The following news items and summary may explain why Bush and Putin are so friendly and so much alike:

February 28, 2005
From Russia With Love
While [Russian President] Putin travels with a contingent of reporters just as Bush does, the Kremlin press pool is a handpicked group of reporters, most of whom work for the state . . .

Washington Post
In Russian Media, Free Speech for a Select Few
February 25, 2005

The Bush administration paid a prominent black pundit $240,000 to promote the law on his nationally syndicated television show and to urge other black journalists to do the same.

USA Today
Education Dept. paid commentator to promote law
January 7, 2005

. . . and the rest selected for their fidelity to the Kremlin's rules of the game.

Washington Post
In Russian Media, Free Speech for a Select Few

"It was very specifically said [that] we need to be fairer to the Bush Administration or to the Republicans than anybody else in the media would be. But that was always understood there as a sort of a code for “lay off.”

Former Fox News reporter
interviewed in the documentary Outfoxed
2004

Helpful questions are often planted.

Washington Post
In Russian Media, Free Speech for a Select Few

Gannon: In your denunciations of the Abu Ghraib photos, you've used words like 'sickening,' 'disgusting' and 'reprehensible.' Will you have any adjectives left to adequately describe the pictures from Saddam's rape rooms and torture chambers? And will Americans ever see those images?

McClellan: I'm glad you brought that up, Jeff, because the President talks about that often.

White House press conference
May 10, 2004

Unwelcome questions are not allowed.

Washington Post
In Russian Media, Free Speech for a Select Few

During his trip to Germany on Wednesday, the main highlight of George W. Bush's trip was meant to be a "town hall"-style meeting with average Germans. But with the German government unwilling to permit a scripted event with questions approved in advance, the White House has quietly put the event on ice.

Der Speigel
With a Hush and a Whisper, Bush Drops
Town Hall Meeting with Germans
February 23, 2005

And anyone who gets out of line can get out of the pool.

Washington Post
In Russian Media, Free Speech for a Select Few

During last year's election campaign Bush avoided interviews with leading newspapers, such as the Washington Post, but frequently invited reporters from smaller swing state publications to speak with him on Air Force One. Vice-president Dick Cheney took the strategy one step further and banned New York Times reporters from travelling with him.

The Observer
The mole, the US media and a White House coup
February 20, 2005

Television channels air newscasts with fancy graphics but follow scripts approved by the Kremlin.

Washington Post
In Russian Media, Free Speech for a Select Few

The [Education] Department already has paid Ketchum . . . to produce a video release on the law that was used by some television stations as if it were real news. Other government agencies -- including the Census Bureau and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention -- also have distributed such prepackaged videos, a practice that congressional auditors have described as illegal in some cases.

Washington Post
Administration Paid Commentator
January 8, 2005

The general manager installed at NTV after the Kremlin takeover was later fired when his coverage of the Moscow theater siege in 2002 angered Putin.

Washington Post
In Russian Media, Free Speech for a Select Few

CNN's top news executive, Eason Jordan, resigned after a web-fed controversy over comments he made at a conference last month in Davos, Switzerland . . . Jordan drew the ire of mostly right-wing bloggers after he allegedly said that U.S. forces in Iraq targeted journalists on several occasions.

NewsHour
Bloggers and Journalists
February 14, 2005

NTV's most independent remaining hosts, Leonid Parfyonov and Savik Shuster, were taken off the air after the government bristled at their talk shows. Shuster's show was called "Freedom of Speech."

Washington Post
In Russian Media, Free Speech for a Select Few

ABC is canceling Bill Maher's late-night topical talk show, "Politically Incorrect," [which] has been on thin ice since just after the September 11 terrorist attacks, when host Maher was quoted as referring to past United States military actions as "cowardly."

CNN
Maher canceled
May 14, 2002

[MSNBC host Phil Donahue's show] was cancelled despite having the best ratings on the network; this occurred, according to published reports, after a study commissioned by NBC described Donahue as "a tired, left-wing liberal out of touch with the current marketplace" who would be a "difficult public face for NBC in a time of war."

Fair and Accuracy in Reporting
MSNBC's Double Standard on Free Speech
March 7, 2003

"People do get fired in American press. They don't get fired by government, however. They get fired by their editors or they get fired by their producers, or they get fired by the owners of a particular outlet or network."

George W. Bush
Joint Press Conference with President Putin
February 24, 2005

Newspaper editors at the Texas City (Texas) Sun and the Daily Courier in Grants Pass, Ore., apologized for opinion pieces critical of Bush's leadership in the aftermath of the [9/11] attacks, then fired the writers. "Criticism of our chief executive and those around him needs to be responsible and appropriate," wrote Daily Courier editor Dennis Roler in an editorial.

USA Today
The post-Sept. 11 world is potentially confusing
October 8, 2001

If Bush does not trust the Russian press to get the story of yesterday's news conference right, he can at least go to the Kremlin's own Web site. On it was posted a transcript of the joint news conference. Only all of Bush's statements and answers were deleted.

Washington Post
In Russian Media, Free Speech for a Select Few

The list of names of countries supporting the U.S.-led military action in Iraq has been removed from the White House Web site. [Also] gone are links to the audio and video of President Bush's statement that "I'm not that concerned" about Osama bin Laden . . .

Washington Post
Those White House Links to Nothing
October 25, 2004

The Kremlin press pool is like so many institutions in Russia that have the trappings of a Western-style pluralistic society but operate under a different set of understandings, part of what analyst Lilia Shevtsova of the Carnegie Moscow Center calls "the illusion of democracy."

Washington Post
In Russian Media, Free Speech for a Select Few

When conservatives talk of George W. Bush’s “transformational” role in American politics, they are referring to a fundamental change they seek in the U.S. system of government in which the Republican Party will dominate for years to come and power will not really be up for grabs in general elections . . .

This concept also might be called the “Putin-izing” of American politics, where one side’s dominance of media, financial resources and the ability to intimidate opponents is overwhelming – as now exists in Russia under President Vladimir Putin

Robert Parry
Bush & the Rise of 'Managed Democracy'
February 12, 2005

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"I've just had a very important and constructive dialogue with my friend . . . We have had, over the past four years, very constructive relations, and that's the way I'm going to keep it for the next four years, as well."

George W. Bush
Joint Press Conference with President Putin
February 24, 2005