Flannelled Fool Dodgy Stories Exposed

[Update at end of post]

As Zelo Street readers discovered some time ago, the relationship between the output of the odious flannelled fool Henry Cole, formerly tame gofer to the perpetually thirsty Paul Staines at the Guido Fawkes blog, and reality has always been a tenuous one. Now his penchant for peddling porkies has been picked up by the national press - but that has not stopped his appetite for ever-more creative writing.

All together now: "Smile ... while your pants are blazing ..."

Master Cole’s tendency to talk well, but lie badly, was picked up by the deeply subversive Guardian’s Media Monkey column, which told “For the Sun’s rookie Westminster correspondent Harry Cole, it’s not been the best of spells - and just when he was keen to impress new editor Tony Gallagher too. Although the former Guido Fawkes sidekick has scored a few splashes, they have a tendency to prove dodgy”.

Such as? “Like the claim that Jeremy Corbyn ‘will kiss Queen’s hand to grab £6.2m’, later shown (on BuzzFeed) to be based on a false assumption … Or the supposed scoop that Corbyn long ago gave £45 to an IRA man on the run, which, as a law professor pointed out on Twitter, was alleged by the Times back in 1987 only to be retracted 12 days later”. Yes, those were debunked on Zelo Street too (see HERE and HERE).

It got worse: “Thursday’s Cole corker, ‘BBC boss and Savile Cover-up’, which was wholly indebted to a Meirion Jones article about Alan Yentob (who denies the claim) in an issue of Spectator Life that also hit doormats at dawn on Thursday, but nevertheless was run in the Sun with ‘Exclusive: Yentob Storm’ above the headline. To be fair, though, ‘Derivative: Yentob Storm’ doesn’t have quite the same ring”. Quite.

And I have even worse news for the flannelled fool: the Guardian missed the wholly fictitious claim by Master Cole that Jeremy Corbyn did not attend the opening match of the Rugby World Cup at Twickenham because he wished to snub Royalty. The reality was that his walk-in constituency surgery went on well into the evening. But has this exposé of his dodgy storytelling made Cole stop and think? You jest.

No, like the dog returning to its vomit, today has brought more Cole fiction, as his “Labour Conference Diary” tells “‘I’m not in favour of hereditary systems in politics’ said Jeremy Corbyn in his big conference interview on the Andrew Marr Show … Which is surprising given the ‘hereditary system’ in Labour’s new top team … Labour’s Shadow Foreign Secretary Hilary Benn is the son of left-wing firebrand Tony Benn and Labour’s new Shadow Environment Secretary Lisa Nandy’s grandfather was in the House of Lords”.

Let’s take this nice and slowly, shall we, Master Cole? An hereditary system is where one generation is succeeded by the next one by right. Hilary Benn and Lisa Nandy were elected through the democratic process, and are answerable to their electorates, so their presence in the Commons is not the result of an hereditary system.

The flannelled fool’s pants are well and truly on fire once again. Another fine mess.

[UPDATE 29 September 1150 hours: as if to prove my point, Master Cole has brought forth another steaming "exclusive" telling "TO WEAR A SUIT, OR NOT WEAR A SUIT, THAT IS THE QUESTION FOR JEREMY CORBYN ... Insiders aren't even sure if the Labour leader owns a suit".

Do go on. "An extraordinary row has broken out in Jeremy Corbyn’s inner circle over whether the eccentric Labour leader should wear a suit when he gives his big conference speech tomorrow". Except there is no row, and Cole is once again making it up.

We hear from "an insider", and later from "One weary aide", although whether this is an aide to Corbyn, or to someone at the Sun, is not told. Only at the very end do readers find "A spokesman for Mr Corbyn admitted he had no idea what his boss would be wearing: 'there’s not a style guru, you’ll be surprised to hear'".

That one genuine quote, to no surprise, does not back up the idea that there has been "An extraordinary row". Because, once again, Master Cole's pants are on fire. There's more steers that are bum in your super soaraway Sun]