The people have spoken (and they say similarly in Australia, too): Almost 60% of British people believe that Rupert Murdoch has too much influence on the country’s politics, according to a new poll.
Showing all posts tagged Britain
Our Libya intervention is (mainly) about one short word starting with o
Hard to disagree with most of what George Galloway says on Sky News:
Books still matter; pulp title tells too much about British killing in Afghanistan
Yet another example of a Western government giving bogus reasons to try and censor material in the public interest. Similar claims were made against Wikileaks. The issue here is the state being embarrassed and ashamed. They should be: The entire print run of a highly critical and embarrassing account of Britain’s role in southern Afghanistan…
What I’m hearing about Christmas Island chaos
This last weekend saw a large break-out at Australia’s Christmas Island detention facilities. The federal government acknowledges tear gas was used to quell the protests. Thousands of asylum seekers languish for months and often longer with no indication when their cases may be resolved. It’s a prison camp designed to punish those seeking asylum. My…
US-backed thugs in Saudi Arabia armed by Western arms firms
As Saudi Arabia crushes peaceful pro-democracy protesters, let’s not forget the Western firms doing business with the brutes: A newly-released secret U.S. diplomatic cable has alleged that British-based defense contractor BAE Systems PLC bribed Saudi officials in return for lucrative arms deals. The cable from the U.S. embassy in Paris, released by WikiLeaks on Friday,…
Neo-liberalism only helps the corporations, nobody else
As Britain’s conservative government embarks on a massive program of privatisation, Britain’s Channel 4 Dispatches discovers that many major multinationals, including Serco and G4S, are doing very nicely, thank you, out of the public cuts: Channel 4’s Ben Laurance writes in the Daily Mail: It has been a week in which public sector workers have…
Murdoch’s News of the World incubates culture of deception
Today’s Guardian editorial is scathing, necessarily so, and reminds us that the Murdoch empire is always about power and access with ideology a distant second. Remind me why virtually no politicians or journalists dare challenge its power when its actions are clear for all to see? Bravery, please: The collapse of a high-profile murder trial…
The Blair/Gaddafi relationship that reeked of death and torture
As Tony Blair prepares to visit Australia to share his invaluable lessons in killing Arabs and launching illegal wars – organised by one of the country’s largest Jewish families, the Pratts, who clearly love Blair for backing Israeli apartheid – it’s worth recalling what the former British Prime Minister has done. Here’s Gareth Pierce in…
Topple the Tyrants sends message to Saif Gaddafi
I salute this form of civil disobedience, public protest and act of solidarity with rebelling Libyans: It may be furnished, according to its new occupants, just as you would expect “when you have spent …£10m of blood money on a house”, but judging by the appearance mid-afternoon of a masked man in camouflage gear carrying…
Serco puts out the begging bowl
What is a poor, little multinational like Serco to do when Britain has less money to give? Look outward: Serco, the FTSE 100 support services group that runs the Docklands Light Railway, is to target growth in international markets as the UK economy comes under pressure from public spending cuts. Christopher Hyman, chief executive, said…