Axe Hangs Over Political TV as Freedom of Speech is Removed!

[KoKo]

(Ha! and you thought this post could have been about CNN/MSNBC/FOX. Sounds like Putin and Bush are on the same quest.)

Axe hangs over political television as Freedom Of Speech is removed

From Andrew Osborn in Moscow

Axing a TV programme called Freedom Of Speech on the grounds that it is too critical of an increasingly authoritarian government sounds a bit too Orwellian to be true.

But in Vladimir Putin’s Russia the truth is often more far-fetched and sinister than fiction. Last Friday Svoboda Slova (Freedom Of Speech), Russia’s last remaining live political talk show, was aired for the final time. It was the only programme on Russian television that actively promoted political debate and allowed members of the audience to voice their concerns live on air about the people who ruled them – and so they did, week after week.

The new bosses of NTV, the channel that broadcast the show, claim it was too expensive to produce and was not popular enough, and therefore had to die. In fact it was entirely studio-based, so costs were kept to a minimum, and was one of the channel’s most-watched shows, regularly commanding the attention of up to 25% of Russia’s 150 million viewers.

Vladimir Kulistikov, the channel’s new director- general, is a Kremlin loyalist and has made it clear that things are going to change at NTV, previously regarded as one of the last bastions of independent political TV journalism in Russia. He lost little time in appointing a new deputy, Tamara Gavrilova, an old classmate of President Putin and a member of his so-called “St Petersburg set” .

Savik Shuster, the charismatic, bespectacled host of Svoboda Slova, who made a name for himself by sharply criticising the Kremlin, was offered a senior management job with NTV by way of compensation.

Critics believe the channel’s fate is now predictable. It will, they say, be turned into yet another drab, Soviet-style, self-censored outlet showing hour after hour of soap opera, war films, rudimentary and uncritical news reports, and dreary repeats.

MORE..........

http://www.sundayherald.com/43289

[Mnemosyne]

1. Didn't that already happen here?!!

the "liberal" mainstream media, et al, are all censored. I have almost completely stopped watching at all, they suck and really piss me off.

Thanks for post KoKo!!!

Too much stress to watch.

:puke: :puke: :puke:



:hi:

[cybildisobedience]

2. How is that any different...

from "Politically Incorrect" being taken off the air because the host made "politically incorrect" statements.
Pooty-Poot and Bush really are soulmates!

[tom_paine]

3. Exactly. Comrade Putin is farther along than Bunnypants*, using the Bush

Playbook for Installing Totalitarian "Managed Democracies".

Bunnypants* is undoubtedly jealous.

Yes, it is laughable to hear or read our Media Whores criticizing Comrade Pooty-Poot for using the Bushevik Playbook on the Russians.

Are they jealous? Should "Managed Democracy" ONLY be exclusive to Imperial Amerika?

Yes, Bunnypants* and Comrade Putin are "soulmates".