Wednesday, July 08, 2009

Tory Sleazer in Chief: How Soon Will Dave C Sack Andy?



Seems to me that both Iain Dale and Tim Montgomery have a failure of both humour and perspective in getting way too serious about Newsnight's "The Politics Pen", a less than hilarious homage to the entrepreneur snaring "Dragon's Den", for example HERE, from Timbo.

Four panelists consider ideas from viewers on how to save money and address the national debt. Whatever their allegiances or otherwise, and it is possible that none of them are currently card-carrying members of any party, they are pretty reasonable. One is an ex-Labour adviser, one is an independent pollster who has had some good gigs off Labour, one is a former Labour donor but gone over to the dark side as a Tory advisor, via the Lib Dems, and the fourth is a clearly Tory-orientated capitalist.

But whatever, it's just a bit of fun. More valid, by far, than Iain Dale's own Political Blog Ranking. That being horribly biased and extraordinarily weak in methodology.

Anyway's Newsnight have come back with something rather better than a fisk of Peter Rippon's "grow up Tory boys" riposte to their whinery. That is coverage of the Guardian scoop on an apparently absolutely endemic rule-breaking, privacy-busting, sleazy and very likely criminal regime of 'phone tapping and "blagging" at the News of the World under Andy Coulson.

Here's a reasonably sensible Conservative Home response that leans on non- advice from Alistair Campbell.

Coulson of course resigned from his job as Editor at the News of the World, claiming ignorance, avoiding PCC and other investigations of a Royal 'Phone Tapping Scandal which saw a couple of investigators imprisoned, and then bobbed up smartish at CCHQ as Dave Cameron's Conservatives' impression manager in chief.

On an annual salary that is even more than the Capital Gain's Tax avoided by George Osborne through contrived "first home" elections.

Well, it seems many of Coulson's staff were at it. And that this was very well known. And that they may not even have been the worst in the business.

How much did Coulson know? How much did Cameron know?
Will Coulson leave before he is pushed?
Will Cameron take responsibility for this sleazer and all his sleazy works?
Will DC be quicker to act than GB was with McBride?

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

aren't the known tactics of this chap and the news group he once worked for the very reason why Camoron hired him?

Barack Obama said...

Eaxctly

Barack Obama said...

Spelling isn't my strongest suit. That should say exactly.

I've said it before and I'll say it again.

Cameron is a lightweight.