Lies on SKY: The British Media Circus comes to RussiaTimothy Bancroft-Hinchey
Right on cue two days before Russia's Parliamentary elections, comes SKY News. Are they following terrorists, interviewing rapists, glorifying murderers and taking sides? Are they asking Americans in Iraq if they are looking for revenge for 9/11? Why no, they are muck-raking in Russia's vast interior, painting a negative image of Vladimir Putin.
In the sewer where the British media resides, pride of place in this festering cesspit, alongside the British Bullshit Corporation, must be reserved for SKY News, where lies on SKY abound, where stories are turned around or upside down, where gross manipulation rules the day and where insinuation goes hand in hand with reporting what are supposed to be facts.
So where does SKY News turn up in Russia two days before the election? In a nice, refurbished, modernised interior city in Russia's vast hinterland? In a village which has had a new plant built bringing jobs and prosperity? No, in remote districts of Kurgan, where SKY found a few buildings with crumbling walls, a 40-year-old lady who is already a grandmother, who turned on the tears as SKY revealed an "Ahhhh! Factor" shot of a baby sleeping in a cot, covered in a blanket to avoid the mosquitoes "breeding underground" before switching to a "wow ! factor" shot of the Governor's residence to create a nice contrast. Kind of like showing a snapshot of a tramp lying in a pool of urine on Victoria station and then a clip of the Chancellor of the Exchequer jetting off to Klosters for his skiing holiday.
This, complete with aggressive and unacceptable soundbites such as referring to Russia's Prime Minister Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin as "Putin" and quotes from obscure Just Russia opposition supporters saying that United Russia is, and I quote: "the party of swindlers and thieves".
Interesting because in 2007, United Russia swept to a massive and thumping election victory with figures that would astonish leaders like Cameron (whose name rhymes with "moron") or his nasty little side-kick in the Foreign Office, Hague, that bald-pated slap-head whose name rhymes with "plague". In 2007, United Russia won the election with 64.3% of the vote, won 315 out of the 450 seats in the DUMA and 2,838 out of 3,785 seats in regional parliaments.
Through the perfectly natural process of political image-wasting it is natural that United Russia will not garner quite such a hefty slice of the vote four years on, which is expectable and healthy but one thing is sure: United Russia will be confirmed as Russia's most popular party, and by far, in Sunday's election, ahead of the Communist Party of the Russian Federation which should come in second. Way, way behind United Russia will be SKY's darlings such as Just Russia.
Let us look at the latest opinion polls coming out of Russia (a compilation of several polls taken recently across the country): In first place we have Dmitry Medvedev's United Russia (Vladimir Putin will fight for the Presidential election in March 2012) with 40%; in second, Gennady Zyuganov's Communist Party of the Russian Federation (11%); third Vladimir Zhirinovsky's Liberal Democratic Party of Russia (9.5%), fourth Sergey Mironov's Just Russia (8.5%); fifth, sixth and seventh on one per cent apiece, Yabloko (led by Grigory Yavlinsky), Patriots of Russia (Gennadi Semigin) and Right Cause (Andrei Dunaev).
That just about takes the wind out of SKY's sails, does it not? Did the Party of Camoron and Hague the Plague win with a percentage lead four times that of the second most voted political Party, Labour? And now we are muck-raking, let us take a quick look around Britain, shall we?
The last time I visited Camoron and Hague the Plague's country, I was shocked. I was waved through passport control by an obese gentleman with his stomach hanging out of his shirt who did not appear to speak English, whereupon I was interviewed by a lady in a veil who I could not understand very well, who called a gentleman in a turban who I understood less well, who in turn called a young Caucasian English-born spotty-faced youth who I could not understand at all. The spoken English language has disappeared - what you get today is gabbling and grunts; "water" is now "wor'a", "seventeen" is "sivin'oin", "Excuse me, sir!" has become "Oi!! Moi'(t)!" (without the T).
The train which took me to central London was bedecked with graffiti of the most inane kind - Tosha sucks c***, Kevin sh*ts - and the floor was invisible because it was covered with a sea of fast food packages and, from the smell, far worse festering thereunder. Indeed, it appeared that Kevin really does. From what I could see, the hotels in London are overpriced flea-pits complete with alien pubic hairs on the sheets and in my case a toilet that did not flush complete with a noisy air-conditioning unit outside the window which appeared to be competing with a faulty jet engine.
A visit to the countryside is, in a word, a challenge. Spread across the train seats with his boots on those opposite, is a sivin'oin-year-old "Kevin", no doubt living with a "Tosha" who refuses to shift after a polite request. "Oim si'in 'ere, si' somewhere fakkin' euse". It did move, and very fast, when I removed my dark glasses and it observed what was lunging behind my eyes. The journey was punctuated by the most disgusting swear words bawled from the throats of screaming Toshas and Kevins on a raucous school trip, the teachers accompanying them cringing in embarrassed silence and when I arrived at my destination, I flinched and groaned spontaneously in amazement. The station platform looked as if the inhabitants of all the pigsties in the surrounding area had been kettled into it for a week and smelt even worse. Swear words had been scrawled in excrement across the station walls in what looked like a perfect mix between a war zone and a public latrine.
One quarter of all families in England and one third of those in Wales are classified as living in fuel poverty, I saw plenty of houses in ruin, I met plenty of people living in abject misery, I heard hundreds of complaints from people who saw themselves in an eternal cycle of unemployment and saw no future for their children. Ninety-five per cent of English schoolkids, it seems, come out of school after thirteen years unable to spot the difference between "its" and "it's", mental arithmetic appears to be rocket science, writing skills are three lines full of spelling and grammar mistakes. Moving from the education to the health ministry, patients are terrified of going to hospital because they say they are far more likely to pick up an infection there and come out worse than when they went in. Not that good so far, is it? See how easy it is to go around finding trouble?
Almost everyone I spoke to accused the governing class of being more interested in feathering their own nests and of having lost touch with reality, strong on soundbites and weak on policy, more likely to be found wearing a suspender belt in an underground apartment near the House of Commons spending time with Spanking Sarah and a feather duster than in their Constituencies working.
Back to SKY News. This afternoon, this illustrious channel called in an ex-diplomat called Charles Crawford, who will be an international observer of the Russian Parliamentary elections on Sunday and who stated "I think there is Twitter in Russia". That just about sums up the British media, SKY News and puerile and slanted takes on Russia, does it not?
Vladimir Putin does not go around the world starting wars, printing flags and supporting terrorists, thieves, torturers, arsonists and rapists, murdering women and children. He represents the rule of law and not the jungle, he represents a multilateral approach to crisis management and the use of the UNSC as the proper forum for debate and discussion and dialogue and not as a body to rubber-stamp NATO's murderous and greedy schemes. He represents sustained prosperity and improvement of the standard of living for the vast majority of Russians, he is a patriot, he cares for Russia and the interests of Russian people, he is the right man in the right place at the right time.
That is why he will be elected President in March with a huge majority of the vote, that is why United Russia will appear on Sunday by far as the largest party in a free and fair democratic election. Sure, SKY News will insinuate that there were irregularities but then again, what do Tosha and Kevin do? Eh what?
