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The Tuesday Cyril (update): Red and Blue Letter Day
We have now added a scan of this week's midweek Rochdale Obbie letters page - running 4-0 against Sir Cyril Smith MBE and Paul Rowen MP - dubbed the dog that didn't bark. This includes letters from known Labour and Tory activists as well as unaffiliated environmental campaigners.
Here is the previous week's scan:
Counting the previous two Saturdays we get a three-all count for and against spanker-Smith's asbestos sell-out. Counting the Wednesdays alone we get 10-1 against the dark knight. Overall it is 13-4.
What can be the Guardian Media Group Regional Newspapers' excuse for biasing the big selling Saturday edition in favour of the old plonker? Perhaps a formal complaint would be in order?
Clearly Turner and Newall/Turner Brothers Asbestos/Federal Mogul had EVERY REASON to want to keep asbestos products flowing into world markets. Essentially the owned the ground from which it was being extracted. They owned the women and child "pickers" that were teasing the deadly fibres out of the rock with their bare hands too.
But what was in it for Cyril Smith? Fighting for the right to die of cancer simply cannot ever be an excuse or a reason for what he did.
9 comments:
The Wednesday edition of the Rochdale Observer publishes more letters against Cyil Smih than those that support him. The Saturday Observer prints pro and anti in fairly equal numbers. You automatically assume that there is a deliberate bias against your side whereas the opposite could just as well be true.
You could be right, you might even know that you are right, but for that to be true it must be that the Observer reltting you know how many letters they get from each side. I think we can discount that.
It could be that everybody that writes a letter on the subject then notifies you that they have done so. That's probably even more unlikely.
Maybe a lot of the anti T&N letter re being penned by the same Labour hack and farmed out to be signed. And if you werein contact with this person then you would know exactly how mant were not being published.
The majority seem tocome fromLabour Party employees, Labour candidates or Mesrs Hollinrake and Caoates - labour activists who are joined at the hip.
Then there's ex-Tory councillor (with heavy emphasis on the 'ex' and very heavy emphasis on 'Tory) whose only action of ny note in his brief reign as Conservative Group Leader in Rochdal was to march his rag-bag of troops into a disastrous coalition with Labour to run the council.
His lack of achievement is eclipsed only by his complete lack of judgement and his hatred of the Lib Dems has taken him into the role of Labour poodle. That he might sign letters written for him by Labour would come as no surprise. That he might write even a semi-coherent letter himself would be a total shockas witnessed by the garbag that he often posts on this blog
A fair but totally speculative point.
However, the few letters that were supportive of asbestos and T&N all have one remarkable similarity:
They all, for whatever reason, mention Cyril, and in a positive light, in a manner that appears contrived.
The last letter supporting Cyril was so odd that many thought it was a spoof. A glowing description of the asbestos factory- it was loverly, you could have a nice lie down in a medical centre if you got a headache, and that you would be driven home in a nice company car and have time off on full pay etc.
An incredible display of deference and blind obedience for someone who has tired to make asbestos disease a petty, personal and party political issues for the apparent sake of self-preservation.
What is national Lib Dem policy on asbestos and why does it now appear so different in Rochdale? What is going on?
It would be remarkable "Wally Range" if the postbags for the two editions were distinct and separate.
It would be remarkable that over the weekend and on Mondays towards the Wednesday edition they ran 10-1 against, yet on Tues/Weds/Thu for Saturday they ran 50-50.
It is a fact that the RO sells several times more papers on Saturdays than on Wednesdays.
It is also a fact the the RO has been protective of Sir Cyril and his menagerie.
Your speculations are stone crazy as Dave H himself might say. You clearly don't know this Tory if you think he needs assistance in coming up with a point of view about Cyril and Co.
The "dog that did not bark" is a good line for Mr Rowen. And you know it. And you WR, Dave I mean, is the feral dog that barks and bites without rhyme or reason.
"Maybe a lot of the anti T&N letter re being penned by the same Labour hack and farmed out to be signed. And if you werein contact with this person then you would know exactly how mant were not being published"
You are right Wally Range!
"You clearly don't know this Tory if you think he needs assistance in coming up with a point of view about Cyril and Co."
And you clearly do know this torY don't you CRAZY PAUL!
Politicians having things written for them?
Somebody obviously doesn't do irony.
Back to square one I think.
Very interesting that Hennigan projects his own dissembling behaviour onto others. Clearly the drafting of speeches and letters for politicians and activists is not out of bounds. But Hennigan has been caught out putting ridiculous words into unsuitable people's mouths before e.g. during Labour's selection process in Rochdale and submitting letters without permission in other people's names.
And then there's the MP for Turner and Newall who relied on the firm's Health and Safety man to draft stuff for him. Stuff that he repeated almost verbatim even when the terms of the debate were changed.
Wally Range
It is irrelevant who is or isn't penning letters - the real point is addressing the substance of what they say, which in this case is very real. Every argument made by Smith and his apologists has been addressed directly rather than by using diversionary tactics.
The fact that the Rochdale LibDems do not feel that Cyril Smith has a case to answer, seek to rubbish those who want to make him accountable for his actions, rewrite history with their comments about hindsight, and then attempt to throw in a bit of censorship really just shows how low they have fallen and how unworthy they are unworthy of John Bright's heritage.
Surely, there must be some decent Rochdale LibDems out there - who are prepared to say that on this matter Cyril Smith was plain wrong.
Of course the next time the public hear the LibDems start their usual routine about other parties never being accountable, addresing the questions raised or only being in it for themselves - we shall all now how to respond
I agree that it isn't important who is or isn't penning letters. That's the point I was trying to make to Piss Crawl to stop him going on his rather pathetic "mine's bigger than yours" letter-writing count.
But it is interesting to note what conclusion he immediately leaps to. If the ratio of letters printed in one edition of a newspaper is different from that in another it does not automatially mean that the one that is not in your favour is fixed. The reverse could just as easily be true.
Or it could be that you actually know how many anti-Smith letter are not being published. The only plausible explantion of that is they are all being written by one person and that peron is in contact with you.
In the world of conspiracy theories, everything can be made to fit.
"The only plausible explantion of that is they are all being written by one person and that person is in contact with you."
No it isn't perhaps someone knows what is happening inside the Rochdale Observer.
So all this stuff about Cyril and TBA is just a conspiracy theory - how low do the Rochdale LibDems want to go?
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