RusAD
In the left pic: a hammer near the sink, blood on the sink, beer in the shower. In the right pic: a pretty sus photo under the phone cover (did she beat her abusive father with the hammer until he got into a coma and get happier as a result?). On both pics: a framed picture referencing Untitled Goose Game
Adding to all the reasons already listed, Russia isn’t striving. For example, right now there is a number of towns and cities experiencing outages in central heating (with houses designed around central heating so basically no other option to heat their appartments) while the weather dips to -20°C (around -4°F). All because the centralized boiler facilities weren’t properly maintained due to the lack of money (or, to be more precise, due to money being diverted towards the war).
There are other signs, like plains malfunctioning and flights getting delayed because some component broke and cannot be replaced due to sanctions, and they happen more and more often. Also the less noticeable stuff like prices of common goods increasing by a factor of two in the last couple of years while salaries barely increased at all.
So yeah, Russia is keeping itself afloat, but it isn’t thriving at all
What do you mean “Finally”? The protests in Russia started on 24th of February 2022. Over 1000 protesters were detained just in Moscow that day alone. And the protests continued after that.
The problem is, these protests achieved nothing, they only resulted in fines (which undoubtedly went to funding the war), protesters being beaten, detained and some even got a criminal charge. So the protests died down because continuing them only fueled the regime more. Some people shifted to solitary picketing, some started doing online activism, some started sabotaging the railways and burning down enlistment centers, some left the country altogether and some, undoubtedly, just gave up.
If it’s the only option, then the democracy is already dead and voting for Biden is pointless. Democracy entails that the government represents the will of the people. And you’re suggesting that because some old fart decided to cling to power, everyone should stop demanding that their will is represented and start kissing that old fart’s ass. “That’s the only person you can vote for to preserve democracy” is a self-defeating statement…