Perhaps some European leaders really do believe that maintaining the Union’s cozy prosperity justifies silencing ourselves on human rights and other issues that annoy the Kremlin. Of course, we may speak up, briefly, about “commercial” matters like the expropriation of Yukos, but if the Kremlin puts a price on our values or criticism of Russian wrongdoing – as in, say, bloodstained Chechnya – Europeans seem willing to shut up rather than face the possibility of higher energy prices, or even a blockade like that now facing Ukraine.