THE EXILE - Political Trading Cards

Dina Oyun

Tuva On-Line

Name: Dina Oyun

Team: Tuva On-Line

Leads: Halfway to second

Hair: Dyed brownish

Jewish: No

Connections: Dep.Press Min.Mikhail Seslavinsky, Central

Career: Asked Putin about “unprecedented number of violations of election law ” in Tuva during press meeting....Comment thrust her into the Big Leagues for the first time...Now under investigations by Tuva prosecutor for spreading incorrect info...local government backed Tuvinskaya Pravda accused her of “causing the republic colossal damage ”...Victim of Putin ’s “Let 1000 Flowers Bloom ”...

Grigory Gongadze

Ukrainska Pravda

Name: Grigory Gongadze

Team: Ukrainska Pravda

Leads: Not anymore

Hair: Still growing

Jewish: No

Connections: Severed

Career: Obi Wan-esque career in which he became more powerful than his enemies could possibly imagine after death... Marginal Ukrainian editor of Ukrainska Pravda website... Ukrainian President caught on tape ordering him disposed of... Disappeared in fall 2000... Turned up headless in the woods outside Kiev, making his girlfriend famous and sparking the Ukrainian opposition to life...

Grigory Pasko

Japanese TV

Name: Grigory Pasko

Team: Japanese TV

Leads: One meter from next guy on chain gang

Hair: Poorly washed since detainment

Jewish: No, though “Grigory” sounds suspicious

Connections: Western and Russian human rights groups

Career: In 1997,passed Japanese media state secrets whose secret status was classified...Currently serving four years hard labor... Uncovered radioactive waste dumping by Pacific Fleet... Jailed by FSB for Treason...Charge upheld by the Supreme Court...Russian Constitution makes it illegal to classify information about the environment...Constitution also bans two-tier pricing at museums...One of Amnesty International\’s “prisoners of conscious ”......

Eduard Limonov

Limonka

Name: Eduard Limonov

Team: Limonka

Leads: NatsBols

Hair: Like a middle-aged James Dean

Jewish: No

Connections: Alexei Mitrofanov, Andrei Bykov, the eXile, PEN Int ’l

Career: Former eXile columnist and guru... Arrested April 2001 on terrorism charges for conspiring to invade Kazakhstan... Faces 24 years in jail...After Solzhenitsyn,probably the most famous Russian writer alive...and the most hated...Lived for 8 years in America...In first shocker novel,described how he blew a black homeless man...and sold 1.5 mln copies of that book in Russia...

Sergei Ivanov

Defense Minister

Name: Sergei Ivanov

Team: Defense Minister

Leads:

Hair: Helmet like

Jewish: No

Connections: Putin

Career: Long said to be number two in the government... Trade to MoD signals that Putin is looking for a grand slam reorganization in the armed forces league, or else someone to back him in a future coup... Now he’s got a nuclear suitcase of his very own... Botched handling of Kursk crisis while in the Security Council proves he can’t handle public opinion... After the loss of Ivanov, the Security Council is going AAA... First FSB General to be called Russia\’s first “civilian” head of MoD...

Alexsandr Rumyantsev

Atomic Minister

Name: Alexsandr Rumyantsev

Team: Atomic Minister

Leads:

Hair: Falling out from years in nuclear industry

Jewish: No

Connections: Iran, countries with unwanted nuclear waste

Career: Tried to implement a plan to import Thai waste to a compound near Sakhalin Island last year without anyone noticing... Well respected and entrenched in Russia’s nuclear establishment... Supports importing other countries nuclear waste... Will maintain current trajectory of the Atomic ministry, including bolstering Russia’s dependence on nuke plants... Replacing notoriously corrupt Atamov, who funneled billions to The Family, himself, and who knows who... Rumored that this ministry will be soon abolished

Mikhail Fradkov

Chief of Tax Police

Name: Mikhail Fradkov

Team: Chief of Tax Police

Leads:

Hair:

Jewish: No

Connections: Potanin, Alfa Group

Career: Moscow Times called him “moon faced” and a “moderate liberal”... Fired four times by Yeltsin... In early 90’s was an international trade official overseeing exports of everything from heavy industry to alcohol... Back then, export was the key to becoming an oligarch... In 1998 tried to become an oligarch as head of Ingosstrakh, but decided he made a better bureaucrat... Doesn’t plan on sending in masked, armed police to collect taxes... Will go easy on Putin-approved oligarchs... KGB veteran and Fradkov’s new deputy Veryovkin-Rokhalsky will wear the pants in the tax police station...

Boris Gryzlov

Interior Minister

Name: Boris Gryzlov

Team: Interior Minister

Leads:

Hair: And mustachio

Jewish: No

Connections: Putin, St. Petersburg Clan

Career: Publicly claimed that he would jump out a window if Putin told him to... Head of Yedinstvo only because the just-add-water party lacked any other stable options... Has no politics other than “The Prez is always right”... Last year, after getting in an accident with a milk truck on the road to St. Pete, Gryzlov demanded that the milk factory pay him 500,000 rubles compensation... The average salary of the milk factory’s 110 workers: 750 rubles a month... Only entered politics in 1998... Recent trade to Interior Minister will not increase his autonomy... his deputy Vasilyev will control things in the ministry...

Roman Abramovich

NEO-OLIGARCH - SIBNEFT

Name: Roman Abramovich

Team: NEO-OLIGARCH - SIBNEFT

Leads:

Hair:

Jewish: Unknown

Connections: Berezovsky, Aksyonenko

Career: Widely reported to be the "hidden hand" behind choice of Aksyonenko as Vice-Premier...Recent NTV report about him used sinister blacked-out picture of a face covered with a question mark to illustrate him...Actually we have his picture, but are afraid to use it...Considered driving force behind rumored plans to create a "Gosneft" state oil company... Finished behind Tatiana Dyachenko and Boris Berezovsky in Novaya Gazeta's recent "Grey Cardinal" ratings...Strong candidate for 1999 Evil Rookie of the Year award.

Boris Berezovsky

OLIGARCH - LogoVAZ

Name: Boris Berezovsky

Team: OLIGARCH - LogoVAZ

Leads:

Hair: little wisps, widely spaced

Jewish: Yes

Connections: Tatyana Dyachenko, Nikolai Aksonyenko, Roman Abramovich

Career: Sued Forbes magazine for calling him "the Russian Godfather "... Made a fortune selling Vaz cars marked for lower-priced foreign distribution on more expensive domestic market... Reportedly routed all of Aeroflot's revenues into private bank accounts in Switzerland... Suspect in Vladislav Listyev killing... Tossed 4-0 no-hitter against triple-A Spokane on July 6, 1993... Master at acquiring control of companies by buying minority stakes through dummy investors, then adding those stakes to his own minority shares... Daughter Liza arrested in 1998 for blow possession.

Viktor Chernomyrdin

OLIGARCH - GAZPROM

Name: Viktor Chernomyrdin

Team: OLIGARCH - GAZPROM

Leads:

Hair: League leader in 1997

Jewish: "Cherno-" means "Schwartz" in Yiddish

Connections: Berezovsky, Dubinin, Al Gore

Career: All-Star first baseman since late 1992, when he was named Prime Minister to replace Yegor Gaidar...Is said to have pocketed 2% of Gazprom shares when he helped to structure the ex-Soviet company in late perestroika years, making him worth some 2 billion dollars...Famous quote while Prime Minister: "We hoped for better, but it turned out like always."..

Anatoly Chubais

LENINIST RAO-UES

Name: Anatoly Chubais

Team: LENINIST RAO-UES

Leads:

Hair: Lots; glowing orange color

Jewish: On his mother's side

Connections: World's largest rolodex. Lawrence Summers, Alexander Voloshin, Yegor Gaidar, "St. Petersburg Mafia" (i.e Boiko, Mostovoi)

Career: Recently tabbed an "oligarch" by Yevgeny Kiselov after shoring up control of UES...After having been a great Kremlin intriguer, is now literally a major regional powerhouse, brokering control of regional industry through judicious turning on and off of energy subsidy faucet...If he ever runs for office, may use famous Calvin Trillin campaign slogan: "Never been indicted"...Snake-charmed entire Western press corps with brandishment of laptop computer...Speaks English; has been spotted in limo outside Night Flight...Destined to work as cafeteria manager in hell, where jello will be on the menu but never on the shelves.

Vladimir Gusinsky

OLIGARCH - MOST Group

Name: Vladimir Gusinsky

Team: OLIGARCH - MOST Group

Leads:

Hair: bald

Jewish: Head of Russian Jewish Congress

Connections: Luzhkov, Berezovsky, Yavlinsky, Nemtsov

Career: Was awarded national broadcasting license for television network NTV in exchange for hysterical anti-Communist propaganda in 1996 presidential elections...When Yeltsin fell out with Luzhkov in 1994, Kremlin bodyguard Alexander Korzhakov used paramilitary troops to attack Gusinsky's armored convoy in broad daylight on the Novy Arbat in order to send message to Luzhkov...Along with Berezovsky, lost in bid for Svyazinvest to George Soros and Vladimir Potanin in 1997, setting off so-called banker's war...

Mikhail Khodorkovsky

OLIGARCH - ROSPROM

Name: Mikhail Khodorkovsky

Team: OLIGARCH - ROSPROM

Leads:

Hair: Black, relatively thick on head, car salesman-y mustache

Jewish: Yes

Connections: Security structures, security structures, security structures

Career: Won massive stake in Yukos in loans-for-shares deal for almost nothing...Owned, through Bank Menatep, a 10% stake in Moscow Times's parent company Independent Media...Currently ensconced in Yukos minority shareholder mess... Got government to assume its private-depositor debts after August crash...Name instantly recalls phenomenon of postcommunist spook profiteers...We dare you to run up to him waving a toy water pistol.

Viktor Khristenko

VICE-PREMIER - WHITE HOUSE

Name: Viktor Khristenko

Team: VICE-PREMIER - WHITE HOUSE

Leads:

Hair: like a younger Milosevic

Jewish: No, just Ukrainian

Connections: Chubais, Gaidar

Career: Recently appointed First Deputy Prime Minister as a compromise to balance Berezovsky's influence over other First Deputy Prime Minister Aksyonenko... Made a public show of taking on Norilsk Nickel for tax arrears in summer of 1998, threatening bankruptcy against Norilsk subsidiary Severonickel; campaign fizzled out... Quoted on August 11, 1998: "The question of Russia's default is not on the agenda"...Recently was given a specific weekly time-slot for meetings with Yeltsin, making him one of a select few with guaranteed access to the Czar.

Alexander Lebed

GOVERNOR - KRASNOYARSK

Name: Alexander Lebed

Team: GOVERNOR - KRASNOYARSK

Leads:

Hair: Covers head, but thinning noticeably since taking over Krasnoyarsk

Jewish: Phrenologists declared him totally un-kosher

Connections: Berezovsky, Stepashin

Career: Career peaked when he ended Chechen war as Head of Security Council under Yeltsin, who sacked him for his trouble... Took over 14th Army in 1992 and shelled the heck out of anybody who opposed him, ending a civil war between Moldovans and Transdniestr Slavs... Backed Yeltsin in 1991 and 1993; later distanced himself... In '98, funded by Boris Berezovsky, became governor of resource-rich Krasnoyarsk oblast... With Primakov's help, ousted Krasnoyarsk aluminium thug Anatoly Bykov; Bykov has returned on Stepashin's watch and situation remains unclear...Beat Taibbi in billiards and Ames in toilet-polo.

Mikhail Lesin

PROPAGANDIST - KREMLIN

Name: Mikhail Lesin

Team: PROPAGANDIST - KREMLIN

Leads:

Hair: Thick strands, wavy, short, in Chazz Palmientieri style

Jewish: ?

Connections: Alexander Voloshin, Boris Yeltsin

Career: Founder of Video International, which has a de facto monopoly on sales of advertising to RTR television...Video International chronically late in paying advertising revenues to RTR...The creative genius behind the "Bank Imperial" commercials...Also authored the "Choose with your heart" pro-Yeltsin campaign ads...Video International in 1996 received a payment of 218 million rubles from Moscow City Bank just before the bank went bankrupt; bank director Dolgov subsequently disappeared...Head of Kremlin press service between Sep. '96 and Mar. '97...New Ministry said to have been created "in order to see through the successful completion of elections."

Yuri Luzhkov

MAYOR - CITY OF MOSCOW

Name: Yuri Luzhkov

Team: MAYOR - CITY OF MOSCOW

Leads:

Hair: Tongue-shaped white stripes, above ears

Jewish: No

Connections: Sergei Lisovsky, Sergei Yastrzhembsky, Yevgeny Kafelnikov

Career: Focus of most of Kremlin wrath lately as last remaining serious political opponent to Yeltsin in possession of tangible political power...Readiness of military to intervene against him laid bare in recent incident in which he was denied right by air force to fly a helicopter over Moscow oblast...Recently hired ultimate slimebag Sergei Lisovsky, mainly as a counter-kompromat threat; Lisovsky immediately dropped hints in Novaya Gazeta that he had 1996 campaign irregularity stories to tell about the Prez...Faces tiny, annoying political obstacle in weasely Sergei Kiriyenko, who's running for mayor...Rumored to be near sealing a politcal alliance with Yevgeny Primakov, which would bring down instant Kremlin retribution...Stomach said to have four chambers, like a cow's

Vladimir Potanin

OLIGARCH - UNEXIMABNK

Name: Vladimir Potanin

Team: OLIGARCH - UNEXIMABNK

Leads:

Hair: Some; rogaine

Jewish: Apparently not

Connections: Chubais & Co., George Soros, Boris Jordan

Career: As Uneximbank chief, made 1995-96 All-Star team with victories in Norilsk Nickel, Sidanko, and Nafta-Moskva loans-for-shares auctions... Is widely credited with having thought up idea for loans-for-shares... Was named Deputy Prime Minister in obvious campaign-funding-for-influence swap immediately after Yeltsin's 1996 re-election; lost his post the following winter... Nicknamed "Baby Billionaire" by Washington Post's Fred Hiatt... Soccer enthusiast. Eerie resemblance in looks, voice, and mannerisms to actor Harvey Keitel.

Yevgeny Primakov

EX-PRIME MINISTER - WHITE HOUSE

Name: Yevgeny Primakov

Team: EX-PRIME MINISTER - WHITE HOUSE

Leads:

Hair: Impressively thick for a 69-year-old

Jewish: Self-hating... Very publicly positioned self as an Arabist

Connections: Communists, Luzhkov, plurality of voting-aged Russians

Career: Named Prime Minister in September, 1998; fired in May, 1999... Presided over stabilization of Russian economy as it crashed to Bronze Age levels... Became first head of government to enjoy broad popular support and legitimacy in the Yeltsin era... During his tenure, both Alexander Smolensky and Boris Berezovsky were served with warrants for their arrest, while other oligarchs were in retreat. Upon Primakov's firing, oligarchs' warrants and indictments were lifted... Now said to be considering an alliance either with Luzhkov's Fatherland party or with the Communists.

Vladimir Putin

PRIME MINISTER - WHITE HOUSE

Name: Vladimir Putin

Team: PRIME MINISTER - WHITE HOUSE

Leads:

Hair: Thin, silvery, like a high school vice-principal's

Jewish: Not that we know of

Connections: Anatoly Chubais, Anatoly Sobchak, Pavel Borodin

Career: Was a law student of then-assistant professor Anatoly Sobchak at Leningrad State University in the mid-1970s...Served in foreign intelligence division of the KGB between 1975 and 1990...Became Sobchak's press secretary after latter was elected mayor of St. Petersburg in 1991...Became de facto deputy mayor under oft-travelling Sobchak starting in about 1993...Became head of SPB division of the NDR in 1995...Became deputy to swindling Kremlin Administration chief Pavel Borodin in 1996...Became FSB chief in July, 1998...Enjoys wrestling and speaks fluent German.

Vladimir Rushailo

REPRESSOR - MVD

Name: Vladimir Rushailo

Team: REPRESSOR - MVD

Leads:

Hair: Lonely black strands, widely spaced

Jewish: No

Connections: About 500 vori v zakone

Career: New Interior Minister; famous as founder of RUBOP (also known as RUOP), the much-feared organized crime police, created in 1991...His anti-gangster force was widely considered to be the city's most fearsome gang, about whom it was said: "The only gang scarier than Solntsevo is Shabolovka (RUBOP was located on Ulitsa Shabolovka)"...Credited with great success in buying back hostages in Chechnya, although detractors claim that only his close links with the Chechen mob allowed for such success...Under his direction, even FSB and MVD chiefs were barred from visiting RUOP offices without a RUOP chaperone... Owns dacha next to Boris Berezovsky crony/ORT director Badri Patarkatsishvili.

Alexander Smolensky

EX-OLIGARCH - SBS-Agro

Name: Alexander Smolensky

Team: EX-OLIGARCH - SBS-Agro

Leads:

Hair: None on head; carroty mustache

Jewish: You betcha

Connections: Has been on both sides of the Chubais/Berezovsky axis

Career: Recently unindicted...Gained control of AgPromBank--and with it his hands on funds delegated for government subsidies of agriculture--after giving Anatoly Chubais a $3 million interest-free loan in 1996...SBS-Agro among those banks rescued by the government with stabilization loans after August crash...One of many who made his initial fortune in currency trading in the early 1990s...Lost out in Svyazinvest bid and was mighty pissed. Likes to make grandiose charity gestures; doesn't like to pay to cheated depositors...We'll never know just how many Swiss have retired early on his servicing fees.

Sergei Stepashin

EX-PRIME MINISTER - WHITE HOUSE

Name: Sergei Stepashin

Team: EX-PRIME MINISTER - WHITE HOUSE

Leads:

Hair: Thin, covers head, unkemptish, kind of just flops around

Jewish: Grandmother rumored to be Jewish

Connections: Chubais

Career: Named Prime Minister in May 1999... Was head of the FSK, the successor to the KGB, from 1993 through mid-1995... Bold invasion of Chechnya in December 1994 led to unprecedented Russian humiliation before tiny, bearded republic... Attack on Chechen kidnappers in Budyannovsk led to scores of Russian hostages being shot; nearly all Chechen gunmen escaped... As MVD chief in 1998-9 presided over nationwide doubling of contract killings, most famous of which (i.e., Galina Staravoitova) have yet to be solved... Likes Nikita Mikhailkov; may have wept during "The Barber of Siberia"...

Vladimir Vinogradov

EX-OLIGARCH - INKOMBANK

Name: Vladimir Vinogradov

Team: EX-OLIGARCH - INKOMBANK

Leads:

Hair: Some, fluffyish, blow-dried

Jewish: No

Connections: None left

Career: Former Moscow Mayor Gennady Popov remarked that Inkombank has a great art collection, for a bankrupt company...Often accused of hoarding bank assets in Switzerland...Other oligarchs never let him join in their reindeer games; he was completely left out of loans-for-shares...Babayevsky confectioneries are his biggest prize... Has been plagued by illness in the last year or so...Was one of original "group of seven" oligarchs, although Boris Berezovsky conspicuously declined to include him in his famous 1996 interview with The Financial Times about the bankers...Owes about 2 billion dollars to various creditors following August mess.

Alexander Voloshin

SCHEMING CHIEF OF STAFF - KREMLIN

Name: Alexander Voloshin

Team: SCHEMING CHIEF OF STAFF - KREMLIN

Leads:

Hair: None on top of head; ugly beard

Jewish: No

Connections: Formerly Berezovsky; currently Chubais. Very available.

Career: Made fortune with Berezovsky helping to organize and promote the AVVA pyramid scheme, in which shareholders were promised a newly designed "people's car" once the factory was built. No cars were ever delivered...New chairman of the board at UES, where he'll make a dynamic fund-raiding duo with Chubais in preparation for 2000 campaign...Dead ringer for obnoxious New York Post sports columnist Peter Vescey.

Rem Vyakhirev

OLIGARCH - GAZPROM

Name: Rem Vyakhirev

Team: OLIGARCH - GAZPROM

Leads:

Hair: Covers most of head; silverish

Jewish: No

Connections: Viktor Chernomyrdin, Yevgeny Primakov

Career: Probably deciding factor in Yugoslav war when he agreed to back Chernomyrdin's plan to threaten to stop sending gas to Serbia unless Milosevic signed the peace deal...Through Gazprom, controls a 30% stake in NTV...In latest of many clever tax-avoidance schemes, was allowed last year to sell 2.5% stake on behalf of the state to German partner Ruhrgas in lieu of paying taxes...Sworn enemy of Sergei Kiriyenko, who tried to force him to pay taxes last year, and also hinted at unseating him... Job may be in trouble--rumor has it that Chernomyrdin, who he replaced, is going to take his old job back.