The Power of Pinot Grigio 58


After five years of heated blogging, I take a couple of days off to watch golf and down many a litre of pinot grigio, while sticking up some wind-up posts about abolishing the BBC and Jane Goody accents. The result? Rebekah Brooks falls, Murdoch teeters and the horrid nest of corrupt cop liars are in trouble.

This was a two bottle day. For tomorrow’s third round I shall drink three bottles of pinot grigio (or probably a nice burgundy, given the weather forecast). That should bring down Cameron.

Who said alcohol isn’t good for you? It has wonderful results.


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58 thoughts on “The Power of Pinot Grigio

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  • Jonangus Mackay

    Very good. Excellent.
    .
    But, with respect, Your Honour (or should that be ex-Excellency?), you’ve still not told us what you said or did not say to Jason Cowley.
    .

  • Jonangus Mackay

    Early Murdoch stories that promoted child suicides — Oz editor Richard Neville:
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    http://j.mp/nHVt9d
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    Hope on Tuesday these previous offences will be taken into account. I urge all readers to forward above link to their MPs and, in particular, to members of both Commons committees considering Murdoch Most Foul on Tuesday.
    ::

  • Jonangus Mackay

    Curse these word-completion programs built into smart phones. Line above should read not ‘promoted’ but prompted.

  • Philip

    Connecting your personal wine consumption with the larger political seen seems to me an instance of the classic logical error, post hock ergo propter hock.

  • dreoilin

    “post hock ergo propter hock”
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    Indeed, given the “teetering, falling, and getting into trouble” that he describes as the result.

  • dreoilin

    Methuselah Now,
    Interesting link from mondoweiss.net, thanks.
    .
    Good to see you Richard!

  • Jonangus Mackay

    Last night’s interview that did for Rebekah — ‘Sure she has to go. You bet she has to go.’ The fatal words come 5 mins in:
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    http://bbc.in/aXQtp
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    Back-announcing the piece, Newsnight presenter Kirsty Wark appeared to have missed utterly the significance of what News Corp’s biggest shareholder, after Murdoch himself, had just said. This was *the* scoop in the whole of last night’s show ~ yet, astonishingly, went completely unspotted. (The BBC website heading is also misleading. Yet another example of the journalistic incompetence that has long pervaded the Corporation’s online operation.)
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    Murdoch’s response to the Saudi diktat, no doubt reluctant in the extreme, was nonetheless scimitar-swift. Sacrifice of his cuddly Gorgon confirms that he now accepts the whole ranch is surrounded by flames.
    ::

  • KingofWelshNoir

    ‘Who said alcohol isn’t good for you?’
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    No one with any credibility as far as I am aware.

  • Jonangus Mackay

    I see the Guardian has only now picked up on the above story — 24 hours after the interview went out. They were asleep at the time? Astonishing.
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    http://bit.ly/qCT4L2
    :

  • Jon

    Must’ve been the second bottle that caused Les Hinton to fall. Well done you, carry on! Murdoch Jnr next? Fox News will take a while, but it’s a possibility. Keep some champagne in the fridge!

  • John Goss

    Stick to the Burgundy, Craig. Since the doctors at the Queen Elizabeth (2004) told me red wine was good for reducing blood pressure I’ve been hitting it pretty hard. I binned all the other shit they wanted me to take!

  • mary

    Jonangus Perhaps Rusbridger’s lot are tuned in to what Craig writes and our comments thereon and pick up some nuggets. I posted something about the Saudi prince early yesterday morning quoting a Google news item –
    .
    ‘Speaking from his 252′ $150m luxury yacht which he bought for a knockdown price of $19m from Trump who was on his second bankruptcy, this Saudi prince thinks Rebekah should go. What he says obviously goes. He has to protect his investment in this stinking swamp doesn’t he?!
    .
    Major News Corp. investor calls for Brooks to quit
    (AFP) – 5 hours ago
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    LONDON — Saudi billionaire Prince Alwaleed bin Talal, a major shareholder in Rupert Murdoch’s scandal-hit News Corp. organisation, on Thursday said under-fire executive Rebekah Brooks “had to go”…..’
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    Then I went out and came home three hours later to hear that she had resigned.

  • mary

    This connection of Les Hinton’s wife to Gordon Brown makes the contents of Brown’s speech to the HoC on Wednesday even more unbelievable.
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    Personal life
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    Hinton and his long-time partner Kath Raymond married in 2009, with Rebekah Wade and Andy Coulson invited to the later celebration. They live in a townhouse on Manhattan’s upper east side. Raymond, an advisor to former Prime Minister Gordon Brown in 2007-2008, and to David Blunkett before that, wrote briefly for The Daily Telegraph from New York City.
    .
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Les_Hinton

  • mary

    eg http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/mediamonkeyblog/2008/apr/18/brownnosingatthesun
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    Brown-nosing at the Sun
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    The Sun features a new expert pundit on its pages today to analyse the UK’s special relationship with the US under Gordon Brown. Kath Raymond is billed as a “former government adviser who now lives in New York”. Kath offers a paean of praise to Brown, “a tireless and clever worker” and “a world-class heavyweight who can be relied upon in the leanest of times”. On she gushes: “There isn’t a big-time businessman or financial whizz-kid on Wall Street that Brown doesn’t know or whose admiration he hasn’t earned”. And, to show she knows her stuff, she also namechecks the Wall Street Journal and the article Brown has penned for it this week. The Wall Street Journal is of course part of the same empire as the Sun, now that Rupert Murdoch’s News Corporation has bought Dow Jones. The US business is being run by Les Hinton, until recently head honcho at Wapping in charge of, inter alia, the Sun. He has been joined in New York by his partner, a former government adviser by the name of… step forward, Kath Raymond.
    .
    Posted by Monkey Friday 18 April 2008 14.23

  • Herbie

    Les Hinton resigned. That’s much more significant than Wade. Looks like they’ll have
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    difficulty holding News Corp together in its present form, with Fox News itself now
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    under pressure in the US.
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    With all these enquiries, leaks and backstabbing now going on here and in the US and
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    other places there’s a possibility something might emerge about Blairio and co which may
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    not be so easily contained by a compliant judge.
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    Something indictable, I hope.

  • Herbie

    Oh dearie, dearie me. Cops caught lying and perverting the course of justice again:
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    “Scotland Yard’s most senior officers tried to convince the Guardian during two private meetings that its coverage of phone hacking was exaggerated and incorrect without revealing they had hired Neil Wallis, the former deputy editor of the News of the World, as an adviser.”
    .
    http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2011/jul/15/phone-hacking-met-police-guardian
    .
    It seems the whole of the Metropolitan Police’s top officer cadre are up to their necks in collaboration with News Intl.

  • ingo

    Right you are Herbie, the trust in the police has been eroded by their own political policing and newsmanagement of the most vile kind, politicians almost don’t come into the equation. Anybody worth his three brain cells in the Met must realise that this will make their policing an intolerant affair, because the general public will not believe that they are working ontheir behalf anymore, this is the last straw.

    Anybody arrested, do not talk to nayone until they have allowed you a lawyer, they have no right to any information, unless they agree to reform themselves. ACPO, a private company, should in future tender for their services, regionally as well as nationally, and we as voters, should ideally have a non ACPO choice when we elect our police commissioners,providing this promise will ever be granted by our little Goebbels.

  • mary

    Right on Ingo. I liked the name of their PR bod which could have come straight out of the list of characters in The Godfather.
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    Dick Fedorcio OBE, Director of Public Affairs – his pathway to the top
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    Dick Fedorcio, is Director of Public Affairs and Internal Communication for the Metropolitan Police Service, a post he has held since September 1997.
    .
    He is a member of the Management Board and is responsible for explaining and promoting the work of the Met’s 30,000 police officers and over 10,000 police staff. Based at New Scotland Yard, he leads a team handling media, public relations, publicity, advertising, public affairs and internal communication.

    On leaving school he started his career with the Greater London Council where he spent 12 years, which included a short spell with Basildon Council, before being appointed county information officer for West Sussex County Council in 1983. In 1986 he joined Kent County Council as director of corporate communication, where he stayed for 8 years, before joining the Electricity Association in 1994 as director of communication. In 1996 he moved into consultancy with Westminster Advisers.

    He was President of the Institute of Public Relations in 1992, having previously served on its council since 1986 and chaired the Professional Practices and Local Government Committees. He was made a Fellow of the Institute in 1991, a Fellow of the British Association of Communicators in Business in 2001 and is also a member of the Market Research Society.
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    The Director of Public Affairs of the Metropolitan Police Service, Mr. Dick Fedorcio, was awarded an OBE in Her Majesty the Queen’s, 2006 Birthday Honours List.
    .
    What was the OBE for FFS?
    (Met website – Who We Are)

  • Methuselah Now

    Hi,

    One of the most poisonous relationships, that enabled/encouraged this nexus with the corruption of the police and their leaks, doing a great job of hiding under the radar and that which effected more people most immediately on a daily basis, as bad as Andy Hayman being caught having improper affairs, losing his job, and still retaining his pension and being given a job by News International, is the great bankrupt tabloid-feeding terrorist-fear propagandising, anti privacy and rights @?*%# of David Blunkett.

    It wasn’t just the police, though they are in their necks in it and should all resign, but the now invisible David Blunkett that intertwined himself most directly, of the politicians, within editorial coverage (quite happy to comment and leak on those unconvicted, or even found innocent).

    Kind regards,

    MN

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