Glenn Reynolds looks over some disappointing news from President Vladimir Putin's increasingly statist Russia and wonders, "is Russia the next Zimbabwe?":

This [news] explains how hard it is to turn a former dictatorship into a free-market democracy. The Cold War ended over a decade ago, and Russia is still in an uncertain state. This should put Iraq's transition in perspective.

Well...only in the sense that post-Communist Russia in a way resembles the Weimar Republic, with its putsches, backslides and incomplete transformations. The former Soviet Union, like pre-Hitler Germany, is a broken dictatorship for which the world has done little more than encourage to reform. You're onto something but only halfway there. Germany and Japan are fully-functioning, healthy democracies that, like Russia, were once internally fanatic tyrannies; they were, however, both well on their way to normalcy by the mid-Fifties, a benchmark that the Federation has passed. What's the secret to success? American-led intervention, a reconstruction based on relatively sound and clear principles, and the logistical-military will to ensure that a democratic infant survives those first deadly years. South Korea and Taiwan are miraculous exceptions: the practical reality is that modern totalitarian states, excepting invaded states like the old Eastern Bloc, are unlikely to fully democratize on their own. That cultural and sociopolitical rot just has to be cleaned out.

Let's hope, incidentally, that Russia turns out like South Korea or Taiwan, and not the Weimar.