Bush only half as popular as Clinton

May 24, 2002

In Moscow, Clinton matroishka dolls outsell Bush ones nearly 2:1.
Unhip Bush dolls fail to stack up

But in the city's matryoshka doll markets -- the truest way to gauge what's hip in this country -- [Dubya] stands beaten, as his father was, by Bill Clinton. Yesterday, 24 hours before Mr. Bush was to land in the city, souvenir sellers on Moscow's storied Arbat Street were hoping for brisk sales of the wooden dolls, some newly painted with the U.S. President's face, smiling under a large white cowboy hat. But the Bush dolls were being scorned by tourists in favour of Clinton dolls that have been on the market for years.

"I guess he is not like Clinton, he is not so interesting," a vendor named Igor said. Clinton dolls were outselling Bush dolls two-to-one, he said, just as they would on any other day.

I'm not all that surprised. I was in Moscow when the Lewinsky scandal was going full-blast. I remember walking by street merchants selling copies of the Starr report translated into Russian on the street outisde the Mayakovskaya metro stop, within a week of the report's release on the Internet. I think that endeared Muscovites to Clinton...

(via boingboing)