In the economy

The death of "Izvestia"

June 7, 2011 Vladimir Nadein

Gazeta drama in three lanes

The first strip: the brothel "desire"

Today the Izvestia newspaper is a miserable, worthless newspaper, beating in dying convulsions. Its real circulation is half as much as, for example, the many -threaded Uralmash plant a quarter of a century ago. Now it is relocated to the 5th street of the Yamsky field. I know this field. There are quite decent buildings where warehouses were located. Either spare parts for tractors, or rag recess. If Izvestia continues their flight, then the next time they will be moved for the Mytishchi.

But there was a serious general political newspaper with significant international authority. And not only in Soviet times, when a halo of “government voices” overshadowed it. After 1991, the owner of the editorial staff became a journalistic team, but with all the contradictions of development, with all the mistakes and errors of managers who did not have the slightest experience in managing the information business in market conditions, Izvestia remained “Izvestia”.

Until the summer of 1997. This is generally a fatal season for the Russian media. The 1996 presidential election campaign has brought to life the corruption of a very special kind. To the chief editors who grew up on Soviet salary modesty (however, plus “rations”) came some little men in luxurious, no one of the journalists of not wearing European costumes, and asked for a flattering half-whisper: “Are you actually for Yeltsin or against?”

The "main" answered without hesitation. Former members of the CPSU, they had a sincere and natural hostility for the main rival of the current president. “No, maybe you are still for Zyuganov? - the little men continued to coo in luxurious costumes. “Tell me honestly, your beliefs are holy for us.” And, having listened to the assurances that the “our” newspaper or “our” radio resolutely stand on the side of the current president, sighed in relief: “So you will understand us correctly. Since this is not a bribe, but sincere gratitude to the brothers in the fight. ” And they held out a piece of paper.

The main editors of independent media picked up a stretched piece of paper, and something strange instantly happened to their independence. If they were offered a thousand dollars, they would give a person in a European suit a sonorous, instinctive slap in the face. If the proposal were calculated by tens of thousands, they would call the police. But they were laid out such fabulous amounts in such bizarrely disguised options (in cash, banking account in America, villa in Spain) that a few units could stay. However, the names of these rare righteous people, like those who could not resist the terrible temptation, will be die in offshore forever.

Exclusively for accounting correctness, we note that the terrible amounts that became for many “main” irresistible temptations were miserable crumbs from an abundant privatization table.

The little men in luxurious costumes turned out to be future owners of life, and this future came in a matter of weeks after the election - along with the security auction, ruble corridor and buying oil and gas fields a thousand times cheaper than they will soon be resold. The same fate was expected by many media. "We bought them for Yeltsin, so why not bite them for ourselves?" Mass raiding on the information field began. The media with a well -established positive reputation underwent a furious attack by cash bags.

In the spring of 1997, Izvestia reprinted a tiny note from one French newspaper. It was about the fact that the then Prime Minister V. Chernomyrdin owns the shares of Gazprom in the amount of five billion dollars. Today you will not surprise anyone with billions of officials, and then this publication was on the lips of everyone even in the Kremlin.

Never later this information has been refuted, but no consequences were left without consequences. Either on the team of Chernomyrdin, or from the depth of their own feelings, sir the owners of Lukoil, owed to the high patron for everyone, began a shameless bosting of shares among the newspaper employees. Not rich people, rarely crawling out of need, journalists were for the sake of selling anything that did not give them papers for the real thousands of dollars. With this money, you could buy a good refrigerator, insert your teeth to your mother and even fly into Egypt twice. It never occurred to any of my humanitarian colleagues that they were selling their future for being nothing.

In the face of the inevitable disaster, the editorial managers made a terrible mistake. "The mouse-mother was frightened, she began to call a cat in the nanny." From the evil Corsair millions of Lukoil, they began to look for peace in the ONEXIMBASK pirate harbor. With the money of “ONEXIMBASK” and in favor of “ONEXIMBASK”, they began to tear out shares from LUKOIL's clutches - well, and tore the newspaper to shreds.

All further-some continuous series of nightmarish plots, flickering editors, strange owners who sweaty hands, in the dark and in a hurry, resold the newspaper to each other from under the floor. Powerless and inglorious, it fell lower in the eyes of public opinion, which made it became more and heartless, comfortable and shameless.

Like many other Russian media, Izvestia pleased Putin, singing non -existent victories and beckoning the reader with bright horizons. But this is still half -worn. They sang posture to "United Russia", touching the perfection of the electoral system. They gave entire pages, exalting the last creations of N. Mikhalkov - pushing and sorry. Not able to write in Russian, replacing the arguments with curses, and passion-lexical indecency, this newspaper should cause disgust even among its owners. However,
Many doubt that Alina Kabaeva is interested in such a trifle. The crowned gymnast by the will of favorable fate led a huge information holding. It includes a lot of things, and the once prying Izvestia has long been not players on the domestic electoral field.
Personnel cleaning, ridiculous and cruel, neither for a moment stopped in the famous building on Tverskaya. They brought with them new strata of all kinds of dirt - moral and physical. The once friendly institution turned into a barn. The floors are black, creaking. Handy toilets dominate in the editorial atmosphere. From eight floors of journalists, they drove one and a half. However, without infringement of the authorities themselves. All other space is given to tenants of the most extravagant directions.

Naturalists know how foxes survive badger. The foxes are shit. They shit so abundantly and tirelessly that the squeamish badgers themselves leave their holes. Something similar happened with Izvestia. The abomination of strategic leadership and mud of everyday thoughts of four generations of men in the jackets from Versace squeezed out of the Izvestinsky house. They sucked life from an eight -story large -block shell. They say that now they will carry out a fantastic reconstruction and open the most luxurious brothel in Europe. Or the office of the corporation, luxurious, like a brothel. In any case, the calculating owners have long had a persistent desire to occupy the building in the very center of Moscow with something more decent than the editors of a serious general political newspaper.

But the editors of Izvestia have occupied only one and a half floors in recent years. Well, they would have been stung at half the floor-would the brothel with the editors not get along? Still, the first ancient from the second ancient falls nearby. Why was the once proud collective to evict a building hastily freed from the warehouse of households?

The fact of the matter is that they do not get along in any way. And why - this will be discussed in the second lane of our narrative.

Photos of RIA Novosti