“Revulsion, however justified, is a dangerous counsellor.”
– Bruce Anderson, on the continuing saga of Rupert Murdoch. A good article overall, somewhat spoiled by a daft remark about Australia.
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Samizdata quote of the dayJuly 14th, 2011 |
 16 comments to Samizdata quote of the day |
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From what little I know of the matter, what strikes me as odd – in an especially-jarring way – is the way in which UK politicians are baying for the blood of Rupert Murdoch.
It seems to me to be a classic case of ‘don’t ask for what you want, because you might just get it’. Murdoch can surely expose far-more damaging things about most UK politicians that they can about him or his operations.
Is it perhaps that the politicians are being dragged into this fight by their friends and supporters in the commentariat and the chattering classes, who hate NI and Murdoch (although they don’t quite know why, they just feel that they ought to) and are demanding that Something Must be Done!
If I were a run-of-the-mill politico in the UK, I would chew my own arm off before I would let Murdoch be hauled into a Parliamentary committe and asked questions. Any questions. Because while you can control the questions, you can’t control his answers. It could get absolutely fascinating. The NOTW was in the business of knowing things that people didn’t want known, and I’ll wager good money that while the paper is closed, its files are well-secured at News International.
This one could get rather interesting.
llater,
llamas
llamas
Suddenly I have a vision of Leonardo diCaprio, playing the part of Howard Hughes in The Aviator, answering questions from (I think) a Congressional Committee about corruption in the airplane business.
Llamas, when one realizes that one of the proven marketing tricks in any British politician’s bag (or in every British editor’s bag, for that matter) is the word envy, much of one’s mystification disappears.
Until about 1990, the BBC faced no meaningful competition. The supposed competition was hobbled in such a way that it was not allowed to provide any meaningful threat. (I have written about this). With Sky, Murdoch destroyed this status quo. A large proportion of the British establishment will never forgive him for this.
On the other hand, I will always admire the fact that he did this. Yes, he is an opportunistic, toadying, lowbrow, borderline dishonest media proprietor (one of a long tradition in Fleet Stree, admittedly), but the truth is nobody has to read his newspapers or watch his television stations, and those people who do choose to pay money to do so. Compared to the BBC, I find him pretty inoffensive, and not very powerful.
Where laws have been broken in the present scandal, by all means punish the perpetrators. But doing more than that is an overreaction.
Well said, Michael. Particularly this:
BBC commentators complaining of Murdoch’s “domination” of the British media should be greeted with the peals of derisive laughter they deserve.
Forget Sky, though; I don’t think they’ve forgiven him for Wapping.
Murdoch could always sell off the Metropolitan Police. Sir Paul Condon said there were about 250 bent coppers in 1997, now I’d say it’s at least 1,000.
Steve Bell’s cartoon summed it all up, Murdoch with two dogs (policemen) attached to leashes.
Who do the wreteched Met Police serve, the British taxpayer, or a foreign corporation?
Its as clear as day that Stephenson, Yates, and the ridiculous clown Andy Hayman (who stifled the phone hack investigations, by an uncanny coincidence, got a job at The Times), are bent coppers. They don’t care, because like all coppers they get enormous, absurdly generous pensions. They have committed treason, but the Met is so utterly corrupt there is no hope for it. Sue Ackers is alas surrounded by crooks and clowns.
Why hasn’t Medusa been arrested yet? Because Scotland Yard is so bent its a circle. What’s clear is the existence of a protection racket, akin to that operated by the mafia, consisting of tabloid journalists and editors, bent coppers, criminals and murderers
The disgusting, sick, hacking of Millie Dowler’s phone, the hacking of phones of the families of dead serviceman, the list is, and will be, endless…the aiding of and financing of criminals, the enthusiastic collusion with bent coppers. As the Dowler’s said, the press, police, and politicians should bear and suffer the pain in order for the corruption to cleansed out.
Everything should be revealed, every detail. Raid those newspapers, obtain any and all of their files, and reveal it to the public.
Murdoch, a man who is not British and thus has no business meddling in our affairs, who desecrates the graves of serviceman, colludes with criminals, a man who who has not the dignity or humility to apologise to the Dowler family and to the many other victims of his crass, sewer journalism, is benath contempt and deserves the utmost humiliation.
The scumbags at the Met Police deserve something special; utter evisceration and anihilation.
A Tale of Two Andys:
http://www.bloggerheads.com/archives/2010/12/andy-coulson-andy-hayman/
Why is that the slightest bit relevant?
Why is that the slightest bit relevant?
Agree with James. Why the foreign-born status of a media proprietor is relevant to this issue – the breaking of law by journalists and bent coppers – is beyond me.
However, James, you may not have come across this “Gary” before. He appears to be a lunatic but he has a certain amusement value. He’ll be banned eventually. They always are.
Indeed. Murdoch’s nationality is not relevant, whatever it might be.
On the other hand, this whole business has turned into a political witch-hunt, and I will start taking it seriously again once I see some police arrested. Surely, the police taking bribes is the most serious crime that has taken place?
+1 Michael Jennings. I think that a lot of the faux outrage being directed at Murdoch and his minions is actually a smokescreen to cover the unsavoury activities of senior police officers and politicians. For decades, there has been a rather stinky backroom nexus of comfortable accommodation between HMG (regardless of party), New Scotland Yard and the grubbier end of Grubb Street. Now one part of that nexus has been partly-exposed, and the other players and thropwing wet grass on the fire at a frantic pace to obscure their part in it.
And let’s stop glorifying this as ‘phone hacking’, as though squads of dedicated cyber-criminals laboured for weeks in darkened rooms to wring the data from an unwilling system. As I understand it, we’re talking about exploiting default voicemail passwords. It’s no different than leaving a fat file of sensitive documents on the table in front of a newspaper reporter, telling them what’s in it, and then excusing yourself to go the the bathroom. Only a complete naif would expect them not to take a peek.
The lesson here is not that reporters need to go to jail for doing what reporters do. The UK press, generally, praised Assange to the skies for doing the exact-same thing. The lesson here is that if you’re in the public eye, maybe you should change your voicemail password from the factory default. And if you are thrust into the public eye (eg if you have the misfortune to become a murder victom) then the police should act swiftly to secure evidence, like, maybe, securing your cellphone account in the same way that they secure the murder scene.
llater,
llamas
An excellent point, Llamas.
Oh well. If the newspapers get muzzled no big deal. What good are they doing? The Euro is going down the tube, British sovereignty no longer exists and whatever rights we used to have have been destroyed.
Time for the blogs to take over where the media has failed. Another five years of destruction by the BBC/Westminster/EU will leave people hungry to know the truth.
Jamess, if you think that blogs won’t be next in line, you are deluding yourself. It’s only a matter of time and a particular blog’s success.
I am bemused that Jamess thinks it is “no big deal” if newspapers get muzzled.