Savile – Dacre Pants On Fire

[Update at end of post]

The fallout from Jimmy Savile’s alleged activities continues, with a well-trailed Panorama expose this evening. And, despite all talk of the BBC covering the whole affair up, that programme will air on not just the BBC, but its main channel BBC1, and during peak transmission time – unlike the dropped Newsnight item, which would have gone out on BBC2 rather later in the evening.

It's true if I f***ing say so, c***

This, of course, does not accord with the narrative dictated by the legendarily foul mouthed Paul Dacre, and his angry and obsessive hatred of the Corporation has led the Daily Mail to go beyond what is actually known into a blatant attempt to push the BBC into actions that the Vagina Monologue has decided they should take in order to satisfy his demands.

So it should have surprised nobody to see today’s print edition of that paper declaring “Newsnight boss quits over damning evidence of Savile ‘cover-up’”, nor that the boss concerned has not quit. Moreover, there is no evidence of a cover-up (hence the use of quotes around the phrase), although that boss was warned that his action would cause the accusation to be made – as the Mail is now doing.

Spot the teensy slice of invention

Peter Rippon, editor of Newsnight – the title, like that of Barney Jones at The Andy Marr Show (tm), means he runs the show – has not quit. So the Mail has changed the assertion in its on-line edition to read “stepped down”. But he hasn’t done that either. Of course, this event may come to pass, but at the time the Dacre hacks were making their assertions, they were doing so with trousers well alight.

Such is the all-consuming rage of Paul Dacre that he is driving his obedient minions to attempt to cause the BBC to bend to his will by frightening them. That this is the paper’s main mission is confirmed by the lead item in Daily Mail Comment – the authentic voice of the Vagina Monologue – which repeats the assertion that Rippon has stepped down and righteously demands an independent inquiry.

Added to this is a characteristically batshit rant by Melanie “not just Barking but halfway to Upminster” Phillips, where she smears Harriet Harman as some kind of apologist for paedophilia, blames a culture of permissiveness, and dumps any related wrongdoing on “the left”, whatever and whoever that is. Mad Mel has decided that sexualisation of the young is another of those “liberal left” crimes.

Meanwhile, what the Mail is not telling its readers is that, when Panorama investigated Rippon’s assertion that the initial Newsnight investigation into Savile was pulled for “editorial reasons”, their researchers “found no evidence to contradict that view”. So the Mail, as with anything else that doesn’t fit its narrative, has just made it up to fit the demands of its raging, swearing editor.

And the Mail still isn’t telling why it took until now for it to care about Savile.

[UPDATE 1235 hours: Rippon has now, as reported by the BBC - which, it should be noted, is accused by the Mail of covering up its past activities - stepped aside from his role at Newsnight while the investigation into the shelving of the programme's item on Savile takes place.

But he still hasn't quit. And nor is the Mail doing any of its own investigation into Savile - it's just riding on the back of everyone else's, while dumping as much as possible on the BBC. And that's for one very good reason: Dacre believes he can inflict some damage on the Corporation.

As for actually covering news, stuff that. Priorities, priorities]