Press Joins Guido In The Sewer

In case there was still anyone out there who thought that our free and fearless press possessed even the distant remnant of a principle, that notion was dispelled as the unseemly convocation of hacks and pundits gorged themselves to the brink of mass projectile vomiting over the gotchas performed yesterday by the perpetually thirsty Paul Staines and his rabble at the Guido Fawkes blog.

The two people who were suspended from their jobs were not merely part of the fun of it all for The Great Guido: those who scrabble around the dunghill that is Grubstreet also showed that they don’t give a flying foxtrot about folks being thrown out of work, so long as they can kick the hated BBC. So it was that they all went in with both feet.

Over at the Northcliffe House bunker, the Mail did what it does best - talk well, but lie badly - as it told readers that one of the questioners in the Tory leadership debate was a “Labour apparatchik”. He wasn’t. But those who formerly toiled under the jackboot of the legendarily foul mouthed Paul Dacre knew that the Beeb had to apologise.

And the other pillar of right-wing righteousness, the Murdoch Sun, howled that “BBC bias allowed anti-Semitic Corbyn stooges on Tory leadership debate”. One person was accused of making anti-Semitic comments, but in the retelling, and with the mob already slavering at the prospect of BBC blood, one person becomes at least two.

The Sun calling "bigot" on others. Yes, really

At least the Murdoch mafiosi were honest about their motivation. “IF the scandal of the BBC’s Tory leadership debate doesn’t trigger wholesale reform over its political bias nothing will. It has rarely been more blatant. Here was the corporation caught red-handed passing off Corbyn stooges as ordinary people chosen to ask searching questions of the candidates for PM”. Some viewers support Jezza? Get over it.

There was more: “the BBC is awash with lefties using the broadcaster, funded by your compulsory licence fee, to push their anti-Tory, anti-capitalist, pro-socialism agenda. They don’t recognise their bias because in their warped worldview they occupy the centre ground, not to mention the moral high ground, and not the far left where most people see them … If those behind it aren’t ashamed enough to quit they should be fired”.

Similar sentiments were expressed by official Brexit Party “paper”, the joke that is still called the Express. Yet the press establishment is seemingly unaware of exactly where this puts its own reputation for allegedly fearless journalism. So let me put them straight.

The BBC Tory leadership debate was on Tuesday evening. But yesterday morning, there was no righteous howling about the background of questioners. Which means two things: one, the right-wing press has admitted it didn’t bother to scour those questioners’ backgrounds in the hours between the debate and going to press.

And two - most damaging - that supposedly credible news sources are now relying on hit jobs undertaken by a borderline Fake News outfit, run by Paul Staines, someone with a history of far-right association, drug abuse, alcohol abuse, an Apartheid apologist, an accessory to terrorism, and a vindictive bully whose hypocrisy is off the scale.

The Great Guido is in the sewer. The bad news is, the press is in there with him.

Enjoy your visit to Zelo Street? You can help this truly independent blog carry on talking truth to power, while retaining its sense of humour, by adding to its Just Giving page at

https://www.justgiving.com/crowdfunding/zelostreet3