Boris Nikolayevich Yeltsin [Борис Николаевич Ельцин], first President of the Russian Federation [1991-1999] has died, apparently from heart problems.
He was what he was, a hard drinking construction worker who made it big in politics of the same Communist Party that had thrown his father into the gulag for anti-Communist views.
The BBC obituary is polite about it.
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4 comments
A blue collar mayor like Richard J. Daley the Elder. But, also like Daley when it came to Vietnam, a bull-headed jingoist. It would explain Yeltsin’s poor Chechen decisions.
Chechnya was the result of his birth in the southern Urals, there was no love lost between Russians and non-Russians in the region, but for all of the “nice guy” facade, he was definitely a street fighter.
With the reports of drinking, I’m surprised he lasted this long. I hope he wasn’t sober when he went out…
I doubt he’ll require embalming, he’ll enter the coffin pre-pickled.