Delingpole – Trouble Down Under

Today is a day like any other for the blogging world of James “saviour of Western civilisation” Delingpole, who has latched on to an opinion convenient to him – from Matt Ridley, another climate change “sceptic” – and which quotes with approval another opinion convenient to him, from Nic Lewis, yet another climate change “sceptic”. He is thus reassured that he is “Right About Everything”.

Bit more fair and balanced in Oz

All who dissent from the Weltanschauung of Del Boy are treated to the customary broadside of abuse, and the likelihood of global warming “is now roughly on a par with Elvis being discovered alive and well and living in Bolivia and ready to rush record a new album just in time for Christmas”. Sadly, though, Del’s tirades have not found favour everywhere they have been published.

And one place where the press regulator has passed significantly adverse comment on the Delingpole oeuvre is in Australia, where the country’s Press Council has today passed judgment on an article written by Del Boy and published in The Australian on 3 May this year. In fact, there has not been just one adverse finding, but three, on the piece “Wind farm scam a huge cover-up”.

There were complaints about inaccuracy, and also that the article was grossly offensive, neither of which will surprise anyone in the UK already up to speed on Del Boy and his modus operandi. To this, The Australian deployed a straight bat, and rather like the Telegraph had in the UK: it “responded that the article was clearly an opinion article and it believed the opinions were honestly held by the author”.

This did not stop three aspects of the complaints being upheld: “First, it has concluded that even if the [Government Renewable Energy Scheme] REC scheme has the weaknesses alleged in the article it cannot tenably be described as a ‘kind of government-endorsed Ponzi scheme’”. Del’s used that one over here before now, so no surprise there – except that in Oz some action was taken.

Next? “Second, it has concluded that the claim that a law firm sought gagging orders has been publicly denied by the firm and, in the absence of any supporting evidence, constitutes a breach of the Council’s principles concerning misrepresentation”. Again, Delingpole gets away with that kind of thing here, and the now discredited PCC excused him last time he came up before it.

And just to round things off in true Del Boy style – you’ll love this one – is “Third, it has concluded that the report of the anonymous remarks concerning paedophilia, a very serious and odious crime, were highly offensive ... the level of offensiveness is so high that it outweighs the very strong public interest in freedom of speech. It ... did not require quoting the reference to paedophilia”. Yep, that’s Del Boy once more.

Read the full adjudication HERE. Hats off to the Australian Press Council.

Guido Fawked – Wining Ignorance

You’ve all seen the scene at the end of Diamonds Are Forever, when oddball villains Mr Wint and Mr Kidd are rumbled by their not knowing that Château Mouton Rothschild is a claret – and of course the aftershave: “I’ve smelt that aftershave before, and both times I’ve smelt a rat”. Sadly, more than 40 years on, there are still those whose proficiency in oenology can be found wanting.

And, despite their propensity for consuming anything alcoholic, it is the rabble at the Guido Fawkes blog who have inserted foot in mouth so clumsily on this very subject, during at attempt to have a snark at Foreign Secretary William ‘Ague. The Fawkes folks have discovered that the Foreign Office (FO) on occasion serves upmarket wine with their nosh (something everyone else already knew).

The post goes awry at the very beginning, proclaiming “Vinter William’s Fine Wines”. Vinter? What that? Vinter is Old Norse for – you guessed it – Winter. So nothing to do with wine, then. Perhaps they meant Vintner, which may be interpreted as “Wine Maker”, or for the purposes of the Fawkes folks, “Wine Merchant”. And the rest of the post doesn’t get much better.

The range of wines that has been served by the FO is at least accurately described, these including Château Cheval Blanc 1985 and Château Léoville-Lascases 1989, but then readers are told that “A classic Bordeaux is also on offer, the £142-a-bottle Château Cos de l’Estournel 1986”. Well, Château Cos de l’Estournel does indeed fit this description, but is merely a Deuxième Cru.

That is, it is a second division player according to the original Bordeaux wine classification of 1855. But then, so is Château Léoville-Lascases. And Château Cheval Blanc is a Saint-Emilion Premier Grand Cru Classé A, one of the top rank of that area’s red wines. And Saint-Emilion is a Bordeaux wine region. So all three of these wines fit the description of “classic Bordeaux”.

And as if that isn’t bad enough from the Fawkes rabble, they illustrate the post with a photo of William ‘Ague that is not only well out of date, but which shows him holding a tipple that is definitely not “classic Bordeaux”, or indeed any other wine. Moreover, anything presided over by the perpetually thirsty Paul Staines has no room to talk about anyone else becoming “well lubricated”.

So it’s over the rail and into the ocean behind Mr Wint and Mr Kidd for the Fawkes folks this time. Another fine mess, once again.

Plebgate Bites Back – Press Clueless

Only yesterday, master of serial dishonesty Richard Littlejohn was talking about “brave whistleblowers” within the Police force. He did so in order to support the editorial line of his legendarily foul mouthed editor, Paul Dacre. As they have done for decades past, the Mail, Sun and now the Maily Telegraph all took whatever the Police told them as immutable fact.

After all, they took Police accounts as fact for the Birmingham Six, Guildford Four, Winston Silcott, Colin Stagg, Hillsborough, Orgreave, Blair Peach, Jean Charles de Menezes, and last summer Mark Duggan. So what could possibly go wrong when they took as fact – without bothering to get a second source – an account of an altercation at the end of Downing Street from an allegedly disinterested passer-by?

Except, in what has since been called Plebgate, the passer-by was a serving Police officer, and though his account matched the official log of the incident, which as with the first account was leaked to a paper known as a conduit for this kind of material, it now seems that he was not there at the time. Young Dave is said to be furious, and so he should be – one of his MPs appears to have been fitted up.

Yes, Andrew Mitchell – by his own admission – swore at Police officers, something that has got others arrested (an action that all of those newspapers have heartily applauded). There was a less than harmonious relationship between Mitchell and his deputy at the Whips’ office. There was tension between the Government and the Police over spending cuts. All these are true.

But none of those factors discharge editors and journalists from their duty of care: to get the story, but then check it out and stand it up before publishing. This, after all, is exactly the charge they have all levelled at the BBC’s Newsnight, following the episode which led to Alistair McAlpine being wrongly accused of involvement in the North Wales care homes scandal.

Moreover, what the return of Plebgate has also done is to show that these titles are utterly and totally incapable of doing investigative journalism any more: if the story is not fed them by PR people or lobby groups, if it does not arrive under plain wrapper on a CD-ROM, if it does not emerge from exercising “The Dark Arts”, or trawls of the electoral register, the land registry or Companies’ House, they are lost.

That the proper investigative analysis was done by a broadcast journalist, Michael Crick, does not occur to them. It is not Leveson that is putting a chill on journalism: that has already happened under the aegis of Dominic Mohan, Tony Gallagher and Paul Dacre. In a world where agenda-driven copy and what Nick Davies called “The News Factory” rule newspapers, they have been found gravely wanting.

And all they can do is flail around like so many dinosaurs. That’s not good enough.

Flannelled Fool Hillsborough Smear Fail

Right now, the favourite for that coveted Christmas number one slot is a remake of the late 60s Hollies hit He Ain’t Heavy, He’s My Brother, recorded under the auspices of The Justice Collective. Artists have come together to play their part in a recording whose proceeds will go towards the legal costs of those families of Liverpool FC supporters who lost their lives at Hillsborough.

Hillsborough memorial at Anfield

Also taking part is local MP Steve Rotheram, whose Walton constituency includes both Anfield and Everton, and who swapped his ticket for the Leppings Lane end of Hillsborough stadium for a stand seat shortly before kick-off that fateful Saturday afternoon in 1989. There but for the grace of God and all that. He has been a tireless advocate to get Justice For The 96 – those who died.

I can call MPs what I like, cos I'm on telly!

But not everyone out there is supportive of Rotheram, particularly the rabble at the Guido Fawkes blog, and especially the odious flannelled fool Henry Cole, who has already fallen into the gutter in his attempts to discredit the MP. Now he has, of his own volition, tumbled from gutter to sewer as he continues his abuse of Rotheram in an attempt to get a reaction and thus more attention.

“No prizes for guessing who the only person smiling in the Hillsborough charity video was, eh?” sneers the snooty and insensitive Cole in a Tweet accompanied by a video still showing Rotheram, er, not smiling. But let’s cut the talking bogbrush a little slack here: maybe Rotheram has been smiling where others have not in the promotion of this track? Let’s check that out.

Sadly, no, Rotheram is not the only one happy to see the potentially significant benefit for relatives of all those dead fans whose memory was so shamefully trashed back in 1989 and who have had to fight so hard and for so long to get where they are today. For starters, former Liverpool player and manager Kenny Dalglish was also smiling when promoting the single.

And as can be seen here, rather a lot of people were smiling at the release of the song today, and not just Steve Rotheram. That anyone is so low to even think that the MP is in this for himself either knows nothing about the Hillsborough tragedy, nothing about the city of Liverpool, nothing about Steve Rotheram, or in the case of the flannelled fool, most likely all three.

Worse, he probably doesn’t give a damn that he is so ignorant of a subject on which he pretends to be knowledgeable, however tangentially. Perhaps his best pal (yes, it’s her again) Nadine Dorries could put him straight on matters Merseyside before he makes himself as popular in Liverpool as his hero Boris, and the Sun newspaper. Or perhaps he considers Liverpudlians beneath him.

After all, they generally don’t do serial dishonesty so well. Another fine mess.

Littlejohn Gets Plebgate Wrong

A Police officer thought to have been the source of stories in the Sun and Daily Mail that led ultimately to the resignation of chief whip Andrew Mitchell – the so-called “Plebgate” saga – has been arrested on suspicion of misconduct in a public office. This has caused the right leaning part of the Fourth Estate to go apoplectic with rage and, for good measure, say that it’s, well, Leveson, so there.

Whistleblowing, Guv? It's that or Muslims, innit?!?

Nowhere has this tendency been more superbly displayed than at the Mail, where the obedient hackery of the legendarily foul mouthed Paul Dacre has gone into why-oh-why overdrive today: “Police Federation attacks arrest of leak officer who sparked 'plebgate' row that cost top Tory Andrew Mitchell his job” screams the headline. Yes, it’s the cops who are angry, and the Mail is just passing on the information.

This is followed by the introduction of the frightener du jour “chilling” and its conjunction with “whistleblowing”, the whole being rounded off with a stern warning that having anything to do with the proposals put forward by Lord Justice Leveson will mean the end of the freedom of the press to print all manner of pejorative garbage while not letting the readers in on the whole story.

And just to underscore that all the Mail wants is a fine, honest and upstanding Police force that does not have the fear of being nicked just for speaking to a hack off the record, Dacre’s tedious and unfunny churnalist Richard Littlejohn has been pressed into service to frighten the readers even more. “Without brave whistleblowers, Ali Dizaei would be running the Met police” exclaims Dick. What a Dick he is.

Dick talks of the Met being “furious” over the arrest, though how on earth he can tell from the poolside of his gated Florida compound is unclear. But he is deeply unhappy with new Commissioner Bernard Hogan-Howe and one of his deputy Assistant Commissioners. Then he says a provision of the Leveson report has been “embraced” by Hogan-Howe. Sadly, this is not possible. It’s not for him to do so.

But what Littlejohn and the three hacks whose by-line appears on the headline article appear unwilling to tell their readers is that this arrest may not be about who the information about Andrew Mitchell may or may not have been passed to. It centres on the possibility that the officer in question was not present when Mitchell had his sweary outburst at the end of Downing Street.

Moreover, the further possibility, which the deeply subversive Guardian has managed to pick up on, is that there may have been, shall we say, some creative embellishment during the translation of what Mitchell actually said into what was fed to the press. And that would be the press for which Littlejohn works. So rather than let the readers know they may have been suckered, someone else gets kicked.

Nobody addresses the thought that single-sourced copy might not be A Good Thing.

Murdoch Supports Gun Control – Perhaps

In the wake of the Sandy Hook Elementary School massacre, the reaction of one media owner stood out: Rupert Murdoch, he of News Corporation, the Sun, the New York Post, and of course Fox News Channel (fair and balanced my arse) reacted with horror. Although he has now taken US citizenship – necessary in order for him to own those Stateside interests of his – he looked back to his native Australia.

“Terrible news today. When will politicians find courage to ban automatic weapons? As in Oz after similar tragedy” he Tweeted, the tragedy in question being the Port Arthur massacre in Tasmania. The shooter on that occasion was armed with a semi-automatic rifle (not fully automatic, so a direct parallel with US laws) and had killed 35 others before being arrested.

Gun laws in Australia were tightened significantly in the wake of this killing spree. But Rupe was clearly wary of any action in the USA: “Nice words from POTUS on shooting tragedy, but how about some bold leadership action?” was his follow-up Tweet. So it’s clear to anyone in the Murdoch empire where the boss stands. And the papers have followed his lead.

The Super Soaraway Currant Bun was unequivocal: “End the lunacy” shrieked the headline, calling the Sandy Hook shootings “America’s Dunblane”, that being the 1996 school killings that were the trigger for a handgun ban in the UK. Barack Obama’s speech was extensively quoted. Photos of all 20 children killed were shown. It was no different at the New York Post.

There, in an article titled “Remembering the kids gunned down in the Newtown massacre”, there is a recollection of all those children – four aged seven, the remainder just six – and an accompanying editorial that asks the question “Has technology rendered the second amendment to the US Constitution obsolete?” which is then answered in the affirmative.

So far, so encouraging, but when it comes to Fox News, everything changes: the word has gone out not to talk about gun control. There have been what had to be necessary exceptions, such as Chris Wallace’s Fox News Sunday discussion, which would have sparked real outrage if the subject had been off-limits on a show which remains one of the channel’s few less than totally partisan broadcasts.

But Fox News has a problem with this whole business: boss Roger Ailes and at least one of his hosts – professional loudmouth Sean Hannity – have permits to carry concealed weapons in New York state, there is the channel’s appeal to the libertarian and Tea Party constituency to consider, and their previous form on the issue. But they will have to say something, and say it soon.

And then we will see just who calls the shots at Fox News Channel.

Brendan O’Neill Gun Analysis Fail

Some of those that inhabit the bear pit that is Telegraph Blogs use bluster and even abuse to make their point – pace James “saviour of Western civilisation” Delingpole – while others try a little reason, despite the venom emanating from those who drift around the comments sewer. Others try to be provocative for the sheer hell of it, and in the case of Brendan O’Neill, fall down flat doing so.

O’Neill edits the “online magazine” Spiked, which, if it is anything like his latest post at the Tel’s blog repository, certainly should have been. “It isn’t redneck ‘gun culture’ that causes mass school shootings, it’s the culture of narcissism” he proclaims, making his first false statement: nobody mentioned the word “redneck” in the wake of the Sandy Hook school massacre.

This might be because “redneck” is a pejorative term aimed at those in the southern states of the USA, and Connecticut is assuredly not one of those. Then O’Neill suggests that his readers “look over there” by talking about school shootings, whereas the concern right now is about mass killings period. But to distract readers suits his purpose, which is to support the conclusion he has already made.

And focusing on school killings conveniently excludes the Aurora cinema shootings, the Tucson Safeway attack, the Washington sniper spree, and many more. O’Neill knows this full well. And all of these crimes involve modern, semi-automatic weaponry that can deliver dozens of rounds in a few seconds, which takes us to his supposedly clinching argument.

O’Neill tells that guns have always been there, and to an extent he is right, but the ability for a citizen to acquire products such as those I described yesterday – like the Barrett M-82, the Bushmaster M-4, the Glock pistol, and even a civilian specification AK-47 (merely “semi-automatic”, rather than fully so), is a wholly recent phenomenon. That’s why they only feature in killings in recent years.

So that answers his question “why did such shootings only take off in the late 1970s and early 1980s”. If you can’t loose off more than one shot at a time, and the magazine only carries the six of a (for instance) Smith and Wesson pistol, then the potential for gunning down 20 children in a few seconds is next to zero. The Tuscon shooter emptied his clip of 33 rounds in less than a minute, remember.

And he was “only” using a Glock. None of this has anything to do with narcissism. It has to do with ready access to the kind of weaponry that has more to do with the ability to start a small war, rather than protect one’s property and personal freedom. That isn’t the spin of “pious critics”, but plain fact. It would be good to see Brendan O’Neill doing some research before inserting boot, but don’t expect it any time soon.

Still, keeps someone occupied, pointless though it seems. No change there, then.

Panorama – There May Be Writs

[Update at end of post}

This evening, the BBC’s long awaited Panorama on the affairs of Frederick and David Barclay (aka The Fabulous Bingo Brothers) is set to be broadcast, after acting Director General Tim Davie gave the nod. The Bingos are notoriously sensitive about anything that looks remotely like criticism, and this, coupled with their legendary humourlessness and willingness to sue, means their lawyers will be watching.

Suitably forced smiles for the press

The Bingos’ attitude has typically been to portray anyone disagreeing with them as being bullies and liars, while managing at least the first of those attributes themselves. This has manifested itself in the way in which they have approached their ownership of the Channel Island of Brecqhou and their relationship with the people who live on the adjacent larger island of Sark.

As to the second of those attributes, David Barclay said in a statement that “My brother and I have no editorial, political or economic power in the UK”. Oh really? Then riddle me this, Monsieur Bingo: how come the Maily Telegraph is not carrying any news about the Panorama programme, and why when I do a search for “Barclay Brothers” on the Telegraph site do I get zero references to them?

Then we come to the potential for legal action: this is a very strong possibility, given the Bingos’ previous form. The Panorama is being presented by John Sweeney, who has previously been sued by the twins. The action eventually ended in a French court in Rennes, where the Bingos were awarded a not very whopping 20,000 Francs (about £2,200 at the time) in costs and damages.

Private Eye issue 1264, Page 12

A subsequent action against the Times was later withdrawn, but the most jaw-dropping example of the litigious nature of the Bingos was in 2010 when they took action against Private Eye over what was clearly a spoof article in Issue 1264 (just to show that the piece was purely in jest, the feature further down the page is also included). The Eye took a robust attitude and rebutted the claim.

Indeed, it was a pity that the Eye’s lawyers did not simply refer the Bingos’ legal representatives to the precedent case of Arkell versus Pressdram (the woman running the local post office on Sark was also presented with a threatening solicitor’s letter for displaying a copy of the Eye spoof). Given the over-sensitive nature of the Barclays, legal action following Panorama seems certain.

But, it seems, whatever happens, it is most unlikely to be reported by the Telegraph: despite claims of no proprietorial control, the Bingos manage by the most miraculous of coincidences to keep their names out of the paper they just happen to own. That’s more effective censorship than even Rupert Murdoch himself. And their whole demeanour means good viewing figures for Panorama are guaranteed.

Especially as the potential shower of lawyers’ letters means it may not get repeated.

[UPDATE 18 December 1000 hours: anyone tuning in yesterday evening would have seen the protestations of the Barclays and their representatives about the limits of free speech, while bankrolling a newsletter distributed on the island of Sark that routinely trades in character assassination and forthright defamation of others, including presenter John Sweeney.

The comparison between the recording of his behaviour and its reporting in this publication was stark. Also clearly demonstrated was the way that Sweeney was followed while filming on the island by one of the Barclays' employees. You can see video HERE but remember - there is the likelihood of writs from The Fabulous Bingo Brothers, so don't delay viewing]

Sports Personality – Ruined By Rotten Lefties!

Not in living memory has there been such a long list of deserving contenders for the coveted BBC Sports Personality Of The Year (SPOTY) award. We had the Olympics, Paralympics, the Tour de France winner, a Grand Slam tennis champion, as well as a miraculous Ryder Cup win for Europe and a cricket team on the verge of putting one over on India in their own back yard (since confirmed, folks).

So few begrudged the BBC coverage running over by the thick end of half an hour, as viewers got to relive the most magical sporting year in living memory. We put on the best Olympics and Paralympics ever. Oh yes we did. And in the year of the Queen’s diamond jubilee, too, which event made it all the more fitting that Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge should be there to present the main award.

But there was also mileage for hacks and onlookers here, and mainly in honing the skill of praising the athletes and the occasion, while laying into the Beeb. The Telegraph led the way, first with the straight reporting “Bradley Wiggins wins BBC Sports Personality of the Year 2012 capturing the hearts of the nation”, and then bringing in pundit Iain Martin to provide the spin.

“Well done Bradley Wiggins, but the BBC was way over the top” whinged Martin, getting his snark in and – as with just about every other commentator – missing such minor items as the hundreds of Games Makers who had sensibly been invited to celebrate a sporting year for which they had all given so selflessly of their time and energy. But at least Martin was unequivocally supportive of the athletes.

This was not the case over at the Mail, where there was suitably grovelling Royal praise for Kate’s appearance, but a gratuitous and nasty amateur fashionista attack on many of the athlete’s outfits from Liz Jones, whose carping at Rebecca Adlington, Louis Smith, Katherine Grainger, Sarah Storey and Nicola Adams was bang out of order. That she will have been paid for this drivel is a minor miracle.

Even the Super Soaraway Currant Bun was happy with the outcome, especially as Kate was there. But the triumph of ordinary everyman Bradley Wiggins was not universally praised: head of the Young Britons’ Foundation Donal Blaney was aghast. “Grotty little scrote Wiggins fails to bow to HRH The Duchess Of Cambridge” he sneered. Wiggins is not shorter than Blaney.

Moreover, Blaney’s increasing girth over time would give him difficulty mounting and successfully moving a bike for more than the odd couple of miles, let alone competing on one. But he remained unable to take the hint, maintaining that anyone finding adversely on his preposterous outpourings was a “leftist”, rather than someone who had correctly identified him as a complete prat.

Such is the vacuousness of today’s punditry, whatever its chosen media.

Tom Watson Vindicated Again

For some in and around the Fourth Estate, laying into Labour MP Tom Watson has recently been a clearly enjoyable sideline, so much so that the enjoyment has forced the inconvenient matter of fact checking to take a back seat. So, while events in west London some years ago are gradually unearthed, it is coming clear that many of the recent attacks on Watson have been significantly untrue.

Moreover, the cluelessness exhibited by hacks and pundits – especially at the Mail – is breathtaking. When Watson criticised Home Secretary Theresa May for limiting enquiries to the North Wales care homes scandal and the activities of Jimmy Savile and the like, nobody stopped to think that he was alluding to at least one other unconnected affair. And they aren’t reporting that affair, now it is being unearthed.

Instead, the line has been trotted out that the MP for West Bromwich East was behind the speculation that caused Alistair McAlpine to be mistakenly identified, and the naming of Peter Morrison, former MP for Chester, but he was not. Typifying this approach was Andrew Pierce, who called Watson’s intervention “The one-man crusade that fuelled child abuse rumours”.

Pierce asserted that Watson had informed “a political blogger” that the Prime Ministerial aide had served Margaret Thatcher, but he didn’t identify the person in any way. No PM was named, nor any party, nor any timeframe in which the activities took place. Pierce won’t be apologising, though, and nor will the odious Quentin Letts (let’s not) who joined in the smear campaign with relish.

Letts, who it seems was most unhappy about being taken to task recently by this blog over his slapdash and inaccurate portrayal of the Leveson presentation, holds no thoughts of others’ sensitivities when laying into them. He told readers that the Watson intervention was just to take the heat off those rotten lefties at the BBC over the Savile business (the same rotten lefties who give Letts regular screen time).

Letts also claimed that Watson had “made pointed (and wrong) claims about one of Margaret Thatcher’s friends being a pederast”, which he hadn’t. Perhaps he would care to explain the Police enquiries now under way into the former Elm Guest House on Rocks Lane in Barnes, run at the time by Carole Kasir, who was found dead in suspicious circumstances at the age of 47.

The guest house was frequented by gay men, and also rent boys who took their clients there. When the notorious Special Patrol Group busted it, they broke in on two of their fellow officers. Many politicians were allegedly involved, and they weren’t all Tories. Some of those involved are now coming forward. Tom Watson is once again being vindicated, while the press keep their heads down and keep schtum.

This is what passes for investigative journalism nowadays. And it’s not good enough.

You Can Own These Guns Legally

You’ve heard the immortal words of “Dirty” Harry Callahan: “this is a .44 Magnum, the most powerful handgun in the world, and would blow your head clean off”. But in the USA, you can buy and own guns that put weapons like that in the shade. Blowing someone’s head clean off? You can wipe them out completely with a weapon like the Barrett M82 sniper rifle, which packs .50 calibre ammunition.

Yes, a round rather larger than that in the .44 Magnum, and with the capability of firing it around five miles. The M82 is effective – accurate – at distances of over a mile. It has a delivery that can penetrate armour plate. It is widely used by the military. Owning one of these is not a necessary part of keeping your home and its occupants safe. But it can be legally owned in the USA.

Maybe you want something a little more mainstream? Well, the Bushmaster M4, which was used to such lethal effect at Sandy Hook Elementary School, is more widely available, and it too is legal for the citizen to own. It was also the weapon of choice for the “Washington Sniper” attacks of October 2002. This assault rifle is a civilian derivative of the Colt M4 carbine.

Making the M4 legal, though, extends to it being “only” semi-automatic, plus the barrel is a little longer. It can still deliver over 700 rounds a minute, which means that it too is a little over the top when it comes to personal protection. But this and the M82 are rather obvious: folks can see you’re packing some serious heat. Well, there is also a legal and lethal product that gets round that problem.

Easily concealed about one’s clothing, the Glock semi-automatic pistol is light and can take a magazine holding up to 33 rounds of ammunition. That magazine is a clip that can be changed in a few seconds. This was the chosen weapon of Jared Lee Loughner, who targeted Rep Gabrielle Giffords and killed six in the space of a single minute. He’d have killed more if he hadn’t fumbled the reloading operation.

And, just in case this hasn’t sufficiently underscored how lax the US’ gun laws are, consider this: the world’s most widely available military assault rifle – over 75 million are known to have been made – can be legally purchased and owned by a US citizen. I give you the AK-47 aka Kalashnikov rifle, rugged, dependable – and reliably lethal. Your local gun dealer will have more information on this product.

Mind you, the AK-47 is old enough technology to “only” deliver 600 rounds a minute. But it, too, is way more than a self defence device. It’s the kind of weapon you would acquire if embarking on a terror operation or minor war. And there are guns like these in households across the USA right now. All you need to do is to drive over to the local gun store and hand over the money to arm yourself to the teeth.

Don’t forget your driver’s license, mind. They don’t sell this kit to just anyone.

The Hitch Of Doom

Since data from last year’s census was made available recently, a frightening discovery has been made by the legendarily foul mouthed Paul Dacre and his motley band of hacks and pundits: the number of white and upstandingly Christian citizens of the United Kingdom is decreasing over time. This is clearly A Very Bad Thing, especially as that is also the target demographic for the Daily Mail.

They're not coming to take him away. Yet

So over at the Dacre Bunker, an operation to frighten those readers into buying yet more papers was indicated. This has taken the form of two doomsayers engaging maximum why-oh-why mode, the first being A N Wilson, whining that “I no longer recognise the Britain I grew up in”, not realising that this might be because the Britain he grew up in is not the UK in 2012.

Wilson is not prejudiced, you understand, but takes clear exception to finding that there are Asian taxi drivers in Stoke-on-Trent, and that the city looks rather different to what it did 30 years ago. He’s even less prejudiced against Albanians, who are by definition criminals. And recent immigrants, it is suggested, are generally in receipt of state benefits, in accordance with the mindset of his editor.

But this is only the warm-up act for the perpetually miserable Peter Hitchens, who has taken time out from trying to convince anyone that smoking one spliff causes permanent mental derangement to whine apocalyptically “Alien nation: The new census reveals a Britain that would be unrecognisable even to our grandparents”. Yes, and my grandparents would have revelled in it.

For starters, they would not have had to suffer appalling workplace safety standards, frequently dodgy food quality, having to pay to see the doctor, not being able to refrigerate (far less freeze) food to keep it fresh, not having access to up to date and factual information except through newspapers whose agendas were driven by cranks like Max Beaverbrook and the Rothermeres, and much more.

That generation still had to suffer relatively low wages, coupled with many having to remain at home and dedicate significant time to domestic toil: many homes still had no inside toilet, vacuum cleaners were a luxury item for many, and as for automatic washing machines – you must be joking. Most houses had no telephone, nor television. Nor did they have access to a car.

But all of this is ignored by Hitchens, who instead carps about same-sex marriage, immigration, and of course the EU, while trying to frighten readers by suggesting that Islam will take us over because the followers of The Prophet have larger families (Hitch has clearly not met many Roman Catholics of late). And all the time there is talk of the “indigenous British”, this in a country that is the product of immigration.

Hitchens wants a Britain that never existed. But the rest of the world has moved on.

Top Six – December 16

So what’s hot, and what’s not, in the past week’s blogging? Here are the six most popular posts on Zelo Street for the past seven days, counting down in reverse order, because, well, I’ve got some pre-Christmas stuff to do. So there.

6 Jacintha Saldanha – Media To Blame, Say Media The tabloids all banged on about the 2Day FM hoax call. Then they turned to play the other side of the field and dumped on the hoaxers. Same old, same old.

5 EXCLUSIVE Guido Fawked – Teaboy No-Mates Newly appointed teaboy to the Guido Fawkes blog Alex Wickham pretended that commentator Owen Jones was a mate of his. Jones disagreed. Here’s why he was right to do so.

4 Mail Photo Theft Hypocrisy The Dacre attack doggies came over all righteous when fashion blogger Poppy Dinsey found her photos were being lifted and used without her knowledge or permission. This was a bit rich, given that the Mail has form for thieving photos without asking or paying up – including Ms Dinsey’s.

3 Murdoch Stateside Court Case Going unreported in the UK was a case brought by a US union and the Avon Pension Fund against Rupe and his pals over securities fraud. Murdoch’s lawyers are trying to get the case thrown out. They’ll be lucky if they do.

2 Tom Watson Vindicated – Nobody Apologises All the hacks, pundits and bloggers who accused Labour MP Tom Watson of being involved in the Alistair McAlpine naming, and asserting that his Parliamentary intervention was something to do with the North Wales care homes scandal, went quiet as it came clear that he hadn’t done anything of the sort.

1 Boris Johnson – Pants On Fire Bozza waded into the energy debate with his latest Telegraph column. Sadly, his relationship with the facts suffered significant damage in the preparation of the piece, and this points up some of the more blatant whoppers.

And that’s the end of another blogtastic week, blog pickers. Not ‘arf!

Boris Deputy Brain Drain

London’s occasional Mayor Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson is back in the news again, but not on account of anything he has accomplished: not for the first time, the subject is one of his deputies, the latest being Stephen Greenhalgh, the deputy Mayor for policing, whose first appearance at members’ questions was less than totally persuasive. Dave Hill of the deeply subversive Guardian summed it up as “petulant and inept”.

Cripes chaps, this reality malarkey is dashed difficult!

And appearing equally inept was Greenhalgh’s alleged groping of a female staff member in a City Hall lift, which prompted calls for the former Hammersmith and Fulham councillor to go. As if this was not bad enough for the second Johnson term, it was then alleged that the source of the leak about Greenhalgh and the grope was his fellow deputy Kit Malthouse.

The litany of Bozza and failed advisors does not, moreover, end there. Dumped by the discerning electors of Barnet at the last Assembly elections was Brian Coleman, former chair of London’s Fire and Emergency Planning Authority. Coleman has been censured for calling a constituent a “Blackshirt” and is awaiting trial for assaulting a woman cafe owner after a parking row in September.

Coleman was accompanied out the door at the elections by Richard Barnes, whose departure was painted as the result of him being targeted by a campaign to save Ealing Hospital, which was not in fact targeted for closure. He and the Standard seem to have forgotten the furore he caused after the London riots when he cracked a crude racist joke, following a slur on the Irish earlier in the year.

That wasn’t the only racist quip by a Bozza deputy: earlier in his first term, James McGrath had “allegedly remarked that Caribbean immigrants should go home if they do not like London”. Bozza asserted that McGrath was not a racist, but, and this is a big but, his continued presence was considered not good for the Bozza mayoralty, and his resignation was therefore accepted.

McGrath was the first to go, and he was followed very soon afterwards by Ray Lewis, deputy Mayor for young people, after the Guardian dug up events from his past. These pertained to his financial affairs and conduct: Bozza changed his opinion from lauding Lewis as a “tremendous deputy” to accepting his resignation “with regret” 24 hours later.

And to make it three in a row for that first term, there was also the loss of Tim Parker, his first deputy Mayor, who explained that “he was stepping down because he did not think Johnson needed a full-time first deputy mayor”. Anyone looking at the fallout from the elections and the latest shambles might reasonably get a feeling of déjà view over the whole business.

They then might wonder who will be on their way next (clue: it won’t be Bozza).

Newtown School Shooting – NRA Silent

[Update at end of post]

After the shooting in Tucson, AZ when a federal judge was killed and Rep Gabrielle Giffords, the target of the attack, was critically injured, there was a call to put down the guns, and the gun metaphors, political campaigning having become heavily charged with their like over the preceding years. Maybe the politicians did put down the gun metaphors, but the guns kept on being fired.

And the citizens kept being killed and injured: only last July, at a cinema in Aurora, CO eleven were killed and many more wounded after a gunman threw gas grenades into the auditorium before loosing off his weapons. The inevitable suggestions from the gun lobby that, if only more of those present had been armed, one or more could have taken the shooter out, were predictable and pointless.

Why so? Well, after the gas grenades had gone off, nobody could see the gunman, and in any case he was wearing body armour. And now has come another multiple fatal shooting, this time at what those Stateside call an elementary school, what we in the UK call a primary school. Twenty little children no older than ten years old were gunned down. Many more were injured or traumatised.

The USA has been here before: there was another shooting, at Columbine High School, back in 1999, an episode which led campaigner Michael Moore to confront Charlton Heston, staunch champion of gun rights and hugely popular with the National Rifle Association of America (NRA), as part of his film Bowling For Columbine. The NRA did not so much as pause for thought.

Well, they have this time: the NRA Twitter feed went very quiet yesterday afternoon and has yet to give any reaction to the events at Sandy Hook school in Newtown, CT. But the NRA will be speaking up as soon as the initial shock and revulsion has died down, excusing not merely the provisions of the Second Amendment, but also the legitimacy of citizens packing all manner of high powered guns.

And that is what those of us in the UK can’t comprehend: what need is there for anyone to own assault rifles, machine pistols, or anything else that can deliver more than half a dozen rounds? What need is there for some citizens to indulge in a kind of macabre arms race? In 2009, there were over 10,000 gun related homicides in the US. There were 63 in the UK. That’s an approximately 30-fold difference.

How many more times will a President have to repeat Barack Obama’s words from yesterday? “As a country we have been through this too many times ... Our hearts are broken today, for the parents, grandparents, sisters and brothers of these children, and for the families of the adults who were lost”. Mayor Bloomberg of New York wants leadership on the issue. I have a suggestion for him.

Let’s see the NRA show some leadership for once.

[UPDATE 1810 hours: for those reading in the UK to get some idea of the sheer wilfulness of gun advocates in the USA, here is a segment from yesterday evening's CNN Piers Morgan Tonight, where the host gets very clearly fed up with one panellist who is dissembling and suggesting that the way to stop the shootings is to get rid of existing restrictions on where citizens can carry guns.

He sticks to his script despite Morgan's, and the two other studio panellists', interventions. He does not accept that a primary school teacher owning semi-automatic weapons is unreasonable. This panellist is typical of the gun lobby. Note also that he asserts that gun murders in the UK have increased dramatically as a result of the post-Dunblane handgun ban]

TPA Police Hypocrisy – They’re Nicked

Until last month, policing priorities and the liaison between elected representatives and police forces were the remit of Police Authorities. These have now given way to Police and Crime Commissioners (PCCs), the reason being that this makes policing more democratically accountable, as the Commissioners are elected representatives themselves. And in the vanguard pressing for them was an old friend of this blog.

More guff from Tufton Street

Yes, supporting PCCs from the very start has been the dubiously talented array of non-job holders at the so-called Taxpayers’ Alliance (TPA): back in 2010, using the platform afforded him by ConservativeHome (not that they’re Conservatives, of course), non-job holder Mark Wallace told that “we need directly elected Police Commissioners”. He urged the Home Secretary to press on with them.

Indeed, it was later reported, also on ConservativeHome, that the TPA’s EU “expert” Lee Rotherham would stand for election as a PCC in Lincolnshire, and he was described as “An excellent candidate”. Sadly, when the election was held, Rotherham was elsewhere. So that excellence did not extend to actually completing and submitting nomination papers, then.

But the TPA pressed on with its support, with “grassroots coordinator” Andrew Allison (as the TPA has no grassroots, this is their most aptly titled non-job) complaining about supposed waste by Humberside Police Authority while repeating the mantra “We support elected Police Commissioners”. This was followed with more TPA “research” titled High Costs Of Unaccountable Police Authorities Revealed.

Not everyone, however, was persuaded: West Midlands Councillor John O’Shea, aka PoliticalHackUK, asserted that the TPA had it wrong, especially the claim that PCCs would replace chief executives. He estimated that, when the cost of elections was factored in, PCCs would in fact cost more than the Police Authorities they were replacing. So how are things looking as the dust settles after those elections?

Well, quite apart from the miserable 14.7% turnout across the country, the TPA are complaining about the activities of the very people they campaigned for. “Are Police and Crime Commissioners appointing friends to non-jobs?” asked non-job holder Andrew Allison, wording his rhetorical question in the style of Fox News Channel (fair and balanced my arse). Then he answered his own question.

“More rows as some PCCs appoint friends as deputies” he confirmed. What did he expect? Freed from the oversight of Police Authorities who would have stamped on that kind of behaviour in short order, PCCs can please themselves until the next election comes into view. The TPA has once again failed to think through its ideas and is now playing the other side of the field, hoping the public won’t notice.

Well, they have noticed, and hopefully some of the politicians will notice, too.

Littlejohn Zero Research Take 94

The Daily Mail’s tedious and unfunny churnalist Richard Littlejohn has a more or less permanent grudge against a number of politicians, most of whom represent Labour and the Lib Dems, which he clearly believes to be too liberal and wishy-washy for his taste, which gives every impression of being that of an early 1980s London cabbie. And one of those he most reviles is Leicester East MP Keith Vaz.

Keith Vaz, Guv? 'E's a bleedin' foreigner, innit?!?

This should surprise no-one: Vaz was not born in the UK, he is Asian and of Indian-Portuguese heritage, he supports the wrong party, and has been criticised in the past for certain of his activities. That his constituents have returned him to parliament for the past twenty years with (since 1992) well over 50% of the popular vote is of no significance to Dick and his legendarily foul mouthed editor.

So what has Vaz done to provoke the ire of Dicky Windbag? Simples. He has become involved in representing the family of nurse Jacintha Saldanha. So, instead of asking why this might be, Littlejohn has gone off the deep end. Fortunately for him, right-wing pundit Jill Kirby had already produced a why-oh-why attack on Vaz in her weekly ConservativeHome column.

And today’s Littlejohn rant covers, to no surprise at all, much of the ground already covered by Ms Kirby, with a suitably exaggerated listing of Vaz’ supposed misdeeds inserted, together with giving the impression that he was actually there when the bereaved family appeared before the media this week, rather than the more prosaic fact – that he was behind the gates of his secure Florida compound.

So Dicky Windbag appears to have lifted his line of attack from someone else, and has, like Ms Kirby, complained that Vaz is not the family’s MP. But, as Littlejohn’s own paper has already noted, he is the family’s spokesman. Why Jacintha Saldanha’s immediate relatives would want his assistance is not considered, and yet again this shows that Dick can’t be bothered with a little research.

“The only obvious connection between the Saldanhas and Vaz is a common Indian heritage” he asserts, failing to understand that the family name is actually Barboza. He’s wrong: unlike most who live and have relatives on the Indian sub-continent, Jacintha Saldanha and her husband shared the same Christian and indeed Roman Catholic faith as Keith Vaz.

Moreover, the dead nurse also shared the same Indian-Portuguese heritage as Vaz: Saldanha (it’s pronounced Sal-Dahn-Ya) is a Portuguese name. So there is very good reason for her family to seek out Keith Vaz. Littlejohn could easily have found all of this out, but then, that would have introduced the kind of nuance that would detract from the blunt and crude objective of kicking a Labour MP.

And that, after all, is what meets the Daily Mail agenda. No change there, then.

Murdoch Stateside Court Case

Seemingly going unreported despite the increasing notoriety of the defendants is a class action for securities fraud lodged at the US District Court in the Southern District of New York. Here, plaintiffs including a UK Local Government pension fund are suing News Corporation, News International, and also Rupe, Junior, Les Hinton and Rebekah Brooks, just to be on the safe side.

Securities fraud in this instance refers to the price of News Corp shares, the allegation being that some information regarding the less than totally legal behaviour of some of Rupe’s troops in the UK had not been disclosed in a timely manner so that potential investors could form a properly informed judgment as to whether or not it was worth putting their money into the Murdoch empire.

That so little is known about this action seems strange, given that it has been rumbling on since papers were first filed in July 2011 (my thanks to @jpublik for the tip). And why the action was taken is not hard to see if the News Corp share price movements during 2011 are examined: after fluctuating between $18 and $19 in April and May, there was a fall in August to under $14.

The volume of shares traded as the price fell shows spikes that suggest heavy selling, possibly automatically triggered, and one can only assume that the investors taking the action baled out during one of these episodes. The News Corp share price did not recover that $19 level until January this year (it later went well above $20 on the prospect of the company being split up).

So who is taking the action? Well, there is a US Trust and a Union pension fund, but the interest for those in the UK is that the action has been joined by the Avon Pension Fund, which is nowadays administered by Bath And North East Somerset Council (aka BANES). Avon was a county set up as part of the 1973 Local Government reorganisation, but later abolished.

And the latest development is that News Corp is trying to have the action dismissed. The grounds for this are that the allegation of non-disclosure of wrongdoing is incorrect, and that evidence of voicemail interception had been disclosed as early as January 2011. But what really put the lid on the whole affair was the July 2011 revelation that the Screws had Millie Dowler’s phone hacked.

It was the Dowler revelation, and the subsequent closure of the Screws, that hit the share price, and it is more than likely that this will form the central plank of the case against News Corp, along with the likelihood that someone high up in that organisation knew about it. So if Rupe and his Stateside troops get this action dismissed, I reckon they can count themselves very lucky indeed.

And if not, well, it could get even more messy – and a lot more expensive.

Guido Fawked – HuffPost Jealousy

One has to cut the rabble at the Guido Fawkes blog a little slack on one part of their approach to the blogosphere: they like to see other bloggers get on, to the extent that there is a regularly updated list of links to other blogs and media websites. But – and with the perpetually thirsty Paul Staines there is inevitably a but – this encouragement is only given to those approved by The Great Guido.

HuffPost UK Political Director Mehdi Hasan gets kitted up for a friendly chat with The Great Guido and friends

And that means any blog that passes adverse comment on Staines and his gofers, the odious flannelled fool Henry Cole and newly-appointed teaboy Alex Wickham, cannot hope to be allowed on to the supposedly privileged list. This proscription also extends to any blog or online news source that is regarded as competition, and especially if its politics do not meet with the approval of Staines and his pals.

So it should come as no surprise that the Huffington Post UK is frequently on the end of sneering dismissal by the Fawkes rabble, and is rarely cited in its links list, especially now that Mehdi Hasan has been appointed Political Director there. Staines harbours an irrational hatred of Hasan, partly because he is making a success of his career and Staines can’t do anything about it.

The latest lame Fawkes attempt to spin against Hasan and the HuffPost UK has come with the news that early hire Dina Rickman is leaving to further her career elsewhere, and that the site’s first Political Editor Chris Wimpress had already left (the Fawkes blog is a bit late with the latter news, which I was given last month). This is suggested to be something out of the ordinary. It isn’t.

Then, to reinforce the idea that the HuffPost UK with Hasan on board is A Bad Thing, come selectively interpreted traffic figures. The figure for August of 4.1 million unique visitors is mentioned, then a figure of 2.5 million per month from a HuffPost UK advert, followed by the suggestion that traffic must have declined since August, which is then laid at the door of Mehdi Hasan.

Sadly, this is nothing more than hot and steaming bullpucky. The 2.5 million visitors figure is clearly an average one – the hint is in the “per month” phrase, folks – and the 4.1 million in August is more than likely due to most of the Olympic Games, and part of the Paralympics, falling in that month. Those events might not matter to The Great Guido, but they are meat and drink to the HuffPost UK.

So there hasn’t been a downturn, the HuffPost UK isn’t suffering a “brain drain” (clear scrape of the barrel there, Fawkes folks), and Mehdi Hasan is still no nearer to the exit door. But The Great Guido has demonstrated his high principles: Staines has no problem in gatecrashing the HuffPost UK opening bash and getting himself Elephants Trunk and Mozart on their booze, and then kicking them as a thank you.

Especially as he can’t stop their ratings progressing. Another fine mess, once again.

Mail Photo Theft Hypocrisy

[Update at end of post]

The Mail Online website likes Poppy Dinsey. This 25 year old “fashion blogger” had already been featured after she appeared on the BBC Newsnight programme – the characteristically leering headline was “Newsnight bunnygirl” – and yesterday she made another appearance after finding that a porn site in the States had published photos of her without asking first.

What's f***ing wrong with a little photo copying, c***?!?

Now, given that Ms Dinsey runs a site called What I Wore Today, and uploads a photo of her in her outfit du jour on a regular basis, it is no surprise that there are a lot of photos of her out there. And it’s all too easy for someone to take copies of them, even if the results may not be a patch on the originals. But the Mail is deeply concerned about photo theft.

And that may come as a surprise to many who have encountered the Mail and its cavalier attitude to thieving photos when it suits, such as the time in 2010 when Los Angeles and Miami based agency Mavrix Photo decided to sue for copyright infringement. It was alleged that Mail Online had used as many as ten photos without permission. This was not an isolated occurrence.

After the student protests and fringe violence that took place in November 2011, photographer Thomas Welfoot sold an image of the young man who dropped a fire extinguisher on to Police from the roof of a Central London building to Sky News. The Daily Mail then lifted it and published it five times. After taking issue with this copyright theft, he was offered a fraction of the amount invoiced.

In April last year, they were at it again, this time raiding Flickr and Facebook to garner images for a Mail Online piece. This year, Neil McGrain discovered that the Mail had lifted one of his photos without permission, acknowledgement or payment, and despite his only request being that a donation was made to a late acquaintance’s memorial fund, it took several attempts to get it.

And in the same month, photographer Gakuranman found that the Mail had used several of his photos without permission and had even cropped the identifying watermark from most of them. Again, only after the Mail was pursued for payment did they agree to stump up. By now, it should not be difficult to discern a pattern of offending: lift the image and hope the photographer doesn’t pursue you.

All of which makes the synthetic outrage over Poppy Dinsey a blatantly obvious slice of hypocrisy. But perhaps there is a more straightforward explanation: the “revealing outfits” that she is alleged to wear are exactly the kind of thing that Mail Online loves to parade in its so-called “sidebar of shame”. And letting anyone else get a piece of that photo action is not in the interests of Martin Clarke and his gofers.

One rule for the Mail, and another for everyone else. No change there, then.

[UPDATE 1830 hours: In a jaw-dropping case of "You couldn't make it up", it seems that the Mail even lifted Poppy Dinsey's own photos themselves - and then ran a piece complaining about someone else doing it! Ms Dinsey has been in touch to point Zelo Street in the right direction, for which many thanks.

The photo the Mail used for their original "Newsnight bunnygirl" story was used without Ms Dinsey's permission, and without payment (the Evening Standard, formerly part of the same newspaper group, also lifted her photos, but was rather less gracious when it came to paying up).

Both papers were invoiced and ultimately settled, but once again it is a case of nick the photo, don't tell the copyright holder, and only pay up and acknowledge if pressed. The Mail went one step further, by lifting photos without permission and then castigating someone else for doing the same thing. There's some brass in those necks round at the Mail offices]