Sun Corbyn IRA Smear Busted

Hardly has the odious flannelled fool Henry Cole, formerly tame gofer to the perpetually thirsty Paul Staines at the Guido Fawkes blog, started work for the Super Soaraway Currant Bun as its “Westminster Correspondent” than the flagrant dishonesty that made the Fawkes rabble so notorious for so long has surfaced in the Murdoch press, making the Sun even less trustworthy than before, if such a thing were possible.

Smile sleazebag, yer pants are on fire. Again

“JEREMY CORBYN TRIED TO FUND IRA BOMBER’S FLIGHT … Labour leader posed a 'grave threat to national security’” tells the headline today, with Master Cole’s allegedly “exclusive” by-line. So what’s the story? “Jeremy Corbyn tried to fund an IRA bomber’s flight from British cops when he was caught by a clever fraudster, The Sun can reveal … The embattled new Labour leader handed over £45 to Irishman Sean O’Regan, who approached him inside Parliament to claim he was part of an IRA active service unit”.

There was more: “Having pulled off the trick, which extraordinarily also included the claim to Mr Corbyn that he had planted bombs in London and now needed to escape, the conman was later caught and convicted of fraud for it”. But, as Captain Blackadder might have said, there was only one thing wrong with this story - it was bollocks.

Never mind that Cole got the usual gullible suspects to give him quotes - comedy turn Conor Burns and appallingly disloyal Simon Danczuk among them - Corbyn had not done any such thing. As the Times was forced to concede at the time, the con man had approached not the MP, but one of his staff. When Corbyn found out what had happened, he called the Police. And Cole could have found this out before writing his story.

We know this because James Chalmers, who is Regius Professor of Law at Glasgow University, Tweeted EIGHT DAYS AGO “This is doing the rounds: from The Times, January 31, 1987. I can see why; it's a great story. But there's a catch … 12 days later, the Times apologised, saying the money was actually paid by a staffer and Corbyn notified the police when he found out”. Cole’s evidence is a Commons motion from the earlier date.

Cole’s excuse for not doing his homework? “All allegations were put to Labour leader and then given best part of the week to deny this”. Chalmers’ warning WAS ALREADY OUT THERE. No, the buffoon just dug himself in a bit deeper: “Asked to specifically deny the allegations here, Labour refused. All ears”. As my good friend Mr Ceebs has observed of Cole’s wibbling: “A defence that in a defamation case will work as well as getting your cock out in front of the judge”. Quite.

Master Cole’s two stand-out Sun stories so far have been, first, the claim that Corbyn only agreed to join the Privy Council because £6.2 million of “Short Money” would be lost to the Labour Party (a pack of lies), and the Corbyn IRA “story”, despite the warning that it was untrue already being out there on social media.

Any half-credible newspaper would have sent Cole down the road by now. But, as it’s Creepy Uncle Rupe’s fave title, the Sun will most likely adopt the approach of Fox News Channel (fair and balanced my arse) and promote the lying SOB.