Oct 10, 2008

Russian TV Instructed to Play Down Economic Slump


Foreign Policy: Russian state television channels have been instructed to downplay the severity of the financial meltdown. The main channels have either downgraded or ignored altogether Russia's financial turmoil since it began in mid-September, according to media monitoring companies and research by The Moscow Times. On Monday, for instance, none mentioned the meltdown in Russia or any possible repercussions from the crisis. Only the smaller Ren-TV and Zvezda channels mentioned the stock plunge, according to Medialogia, a private company that tracks the media.

Meanwhile in America, it seems that our journalists have been instructed to do exactly the opposite. I'm pretty sure journalists are now contractually obliged to compare the current US economic disaster to the Great Depression. Although I don't know anyone who's packed up their truck to move to Californi to pick oranges yet. Just saying. Zzzeitgeist has a great piece on this, if you're interested.

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