January 20, 2008 (LPAC)--Two years ago, Dmitri Medvedev, now the leading candidate to succeed Vladimir Putin as President of Russia, was one of the first Russian officials to talk openly about the global financial crisis as a strategic determinant for the years ahead. More recently, however, Medvedev has missed the mark in his evaluation of that crisis. Touring Western Siberia this past week, Medvedev noted that the development of a mortgage market in Russia has slowed because of the global liquidity crunch, Prime-TASS reported. "Let's hope that this year such processes will be mitigated, or even entirely absent, on a world scale, so that we'll be able to redress this situation," Medvedev said.

"They shouldn't be turning a blind eye to the systemic nature of the crisis!" Lyndon LaRouche exclaimed, upon hearing of Medvedev's remarks. Likewise, LaRouche called some of Moscow's claims of economic success during 2007 "unjustified boasting," given that the "successes" were based -- as the Russian leadership well knows -- on the worldwide speculative surge in natural gas and petroleum prices.