However the myth that Putin is a dictator is what fuels Americans’ hostility towards Russia.

That is not what fuels American hostility towards Russia. It is 100 years of propaganda against a successful country with an economic system that is not unfettered capitalism. One of the reasons the New Deal passed back in the 1930’s is because the USSR was raising a lot of people out of poverty under authoritarian socialism/communism, and hungry and out of work Americans who were informed were wondering if maybe the Soviet solution wasn’t a better deal for the 99%. Roosevelt very clearly said that the New Deal was his effort to “save capitalism.”

This was followed by the USSR mostly winning WWII in Europe, and the US spending the post-war years demonizing our WWII ally for a lot of the same reasons as in the last paragraph.

There were brief periods of detenté, but mostly it was one long anti-USSR rant from 1917 to 1991. Entire generations of Americans (mine being one of them) were raised learning constantly how horrible the USSR was. I don’t know how old you are, but my wife was born in Czechoslovakia (now the Czech Republic) and learned exactly the same things about the US. Same type of propaganda, just from the other side.

I already wrote about what happened after the breakup of the USSR.

Putin put a stop to the financial raping of Russia lead by the big US financiers, and that made him “the enemy” of the US that he is today. 70 years of anti-USSR propaganda, and now 15+ years of anti-Putin propaganda — THAT is what fuels the hostility towards Russia.

Regarding both Putin and Assad: They are both running Russia and Syria pretty well (IMO) given their situations (Assad is a story for another day). But let’s be honest here: elected officials that never get unelected are democratic in name only.

I run a company that I founded. We’re not so small anymore, so I also work “AS A TEAM” (your words). But there is no question who is leading the team, and there is also no question that I will be replaced as team leader. I dictate what will happen. Does it always get done the way I want? No. Can I have employees that change my plans or don’t implement as I like publically beaten? No (although the thought does occur to me sometimes…). So unlike Saudi Arabia, which is a true dictatorship, my company is a semi-dicatorship. There are laws that limit my absolute power. This is similar to Russia and Syria.

I’m not your enemy Leah. I’m not Russia’s enemy, or Syria’s. Russia represents economic and political alternatives to US hegemony. Hostility towards Russia is based on US propaganda.

If you want additional evidence, look at the press regarding France and Germany — staunch US allies — when they wouldn’t support the illegal US invasion of Iraq in 2003. Massive propaganda against them. That lasted only a couple of years. Take that an multiply it by about 5 and then continue that propaganda for 100 years to understand how the vast majoriy of Americans have been raised to see the USSR and now Russia.