poliphilo

The News of the World was a disgusting rag- but I'm not rejoicing; Murdoch will regroup and rebrand and The Sun on Sunday will be equally disgusting. Do tabloid newspapers have to be hypocritical and pandering? Is "decent tabloid" a contradiction in terms?

Actually the Mirror used to be decent. At least that's how I remember it- back in the days of Cassandra and Marje Proops. Perhaps it still it is. I haven't looked recently.

I feel sorry for the NOTW journalists. There was a funny little terrier-like man with a glass eye on TV last night who used to be their political editor (the NOTW had a political editor? That must have been an easy job). I found myself warming to him. No-one should be thrown out on the street like that .

Closing the NOTW was a bold brash action- Very Murdochian.- but it doesn't do away with the scandal. And what about all the unemployed journalists who know where the bodies are buried and now bear a grudge?

The media are saying Brooks has been retained to act as a firewall between the raging inferno and James Murdoch. I think she'll be burned up pretty quick. He's already in the frame for handing over hush money to potential litigants. He says he didn't know the facts- which is the same argument which has failed Andy Coulson. James was on TV last night; I wasn't impressed. He seemed scared. He has a whiny voice.

The PM is also in the frame. He's acting angry now and leading the charge, but nothing is going to wipe all the pictures of him schmoozing with Brooks or the fact that he employed Coulson in Downing Street.