Last Friday, TV Rain aired a report about the hellish freak show of yet another batch of “patriots” and “guardians of the state,” cashing in by skimming propaganda budgets. Be sure to watch the report; today we’ll explain whose money is funding this whole youth-patriotism extravaganza. Don’t expect any surprises: as usual, it’s about presidential grants, with 70 million rubles (about $1 million) allocated to the #Set movement. We’ll also take a closer look at the creators of this “patriotic analysis” and the blacksmiths forging Russia’s so-called “spiritual bonds” (a Kremlin-style phrase about traditional values).
This is interesting:
One of my favorite characters in the piece is a certain Ruslan Ostashko (I wrote about this creep before); he created a special patriotic internet portal called Politrasha. Politrasha deals in pseudo-journalism—they make idiotic posters and shoot even more idiotic videos. Here, for example, is Ostashko, who looks like a heavy drinker, explaining that Putin cannot be broken:
When Ostashko isn’t talking about Putin, he uses his videos to talk about me and the work of the ACF (Anti-Corruption Foundation). By the number of articles and videos devoted to me, I hold an honorable fourth place—after Putin, Poroshenko, and Obama.
A whole team works there—hosts, camera operators, designers—all for the sake of putting out stupid collages about Zhora Alburov, Sobchak, or Dzyadko, and then, in a sepulchral voice, claiming that Navalny’s blog has a “secret English version” made especially for State Department officials. Incidentally, in his interview with TV Rain, Ostashko says he has already gathered proof that, with State Department money, the Anti-Corruption Foundation is just about to destroy Russia. I can’t wait to see it.
When he’s not running his trashy website, Ostashko stays in close contact with the Presidential Administration, and with Timur Prokopenko in particular.
If you look up Ostashko’s number in Prokopenko’s published text-message correspondence, it turns out that one of the main areas of his work is planting stories, using fake bloggers, and pushing topics that the Presidential Administration believes should discredit me.
It was he who, at the request of the Presidential Administration, promoted the story “Navalny killed a moose”—remember that one?
This genius PR man created, and coordinated with Prokopenko, a website featuring my supposed confession to killing a moose.
“Will the domain navalnyhuy.com work?” Ostashko asks.
“No, the opposite—make it subtle, so people think it’s real and completely serious: ‘I’ll tell you how I killed a moose,’ etc.” replies Timur Prokopenko, deputy head of the domestic policy directorate.
Ostashko then launches the site and even a Twitter account “just like Alexei’s.”
Enough about Ostashko. Here’s another group of “heroes” from TV Rain’s report who also deserve attention. I’m talking about the new youth movement “Set.” They put on fashion shows, produce patriotic clothing and jewelry, make films about “spiritual bonds,” and so on.
This is yet another reincarnation of Nashi (the pro-Kremlin youth movement), and in sheer derangement it surpasses even the aforementioned Politrasha.
At the end of TV Rain’s segment, some representative of “Set” says they exist on private donations and receive no support from the state other than moral support.
Today we return to our favorite genre: “find the grant-eater.” We’re using the same presidential grants portal that we used to track down funding for the Night Wolves.
Like any other Kremlin project, #Set is built on lies and deception. No state support, you say?
Here is a very specific project. Young patriotic designers producing clothing with deep meaning:
Organized with your money and mine:
Let’s look at other #Set projects right on their website. A photo exhibition about Putin:
Showing photographs of “the most influential man in the world” and “the ideal of a strong and powerful Russian man” cost us another 11 million rubles (about $160,000).
Apparently photos of Putin weren’t enough—they also needed to paint him. The Set movement branched out into the visual arts. Here is their “Art-Hive” project:
Another fashion show. This time at the Manege exhibition hall, called “New Russian.”
We turn to the grants portal, and voilà:
And what about the informational portal that “tells its story from the year 2045”? A truly vital thing. How did we ever live without it? You couldn’t invent a better way to spend 12 million rubles (about $175,000) in budget money.
A film festival with the promising title “Russia: A Country of Sound Meanings”? Sure—here’s 12 million rubles (about $175,000).
Spending only a minimal amount of time searching, we managed to find nearly 70 million rubles (about $1 million) in state grants awarded to the #Set movement.
What do all these projects have in common, and what do you need to know about them?
In short, in between loafing around on social media and fabricating criminal cases, the Presidential Administration came up with an innovative gray scheme for financing a new generation of Nashi-style activists.
We are sure there are more grants and budget subsidies than what we found. By definition, #Set cannot have any funding other than Kremlin money—or at least money from the Kremlin’s orbit. The same goes for Ostashko, who is hardly paying out of his own pocket to build and maintain a content-heavy website, shoot videos, organize discussion clubs, and at the same time launch sites like “how Navalny killed a moose.”
And finally, I invite all readers to enjoy what we have all shelled out at least 70 million rubles (about $1 million) for. And that’s only the official figure—obviously, the real amount is much higher.