European Court Rules Against Mosely

Update: Max Mosley; enemy of the common man.


The European Court of Human Rights ruled yesterday against Max Mosely's attempt to gag the press. The fundamental component in this little saga by the way, is people chucking their weight about and it is that which is the genesis of this tale.

When Martin Brundle, then ITV's commentator for Formula One, wrote an article for the Times questioning the style of Mosely's autocratic rule of F1 and his far from subtle jihad against all things McLaren, Mosely, as is the wont of megalomaniacs, took umbrage and issued a writ against Brundle and the offending newspaper, The Times. Brundle responds.
(Link dead)
Before I say more about the wisdom of Mosley issuing a writ against News Corp, proprietor Rupert, the dirty digger, Murdoch, and the subsequent outcome, let me offer this newly discovered piece where the writer shows a canny degree of insight.

Taken from the comments of a motor sports forum, and it is the last paragraph that we need to pay particular attention to.

There's another point which hasn't been touched on yet.

The Sunday Times is part of a large media empire - News Corp - owned by Rupert Murdoch.

In the UK, News Corp has a serious level of clout. Outspoken support of various parties and criticism of others by its papers has previously influenced election results. Its papers also helped increase public opinion for the war in Iraq in the UK by dripfeeding stories about Saddam's atrocities and WMD through both its down and upmarket newspapers.

The closest analogy I can think of elsewhere is Ferrari deciding to sue a Berlusconi owned newspaper or TV channel in Italy. Whether or not the FIA has a strong case is irrelevant, its taking on a very powerful organisation owned by someone with considerably more global clout than Max who also has a serious inability to deal with people who have differing views from him.

After the FIA announced it was suing the Sunday Times, the paper let Brundle write two more articles that, if anything, are even more critical of the FIA and also published another article written by a different journalist that was equally scathing. Its safe to say they aren't being intimidated by the FIA unlike ITV.

What will be interesting is whether News Corp decides to have a close look at the FIA and Max Mosely himself to see what skeletons there are hidden in his cupboards. News Corp practically destroyed the Conservative party in the UK a decade ago by releasing stories about corruption and sleaze within the party. If Max didn't like Jackie Stewarts comments about him then Rupert Murdoch has the ability to make him feel like a brain tumour is a birthday present. Lets hope for Max's sake he hasn't made dodgy deals in the past or had affairs he doesn't want people to know about. source

Skeletons in cupboards indeed, and of those Mad Max had his share, and a few months later they were going to come out of the closet, all singing, all dancing on the front page of the News of the World; proprietor, you've guessed it, the dirty digger himself.

Rather than re-hashing stuff, for there is much I want to post today, let me send you to a post that I wrote at the time under he heading, Christmas Comes Early For Ron And Martin.

Nothing became of Mosely's suite against News Corp by the way, it just faded away. Pitpass suite dropped

For an insight to Mosely's character and how it reflected in his dealings with Ron Dennis, CEO of McLaren, cast your eye over this little tirade. Mosley Sends Severe Letter to Dennis A tad less than graceful you might agree.

But that pales in comparison to Mosely's shear vindictiveness and abuse of his position, demonstrated in this shabby attempt to block, through the FIA, Martin Brundle's proposed move to the BBC as part of their new team when they took over coverage of F1 from ITV. FIA trying to ban Martin Brundle?


Another opinion found on the web.

I asked a friend of mine who has worked for Rupert Murdoch’s News Corporation whether it was likely their revelations about Mosley in the News of the World was a response to the FIA’s decision to sue The Sunday Times (because of Martin Brundle’s columns on McLaren and Ferrari).

He chuckled at my naivete in even asking the question. Of course that’s what happened… Ron Dennis speaks, Max Mosley sues

And before we move on, a little titillation.

The reason we love such cases is that the British establishment is at its magnificent best when debating sex, in its studiedly dispassionate style. The Lady Chatterley trial in 1960 set the benchmark for this irresistible combination of gravitas and salaciousness, as when prosecution counsel Mervyn Griffith-Jones asked whether the novel was "a book you would wish your wife or servants to read". Max Mosley case: A spanking good spectacle

Max Mosley loses European court privacy law bid

Ex-motorsports boss Max Mosley has lost his European Court of Human Rights bid to force newspapers to warn people before exposing their private lives.

He said the Strasbourg verdict was "disappointing" but he may appeal, to keep fighting for tighter privacy laws.

In 2008, the UK High Court awarded him £60,000 damages after ruling the News of the World invaded his right to privacy by reporting on his sex life.

Victory might have led to new privacy laws, which press bosses oppose.

Mr Mosley, 71, said of the judgement: "[I'm] obviously disappointed, but it's satisfying that they've been extremely critical of the News of the World.

"I think they've underestimated the danger from the UK tabloids but obviously they're the judges and one has to respect their decision."
Super-injunctions

Mr Mosley won his 2008 High Court battle after a judge ruled there was no justification for the News of the World's front-page article about him paying five women to take part in a sado-masochistic orgy.

The tabloid reported that the orgy involving Mr Mosley, the son of fascist leader Oswald Mosley, had Nazi overtones, but this was rejected by the judge.

Although he was awarded £60,000 damages, everyone had learned the details of his sexual preferences, and he argued money alone could not restore his reputation.

He said once a story had been published, you could not "un-publish" it, and the damage had been done. blah blah

What I do find more interesting than the news of Mosely's defeat in the European Court of Human Rights, is this five minute, but comprehensive interview with Jeremy Paxman, where among other things discussed, are Twitter, nutters and injunctions. more

The ''few thousand pounds'' quoted by Mosely as being the cost of a super-injunction, is I am led to believe, about a hundred grand.



More graphics at, Mad Max's F1 Megalomania

Yes, Yes, Yes, Yes, Oh FFS!

One from the past. I was with them all the way until...... well you'll see. (Well not really, Max Mosley is a twat, but I didn't want to spoil my header.)

I did take the liberty of using my own graphics, one of which features a new crow.

A murder of crows, that's a funny old name for a bunch of birds.

Paul Dacre: self-serving and sanctimonious

The Mail editor’s attack on Judge Eady is nothing but a plea to be allowed to continue publishing lies

By Neil Lyndon

NOVEMBER 10, 2008

Paul Dacre, Editor-in-Chief of the Daily Mail, has effectively argued that democracy might collapse and newspapers like his own could go out of business unless they are allowed - without reprisal or punishment - to go on publishing lies.

That conclusion can be drawn from Dacre's speech yesterday to the Society of Editors' conference in Bristol.

Attacking the ruling of Mr Justice Eady that the News of the World breached the right to privacy of the Formula 1 boss Max Mosley in publishing details of his five-hour S&M orgy, Dacre said: "If mass-circulation newspapers, which, of course, also devote considerable space to reporting and analysis of public affairs, don't have the freedom to write about scandal, I doubt whether they will retain their mass circulations with the obvious worrying implications for the democratic process."

Max Mosley surely has justice more on his side than does Paul Dacre

Describing Mosley's acknowledged sexual tastes as "perverted, depraved, the very abrogation of civilised behaviour of which the law is supposed to be the safeguard", Dacre went on to argue that Mr Eady "has, again and again, under the privacy clause of the Human Rights Act, found against newspapers and their age-old freedom to expose the moral shortcomings of those in high places."

These pronouncements sound high-minded and public-spirited; but their elevated moral tone is in marked contrast with the practice of the press, not least in the case of Paul Dacre's own newspaper.

The reason why Justice Eady found for Max Mosley was that the News of the World had published an odious and indefensible lie. The paper had alleged that Mosley's S&M session contained elements of Nazi role-playing and that it had mocked the Holocaust and its victims. In his ruling, Mr Eady found "no evidence that the gathering... was intended to be an enactment of Nazi behaviour or adoption of any of its attitudes. I see no genuine basis at all for the suggestion that the participants mocked the victims of the Holocaust."

After the court case, Max Mosley announced that he would be setting up a fund to help less well-off people take legal action against newspapers which breached their privacy. He said: "I have learnt first-hand how devastating an invasion of privacy can be and how readily papers like the News of the World will destroy lives in the knowledge that few of their victims will dare sue them. I want to encourage a change in that practice."

In these observations, Max Mosley surely has justice more securely on his side than does Paul Dacre in his sanctimonious and self-serving moralisings.

Dacre’s elevated moral tone is in contrast with the practice of the Daily Mail

Everybody who has been the subject of coverage in the newspapers knows that they routinely, unashamedly publish lies and that - fearing no reprisal or punishment - they care nothing about the consequences of their untruths upon the lives of their victims. No case more amply demonstrated that indifference than the treatment of the McCann parents over the abduction of their daughter Madeleine.

Could any falsehood be more foul and loathsome than to allege, without any reason or evidence, that a child's parents had been culpable in her disappearance and/or death? The Express Group newspapers which profited for months from trading in that horrible fiction fully deserved the penalties that were meted out in court when the McCanns sued.

The truth is that our national press is a degraded institution - one which traffics in degradation with increasing desperation as its revenues collapse. If newspapers lose their mass circulation, as Paul Dacre fears, they will merely suffer the fate they richly deserve. thefirstpost

I did check out the owners of the paper, Dennis Publishing. They appear to be independent of the usual scumbags, and they do print Viz, so I guess I can make allowances.

Christmas Comes Early For Ron And Martin

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"she needs more of ze punishment!"

Well it couldn't happen to a nicer guy, surely this is Mosley gone gone gone.

Let us have a look at the headline from The Screws, proprietor Rupert Murdoch


F1 boss Max Mosley has sick Nazi orgy with 5 hookers

Son of fascist Hitler lover in sex shame

Now I'm not one to deny a fellow his sexual peccadilloes but getting the arse whipped off you on film is not the most desirous of things, especially when you have enemies, and I reckon you have your share of those Maxy baby.

But it's not the number of enemies that count when it comes to this little tale of pervery rather it's the quality of said enemy

I think it's no accident that the News of the World, proprietor Rupert Murdoch, splashed this all over the front page, because sometimes when a newspaper, The Times, proprietor Rupert Murdoch, is served with a writ for libel it's not totally out of the question that said proprietor, fights back, and fights back in the dirtiest of ways and they don't come any dirtier than Murdoch.


In short Max you've fucked up, fucked up big style. Issuing a writ against The Times because Martin Brundle dared to tell the truth about your endless harmful campaign against Ron Dennis and McLaren was, to put it mildly, a tad imprudent.

Bye bye Max, don't let the door catch your arse.

FORMULA One motor racing chief Max Mosley is today exposed as a secret sado-masochist sex pervert.

The son of infamous British wartime fascist leader Oswald Mosley is filmed romping with five hookers at a depraved NAZI-STYLE orgy in a torture dungeon. Mosley— a friend to F1 big names like Bernie Ecclestone and Lewis Hamilton— barks ORDERS in GERMAN as he lashes girls wearing mock DEATH CAMP uniforms and enjoys being whipped until he BLEEDS.


The multi-millionaire son of Sir Oswald, who was a pal of Adolf Hitler, plays a concentration camp commandant in a FIVE-HOUR torture chamber video.

Mosley—the most powerful man in motor-racing—barks orders in German as he WHIPS two hookers dressed in striped uniforms reminiscent of AUSCHWITZ garb while girls in Nazi uniforms look on.

At one point the wrinkled 67-year-old—who publicly likes to give the impression he has put his father's evil legacy behind him—yells "she needs more of ze punishment!" while brandishing a LEATHER STRAP over a brunette's naked bottom. more and video.

And then we have today's follow up from, where else but The Times.

Max Mosley, one of the most powerful men in world sport, was under pressure to resign as boss of Formula One’s governing body last night after he was exposed enjoying a Nazi-style orgy with five prostitutes.

Jewish groups condemned the behaviour of Mosley, 67, whose father, Sir Oswald, was the leader of the British Union of Fascists and a friend of Adolf Hitler.

And every dog must have it's day.

Martin Brundle, the driver-turned-pundit who was recently the subject of a libel action brought by Mr Mosley, said: “It’s not appropriate behaviour for the head of any global body such as the FIA.”more

Max Mosley White Russian! Shurely Shome Mishtake?

Chilling Effects. When you fix your search facility, I might fix this post.

 My comment is in the graphic, and reflects entirely what Mosley is all about. A law requiring a prior-notification requirement for ''sensitive'' articles that are to appear in the press.

Thus enabling those that can afford the exorbitant fees, to instruct firms of parasitical scumbag shysters, to issue a writ against the offending member of the fourth, crumbling, council estate.

Max Mosley; enemy of the common man.

And I am by no means moralising regarding Mosley's sexual peccadilloes, I'm only surprised that he had to pay for it all, I would have thought there were plenty who would have jumped at the opportunity to beat the shit out of him, free gratis n'all.

Mosley to fight on for prior-notification requirement
28 September 2011

Max Mosley will continue to push for changes to privacy laws after failing to have his case against News of the World and the UK heard by the grand chamber of the European Court of Human Rights.
Mosley’s lawyer, Tim Lowles, told Solicitors Journal the former F1 boss was among the core participants invited inform the Leveson inquiry set up after the phone hacking scandal and that he would argue further for the introduction of a pre-notification requirement in privacy cases.
“The landscape has changed since the hacking stories earlier this year and the government now has to take a position on privacy,” Lowles said.
Asked if a new culture of respect within the media would be sufficient to protect privacy rights, Lowles replied: “Any law or regulation that revolves around privacy can only work if there is a requirement of prior notification. Otherwise it’s up to the editor. And once the information is out there, there’s no way of bringing it back into the private sphere - prior notification is the only way.”


Rod Dadak, head of media at Lewis Silkin, said that although Mosley had lost the ECtHR battle he had won the war “as his case more than any other put privacy and the press on the map”.
Dadak said Mosley’s attempt to persuade the grand chamber to make it compulsory for prior notification by journalists of stories potentially breaching privacy was bound to fail.
“Nevertheless”, Dadak continued, “in putting the spotlight on the media, and with a welcome boost from the phone hacking scandal, he has been hugely successful in his overall campaign. The balancing exercise is no longer a one way trip down the road of freedom of expression.”
In a ruling on 10 May, the human rights court found that NOTW’s conduct was “open to severe criticism” and that financial damages were not a suitable remedy once private material had been put in the public domain.
But, the Strasbourg judges said, the human rights convention did not require governments to provide for a pre-notification requirement to secure the privacy rights enshrined in article 8.
In a letter dated 16 September, the court said the grand chamber would not consider Mosley’s appeal and that the May ruling would stand.
The decision puts an end to the case the former
F1 boss brought against the News of The World for running a story alleging he had been involved in a “sick Nazi orgy with five hookers”.
The Mr Justice Eady ruled in July the same year that Mosley’s privacy rights had been breached. The judge made an award for £60,000 – together with a £420,000 costs order – but said “an infringement of privacy cannot ever be effectively compensated by a monetary award”. solicitorsjournal

From the comments:

. . . . The rulings comes as a bellwether for Europe’s concept of a “right to be forgotten,” and have implications for speech and internet freedoms. . . .

. . . . I’ve argued in the past that a “right to be forgotten” is only likely to benefit wealthy or influential people, who shouldn’t be able to destroy search results any more than they can fine bookstores for selling books that displease them. more

And never one to miss an opportunity, a few pics.

Mad Max's F1 Meglamania

For those of you that do not follow F1, this reflects my feelings about the FIA's (Max Mosley's) constant assault on the manufacturers technological advancement of their cars.

The FIA's basic philosophy, if it works, ban it.

Beyond Belief: Rapture Ready by Max Blumenthal

Once a flood, pray excuse the analogy, someone comes up with the goods, that were it not on film, it would be beyond belief, stunningly beyond belief.

Blogger Max Blumenthal has come up with such goods in the form of a short film entitled, Rapture Ready: The Unauthorised Christians United for Israel Tour.

I will let Blumenthal give his own introduction, but the film is an absolutely must watch. I should and would write further if I were not truly lost for words after witnessing the goings on in this asylum.

Truly, Only In America.

On July 16, I attended Christians United for Israel's annual Washington-Israel Summit. Founded by San Antonio-based megachurch pastor John Hagee, CUFI has added the grassroots muscle of the Christian right to the already potent Israel lobby. Hagee and his minions have forged close ties with the Bush White House and members of Congress from Sen. Joseph Lieberman to Sen. John McCain. In its call for a unilateral military attack on Iran and the expansion of Israeli territory, CUFI has found unwavering encouragement from traditional pro-Israel groups like AIPAC and elements of the Israeli government.

But CUFI has an ulterior agenda: its support for Israel derives from the belief of Hagee and his flock that Jesus will return to Jerusalem after the battle of Armageddon and cleanse the earth of evil. In the end, all the non-believers - Jews, Muslims, Hindus, mainline Christians, etc. - must convert or suffer the torture of eternal damnation. Over a dozen CUFI members eagerly revealed to me their excitement at the prospect of Armageddon occurring tomorrow. Among the rapture ready was Republican Former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay. None of this seemed to matter to Lieberman, who delivered a long sermon hailing Hagee as nothing less than a modern-day Moses. Lieberman went on to describe Hagee's flock as "even greater than the multitude Moses commanded."

Throughout CUFI's Israel Summit, videographer Thomas Shomaker and I were hounded by PR agents seeking to prevent us from interviewing attendees about the End Times. The conference, we were told, was about "one message" - evangelical Christians supporting Israel. We were instructed to only interview CUFI leaders capable of sticking to the talking point that their support for Israel has, as Hagee declared, "nothing to do with the End Times." But I was forbidden from asking Hagee about statements he made in his book, "Jerusalem Countdown," that appeared to blame Jews for their own persecution. After doing just that during a press conference, I was removed from the conference by off-duty DC cops summoned by members of Hagee's family.

I have covered the Christian right intensely for over four years. During this time, I attended dozens of Christian right conferences, regularly monitored movement publications and radio shows, and interviewed scores of its key leaders. I have never witnessed any spectacle as politically extreme, outrageous, or bizarre as the one Christians United for Israel produced last week in Washington. See for yourself. Max Blumenthal

Rapture Ready: The Unauthorized Christians United for Israel Tour from huffpost on Vimeo.

Mosely "Not Going": Don't Bet The Farm and a WTF Is This?

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Max, one word, toast.

FIA president Max Mosley is facing renewed pressure to resign over newspaper allegations about his private life.

Germany’s national motoring body, ADAC, has written to Mosley asking him to “very carefully reconsider his role” in light of the controversy.

And the Dutch motorsport federation, KNAF, has said it will vote for Mosley to stand down at the upcoming extraordinary general meeting of the FIA membership.

On Thursday four of the six major car manufacturers involved in Formula 1 expressed their concern that the scandal risked damaging the sport's image and the FIA's reputation, and urged the governing body to give an official response.more

But what I find most bizarre is Mosely's response to the statement issued by BMW/Mercedes.


What The Fuck kind of a reply is this to make in the twenty first century to the two leading German auto manufacturers and major participants in Formula One?


"Given the history of BMW and Mercedes Benz, particularly........" Stroll on! need I say more?

Get the fuck gone Max you're goddamn embarrassment, not only to yourself but to everyone else and the sport I love.

H/T Pitpass for the screen capture, they seem a bit possessive of their words.

Christians United For Israel: One Million Bats

"The floor of the cave has been on the phone, it wants its batshit back." - Bill Maher

Just a short piece on the crazy, Christians United For Israel, who, if they are to be believed, have just recruited to the bat cave, their one millionth bat.

What's with all the bats you say? Well really you have to go back to my July 2007 post, Beyond Belief: Rapture Ready by Max Blumenthal to truly appreciate the batshit.

Rather than send you off to that post, I have brought the whole thing over here and it is now pasted below. And where below I say, Blumenthal's film is an absolutely must watch, I mean it's an absolute must watch.

Drive on!

Delusional Milestone
By Lawrence Davidson
April 08, 2012

Pastor John Hagee’s Christians United For Israel (CUFI) announced the “registration of their millionth member” on 18 March 2012. This organization, founded in 2006, with the goal of “realizing the political potential of tens of millions of evangelical Americans who support Israel” can also be said to have the goal of destroying, in the name of God no less, the legitimate political aspiration of Palestinian statehood. And, the CUFI now has as much influence with our Republican Congress as does the Jewish Zionist lobby, AIPAC.

Why should the devout Mr. Hagee and his one million followers be so enamored of Israel? Actually, they have no rational reasons to offer. However, they do have a number of non-rational ones. For example, “We support Israel because all other nations were created by an act of man, but Israel was created by an act of God.”

Hagee and his followers do not know that this is so. They just ardently believe it is so. Yet there is a difference between demonstrable fact and belief. As to subject, ardent belief, or what might be called faith, is widely variable and changes over time. Thus, for a considerably longer period of time than the life of Hagee’s particular brand of Christianity (in fact for thousands of years) vast numbers of people ardently believed in the reality of the Olympian Gods. For almost 1200 years, countless individuals, every bit as assured of their faith as Pastor Hagee, came to the shrine at Delphi to prey to Apollo and, through his oracle, the Sibyl, petition for the God’s advice and favor.

There is no more hard evidence for Hagee’s faith than that of the Sibyl. Think of the lottery. Despite people’s belief in their “lucky number,” every number has an equal probability of turning up. In the same way, when John Hagee dies he has an equal chance of finding himself on the shore of the River Styx as he does at the gates of heaven or hell. Of course, this comparison is not completely accurate. Here there is also the equal chance that no number turns up at all, and Mr Hagee simply dissolves into worm food.

Just so there is no hard evidence for the claim that Israel was created “by an act of God.” (As to modern Israel there is no historical doubt that the deed was done by a combination of Jewish militias, the British Empire, and the General Assembly of the United Nations.) The Bible stories are just that, stories, and quoting them as if they constituted evidence beyond the realm of faith just won’t do.

No one credits the stories told in Hesiod’s Theogony (the story of the origin of the Olympian Gods) as proof positive of the existence of the Zeus and Apollo. Pastor Hagee would counter that the Theogony was “created by an act of man”while the Bible is, allegedly, the divinely inspired words of God. And, indeed, it appears that up to one-third of the adults in the United States agree with him. Unfortunately, it is quite possible that as many people now believe in the literal, divine truth of the Bible (and therefore the divine origin of Israel) as once believed in the reality of Zeus and his Olympian clan.

However, yet again, belief no matter how ardently held, does not make something true. And, it does not matter if it is the belief of one person or a million. The situation is the same. Faith is not the same as fact.

Unfortunately, this does not put an end to our subject. Faith may not move mountains but it can move the masses. It can move Hagee’s million and many others as well to actions that are very real indeed. It can move people to empty their wallets in an effort to financially support their alleged certainties. Worse yet, it can move them to take up arms and slaughter their neighbors–or at least cheer on others who do so.

I have a strong suspicion that if the Israelis some day evict every last Palestinian from Pastor Hagee’s “Holy Land,” killing thousands in the process, the pastor will shout Hallelujah and salivate in anticipation of the second coming of Christ. It is just a personal opinion, mind you, but if you believe so strongly that you are willing to underwrite murder and mayhem you constitute a real danger to world peace. As such you should be preaching your defense before the International Criminal Court rather than preaching to the multitude. ICH

Professor Lawrence Davidson - Department of History - West Chester University

~ ~ ~

Beyond Belief: Rapture Ready by Max Blumenthal

Once a flood, pray excuse the analogy, someone comes up with the goods, that were it not on film, it would be beyond belief, stunningly beyond belief.

Blogger Max Blumenthal has come up with such goods in the form of a short film entitled, Rapture Ready: The Unauthorised Christians United for Israel Tour.

I will let Blumenthal give his own introduction, but the film is an absolutely must watch. I should and would write further if I were not truly lost for words after witnessing the goings on in this asylum.

Truly, Only In America.

On July 16, I attended Christians United for Israel's annual Washington-Israel Summit. Founded by San Antonio-based megachurch pastor John Hagee, CUFI has added the grassroots muscle of the Christian right to the already potent Israel lobby. Hagee and his minions have forged close ties with the Bush White House and members of Congress from Sen. Joseph Lieberman to Sen. John McCain. In its call for a unilateral military attack on Iran and the expansion of Israeli territory, CUFI has found unwavering encouragement from traditional pro-Israel groups like AIPAC and elements of the Israeli government.

But CUFI has an ulterior agenda: its support for Israel derives from the belief of Hagee and his flock that Jesus will return to Jerusalem after the battle of Armageddon and cleanse the earth of evil. In the end, all the non-believers - Jews, Muslims, Hindus, mainline Christians, etc. - must convert or suffer the torture of eternal damnation. Over a dozen CUFI members eagerly revealed to me their excitement at the prospect of Armageddon occurring tomorrow. Among the rapture ready was Republican Former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay. None of this seemed to matter to Lieberman, who delivered a long sermon hailing Hagee as nothing less than a modern-day Moses. Lieberman went on to describe Hagee's flock as "even greater than the multitude Moses commanded."

Throughout CUFI's Israel Summit, videographer Thomas Shomaker and I were hounded by PR agents seeking to prevent us from interviewing attendees about the End Times. The conference, we were told, was about "one message" - evangelical Christians supporting Israel. We were instructed to only interview CUFI leaders capable of sticking to the talking point that their support for Israel has, as Hagee declared, "nothing to do with the End Times." But I was forbidden from asking Hagee about statements he made in his book, "Jerusalem Countdown," that appeared to blame Jews for their own persecution. After doing just that during a press conference, I was removed from the conference by off-duty DC cops summoned by members of Hagee's family.

I have covered the Christian right intensely for over four years. During this time, I attended dozens of Christian right conferences, regularly monitored movement publications and radio shows, and interviewed scores of its key leaders. I have never witnessed any spectacle as politically extreme, outrageous, or bizarre as the one Christians United for Israel produced last week in Washington. See for yourself. Max Blumenthal

Rapture Ready: The Unauthorized Christians United for Israel Tour from huffpost on Vimeo.

Exclusive Extracts From 'Dial M for Murdoch'

If this is anything to go by, then the book should be a good read.

Exclusive extracts from 'Dial M for Murdoch'
Tom Watson
20 April 2012

Few people have done so much to force the News International phone hacking scandal into the public eye as Tom Watson, the Labour MP. Here, in exclusive extracts from a sensational new book (written with The Independent's Martin Hickman), he reveals how he and other members of the Commons select committee were targeted by a media empire that, he claims, ruthlessly discouraged unwelcome attention




Watson told yesterday's launch of Dial M for Murdoch that the News of the World's former chief reporter, Neville Thurlbeck, had "targeted" MPs who were investigating News International's activities. The tale begins in July 2009...

Unbeknown to members of the Culture Committee, the NOTW established a team to investigate their private lives. For several days, as chief reporter Neville Thurlbeck would later tell Tom Watson, reporters searched for any secret lovers or extra-marital affairs that could be used as leverage against the MPs.
Thurlbeck said: "All I know is that, when the DCMS [Department of Culture, Media and Sport Select Committee] was formed or rather when it got onto all the hacking stuff, there was an edict came down from the editor and it was find out every single thing you can about every single member: who was gay, who had affairs, anything we can use.
"Each reporter was given two members and there were six reporters that went on for around 10 days. I don't know who looked at you. It fell by the wayside; I think even Ian Edmondson [the news editor] realised there was something quite horrible about doing this."
Separately, a NOTW figure tasked with talking to Watson and other committee members to glean their question plan let them know that Rebekah Brooks believed Watson and [fellow MP Paul Farrelly] were the inquiry's "ringleaders". Watson was privately told by Downing Street insiders that Wapping was using its connections to persuade senior politicians to urge him to hold back.
Gordon Brown called Watson to tell him that Rupert Murdoch had phoned Tony Blair to tell him to call Watson off.
The book claims that Mr Blair has denied this, with Gordon Brown saying he cannot remember the phone call to Watson. Mr Blair's spin doctor Alastair Campbell remembered intimidation, however...
Speaking three years later, Alastair Campbell, Tony Blair's former communications director, recalled the "bullying culture": "I recall Rebekah Wade telling me that so far as she was concerned, with Tom Watson it's personal, and we won't stop till we get him...."
As the committee continued its work, News International had another assignment for a surveillance expert who had worked for the NOTW since 2003, Derek Webb, whose firm was called Silent Shadow.
The former policeman had legally watched dozens of pop stars, footballers and royals. In 2005 he had followed Angelina Jolie, Delia Smith, Gordon Ramsay and the Home Secretary, Charles Clarke (whose responsibilities included the police); in 2006 George Michael and the comedian Rik Mayall; and in 2007, the Duke of Westminster. Typically, his work would involve tailing a target for five days and noting down where they had gone and who they had met.
From 28 September until 2 October 2009, at the last Labour Party conference before the general election, Webb was ordered to follow the every move of Tom Watson. He had difficulty tracking the MP down. Ironically, on the first night, 28 September, Webb would have been more successful had he phoned the NOTW's political editor, Ian Kirby, who had spent the night drinking with Watson, the Sunday Mirror's Vincent Moss and the Mirror columnist Kevin Maguire in the bar of Brighton's Grand Hotel, where they sang songs round the piano until the early hours.
Tight security because of the presence of the Cabinet made following Watson difficult, but Webb billed the paper £1,125 for seven and a half shifts. Before and after following Watson (who was unaware of the surveillance) he tailed Alan Johnson, the Home Secretary.
The MPs had no knowledge of what NI was doing behind their backs. In January 2010 the committee decided that it wanted to hear from Rebekah Brooks, who was by then chief executive of NI...
The MPs decided they should hear from Brooks herself and asked her to give evidence. In a letter to John Whittingdale on 4 January 2010, she contemptuously dismissed the invitation to answer questions about the "supposed incongruity" between the treatment of Clive Goodman and Matt Driscoll, the "For Neville" email and misbehaviour by News International journalists, which, she said, related to the News of the World, not to other News International newspapers "any more than they do to any other national newspapers".
She asked whether the committee intended to call chief executives of other newspaper groups, said that the News of the World's editor had outlined the measures to end improper behaviour and that as chief executive she would "ensure the proper journalistic standards continue to be applied across all our titles"...
Although the committee wanted Brooks to give evidence, its members, whose private lives News International had pored over, capitulated and decided not to summon her. On the day the committee met to discuss the issue, two Labour MPs close to Tony Blair, Janet Anderson and Rosemary McKenna, were absent. The gay Plaid Cymru MP Adam Price – who in September unexpectedly announced that he would leave Parliament at the next general election to take up a Fulbright scholarship in the US – claimed that the committee's members had been warned that if they had called Brooks, their private lives would be raked over.
Mr Price said later: "I was told by a senior Conservative member of the committee, who I knew was in direct contact with executives at News International, that if we went for her, they would go for us – effectively they would delve into our personal lives in order to punish [us]."
The mystery phone call that led to a hidden trove of email evidence
In 2008, Max Mosley, the former head of motorsport's world governing body, and the son of the 1930s British fascist leader Sir Oswald Mosley, won a landmark privacy case against the 'News of the World'. A story had been published in the Sunday tabloid, written by Neville Thurlbeck, falsely accused him of taking part in a "sick Nazi orgy" which had been secretly photographed. The story appeared with pictures of Mr Mosley indulging in what was claimed to be a five-hour sadomasochistic sex session with prostitutes.
'Dial M for Murdoch' explains how Max Mosley's extraordinary next move – and a phone call from a stranger to Tom Watson – blew open the criminal wrongdoing at News International...
Two years after he had been turned over by the News of the World, Max Mosley was about to strike again. During the summer of 2010, from Monaco, he had been taking an ever closer interest in the phone hacking story and had become determined to ensure the police would not be able to cover up the Screws' seedy past.
He had started talking to Nick Davies at The Guardian and had also acquired a highly confidential source, Mr X, who had told him that Scotland Yard was holding extensive evidence about hacking at the NOTW. Mosley decided the best way to intensify the pressure was through cases in the civil courts which, through disclosure, would unlock the secrets of Mulcaire's files. But there was a problem: money. Under English law, litigants could be liable for costs, which could be crippling, and were often a severe deterrent to potential litigants.
Mosley agreed to underwrite the risk for several claimants, in both the emerging civil privacy cases against the News of the World and in the judicial review against Scotland Yard being coordinated by Tamsin Allen at Bindmans. If the cases were lost, his costs could run into hundreds of thousands of pounds, but Mosley was a multimillionaire.
He had decided he would risk half his fortune, if necessary, to fight Rupert Murdoch; ordinarily that half would have gone to one of his two sons, Alexander, but he was a regular drug user and had died of cocaine intoxication in May 2009. By early 2008 Alexander had temporarily managed to come off drugs but the News of the World's exposure of his father's sado-masochism had devastated him and was, his father believed, a contributory factor in his death. On 12 September, five days before Mosley returned to London at the end of his presidency of the FIA, Allen began judicial review against the Met at the High Court on behalf of Chris Bryant, Brian Paddick and Brendan Montague; they were joined a week later by John Prescott.
Sitting in his London mews house in Kensington in 2011, Mosley said: "I saw it as a much bigger thing than giving the News of the World a bit of their own back, or privacy generally, because I feel the Murdoch empire is a really sinister presence undermining the whole of our democracy. They are capable of suborning the police, Parliament and the government." He suspected the police had been reluctant to inform the victims "because they knew damn well there would be writs flying down to the High Court and their friends in Wapping would be upset".
In a memo to the Home Affairs Committee that was sent in October 2010, the lawyer Mark Lewis suggested several reasons why the police might not have properly investigated hacking in 2006, including a lack of resources, high-priority terrorism cases – and the closeness of the relationship between senior officers and News of the World executives. With the benefit of legal privilege over parliamentary affairs, he speculated whether the two officers who had said there were few victims, Andy Hayman and John Yates – both of whose own phones had been hacked – had been fearful of press coverage.
Lewis wrote: at the relevant time, Mr Hayman had reason to fear that he was a target of Glenn Mulcaire and the News of the World. It became public knowledge that throughout the period of the investigation into voicemail hacking, Mr Hayman was involved in a controversial relationship with a woman who worked for the Independent Police Complaints Commission and was claiming expenses which were subsequently regarded as unusually high. The same, of course, is also true of John Yates who, we now know, at the time when he responded to The Guardian's stories about Gordon Taylor's settlement with News Group, was involved in a controversial relationship with a woman who worked for the Met press bureau.
Lewis offered no evidence that the officers' behaviour towards the News of the World had been unduly influenced by fear, and Yates and Hayman both later denied that their conduct had been compromised by their relationships. With pressure building on the Met, News International became ever more determined to marginalise those making its life uncomfortable.
On 27 December [2010], high up in the peaks of the Yorkshire and Derbyshire border, a phone call transformed Watson's mood. Over previous weeks, a new source had been tantalisingly close to revealing important information. The source, who had very detailed knowledge of the information technology architecture of News Corp around the world, contradicted Watson's belief that data had been lost irrevocably.
As they talked for over an hour, Watson frantically wrote notes on small pieces of paper in his pockets, taking the names of the senior IT people and those that had recently left. He probed the contact while trying not to betray his increasing sense of euphoria.
Back in 2005 when Mulcaire and Goodman were conspiring to hack phones, the company bosses felt they were untouchable. They had politicians and police in their pockets, and they had no "predators"; Watson's logic was that with that level of power you would feel invulnerable – and if you thought yourself invulnerable, you would become complacent and make mistakes. He already knew that Brooks was complacent with her digital fingerprints because of the text message about him which she had sent in April 2009 to someone close to the Prime Minister. If others shared her arrogance, there would be a rich source of information on that second server that the police could use to crack the case. He did not know at that point that data had been or was being destroyed. But just as he had been losing hope, this new discovery reinvigorated him.
How lawyer stumbled on Soham scandal
Under conditions of secrecy in a windowless room at Scotland Yard, victims could inspect the notes about them, though they were not allowed to photograph or copy them. As the actress Leslie Ash and her husband Lee Chapman read Glenn Mulcaire's references to them [early in 2011], they accidentally discovered the "News of the World" had targeted Leslie Chapman – who was not Leslie Ash using her husband's surname, but the father of one of the two children killed at Soham in 2002.
The abduction and murders of 10-year-olds Holly Wells and Jessica Chapman, at the hands of school caretaker Ian Huntley, horrified the public.
Charlotte Harris, the couple's lawyer, recalled: "Leslie Chapman's papers were in front of us and the police were saying of the address: 'Yeah, well it's Fulham,' but it wasn't a Fulham postcode and I was looking at it, and being so familiar with Glenn Mulcaire's handwriting, I said: 'It doesn't say "Fulham", it says "Soham".'" Independent

Max Blumenthal: The Conservative Persecution Hoax Exposed

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This was an interesting enough little read even for me on this side of the pond, it should be more so then for my American readers.

I have to admit to being a fan of Max Blumenthal ever since I viewed his much watch video report on the batshit crazies of the Christians United For Israel in his short film "Rapture Ready"
Previous article with link here or direct link to video here. If you haven't previously watched please do and give yourself a "Cor Blimey" experience for a few minutes.

Or a somewhat less of an experience but still very watchable "Theocracy Now" article and link, or link only.

~ ~ ~

With President George W. Bush only a year away from departing the White House and the Republican succession in turmoil some of the most prominent conservative intellectuals and activists have gathered together for one last great crusade. Movement icons from Robby George of Princeton to Harvey Mansfield of Harvard, from David Horowitz to Brit Hume, raised howls of persecution when they learned that two masked men allegedly attacked a conservative Princeton University student. They insisted that the right-wing acolyte was beaten up "for his conservative views," as Horowitz put it. And they accused Princeton of failing to protect conservatives and upholding a hypocritical liberal double standard. Unfortunately, as I have reported for the Nation, the trumpeted cause collapsed when the victim turned out to be a hoaxer. more

Mad Max's F1 Meglamania

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Just a bit of nonsense for you and a brief word for Max, bugger off, please.

Is that Nico in the lead, heading towards being world champion 2010?









I could stand a bit of that kind of insanity.




A few oldies from posts past.

Rule Britannica Gone!

I had an alert for this story from a source other than the two below. But having had a look round I have settled for these two separate offerings, both from Telegraph blogs as it happens.

Reflecting my own thoughts, I borrow the opening lines from both entries.

How did it last so long? That was the first question that flew into my mind . . . . The old order changeth, yielding place to new.

£1,200 per set, in answer to your question.

The dull but dependable Encyclopaedia Britannica bows to the digital facts of life

The encyclopaedia's entries on art and artists are conservative to a fault. It is as suspicious of new trends as a nervous vicar.
By Max Davidson
14 Mar 2012

How did it last so long? That was the first question that flew into my mind when I read that the Encyclopaedia Britannica will no longer be printed in book form, and will be available in a digital edition only. I assumed its presses must have stopped rolling years ago, round about the time that Dame Edith Evans died.

The reference book, first published in Edinburgh in 1768, has many qualities, but dispensing up-to-the-minute information with colloquial pizzazz is not one of them.

As a boy in the 1960s, I had a complete set of the encyclopaedia, bound in funereal black leather, but even then its entries seemed dated: trustworthy but in a starchy, Victorian way.

I remember using it to research a school project about the American Civil War, cribbing whole sentences, the way a modern student would lift lines from Wikipedia, and my teacher’s acid comment in the margin – “Well written, but dull.” The only joke in the entire encyclopaedia was the fact that its first editor was Smellie.

Whether listing the capitals of the American states or explaining what happened at the Battle of Crécy, the Britannica plays it straight down the middle. Reader-friendliness is not in its repertoire. My sister tried selling copies door-to-door in the suburbs of Sydney in the 1970s and recalls being greeted with crisp Antipodean expletives of the kind you would never encounter in the encyclopaedia.

Very few reference books can boast such a distinguished roll-call of contributors, from Albert Einstein to Marie Curie, but the common touch has long eluded it. In the age of the pub quiz, when bite-sized facts are the dominant currency, the chunky, multi-volume Britannica feels like a luxury from a bygone age.

Still, it is only fair to salute a great British institution, as remarkable, in its way, as the Oxford English Dictionary. Rooted in the values of the Scottish Enlightenment, and kickstarted by scholars of energy and ambition, the encyclopaedia has run and run, weathering financial crisis after financial crisis, defying changing fashions in publishing.

Like the OED, it has appeared in many editions, been subject to constant revision, and had to reinvent itself for the internet age. Unlike the OED, it has strayed from its British roots, having been published in America since 1901.

But its founding principles – the collection and dissemination of accurate knowledge, about everything from Ancient Egypt to the laws of thermodynamics – have never altered. Generations of scholars and researchers have prepared new entries and updated old ones with an academic zeal that puts most reference books to shame.

The encyclopaedia has had its critics, small armies of them. Ever since the first edition contained the entry “Woman: The female of man”, it has struggled to convince women, not to mention racial and religious minorities, that it is interested in their story.

If it is generally sound on science – apart from the time a cocky early editor decided he knew more about gravity than Isaac Newton – its view of history has often been tainted by an anglo-centric bias. Its entries on art and artists are conservative to a fault. It is as suspicious of new trends as a nervous vicar.

But its strengths outweigh its weaknesses – as they have done for two and a half centuries. Now that the encyclopaedia is only going to be available online, it would not be surprising if the printed version enjoyed an afterlife as a prized literary antique, a relic of the good old days, when books were books, lovingly printed and bound, and you could read 500 pages without spotting an error.

The internet has informed more people about more subjects than would have seemed possible 20 years ago. But when knowledge is shared so easily and promiscuously, old-fashioned scholarship goes out of the window. The fact-checkers have been swept away by the tsunami of rumour and counter-rumour.

There are plenty of times I have read something on Wikipedia and thought, 'Well, that’s interesting, but is it TRUE?’ My hand twitches, I look to the bookshelf and wish I had kept my trusty boyhood companion – instead of selling it for twenty quid to buy a new stereo.

The Encyclopaedia Britannica was never a page-turner. It told you about Venice or Monet or Chinese food. It did not make them seem exciting. But for sticklers of facts, not versions of facts, it had a kind of poetry. Max Davidson Telegraph





The sad death of the Encyclopaedia Britannica
by Allan Massie

The old order changeth, yielding place to new,
And God fulfils himself in many ways,
Lest one good custom should corrupt the world.

The lines from Tennyson’s “Morte D’Arthur” seem appropriate to the news that, after some 250 years, the Encyclopaedia Britannica will no longer be published in book form, but only electronically. Knowledge is, we are told, changing so fast that the printed version is quickly out-of -date, while it is easy to correct or amend the online one. The argument is plausible, but spurious. The interpretation of what we know may shift, and new facts may sometimes be unearthed, but the bulk of knowledge endures. I would guess that the vast majority of articles in the Britannica remain authoritative; and this indeed is true of earlier editions such as the ninth, known as “the scholars’ edition” and the eleventh, the last to be published in Britain (though already American-owned). The real reason for abandoning the print edition is that it has become too expensive to produce and sales have been declining. So we have come to the end of an old song.

The Encyclopaedia dates from the 18th-century Enlightenment. In France, Diderot enlisted the services of scholars and “savants” to produce his compendium of universal knowledge, the Encyclopédie. The Britannica was almost simultaneously conceived and brought to birth in an alley called Anchor Close off the High Street of Edinburgh. Its progenitor was a printer called William Smellie (pronounced Smiley), and he published it in three volumes in 1771. The idea took hold, and soon a second edition was in preparation. This was edited by the extraordinary James Tytler, who wrote much of its ten volumes himself; it appeared between 1777 and 1784. He was well-equipped for the huge task, being a chemist, surgeon, printer, poet, political agitator and hack-journalist who also, by way of diversion, manned the first hot-air balloon ascent made in Britain, in Edinburgh in 1784 – perhaps to celebrate the completion of his work on the Encyclopaedia.

Third and fourth editions soon followed, the latter expanded to 20 volumes. It was then bought by Archibald Constable, whom Sir Walter Scott called “the Napoleon of publishers”. Constable was responsible for the next two editions. In 1827 when he was ruined in the financial crash which also brought Scott down, he sold it to A & C Black, who continued to publish it in Scotland till they removed their headquarters to London. Black sold it to American interests, and the first edition published in the USA appeared in 1921. Before then the American owners had embarked on the practice of door-to-door selling, a dispiriting task often undertaken by poor students and impoverished graduates.

I have never owned a set of the Britannica, though I should like to have one of the eleventh edition, over which I pored for many hours in my school library more than half a century ago. The leather binding spoke of authority, the print was beautifully clear, and the articles as lucid and elegant as they were informative. Even today I suppose that many of the historical ones retain their value. The scientific ones will be out-of-date, of course, yet still interesting and useful as evidence of the best that was known when they were written.

It’s sad to think that there will be no more of these solid volumes, but that’s the way the world is going, and fewer and fewer works of reference will appear in hard copy. A & C Black, the former proprietors of the Britannica, now invite people to update their “Who’s Who” entry online, and probably most people who consult the latest revision of the Dictionary of National Biography probably do so on the screen. Allan Massie Telegraph

Fukushima Round-Up from Alexander Higgins

Oldest first.


TEPCO: New Holes In Fukushima Nuclear Reactor 1 and 3 Discovered, Radiation Leaking Into Ocean

Radiation Levels Higher Than Chernobyl Evacuation Limits Span Over 800 KM in Japan

Fukushima Reactor 1 Radiation Levels Max Out Instruments, Hit Over 1,000,000 uSv per hour

Fukushima Nuclear Plant Worker Dies At After Passing Out On Job

Famous Physicists, Michio Kaku, tells CNN “The Nightmare Is Not Over”, “Fukushima Is A Ticking Time Bomb”

High Concentrations Of Plutonium Found In Rice Field Soil Over 50KM From Fukushima Plant

Radiation Experiments on Black People Left Holes in their Heads – Warning Graphic Video

Highly Radioactive Substances Detected In Tokyo – Higher Than Amounts In Prefectures Near Fukushima