Liberal journalists now lament that some in the conservative media "have routinely repeated Russian talking points on TV," as if liberals have always treated the Russian government as an expansionist enemy. In reality, American conservatives have long been the harshest domestic critics of Russia, and the liberals have long suggested a moral equivalence between Russian totalitarians and American and European democracies.
Sting sang a song called "Russians" that rejected the Cold War and hot war, declaring them unwinnable. How does that look right now?
On the latest NewsBusters Podcast, we dig deeply into the Media Research Center archives to explore the media treatment of Russia during the Cold War and after it. Research Director Scott Whitlock joins the show to recall how the media elites over many years have lauded Soviet communism and its egalitarian dreams. In 1988, Ted Turner's TBS aired a documentary series titled Portrait of the Soviet Union that was so pro-Soviet that the Soviets apologized for it when they put it on TV on Russia. (See his study here.)
As the Soviet Union liberalized and then ceased to exist, the American media elites often lamented how Russia would become "just another capitalist machine" and the Russians lost all their dreams of cradle-to-grave socialist security. So they probably shouldn't lecture about repeating "Russian talking points on TV."
Enjoy the podcast below or wherever you listen to podcasts.
