One of the more positive and biggest topics in the country seems to be the National Projects on health care, education, agriculture, demographics. As a result of the Soviet Unions great expenditures in science, military and space, as well as lack of market based mechanisms the situation in Russia's schools, hospitals, farms etc. are very grave. The chronic underfunding has created very real problems which threaten to remove any success Russia has had in educating it's rural population.

Dmitry Medvedev a friend of Putin's and the highest government official after Putin himself is in charge of the national projects. The state television reported how he has carried out his report to the Duma on the progress of the national projects. Based citing of number such as 3500 new school buses he mentioned that without new roads these buses wouldn't last long. While there is a lot of positive being said it is amazing how mute and subservient the Duma has become. Even the fervent Zhirinovsky with his LDRP nationalist party didn't ask a word about what is being done to curtail the expansion of governments bureaucracy and the absence of any kind of oversight in the national project.

The problem is that without any sort of checks and balances, the national projects are nothing more then government handouts and will not create education, health care and agricultural systems that are sustainable, not dependent on the government and are able to evolve and reverse the grave demographic situation in Russia.