How long does Putin have left in office?

[ikalugin]

I did already mentioned that Ukrainians were lied to? Essentially they were promissed (by the "pro russian" elites, "pro russian" my ass) that by joining EU and NATO they would receive western european standards of living from the get go.

Same thing happned back in the 1991, when they were promissed that by separating from the USSR and RSFSR they would become the eastern France or southern Canada.
And as we know even Belarussia did better economically:

In fact, due to the decrease in population post 1991, Ukrainian GDP (not per capita) did not recover from the break up of the USSR:
http://www.ukrstat.gov.ua/operativ/o...07/page_02.htm
Reaching smashing 74 percent of 1990s levels just before the crisis hit.

As to if anything belongs to anyone - this could be argued about any state, I have provided the examples above. In my opinion it was a Soviet mistake to increase rights of the regions and regional elites, the same mistake Russia did after the break up.