Alexey Navalny and the Empty Spectacle of the Russian Election

Masha Gessen writes about Russia’s rigged elections, and Alexey Navalny’s efforts to register as a Presidential candidate opposing Vladimir Putin....

"As soon as the commission meeting was over, Navalny posted a prerecorded video calling on Russians to boycott the “election.” Sobchak responded by quoting him back to himself, repeating his six-year-old statement on the futility of staying home and raging at the television. “Elections remain the only way to change anything,” she wrote. Of course, she is assuming that there is, in fact, a way to change something in Russia."