The Official Newscorp/UK end of season finale/Rebekah Brooks did 9/11 thread

But the important aspect of the story is not that another person’s phone was hacked, but that the “News of the World” were able to obtain the mobile telephone number of an individual who had been given a “secret identity” – known only to a very small number of people – to protect him.

In 2001 the High Court had granted a wide ranging injunction to prevent the identification of the two individual who had been convicted of the murder of James Bulger ([2001] EWHC 32 (QB)). This was granted because of the “clear and credible” risk to their lives from mob vengeance or revenge attacks. It was accepted that if Robert Thompson’s identity had become public knowledge, the exposure could potentially have put his life at risk. We have previously posted the terms of this injunction. It appears that anyone seeking to obtain Robert Thompson’s mobile number would have been in breach of it.

The question is: how did the “News of the World” obtain the mobile telephone number of an individual who had been given a “secret identity”? One obvious possible source is the police. Serious questions have already been raised about the leaking of information by corrupt police officers to the “News of the World”. Scotland Yard’s “Operation Elveden” is now investigating allegations of corrupt payments to police officers. It seems likely that this investigation will now be considering how the “News of the World” was able to find Robert Thompson’s number and then hack his telephone in order to run stories which, potentially, put him in danger.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/tony-blair/8740530/Tony-Blair-is-godfather-to-Rupert-Murdochs-daughter.html

Rupert Murdoch's daughter needs all the spiritual guidance she can get!

Every time I think I've got a handle on the different parts cynicism to pure self-delusion in Tony Blair something like this comes out.

NI is flogging the wapping site

hope it's in public

The old offices, not the new ones.

http://www.abc.net.au/pm/content/2011/s3315998.htm

THREAD DELIVERS.

NATALIE ROWE: I mean it's been said in the newspapers that he was at university. He wasn't. At the time he was working for William Hague. I remember that vividly because he called William Hague insipid and I didn't know what the word meant. I do now.

ahahahaha

we all do now

it's kind of impressive, how little people care about sleaze any more. is there anything that could actually threaten that little shit's job security?

lol at Guido framing the story in exactly the same way as the NotW did originally - http://order-order.com/2011/09/12/50318/

Wow, that is tremendous.

The nut:

"But if you look at it because there was a nice gloss put on the story and an editorial that effectively gave George Osborne the benefit of the doubt then you could say well, George Osborne was almost indebted to Andy Coulson.

"Andy Coulson had done George Osborne a favour and perhaps it was time for George Osborne to reciprocate and do a favour back."

This story doesn't need 'phone hacking' as an element:

1) Girl tells/sells story to DMirror.
2) Said paper contacts Tory offices regarding story, to make sure it's not totally libellous.
3) GOsb 'confesses' situation to the 'powers-that-be'
4) Powers-that-be say "Don't worry about it, we're on the case"
5) They contact NOTW to draft a safety curtain with as much detail to spike the original slant, and enough editorialising to totally discredit the story's original source.

Same old.

is she saying s.thing new and potentially actionable* that has scared off the uk papers or?

*as they say though, he's never sued anyone over her claims before

xpost

2-5 is total speculation, right?

http://www.britishblogs.co.uk/images/373908.jpg
Think there should be a "Photoshop this image of George Osborne onto other pictures" thread.

need higher res

Or get Private Eye to run it on their letters page every week.

2-5 is total speculation, right?

― TracerHandVEVO (Tracer Hand), Monday, 12 September 2011 11:04 (9 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

Yes, officer. Mods, please add "allegedly" to every line.

I have a friend who knows the ppl of posh world. Years ago she passed along a story abt how the Cam/Osb crowd were friends with a dominatrix. A detail I haven't seen brought up elsewhere is that her pals would occasionally pop in and shit on the chest of clients who liked that sort of thing.

Think there should be a "Photoshop this image of George Osborne onto other pictures" thread.

Think Moira Stuart was wise to obscure her features behind those flowers though. Allegedly.

See, when Barack Obama found himself at a stag do in Wokingham, he was savvy enough to leave before the strippergram arrived.

Sad thing about this is that it shows the awful little sneeze expulsion isn't a racist on top of everything else.

i don't think this is really a gauge of that at all; which isn't to say that he is or isn't, just that whether he is should probably be judged on something less convoluted than 'why some of my preferred dominatrixes are black!'

enh who knows

i do think he should answer the question why he was hot to hire coulson

he'll never say 'bc he did me a solid', but what will he say?

xp

haha yeah

yeah despite her dominatrixing, the power relationship here runs along pretty traditional contours

xpost

'bc he did me a solid'

I hope this is not a reference to some of the services offered by Ms. Rowe's colleagues, as mentioned upthread.

Better that than "he did me a sloppy".

There isn't actually anything much here at all except the lols and the direct connection between the prostitute photo and Coulson. We knew about George, cocaine and prostitutes, we knew that Newscorp and Coulson were positively spinning things to suit the Tories, we knew that Cameron wouldn't have hired him if he hadn't.

I assume this is one of those things that gets roundly ignored by the mainstream media who are terrified of the lawsuits until such time as it's all over the internet and they can do so with impunity.

There isn't actually anything much here at all except the lols and the direct connection between the prostitute photo and Coulson.

it's a Good Story though, a good theory: why did osborne back the toxic coulson? one might ask. this is a plausible reason.

xp

oh - 'her pals' in my previous post was not meant to imply fellow sex workers; I meant the tories she knew.

Oh It's An Amazing Story.

... but I'm assuming they were, uh, delivering the solids services to said Tories? Scatological rumours never go out of fashion it seems.

shit happens.

What's in that aerosol in the photo? Seems like a strange item to be sitting on the table.

Imagine these, uh, encounters get a bit smelly

https://images.jmcatalog.com/prdimgs/Mes3et674/MESS/MESS3.JPG

wait so she'd bring in tories she knew to shit on other clients? metaphorical fetishes, i like it.

to clarify, as I understand it: the tories would be hanging out at their dominatrix friend's place. A client would come to see her, & presumably be taken to a private room. The client likes being pooed upon. At some point, someone – presumably not the client (one imagines him masked) – decides it would be a laugh for one of the young tories to do the chest-pooing instead of the dominatrix. Then, as Mark says, shit happens.

yes, i mean i don't know if the details really hang together but I have had faith in the story ever since I heard it.

Has it been confirmed anywhere yet that Paul McBride is defending Coulson? Only seen it as a rumour.

I'm sure I read it in a news report last week sometime, can't remember where.

http://news.stv.tv/scotland/261888-andy-coulson-hires-former-sheridan-lawyer/

Damian McBride would have been funnier

grauniad has reported the story

And the Telegraph now.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/phone-hacking/8757740/Phone-hacking-Andy-Coulson-helped-spin-story-of-George-Osborne-and-dominatrix.html
Cabinet re-shuffle ahoy!

if only