A prominent senior advisor to the Russian government and media consortium head millionaire was found dead inside a top Washington DC hotel on Thursday.
Sputnik News states, “Mikhail Lesin died from a heart stroke,” a family member told RIA Novosti.
On closer inspection of US media coverage, however, it appears that Washington’s propaganda machine has seized another opportunity to try and spin this story against Moscow.
Meanwhile, a Yahoo! News release says that Washington DC Metropolitan Police Department are now investigating the circumstances surrounding his death. In shameless fashion, Yahoo! Newsgoes on to try and paint the victim as an international criminal…
Unfortunately, however, following on with the western media’s now common practice of intentionally demonizing Russia, and personalizing every Russian-related news story by wrapping the narrative around “Putin” (Russian President Vladimir Putin), the original Yahoo! News story authored by Mike Levine and Justin Fishel ran with this headline:
“Putin Associate Found Dead in DC Hotel”.
In reality, Lesin was not merely a “Putin Associate”, but a senior Russian government advisor (2004 – 2009) holding the position of Press Minister (1999 – 20040, and was also a businessman who, as head of Gazprom-Media Holdings (2013 -2015), was well-known not just in Russia, but internationally too.
Lesin is also credited with creating the highly successful global news network Russia Today (RT).
Not surprisingly, the US news wire service took the liberty of inserting a number of cynical talking points into their new release which appear to be assembled in order to posthumanously discredit Lesin, portraying the deceased as a criminal and ‘state censor” and a criminal. Here are some of Yahoo’s defamatory statements:
Mikhail Lesin, the former head of media affairs for the Russian government who’s been accused of curtailing the country’s press freedoms…
Accused of what exactly, and by who? As expected, no specifics here. For some reason, Yahoo! News authors Levine and Fishel are waging a type of blanket ad hominem attack here. Of course, it didn’t stop there:
Lesin “led the Kremlin’s efforts to censor Russia’s independent television outlets,” one U.S. lawmaker charged last year.
Lesin had “acquired multi-million dollar assets” in Europe and the United States “during his tenure as a civil servant,” including multiple residences in Los Angeles worth $28 million.
“That a Russian public servant could have amassed the considerable funds required to acquire and maintain these assets in Europe and the United States raises serious questions,” Wicker wrote.
It’s unclear if the FBI ever begun a probe.
The last statement is extremely off. “It’s unclear if the FBI ever begun a probe,“… what kind of a leading statement is this exactly? Not a journalistic one.
This is yet another example of a western media outlet shamelessly using a tragedy, in this case someone’s death, in order to score cheap political or propaganda points. Disgraced French magazine Charlie Hebdo tried something similar (albeit much worse) this week when making fun of the 227 dead Russian airplane victims in a series of “cartoons”.
Levine and Fishel also took the opportunity to take a subtle dig at Russia Today (RT):
“Russia Today, the English-language news network backed by the Russian government.”
Notice the phrase “backed by the Russian government”, as if to insinuate that the Russian government is a nefarious entity in this case, instead of referring to it as what it really is – a partly state-funded media outlet.
It’s as if the Pentagon or the CIA authored this story and handed to Levine and Fishel for publication.
The fact that the US media are so quick to try and demonize the victim should raise serious red flags in this case. It’s as if the public relations operation is being managed by an external party – otherwise there would be no reason to rush to slander a dead man.
This is US propaganda at its worst, but sadly, it’s something we’ve come to expect over the last 24 months.
