MOSCOW YOU MIGHT get the impression from western media reports that the airwaves in today’s “increasingly authoritarian” Russia are little but warmed-over Soviet propaganda. The truth isn’t that convenient. As Russia continues its bumpy rise in world affairs, what happens in the nation’s kitchens and living rooms is a mosaic of the concerns and contradictions of this peculiar moment. Coverage of the Kremlin and President Vladimir Putin is extensive, loving, and often absurd.

A good portion of the evening news recounts step by bureaucratic step what the president did that day. Occasionally things get carried away, as in August when the Kremlin released the famous topless fishing photos from his vacation in Siberia. Outside the state-controlled networks there are variations. The network REN-TV does its best to keep an independent outlook, frequently interviewing exiled Kremlin critic Boris Berezovsky and others.

Last weekend, it reported that a banner put up by the pro-Putin United Russia Party, which read “Putin’s Plan: Russia’s Victory,” had been defaced to read, “Putin’s Plan: Russia’s Disaster.” The regular newscasts feature a surprising amount of overseas news, and are free of soft features about health issues or lifestyle trends - and nothing at all about the child care custody travails of fading pop stars or the legal problems of long retired football players.

So while the coverage usually finds ways to make Russia look good, you could reliably say that many more viewers in Russia than in America can name the current British prime minister. All the networks know a populist bandwagon when they see one. In the past few weeks inflation has reared its head here, so the networks are racing to get out their hidden cameras to catch unscrupulous retailers in the act.