It is now gone 8.30 pm, and it is rare for the same story to remain in that position at PHI for so long. When that happens, as it does occasionally, it usually means it is covering-up something they don't want to highlight. UPDATE at 2350: the story has been re-jigged a little and the headline changed, but it's still there in prime position.
I know I am not the only reader to have noticed how the positioning of various stories at PHI and their duration in those positions is very obviously politically motivated and skewed to favour the political left especially Labour. As I have mentioned before, even their choice of "hand picked" Phi Wire links are very strongly slanted.
Here's the permanent link to their item regarding Coulson's voluntary attendance at a meeting at a solicitor's office and his subsequent interview by police - two days ago! Nothing has happened since, apparently, so why did this suddenly pop up today? Ah yes, of course: the toxic Woolas story...
Even more interesting is Harriet Harman's assertion that his (continuing) presence in Downing Street "casts serious doubt over David Cameron's judgement". Now place that next to Ed Miliband's judgement in making Phil Woolas his shadow immigration minister, and one can see just how obviously this is a diversionary tactic. Note that Red Ed himself didn't dare make such a comment and has remained silent, and for the second time in as many days it was Harman who made the statement to the media.
As always, the clues to the motivation behind such media-based stories are there for anyone who looks with just a little extra attention!
Back with Woolas for a moment: it is notable how differently he has been treated by Ed Miliband and other senior Labour party people, as a Miliband shadow cabinet appointee, compared to how they have dealt with Ken Livingstone who has broken the party's rules by supporting a non-Labour candidate in the recent Tower Hamlets mayoral election.
According to those rules, he should have been expelled from the Labour Party; but Labour has no credible alternative to put up against Boris for the London mayoral election in 2012. Therefore they have again made it "one rule for some, another for others" as they have done before, e.g. selecting Jack Dromey (Harriet Harman's other half) for a seat that was to be selected from an all-female short list.
Martin Bright has spotted the Woolas/Livingstone anomaly; and now we can also see just how inappropriate it is for Ms Harman to be making such statements as this one about Cameron's judgement. Tory Bear has noted Labour's Tom Watson's attempts to associate smearing with the current Downing Street set-up, responding with this tweet:
"To hear @tom_watson talk about smears and No10 is like asking [Harold] Shipman about care for the old. Bare faced lie when he said it wasn't political"Tom Watson is of course known to have been associated with the Derek Draper/Damian McBride/Ed Balls/Kevin Maguire "smear unit" that was such a scandal a year or so ago, as well as doing very well from "Smeargate" financially.
'Back with Woolas for a moment: it is notable how differently he has been treated by Ed Miliband and other senior Labour party people, as a Miliband shadow cabinet appointee, compared to how they have dealt with Ken Livingstone who has broken the party's rules by supporting a non-Labour candidate in the recent Tower Hamlets mayoral election.'
ReplyDeleteNo, he supported the Labour candidate as first preference and called for voters to give Lutfur Rahman their second preference. No rule was broken.
As for Woolas, he is a proven liar who exploited racism in an attempt to cling onto his seat. He should have been expelled much earlier.
Yes, that is what he said on the Daily Politics yesterday. Although it seems difficult to be absolutely sure of what he did and didn't do, that does ameliorate the charge against him that Martin Bright was making.
ReplyDeleteIt's always a problem to deal with these peculiar multi-stage electoral systems, even when in practice they don't need the later stage(s) post-voting.
I have a feeling that even some of our most well-established commentators, with their inside sources, will continue such things wrong for some time to come, and the rest us who rely on them as sources are probably going to have to learn how to spot their errors before they realise it themselves!