sex and politics

There’s only one problem. He won’t.

Given the fact that mayor Zoran Janković and his list of city councilors are the only non-parlamentarian political force in Slovenia to be reckoned with on the national level, his continuously rumoured running for parlimanetnary office in autumn is frequently the topic of choice for journalists and pundits all over Slovenia. Despite the fact that Janković has continuously denined any such future move.

The title reads “Jankovič Will Run With Another List” (source, if not already changed)

Now, why would they run a story like that? Because they skipped class when sense od humour was being handed out. In the video you’ll see Janković give a straigth answer to a journalist’s question about whether he’ll run or not. And after Zoki takes a jibe at the press, pengovsky (smart as ever) decides to light up the mood and asks “what about any other list?”. A valid question, but it wasn’t meant entirely seriously. And neither was the answer:

Everyone got it. Except for RTV SLO webiste, where the team probably spent the afternoon asking themselves how could it be that noone else picked up the story. We’ll I’ve got some real news for you guys: It was a joke! Lighten up And stop transcribing verbatim what everyone else says. Use your own head!

Remember Sinfo? (click if no) This monthly magazine presents Slovenian government’s take on the matters to English speaking readers. Which is all fine and dandy except that most English-speaking readers (i.e.: ex-pats, foreign journalists and businesss people) don’t matter a pair of fetid dingo’s kidneys, as they don’t have a vote in parliamentary elections.

This week’s edition of Slovenski Tednik

And since Janša & Co. lost control of the largest Slovene newspaper and are faced with increasingly independent state media (a contradiction in terms, I know!), steps have been made to influence public opinion and nudge it in the right direction (right being the operative word here). Enter Slovenski Tednik (Slovenian Weekly), a weekly rag which is distributed for free in all but eleven Slovene municipalities (which just happen to be the eleven Slovene cities, where population tends to lean a bit more to the left side of political spectrum).

Now, the funny thing about this particular sorry excuse for a newspaper is its partisan style which would make even Fox News blush. Picking up the current issue, one can read the following titles: “Our Veto Not Excluded” saying that Janša’s government is threatening Croatia to veto its accession to the EU (not true). “Leftist Artiliery Agains The Government”, where it accuses the union leaders of being associated with the opposition (which they are), but it does not specify what sort of crime that should be. It just says that their Communist past shows through the type of songs they play at their rallies (they even play The Internationale, imagine!) and so on and so on.

Now, I’ve nothing against opinionated media. Quite au-contraire - I am ever more convinced that neutrality does not equal objectivity (the fact that this position presumes existance of an educated reader/listener/viewer is stuff of a whole new post). There is however a big difference between opinionated media producion which more or less gives both sides of the story and contextualises them on one hand and Voelkische-Beobacther-like rags and horns which hail our fearless leadership, which has all the answers.

And just to be totally fair, I must add that Slovenski Tednik is privately owned which in theory gives its ownership the freedom to print whatever content they see fit. The fact that the founder of the rag is closely connected to the rulling party is only an added bonus. On the other hand every Slovene municipality has its own Pravda, with a mayor’s “editorial” at the beginning and the rest of the paper extolling the virtues of a particular mayor and his team. Ljubljana magazine, aptly named “Ljubljana” is no exception to the rule. But these magazines are both presented and perceived as a sort of local versions of Sinfo. While Slovenski Tednik pretends to be a proper newspaper. We’ll see if the forces of market economy, so hailed by this government during its earlier stages will do the trick and send the paper to media-oblivion where it will join Republika, Slovenec and Jutranjik, dailies which in their own time tried to shape the public opinion, but instead the public shaped them into a roll and sent them flying to the nearest dust-bin.

A biblical story, naturally.

Once upon a time, there was a guy who had clear political convictions. Not that he let them get in the way of having fun or getting laid, but he was quite outspoken about the matters of the world - especially Slovenian politics. But he was a fun guy to be around. A party animal that could hold his liquer. But eventually he settled down and like most of his student colleagues ended up in the media world. Not surprisingly he chose to write for a magazine that more or less echoed his political views and which he read avidly alerady as a student. Predictabily, he was slightly out of his depth at first and when his editors taksed him with digging up the dirt on the mayor of a certain Central European capitol, he turned to a colleague of his working for another media company and asked him if there is a person in the city administration which could spill the beans of mayor’s alleged misuse of public funds or some other juicy details. Now, our hero was a complete greenhorn back then and of course didn’t know that sources are not shared but must be found - or, as it happens in most cases - sources themselves find journalists.

But hey! You live and you learn. So he kept on working, gaining experience and bettering his articles. The political and media world around him, though, reached boiling point as several hundred journalists from all walks of life signed a petition claiming government pressures and even censorship. Did we say “all walks of life”? Not really. A small-but-significant portion of journalists, mostly from our hero’s magazine and other media of similar political alignment did not sign the petition, but instead wrote a counter-petition, an “Ethical Call To Professionalism” in which they denounced the original petition and its signatories. Our hero, possibly still being rather fresh and idealistic, signed this counter-petition together with his colleagues from the magazine.

But Fortune is a fickle lady and owners of the parent company of his magazine (which just happened to be the country’s most influential daily newspaper) had a political change of heart and started attacking the government they previsouly supported. Eventually things started to change at our hero’s magazine as well, as the owners - amid outcries of censorship, similar to those which the magazine denounced earlier - replaced the editors of the magazine and (by extension) changed the political profile of the magazine as well. And within months the magazine ran a story uncovering a network of nepotism and cronyism surrounding and leading up to the prime minister of the country, connecting him to a construction scandal which rattled the country weeks earlier. But as the magazine’s circulation was somewhat low (it wasn’t big to start with, but as a result of editoral changes it dropped even further, losing hard-core readers), an abstract of the story was run in the daily newspaper as well. And lo! behold! One of the two authors turns out to be our hero.

No one knows exactly what happened. Did he realise the error of his previous ways or was he threatned into writing it? Or could it be that he is just a good adapter? Who knows. But I sure wouldn’t like to trade places with him at that particular table, because like J.C. in that olive grove 1975 years ago I’d have wished for that cup to be taken away from me.