“Ever since the wave of urban protest that hit the country in late 2011, Vladimir “Putin and his United Russia Party seem to have decided to cut their losses with the country’s finicky élites and focus on demonizing them as Western agents for the benefit of a poorer, older, more rural voter base. … Everything blunt, homespun, and orthodox is in. Everything multifaceted, foreign, avant-garde, or deviant is out.”