Murdoch's poodle
There’s nothing more disheartening than having a journalistic rant when everyone seems to agree with you, says Richard Lutz
A rant, according to the unwavering mores of reporting is ‘…when you bash out something on the keyboard with no afterthought nor forward thinking…and with no other aim than to dispose of anger or desperation …or both’
That from The Elements of UK Journalism (1981), an obscure academic tome ignored by most hacks.
But when it comes to The Leveson Inquiry and this week’s appearance from the identikit Cabinet minister Jeremy Hunt (do these guys come out of an Oxbridge template?), I just have to let it roll regardless.
So..here it goes and if I repeat some things I ranted about last month on this site, well, sorry.
Let’s go over things. In December 2010, Cable opens his big mouth in the presence of a hidden microphone and says he will stop Murdoch in his tracks from taking over BSkyB.
Bam. He gets whacked. Or, to be pedantic, steps down (ie; he gets whacked).
Who gets his place? None other than Jeremy Hunt, up to that point unalloyed cheerleader for the crummy phone hacking Murdoch regime.
According to emails released for Leveson, there are a mountain of Hunt/Murdoch messages after his appointment as unbiased overseer of the takeover. That’s right…after he was appointed to supervise the takeover decision making.
From James Murdoch to Hunt after Hunt greenlights the Sky deal: ‘Big few days. Well played.’
Two minutes later, Hunt replied: ‘Thanks think we got the right solution.’
Now, it is unsure in the last email whom Hunt refers to when he alludes to ‘we’.
Is it the government? Or Hunt himself and the Murdoch crew?
Does it matter? What is he doing communicating with the Murdoch clan if he is an unbiased judge?
It is patently obvious that the inner Cabinet couldn’t wipe the grin off their faces when Cable slipped up and they could slap their own tame boy into the semi judicial role of okaying the Murdoch takeovers.
Hunt was Murdoch’s poodle. Still is. Cameron is the boss who knew well that Hunt was safe hands and without a stitch of unbiased independence when it came to decision making. And the Murdochs, up until their dramatic fall, must have been laughing into their flutes of Australian champagne.
Leveson and company are revealing the grubby innards of realpolitik. Not the stuff you read in papers or the ‘net. But the hard edged crummy machination of government and business.
And once again, it is the public, the taxpayer, the voter who loses when it comes to these powerful decision makers: whether it is an elitist like Cameron or a devious aspirationalist (and godfather to Murdoch’s baby) like Blair.
See also Alan Clawley’s article, Heritage – Who knows best?
