Putin's Russia by Anna Politkovskaya

I was wondering lately why the Western elite is so naive in relations with Putin's Russia. Why famous journalists of the NYT and Foreign Policy, assume that they can apply to Russia the Western standards, why they believe that signed agreement will be respected, how can they consider that the image of Russia presented in the English language RT television is real. I have the impression, that today even Republicans known for its suspicion with relations to Russia,  behave like children in the fog.

If they have read Politkovskaya, after all, they would know that this is not a country that uses democratic standards. So why not  Politkovskaya became required reading for American whizzes international politics and the media authority promoted by CNN? No, because it is useless.
In my opinion, Politkovskaya stories are steeped in Slavic soul, and only the reader endowed with such sensitivity, can appreciate and fully understand her journalism. I do not agree, that this is a book about Putin. I also believe that not a political dimension is crucial for this book. It is an emotional analysis of the Russian society, depraved by an evil power. 
Reading some of the stories, you can have the impression that this is not contemporary Russia, but the tsarist times and portrayed characters have been described by Chekhov. As in Checkov novels, you will find here stories about simple people, who are maneuvering in a heartless, hostile system to realize their mundane goals, harming the weaker. There are also utterly honest patriots who endure with dignity their plight. There is also poverty, not less than the tsarist regime. Politkovskaya wrote about real Russia, without the glitz of Moscow and St. Petersburg.

Knowing so well the realities governing modern Russia like Politkovskaya did, what courage she needed to have to write about it directly, without embellishments, without reticence, without a doubt. Is it worth dying for the truth about Russia? This question is not only to Politkovskaya but also to B. Nemtsov, A. Litvinenko, and many others, already gone. Probably today with the same thought goes to sleep many opposition figures in Putin's Russia.