|
|
Cameron aide pushes wacky ideas for growth
A top advisor to Cameron has advocated abandon worker and consumer rights in a desperate attempt to kick-start economic growth.
The front-page of the Financial Times tomorrow says Steve Hilton is leading a “crusade” against employment laws, maternity leave and consumer rights.
The story also contains this anecdote:
Steve [Hilton] asked why the PM had to obey the law,” according to one Whitehall insider of a meeting in March to discuss the government’s growth strategy.
“Jeremy had to explain that if David Cameron breaks the law he could be put in prison.”
Oh and he had this bright idea too…
While looking at ways to cut the deficit, he suggested abolishing hundreds of government press officers and replacing them with a single person in each department who would communicate via a blog.
It gets better…
“He also wanted to suspend all consumer rights legislation for nine months to see what would happen”
This guy is in the inner circle?
Exclusive: NGO workers dispute allegations against Johann Hari
Interns who worked at an NGO and accompanied Johann Hari to the Central African Republic in 2007 dispute allegations made against him in Private Eye, the Times and the Telegraph.
The incident is central to the furore over the Orwell Prize award made to the Independent columnist in 2008. A letter has been sent by the two researchers to media outlets that reported on the incident.
Due to the sensitive nature of the work, neither Private Eye nor the Telegraph’s Damian Thompson named the charity. For similar reasons I won’t name the authors of the letter as it would identify the charity.
Private Eye reported:
Hari did not hire a translator, instead browbeating a charity worker into translating for him. He promised to give her his notes when they returned so she could file her own report on the war, and then broke his word. He continued to hold on to the notes even after she complained to Simon Kelner, the Independent’s editor. “The reason for this became clear when his article came out, as most of the content differed from what interviewees told us,” the aid worker told us.
Hari “completely exaggerated the extent of destruction in Birao”. He “completely invented quotes, in particular those of the French soldiers”. In one gruesome vignette, Hari had French soldiers telling a piteous story of how “children would bring us the severed heads of their parents and scream for help, but our orders were not to help them”. “They did not say this. I know because I was there and I did the translating for them.”
But the story is based on one source who apparently had a big falling out with Johann Hari over political issues.
A copy of the letter disputing the allegations made by Private Eye, and repeated by the Telegraph, has been passed on to this blog.
The letter states, in full:
Sir,
Your article ‘Orwellian Nightmare’ includes a number of inaccuracies regarding the actions of Johann Hari during a research trip to the Central African Republic in 2007. As we were present during the trip we know these allegations to be untrue.
Firstly, it is alleged in your article that a key quote from a French soldier that was reported by Johann was fabricated. Our recollection, expressed in an email to our colleague under two months after the trip, is that it was accurate. Johann specifically checked the accuracy of this quote with us after drafting his article.
Secondly, it is alleged that Johann exaggerated the extent of the destruction in Birao. 4 months before our arrival in Birao 70% of homes were burned during fighting. Although some reconstruction had taken place by the time we arrived we can confirm that the town was still in a shocking state whilst we were there, and a large proportion of the nearly 14,000 who had fled the fighting had not yet returned. Our photos taken during the trip confirm the terrible state the town was in. We do not believe that the destruction in Birao was exaggerated.
Finally, based on our collective memory of the trip, we do not believe that it is accurate to say that Johann was guilty of ‘browbeating a charity worker’. It is our view that Johann had a reasonable expectation before travelling to the Central African Republic that translation services would be provided by the organisation for which your source worked at the time.
There were, unfortunately, some personal disagreements between the participants in the trip, along with disagreements about certain aspects of the conflict in the Central African Republic. This may have contributed to the nature of the account that you have been given. We are aware that the Council of the Orwell Prize are considering whether to strip Johann of his prize in part due to these allegations. It is our hope that they will consider our account of these events before doing so.
We fully respect your decision not to name your source in order to protect the charitable organisation for which they worked at the time. As our names would also link this story to that organisation we respectfully request that you do not publish them either.
Names and contact details supplied, identities verified
In a speech a few weeks ago, Johann Hari admitted making mistakes and apologised for them. He said many people who criticised him over his mistakes were right do so.
However, he disputes the version of events over the Central African Republic affair and other allegations made against him.
He has also been asked by the Independent’s new editor not to make any public comment until its inquiry has reported in September.
[If you would like to appeal to Private Eye to run a correction, email Ian Hislop on ]
Update: With regards to this specific incident, I asked the Media Standards Trust whether the Orwell Prize judging committee had considered this letter before making a decision. This is relevant because this article was the basis of the Orwell Prize. They said they won’t be making any statement yet on the issue further to what they’ve already said.
It also considered a representation by Johann Hari in its deliberation, and appropriate weight was placed upon it. The Council of the Orwell Prize is fully satisfied that it has adopted the appropriate procedure for an exercise of this kind.
The Independent has now requested that the Council consider further representations by Johann Hari before announcing the decision. However, it would appear that Johann Hari is not permitted to make any further representations whilst The Independent’s investigation is conducted.
(Emphasis mine)
Should the Guardian consider a paywall too?
Last year, I revealed that the Guardian newspaper was considering an exclusive ‘members club’ (an idea that doesn’t seem to have been pursued vigorously) to raise revenue. At the time, senior executive Emily Bell told Liberal Conspiracy:
No – we are not contemplating a pay wall, nor as far as I’m concerned would we ever….they are a stupid idea in that they restrict audiences for largely replicable content. Murdoch no doubt will find this out – even rudimentary maths suggests he will struggle with a completely free model to meet advertising revenue levels across the NI offerings.
But I suspect this position may be about to soften, and not just because Emily Bell has left.
continue reading… »
Fox TV: Oslo terrorist couldn’t be a Christian
Fox News’ top presenter Bill O’ Reilly yesterday evening attacked the characterisation of Breivik as a ‘Christian terrorist’.
He said: “No one believing in Jesus commits mass murder.”
He added: “The man might have called himself a Christian on the net, but he is certainly not of that faith.”
He said that the reason the media was calling Breivik a Christian was because “the left wants you to believe that fundamentalists Christians are a threat just like crazy jihadists are.”
Watch (via @cathrynfraser)
Yesterday, Melanie Phillips wrote:
Obviously, it is important to prevent any retribution against ordinary Christians, the vast majority of whom are utterly appalled at what has happened and who themselves live blameless, law-abiding lives. But what has happened has gone much further than that. The impression has been sedulously created that this act of Christian terrorism by a Christian man from Norway had nothing to do with nothing to do with the Christian community or indeed Christianity.
…
As for the BBC, it has seemed determined to wrench the spotlight away from the role of Christianity in these bombings and instead displayed an obsession with avoiding ‘Christianophobia’. Item after item on radio and television has dwelt upon the need to avoid blaming Christians for what happened, rather than addressing the hard questions to the community that cry out to be asked.
Oh wait, no.
That was Melanie Phillips talking about Muslims (I switched the words around) after 7/7. I think Melanie Phillips would call your attitude a ‘culture of denial’ Mr O’Reilly.
Telegraph ‘smoking gun’ on Piers Morgan falls flat
The Telegraph ran this excited headline last night: CNN’s Piers Morgan ‘told interviewer stories were published based on phone tapping’.
Oooh, that’s interesting! So he admits to phone-tapping? Erm, not exactly.
The Telegraph ripped the audio from this BBC Desert Island Discs interview (h-t @fieldproducer)
Here is how the segment goes:
Interviewer Kirsty Young: “What about this nice middle-class boy, who would have to be dealing with, I mean essentially people who rake through bins for a living, people who tap people’s phones, people who take secret photographs, who do all that nasty down-in-the-gutter stuff. How did you feel about that?”
Piers Morgan: “To be honest, let’s put that in perspective as well. Not a lot of that went on. A lot of it was done by third parties rather than the staff themselves. That’s not to defend it, because obviously you were running the results of their work.
Not exactly a smoking gun.
Listen the audio segment
As the Guardian’s Oliver Burkeman points out:
In short, @piersmorgan appears to agree he ran stories based on the work of the *kind* of people who hacked phones
Last night CNN issued a statement on his behalf stating:
There is no contradiction between my comments on Kirsty Young’s Desert Island Discs show and my unequivocal statements with regard to phone-hacking. Millions of people heard these comments when I first made them in 2009 on one of the BBC’s longest -running radio shows, and none deduced that I was admitting to, or condoning illegal reporting activity. Kirsty asked me a fairly lengthy question about how I felt dealing with people operating at the sharp end of investigative journalism. My answer was not specific to any of the numerous examples she gave, but a general observation about tabloid newspaper reporters and private investigators. As I have said before, I have never hacked a phone, told anyone to hack a phone, nor to my knowledge published any story obtained from the hacking of a phone.
Again, I hate to defend Morgan but this isn’t a smoking gun.
If other tabloids were involved in this practice – there should be a proper investigation by the police or another body. There is nothing definitive here at all. Once again Guido Fawkes has been talking up a story that has fallen flat.
Compare Phillips now to her writing after 7/7
You may have noticed that Melanie Phillips wrote a reply to my news piece earlier about how she was mentioned and quoted by the Oslo terrorist Breivik.
Phillips took time to go through Liberal Conspiracy to dredge up other times we had mentioned her, but didn’t even bother reading the front-page. She isn’t the only one I mentioned from the manifesto of course – we also pointed that the English Defence League was admired by him in internet postings.
I also pointed out that the manifesto frequently links to and mentions people such as Robert Spencer, another person that Phillips has quoted approvingly in the past. On Twitter I have pointed out links to several other groups such as the Hindu far-right in India.
Anyway. Yesterday, Melanie Phillips wrote on her blog:
After all, we don’t even know yet whether Breivik acted alone. We don’t know whether this ‘manifesto’ was indeed written by him or indeed what it is: as Mark Steyn observes here, it reads like as weird kind of cut-and-paste job. If it is indeed the work of a psychopath, it doesn’t bear examination for a single minute.
And yet the words of a deranged individual are being cited by people like Hundal who are taking them entirely seriously. Since when did people ever use the ravings of a madman in public debate?
Odd. Melanie Phillips wasn’t so afraid to ask questions and link the actions of a few ‘madmen’ (a term offensive to some) to Muslims straight after the terrorist attacks of 7/7.
Here is what she said then: (h-t Chris Brooke):
Above all, this poses the most urgent questions about the Muslim community from which this monstrous act has sprung. It is absolutely essential that we all find the answer to such questions if we are to have any hope at all of preventing further such atrocities.
…
In doing so, it has been taking its cue from the Muslim community itself which seems to be in the deepest denial. Yes, it has certainly condemned the atrocity in the strongest terms. But in the very next breath, its leaders have effectively washed their hands of it by repeating like a mantra that anyone claiming to be a Muslim who commits such an act is not a proper Muslim, because Islam is a religion of peace.
She also wasn’t averse to using that tragedy to attack the left broadly:
These lies emanating from extremists in the Muslim world have been further inflated by support from those in the wider community in Britain – mainly on the left – whose obsessive repetition of such falsehoods and disproportionate attention to the misdeeds of the west while ignoring Muslim atrocities have helped turn grievance into hysteria.
Breivik didn’t act alone – he had plenty of people agreeing with him on what the problem was and who was causing it.
Melanie Phillips’ response yesterday reminds me of this widely circulated poster on Facebook
Compare and contrast: Labour v Tories
The above graph shows the percentages of quarterly growth since the Tories assumed power in May 2010.
The Tories inherited 1.1% growth in Q2 from Labour, but in the last 9 months very little real growth has occurred. The economy has ground to a near shuddering halt.
Above, using the Q2 2010 and Q2 2011 I plot a) The momentum that Gordon Brown had the UK economy heading in, compared to b) the direction that David Cameron now gdp traveling in.
Clearly the economy has dropped a couple of gears since fiscal austerity packages have been commenced.
Remember the Greek Eurozone crisis occurred throughout Q2 2010 and Labour still delivered 1.1% growth so ignore Tory excuses that blame foreign affairs.
And that brings me to the great British choice.
By going too far, too fast, too soon the Tories are delivering growth that amounts to very little.
In fact in real terms (considering wage freezes and inflation) this practical stagnation. But look how different things could have been.
Had Labour’s economic strategy of stimulus and delayed spending cuts been implemented, the UK economy would be performing much better.
Amy Winehouse’s phone was also hacked
The deceased singer Amy Winehouse’s phone was repeatedly hacked in recent years, a reporter claimed last night.
Tabloid reporters hacked into her phone to obtain details of her stays in rehab and when she was expected to arrive at clinics, so photographers could be in place.
Charles Lavery, a former investigative journalist at Scotland’s Sunday Mail reported that her brother was also a victim.
His phone and personal data was mined for potential stories.
A source told Lavery:
Take a look at the acres of coverage of her getting out of taxicabs and walking into rehab. Or walking out of rehab into cabs. How did that happen? Or the details of her time in rehab, her private life. A lot of the time some people close to her sold the info, but her data was accessed on a routine, wholesale basis.
And not just by one newspaper group, by most of them.
A lot of showbiz journalists started covering tracks with the news of her death.
Lavery reported last night that details from Winehouse’s phone were either sold or used to photograph her after treatment.
He also told NME mag that he confirmed the phone-hacking details soon after her death.
Oslo terrorist cited Melanie Phillips in his manifesto
As we reported yesterday, the Norwegian terrorist Anders Behring Breivik published a 1,500 page manifesto online that warned of “Islamic colonisation” of Western Europe.
He introduced the manifesto by writing that it “presents advanced ideological, practical, tactical, organisational and rhetorical solutions and strategies for all patriotic-minded individuals/movements”.
The manifesto also has this quote on Page 361:
Our culture is now deep into uncharted territory. Generations of family disintegration in turn are unravelling the fundamentals of civilised human behaviour. Committed fathers are crucial to their children’s emotional development. As a result of the incalculable irresponsibility of our elites, however, fathers have been seen for the past three decades as expendable and disposable. Lone parenthood stopped being a source of shame and turned instead into a woman’s inalienable right.
The state has provided more and more inducements to women – through child benefit, council flats and other welfare provision – to have children without committed fathers. This has produced generations of women-only households, where emotionally needy girls so often become hopelessly inadequate mothers who abuse and neglect their own children – who, in turn, perpetuate the destructive pattern. This is culturally nothing less than suicidal.
The above quote is not Breivik, but rather the Daily Mail columnist Melanie Phillips.
After the quote, he adds:
I sometimes wonder whether the modern West, and Western Europe in particular, should be dubbed the Fatherless Civilisation. Fathers have been turned into a caricature and there is a striking demonisation of traditional male values. Any person attempting to enforce rules and authority, a traditional male preserve, is seen as a Fascist and ridiculed, starting with God the Father. We end up with a society of vague fathers who can be replaced at the whim of the mothers at any given moment. Even the mothers have largely abdicated, leaving the upbringing of children to schools, kindergartens and television. In fashion and lifestyle, mothers imitate their daughters, not vice versa.
Another article by Melanie Phillips in the Daily Mail on immigration (safe link) is quoted in its entirety in the manifesto.
But there is no suggestion that his actions were inspired by Melanie Phillips, nor am I making that claim.
Breivik also quoted an article by presenter Jeremy Clarkson on the flag of St George, which says: “This is the only country in the world where the national flag is deemed offensive.”
Breivik is due to make his appearance in court today, where he is expected to plead not-guilty and ‘explain’ his actions.
Lansley admits unions were right on pensions
The Telegraph today has an extraordinary leak from health secretary Andrew Lansley.
The letter essentially echoes what Labour, and especially the unions, have been saying about changes to pensions.
According to the Telegraph:
He said: “The paper…assumes that public sector workers, many of whom are women, will work a 48 year career [to get a full pension].
“In the NHS currently, the average full time career for those taking a pension is only 18 years and it seems unrealistic to suggest that pension scheme design should be based on the assumption that a predominantly female workforce would need to work full time 48 year careers in future to receive a full pension. It is also difficult to see how this meets our commitment to maintain gold standard pensions.”
In the five-page letter, Mr Lansley criticises other parts of the proposed reforms – drawn up following a report for the Government compiled by former Labour minister Lord Hutton – for being particularly unfair to NHS workers.
Many health workers already pay more for their pensions than civil servants or other Government employees.
“We face a real risk, if we push too hard, of industrial action involving staff groups delivering key public services,” he said.
“There is also the risk that lower paid staff in particular will simply opt out, leaving HMT [HM Treasury] with reduced receipts in the short term while still having to pay for past pension promises.
Wonder how the government’s own claims will stand up now. This is a big bomb in the midst of the government’s push to destroy public pensions.
How Cam’s ratings have collapsed since election
In the 63 YouGov polls since David Cameron became PM there has been one clear pattern. He’s bombed.
He has gone form highs of +47% in approval ratings to today’s record low of -16% as PM.
That’s a net turnaround of 63%.
Since June of 2010, more than 10 million voters have ceased to approve of the PM. And a whopping 16 million extra now disapprove of him.
That’s a net change in the opinions of 26million voters.
US went into deep debt to pay for tax cuts
Right-wingers are fond of constantly citing the ‘Laffer curve’ – an economic model of taxation – as evidence that cutting taxes will raise revenue.
Nearly ten years ago the Republican President George W Bush made the same promise: that massive tax cuts aimed at America’s richest would stimulate the economy and raise government revenue.
But it did not quite work out like that, as the Associated Press reported soon after.
Bush’s tax cuts of course pushed the US economy deeply into the red and the national debt exploded.
The tax cuts eventually added $2.5 trillion to America’s national debt.
via Think Progress
Oslo terrorist ‘manifesto’ warned of ‘Islamic colonisation’
The Norwegian terrorist Anders B. Breivik posted a manifesto to the web which warned of “Islamic colonisation” of Western Europe and offered a plan to deal with the problem.
Norway’s TV2 reported that the attacker had uploaded a 1,500 page manifesto, written in English, and a video to YouTube just hours before the attack.
YouTube has now taken down the video, though the manifesto remains published on Google Docs.
It is titled: “2083 – A European Declaration of Independence”.
The introduction says it contains the following topics:
1. The rise of cultural Marxism/multiculturalism in Western Europe
2. Why the Islamic colonization and Islamisation of Western Europe began
3. The current state of the Western European Resistance Movements (anti-Marxist/anti-Jihad movements)
4. Solutions for Western Europe and how we, the resistance, should move forward in the coming decades
5. + Covering all, highly relevant topics including solutions and strategies for all of the 8 different political fronts
The manifesto can be read from here.
In it he says:
The compendium/book presents advanced ideological, practical, tactical, organisational and rhetorical solutions and strategies for all patriotic-minded individuals/movements.
The book will be of great interest to you whether you are a moderate or a more dedicated cultural conservative/nationalist.
The manifesto also offers frequent references to far-right websites such as Jihad Watch, Gates of Vienna and Frontpage magazine.
It also cites paragraphs from the American far-right blogger Robert Spencer.
As Paul Woodward points out:
The Oslo killings, however, should be seen in a different light since there is a wealth of evidence to suggest that the perpetrator of this atrocity, even if it turns out he was acting alone, was very much part of a political movement — a movement whose leading ideologues regularly appear on Fox News and have high public profiles.
Robert Spencer of Jihad Watch does indeed regularly appear on Fox News.
Oslo terrorist praised English Defence League
The 32-year-old terrorist Anders Behring Breivik, now held responsible for 91 deaths in Norway, was highly appreciative of the English Defence League and wanted to set up a similar chapter in Norway.
In comments he published online at newspaper sites and discussion forums, he complained repeatedly that the media was not critical enough about Islam. He also praised the right-wing political leader Geert Wilders’ party in Netherlands wanted a similar party in Norway.
He was also a member of the far-right group ‘Nordisk’. According to the Norwegian anti-racist magazine EXPO: “Nordisk launched in 2007 and quickly became a hit among so-called “national” in Sweden. The forum currently has over 22,000 members – and one of them was Anders Breivik. Among the forum members will find everything from Sweden’s Democratic MPs to senior Nazis. What unites the members is a critical attitude to the current refugee policy and immigration.”
Translations of his comments online showed a deep-seated hatred of European tolerance to minorities.
He discusses how he admired the English Defence League and the SIOE (Stop Islamisation of Europe):
I have on some occasions discussed with SIOE and EDL and recommended them to use conscious strategies.
The tactics of the EDL is now out to “entice” an overreaction from Jihad Youth / Extreme-Marxists something they have succeeded several times already. Over The reaction has been repeatedly shown on the news which has booster EDLs ranks high. This has also benefited GDP. WinWin for both.
But I must say I am very impressed with how quickly they have grown but this has to do with smart tactical choice by management.
EDL is an example and a Norwegian version is the only way to prevent Flash / SOS to harass Norwegian cultural conservatives from other fronts. Creating a Norwegian EDL should be No. 3 on the agenda after we have started up a cultural conservative newspaper with national distribution.
The agenda of the Norwegian cultural conservative movement over the next 5 years are therefore:
1. Newspaper with national distribution
2 Working for the control of several NGOs
3 Norwegian EDL
On Islam and Muslims:
How many thousands of new Europeans must die, how many one hundred thousand European women should be raped, millions robbed and tractor discarded before you understand that multiculturalism + Islam does not work?
…
The curriculum at the school now consists also largely of the demonization of our ancestors (evil imperialists, big farmers who raped maids, bloodthirsty Crusaders who invaded the peaceful Muslims) as it gives a victim the role of Muslims. The result is that Norwegian girls aged 12-18 are particularly vulnerable and often oppressed. They lack pride, æreskodekser and a correct understanding of Islam.
…
No wonder the Progress Party won the school election. It grows up to a new generation dhimmifisert youth who actually know what Islam and dhimmitude is in contrast to the white politicians and journalists who choose to move to Oslo in 20-30 years of age.
He attacked multi-culturalism:
Multiculturalists will be very embarrassed if you mention Japan and South Korea as these nations proves quite obvious that mass immigration is only a result of specific Marxist doctrines and very rarely economically or culturally privileged. Japan / South Korea has a border and border guards. If one lacks the visa one is denied passage … (Europe had known this scheme prior 1950-1960)
…
And if we then think that multiculturalism wonderful doctrines is the main cause of the ongoing Islamization of Europe and the U.S., one should not criticize multiculturalism while leading No. 1, the one Jesus Christ Obama for his fundamental principles?
He continuously attacked Marxists:
Now it unfortunately already cut himself with Marxists who have already infiltrated-culture, media and educational organizations. These individuals will be tolerated and will even work as professors and lecturers at colleges / universities and are thus able to spread their propaganda.
…
In a society where Marxist extremists Thomas Hylland Eriksen is allowed to practice freely within the bounds of political correctness, other more moderate humanists / kulturmarxister (extremists), as Mads Gilbert and Erik Fosse appear frigjørngshelter (Nazis (Jews) should be crushed just like the Nazi Germany).
Had Western Europe and the U.S. decided to imprison all Marxists (Nazis and Marxists) after WW2 and swearing Marxist principles of hate ideology similar to Nazism, we had never been in the current situation.
Update:
An English translation of his comments online has been posted here (via @Flying_Rodent).
Glenn Greendwald at Salon notes how the national media jumped to blame Muslims, and now are playing down the word ‘terrorist’.
Scores dead in terrorist attack in Oslo, Norway
Large explosions have rocked the capital of Norway around 3pm today.
They are assumed to be terrorist attacks, though no group has yet claimed responsibility.
ABC News reports it was a massive car-bomb.
The video below shows the scene from one of the explosions
This a picture the New York Times is using:
Evert Whitehouse in Oslo emails the BBC to say:
Well it’s quite shocking, it seems unreal that places here would be targeted by bombs. Apparently the prime minister is in safety and unharmed according to media reports here. The areas that have been hit, such as the government HQ looks like an urban warzone, glass lies scattered all over the streets and a building is on fire, from what I can see on the television. The areas are being cordoned off by the police in fear of more bombs going off.
Several people have been reported as injured. One person has been confirmed dead so far by the local station NRK.
YouTube video here shows lots of broken windows.
More pics from Twitter here.
Story developing. If you have more updates, post them in the comments below.
Public mostly blame media for ‘Islamophobia’
A national poll of Britons has found that the media industry is seen as most to blame for ‘fear of Islam’.
Muslims abroad and far-right parties such as the BNP and EDL come a joint distant second in the poll by Comres.
They were asked: “Which one of the following groups, if any, do you think is most to blame for Islamophobia, fear of Islam, in the UK?”
29% of Britons blamed the media. 14% blamed Muslims abroad and 13% blamed far-right parties.
Just 11% blamed Muslims in the UK for ‘Islamophobia’, with politicians getting the same amount of blame at 10%.
Around 1% agreed with the statement: “I do not think that Islamophobia exists in the UK”. It has not been possible to confirm whether they spent most of their time trolling websites.
Another question by ComRes asked whether people thought the Qur’an justified use of violence against non-Muslims.
Around 14% thought it did, while around 65% disagreed.
James Murdoch is lying, say ex-NotW staff
This could be potentially lethal for James Murdoch.
The New York Times reports:
Two former News International executives publicly contradicted James Murdoch’s testimony to a parliamentary committee, saying Thursday that they told him of evidence in 2008 that suggested that phone hacking at one of the company’s tabloid newspapers was more widespread.
The former executives said they informed Mr. Murdoch at the time that he was authorizing an unusually large secret settlement of a lawsuit brought by a hacking victim.
The problem for Murdoch is that the employees aren’t just anyone – they are Colin Myer (the last editor) and Tom Crone, the former News International legal manager.
The Guardian reports:
Colin Myler, editor of the paper until it was shut down two weeks ago, and Tom Crone, the paper’s former head of legal affairs, said they had expressly told Murdoch of an email that would have blown a hole in its defence that only one “rogue reporter” was involved in the phone-hacking scandal.
This contradicts what Murdoch told the committee when questioned on Tuesday.
The trap was laid by Tom Watson, who asked at the Select Committee hearing:
“When you signed off the Taylor payment, did you see or were you made aware of the full Neville email, the transcript of the hacked voicemail messages?”
James Murdoch replied: “No, I was not aware of that at the time.”
Now he is accused of misleading the Select Committee by prominent former employees.
Caroline Lucas launches new Green think-tank
Caroline Lucas MP launched a new Green think-tank, ‘Green House’ this morning.
I chaired the meeting, at which we launched our first two papers.
- Sustainability Citizenship by Prof Andrew Dobson, Keele University, urging politicians to involve people in decision making as morally acting citizens; and
- Mutual Security in a Sustainable Economy by Molly Scott Cato, Green Economist and Brian Heatley, a former senior civil servant. This paper sets out how we should redefine poverty, disconnect welfare from the labour market and reconsider the retirement age.
Both these papers are now available on our website: http://www.greenhousethinktank.org
The Green House Advisory Group, whose membership makes clear that this is far more than just a Green Party initiative.
It is also far more than just a metropolitan organisation. Our board so far includes:
» Michael Meacher MP, the former Labour Environment Minsister;
» Bea Campbell, the feminist, journalist, playwright and broadcaster;
» Tim Jackson, Professor of Sustainable Development at the university of Surrey and author of the influential book Prosperity without Growth;
» Jean Lambert, London’s Green MEP;
» Victor Anderson, a former member of the London Assembly and green economist;
» Mary Mellor, leading eco-feminist;
» Jonathan Porritt, former chair of the Sustainable Development Commission;
» Geoff Tansey, a leading expert on creating a fair and sustainable food system; and
» Simon Thomas, former Plaid Cymru MP for Ceredigion, and member of the Welsh Assembly.
Green House expects to publish further papers this Autumn the food price crisis and the future of banking.
I hope that LC readers will welcome this new development.
Green House is interested in joint initiatives with progressives; contact me offline (or in the comments, below), if you have ideas.
Our website: http://www.greenhousethinktank.org
Factcheck: Tory MP did lie about Piers Morgan
At the Murdoch hearings on Tuesday, Conservative MP Louise Mensch made a claim regarding Piers Morgan during the proceedings.
She said:
Piers Morgan – now a celebrity anchor on CNN – said openly in his book, which, clearly, was published before this controversy broke, that he had hacked phones. He said that he won scoop of the year for a story about Ulrika Jonsson and Sven-Goran Eriksson. He actually gave a tutorial in how one accesses voicemail by punching in a set default code. Clearly, from the account that he gives, he did it routinely as editor of the Daily Mirror.
Does the claim stand up? Not really.
She was invited on to CNN where she refused to make the claim again, saying repeatedly she was no longer protected by Parliamentary Privilege.
But if she was certain that Piers Morgan had said in his book that he had hacked phones, why not repeat it?
Watch
Here is the background. Louise Mensch MP took Piers Morgan’s words completely out of context.
This is the passage from his book.
Yesterday evening, Channel 4′s FactCheck blog also investigated whether her claim stood up.
They say:
So yes, Mensch is right that he gives his readers a tutorial in phone hacking, but this is quite blatantly not an open admission from Morgan that he hacked phones, routinely or at all.
…
Piers Morgan is big enough and ugly enough to fight his own battles. But in the absence of any confession to phone hacking in his book, FactCheck can’t let Louise Mensch skip off into the sunset with her cloak of parliamentary privilege flapping in Morgan’s face.
That looks like an abuse of Parliamentary Privilege then. Her claim that Morgan said in his book he had hacked phones was untrue.
I’m no fan of Piers Morgan but this attempt to deflect attention away from News International is pathetic.
Piegate goes global and gets animated
Update: Piegate now animated!
Have you watched Piegate enough times yet? I bet you haven’t.
Rather than having to keep rewinding videos, here is a gif on loop that allows you to even count how many MPs had their mouths open during the incident (including Tom Watson).
(the image is 3mb though, so may take some time to download on slow connections)
Meanwhile, Google News is recording nearly 10,000 articles mentioning Jonnie Marbles!
His Twitter account went from just over a 1000 followers yesterday to over 15,000.
He tweeted last night around 3am:
So, no chance of a job at Sky, then?
At least he got name-checked on Mashable, Business Insider and TMZ!
I’m assuming he isn’t in prison then, which is good.
But debate on his actions raged across the web. Tim Hardy wrote in praise of Jonnie Marbles:
Those rushing to condemn Jonnie Marbles perhaps have more faith in the willingness of the powerful to regulate themselves than I do.
What Jonnie did was crude and disrespectful and childish and silly. It mocked that veneer of pomp and decency behind which crimes are hidden daily – which is exactly why it was needed.
Hmmmm.
Jim Gilliam replied in the comments:
“The role of the clown is to show the ridiculousness of power. This man to whom politicians have frantically paid court for decades has been shown as a fool.”
That’s not even remotely what happened. This stunt didn’t show the ridiculousness of power, and it certainly didn’t show Murdoch as a fool. Why anyone would want to show Murdoch to be a fool is completely beyond me as practically the entire planet already thinks he is evil.
“It mocked that veneer of pomp and decency behind which crimes are hidden daily – which is exactly why it was needed.”
Uh no, that’s not at all what it did.
All this did was make people feel a twinge of empathy for him, and it completely changed the tone of the rest of the questioning and overwhelmed the news coverage that followed. This stunt was a total fiasco, and this comes from someone who made a documentary 7 years ago called Outfoxed: Rupert Murdoch’s War on Journalism.
I agree with Jim. To show the ridiculousness of Murdoch’s power would have required something more ingenious and clever. Something that awes and exposes Murdoch. This was just a lazy pie-in-the-face. Are activists just getting too goddamn lazy?
Also turns out Jonnie was a member of the Labour party, which have now suspended him.
You can read articles through the front page, via Twitter or RSS feed.
» How the UK could pay for its demographic “time-bomb”
» Osborne’s time is running out, even amongst friends
» BBC goes along with govt spoiling tactic on disabled people
» The ‘madness’ of terrorism and other offensive terms
» Palestinian children routinely jailed for throwing stones, report finds
» What are people like Melanie Phillips calling for then?
» Anders Breivik wasn’t a “lone wolf”, he was part of a movement
» The famine in Somali is no natural disaster
» Will tomorrow be the day people start to question Osborne’s competence?
» The inequality rarely mentioned in Westminster: Scotland’s land
» How child-beating teachers were STOPPed 25 years ago
|
41 Comments 193 Comments 31 Comments 77 Comments 44 Comments 220 Comments 45 Comments 108 Comments 466 Comments 73 Comments |
|
LATEST COMMENTS » Lee Griffin posted on There's no simple way out of this economic rut, for the left or right » Robert posted on Cameron aide pushes wacky ideas for growth » Robert posted on Cameron aide pushes wacky ideas for growth » Brian Pelan posted on Exclusive: NGO workers dispute allegations against Johann Hari » Brian Pelan posted on Exclusive: NGO workers dispute allegations against Johann Hari » Primly Stable posted on Cameron aide pushes wacky ideas for growth » Leon Wolfson posted on Fox TV: Oslo terrorist couldn't be a Christian » Leon Wolfson posted on Cameron aide pushes wacky ideas for growth » Leon Wolfson posted on How the UK could pay for its demographic "time-bomb" » Elaine S posted on Oslo terrorist cited Melanie Phillips in his manifesto » Larry posted on Fox TV: Oslo terrorist couldn't be a Christian » Leon Wolfson posted on There's no simple way out of this economic rut, for the left or right » Thomas Stewart posted on Cameron aide pushes wacky ideas for growth » Steve posted on BBC goes along with govt spoiling tactic on disabled people » Leon Wolfson posted on There's no simple way out of this economic rut, for the left or right |
