A gold medal in the Paralympic Games, an international sporting event for disabled athletes that occurs every four years, is worth less than a gold medal in the Olympic Games. That’s the message being sent by Latvian President Valdis Zatlers, who has yet to publicly acknowledge the accomplishments of athlete Aigars Apinis.

Apinis won the gold medal Sept. 8 in the discus throw, setting a world record in the process. The Paralympic Games continue through Sept. 17 in Beijing—the same venue as the just-concluded Olympic Games.

But unlike when Latvian BMX cyclist Māris Štrombergs won gold in the Olympics, Zatlers and his office have been oddly silent in congratulating Apinis.

It wouldn’t have anything to do with the fact that Apinis competes from a wheelchair, would it?

Latvian athletes won a full set of medals in the Beijing Summer Games. Zatlers and other government officials were there to cheer on Latvia’s athletes and to see some of the victories. Štrombergs won the gold, Ainārs Kovals got silver in the men’s javelin throw, and weightlifter Viktors Ščerbatihs earned a bronze in his weight class. Each time, Zatlers was quick to congratulate the athletes. His press office dutifully sent out releases to the media noting the president’s message of praise.

But Apinis has been shut out. Even after winning a second medal, a silver in the shot put on Sept. 12, the president’s office has not uttered a word.

When I contacted Apinis by e-mail after his gold medal victory, he replied that the only Latvian official who had sent a congratulatory message was Edgars Šneps, the assistant state secretary for sport in the Latvian Ministry of Education and Science. Apparently, even Education Minister Tatjana Koķe—who was present with an entourage in Beijing for the Olympics and issued several press releases congratulating Latvian athletes—could not be bothered to pick up the phone or a pen.

“Yes, in the last Paralympic Games, the president (Vaira Vīķe-Freiberga) was quick to congratulate us,” Apinis said.

“They probably are busy as always,” Apinis said about the government officials, “and it may not seem important, but we are carrying Latvia’s name in the world and the Latvian flag is flying.”

To be fair, it has been a busy week for the president. On Sept. 8, the day Apinis won his gold medal, the president’s calendar included an interview with Latvian Independent Television, working on pardons and a meeting with Saeima Chairman Gundars Daudze. The next day he had a full slate of meetings with the new ambassadors from Finland, New Zealand and Denmark, as well as with the foreign minister of Iceland and the head of the U.S. Air Force in Europe. Sept. 10 and 11 were no different. Plus there were preparations to make for the Sept. 12 visit to Rīga by NATO Secretary General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer.

When Vīķe-Freiberga in September 2004 sent a note of congratulations to Apinis and teammate Edgars Bergs for their medal victories in the Athens Paralympics, she was in New York—also with a full slate of meetings and presentations.

Curious about why Zatlers and Koķe were mum on the athlete’s accomplishments, I e-mailed their press secretaries. I am still waiting for a reply three days later.

The message from the president and others seems clear. Win a medal in the Olympics, where the “able bodied” compete, and we will take notice at the highest levels. Get one in the Paralympics and an underling will get in touch without any fanfare.

Latvians in Ireland now have their own television service, Latviešu Televīzija Īrijā, created by a team of former media professionals working under less than ideal conditions.

The television service, available online at lti.ie, began work after a number of Latvian immigrants in Ireland came together to make a fun video for April 1. All of them had worked in various television jobs back in Latvia, LTĪ spokesperson and consultant Sandra Bondarevska said in an interview from her home in Dublin.

From that they got the idea for the Latvian television service, which not only creates news programs but also special videos.

One of the reasons for LTĪ, Bondarevska explained, stems from the desire to tell a story of the immigrants that is different from the one sometimes presented by media in Latvia.

“The whole story of what is happening here is not presented,” Bondarevska said. “That stereotype about the mushroom pickers is deep.”

Visitors to the Web site will not find much material yet—and certainly not the daily news reports once promised by LTĪ. Available are a few short newscasts featuring the often expressionless anchor Andris Pūce and some special reports on recent cultural events, including one of the June 21 celebration of Jāņi near Dublin. For a shoestring operation, the newscasts are impressive. The May 12 program is especially well done, with several solid stories complete with “B-roll.”

But don’t all of you go rushing off at once to view the Web site. Bondarevska warned that one of the concerns the group has is server capacity. Even with just a few people concurrently watching videos, the site can slow down significantly. To get around the problem, LTĪ has started posting its video to the popular YouTube service. Therein lies another problem: YouTube limits videos to 10 minutes, meaning LTĪ cannot post longer reports online.

The LTĪ crew also is limited by technology and time. Although digital technology has improved vastly since some of them were actively working in Latvian television, it still can be expensive to purchase quality recording and editing equipment.

“We film in the most basic of conditions,” said Bondarevska, whose television career included work for Ogres TV and Latvian State Television. “I tell these television guys that it’s a question of a couple of years, and all these technical things that slow us down will be resolved.”

And unlike when their day jobs revolved around a television studio, the Latvian immigrants now have other work that takes priority, making LTĪ more an avocation. Money earned from those jobs helps to fund the television service.

LTĪ also does not have sponsors and is cautious about entering into any such financial relationships, Bondarevska said. While the support would help the service, the LTĪ crew wants to maintain editorial independence.

“Yes, it’s a plaything, it’s a game,” Bondarevska said, “but it’s our game.”

LTĪ is still in its infancy, testing ideas and the means to realize them. Future directions might include offering DVDs of programs, working with a Dublin cable televison outlet to reach a wider audience, taping games of the Latvian Hawks hockey team and creating an “open microphone” program that would allow Latvian immigrants an opportunity to voice their opinions about life in Ireland.

Added Bondarevska: “I think Latvians in Ireland have much to say.”

The weeks before Midsummer have seen some of Latvia’s journalists—as well as some of the politicians covered by them—lapse into a spate of silliness and stupidity. About the only thing to emerge from the mess is the sense that when it comes to ethics, these journalists and politicians have much to learn.

Earlier this month, popular television journalists Jānis Domburs and Iveta Elksne came under fire by the daily newspaper Diena for having participated in training sessions where company officials are taught how to deal with the media.

Domburs, who leads the public affairs show Kas notiek Latvijā?, and Elksne, a presenter for Latvian State Television’s 100.pants, were blasted in a June 11 commentary by Guntis Bojārs, head of the investigative team at Diena. Under a headline that compared them to dolls that can be bought, Bojārs wrote that the pair had stepped over an ethical line, damaging their credibility. How can they train the same people they might have to interview about issues of the day?

It’s a fair question. But I doubt that Domburs or Elksne gave away any secrets, because journalism really doesn’t have any. Training sessions such as the ones in which Domburs and Elksne participated usually are focused on letting officials understand what kinds of questions journalists ask and how to be prepared to respond to them. A common message is not to try to hide the truth, because it will eventually come out anyway. As Domburs himself wrote in a response published in Neatkarīgā Rīta Avīze, his participation in these training sessions may actually help officials who are reluctant to speak publicly.

Perhaps it was improper for Domburs and Elksne to participate in the sessions. But it was just as silly for Diena to scramble to the ethical high ground. I, for one, was shocked to see Pauls Raudseps, editorial page editor for Diena, take the stage during November’s “umbrella revolution” demonstration in the Dome Square. Yes, the paper had supported the protest movement, but it’s quite a different thing for a journalist to take an active role in a protest. That, too, is crossing a line that may damage a journalist’s credibility. Pot, meet kettle.

Another silly and verging on stupid thing was done by Interior Minister Mareks Segliņš. He was angered by journalist Baiba Rulle’s story in Diena suggesting that a theft of funds from the Corruption Prevention and Combating Bureau (Korupcijas novēršanas un apkarošanas birojs) may have been orchestrated by the People’s Party (Tautas partija), to which Segliņš belongs. The government is now investigating the head of the bureau. Segliņš’ response was to send a threatening text message to Rulle, an action that of course turned into front page news the next day.

Now comes the really stupid thing. Oskars Kastēns, the special assignments minister for social integration affairs, has got himself into hot water with his party—and no doubt his wife. On June 19, Diena published the results of a two-month investigation into rumors that the minister’s behavior isn’t always in line with the “family values” espoused by the conservative First Party of Latvia (Latvijas Pirmā partija), to which he belongs. Young journalist Aleksandra Jolkina exchanged romantic text messages with Kastēns, they met in person, his hands wandered… Gotcha! The newspaper and Kastēns—a former journalist—don’t disagree about what happened, but the minister maintains he was just playing along to see how far Jolkina would go. I’m sure that reasoning went over real well with Mrs. Kastēns.

Whether Kastēns was really just testing the journalist or whether he was thinking with his dumb stick is immaterial. It doesn’t look good for the minister. If nothing else, as a married man and as a well-known politician, he should have known better than to respond to the romantic advances, real or not. Hey, maybe that’s something Domburs and Elksne can teach at their next media training seminar.

Diena is taking its share of hits on the Kastēns story—as well it should. The journalistic method employed to get the story was stupid. Rival NRA and others in the media have questioned the paper’s ethics, arguing that what Diena did was not investigative reporting, but tabloid journalism. A couple of commentators even compared it to prostitution. Europeans generally are more mature than Americans when it comes to the private lives of their public officials, but it seems Diena had it in for Kastēns. Some critics say the impetus for the story was Kastēns’ reluctance to appear at the May 31 “March for Equality” in support of Latvia’s sexual minorities, even though his secretariat is devoted to the integration of all members of society.

Kārlis Streips, blogging on diena.lv, defended the newspaper’s investigation by comparing its newsgathering method to the famous 1977 Chicago Sun-Times sting operation led by reporter Pamela Zekman. The newspaper set up a bar called the Mirage to entrap city inspectors willing to take bribes in return for turning a blind eye to problems in the tavern. Streips’ comparison is weak. Zekman and company uncovered systemic problems in Chicago’s political machine and exposed criminal activity. Kastēns did nothing illegal. And the legend of the Sun-Times investigation, now a classic in journalism textbooks, endures as much for its innovative reporting as for the ethical questions it raises about the use of deception in gathering information.

If Streips and Diena want to point to Western journalistic practice for support, they might consider the Society of Professional Journalists’ Code of Ethics. The code states, in part, “Avoid undercover or other surreptitious methods of gathering information except when traditional open methods will not yield information vital to the public. Use of such methods should be explained as part of the story.” Jolkina’s story falls far short of this principle. With perseverence, she could have gotten the story using open methods. While her story explains how she went about baiting the trap for Kastēns, it does not explain why this method was necessary. Whether the story was vital to the public also is debatable.

At the same time, it is silly and ironic that the paper’s main rival, NRA, has been among the most vocal in pointing out the ethical shortcomings over at Diena. Along with its parent company, Mediju nams, Neatkarīgā Rīta Avīze is not exactly known for taking the ethical high road. For one, their frequent homophobic attacks against the openly gay Streips and others go against the Code of Ethics of the Latvian Journalists Union, now headed by NRA commentator Juris Paiders. The code states in part that journalists should respect a person’s private life, nationality, way of thinking and religious conviction.

For another: three days before the Kastēns scandal broke, Mediju nams announced that Elita Veidemane has been named assistant editor of NRA. Veidemane established her legend during the late 1980s as editor of the pro-independence Atmoda. But since 2007 until getting her new job this month, she served as editor-in-chief of NRA’s sister publication, Vakara Ziņas—the best-known example of tabloid journalism in Latvia today.