On Monday the 9th, The Sun ran a story about a letter the Prime Minister wrote to the mother of a soldier who died in Afghanistan. I think they did use her for political purpose to bash the Prime Minister. They seem to care about the lives of the soldiers now. They denounce vehemently the lack of equipments but when Iraq was invaded, they did not really care about the poor equipment soldiers had already at the time. They call themselves journalists but they did buy the lies of Tony Blair about the WMD.

At the eve of Brown’s conference, they switched their support from the Labor to the Tories. They have the right to do so although they should stick to the principles they claim to have by being the watchdogs whatever government is in place.

But may be future leaders of the Labor should learn a lesson from it. As a matter of fact politics have to govern and not care about the editorials of newspapers especially from the Sun. It is naïve from Gordon Brown to call Rupert Murdoch a friend because this guy does not really care about who is power as long as the politics serve his interests.
Labor is supposed to be the party of the people. Well out of these stories of “amour blessé” we learn that Labor was in power to please Murdoch. They were elected to change Britain not to frolic behind close doors with News Corp.

Labor deserve what they got. It is pathetic that after that story on Monday, Brown called his “friend” Rupert to complain about the treatment he is having from the Sun, and how funny it is to hear that Murdoch regrets the way his papers has turned against Brown. (http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2009/nov/12/gordon-brown-rupert-murdoch-misspelling?CMP=AFCYAH)

Wrong choice

What a surprise !The Nobel Peace prize was awarded to Barack Hussein Obama, the US President and the commander in chief of an Army involved in two wars. A guy who has escalated the war in Afghanistan by sending more troops there, around 20,000 men and women and is thinking about sending 40,000 more soldiers.To his credit he has made great speeches about the importance of dialogue, but the last time I’ve checked there were still wars in Afghanistan,Irak,Congo…


President Obama did not ask for the Nobel Peace Prize, and he has admitted that he did not deserve it. It is also true that the Prize is not only about achievements but also effort.
Rachel Maddow in her show reminded us that the Price was awarded in 1935 to a journalist called Carl Von Ossietzky and that he did not really achieve anything, same thing with Aung San Suu Kyi because the junta is still in power… There is a difference though. Those Nobel Prices fought or are still fighting with their lives and the million dollars which is given with the Prize is very useful for the fight. Now the award goes to the more powerful man in the World protected by more than 400 men and women of the secret service, and the million dollar will go to charity. How sweet...

There are hundreds of people fighting with their lives in China, Congo Cuba,Burma,Russia,Zimbabwe with no secret service protection, with no money and the guys from Oslo decided to give that Prize to the President of the United States. Wrong choice.

The Ethics of Journalism

Today in class I've seen " Absence of Malice" of Sydney Pollack with the late Paul Newman. The son of a mobster is being investigate concerning the murder of a union leader. This movie made in 1981 is still contemporary despite the facts that newspapers all around the world especially in Western countries are dying. Newsrooms become smaller than ever.

The movie shows how a journalist can be manipulated. Indeed many journalists are more PR than real journalists. They are supposed to seek the truth in theory. In the real world they are some kind of puppets and above them government and big companies are pulling the strings. Of course in this movie or in l'affaire Julien Dray, it is not serious. When journalists are manipulated in order to prepare the opinion to go to war, that is a different matter.Thousands may be millions of lives are in danger. Indeed concerning the Iraq War journalists all around the word especially in the States and in Britain have been successfully manipulated.

However it also the job of journalists to sell newspapers or to write or broadcast a good story;how do we judge the quality of a source especially if it's from the police or the government?How do we investigate with limited resources?

Clearstream

Le procès Cleastream entre maintenant dans sa troisième semaine. Pitoyable spectacle auquel participe l'ensemble des journalistes. Aucune enquête de fond, des dizaines et des dizaines de noms sont apparus dans ce fameux fichier et on ne parle que de celui du Président de la République. Rien sur l'affaire des frégates de Taïwan. Comme d'habitude on ne s'attarde que sur ce qu'il y' a de plus spectaculaire,de vide et de facile. Le procès continue...

The conservatives are back?

The general election in UK should be called in several months. The Tories has started their conference;" Ready for change is their motto". They should change it to ready for cuts, cuts and cuts.
The Labour is doomed, and the Lib Dems are not being taken seriously.I rephrase that; the Labour thinks that it's doomed and the Lib Dems don't want to be taken seriously.
So the Tory party is triumphant. The election has already be won,it's been a while now that all the newspapers are dancing around Labour's coffin. The prime Minister takes pills to get through,he is blind,stubborn,anxious,sick,mad,crazy...in other words his policies are wrong.

On the other hand David Cameron is fluent in english, the Prime Minister is not, he probably speaks some Scottish dialect that no one but himself and probably his wife can understand.

6,7, 8 months are an eternety in politics, wait and see.

MP’s expenses and Brown

Mp’s expenses and Brown

It’s been now 28 days since the Daily Telegraph started their revelations about the MP’s expenses. Some would say that they have unleashed a campaign against politicians as a whole. For some it is investigative journalism at its best.

The political establishment is shaken by it. Heads are rolling, Michael Martin, Julie Kirkbride,Jacqui Smith,Hazel Blears…


The public is angry, the press, the commentators are going wild. The British democracy is in peril. The BNP is on the verge on taking power. MP’s are going to need police protection like the Royals because they can be lynched.
Everything is moving fast though; the press has shifted its fire power from the MP’s to Gordon Brown. There is no ambiguity in The Guardian’s editorial (3/06/09) “Labor has a year left before an election; its current leader would waste it. It is time to cut him loose.”
I do think though that the Press in general does not learn anything from the past. Dominique Wolton a French scholar and researcher call it” la culture de l’instant”. We can translate it by the culture of the present, of the moment without looking forwards or backwards. It seems that today is eternal with no future.

I can’t predict the future but I think Gordon Brown will stay on and could end up by winning the next election if it is in one year time. One year in politics is a very, very long time.
That does not mean that the Prime Minister does not deserve the critics, but to count him out is premature and begging for more blood and heads will not fix ‘broken England” or save the papers from their struggle to survive.

Cheney an example for democrats

Last week Dick Cheney was all over the news with President Obama.
He dared to speak after him about national security defending the previous administration and presenting, justifying his views. Well I have to say that I don't agree with him but I think it is a lesson that democrats should learn when they are in the opposition. During the Bush years they did not speak up even though there were many things to talk about,WMD,torture,social security...
They were quiet, why Cheney should follow this bad example?