Frontline documentary on Murdoch phone hacking scandal

[Craig234]

I think there has been some confusion about why this hacking scandal has had the legs it has posing such huge damage to the Murdoch empire.

His power in the US is huge - the Fox line of channels including the #1 channel people turn to for cable 'news' apparently and the Wall Street Journal - and more powerful in England.

So, the newspapers hacked into cell phones for stories. Bad going, arrest the guilty, but destroying Britain's by far biggest media empire, #1 papers, #1 cable?

This documentary helps to explain some of why it's so damaging. In part, it shows the old rule about the coverup.

When the Guardian - my favorite UK paper and better than perhaps any in the US - ran a story accusing Newscorp of hacking into thousands of cell phones for stories, News attacked them harshly; the Guardian staff were pull in front of Parliament in trouble, since they couldn't reveal their sources, and Newscorp insisted up and down management is was a 'rogue' reporter only.

Reminds me a bit of why Watergate brought down a president, as the denials fell apart gradually one after the other making it a lot worse.

To this day, there's not a lot of appreciation of the level of corruption going on besides the scandal. It seems to have started with Thatcher - the right's favorite politician not named Reagan - Murdoch backed her for Prime Minister (she was heard telling someone 'he's going to win this election for us') and after she won, the anti-monopoly rules were broken to allow Murdoch to buy two more major newspapers, the Times and Sunday Times. Shock.

When Tony Blair ran for Prime Minister with Labor - Murdoch had backed the other side - he flew to Australia to meet with Murdoch and staff; Murdoch switched sided and backed Blair and he won and Blair's government then waived more laws allowing Murdoch to own more cross-media than had been allowed. Shock.

There's a lot to learn from this documentary, from the corruption (power corrupts cliche applies) to how difficult it is for the 'right thing to get done' against the corruption.

Scotland Yard ended up implicated bribed by News for information, while they defended News against the phone hacking allegations; turned out this cozy relationship went back to Murdoch's union busting when he secretly built a printing factory and fired his union workers and printed his four papers at the new factories, and the conflict labor made him very close to the police.

After that, police inspectors retired to positions with News like writing columns, and News staff were hired into the police public relations department.

The current Prime Minister hired the News of the World editor iin the middle of the phone hacking scandal to be his communications director.

News Management all lied. Police lied. Politicians lied. It's good to know the story.

Plug for PBS: Frontline does it again, good for them and PBS, public interest television - not Fox News.

http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/

 

[Thump553]

Like nearly all Frontlines I've seen, an excellent documentary.

What really surprised me was three things:

(1) The whole thing was triggered off by Murdoch's papers printing a story about one of the princes's having a sore knee from playing soccer. The only way they could have known this was from his voicemail account. The Royal Family complained and the police hopped-can you imagine them even bothering to fill out a report if Joe Blow filed such a complaint, much less investigate it?

(2) How close Murdoch came to having the whole thing blow over. Years of payoffs and denials almost worked, but then the NY Times published a story about it (only one English paper-The Guardian-was publishing on it before) which enboldened the balance of the English press to look into it.

(3) Definately a black eye for English police-they were in the scandal up to their eyebrows and really dragged their feet on a full scale investigation. They had evidence of thousands of people being hacked, and sat on that evidence for years while Murdock denied it had happened.

 

[Craig234]

nm, but I'm glad you enjoyed it.

 

[Phokus]

marked 4 later.

 

[Lemon law]

I am skeptical that anyone can connect or prove that Rupert Murdock is not the ringleader of the phone hacking and all the illegal activity. Even though its hard to believe that he is not.

But still, like others, time runs out for Rupert too, as he is a very old fart and death by natural cause is soon likely to end his career of world media dominance. As ole Rupert has sacrificed everyone, including his own famdamily to avoid being prosecuted.

Once Rupert dies, his media empire and maybe the media axis of evil, is likely to unravel at near the speed of light. I certainly would prefer that Rupert M get nailed and prosecuted for his illegal activities before he dies, but failing that, death by natural cause will still do God's work. As Rupurt M. lives on borrowed time.

Murdoch is already 81 years old and is already showing increasing signs of senility.

 

[RedString]

Someone will step up and take his place.

The conspiracy nuts have been talking about media control in politics for how long now? Same with military industrial complex, etc, etc, etc..

 

[Lemon law]

Someone will step up and take his place.

The conspiracy nuts have been talking about media control in politics for how long now? Same with military industrial complex, etc, etc, etc..

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I somewhat agree with Redstring, and there will always be Rupurt Murdock wantabees.

But in my mind, will someone be able to take over the existing Rupert empire, or will such a Rupert wantabee have to start from scratch if the existing Rupert media empire totally unravels after Rupert dies.