The wheels are falling off the Murdoch bus
I LOVE cowboy films. I think it is something about frontier people struggling through an alien wilderness in their hope of finding a promised land that I find so alluring.
Often, though, they’re simply stories about goodies and baddies. Justice and injustice. Throw in a few hostile Apaches or Sioux and you have a winning formula. Most Western movies have an underlying moral theme. Good always prevails in the end.
I was watching Shoot-Out at Medicine Bend the other day. Made in 1957 it starred Randolph Scott and a young James Garner. It was the last film Scott made with Warner Brothers.
Scott plays Captain Buck Devlin who, along with two comrades, has just been pensioned off from the army. Devlin’s brother is murdered in an attack by a Sioux war party. He had been unable to defend himself because he’d been supplied faulty ammunition.
To cut a long story short, it turns out that an unscrupulous businessman, Ep Clark, in the nearby town has been selling cheap but shoddy goods in a bid to undercut the town’s other businesses.
In this way Clark’s pioneer emporium drives out the local competition. People are as powerless as he is ruthless.
Clark has both the mayor and sheriff of Medicine Bend in his pocket. He has complete control. And no-one can do anything. Enter Buck Devlin and his heroes.
I COULDN’T help but read parallels with the hacking scandal that has engulfed News International. I’m not saying Rupert Murdoch is a baddie but many think his global media empire is a threat to democracy itself.
The hacking scandal at the News of the World has appalled many people in the country especially after revelations that the murdered schoolgirl Milly Dowler’s mobile phone was hacked into by News of the World journalists.
The media mogul was quick to react and sacrificed the red top Sunday newspaper which published its last edition on July 10. According to the lawyer representing the family of Milly Dowler, Murdoch was then “humbled to give a full and sincere apology” in person.
But it seems this is one story that just won’t go away. Indeed, day by day, fresh insights emerge about what some describe as corruption on “an industrial scale”.
Former prime minister Gordon Brown, who rarely inhabits the corridors at Westminster these days, made a rare appearance last week and launched a sustained attack on News International chiefs.
It seems the wheels are falling off the bus of the Murdoch empire. His other controversial red top, chief executive Rebekah Brooks, resigned – belatedly – saying that although she had wanted to remain “on the bridge” she also needed to prove her innocence. She was later arrested and questioned by police.
A planned bid for full control of BSkyB had to be abandoned.
PRIME Minister David Cameron, meanwhile, has come under mounting pressure after admitting he had met with Murdoch executives on 26 occasions over the last year. It has been revealed that Andy Coulson, the PM’s former communications director, “friend” and a one-time editor of News of the World (it was allegedly on his shift that some of the phone hacking events took place) had attended Chequers, the PM’s official countryside retreat – even after he had resigned his Downing Street post following the controversy.
Rupert Murdoch and his son, James, the company’s deputy chief operating officer, have both been summoned to appear before a House of Commons select committee to answer questions about the scandal. A defiant Murdoch has insisted he will challenge the “total lies” issued about his News Corporation media empire.
But the plot only thickens. Serious allegations about cosy relationships between News International executives, politicians and Metropolitan Police officers continue to emerge.
Sir Paul Stephenson, Metropolitan Police commissioner, according to reports in Sunday newspapers, accepted a stay at a top health farm where former News International executive Neil Wallis was a PR. It’s calculated Sir Paul’s stay at Champney’s spa, where he was recovering from surgery, would have cost more than £10,000.
The stay raises serious questions over the Met boss’s judgement and his connections to Mr Wallis, who was arrested last week over the phone-hacking scandal. Media commentators suggest the Met soft-pedalled a previous phone hacking investigation.
Within hours of the Sunday tabloid revelations, Sir Paul resigned. Repudiating any allegation of wrongdoing he conceded public perception was of a loss of trust in the Met police.
Mr Cameron, facing mounting criticism from opposition leader Ed Miliband, has announced a judicial review will run in tandem to a fresh police enquiry. Miliband, whose reputation has swung from zero to hero over the affair, has called for new media laws to control cross-media ownership.
Politicians from all parties accept they formed relationships with News International that were too cosy, too obsequious. They were doubtless mindful of the famous headline “It’s The Sun Wot Won It” that appeared on the front page of The Sun on Saturday, April 11, 1992.
Readers had been advised: “If Kinnock wins today will the last person to leave Britain please turn out the lights.” Courting Murdoch had helped the Conservatives win an unexpected victory. Not courting Murdoch could prolong political exile.
So they all partied and dined together and soaked up the corporate hospitality. Some commentators say the super dominant Murdoch created a “culture of fear”. His newspapers became judge and jury. Now his own fitness is being challenged. Indeed it has become open season against News International.
HOPEFULLY some good will come from the sorry sordid saga. It would be a tragedy if the freedom of the press to expose legitimate matters in the public interest were to be curtailed by Westminster politicians on payback mode, who say one thing but, ultimately, want to protect their own privacy and self interests.
Remember the legitimate exposure of MPs’ expenses, the campaigning journalism at News of the World in combating paedophiles and championing Sarah’s Law? Remember Mazher Mahmood, the “fake sheik”, who exposed the crooked money grabbers...
The judicial enquiry needs to address fundamental issues about the relationships and practices of three of the establishment’s main pillars; the government, the police and the media. About how they are accountable to one another and the people – all of the time.
Medicine Bend lacked the “plurality” (that we hear so much about nowadays) or the diverse competition of businesses its citizens had previously enjoyed before Ep Clark had his way.
But like most Westerns the goodies won in the end. It was some ? shoot-out! The baddies always get their comeuppance.