Don’t Blog about the Patriarch

We’ve written in the past about the Russian government’s worrying oversight of the blogosphere, but this one looks like it could be actionable.  From the Moscow Times:

Renowned designer and Russian Internet personality Artemy Lebedev has outraged senior lawmakers and Russian Orthodox Church officials with an ironic blog post about last week’s death of Orthodox Patriarch Alexy II.

In a blog post last week, Lebedev said a decree issued by President Dmitry Medvedev calling on television channels and radio stations to cancel entertainment programs after Alexy’s death Friday was an “insult” to his “atheist sensibilities.”

He posted a photo of Alexy under the caption: “Suddenly Called to the Boss’ Office.”

We’ll have to wait and see is Artemy Lebedev ends up in prison like Sawwa Terentiev for this ill-advised blog post.