Russian Media Backs Trump, Questions US Democracy

christiefan915

christiefan915

Catalyst
Contributor
Russian state-owned media does little to hide its preferences in the U.S. presidential election. News reports about the race for the White House on Russian television devote most of their time to elaborating on Donald Trump's allegations that Hillary Clinton is corrupt and the election is rigged.

"Clinton has a choice. Either she gets the presidency or she goes behind bars," pro-Kremlin journalist Dmitry Kiselyov said during his flagship Sunday program on the state-controlled Vesti channel. Unlike the anti-establishment Trump, he told viewers, Clinton has the full backing of the U.S. security services, "oligarchic" corporations and the media. Other reports on the Kremlin-controlled TV channels that are the primary source of news for most Russians have highlighted concerns about Clinton's health, linked her to sex scandals and suggested the Democratic Party is "panicking" over recent polls.

"My colleagues at these channels completely back Trump and show all the bad things about Clinton," said Aleksei Venediktov, the editor of liberal Russian radio station Ekho Moskvy. Russian President Vladimir Putin has repeatedly rejected claims that the Kremlin would like to see Trump win the White House. Experts, however, point to strong similarities between their positions on major foreign policy issues, including Syria and Ukraine.

The Russian media is pushing Trump's candidacy "very, very aggressively," according to a European Union official who monitors the Russian media and spoke on condition of anonymity because he is not authorized to speak publicly on the issue.

In contrast, negative stories about Trump often get lighthearted coverage. Reporting fresh allegations of sexual abuse against Trump on Oct. 15, the Vesti channel aired a segment called "Too many p------" set to jaunty music that took viewers through allegations of sexual misconduct by former president Bill Clinton and some of the claims against Trump himself.


http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/russian-media-backs-trump-questions-us-democracy-43322294
 
Clinton has the full backing of the U.S. security services, "oligarchic" corporations and the media.
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Echo_of_Moscow
Echo of Moscow runs a website that publishes analytical and factual materials in a variety of fields including international and domestic political affairs, social developments and cultural trends. The articles are written by members of the so-called Echo of Moscow Club, an honorary group of political analysts, academic researchers, columnists and public figures. Among the site's authors are Boris Akunin, Dmitrii Bykov, Matvey Ganapolsky, Eduard Limonov, Alexey Navalny, Valeriya Novodvorskaya, Victor Shenderovich, and a number of others, who have sustained national and international acclaim in their areas of expertise.
 
anatta said:
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Echo_of_Moscow
Echo of Moscow runs a website that publishes analytical and factual materials in a variety of fields including international and domestic political affairs, social developments and cultural trends. The articles are written by members of the so-called Echo of Moscow Club, an honorary group of political analysts, academic researchers, columnists and public figures. Among the site's authors are Boris Akunin, Dmitrii Bykov, Matvey Ganapolsky, Eduard Limonov, Alexey Navalny, Valeriya Novodvorskaya, Victor Shenderovich, and a number of others, who have sustained national and international acclaim in their areas of expertise.
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You don't think it's odd that Russia is so invested in our campaign? I haven't seen this level of interest from other countries.
 
christiefan915 said:
You don't think it's odd that Russia is so invested in our campaign? I haven't seen this level of interest from other countries.
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I think virtually any country out there - Europe/Asia/the Americas - is interested in our campaign.
"Invested" in what manner? intense interest? the hacking?

I'm not sure of why the DNC was hacked - maybe they just don't take cyber-security seriously, like Hillary herself?
Podesta had a ridiculous password..maybe they do it because they can
 
This was written about six months before Trump became the nominee.

If you ask the average Russian who is running for president in America, you'll most likely get raised eyebrows instead of an answer. But one does not have to be a prophet to predict that if Donald Trump wins Iowa, Russian TV will be overjoyed. The once seemingly endless debate among the Russian establishment over whether a Democratic or Republican president would be better has long seemed pointless. After all, Russia seemed to be getting along with George W. Bush -- who once saw Vladimir Putin's soul in his eyes -- before an awkward confrontation as Russia invaded the Georgian provinces of Abkhazia and South Ossetia in August 2008. And although Barack Obama "reset" ties with Russia, his administration's policy was thwarted with the annexation of Crimea and Russian military engagement in Ukraine.

President Putin likely knows he will never be regarded as a legitimate partner by any mainstream president of the United States. So it's now all about Trump, who challenges not a political camp, but the core of the U.S. system itself. It was not by accident that Putin endorsed him last December, and the official Russian media has taken the same line since then. Edouard Limonov, once a rebellious Russian writer, put it bluntly in the pro-Kremlin Izvestia daily: "We prefer Trump because he accepts Russia as the state of the tough men."

Ultimately, the Kremlin takes a two-pronged approach to the United States. Tactically, Russian authoritarianism presents itself as not all that different from Western liberal democracies. The argument goes that both kinds of regimes are flawed, with their strings pulled by forces from behind the curtain. Indeed, Putin is always keen to emphasize flaws in the American democracy, usually pointing out that George H.W. Bush won the presidency in 2000 despite losing the popular vote. In doing so, he seems to be sending a message to his nation that rigged elections in Russia are somehow a similar phenomenon.

Strategically, though, relations with the West are seen as a zero-sum game, and anything that can be seen as an American failure -- whether on the battlefields of Syria or in domestic electoral politics -- is seen as a reason to celebrate in Moscow.

And from this perspective, Vladimir Putin looks at Mr. Trump -- a populist who seems willing to throw the usual values to the wind -- as his natural ally, and a potential vehicle for his own global interests. If Trump secures the Republican nomination, Russian officialdom can be expected to celebrate his victory much like Napoleon celebrated his triumph in the battle of three emperors at Austerlitz two centuries ago.

Mikhail Fishman is editor in chief of The Moscow Times.
 
President Putin likely knows he will never be regarded as a legitimate partner by any mainstream president of the United States.
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bingo.
and that is why we don't take Russian security interest seriously. Our "mono-polar madness".
If we want detente with Russia we need to take them seriously - they do have legitimate interests and they are a superpower.

Strategically, though, relations with the West are seen as a zero-sum game, and anything that can be seen as an American failure -- whether on the battlefields of Syria or in domestic electoral politics -- is seen as a reason to celebrate in Moscow.
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^ this has got to change
 
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