Posted on 01/08/2017 1:20:53 PM PST by Navy Patriot
I’d trust RT over the NYTimes and the WaPost any day.
And the documents in the report cited were from 2012
Apparently, the current definition of “negative coverage” is telling the truth about a liberal.
NYT's coverage of Donald Trump throughout the U.S. presidential campaign was consistently negative..."
The hacks at the NYT will be after FR next for being a Commie hotbed of anti-H->! Fake News....
Completely bogus finding against RT.
Sham agencies, all of them.
Word is he had had a falling out with Putin and was about to become an informer, a 'snitch'. Putin's Russia is very much like the Mafia.
RT (Russia Today) and the other Moscow-controlled media outlets reported at the time that there were no signs of foul play--that he died of a heart attack.
However, when the autopsy report came out 4 months later (March 2016) it was revealed that he actually died as a result of blunt force trauma to his head and body.
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Mikhail Yuriyevich Lesin (July 11, 1958 November 5, 2015) was a Russian political figure, media executive and an adviser to president Vladimir Putin.[1]
In 2006 he was awarded the Order "For Merit to the Fatherland", one of Russia's highest state decoration for civilians.
Mikhail Lesin was nicknamed the Bulldozer because of his ability to get virtually all Russian media outlets under The Kremlin's control.[2]--wikipedia
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"RT [Russia Today] has been called a propaganda outlet for the Russian government[10][11][12] and its foreign policy[10][11][13][14] by former Russian officials[15] and by news reporters,[16] including former RT reporters.[17][18][19]
It has also been accused of spreading disinformation.[20][21][22]
The network states that it offers a 'Russian perspective' on global events.[24]"
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RT_%28TV_network%29
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RT = RUSSIA TODAY
Nov 2015...
Vladimir Putin's media Svengali who was found dead in DC hotel was 'murdered for being an FBI informant'
"Nicknamed the 'Bulldozer', Lesin was one of the key props of the Putin presidency, personally masterminding a wide-ranging media crackdown which has left the vast majority of Russian TV stations and newspapers obedient to the Kremlin."
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The following article is from December *2014*
"Mikhail Lesin has stepped down as head of major state-controlled media holding Gazprom-Media, the company said late last week.
Gazprom-Media, whose holdings include independent radio station Ekho Moskvy, said Lesin's resignation was due to family reasons, Russian media reports said Friday.
The holding's board of directors will finalize his resignation at an upcoming meeting, Gazprom-Media was cited by Ekho Moskvy as saying. No replacement has been named.
Earlier, a flurry of reports of Lesin's imminent resignation appeared on Russian news wires, all based on undisclosed sources and giving divergent accounts of the motive.
Forbes Russia cited sources in the media and government as confirming the resignation, with one of the individuals claiming that the decision was made personally by President Vladimir Putin."
http://www.themoscowtimes.com/article/513690.html
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WASHINGTON - A U.S. senator has asked federal authorities to investigate whether a powerful Russian media mogul seen as the mastermind behind the Kremlin-funded RT [RUSSIA TODAY] network used dirty money to purchase pricey California real estate.
U.S. Senator Roger Wicker (Republican-Mississippi) has asked the Justice Department to investigate whether Mikhail Lesin, Russian President Vladimir Putin's former press minister, violated the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act or laundered money by acquiring multimillion-dollar homes in the Los Angeles area.
"I...understand that following his government service, Mr. Lesin moved his immediate family to Los Angeles, California, where he acquired multiple residences at a cost of over $28 million," Wicker wrote in the July 29 letter. "That a Russian public servant could have amassed the considerable funds required to acquire and maintain these assets...raises serious questions." ..."
http://www.rferl.org/content/lesin-wicker-real-estate/25477122.html
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Here's something from 2013 on Mikhail Lesin, again, the creator of Russia Today (RT), who was found dead in a Washington DC hotel in Nov 2015...
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The recent return of Vladimir Putin's longtime eminence grise, Vladislav Surkov, to the Kremlin was widely discussed in the media. Much less noticed was the appointment of Mikhail Lesin, Putin's former information minister, as the new head of Gazprom-Media, Russia's largest, and de facto state-run, media group, which incorporates several broadcast, print, and online outlets.
Lesin's return to a senior position is no less symbolic than that of Surkov, and says a lot about the Kremlin's plans for Russia's few remaining uncensored media.
Lesin was a central figure in the early Putin years, spearheading the Kremlin's effort to silence the country's independent television, the first step in the consolidation of authoritarian rule.
The first target was NTV, at that time Russia's largest and most popular independent TV channel, whose hard-hitting news broadcasts, talk shows, and satirical programs criticized the government over growing corruption and the war in Chechnya and gave airtime to the opposition.
In June 2000, a month after Putin's inauguration, NTV's founder and majority shareholder, Vladimir Gusinsky, was arrested and placed in Moscow's infamous Butyrka prison.
While he was there, the information minister made an offer: Gusinsky could have his freedom if he agreed to transfer his media holdings to Gazprom, the state-owned energy monopoly.
On July 20, 2000, while still under a prosecutorial recognizance, Gusinsky signed a deal to sell his media outlets to Gazprom that included "Annex 6," which provided for the "termination of the criminal prosecution against Mr Vladimir Aleksandrovich Gusinskiy in connection with the criminal case initiated against him on 13 June 2000, his reclassification as a witness in the said case and suspension of the precautionary measure prohibiting him from leaving [the country]." "Annex 6" was personally signed by Information Minister Mikhail Lesin.
In its 2004 ruling, the European Court of Human Rights found the NTV owner's arrest to have been politically motivated and in violation of the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms, emphasizing in particular that "the facts that Gazprom asked the applicant to sign the July agreement when he was in prison, that a State minister [Lesin] endorsed such an agreement with his signature, and that a State investigating officer later implemented that agreement by dropping the charges strongly suggest that the applicant's prosecution was used to intimidate him."
In the end, Gusinsky refused to give up NTV (once out of Russia, he annulled the deal as having been signed under duress). The offices of Russia's largest independent television channel were forcibly taken over by Gazprom-installed security guards in the early hours of April 14, 2001. TV6, a smaller independent channel that sheltered former NTV journalists, was shut down by the authorities in January 2002. The journalists found another short-lived home in TVS, Russia's last nationwide independent television channel, which was taken off the air in June 2003. By this time, the regime no longer cared for appearances and saw no need to hide behind "legal" decisions of obedient courts: the TVS signal was switched off by a direct order of Information Minister Mikhail Lesin, who cited 'viewers' interests" as the reason for the decision.
After this state campaign against major media outlets, Lesin left the spotlight, only occasionally surfacing in the news, for instance, when he co-founded RT [Russia Today], the Kremlin's English-language propaganda mouthpiece.
His return as the new director general of Gazprom-Media could signal another attack on media pluralism in Russia. A likely target could be Ekho Moskvy radio, which, unlike other Gazprom-Media outlets (including the present pro-Kremlin NTV), continues to maintain an independent editorial line and invite opposition leaders to its studios. Many in the Russian media community took Lesin's appointment as a grim sign.
Interestingly, Lesin may become one of the first senior Putin regime officials to face consequences for his involvement in human rights abuses. Earlier this year, civil society groups reportedly proposed Lesin's name for inclusion in the US blacklist under the Magnitsky Act, which provides for visa bans and asset freezes for Russian officials involved in human rights violations.
The next update of the US list may come in December. Meanwhile, sources in the European Parliament indicate that Lesin may be placed on a European Union visa blacklist. This would come as bad news to Putin's media enforcer: according to the newspaper Helsingin Sanomat, Lesin owns a 2 million, euro estate in Finland's Turku Archipelago, purchased through a company registered in the British Virgin Islands. This would indeed be a timely and appropriate message, that helping a dictatorship to muzzle the free media and enjoying the comfort of the Western world are no longer compatible.
http://www.worldaffairsjournal.org/blog/vladimir-kara-murza/ominous-return-putins-media-enforcer
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UPDATE: MAR 2016...
A former aide to Russian President Vladimir Putin found dead in a Washington hotel room was killed by a blunt force trauma to the head, U.S. authorities said Thursday.
Mikhail Lesin, 57, was found dead on the floor of his room in Dupont Circle on November 5.[2015]
Autopsy results show that he died from blunt-force injuries of the head, according to a joint statement Thursday from the D.C. Metropolitan Police Department and Office of the Chief Medical Examiner reported by NBC Washington , but the exact manner of death was undetermined.
Also contributing to his death were blunt-force injuries of the neck, torso, upper extremities and lower extremities, the statement said.
Russian media originally reported that Lesin, a former government minister, had suffered a heart attack. ...
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"On Friday, November 6 [2015], RIA Novosti reported that Lesin died of a heart attack citing a spokesman for the family as saying: "Today, Mikhail Lesin died ... His death came supposedly from a heart attack."[35][38]
RT [Russia Today] reported the next day that the cause of death was a heart attack.[31][39][40][41]
https://web.archive.org/web/20161026095000/https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mikhail_Lesin
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"When he [Mikhail Lesin] quit Gazprom Media in December [2014], a move seen as a shock, he cited family reasons although there were unconfirmed claims he had fallen out with other influential figures close to Putin. ..."
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3315994/Vladimir-Putin-s-media-mastermind-dead-DC-hotel-murdered-FBI-informant-alive-claim-Russians.html
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From 2014...
"Mikhail Lesin has stepped down as head of major state-controlled media holding Gazprom-Media, the company said late last week [Dec 2014].
Gazprom-Media, whose holdings include independent radio station Ekho Moskvy, said Lesin's resignation was due to family reasons, Russian media reports said Friday.
The holding's board of directors will finalize his resignation at an upcoming meeting, Gazprom-Media was cited by Ekho Moskvy as saying. No replacement has been named.
Earlier, a flurry of reports of Lesin's imminent resignation appeared on Russian news wires, all based on undisclosed sources and giving divergent accounts of the motive.
Forbes Russia cited sources in the media and government as confirming the resignation, with one of the individuals claiming that the decision was made personally by President Vladimir Putin."
" [RT (Russia Today) founder, Mikhail] Lesin was a central figure in the early Putin years, spearheading the Kremlin's effort to silence the country's independent television, the first step in the consolidation of authoritarian rule.
The first target was NTV, at that time Russia's largest and most popular independent TV channel, whose hard-hitting news broadcasts, talk shows, and satirical programs criticized the government over growing corruption and the war in Chechnya and gave airtime to the opposition.
In June 2000, a month after Putin's inauguration, NTV's founder and majority shareholder, Vladimir Gusinsky, was arrested and placed in Moscow's infamous Butyrka prison.
While he was there, the information minister made an offer: Gusinsky could have his freedom if he agreed to transfer his media holdings to Gazprom, the state-owned energy monopoly. ..."
http://www.worldaffairsjournal.org/blog/vladimir-kara-murza/ominous-return-putins-media-enforcer
I thought it was the “Kremlin Flu”.
Man, this is getting silly. Now the New York Times is saying that news stories by a Russian Internet Media Company tipped the scales of our elections, because they falsely reported facts from stolen emails of the DNC...? Oh man, this is so lame...
RT, a state-run Russian television network that broadcasts around the world in English, was implicated in a recently declassified United States intelligence report that accused the Russia government of meddling in the American presidential election to tip the vote in favor of Donald J. Trump.
CNN, a state-run Democrat controlled television network that broadcasts around the world in English, was implicated in a recently declassified United States intelligence report that accused the Democratic Party of meddling in the American presidential election to tip the vote in favor of Hillary R. Clinton.
Oct 2016
Schweizer explained the deep ties the Clintons have to Russia, specifically how in 2010 then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton approved the sale and transfer of 20% of U.S. uranium output to the Russian government ...
"according to some calculations, the Uranium One deal, involving top Clinton donors Frank Guistra and Ian Telfer, has transferred as much as 50 percent of projected American uranium production to Kremlin control."
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RUSSIAGATE
Who paid Bill Clinton's $2.5 million commission and $500k speaking fee for brokering the sale of 20% of America's uranium deposits to Russia?
You are speaking about a really interesting deal that ended up giving Vladimir Putin and the Russians control of one-fifth of all uranium production capacity in the United States.
Since uranium is considered a strategic asset, with implications for national security, the deal had to be approved by a committee composed of representatives from a number of United States government agencies. ..."
As part of just-inaugurated President Obamas new foreign policy to improve relations between the United States and Russia, then-Secretary of State Hillary Clinton met with Russias Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov in March 2009. Meeting in her hotels Salon Panorama in Geneva, she presented him with a small gift box containing a bright red button symbolizing the Obama administrations desire to reset the relationship between the two governments.
Thus began an effort to transfer American technology to Russian President Vladimir Putins own Silicon Valley, called Skolkovo. In a report released in late July by the Government Accountability Institute (GAI) entitled From Russia With Money, authors Stephen Bannon and Peter Schweitzer reviewed the long sordid history of the technology transfer from companies such as Google, Intel, and Cisco of hi-tech technology with useful military applications.
The report quoted warnings from the FBI and the U.S. Army Foreign Military Studies Program at Fort Leavenworth that the transfer would work against American interests. Warned the U.S. Army:
[The reset would serve as] a vehicle for world-wide technology transfers to Russia in the areas of information technology, biomedicine, energy, satellite and space technology, and nuclear technology.
It was clearly a quid pro quo arrangement: 17 of the 28 companies involved in the technology transfer gave millions of dollars to the Clinton Foundation or to Bill Clinton for giving some speeches.
When those authors, both of whom are affiliated with Breitbart News, summed up their conclusions, one question remained: The GAI investigative report says its unclear how much, if any, money [John] Podesta made. Podesta, having served the Clintons for years, first as chief of staff to President Bill Clinton and then as counselor to President Obama and finally as Hillarys campaign chairman, deserved a payoff.
But it wasnt clear until the latest batch of e-mails provided by WikiLeaks went public last week that Americans now know. For his efforts Podesta received thousands of shares of common and preferred stock in one of the companies involved in the transfer. The fact came to light when WikiLeaks published e-mails Podesta sent to the company ordering it to transfer his shares to a shell corporation he had created a month earlier.
The e-mails included a letter Podesta wrote to the corporate secretary of that company instructing him to retitle 33,693 shares of preferred stock to Leonidio Holdings, LLC, a corporation that Podesta (or one of his staff) created using a Corporation Service Company to hide the shares from public view.
The company that gave Podesta the stock shares, Joule Unlimited, claims to be a producer of alternative energy technology that will eventually be able to produce energy that will be competitive with oil priced at $50 a barrel. It was a recipient of millions of Putins rubles as one of the gang of companies working to transfer American technology to Russia, one of Americas enemies.
As Schweizer told the New York Post in an interview in July:
The Clintons, they get their donations and speaking fees in the millions of dollars. The Russians get access to advanced US technology. The tech companies get special access to the Russian market and workforce .
All I ask is that people look at the money. Who made the deals, who benefited from the deals?
Thanks to WikiLeaks the people now know the name of at least one of those who participated in the deals and how he benefited from them: John Podesta, Hillarys campaign manager.
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