The Murdoch-Greenspan Nexus

That’s such an incredibly bad quote to have given out.

Firstly, as this all started years ago, the mistakes have been huge for it to have got this far. Further the MET say news international were actively trying to impede the investigation.

But mainly, it will now be understood by most people to be saying the hacking was a minor mistake, it’s too subtle and complex a message to try and communicate in the modern media. Which is hilariously tragic.

This was clear on newsnight last night where a us senator had to have the point explained quite slowly to see the true intent.

With, notably rare exceptions, the News of the World is the biggest selling weekly newspaper in the UK.

No one ever mentions the founder of the dynasty, Sir Keith Murdoch. But his career illuminates that of his son. He was also a pal of Lord Northcliffe, so this is a story that goes a long way back.

This snippet is amusing:

he spent the rest of the war encouraging a patriotic spirit, and attacking the Labor Prime Minister, John Curtin

Rupert supported Labor under Gough Whitlam in the 1972 election, interestingly. He’s sometimes less predictable than his underlings.

————————–

So, since the Sun is going to publish on Sundays now, doesn’t NI have the same number of UK Sunday papers as before? Is it just like renaming NotW as the Sunday Sun, or is there more of a difference?

…once the UK is finished.

I know the scandal is bad but that’s a bit apocalyptic

Has NI announced that the Sun will publish on Sunday yet? I hadn’t heard that.

I know that it is very likely that Murdoch will try but at in current circumstances I can’t see how he can do so.

The evil man is not looking so healthy these past few weeks, he looks about ten years older. The scandal seems to be taking its toll.

What I don’t get about the BSkyB deal is why it is seen as such a good financial deal. Freeview means that every house in the UK already has plenty of choices for TV channels. Internet distribution is going to eat into satellite. Seems to me that he is buying a cash cow that is starting to run dry.

In an interview, Mr. Murdoch said that “the situation has developed not necessarily to the advantage of News Corp.”

And if any of those involved tried to hack any victims of 9/11, they’ll be in for an extended all expenses paid vacation in the United States

It would be funny as hell to see the Obama administration prosecuting someone else for invasion of privacy and illegal interception of phone calls. Reminds me of Admiral Tug Benson, the Lloyd Bridges character from “Hot Shots!” – “You endangered the lives of some damn fine pilots out there today. Well, that’s my job.”

So, since the Sun is going to publish on Sundays now, doesn’t NI have the same number of UK Sunday papers as before? Is it just like renaming NotW as the Sunday Sun, or is there more of a difference?

I believe The Sun publishes more photographs of breasts, I believe that’s the main difference.

PHB: The answer is “football”. Also, as pointed out, they’re pretty good from a technical point of view.

But the big differentiator is the footy near-monopoly.

philofra @19

Greenspan recently used the phrase “with notably rare exceptions” to discount failures of free-market policies, which fits nicely with Murdoch’s “minor mistakes”.

elm@20

Yes, “with notable rare exception”.

Both men were entrenched in certain business models and had problems with currents that didn’t apply to them. A commentator said that Murdoch is probably at a loss of what to do because he has never been in this position before. He has lost control of the situation.

Henry, yes, the 9/11 victims thing could be a honey pot like the Rather memo. That would explain King pushing it. But the resignation of Brooks, less than a week after NOTW was closed, evidently, according to the consensus here, to prevent precisely that, suggests to me something big is still below the surface of the water. My guess is Brooks saw she was the firewall, the one who would be sacrificed to protect the Murdoch family. She didn’t like this role and is now talking about cooperating with the investigation. The other reason I’m somewhat skeptical of the honey pot theory is that it seems likely the FBI will trip over something once it starts investigating, even if that particular angle cannot be confirmed. Do we really think Murdoch was pulling all this in England and staying clean in the US?

Even the NY Post barely pretends to do any actual reporting, let alone Faux News. So I don’t know why Murdoch’s US properties would need to do any hacking; they generate their copy by just making shit up.

The Guardian just reported that Les Hinton has resigned. He’s Rupert’s man at the Wall Street Journal, but he was chair of News International until 2007.

Are the rats deserting a sinking ship, or are they taking a bullet for their Leader?

Henry, yes, the 9/11 victims thing could be a honey pot like the Rather memo. That would explain King pushing it.

I don’t think so. While King is a gobshite with a crush on the IRA, his district includes lots of people with NYPD/FDNY connections. Though I’d agree that Newscorp has shown a willingness to fight hardest where it feels that it has a defence — and while Murdoch has brought in British and Australian editors for the Post, I’d agree with John Q about regional pathologies.

Why has it never been an issue that the second largest shareholder (probably after Rupert) in NI is the nephew of the Saudi king?

Because a 7% stake (behind the Digger’s 39.73%) isn’t enough to drive home the issue, even if it’s three times the value of the next largest institutional investor?

At the risk of prompting them to block up the back door I use, google “modify headers”.

Richest person in Saudi Arabia is pretty exclusive, though. Implies a certain influence. Especially as the sources of his wealth are not entirely clear, and some think he is a front man for the money of others.

@24 Do we really think Murdoch was pulling all this in England and staying clean in the US?

Well, there’s the “I’m going to fly a plane full of drugs one time, so I can finance a legitimate business” model possibility. I don’t know I would believe that, but I suggest it.

Henry @14: Well, the DOJ isn’t shy about using the FCPA, but based on what little I know of the scandal so far, I agree that it would be a stretch in this case. Still, depending on what certain US citizens knew, and how involved they were in any bribes, there’s certainly a potential case here. Certainly worth an investigation, in cooperation with the UK.

Now, as to the 9/11 rumors, even if the investigation into the rumors of hacking 9/11 victims shows those rumors false, an investigation can easily turn up evidence of other criminal acts. Criminal acts like this by large organizations, much less media companies, are matters of serious concern. They cannot be countenanced because rational self-interest is what prevents large organizations from engaging more frequently in abuses. So when a large corporate player falls prey to a criminal temptation that other large players might fall to as well, prudence and justice – hell, prosecutorial ethics – demand that the hammer come down on that large corporate player.

I would not expect Murdoch to be given any quarter by the Department of Justice.

The institutional weight towards aggressive prosecution will be enormous and unrelenting. Multiple agencies, a massive coalescence of investigatory power, and career prosecutors who view this as big game will generate a very large amount of momentum.

I also doubt there was much hacking in the US – but that might be American blindness on my part. I don’t see the environment in the US that allowed the tabloid’s operations to survive in Britain. I can’t see the police as being quite so willing to help, nor the crimes continuing so long without arrest.

I have to say… my primary gripe with Murdoch right now has to do with what he’s done to the WSJ. But as I learn more about the scandal in Britiain, I see my primary gripe may have a challenge.

Before someone comes out with the standard tropes: yes, the previous comment is pure speculation, and I’m not claiming otherwise. You need to be able to speculate beyond the facts you have to see where you may need to investigate further. You don’t pretend your speculations are more than that, but you don’t refuse to speculate either. Had Nick Davies not followed suspicions he could not initially prove, none of this would have come out in the first place.

42: it is entirely possible that the sexual dirt that gets exposed after hacking is an interesting commercial by-product but essentially still just a by-product.

Hmm . . . I think that the immediacy of global media might put RM in a bad position next week. In order to save himself from the wrath of the British public he’s got to be utterly contrite and forlorn in front of the select committee on Tuesday. But this line – “we committed horrible crimes and covered them up” – isn’t going to look good in the US and elsewhere, unless he can _also_ be putting out the line that bad as it was, it’s just a little local difficulty confined to the NotW.

But if he says anything to the US that can be interpreted as downplaying the enormity of it all, the British media are going to be all over him. Twenty years ago you could probably have got away with a different habitus for each continent: now, not so much.

Officers at the scene say the accused had been interrupted while breitbarting a defrosted chicken.

Chris, the TV pictures from the committee are likely to become central to both the consensus view and the collective memory of this thing.
The practical effect in the US may be more important, because in the UK matters already have forward momentum with the criminal and then judicial inquiries.

Murdoch and the others giving evidence will need to pitch it very carefully.
His multi-newspaper printed apology hasn’t hit the right note.

Here is a link to remind us of the close ties between Robert Murdoch’s Fox News and the Bush administration, beginning with Fox News’s Tony Snow, who became Press Secretary:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=439×1499159

and here is John Dean on the coverup (1st installment of 2 articles): http://verdict.justia.com/2011/07/14/rupert-murdochs-watergate/

I’d also note that as of late 2001, mobile phone penetration in the US was still actually not that high compared to the UK – those “pagers” were still popular.

True on the first point, at least. My recollection was that by that time, most people who would have carried pagers in the mid-Nineties had gone over to mobile phones. But maybe that was a couple of years later.

Not everybody else had. My wife tried unsuccessfully to persuade me to carry one through the early 2000s; I had this mortal fear of getting spammed with telemarketing calls everywhere I went (this was before the national do-not-call registry, so landlines had essentially no defense, and that was what I was used to).

Another One Bites the Dust:

Rebekah Brooks arrested.

http://abcnews.go.com/International/rebekah-brooks-rupert-murdoch-executive-arrested/story?id=14091082

Jeez, things are moving fast.

Being from the UK I am only mildly surprised about the existence of some strong beliefs and viewpoints that other countries are unlikely to be affected/infected in the same way as the UK.

Do many motivational factors for politicians, policing, media and corporations not align on so many points in the area of information that a great deal of the I scratch your back you scratch mine sort of mentality exists? It would seem very strange to me in any society if they did not.

Add to that mix a pressure causing organisations to look for ways to protect themselves and a generally toxic mix is very much bound to exist. Get over the denial, this is something which we all recognise in some ways, and deny in others, but certainly have to deal with in todays information environment.