Yesterday the Wall Street Journal featured a column on the Kremlin’s successful efforts to jam and distort free press both within and outside of Russia:

Kremlin More Subtly Jams Freedom’s Beams Michael McFaul and Kathryn Stoner-Weiss paint a demoralizing picture of Vladimir Putin’s relentless attack on democracy and the toll it has taken on Russian society (“Notable & Quotable,” Jan. 18). In the longer essay for Foreign Affairs from which the excerpt is taken (“The Myth of the Authoritarian Model,” Jan./Feb. 2008), the writers also emphasize how, instead of building “an orderly and highly capable state,” the Kremlin has focused on neutralizing independent media within — and outside of — Russia. The Kremlin clearly has a comprehensive strategy to neutralize foreign broadcasters. Congressionally funded Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (RFE/RL) and BBC World’s Russia service have seen a dramatic reduction in their broadcasting power. Though the trend has accelerated sharply in the past few years, the strategy to deploy these tactics was born as early as 2002 when Mr. Putin officially revoked the 1991 Yeltsin era decree that established RFE/RL’s presence in Moscow.