Are you sure you aren't suffering from a case of confirmation bias here? I have noticed, especially in circles like Twitter or HN that people are very eager to

Are you sure you aren't suffering from a case of confirmation bias here? I have noticed, especially in circles like Twitter or HN that people are very eager to accept and buy into reports that the Russian economy is doing poorly, but if Western sources, media, analysts, companies, think-tanks, and agencies report that Russia might not be doing as poorly as we thought, the amount of suspicion and the level of hard-facts standards suddenly goes through the roof. This can cause us to reach at rather silly lengths to explain away these reports using whatever reasoning necessary. On the other hand, maybe you're right, and maybe The Economist, Goldman Sachs, the IMF, and the numerous other sources referenced in the article have all been compromised by the KGB within the past several months and have been turned into Kremlin propaganda pieces.