This week’s cartoon by Spanish cartoonist Juan Rodriguez Morales is called “Rock, Paper, Scissors!” You can find more of Juan’s cartoons at Spanish language Russia blog La Mirada al Este.
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Just a quick post to wish you all a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!
I also wanted to let you know that the Global Voices initiative is now five years old. David Sasaki has written a great retrospective of Global Voices’ first five years that I really recommend you read if you get the chance.
The team over at Global Voices have done an amazing job over the past half-decade promoting and supporting bloggers and journalists across the world (including in Russia and every country of the Former Soviet Union), and they really deserve every plaudit they get.
Global Voices are funded partly by charitable donations, so if you were looking for someone to donate a little money to this Christmas, I think they’d really appreciate your help!
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You can find more cartoons by Spanish cartoonist Juan Rodriguez Morales at Spanish language Russia blog La Mirada al Este.
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I was amused to stumble across this Russia Today video report about the 70th anniversary of the battle of Khalkhin Gol.
Why amused?
Well, do you notice that the title of Russia Today’s report from August 2009 is almost exactly the same as the title of the article I wrote in January 2008 – an article called ‘Khalkhin Gol: The Forgotten Battle That Shaped WW2‘.
Sadly, I’m told that you can’t copyright blog titles. So, rather than being annoyed, I’m instead going to settle for being smug/amused that Russia Today reporters use Siberian Light for their research.
And for their copy writing.
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Rumours are circulating (again!) that former gymnast Alina Kabaeva has given birth to a bouncing baby boy, who just happens to be Vladimir Putin’s son.
These rumours come not long after almost identical rumours swept the world’s media in May – I reported about the phantom Alina Kabaeva baby here on Siberian Light at the time. As you can guess, the rumours turned out to be untrue… much like the rumours that Kabaeva and Putin were secretly engaged.
Mostly the stories coming out this week have been reported in Indian newspapers (see the Indian Times for an example) and Indian blogs, but a couple of Canadian newspapers have also picked up the story.
The common theme to all the stories this time round is that, again, absolutely no Russian newspapers are covering this story. The cynical will, of course say that the Russian press is terrified of stepping out of line, for fear of facing Putin’s wrath, but as far as I can tell, the real reason is that there is absolutely no substance to the stories – from my reading, it seems as if this week’s stories are just re-hashes of the May story. Even some of the quotes are recycled.
Still, it gives me the opportunity to quote this excellent gem of Russian political incorrectness, which turned up entirely unattributed in the Inquisitr:
“…one analyst told us, “Putin is very careful about his public image. Still, considering Russia’s Muslim population is about 30 million, it might not hurt him politically to have a beautiful, half-Muslim wife.”
I wonder if this story will get far enough off the ground to result in another Kabaeva / Putin denial?
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