Well done Ed Miliband for speaking out about the Daily Mail's article on his father

[claig]

The Daily Mail used a low tactic of accusing Ed miliband's father of hating Britain.

I think it was a nasty thing to do. Just because someone is a Marxist and may criticise some aspects of the country or its instiutions does not mean that they hate Britain.

I'd like to know how much the DM receives from PRs to publish press releases articles on behalf of various 'celebrities' in the sidebar of shame. When they own up to the amount of money that they receive for advertisements masquerading as stories then they can lead the call for a free press.

'No one is arguing (here) that the press be muzzled. However what we do want is that they show some common decency and humanity.'

That is what Clegg and those millionaire in chateaux say, but I think Clegg is facing a public lack of trust in what he says.

'show some common decency and humanity'

That is what Campbell implies, but frankly that will be a very tough sell after his years in New Labour.

The danger is that the reasons they give for press regulation are just more of the spin that they are famed for, and the real motive is more pernicious.

The Mail seems to think so and the Mail is a formidable opoonent because it is backed by millions of middle class readers, who although despised by the great and the good, still have huge influence as voters.

I wonder how many chateaux are owned by the multi millionaire Viscount Rothermere?

"Claig, most of the press is owned by millionaires in chateaux. I wouldn't look to them to liberate you from your oppression by millionaires in chateaux."

Yes, that is right. The battle for power and influence is played out by different millionaires in different chateaux all vying for influence. The winners are the cleverer ones, the ones who use the people in their fight for power.

In my opinion that winner is the side that backs the Mail, because it is the Mail that has listened to the middle classes. There is only one politician who has really grasped that and that is Gove, who has gone easy on his attacks against the Mail, while some of the others in carefree abandon have recklessly and joyously kicked the Mail while it was down. But there is an old saying that Gove probably knows well and is possibly engraved on his heart in Latin

"act in haste, repent at leisure"

and the foolhardy Lords and the great and the good have forgotten it or maybe never paid attention in class when it was being taught at Eton.

Polly Toynbee's article is interesting and she implies, I think, that Miliband will eventually lose his fight with the Mail. I agree with her on that, but I disagree on why. She thinks it is because the Mail is the Establishment and that is where I think she is wrong.

I think it is the BBC, the Guardian, Clegg, the chateaux, the Lords, heseltine et al who are the Establishment and some of those characters also brought the People's Prime minister, Margaret Thatcher down.

But in taking on the Mail, they have taken on the People's Paper, and when they chose to do that, then the only way for them is down!

The DM wrote: "We do not maintain, like the jealous God of Deuteronomy, that the iniquity of fathers should be visited upon the sons". So, a paper with a history of support for fascists chooses to defend their attack on a dead Jewish refugee war veteran by regurgitating a negative trope about the "Old Testament".

That's why people think it's antisemitic. Alex Brummer has chosen to ignore this, and to allow himself to be the living embodiment of a "but some of my best employees are Jewish" defence. Someone ought to send him a copy of the works of Rabbi Yisrael Meir Kagan...

I'm quite enjoying all this Daily Mail "voice of the people" stuff. Absolutely fascinating.

It's a little bit like Orwellian isn't it.. "some millionaire chateaux owners are more equal than others"

Flippinada, you are right. The battle at the top is one of Orwellian complexity and spin, and we are only the viewers on our TV screens. We are the pawns in the chess game that are advanced across the board by the players of the game.

We participate in the game by voting, and we back the side that agrees the most with our views. The winner of the game is the one who can take most of us along, and I would not place a bet against the Mighty Mail.

You're unwell, claig.

For funzies:

Mehdi Hasan Savages Daily Mail On BBC Question Time (VIDEO)

www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2013/10/03/mehdi-hasan-bbc-question-time-daily-mail_n_4039900.html

You should know!

Yes, I should know. I read your posts.

' I read your posts.'

But do you understand them?

I haven't had the chance to see that clip yet but it certainly looks interesting.

On the Daily Politics, a senior ex-Murdoch employee whose name I can't recall, said that the press regulation that those in favour of regulation want will mean the end of much of our local press and that the local press is an important part of our democracy and Kevin Macguire seemed to agree with him.

I never realised that our local press was so important to our society and that many papers would not be able to aford to operate in the proposed new press environment. But if there is truth in that, then the public will back the press as the election nears and the arguments heat up.

Those who want to regulate our free press may then be on the back foot as the election approaches.

The free British press used to be as respected worldwide as the BBC still is. You would not believe how often the British tabloids, particularly the Mail, is ridiculed and disparaged on, for example, French TV. I can't speak for other countries of course as I don't watch other countries' media, other than the UK TV of course. It has proven itself again and again that it is incapable of responsible reporting. It is sad that even light regulation is being considered but you have to understand why it has come to this.

Homehelpme thanks for the explanation of the anti semitic arguement. I hadn't picked up on it in the article and hadn't read round that aspect since. I'm doubtful that the intent was anti-semitic coming from Levy, but I may be wrong.

As for the comment this morning that the Mail is owed apologies. Yes, it came from an underling, albeit a senior one, and I would be very much surprised if he would have said anything that Dacre himself wouldn't agree with. They just don't. You never hear Mail employees going against Dacre.

'The free British press used to be as respected worldwide as the BBC still is.'

Petite, the BBC is a great institution but I fear it has lost a lot of its respect. The Savile case didn't help and then there are all the executive payoffs and pensions and miscalculations etc. But apart from all of that, you are leftwing and so respect it, but the ordinary Daily Mail reader has lost some respect for it because they think it is biased towards the left over issues such as climate change, its Climategate coverage, the EU, political correctness etc etc I hope it regains its forner great reputation for unbiased, impartial coverage but I doubt it will be able to because I think it has a leftwing bias.

'You would not believe how often the British tabloids, particularly the Mail, is ridiculed and disparaged on, for example, French TV.'

Campbell doesn't work over there as well does he?

I don't like some of the Mail's positions versus the French and some of its Little Englander mentality, so I can see that the French may not be too keen on it sometimes, but on the really substantive political issues, I don't think it is bad and would be surprised if it is ridiculed.

It's ridiculed for all kinds of reasons. Next time I see a comment on it I will pm you and let you know, I can't think of any specific examples right now.

Left wing? Actually I am naturally right wing. In fact if I was voting in France I would have voted Sarkozy last election. I LOATHE the champagne socialist government in France, particularly the President. It is only in UK and US politics that I would be considered left wing. Growing up in the. Thatcher years ensured I could never vote for the Tories. I did hope that Cameron would improve them but I, like so many, have been proved wrong.

The BBC actually manages to annoy both sides. To the Mail it is too left wing. To certain left wing commentors it is too right wing. It does a good job. That said the Tories when in power do everything to hinder it. But its poltics isn't actually the issue with the Mail. The Mail hates the BBC for commercial reasons, not because it is too left wing. That's just what it tells its readers.

Campbell does come on to French television from time to time. I have seen him several times. He speaks very good French, comes across as a bright person. In fact until I got UK TV installed a few years ago I had never heard him speak in English, just read of him.

'To certain left wing commentors it is too right wing.'
Are you referring to Marxists?

'That said the Tories when in power do everything to hinder it.'
I think the Tories have little power over the BBC because the BBC is the Establishment. Tebbitt accused them of bias for years, I'm not sure if they were able to influence it at all.

'The Mail hates the BBC for commercial reasons, not because it is too left wing.'
That is possible, I don't know.

'Campbell does come on to French television from time to time.'
The poor French viewers, what did they do to deserve that? What channel is that on, France 24 or TF1 etc?

You would not believe how often the British tabloids, particularly the Mail, is ridiculed and disparaged on, for example, French TV

Really petite what do they say? Is it proper criticism or just Brit-bashing? We French-bash so that's not my point. I'd genuinely like to know whether the criticism is valid or not.

Yesterday Sky News had the editor of the Jewish Chronicle, Stephen Pollard, on to talk about the anti-Semitism angle. I thought he was very reasonable.

His standpoint was that he could see a whiff of it but wasn't convinced it was deliberate although Jews are understandably alert to any real or perceived attack.

I think he's written for the Mail so might be minding his bank balance, but he seemed very thoughtful.

What was very funny was when Kay Burley asked him to comment on the jewish Express publisher, Richard Desmond's allegation of the Mail's anti-Semitism.

Pollard side-stepped it quite skilfully. He used to work for the Express and in his last leader before he was due to go to the Times he wrote something benign that if you read the first letter of every left-hand line vertically it spelled 'Desmond is a cunt'.

It was discovered and I think the Times rescinded the job offer.

limitedperiodonly, from what I have seen the French don't Brit-bash in the stupid way we French-bash. They do talk about an Anglo-Saxon approach etc but it is a serious discussion about difference in culture, as far as I remember, but I am interested in what Petite thinks about that too.

I thought that Boris's speech with the joke about the French mayor was not good. The way he pronounced Alain Juppe and talked about the French with their medals is typical of some English condescending attitudes and it was similar towards the Chinese in the Olympics, and I thought Cameron's stuff about showing that Russian official how good a country we are was frankly cringe-making. I agree with Ed, that type of nonsense demeans us, "Britain can do better than that".

claig I don't have masses of time right now but I will try and find a link for you over the weekend about the Mail grudge against the
Beeb.

Most of the TV I watch in France is on Canal+, and Campbell, each time I have seen him was on an excellent daily show called le Grand Journal. The first half is dedicated to politics and serious culture, the second is more popular culture oriented. As of this year it is presented by Antoine de Caunes, who has grown up a bit since his eurotrash days of my teenage years. Boris Johnson has also been on it a few times, and I have also seen Blair on it once or twice. Anyway, they always get big hitters.

To be honest limited there is far less Brit bashing over here than Frog bashing in the uk. The French are surprisingly anglophile, at least, the media and political shows I watch are. They love British fashion, the Royals, and have a lot of respect for our popular culture as well as our history. In fact some of the shows I have seen on British history and about the Royals are as good as what we have in the uk. However, remember that the French are big on privacy, and there are privacy laws over here that the British press hate (though with the arrival of reality tv and magazines such as Closer and the accompanying 24/7 appetite for gossip that is changing). There is a certain amount of shocked admiration for the tabloids, in a 'we would never dare do that kind of way' but recognition that the tabloids have well overstepped the boundaries. Examples of gross intrusion of privacy from the Leveson inquiry were scrutinised and commented on. Every now and again there will be a section on a media show about recent articles in the British press that have everyone in pretty much gleeful . So a mixture of mocking, fear that the press is going downmarket in the same way here, and serious debates about privacy, legal and illegal collecting of information by journalists. There was a recent documentary on the paparazzi (lots of French paps work in the uk and usa as they can get away with so much more).

I will be keeping an eye on this weekend's programmes to see what they say about Miliband. The Mail is particularly reviled however, despite a grudging respect for how they have coped with the internet etc. Obviously no french newspaper could match that due to the language barrier.

He was right about Desmond though! :o

I will look out for it on youtube.
Blair speaks French, does Boris speak French?

'The French are surprisingly anglophile'
I agree, the French are adults, not this juvenile schoolyard type knocking of foreigners.

. Go beyond the banter with Boris and there's nothing left. He is bright but it is not his political skill whichhas got him where he is, it's his communication skills. Once when he was on French TV he had basically translated all the lame jokes he had been making in the British press, like the one about him being as likely to be PM as being reincarnated as an olive. In one day doing the French rounds last year he came out with that joke three times, and that's just in the things I saw or heard (he did radio shows and several news programmes that day, I didn't catch all of them).

I did a guest post for MN about him earlier this year here: www.mumsnet.com/bloggers/guest-blogs/eddie-mair-boris-johnson

I had a whole section about how the French saw him but cut it out as it wasn't relevant.