BORIS YELTSIN'S BEQUEST

NOTE: PLEASE READ THE FOLLOWING EDITORIAL AND ANSWER THE QUESTIONS AFTER EACH PARAGRAPH. YOU WILL BE TESTED ON THE WORDS IN BOLD

Editorial: New York Times
Published: April 24, 2007


BORIS YELTSIN'S BEQUEST

It is in the nature of men who lead revolutions that they rarely prove to be effective leaders of governments. So it was with Boris Yeltsin.

[WHAT IS THE MAIN IDEA?]

He was a Communist Party man who engineered the dissolution of both the party and the Soviet Union, then became Russia’s first democratically elected leader. He struggled to introduce Western political and economic values and tried to ensure that there would be no turning back. But his shock therapy led to the collapse of Russia’s economy and left much of its wealth in the hands of oligarchs.

[WHAT DOES THE WORD "PARTY" MEAN HERE? IS IT A BIRTHDAY PARTY? A SALSA PARTY?]

[WHY IS THE WORD "WESTERN" CAPITALIZED?]

[WHAT IS SHOCK THERAPY?]

His constant political and personal roiling — including bouts of drunkenness — left many in his country yearning for a traditional strongman, which is what they got with Mr. Yeltsin’s handpicked successor, Vladimir Putin.

[WHY DID THE RUSSIAN PEOPLE BEGIN TO WANT A STRONG LEADER?]

Perhaps the most accurate judgment of Mr. Yeltsin is the one he passed on himself when he abruptly resigned on the last day of 1999: “I want to ask for your forgiveness. For the fact that many of the dreams we shared never came true.”

[WHY DID YELTSIN ASK FOR FORGIVENESS?]

[WHAT DOES THE COLLOCATION "TO PASS JUDGEMENT" MEAN?]

Mr. Yeltsin was a huge figure in an extraordinary time. Brought into the ruling Politburo by Mikhail Gorbachev at the dawn of perestroika— the restructuring that couldn’t save the system — Mr. Yeltsin electrified Muscovites with his openness and accessibility. His defiance of the Communist Party was a deadly blow to its rule, and when party loyalists staged their putsch in August 1991, Mr. Yeltsin’s speech from atop a tank collapsed the rebellion.

[POLITBURO AND PERESTROIKA ARE BOTH RUSSIAN WORDS WHICH THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE HAS APPROPRIATED*. WHAT DO THEY MEAN?]

[WHAT HAPPENED IN 1991?]

As president, Mr. Yeltsin tolerated brazen corruption, ended a 1993 rebellion by ordering tanks to fire on the Parliament and launched the brutal military campaign in Chechnya. The deals he made to ensure his 1996 re-election undermined the democracy he championed. The country he turned over to Mr. Putin was a mess. Looking back, we can identify the most egregious failings of this man. But without Mr. Yeltsin, the death throes of that terrible dictatorship could have been far worse.

[THIS PARAGRAPH IDENTIFIES 4 THINGS WHICH HAVE HURT YELTSIN'S LEGACY--the way he is remembered--WHAT ARE THEY?]

[WHAT DOES THE LAST SENTENCE SIGNIFY?]



[*LOOK AT THE DEFINITION OF "APPROPRIATE" BELOW. WHICH OF THE 3 MEANINGS DO I USE IN ONE OF MY QUESTIONS? WHAT LANGUAGE DID THE WORD ORIGINALLY COME FROM? AND HOW DO YOU THINK THIS WORD FROM ANOTHER LANGUAGE GOT INTO ENGLISH?]


ap·pro·pri·ate (ə-prō'prē-ĭt)

Adjective

Suitable for a particular person, condition, occasion, or place; fitting.

Transitive Verb, -at·ed, -at·ing, -ates. (-āt')

1. To set apart for a specific use: appropriating funds for education.
2. To take possession of or make use of exclusively for oneself, often without permission: Lee appropriated my unread newspaper and never returned it.

[Middle English appropriat, from Late Latin appropriātus, past participle of appropriāre, to make one's own : Latin ad-, ad- + Latin proprius, own.]


EXTRA CREDIT

DO YOU KNOW WHAT LANGUAGE THE WORD "PUTSCHE" ORIGINALLY COMES FROM?

BIG BIG EXTRA CREDIT


WHAT WAS THE BEER HALL PUTSCH?