he's in full suffocating repressive control of his country

judging by recent opinion surveys from the independent Levada pollster, has the backing of most Russians with a current approval rating of 86 percent

Soooo...then why does he need to "suffocate" and "repress" the country if most Russians already support him?

According to Ponomarev, this only boosted participation in the sham election

Huh...I would have thought that high participation made an election more legitimate, not more of a sham.

Guess i don't really understand democracy. Glad I have Politico to tell me that democracy is actually when low election turnout and low approval ratings for the government.