Issue #06/61, March 25 - April 7, 1999  

In recent weeks, rumors of sexual debauchery have swirled around the embattled figure of Yuri Skuratov, Russia's Chief Prosecutor. Skuratov's sudden resignation was said to be connected to a certain compromising videotape. The tape , which briefly aired on RTR television, purportedly shows Skuratov writhing in bliss on the expensive bedding over the El Dorado restaurant, that pleasure palace of New Russians, with two underage girls. In a normal-chaotic country, one would expect that any Timofey, Dima, or Kharry would be able to view this taxpayer-funded cultural event. Not surprisingly, the Yeltsin administration has dragged its feet, refusing to assist the public's right to see its public servants bouncing up and down screaming like otters in company with two pubescent girls in an advanced state of intoxication. This is wrong.

We are particularly interested in that portion of the video which would seem to have most to do with Skuratov's law-enforcement skills: a scene supposedly showing Skuratov "arresting" and handcuffing to the El Dorado's elaborate bedposts the slim, smooth, and tender wrist of a youthful sex worker, then forcing her first to "confess" her "sins," and finally punishing her on her bare red bottom. This little play is followed by a turnabout, in which the spanked becomes the spanker, giving the Prosecutor "a taste of his own medicine"--a quite touching revelation of the humility Skuratov brings to his job, so full of responsibility. If true, this gives a flattering picture of a man devoted to his duties even after working hours.

Yeltsin's administration must be made to understand that Democracy means not just poorly-focused window shots of some tired whore giving head to a hapless low-level chinovnik, but full-color closeups of every contortion by Skuratov and his two companions. Democracy, among its many qualities, means production values. Democracy means that it is the duty of the media to amplify, if necessary, each swollen pimple on the prosecutor's sagging nether cheeks as they jiggle in frenzied activity. Democracy means seeing his tired, ageing scrotum swinging against indeterminate flesh over the soundtrack of a cheap synthesizer and guitar with wah-wah effects. We would go further and insist that the director linger Renoir-like on every welt raised on the Prosecutor's buttocks by the whips plied by his nubile persecutors, and every stage of the salacious lesbian pantomime they enacted for his twisted pleasure in his state-funded bed must be available to the viewing public, even if this means extensive video-enhancement in the labs of the FSB.

Is it true, as some sources have alleged, that Skuratov's two little lesbian meat puppets became so "involved" in their little show with each other that it required the batons of two of Skuratov's beefy lieutenants to separate them and drag them, still entangled, tongue and tail, to the elevator to be tossed naked and steaming out into the freezing Moscow streets at dawn--if so true, the public has a right to expect full documentation of it, including a reenactment of the crime on Dorozhny Patrul--to be scheduled for a reasonable hour, when hardworking journalists will be able to watch it in the privacy of their own apartments.

Releasing the video will clear up these questions, and allow us to stop fantasizing about what really went on.

In sum: we condemn the decision by Fred Weir to tease us into believing that the tape is available for sale on every street corner. Russian citizens deserve to have their rights respected. It is not enough to take half-measures, as some suggest, by offering the public selected stills from this sordid episode, or to give us cropped photos suitable for family viewing. Nor should there be any blacking out of eyes or other body parts. Today a blacked-out nipple or genital area; tomorrow the wholesale airbrushing of historical figures, as in the Soviet Encyclopedias. This will not do. The public demands full disclosure--frontal anal, and oral. And when it's all over, we look forward to a "Making Of" video, complete with outtakes and interviews with the offending parties. And merchandising: Skuratov dolls properly recreating his corporeal likeness, Skuratov weight belts, Skuratov foams and jellies, Skuratov antibiotics. That's what democracy and market economics are all about. It's time Russia learned that painful lesson. For, the pain is in the pudding.