TIME's Person Of The Year

TIME Magazine has once again told us who the most important person of the year is. TIME decided that Russian dictator President Vladimir Putin is the most influential/important/biggest change maker in the world. I would like to be the first of many to say “thanks” to TIME for making sure that another dictator in the making is crowned with such a distinction.

I have trouble with Putin being picked as TIME’s Person of the Year. Not because I feel that he is a dictator in training but because I don’t understand what he has done this year to deserve the title. If you look at the short list of runner-ups you see General David Petraeus, J.K. Rowling and Al Gore. We could easily take J.K. Rowling off that list…what did she do except write some books. Come on. But I truly could make an argument for General Petraeus and Al Gore. Both men have drastically changed the discourse in this country and the world. The General has turned Iraq around into something that Democrats don’t want to talk about during the election because they fear that it is too positive now and would help Republicans. Al Gore has won just about every award this country and world has to give. He has made it cool to jump on the Global Warming bandwagon. Both men have changed the world this year. Both men I feel are more deserving than Vladdy.

TIME states that they bestowed the distinction on Putin because he renewed the faith in Mother Russia for his people and was a stabilizer. All it takes to get your mugshot on the cover of TIME in late December is to stabilize your country. Saddam stabilized Iraq...it doesn't make him a good leader or even an influential leader. Castro stabilizes Cuba. Kim Jung Ill stabilizes North Korea. The list of dictators goes on. That is a weak argument for TIME to make for naming him Person of The Year.

After hearing about Vladdy winning this distinction (TIME made it very clear that this is not an honor or an endorsement) I really tried hard to think about what he did this year to deserve it. Lets put his accomplishments in bullet points:

• Circumvented the Russian Constitution


• Shut down Russian opposition TV stations and newspapers


• Jailed opposition leaders and politicians because he feared they would interfere with the government (that is what the opposition is supposed to do)


• Sent the first of many nuclear shipments to his buddy Ahmadinejad


• Didn’t die (that’s a big one)

I guess the point that I am trying to make is that everything that Putin has done (except the nuke shipment) has affected only Russia. If Russia were giving this distinction out I can understand him winning. However I think the purpose of the distinction is for those that change the WORLD not just their respective country. Therefore Al “Chicken Little” Gore or General David Petraeus would have been much better choices. Even though I think Al Gore is full of himself and so is his crusade…he has done more to change the discourse in this world than most anyone else. General Petraeus (along with the entire US Military), besides being an American hero, has spearheaded a change in the Iraq war that is showing considerable gains and helping to put Iraq back on its feet (even though Senator Reid might not think so). When the New York Times and Washington Post are reporting on the front page the success in Iraq you know that some things are changing for the better. The president of communist China should be considered. Not only is he overseeing a growing superpower he is pretty darn good at sending us poisonous toys. The man who I thought would get it was Iran’s president. Why not? He is a pretty interesting dictator that is shaking things up.

However I will leave you with what I think won it for Putin and is summed up in the first sentence of the article,

“No one is born with a stare like Vladimir Putin's.”

So get working on that stare...it just might be your ticket to a face shot on TIME Magazine...but be sure to stabilize something as well.