Published: 2 November, 2009, 14:06
Edited: 7 May, 2012, 21:24
Ever heard of a British “quality” newspaper called The Telegraph? The same very paper that, in a desperate bid to save their free-fall circulation figures, kept relentlessly spinning the Labour MPs' expenses story on its pages for weeks this summer?
That version of “quality” reportedly cost some £300,000 in payment for the data disk – a disk stolen from the parliamentary fees office – but hey, readership figures went up for a while, did they not?
We've got a prediction to make.
The Telegraph will lose even more readers this year, once the stolen disc euphoria evaporates, unless it stops feeding them the utter tosh we've seen lately.
Take this recent headline in the Sunday Telegraph:
“Russia's £11bn UK bond bid. Vladimir Putin's deputy visits London this week as the crisis-hit country seeks Western relief”.
You've got to love the Telegraph scribes.
It starts with the usual rant about “Russia's crisis-hit economy… unpredictable investment climate… series of diplomatic and corporate crises,” and, of course, about “Putin, who now needs Western money to support the ailing Russian economy.”
It continues with solid praise for the only Labourite The Telegraph really likes “…Mr. Miliband would tell his Russian counterparts that Western firms needed a more modern economy to invest in…”
So, here you have the world according to The Telegraph where stern faced Miliband tells the needy and therefore humble Putin how to behave.
The story ends, however, with a statement that the demand for Russian bonds is expected to be high.
Whoa – hang on a second.
If Aleksey Kudrin indeed comes to London with palm outstretched, why would the City line up money bags to lend to him? Why would Peter Mandelson, the Business Secretary, declare himself delighted with the Russians' visit?
Here's why – and it is fairly simple.
Britain needs Russia far, far more than Russia needs Britain.
Russia's financial recovery was much quicker this year than the West's, especially the British one.
No, Russia can't yet show Chinese-style GDP growth, but every other objective financial indicator points upwards.
So much so in fact, that the Russian Central Bank, an analogue of The Bank of England, or The Fed in the US, keeps on buying US dollars to stem the flood of financial speculators, eager to buy roubles
The stock market capitalization has doubled since the beginning of the year.
Yes, the price of Brent Crude hovering around $80 surely was a help, but what helped much more were steady financial policies and the trust in the current government demonstrated by ordinary Russians.
Anybody even vaguely familiar with the country would remember that both in the late 80s under Gorbachev and late 90s under Yeltsin, the Russians did not pour onto the streets en masse to protest – they had other ways of demonstrating their distrust in their rulers.
They rushed to the banks to withdraw all their savings – and to convert them into something tangible, from golden earrings to a lifetime supply of salt.
They didn't, however, rush to the banks last autumn and winter despite the rouble indeed losing its value rather rapidly and the economy shrinking.
This lack of the usual Russian panic was remarkable and well noted by smart observers. Some foreign investors, who were astute enough to listen to the Kremlin, invested at the market's bottom and are making a veritable killing now …how about 30% returns this year so far?
So, Aleksey Kudrin, the guy many credit with keeping the ship of the Russian finances going steady and strong in rough seas, is likely coming to London knowing he will be wooed by many.
The bond in question promises to be the cheapest money ever borrowed by Russia. Now, how far is that from the needed “relief” declared by The Telegraph?
That The Telegraph prefers to skew the world to fit its neocon ideas is essentially their problem and their readers’.
To us it seems they simply want to borrow heavily from their ideological partner across the ocean – Fox News television, where liberals – as well as Russians – are always the enemies.
The statements, views and opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of RT.