Russian journalist Anastasia Samorotova was fired from the RBC Daily for running a story on Nov. 28, 2007 titled “From the Buffet Table to the Toilet” in which she described the new restrictions on lower- and mid-level government officials from speaking to the press. (The title isn’t about the quality of the food served in the state press service building, by the way. Journalists can eat and use the bathroom in the state press service building, i.e., they can’t actually talk to anyone.)

The manner of her firing was ingenious and so Russian. She was given a series of impossible tasks, like getting quotes from high government officials at night (i.e., while they’re asleep). After she failed to perform a certain number of tasks, she was told she could quit or get fired, as per her contract. She quit. She seems pretty bummed in her recent blog entries, but least she’s alive.

Just for fun, I’m appending the entirety of the article for which she got fired. You never know how long it will stay online.

Премьеру PR не нужен

An article (see translation below) in GARA about the Praileatiz I site (more info here) which is threatened by mining activities. (It seems like it’s either the miners, the loggers, or the pharmaceutical companies that can’t do anything right these days.)

ARCHAEOLOGY

Lawmakers request Lakua to stop all activities surrounding the Praileaitz I cave

The parliament of Gasteiz has made a unanimous request to the government of Lakua to stop all activities being carried out in the area around the Praileatiz I cave.

12/14/2007 11:58:00

GASTEIZ-. A non-binding resolution to protect Praileaitz has been accepted with the support of the Ezker Abertzale, PSE, EA, and EB parties. The EAJ and PP abstained.

The parties proposing the resolution (PSE, Ezker Abertzale, and Aralar) noted that the work being done in Praileaitz I represents the exploration of one of the most important Upper Paleolithic sites discovered in recent decades in Europe, and that the site is being irremediably devoured as a consequence of the activity in the adjacent quarry, Sasiola.

The parties stated that an “additional safety zone” to protect the vicinity around the cave must be established, thereby also protecting the slope where the cave is located.

The parties request in the resolution that the Lakua government either modify or expand the decree which is already in force, in order to protect the entire slope where the Praileaitz I cave is located, and to conserve in ther entirety the natural surroundings of the cave.

While doing this, they also request an immediate stop to all activities in the area, and at the same time to develop a “more explicit” law as quickly as possible, “as quickly as possible the protection of all such sites which could be achieved through this.” [See Note 1 below.]

In the debate, the EAJ has defended itself by stating that the the cave is “well-protected in a satisfactory manner” by the decree issued in July and by the measures taken by the Gipuzkoa Assembly.

361 experts

Last Wednesday, a document signed by 361 experts from around the globe in support of Praileatiz I and the surrounding slope was made public, on the eve of today’s debate.

Note 1: Doesn’t make much sense? Well, it didn’t to me either. Here’s the original sentence:

Hori egin bitartean, ingurune horretan jarduera guztiak bertan behera utz daitezela galdegiten diote, eta horrekin batera lege “esplizituagoak” garatu daitezela “lehenbailehen, haien bitartez lortu ahal izan dadin horrelako guneak benetan babestea ahalik eta lasterren”.

As lawyers argue before the Supreme Court to try to get Gitmo prisoners habeus corpus, protesters outside voice their support.

“Restore habeas corpus!” they intoned, referring to the right to court review of the legality of detention, the heart of the argument before the high court.

Compare with what the protesters voiced their support for in the Teddy Muhammad case.

Protesters shouted: “No tolerance: execution” and “Kill her, kill her by firing squad”.

Notice which side of this divide the Bush Administration on.

The Statesman is running a story on the resignation of the state science curriculum director, who got basically got pushed out for being against creationism.

The call to fire Comer came from Lizzette Reynolds, who previously worked in the U.S. Department of Education. She also served as deputy legislative director for Gov. George W. Bush. She joined the Texas Education Agency as the senior adviser on statewide initiatives in January.

Reynolds, who was out sick the day Comer forwarded the e-mail, received a copy from an unnamed source and forwarded it to Comer’s bosses less than two hours after Comer sent it.

“This is highly inappropriate,” Reynolds said in an e-mail to Comer’s supervisors. “I believe this is an offense that calls for termination or, at the very least, reassignment of responsibilities.

“This is something that the State Board, the Governor’s Office and members of the Legislature would be extremely upset to see because it assumes this is a subject that the agency supports.”

Why shouldn’t the agency support it?!

One reason might lie here, a speech by Don McLeroy (R-Bryan, TX), a creationist and chairman of the Texas State Board of Education. That’s why the TEA “shouldn’t” support people like Barbara Forrest.

The New York Times is running a story on the OSCE’s decision not to send observers to the upcoming presidential elections in Russia, and, specifically, Putin’s remark that he has evidence that this decision was taken at the behest of the US State Department.

The OSCE flatly denies this, stating that the reason for the decision was the Russian government’s unwillingness to provide any visas to the organization.

I predict that this is as far as the discussion will go. In other words, statement, counter-statement, end.

Why won’t Putin counter the OSCE’s reason regarding the visas? Because Putin’s statement is exclusively for internal consumption within the Russian media, where the OSCE’s explanation will not be given any air time. To someone inside Russia, then, the matter is closed. Putin spoke, the media reported. Without some kind of statement from Putin, the media can’t act, since it’s not allowed to think on its own.

For the rest of us, of course, it looks ham-fisted, but that shouldn’t be surprising.

A piece of lukewarm reporting from KPRC in Houston on an unmanned aircraft test supposedly done with NO MEDIA ALLOWED. The newshounds were on the scene, however, although the questions raised were no more serious than whether this technology will be used for speeding tickets, and will these things crash in our schools?!

Questions I’m not entirely uninterested in, but still, the possibilities are a lot scarier than speeding tickets. With the ability to monitor the population comes the likelihood of that ability being abused.

Bin Laden - 3 USA - 0

A response (Steven Rose) to a response (Christopher Hitchens) to the ongoing Amis drama. Hitchens provides a back-handed defense of Amis, stating, as the title of his piece imaginatively puts it, that Amis is not a racist. Leave out the digressions and the article does little more than quibble over definitions.

Bravo. Very courageous of you, Mr. Hitchens, as always.

What Hitchens ignores, however, is what is really intellectually offensive about what Amis said: collective punishment. It’s always been the Fascists that think collective punishment works. During WWII, the Japanese government instituted a system in which families were grouped by neighborhood block. If one person in the block were found to be a spy/traitor/enemy-sympathizer/etc., punishment would be meted out to all members of the block. This incentive to self-monitor and self-regulate was, as can be imagined, fairly successful. Similar methods of collective punishment were used by the Nazis, with similar short-term success.

Therefore, I suggest to Mr. Amis and Mr. Hitchens that they make a proposal to the governing authorities in the UK to institute a similar plan. Messrs. Amis and Hitchens can find details of the German and Japanese systems in their own copious brains, or if that fails, on the internet. That the kind of collective punishment envisioned by Mr. Amis, defended by Mr. Hitchens, is prohibited by the Fourth Geneva Convention is, well, irrelevant, isn’t it? The Geneva Conventions are so September 10th.

So, Mr. Amis, put your money where you mouth is, and let’s do this thing!

Beautiful piece in the Times Online from a year ago. Pretty much sums up what I think of Richard Dawkins, who is probably the only person on the planet capable of making Ted Haggard sound smart.

A long piece by Ronan Bennett on modern anti-Muslim racism, specifically in the mouth of Martin Amis. I missed the brouhaha with Terry Eagleton, but I’m glad someone stood up to Amis, although, as Bennett, points out, it isn’t enough. That Amis has not been ostracized by his peers is an indication of a hardening of views vis-a-vis Muslims throughout the west today.

All writing-related posts will now go on Sound and Meaning.