The disconnect between "the party" (includes both Parties^tm) and the people is becoming difficult to hide.

The allies of the CCP model are busy working to cement our new reality: i.e. challenging the legitimacy of the party is simply illegal, enforced with sufficient violence that people's fear keeps us in check.

Opponents to this model need to figure out a schema around which to organize, yesterday, because without one, the CCP model is where we are going.

The good news is that the Soviet Union chose a different path, and there is greater freedom in Russia and its satellites today than there is in China under the CCP. Is it heaven on earth? Of course not. Putin is not a saint, and it's not a model of pure freedom by a long shot. Disagreeing with Putin is dangerous. That said, it is an infinity more free than is China under the CCP.

The Russians achieved this "better than the alternative" result by enduring the chaos of entirely de-legitimizing and destroying the increasingly stifling leadership they had been living under. It was ugly, and to some extent, ugly it remains, but again, it's better than the worst model we've got: the CCP/North Korea model.

Lesser of two evils.