Four today

1. Aggressive conservative bloggers get Nina Totenberg's Christmas comment exactly backwards. But we all know what those NPR really people think, so why bother asking? WaPo

2. They call him Mr. Sunday? Amazon

3. Perhaps you've seen the cryptic commercials for RT.com and wondered what the hell it was, but were afraid to go to the website for fear of what might pop up. Well, it's a Russian news service, formerly known as Russia Today. Wikipedia

4. Facebook update of the day comes from Joe Mathews of the New America Foundation: "...believes it's the sixth-day weather story that separates the pros from the amateurs."

Video shows brutal attack on Russian journalist

Life News, an online Russian news service, has posted a video that shows two men savagely beating journalist Oleg Kashin. The New York Times posted a link to the video in a story about the still unsolved crime.

Russian journalist gets beaten

From the Los Angeles Times:

A crusading Russian reporter was in a coma Saturday after two masked men savagely beat him with metal rods, an attack that drew the immediate condemnation not only of his fellow journalists but of President Dmitry Medvedev

-snip-

Mikhail Fedotov, the secretary of the Russian Journalists Union, pointed to the bludgeoning of Kashin's hands as particularly sinister.

"What's so utterly disgusting about the case is that the attackers did their utmost if not to kill Kashin but to maim him gravely enough to prevent him from ever being physically able to write again," Fedotov said.

Fedotov said Kashin's beating was the fifth attack on Russian journalists in just the past 30 days, adding to a climate of intimidation in a country that has seen growing protests over limits on personal liberties.

A few links

Reading Mencken in Paris...

...Betting on death, or How Wall Street rebuilt its house of cards

Nothing draws attention like a coverup...

...The limits of health care

Denver voters keep an eye on the sky...

...A members-only section for the Pittsburgh Post Gazette

Burying the lede, and everything else*, **

David Folkenflik had a fascinating and highly disturbing piece today on Morning Edition about a story written by reporter Scott Anderson for GQ that was buried so deep it's been scrubbed from the Internet. The story was entitled "Vladimir Putin's Dark Rise to Power." From NPR's web story:

[Anderson's] investigative piece, published in the September American edition of GQ, challenges the official line on a series of bombings that killed hundreds of people in 1999 in Russia. It profiles a former KGB agent who spoke in great detail and on the record, at no small risk to himself. But instead of trumpeting his reporting, GQ's corporate owners went to extraordinary lengths to try to ensure no Russians will ever see it.

The corporate owners don't seem to have any concerns over the accuracy of the story or with Anderson's safety. An email from Jerry S. Birenz, a lawyer for Conde Nast, the corporate owner of GQ, indicates financial motives were at play:

[Birenz] ordered that the article could not be posted to the magazine's Web site. No copies of the American edition of the magazine could be sent to Russia or shown in any country to Russian government officials, journalists or advertisers. Additionally, the piece could not be published in other Conde Nast magazines abroad, nor publicized in any way.

It wasn't just that there was no reference to Anderson's piece on the cover of this month's GQ, which featured a picture of Michael Jackson, a reference to tennis star Andy Roddick's wife and a ranking of obnoxious colleges and top drinking cities. At this writing, I cannot find any reference to Anderson's piece on the Internet.

Listen to the Morning Edition piece here.

*Update: Gawker is working on a Russian translation of the GQ story. The site has also scanned the article from the magazine for anyone who wants to read it.

**Update II: The New York Times picks up the story.

From Russia, with spin

Russia has hired the PR firm of a Mark Saylor, a former LA Times editor, to help in the PR war between the Republic of Georgia and the two breakaway provinces of South Ossetia and Abhkazia. Saylor's Saylor Company, based in Pasadena, will get $30,000 a month for the work. LA Daily has the story here.

(via LA Observed)

Four in the evening

1. Russia and Nigeria launch what is perhaps the most poorly named business venture in history. BBC (via TPM)

2. Jill Stewart launches another volley at Los Angeles Times media critic James Rainey in response to his critical column about the LA Weekly editor. Once again, she cites awards at the LA Press Club as evidence that she's on the right track. LAT

3. Ann Arbor is about to lose its only daily newspaper. Poynter

4. Scott Martelle on Michael Jackson, Marshal McLuhan and the evolution of new media. Scott Martelle