The Threat of Moral Authority
Moscow, June 1989. A stooped, bespectacled old man named Andrei Sakharov is at a podium, making an urgent appeal to the Congress of People’s Deputies about respect for the rule of law. Another man, the most powerful in the Soviet Union, is sitting at a presidium that towers over the podium and tells him he is out of time. “Don’t you respect this congress?” he asks. Sakharov continues speaking and gesticulating, but he can no longer be heard: his microphone has been cut off. Only the other man’s voice is audible: “That’s it,” he keeps saying. “That’s it.” Sakharov finally turns around, scooping up his speech, steps up to the presidium, still stooped, and tries to hand his sheets of paper to the other man.… Seguir leyendo »