WHAT ARE YOUR THOUGHTS AND MEMORIES OF BORIS? [+] ballot by Barbara_Baby_Cakes ACTIVE Mon Apr 23, 07 - Wed Jul 01, 09 MOSCOW - Former President Boris Yeltsin, who hastened the collapse of the Soviet Union by scrambling atop a tank to rally opposition against a hard-line coup and later pushed Russia to embrace democracy and a market economy, died Monday at age 76, he died of heart failure. The first freely elected leader of Russia, Yeltsin was initially admired abroad for his defiance of the monolithic Communist system. But many Russians will remember him mostly for presiding over the steep decline of their nation. Mikhail Gorbachev, the last Soviet president, summed up Yeltsin’s complex legacy Monday by referring to him as one “on whose shoulders are both great deeds for the country and serious errors.” “Thanks to Boris Yeltsin’s will and direct initiative, a new constitution was adopted which proclaimed human rights as the supreme value,” said President Vladimir Putin, who was Yeltsin’s handpicked successor. He said his former mentor “gave people a chance to freely express their thoughts, freely elect authorities.” U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates called Yeltsin “an important figure in Russian history.” “No Americans, at least, will forget seeing him standing on the tank outside the White House (the Russian parliament building) resisting the coup attempt,” Gates said while visiting Moscow. Yeltsin steadfastly defended freedom of the press, but was a master at manipulating the media. Putin has proven far more popular even as he has tightened Kremlin control. Boris Nikolayevich Yeltsin was born Feb. 1, 1931, into a peasant family in the Ural Mountains’ Sverdlovsk region. When he was 3, his father was imprisoned in dictator Josef Stalin’s purges but later released. A mischievous child, Yeltsin lost his thumb and index finger while playing with a grenade. He was expelled from elementary school for criticizing a teacher at an assembly. Yeltsin joined the Communist Party at age 30 after a brief career in construction in the city of Sverdlovsk, now called Yekaterinburg. He became the region’s party boss in 1976. On Dec. 31, 1999, he stunned everyone by announcing his resignation more than three months before his second term expired. He named Putin — his last prime minister and a former KGB agent — as acting president to give him an incumbent’s advantage. He is survived by his wife, Naina, two daughters and several grandchildren. What impact did Yeltsin have on the world and what will history say about this man as a leader, politician and human being? History will write: "Yeltsin saved the soul of Russia" As a Leader: Yeltsin... As a Politiican: Yeltsin... As a Human Being: Yeltsin... Here are my thoughts... As a Drunk Ballot #114243 : SEE RESULTS Comment: show your vote with comment?

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