public Opinion Foundation recorded a drop of 3% - from 56% to 53%. VTsIOM paints a similar picture. Sociologists in the regions confirm that support for Putin’s party has decreased slightly. The law prohibits Putin from campaigning. But among the road workers involved in the construction of the bypass highway around Krasnoyarsk, Putin made a policy statement that cannot be called anything other than propaganda. “United Russia,” of course, is not ideal, and there are “all sorts of crooks” in it, Putin explained, but by voting for it, people will actually vote not for it, but for him personally, and then he will be able to maintain the situation under control.

The task is very simple, says a technologist participating in the campaign: to convey to people the idea that the future of Putin, and therefore of all of Russia, depends on the party’s results in the elections. This is the intrigue with which the Kremlin intends to attract people to the elections and win on December 2. Of course, for most, the danger of losing Putin is a drama, confirms Alexander Oslon, president of the Public Opinion Foundation: will anything happen without him? And then all that remains is to raise the temperature with all our might: they say, citizens, for your own sake, come out to the referendum if you can.

Putin is apparently even adjusting his schedule to devote the last two weeks exclusively to the elections. During the press issue, Newsweek learned that he would meet with United Russia activists. At the beginning of next week, Putin is already expected in St. Petersburg, and there will be some pre-election business there too. Plans for this week include a speech at a forum of party supporters in Luzhniki, where there will also be a delegation from the non-party movement “For Putin” that met in Tver. Because Kremlin technologists now urgently need to unite the party’s supporters, who already vote for it, with supporters of Putin personally. As the technologists themselves say, “synthesis is needed.”

And there will be something else. In the latest version of United Russia's election plan, according to Newsweek, this is what is written: “Dramatization-1” and “Dramatization-2.” What we are talking about is unknown - the script for the United Russia campaign is generally a military secret, even films with election videos are sent by field mail - but we can conclude that these are two different “dramatizations”. One way or another, it is highly likely that Putin will make another strong move.

The president will still say something very bright and significant, suggests Mikhail Vinogradov, general director of the Center for Current Political Affairs. “There is no other choice,” agrees Dmitry Gusev from the Baxter Group: he will either lead the party, or join it, or do something else in this spirit. Only a change in the space of choice itself will work, the head of the ZIRCON group Igor Zadorin states from a sociological point of view - the emergence of a new player or, conversely, the withdrawal of some party; There are no other grounds for redistributing votes.

As such, there is no downward trend in United Russia’s rating either, Oslon assures: it just moves in waves. The Kremlin will apparently be satisfied with a result above 60%, and if it makes no mistakes, it is achievable. At least, its competitors did not gain anything from United Russia's latest decline - the ratings of other parties are not growing, despite the fact that they are already advertising themselves with all their might. And by December 2, the second wave will successfully arrive, says an employee of the United Russia headquarters. Putin's activity is already bearing fruit. In the same St. Petersburg, after some decline, the rating of "United Russia" again rose by 5-7%, says sociologist Roman Mogilevsky. In his opinion, this is a direct consequence of Putin’s propaganda.

TVERSKY SYNTHESIS

The Putin family came from the Tver province. And they also decided to hold a public meeting in support of Putin in Tver. Last Thursday, more than 700 delegates from 79 regions of the country gathered there. The event was entitled “All-Russian Council of Initiative Groups in Support of Putin”, it took place in the regional drama theater and lasted two hours. The delegates were placed in a sanatorium and brought from there by bus - the public movement “For Putin” is patronized by the presidential administration. This is also a move in the campaign, with the same meaning as Putin’s statement - to mobilize those who are against the party, but for Putin. But in a style not official, but rather folk, with the public in the main role.

Before the event, Don Cossack Vladimir Voronin, together with the captain of an autonomous freezer trawler from Kamchatka, Igor Zolotavin, went out to smoke on the steps of the theater.

• Would you like to change the Constitution? - a foreign reporter asked them.

• “I think some other ways will be found,” the captain replied.

• Why is it the most important thing for him to stay?

• But because I personally believe in him. I see real changes, and I don’t need new shocks, any wobbling left and right, back and forth.

• Is democracy unimportant?

• “Democracy is important,” the captain answered seriously. - I'm talking about the wobbling of the state's course, you understand? You can remember the 90s, when the country was plundered. And only when Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin came to power, the revival of the country began.

The hall was packed. By that time, the only recognizable face of the pro-Putin movement was lawyer Pavel Astakhov, but the famous surgeon Renat Akchurin and movie star Gosha Kutsenko also came to Tver. The delegates listened to the anthem, and the Commissioner for Human Rights in the Tver Region, Irina Blokhina, gave the floor to Ataman Voronin. It was decided to put the entire event on Blokhina’s shoulders. Of the commissioners before Blokhina, only the Chechen Ombudsman Nurdi Nukhazhiev campaigned for the extension of presidential powers.

Cossack Voronin told the audience that an English correspondent asked him about the Constitution, and he, Voronin, reminded him: after all, it was their state that demanded to change the Constitution in order to extradite to England a person who allegedly committed an offense. Voronin quoted the military ataman Vodolatsky, who, if he is approached with democracy, usually says this: “When Columbus’s ships were just approaching the shores of America, we had a system of democratic governance on the Don.” Russian citizens have learned to understand that Russia is not a third-rate country that can be torn into pieces, Voronin concluded: “Largely due to the fact that at the helm today is a person who knows how to govern our country.”

Postgraduate student at Kaliningrad State University. Kanta Ekaterina Nosachevskaya recalled in rather difficult language that people “began to live more socially stable and their way of activity became more dynamic.”

The movement was never established. Instead, a coordination body of 10 people was elected; among them are lawyer Astakhov, ataman Voronin, graduate student Nosachevskaya, surgeon Akchurin and milkmaid Agapova. The delegates also addressed the citizens of Russia. They were informed that they were uniting with one goal - “to promote the continuation of Vladimir Putin’s work for the benefit of the Russian people.”

Activists of the For Putin movement support United Russia, but promise to control it. “We will have to criticize - believe me, we will be the first to stand and say that this party must be disbanded,” Astakhov promises. Putin has more supporters than those who are ready to vote for the party. For the sake of these supporters they are trying: “Get up and vote,” Astakhov said. - We respect [the president] and propose voting for this power. But we respect a specific person.” We need synthesis.

At the briefing, Astakhov was reminded of the presidential administration, the cult of personality, and orders to herd people to rallies in support of Putin. Earlier, an order distributed in Novosibirsk among railway workers, and in Tver among teachers, received publicity. “I started every speech in the regions with the question: are there any deceived or intimidated people here today? Please leave, no problem,” the lawyer defended himself. And the cult of personality, Astakhov explained, is when a person is given credit for the fact that the sun has risen, the harvest has ripened on time and the children are smiling. “And when a person behaves modestly, when he is in his place, it is unforgivable not to support him.” Astakhov also said that more than 30 million signatures had been collected in support of Putin: “A colossal number, several KamAZ trucks; we don’t know where to place them to begin with.” He promised to find out where these KamAZ trucks are located.

The delegates left it up to him to decide what place Putin should take in the future. In Krasnoyarsk, he himself said exactly this: “In what form will I do this [will ask the Duma and the government for the implementation of the decisions outlined today] - I will refrain from answering for now.” The game isn't over yet.

KamAZ trucks with signatures were never shown. And the chairman of the Krasny Putilovets collective farm, Ivan Paplevchenkov, who spoke at a rally in Tver in October, did not appear at this all-Russian council. He said that although he wholeheartedly favors Putin remaining the leader under a certain configuration of power, he has a lot of collective farm affairs to deal with and, besides, the UAZ is under repair. “Who the hell knows,” the collective farm chairman can’t remember who called him to speak at the rally then. But Paplevchenkov had already received a call and was invited to Moscow to a forum of supporters of Putin and United Russia in Luzhniki. Captain Zolotavin is also in no hurry to buy a return ticket to Kamchatka. Cossack Voronin and other activists of the pro-Putin movement are also called.

Sociologists assure us that it is impossible to go too far with glorifying Putin. If anyone is scared off by the virtual, as one Newsweek source puts it, pro-Putin paranoia, it is an insignificant part of the population. The advertising mechanism works - the more, the better, explains Alexander Oslon from Public Opinion: advertising is always annoying, but this does not mean that it does not have an effect.

Daria Guseva participated in the preparation of the material