{"id":3121,"date":"2006-07-25T18:00:25","date_gmt":"2006-07-26T01:00:25","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.bradblog.com\/?p=3121"},"modified":"2007-09-08T16:44:43","modified_gmt":"2007-09-08T23:44:43","slug":"moscow-times-makes-a-big-mistake-lets-tell-them-so","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bradblog.com\/?p=3121","title":{"rendered":"Moscow Times Makes A Big Mistake — Let’s Tell Them So"},"content":{"rendered":"

Guest blogged by Winter Patriot<\/a><\/i><\/p>\n

Lovers of truth, justice and fine journalism received some very bad news today — from Russia. Chris Floyd<\/a> has been sacked by the Moscow<\/em> and St. Petersberg Times<\/em>. <\/p>\n

Chris has written a weekly world affairs column, “Global Eye<\/em>“, for the past ten years, and he’s been writing for the paper(s) for 12 years in all. But today he received a message from the new editor, saying:<\/p>\n

The column no longer fits in with our plans.<\/div>\n

Utterly unbelievable! <\/p>\n

In my opinion Chris Floyd ranks among the best English-speaking journalists in the world, and when I say “best” I am talking about a very<\/em> few people. I’d mention his most outstanding quality — but I can’t. He brings to the table an embarrassment of riches, if ever anyone did.<\/p>\n

I don’t always agree with everything he writes, but on the other hand…
\n
\nHis knowledge of contemporary American and World history is immense. It’s obviously been hard-earned, and carefully squirreled away. His skill with the language borders on incredible; clearly he has a wonderful natural gift, but it’s also been honed though intensive study of Shakespeare (which certainly doesn’t hurt with the intrigue). His passion for truth and justice has not dimmed over the years; instead it simmers and flashes and simmers again. <\/p>\n

He cares very deeply about the things he writes about, and you can see this in every article he writes. You’ll never get a mealy-mouthed, fair-and-balanced approach from Chris Floyd; he always tells you where he stands and why. But it’s not just opinion; it’s never just opinion. His columns are always reality-based, and heavily annotated. <\/p>\n

Over and above all this, he’s been a very good friend of The BRAD BLOG<\/a>, and of The Whispering Campaign<\/a>, and of your lowly and nearly frozen guest-host, and I think we owe him one<\/em>! But that’s not even half the story… <\/p>\n

… because Chris writes the excellent blog Empire Burlesque<\/a>, and he’ll continue to do so. So those of us who read him online won’t miss a word. But surely many Moscow Times<\/em> readers will miss him a great deal, and it seems to me that 6 or 7 people could — nay! should! — make a little noise on their behalf … and on behalf of fine journalism in general. <\/p>\n

There’s not much of that<\/em> left anymore, is there? How can we let it go without a squawk?<\/p>\n

As 6 or 7 green-and-yellow bloggers already know, one simple email might just make a difference. <\/p>\n

If you can spare a moment or two, and if you would like to do something positive on behalf of good journalism … and on behalf of a nearly frozen online friend, please write to editors@themoscowtimes.com<\/a> and explain to them — politely but firmly, please — that their decision to stop publishing Chris Floyd was an unfortunate one. <\/p>\n

Perhaps they could be persuaded to reconsider.<\/p>\n

Oops! I almost forgot the most ironic aspect of all. In the words of Empire Burlesque<\/a> webmaster Richard Kastelein:<\/p>\n

This came at a very strange time – since, we published the Third Edition of Empire Burlesque – High Crimes and Low Comedy in the Bush Imperium<\/em> earlier this morning<\/a> … available on amazon.com<\/a> later this month.<\/p>\n

It’s been a rollercoaster of a day.<\/p><\/div>\n

No doubt it has. <\/p>\n

I’m going to make three suggestions. Do with them what you will:<\/p>\n[1] Write to editors@themoscowtimes.com<\/a><\/p>\n[2] Buy this book<\/a> and read it!<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n[3] Bookmark this blog<\/a> and visit it often.<\/p>\n

Thanks and frozen best wishes to all.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Guest blogged by Winter Patriot Lovers of truth, justice and fine journalism received some very bad news today — from Russia. Chris Floyd has been sacked by the Moscow and St. Petersberg Times. Chris has written a weekly world affairs column, “Global Eye“, for the past ten years, and he’s been writing for the paper(s) […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"ep_exclude_from_search":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[176],"tags":[],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-3121","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-journalist-intimidation","bb-type-bradblog"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bradblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3121","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bradblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bradblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bradblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bradblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3121"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/bradblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3121\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bradblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3121"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bradblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3121"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bradblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3121"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bradblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcoauthors&post=3121"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}