The Chelyabinsk authorities have responded to yesterday’s post about "optimizing the internet at taxpayers’ expense." If you think the response sounded like this: Yes, we screwed up badly and we’re ashamed. Those responsible have been punished, and we will now focus on producing lots of high-quality, truthful reporting about the actual work being done to decontaminate polluted areas, reduce emissions, and relocate residents from the danger zone. Then you badly misunderstand today’s fashionable methods of "working with public opinion": The Chelyabinsk region has long needed to rid itself of an outdated image that does not correspond to reality, an image imposed by radiophobes and financed by a number of Western companies. This is how regional head spokeswoman Svetlana Doronina commented on a blog post by Alexei Navalny about the governor’s administration requesting bids for services to alter and maintain search results in Yandex and Google related to ecology and radiation in the region. “A great deal of money has been invested in the environmental ‘horror stories’ associated with the Chelyabinsk region, including internet materials,” Svetlana Doronina noted. “This money was put up by competitors of our Mayak Production Association (a major Russian nuclear facility), by foreign companies. The environmental problems that do exist in the Chelyabinsk region have been exaggerated beyond recognition. Strange as it may sound, there have long been radical environmental activists who receive salaries from interested parties. Their work prevents the Chelyabinsk region from developing and attracting investors.” chelyabinsk.ru/newsline/416628.html The tough guys in Chelyabinsk have decided to follow the example of Rosneft and Transneft, which long ago mastered the art of talking to me in the following format: - You stole a billion, here is the evidence.* We will not respond to accusations from foreign spies who cannot bear the growing strength of Russia, which the world has once again come to respect!* At first glance, the approach is crude and seems to reflect nothing but the stupidity and worthlessness of the hired PR people. But when you look at videos like these, put out by the youth branches of the Party of Crooks and Thieves (a derogatory nickname for United Russia), you realize this is the mainstream of state propaganda, which at times feels like a parody of Soviet-era propaganda (though Soviet propaganda was still much better made; incomparably less was stolen in the process of producing it):
And of course I can’t resist pointing out this as well: if the Chelyabinsk authorities really want to look for "Western companies financing activists and preventing the Chelyabinsk region from developing," they should have been sounding the alarm long ago about the amusing tricks of Minister Khristenko’s family, which has long been firmly latched onto the juiciest parts of Chelyabinsk industry. They certainly do not live in Muslyumovo and their bank accounts are certainly not in Karabash. It was probably those corrupt environmentalists who persuaded them to take money out of Chelyabinsk and carry it off to Switzerland, rather than the other way around. Update: An old but excellent post on Kashin’s blog in Kommersant. Completely on point.