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Is CNN Getting Kicked Out of Russia?

alternet.org — You probably didn't know that CNN censored Putin for being just too darn sensible. Yep, it's true. About two weeks ago, Putin gave the network an exclusive 30-minute interview. And you know what happened? Nothing. It was never allowed to air. CNN doesn't know it yet, but that decision might have cost them their Russian broadcasting rights.

Who dugg this? Made popular Sep 13, 2008

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  • datagod, on 09/12/2008, -8/+110Good. CNN is biased almost as badly as Fox.
  • SillyRabbits, on 09/13/2008, -0/+58Well, I think his logic follows the idea that, if Nancy Grace can talk about the missing Caylee baby for an hour every night for the past month on CNN, why wouldn't they be willing to air a rare 30-min interview by a world leader (or simply just make the entire thing available on their website). That's clearly why he did it in the first place - to have it seen by people. It's not like he doesn't have better or more important things to do. I obviously don't agree with his form of government, but I can't see how any leader wouldn't see that as an insult.
  • astro900, on 09/12/2008, -4/+60Yes, and I already picture breaking news - "CNN, most truthful and open media channel, has been kicked out of Russian highly censored media network"...
  • Squaker, on 09/13/2008, -6/+45Let them kicked out of Russia. They've earned it.
  • crowbar77, on 09/13/2008, -4/+38Don't worry CNN will spin it in their favor and make Putin look bad while there at it.
  • VitriolAndAngst, on 09/13/2008, -1/+31The media in the USA has a worse reputation around the world than Pravda.

    The number of important stories that get ignored, while the media chases down the shade of red that is being used to put lipstick on pigs, is becoming legendary.
  • inactive, on 09/13/2008, -0/+29I hope CNN gets banned and the ban, or attempt to ban, on South park gets reverted.

    South Park > CNN
  • NickLee808, on 09/13/2008, -7/+36First Fox.
    Now CNN.

    Either journalism is reaching epic lows, or I smell American propaganda.
    If it is the latter, I think America should no longer be considered as the "greatest" country on Earth.

    Maybe this other country (I think it's called Russia?) is more capable of holding that title.
  • wikisky, on 09/13/2008, -2/+31Here's the full CNN interview http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZrQJz3NhcTg&feature ...
    Watch it and you'll find zillions reasons why CNN didn't want to air it. Here's my top two list
    1. CNN as any commercial company would do anything to get more clients (viewers), so it's logical not to air material like "YOU, my dear viewer, is a BAD GUY, your government is really screwed up there and practically caused the death of hundreds civilians.". What viewer will say? Probably something like "WHAT? I'm not a BAD GUY! I HATE CNN! I'll watch Fox News from now on".
    2. CNN as many other US media channels are really screwed up delivering real picture right from beginning of the conflict. It's always difficult to admit own errors. Again, CNN afraid their veiwer will say: "What the heck is going on there. I want to dig dipper. and after reading some neutral material, i.e. Wikipedia, there's high probability the viewer will say: "What is was fed by CNN, Fox News and other US channels is total bias. I hate US mainstream media. I'd rather get independent material from Internet"

    Your turn, I'm sure you'll find few more reasons

  • Thinbev, on 09/13/2008, -4/+32This is why America is antagonizing Russia:
    http://www.iht.com/articles/2008/02/25/business/pl ...

    This is why America is antagonizing Iran:
    http://uk.reuters.com/article/oilRpt/idUKDAH833667 ...

    It's all about our Federal Reserve Notes (US Dollars). There's a currency war taking place among the world's central bankers and the mainstream media isn't talking about it.

    To learn more about the root cause for why we go to war check out this eye opening article: http://web.israelinsider.com/views/7828.htm
  • DigSomeMore, on 09/12/2008, -5/+33Hmm, interesting article...wonder what is going to happen next.
  • Altanar, on 09/12/2008, -5/+30Compared to MSNBC and Fox, CNN's about in the middle.
  • roxgod666, on 09/13/2008, -0/+23Its not about him, its about how CNN just simply did not want to air the interview probably because he exploited some truths that CNN didn't want American ears to hear.
  • silentjay85, on 09/13/2008, -2/+25***** CNN. ***** like this is why average Americans are so ignorant
  • inactive, on 09/13/2008, -1/+23why the ***** would you censor the second most powerful (or maybe first) man on earth...stupid msm
  • hutch1973, on 09/13/2008, -0/+18Wow. Having watched the full version on youtube, then the aired piece by CNN, I'm disgusted. At this point, this country needs a legit national news source, untainted by business and corrupt politicians.

    Of course, we won't get this, because they will lose the opportunity they have to manipulate the American population.

    I'm disgusted.
  • diggmaddy, on 09/13/2008, -3/+19It's not about hurting Czar's feelings, it's about a news channel ignoring the facts and rational discussion about a situation and just going after spicy faux-news to appease their viewers.

    Just imaging, not just the president of Russia, but even if you had some serious rational discussion with an acquaintance for 30 mins, in which you had put your sincerest efforts to give the other person best information possible, and then at the end of those 30 mins, that other person laughs it out saying that he was just messing around with you! Would you be interested in any further discussions with such a person, ever again?

    It's you in this situation. Now think about a president of a country whose time is about 100 times as valuable as yours.
  • JinnRikki, on 09/13/2008, -1/+16CNN does the administrations bidding and was told to make Putin look bad. When they couldn't find a way to edit his interview to make it sound as if he were an evil dictator hell bent on world domination they had to scrap it.
    Nothing new just another day in the life of our corporate/state run media.
  • lukedamonkey, on 09/13/2008, -1/+16I'm curious to see this interview...
    what are they censoring from us that the russian administration wants us to know?
    Or maybe he's telling the truth about Georgia?
    This is very interesting...
  • da_bradler, on 09/13/2008, -0/+14this is what they cut from the interview.(it aired in russia)

    explains relations(paraphrased)

    Stalinist was the one that first split up ossetia and gave the south to georgia. That area of south ossetia is the problem. Russia as it is after the collapse of the USSR rejects Stalin and says that area still is part of Russia, while Georgia defends Stalins decision. (the area has been in Russian control since the USSR collapse, the conflict started when Georgia invade and tried to secure the south ossetia region, then the Russian army counter attacked and drove the Georgian army out and then deep back into georgian territory. )

    this is what he said next(quote)

    You and I are sitting here now, having a quiet conversation in the city of Sochi. Within a few hundred kilometers from here, U.S. Navy ships have approached, carrying missiles whose range is precisely several hundred kilometers. It is not our ships that have approached your shores; it's your ships that have approached ours. So what's our choice?

    We don't want any complications; we don't want to quarrel with anyone; we don't want to fight anyone. We want normal cooperation and a respectful attitude toward us and our interests. Is that too much?

    then an interesting comment about economic relations

    Construction of the first gas pipeline system was started during the 1960s, at the height of the Cold War, and for all those years, from the 1960s until this day, Russia has been fulfilling its contract obligations in a very consistent and reliable way, regardless of the political situation.

    We never politicize economic relations, and we are quite astonished at the position of some U.S. administration officials who travel to European capitals trying to persuade the Europeans not to buy our products, natural gas for example, in a truly amazing effort to politicize the economic sphere. In fact, it's quite pernicious.

    It's true that the Europeans depend on our supplies but we too depend on whoever buys our gas. That's interdependence; that's precisely the guarantee of stability.
  • fasda, on 09/12/2008, -0/+14which is helpful when you need to explain to people that your country hasn't done anything the US and NATO hasn't.
  • ClearBlue99, on 09/13/2008, -1/+15Perhaps Putin did not say what the American Spin wanted him to say. Putin is a pretty big world figure and to not show his side of the story says a lot about the media.
  • damack, on 09/13/2008, -1/+15Hopefully CNN and Fox news get kicked out of Britain too.

    I tune into the broadcasts sometimes and they make the BBC look like angels with the amount of ***** they spew on the air, the bias is sickening.
  • Briandrews15, on 09/13/2008, -1/+14just like right wingers dont see fox as biased
  • scoottie, on 09/13/2008, -1/+12now if we can only get them out of the USA
  • inactive, on 09/13/2008, -2/+13***** CNN
  • audomatix, on 09/13/2008, -0/+11Why wasn't it allowed to air though? Is it possible this could have offered some insight that would have been bad for people promoting war? The facts once again obscured by the wants of the few disregarding the needs of the many.
  • smackydoodle, on 09/13/2008, -0/+10Hmm....it's weird that some people want the media to control what information we're given. If CNN is worried about corporate sponsors so much that they don't share world news, such as Russian leaders talking about the US, then don't call yourself a news channel.
  • ErickStevenson, on 09/13/2008, -0/+10I always wondered what CNN stood for, now I know... Corporate News Network. When they care more about ratings and revenues than facts.
  • richmomz, on 09/13/2008, -0/+9My family immigrated from a then-communist eastern block country, and although there was plenty of propaganda B.S. being spewed on a daily basis back then at least everyone KNEW it was crap. Here in the U.S., people believe the nonsense they see in the media, and to the media's credit they are far more sophisticated in their deception than any cold war propaganda outlet ever was.
  • saranagati, on 09/13/2008, -2/+11well russia hasn't had a czar in what, 3 quarters a century (the article even says he is the prime minister)? And yes I would say it is ok if rather than reporting news, you construe the news to generate political propaganda.
  • wikisky, on 09/13/2008, -0/+9Here's the full interview on YouTube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xwC5q-zMQnw
  • JPHR, on 09/13/2008, -1/+10Living in Western Europe having available CNN, Bloomberg, CNBC, BBC, SKynews but also Russia Today and having some investment in Russia too, I followed this matter with quite some interest. CNN broadcasted every statement by the White House in full, but comment on those statements was seriously lacking. Bush/Perino/Cheney only referring to that small democratic nation (a kind of David against Goliath). The CNN background analysis was nearly totally lacking. For instance never was the presence of US military advisers in Georgia questioned nor that claim of Georgia on Ossetia questioned.

    Check Wikipedia: 1921-1991 Georgia part of USSR, 1991 Ossetia-Georgia war, 1992 Ossetia under Russia/Cis peacekeeping mission. So those nationalistic idiots from Georgia are basing their claim on before 1921 !!
    Please note how many borders over the whole world have been redrawn since 1921!

    For background check conservative Pat Buchanan:http://buchanan.org/blog/2008/08/pjb-blowback-from ...
    End 2007 Putin in frank language repeated these objections:http://www.securityconference.de/konferenzen/rede. ...

    The Neocon and also that client British goverment saw the Neocon wet-dream of a unipolar world exposed and responded as typical Rovian type republicans with the classic ex-KGB characterization, reminding the public of the actions of the USSR in 1968 etc. May I remind you that you can serve the CIA quite honorably. By the way that expansive communist ideology collapsed in 1991 with dissolution of the USSR.
    CNN's positioned itself behind the "leader" Bush with only some token semi impartial short items, which were drowned in the overall news flow. In my opinion as a news service CNN did the American public a real disservice. After being lied into Iraq CNN ought to have known better by now. The selective use of Putin's interview may serve CNN own purposes in the short term, but has seriously damaged their credibility.

    By the way Georgia is a sideshow. Why did CNN never question the intentional lapse by Bush of the ABM treaty. That is seriously affecting the nuclear balance. No instead CNN only mention "Russia may have to attack Poland" as a threat, instead of being dictated by MAD logic and induced by the special treaty the USA forced with Poland.

    Putin gave CNN access in a open format they never enjoy with Bush (who simply does not seem to have sufficient command of the facts) and uses quite selectively that information to damage Russia only. Wow Herr Dr Goebbels could not have improved on that. CNN needs to clean up their act. It seems that the price of even limited White House access is being subservient to the WH spin.
  • IneedaSN, on 09/13/2008, -0/+9the US doesnt need to sensor its media, they do a good jb of that themselves
  • Uranium118, on 09/13/2008, -1/+9"At this point, it is just a rumor, but they are preparing to kick out about half of the half-dozen Western journalists working at CNN's Moscow bureau."

    So 3 only people?
  • evil-doer, on 09/13/2008, -0/+8ya they are in the middle. the middle of "bad to really bad"
  • feureau, on 09/13/2008, -0/+8And CNN gonna find out about the news from Digg. Nice!

    Thank you social reporting.
  • ErickStevenson, on 09/13/2008, -1/+8You got that right. Most americans don't know and don't care what's happening outside their box.
  • ErickStevenson, on 09/13/2008, -1/+8how is that freedom of press when everything they show us is controlled? Enemy or not I think it would be important to what these guys say... US keeps mentioning Russia as a threat, so why not hear what they have to say? Isn't that consider world/international news? Or you don't care what happens outside US?
  • monkeyrun, on 09/13/2008, -4/+11lol we have the freedom of press.

    We have the freedom to NOT publish anything that make our "enemy" look good.
  • DiggzDE, on 09/13/2008, -0/+7For someone who obviously doesn't speak/type the best English, you sure made a couple of good points right there.

    Dugg.
  • kriukov, on 09/13/2008, -1/+8Exaggeration bordering nonsense. 1) Putin is clearly not the world's worst dictator (there are much worse, I think). 2) I don't know what progress was meant here, but the country's economy improved significantly in contrast with the late 1990s (the question whether it did due to Putin is controversial, but it did). The "50 years" number is also taken out of the blue, I guess.
  • uncleosbert, on 09/13/2008, -0/+7well played, comrade.
  • richmomz, on 09/13/2008, -0/+6To be more accurate, the press is only "free" to those who have the resources to control it, and publish whatever nonsense they please. Even Thomas Jefferson, champion of free speech and the free press expressed disappointment with the media distortion being put forward by privately owned media even in HIS day, saying something to the effect of: "It is better to be ignorant than to be misinformed."
  • fasda, on 09/13/2008, -1/+7That makes him power hungry yes but lets compare him to Libya, Sudan, Egypt, Burma, China he's a paragon of liberty.
  • heystoopid, on 09/13/2008, -0/+6No big loss , given the useless indifferent coverage they offer in both Afghanistan , Lebanon and Iraq of late one can only presume to assume they are literally clone their material from the local Halliburton News Contractor .
  • vxp19, on 09/13/2008, -2/+8So in other words, you don't have the freedom of press.

    Press is supposed to be independent, and as such not have "enemies", in double quotes or otherwise.
  • uncleosbert, on 09/13/2008, -1/+6so putin deserves to be censored, because he's unrepentantly evil? and everything our press does is ok, because they're free?

    i guess we see how true that is in practice. let's flip off kim jong too and see what happens! it's not like our behavior is important, we're the good guys!
  • M4tchstickM4n, on 09/13/2008, -0/+5Putin was speaking English. The youtube clip is taken from Russian television and is dubbed in Russian. If you listen carefully you will hear the odd bit of English speech. Also if you opened your eyes you might notice that Putins lips don`t sync to the Russian speech.
  • ErickStevenson, on 09/13/2008, -0/+5Hate Putin or not, I don't know why they would not air an interview with this influencial leader. Might not be president but what was the point of the interview if they are not airing it? They would allow other worst people on air but not this guy? Is the war on Russia already starting?
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