Afterword to the program

Journalism has become an ordinary profession, in the sense that neither special knowledge nor special skills are needed to search and select facts. They, these facts, are naked, arrogant, not even trying to hide behind a verbal veil (as was the case under the Soviets) or a respectable face (as in the rest of the world), everything is out there, for show, at every step and around every turn. Oh, don't you like it? Spit. Have fun. And say thank you that we manage you. For our money? No, they answer, your money is for cigarettes. For our oil – in the sense, for their oil. Their gas. Their land. And their serfs to boot. It’s a pity, you can’t starve it yet, otherwise it would

land, gas, oil and without

dug - that would be beauty.

In my house, on the roof, huge billboards were installed for six months. Life became difficult to bear. I ask a wandering advertising executive: “Who are you? What office? Answer: "FSB". Most likely he lied. But lies only reflect the main truth. This most of the three letters either covers, divides, or leads. And he knows for sure: they can. And under them – it’s possible. It’s just not possible against them.

On Sunday in my weekly program on “Echo of Moscow” the current deputy (M.I. Moskvin-Tarkhanov, “United Russia”) and two just elected to the Moscow City Duma (Alexey Navalny, “Yabloko” - United Democrats and Pyotr Miloserdov, Communist Party of the Russian Federation) discussed a completely unusual question: how can a normal, non-official person survive in a nomenklatura city, that is, in Moscow?

A deputy from the party in power explained: no way. Opposition deputies proposed options, the essence of which is to unite and hold the line, since there is simply no other way out. I refer those interested to the Echo of Moscow website, where a transcript of the broadcast is posted.

After the transfer, I went to the store to stock up on groceries for the week. Sadovo-Triumfalnaya. City center. Wires covered with security cameras. It's as bright as a holiday. Traffic cops are on every corner: they catch those who leave restaurants, those who cross the “continuous” road or make the wrong turn. Or you parked in the wrong place, and you can call a tow truck.

I'm not just saying this. These are all important details of the scene that will take place five minutes after I leave the store.

Grocery cart - to the pole near the car. Packages - in your hands. The bag is on the shoulder. I notice with my eyes that my exit is blocked by a black car with tinted windows. As I approach, she begins to back up, but backs up in a strange way, not freeing the exit, but also blocking the space of the neighboring car. Trunk. Products. I'm disarming the alarm. I open the door. The right leg is already in the car, the hand with the bag is almost on the passenger seat. At that second, a man dressed in all black, with a black knitted cap pulled down over his eyes, runs out of the rear right door of a black car. A second - the door is torn, the bag is torn, another second - and he is already in his car. I fly up screaming and grab the handle of the black car. She breaks out of her seat. There are people all around, the driver jumps out of the car on the right. Late. But fifteen meters away, in a bright yellow jacket, is a traffic police officer, that is, the road patrol service, that is, the traffic police. I scream. I point to the car, which is rushing towards Malaya Dmitrovka. His car is nearby. But he doesn't move. He says: “Call 02.” How about "02"? He is here, here he is, the guardian of order, my security, the consumer of my taxes. What's it like in films about foreign cops? Jump - car - chase. Criminal on earth? Three-finger figure: “Call “02.” Then he radioed: “Nissan Maxima. Black. License number 497 UHV 97.” He handed me a blank piece of paper: “Write down the witnesses.” And he slowly walked to his car.

“So you won’t go after them?” - “Call 02.”

City center. Traffic cops every twenty meters. One arch not blocked by a barrier. Three turns leading to the central highway, to Tverskaya, where there are more police than passers-by at this wet, snowy and rainy evening (10 o’clock). You can go straight ahead, past the casino, right to Tverskaya, left to Pushkinskaya. Number, color, brand - everything is known. Got caught? Three finger figure. The squad from the Tver branch arrived in 10 minutes. They asked: “What about the traffic cop?” - “Call 02.”

Then, half the night, the detective and I walked around the surrounding courtyards, looking into trash cans and basements: did they suddenly throw out a bag? I was again tormented by scenes from films about overseas police officers: why on foot? Why - one policeman, without a partner? Why, in an area lit like a proscenium, with a bunch of people around and traffic cops showing off on the roads, can they snatch a bag and run away?

The officer said: “We are traffic police and don’t consider them to be police.” And we don’t count. They have long been nothing more than an additional tax on our pocket. Why do we pay, that’s the question. In Georgia, the traffic police were eliminated. And in Ukraine too. It definitely didn't get any worse.

They say: The traffic police is the ugliest attribute of the Ministry of Internal Affairs. Nothing of the kind. The traffic police is a showcase of power in general, moreover, it is its most democratic part, the one that we encounter on the street when another part with flashing lights and sirens rushes past. The traffic police is the quintessence of power, its visible face. Boorish, greedy, arrogant.

They say: the orange revolution in Ukraine failed and turned into nothing. Nothing of the kind - it did not fail, if you do not reduce it to the relationship between Tymoshenko and Yushchenko. Maidan was an act of civil self-defense against the authorities. It was a cry that was made to be heard. The liquidation of the traffic police is an indicator that they have heard. And that the cry of the Maidan will not be forgotten. Because they won’t let you forget. This is the difference between Russia and Ukraine (and from Georgia), that here the traffic police is a necessary part of the institution of power. This is both a fence in which stones of popular discontent fly, and an instrument that provides the authorities with unimpeded passage past everyone and everything. The traffic police are in plain sight, on the street, around the corner. The FSB, the Kremlin, the administration, the government are behind the fence. Remove the traffic police, and the stones will fly there. That's why they won't remove it.

...And yet: the center of Moscow, the central highway, the number, color, make of the car with the robbers are known. There are traffic cops on every corner (not far from me, on Chayanov Street, every evening there is the same outfit: “Oh, is that you? Haven’t you been drinking? Go ahead...”). They are catching ordinary, ordinary citizens. “Nissan Maxima”, black, with tinted windows, license plate, numbers, letters, region - unstoppable by anyone rushes with my bag, my money, my documents, mine - everything, rushes through Moscow.

Three finger figure. You couldn’t think of a better illustration for the program on the topic “How to survive for an ordinary person in nomenklatura Moscow.”

Although - why lie there - I would prefer not to be with me. However - with anyone and everyone. With the exception of THEM.