"For some reason, it is those journalists who are disliked by the authorities who die in this country,"
Do tell, tovarishch.
By Moe Lane Posted in Foreign Affairs — Comments (5) / Email this page » / Leave a comment »
If this keeps up, the CDC will have to consider reclassifying Putin-disapproval as a medical condition worth tracking. It certainly seems to be causing its sufferers to come up with a bad case of dead:
Russian Journalist Dies in Fall From Window
MOSCOW —
A military correspondent for Russia's top business daily has died after falling out of a window, and some media alleged Monday that he might have been killed for his critical reporting.Ivan Safronov, the military affairs writer for Kommersant, died Friday after falling from a fifth-story window in the stairwell of his apartment building in Moscow, officials said. His body was found by neighbors shortly after the fall.
With prosecutors investigating the death, Kommersant and some other media suggested foul play.
(Via Glenn)
Прочитано дальше, камрады.
Don't blame me; blame Babelfish.
At any rate, there's apparently a nobody's-talking in effect for this mystery. Just like this one. Or this one. Or this one, come to that. Don't feel bad if you don't know who any of these people are; twenty minutes ago, neither did I. Then again, up until twenty minutes ago I hadn't quite realized that 263* Russian journalists have been reported as murdered since Putin took office in 2001.
I note all of this for two reasons: one, it's appalling in its own right, not to mention disquieting. Recent events suggest that we might - I repeat, might - be dealing with a Russian government that does not understand in its bones that the Cold War conventions were there because the alternative was... messy. This is the problem with letting gangsters into the political system; they usually get where they are by brazenly flouting the rules, so they're not very good at knowing when not to break them.
Two, this is what we call a baseline. Actual suppression of speech involves throwing journalists out of windows, dropping various witch's brews in their food or just shooting them. It'd be really spiff if the people constantly screaming 'fascism' at the American government could spend even a couple minutes a day going after, you know, actual totalitarians - or even actual creeping totalitarians.
Mind you, they hit back.
Moe
*That number may be dubious. The author of the piece also apparently thinks that comparing somebody to Seymour Hersch is a compliment, rather than a killing insult. Grain of salt, in other words, for a given value of 'grain'.
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"For some reason, it is those journalists who are disliked by the authorities who die in this country," 5 Comments (0 topical, 5 editorial, 0 hidden) Post a comment »
I say Dixie Chick tickets and new shoes for the entire NYT Newsroom!
Envisioning when all that is Left is the Right.
not a brain checker, Lord knows I could use one of those :P
Two thirds of the world is covered by water, the other third is covered by Champ Bailey
are branching out overseas to London and now, Adelphi, MD, where Putin critic Paul Joyal was shot in the groin four days after an MSNBC expose on lil' Vlad and his forty hit-men.
I'm looking forward to NBC's hard-hitting investigative journalism following Joyal's "accident." Heh, heh....
He stabbed himself 27 times, poured his own concert shoes and voluntarily jumped into a river..... coulda happened to anyone!
Two thirds of the world is covered by water, the other third is covered by Champ Bailey