A newspaper has died, and the recriminations are only just beginning

HardHearted Perry

So how will Cast Iron ‘Dave’, - the shiny tin foil wrapper over a few vague Tory principles, - handle this one?

Vulture

The imminent arrest of Andy Coulson and Dave's close association with Rebekah Brooks just goes to underline the truth of Peter Oborne's Telegraph article yesty charging that David Cameron has shown a fondness for company that no respectable person, let alone a PM, should be seen dead with.

Cameron's judgement in this - as in everything else he has touched during his short but already catastrophic Premiership - has been worse than woeful. He must go. He will go.

Camerona delenda est - as they say at Eton.

jaybs

The public need to know today how The Guardian were tipped off about the arrest of Andy Coulson this morning and were able to run with it as their main headline last night. Is it that The Guardian are making payments to someone inside The Metropolitan Police or is it someone inside the Police using it as political sabotage? An investigation Must be launched today the police can not be seen to be used in this way!

It is no shock that the labour party lead by the very weak Ed Miliband (whatever political hacks may think) jump on the bandwagon this morning and are good at being so High & Mighty! but the deplorable actions of The News of The World took place many years ago and it was the labour party that was in power and chose! to do nothing, was is they were far too snug in bed with Murdock, of course!

david

Get Lord Ashcroft al over the news today to show that labour really should look at his own house first.

Percy

Poor old Dave, he tries to mix with some common folk and look what happens.

DavidDP

coughTomBaldwincough

Tom Pride

Be wary! The closure of a seedy tabloid newspaper is not an issue of Left v Right - or at least I do not see it as such. But, the party which gerrymandered constituencies to produce election results:

Blair 2005
Votes 9,552,436 (35.3% of the popular vote, equating to approximately 22% of the electorate)
Seats won 355
Votes per seat 26,908
Majority 66

Cameron 2010
Votes 10,703,754 (36.1% of the popular vote, equating to approximately 23.5% of the electorate)
Seats won 306
Votes per seat 34,980
Short of majority 20

(and justifies it on the grounds that Labour constituencies have large numbers who do not register and who of course are entitled to vote and would vote Labour) will seek to screw every political advantage it can from this situation. Milliband and his party will present themselves as responsible, disinterested statesmen seeking to impose responsibility on the press and protect the public, but, their objective will be the end of the “ToryPress”. Expect demands for a new watchdog with teeth, to be filled in due course with Labour placemen and sisters, to ensure “impartiality” of newspaper reporting in the manner of that great bastion of broadcasting impartiality, the BBC – the envy of the World.

Andrew Gilligan sets it out well at http://www.telegraph.co.uk/journalists/andrew-gilligan/8624221/Phone-hacking-scandal-enemies-of-free-press-are-circling.html

Milliband and his ilk - Trust me. I’m a Socialist! My morality is on a higher plain and irreproachable.

jaybs

The public need to know without delay how The Guardian once again received a tip off about the arrest of Andy Coulson this morning and were able to lead with it last night as the papers started to get released. Is someone inside of The Metropolitan Police being paid by The Guardian or is someone leaking to them for pure political sabotage reasons. The Met need to start an immediate investigation.

Of course the actions of The News of The World were wrong but many took place quite a few years ago and which party was in power and choose to do nothing, of course that same party's current leader Ed Miliband is quick to jump on the bandwagon this morning and point the finger of guilt, as much as Rebekah Brooks is responsible he too was a Minister at the time in government, so he needs to do the same, it is funny when you are in Bed with Murdock and snug for so many years how selective you can be!

disenfranchised

there must have been many like me who thought cameron had taken leave of whatever senses he had when he hired the character.
so finding himself deeply in it as a consequence solicits not a flicker of sympathy from this punter.....

starfish

While they all indulge in shadenfreude they seem to be missing the fact thta this is a dagger pointed at all of them

As for Dave I cnanot see how his judgement can be questioned - all this has broken after the appointment and New Labour fawned all over Murdoch for 13 years

BTW how can the Grauniad be so sure of his imminent arrest - a police leak? Did they pay for it? Just a thought

Maggie

Why is Cameron prostrating himself before the press? I feel quite embarrassed by his performance. He hasn't even got the confidence to stand up for himself. He's just said politicians shouldn't be frightened of offending the press but he is giving a very convincing impression that he's terrified of the creme de la scum who're in the room with him. The fact is that Coulson made him a better PM. He's useless now.

Mark

Gonna be interesting to see if Tom Balwin has any skeletons that the Nasal One doesn't yet know about....

*gets popcorn*

StrongholdBarricades

Are the police being paid for the information currently appearing in the media?

Private Schultz

One of the things I'd like to know is why NOTW/NI still seem to be controlling the flow of information from their archives to the police. Suddenly 'discovering' a heap of emails they'd previously claimed no longer existed, for example.

I'd have thought normal procedure where a company is under this sort of investigation would be for a warrant to be sought and pcs/files and all other relevant material to be confiscated by the police, so they can examine _all_ the records for themselves.

DaveJ

"...The Guardian has been reporting since last night that Andy Coulson is to be arrested today...."

The Guardian hacks will have been told this by a 'Police Source'?

This of course will all OK and hunky-dory as it is a leak about a Good Thing about a Man WE Don'T Approve Of and gives a chance of kicking another Man We Don't Approve Of.

Journos = Hypocrites

James Strong

I am uneasy that The Guardian, or anybody else, is told about an arrest before it takes place.
This does not reflect well on the police;they must have leaked it.

Red Weds

The most fascinating thing in all of this for political anoraks is that no one can predict where all of this will lead. Dave is all over the place and as each little titbit comes out it is not impossible to speculate whether his lack of judgement in hiring Coulson and taking him into No. 10 could bring about his downfall - starnget things have happened. Has anyone checked with William Hill on the current odds of an election in the next 12 months?

strapworld

It is hard to believe that Andy Coulson, if he was to be charged with any offence, could get a FAIR trial in this country. No member of any jury could truthfully say they have not heard anything about this saga.

If the press can be taken, rightly, to the High Court by the Attorney General over the Bristol murder enquiry. Surely questions MUST be asked about their hounding of this man?

It appears to me that the assumption that a person is innocent until found guilty has now gone, most especially if you are not a supporter of the left!

I have to say, as one of the strongest critics of Cameron. Having just watched his press conference. How greatly impressed I am by his standing by Mr Coulson. It is so easy to kick a man when he is down. It is easy to be a member of the mob. To be wise after the event. I can well understand that he gave the man a second chance and because of that and the way he would not kick the man today, David Cameron stands head and shoulders above most involved in this shoddy and sordid affair.

I also was impressed that he said Rebecca Brooks should have had her offer to resign accepted. He could not have been clearer.

Dennis Churchill

Peter Oborne’s take on our system in:”The Triumph of the Political Class” made the case that politics and PR/the Media were now two branches of the same professional tree (with a few lawyers thrown in)
This type of scandal is inevitable when first politics is seen as primarily about “image” and second is dominated by people whose judgement has not been tested in senior positions outside politics.

Leon

I'm counting on the Sun being next to go, then BskyB takeover to fall through and who knows maybe our citizens controlling our MP's and not Murdoch.

Baron

run it by me again, Peter, why should Coulson’s arrest be shades more awkward for the boy? Has Coulson been charged with any wrongdoings, let alone convicted?

the rot cannot but have infected the highest layers of both parties, the police, nobody can afford the whole truth to be told, those who know where the bodies are decomposing will keep shtum, few front line pawns will take the rap, that’s just about what’s likely to happen.

if the boy distances himself from Coulson in the press conference, his head will be next on the block, the BBC hyaenas will get him.

strapworld

Lord Ashcroft, writing in the Conservative Home blog remonds us all of a person, who heads Millibands PR.

What a hypocritical man Milliband is.

Tom Pride

Strapworld

True, but, there is a certain poetic justice in the door stepper being door stepped.

TrevorsDen

Vulture - Cameron does not have a close association with Brookes, it was Tony Blair who invited her out for dinner dates and visited lobbyists with her.
It was Prime Minister Brown who who attended her wedding vows.

Asserting your bigotry ever more frequently doe not make your thick views any more true.
And of course it was Miliband who attended a Murdoch soiree only a couple of weeks ago. And it was Miliband who hire the ,man who outed Dr kelly and Miliband who hired the man who hacked in to Ashcrofts bank accounts.

This story is going to turn and bite the hand that feeds it - just like the expenses scandal.

You make good points Strapworld. I think the issue thats not being talked about much is the police selling information. I suggest that its not insignificant that labour home secretaries sat on this, as did senior police officers at the time. They must have done.
The issue surrounding Couson I suspect is this matter and its one he testified about to the House of Commons.
Is it illegal to freely pay police for information, or is being associated with a corrupt police officer in itself a crime.

Murky waters Watson.

Percy

James Murdoch paid Gordon Taylor £700,000 to settle his privacy claim against the News of the World. An estimated 4,000 victims at £700k a pop, why that's a cool £2.8 billion, could this be the real reason the News of the World will exist no more?

Vulture

@ Trev D - I know you don't mingle with the Chipping Norton set so you wouldn't know that Becky's hubbie Charlie Brooks is one of Dave's best chums. Do try to keep up if you can.

The fact that Ed has another sleazeball for his Press person is neither here nor there. He will never be PM. But Dave is -or pretends to be.

Camerono delenda est.

wrinkled weasel

Not so long ago, an octogenarian preacher was telling us that there was going to be a day of reckoning

Public life in the United Kingdom has had a kind of reckoning, a day of judgement, when all that has been hidden is now exposed to the light.

First, we had the MPs and now the fourth estate. This was preceded by revelations about the way those in government ruthlessly assasinated its opponents. "All hell let loose".

Some have called this a witch hunt. Some have wheedled and whined and told us that it was just a few bad apples. The truth is that there is a kind of mass sociopathy that comes from the kind of pragmatism one associates with totalitarians and super-computers.

Everyone's knocking religion. We are told there is no God. I suggest it is time we found one because unless we can see higher than those individuals who allegedly run this country, and aspire to some kind of higher principle, we appear to be heading for our own, self created armageddon.

IanB

A quick WHOIS search reveals that domain names for The Sun on Sunday were registered on 5th July.

Not so much the death of a tabloid as a rebirth.

Simon Stephenson.

Dennis Churchill : 10.48am

Quite right, and whether or not Oborne accurately portrays the entire situation, the substance of what he raises is far, far closer to what needs investigating than the personality-based furore that's going on at the moment. This, by comparison, is just messing about with the periphery. The person of Andy Coulson is important to himself and his family, but not to the rest of us. What he did or did not do is more important, but only in so much as it sheds light on the pressures and considerations which led to his appointment to such an important political position. Why was Coulson chosen, above all others, to direct the communications of the leader of one of the UK's two main political parties? How much was this a pragmatic recognition of the strength of a powerful lobby, and how much an enforced appeasement of it?

Baron

strapworld, sir, you’re on my buy list, spot on, the rot ain’t the hacking, sickening though it is, (one can think of things that have sickened more, much more), it’s about the left leaning fruitcakes, of whom the BBC shines as the top culprit, hounding down individuals whom they dislike, as the great Mark Steyn has it; it’s not the outcome (of the hounding), it’s the process that destroys. Bstards.

strapworld

I do agree with you wrinkled weasel. It is this lack of moral direction which controls much of our society these days.

Trevorsden. You are not a corrupt cop until a court has found you guilty of that charge. Then you are a corrupt EX cop.
but I do agree with your remarks.

RKing

I know this sounds rather cynical but could it be just handy that all this bad press around the News of the World, News Int., News Corp and BSKYB are just whats needed to send the share price down which would suit the Murdochs nicely???

Just a thought!!

strapworld

Percy, And what is/was the most successful newspaper in this country? Of course, The News of the World. So please explain to me the logic of your rather stupid post

Archibald

Let's all spare a thought for the real victims in this, instead of bemoaning the demise of the NOTW. There was a huge Harry Potter premier in London last night, normally guaranteed front page coverage in most papers, and being the last one it would normally have been on them all. And what do they get? A tiny bit on the Mirror cover. So effectively no coverage at all. Those poor little multi-millionaire blighters.

michael

Murdoch's a canny bug*er. He's created two focal points of disgust to stop the spread.
1.NotW.
2.Rebekah Brooks.
... and it's all guilt by association-(that 'no smoke without fire' stuff)- a shield.

Percy

@strapworld
Because if you believe you have a claim against an organistaion and that organistaion no longer exists it means getting redress that little bit harder. Dumb James Murdoch set the bar quite high by shelling out £700k to one claim, shut the NOWT down make claims harder to make if not impossible. It happens all the time in the real world. So there it's not so stupid after all is it.

Axstane

Vulture

It was Cameron's friend Charlie Brooks who married Rebekah Wade. I am totally unable to see why this somehow reflects adversely on Cameron as you appear to imply.

You might, as vultures do, wait for death befoe pouncing. Neither Mrs. Brooks nor Coulson have been found guilty of anything. Since no evidence whatsoever is before us on either matter I suggest you close your beak.

EyeSee

You have to say that Ed 'huh, what, here, should I, oh' Miliband would be more damaging if he wasn't clearly trying to use hindsight to attack Cameron. 'In the light of what we know now, why did he hire Coulsen some time ago?' Ironic too, I feel, that Cameron is in hot water so quickly for this association and yet Campbell? McBride? Somehow the muck people like these (who are only two among many) didn't seem to stick to New Labour. Maybe, people expect more of Cameron? Certainly expecting New Labour to be corrupt and venal would be spot on. Teddy Miliband and all.

General Zod

Strapworld is right about this.

How would Cameron look if he'd said "Yes, Coulson turns out to be a wrong'un, so I apologise for appointing him. Mea culpa"?

StrongholdBarricades

Police are raiding the Daily Star?

Mirror next?

john miller

Laugh? I nearly started.

How many sane people are left in the world?

The main protaganists against NotW and their inside information are saying Coulson will be arrested, err, tomorrow?

Oh...

Cromwell

A number of us have pointed out that we are still waiting for a comment from Fraser on hisinvilvment with the NOW.

Certainly it seems to have prevented the Spectator from pursuing until recently the issues of hacking , bribery of public officials, possible obstruction of justice and the BSkyB takeover.

I admire Fraser greatly. But the longer we wait for some word - the more the man is diminished.

Let us be clear what has already been admitted;
- widespread criminal activity. Hacking
- Payments to police. Almost certainly corrupt.
- Misleading parliament by James Murdoch. No excuse that he didnt have all the facts
- Wrongful payments by James Murdoch that may amount to obstruction of justice. Again no defence that he didnt have all the facts.

Not yet admitted but raised are
- an unhealthy and possibly corrupt relationship between News and the Police.
- an apparent obsession by the Government with allowing the BSkyB deal to go ahead. Hunt claims that he has no powers to stop the deal when section 58 of the act clearly gives them to him. Is he lying - or are his civil servants incompetent?
- Governemnts of both parties too cowed by Murdoch to act in the public interest and in accordance with Nolan Priciples.

On the basis of past events some of these latter will be proven/admitted.

A true augean stables.

Are the Brits up to cleaning them out?

strapworld

Just to place a little hillarity here. I read that our great Scottish Editor was born in Truro!

He is English by birth by golly.

Axstane

Straps

Perhaps his Cornish birth is why Fraser once claimed here that he did not have a noticeable Scots accent - arrrh. But who would have thought it?

However, Fraser is man of obvious merit since he shares his birthday with me and also both of the lead actresses in Dune, Francisca Annis and Sian Phillips.

For that reason alone I am confident thet he will no longer write for the NoW.

Herbert Thornton

Cromwell's writing of a cleaning of the British Augean Stables should remind us that Murdoch's sudden demolition News Of The World can only be a part of the task.

There are many other rotten organisations but it's clear which one ought to be next on the list.

Wouldn't it be even more astonishing - and considerably more gratifying - to wake up one morning to the news that Lord Patten had learned from Murdoch's example - and that the BBC was to be shut down?

Herbert Thornton

A follow-up to my 6:22pm posting: I wonder whether how many hackers may have a future with Wikileaks or as freelancers?

A lot of us would be very interested in learning what people at the BBC the Guardian are up to.

Kennybhoy

Pete Hoskin writes that:

“A newspaper has died...”

and that

“The blood of the News of the World is sprayed right across...”

Just a thoct Maister Hoskin but do you really think that in the circumstances these particular metaphors are appropriate?

Kennybhoy

Strapworld on July 8th, 2011 10:42am wrote:

“It is hard to believe that Andy Coulson, if he was to be charged with any offence, could get a FAIR trial in this country. No member of any jury could truthfully say they have not heard anything about this saga.
If the press can be taken, rightly, to the High Court by the Attorney General over the Bristol murder enquiry. Surely questions MUST be asked about their hounding of this man?
It appears to me that the assumption that a person is innocent until found guilty has now gone, most especially if you are not a supporter of the left!”

If he is charged he will get as FAIR a trial as any other accused person in a high profile case. As fair a trial as, say, Lord Archer or Tommy Sheridan. For at least the past twenty years or so an unholy alliance has existed between the police, prosecutors, and the media and, in truth, a large part of the general public. God forgive them they have all conspired together to undermine the sacred presumption of innocence.

Regarding the Prime Minister I wholeheartedly agree with you.Loyalty is always a beautiful thing to behold, even if it turns out to be misplaced or undeserved.