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Oh, to have been a fly on the wall at that photo session, especially with a video camera to capture the look on Gordon's face!

Nice one Mr Bailey.

Do you think Rupert intends to retire to dig the garden? I somehow doubt it.

Is the ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳ trying to be nice to News International? I suggest you try looking deep into James Murdoch's credentials and skills. I think you will find that daddy is still in control.

One family in charge of such a vast media empire is not good. The Murdoch's own political leanings will be given preference, which is much the same as having state propaganda.

Hmm, but who does Wendi support?

A veritable avalanche of blog posts. Clearly you are through your bloggers block. This is much more like it.

Nick, surely the near 24x7 stream of Labour gaffes over the last few months would place Gordon Brown at the top of James’ Christmas card list. Would the proprietor of Sky News want it any other way?

I think the PM's refusal to have a referendum on the EU Treaty had soured his relationship with Murdoch in any case.

How do you know James Murdoch's opinion
regarding Cameron?

Why is the ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳ concerning itself with this matter?

The ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳ are supposed to be unbiased in political motivations. As such, it is irrelevant to the ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳ whether other news sources are for or against, Party A, Party B, or Party C.

The ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳ continue to exploit international commercial markets, verge on the edge of political bias, and whether they will admit it or not - assist in the "dumbing down" of news.

It all makes me wonder why I bother paying my license fee. I certainly do not pay it to read such drivel - and if I have the choice to not read it, why shouldn't I have the choice to not pay for it either.

So the real changeover in power really is going to happen in 2007.

The heir apparent, Prints James Murdoch has finally been given his own printsipality to run.

And to add to our Gordon's woes, he likes David Cameron.

Let's just hope that like Bush in America, his daddy will be the one pulling the strings.

That way we might be able to counter the catastrophe that would be another Conservative government.*

* = This is based on the assumption that it really is The Sun that decides who runs Britain.

The Murdochs are 'world citizens' with business interests all over the globe, so they should really be viewed from that perspective.

That is, they do what they do to further their business interests ... full stop.

It is a pretty unedifying spectacle to witness politicians grovelling before the Murdochs (as Tony Blair did prior to 1997 when he visited Rupert in Australia) but I guess they think it is worth the humiliation if the media controlled by these people can be loosely 'bought onside'.

If the English people were better educated, they would see though all this, but unfortunately general education levels in England has actually declined over the last few decades.

As a consequence, business people like the Murdochs are inordinately powerful.

Of all the long list calamities to strike NuLab and Team Brown over the past month or so this, from an electroal point of view, is the worst.
The Sun and NoTW were showing deep scepticism towards Brown, now they will fully swing onside with Cameron alongside the Sunday Times. Leaving only The Times alone in the broadly pro-NuLab camp (they'll change soon!)

By my reckoning that only leaves the FT and perhaps the Guardian as pro-Brown.

Mr Constable, you are too trusting me thinks! do you really think top polititions would bother grovelling to the likes of Mr Murdoch if he didnt hold great sway with the british public?
I doubt it!
Also i dont know what facts you possess regarding your comment on education, i would estimate none, as they were saying education standrards were slipping a couple of decades ago too, yet we see an increrase in university applicants year on year for as long as i can remember.
Facts are always good when putting an argument forward.

A balance in the political slant of the printed & visual media is not a bad thing.Good for the health of democracy.
A Murdoch stable which might swing behind David Cameron's Conservatives would provide long overdue balance to the hostile editorial policy endemic in the Labour leaning/LD sympathising ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳/Guardian line.

Other than the silly idea that digital photography is a lesser artform, Mr Bailey should have been given the rather obvious response, "Then photography is like socialism: it flattens everything out." A bit self-evident as Mr Bailey's work is totally 2D.

Thanks for the break and change of material, Nick. It's a welcome opportunity to chuck out some mental baggage and pick up something else. The Murdoch handover and David Bailey joke are interesting and funny. I'm not sure where it fits in but one comment that caught my eye was how front page news is becoming wrapped up in the techniques of fiction writing.

I'll be honest, I don't like or trust James Murdoch. He's a more urbane and modern version of his father. Not a brawling outbacker, more an iron fist in a velvet glove. I doubt Gordon will fight him. Moving forward on developing a positive and inclusive vision from the ground up will win support in the country and drain any long-term Murdoch opposition for free. Not a problem.

I admire the sincerity and patience that was offered in response to the David Bailey joke. It sounds funny in the same way a small boy is corrected by a church vicar. It sounds like David Bailey got what he deserved. I hope the Prime Minister can develop sincerity with humour, as well as humour with sincerity, so he may continue to be like the sun shining on warm soil.

May flowers grow in Blessed Leaders footsteps.

Can anyone explain why the FT is pro Brown? I do not read the paper, but I would have thought tax and spend incompetently, which we have had for 10 years under Brown as Chancellor, would have been anathema. i

It's a myth that the likes of the Sun and NotW have any significant influence on election. Even in 1992 it was calcalated that the key marginals which decided the election didn't have enough Sun readers to make a difference. And how many of those readers actually bother to vote now?

To all those NuLab bloggers who feel that the press might become more sympathetic to the Conservatives, don't forget that you will always have the ingrained institutional center left bias of the ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳ to support you.
It's about time we had a free press again to balance and challenge the torrent of Labour spin.

MikeA: "By my reckoning that only leaves the FT and perhaps the Guardian as pro-Brown" - and the ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳ of course!

I do not think that this is good news for Gordon Brown, even Sky's political blog site had gone pro Cameron.
So much so it is now a Tory love in with very few if any Labour supporters bothering to go onto the blog-site.
It should be renamed the Sky Tory blog-site.
As all it is one Tory talking to another.

No.10

Well said John.

Does it matter? Newspaper circulation is down, their satellite interests are under pressure, and the future of satellite broadcasts are in doubt with the advent of IPTV.

The Murdoch's need terestial access, either through cable, a telephone line or the network of digital transmitters currently being introduced. So for the time being I can't see them rocking the boat.

I wouldn't expect you or other journalists to be critical of each other, but how can you admit your slant on an event depends on who your employer is, or could change at the whim of the boss. Thats what you have intimated.

You asked the other day why are people becoming turned off by politics? Maybe you have hit on something.

I wonder if this will be reflected in the plot of Ugly Betty ?

The real comedy in this is Rupert's republicanism - his dislike of inherited power.

But Labour will continue to get support from the biased ³ÉÈËÂÛ̳ no doubt.

the boy will do what daddy tells him after all he is the paymaster.

It must be difficult for anyone to be "pro-Brown" when he is a walking disater zone.

I fail to see why Bailey would crack a joke about socialism to Gordon Brown.

I'm a socialist and New Labour most definately is not.

In fact, it's a double disgrace that:

a) It still uses the name 'Labour'
b) The Trades Unions continue to fund it, even though it has carried on with their destruction where Thatcher left off.

Remeber the Warwick Agreement? How any one in the TUC upper echelons thought New Labour would honour it is beyond me. It was blatantly obvious from the start that they were only signing it to get the unions to fund them through the election and the unions were to weak and dozy to see it.

New Labour is most definately not socialist. It's not even centrist, it's mildly right wing (which is more right wing than hoodie Cameron is)

'Moving forward on developing a positive and inclusive vision from the ground up will win support in the country and drain any long-term Murdoch opposition for free.'

How I love hearing of the easy answers from the land of the progressive socialist.

Charles E - what a load of woolly-minded guff.

The Sun wrecked it's credibility by
foisting two "men of the people" - John Major and Kevin Keegan - on us. It now backs (and I suspect will continue to back) whoever it thinks will win.

The Murdoch Press follows more than leads - The Sun and The Times will always back the likely winner (which I agree is a re-inforcing strategy). Cameron looks a likely winner at the moment.

The old moan from "real socialists" that Nu-Labour is not socialist is a laugh. Nu-Labour have just found ways of marketing (spinning) themselves so that they are more attractive to more people over a longer period but they are true socialists with their tax and spend agenda and massive wasting of tax payers money. The old saying "you can fool all of the people some of the time but some of the people all of the time" comes to mind and they have done that one well. Tony Blair was very good at marketing himself and Nu-Labour with the power of his charisma but lets be honest Gordon Brown has no charm or charisma and suddenly everyone sees the real Nu-Labour and their incompetence in goverment.

They don't change the editor or journalist team everytime the Murdochs change allegiance, so clearly even they can't believe half of the stuff that they write.

Perhaps Murdoch is just very good at picking up on popular opinion and latches on to which ever side he thinks is going to win, but the power of his papers shouldn't be underestimated.

Companies spend millions on advertising, because as shallow, false and transparent as most advertising is - it generally results in a huge increase in sales.

If there are sufficient people out there who really do believe that their washing powder washes cleaner because the advert told them so, then surely a heck of a lot more people trust stories written in Newspapers.

After all, it's not like the 80s where politics even surfaced in soaps, today the only political info most people get is through the newspapers and the TV.

I'm with David Bailey here. Digital photography doesn't have the vibrance or tonal range of a good quality camera with slide film. I still use a camera from the 70s that has more vibrant colours and can be scanned to over a hundred megapixels.

Digital is for snapshots and journalists.

25 Andy Williams."NuLabour now more right wing than the Conservatives" Great- you willnow be voting Tory at the GE.Yet another defection.

I'm surprised that the Sun is behind Cameron.

He has no policies and at any election would lose their support because he has no-one to put anything into practice anyway. Once the battle lines are really drawn, that will soon be apparent. A green approach to energy and a property review are not policies and won't resonate with Sun voters. Once the government weathers this crisis and gets back on a level, I think things will soon even out again.

Nick,

Did you not know that Murdoch junior was a friend of obnoxious Osbourne's or did you leave out the information deliberately? Why?

I hope the British public would revolt against being manipulated by foreign media moguls.

The Murdoch empire has no real influence. Mostly, it's the appearance of influence. "It was The Sun wot won it" is a nice headline to cement that in place and people have been repeating it ever since. The same illusion is propagated within News International. It's not especially clever but effective enough at keeping all the sheep in line. James Murdoch's rise just proves this.

A closer examination of the facts shows that Murdoch senior is a brute who's prepared to game the rules and bully people into submission to stay in charge of the company. He gets away with it because he's smart enough not to specifically break a rule but only the spirit of the rule. As for political judgement, he wobbled last year and is merely getting behind the polls.

The mainline of the government's strategy tends to grab the low road, or simple practicality and sociability. People may have forgotten but just prior to Tony Blair giving way to Gordon Brown the core policy drive was hitting every button with the electorate. Behind the headlines and brouhaha they look like they're continuing to develop this. Strategically it's unbeatable.

The Murdoch empire will destroy itself. All Gordon has to do is be tolerant and patient. People are loath to change as they fear giving up what made them successful. The older and more successful they are the harder it is to force this so don't bother. Route around it by encouraging more enlightened media and the young. Over time the pebble ripples through the pond and expands positive consensus for no effort.

If I may paraphrase Ricardo Montalbán's "the five stages of the actor":

Who is Rupert Murdoch?
Get me Rupert Murdoch.
Get me a Rupert Murdoch type.
Get me a young Rupert Murdoch.
Who is Rupert Murdoch?

The young Murdoch has been given a province to prove his mettle. Like his father he will pull the stunt of looking like a leader but, really, he needs us more than we need him. Without the rich and varied political environment to play with he would grow flabby and weak. Fighting him only makes him stronger but "Yes Murdoch, no Murdoch" removes the target. Indeed, by heaping on praise he can only become more arrogant or paranoid.

By continuing to smile and relax, not being drawn in to creating mountains of legal clutter or responding mechanically to events, the leader gives space for the people to succeed and be happy. By embracing "no action" Prime Minister Gordon Brown's star will rise and he will become a much loved leader. This is better than respect, which is merely a Mexican standoff, and much more long lasting than fear, which crumbles once the effort is withdrawn.

So, Nick. I think, it just got much better for Gordon.

Do people still read the Sun?

That in itself shows how bad the education system is. A properly educated country would have seen it go bust by now.

What a ridiculous suggestion Nick! Will you be voting according to what the Sun says? Is the British public so naive and stupid?
As regards the loss of data, and other idiotic incompetence of the British Management, people will finally vote on the economy. Bring in the Swiss and the Germans to run our data protection, cause our traditional British management has gone to the dogs!

"I hope the Prime Minister can develop sincerity with humour, as well as humour with sincerity, so he may continue to be like the sun shining on warm soil.

May flowers grow in Blessed Leaders footsteps."

Your doctor phoned to say you haven’t been for your tablets. Can you phone him please because he is threatening to phone the police.

Post #12 Gareth C.

"According to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development's (OECD) analysis, the UK is now ranked 24th in the world for maths, down from eighth in 2000, and 17th for reading, down from seventh at the turn of the millennium.

The latest analysis of Programme for International Student Assessment (Pisa) performance tables follows on from the finding last week that the UK's has lost its top-five science ranking, falling from fourth to 14th in the world.

The Pisa tables are compiled every three years to compare education standards among the world's 15-year-olds."

Thats the OECD and PISA but I'd say that you can also sense these things for yourself.

Just login to a 'social networking' site like Friends Reunited and check out the standard of English from say the 1950's through the decades to date.

I would suggest that you will see a clear decline in standards.

You really do not need politicians telling you that all in the educational garden is rosy.

The future for England, where the value of intellectual capital is almost the only value worth having, is looking a bit dicey (heavy understatement).

As has been described if literacy of school leavers in this country is less than 50% then obviously the Sun - NoTW - and Sky have a ready made market to 'endorse' Rupert's views , or even those of his offspring , which are probably the same - or else.
The reason Rupert endorsed Tony was because Maggie said he was a good bloke and had nothing to do with socialism.

Do people still read the Sun? If so then of course it's absolute proof our education system is going backwards.

That being the case then I would have thought Murdoch junior would have been much pro Labour. The Tories might - although I doubt it - actually improve the education system and in the process the Sun readership levels would hopefully fall.

Come to think of it's probably a much better way of evaluating the education system anyway. Less Sun readers means its improving, more means it's getting worse.

Bailey would have been nearer the mark if he had said that digital is just plain dotty - and the more you enlarge on the fact, the more dotty it becomes. Give me an optical enlarger any day!

what's interesting here is that the supporters of the Government (Hardwidge et al) are desperate to fill us the more New Labour rhetoric about reform based agendas rather than face the comlete mess that is the state of their party.

no surpirse they can't face the facts; more of a surprise that they think after ten years this kind of specious treacle has anything but a gagging effect on the electorate.

Social justice equals ideological dogma, Charles. Get soem new policies. Better still, get a new leader; this one is a dead man walking and you know it.

I think the power of the papers concerned is overrated. There are now very few people who get their news from just one of these sources, especially with the ever-expanding info now available online.

Sveik asks why the FT is pro-Brown. Ten years of economic stability and growth is the answer, I would have thought. It's only incompetent tax-and-spend economic disaster if you believe the Daily Mail.