My latest article for the Guardian went up yesterday. An excerpt: In fact, as several (left-liberal) bloggers point out, the picture of Hague with his adviser and veiled insinuations first surfaced at the Mail on Sunday on 21 August. The Telegraph followed. That was immediately used as a springboard by Paul Staines (aka Guido Fawkes)...

Check out our new Creative ZiiSound D5 bluetooth wireless speaker system giveaway! Choosing your Digital audio work station (DAW) In my previous article “M-Audio Fast Track Ultra” I said I would talk to you about DAW’s or a Digital Audio Work Station. These are programs or software that you have to purchase to use on your computer. A Digital audio work station is a necessity for any home studio as it’s the program that records your music from your audio interface or mixer. Many won’t want to spend the money to get a recording program, so they will settle for Audacity which is a free windows program that records, this will work but it doesn’t offer anything else on it it is strictly an audio recorder. I recommend everyone to purchase...

For years a popular pair of comedians shared a bed during sketches shown in TV. There was never any thought or suggestion of them being ‘gay’ How times have changed. A political blogger wrote about ex-PM William Hague sharing an hotel room with a young male aide during the last electioneering campaign, hinting (nudge, nudge, wink, wink) at an homosexual relationship. In my humble opinion, Mr Hague should have ignored the innuendo, or if he felt the need to address the matter, made a simple , curt statement of denial. Instead, he choose (rather unwisely) to issue a deeply personal statement citing his wife’s repeated miscarriages as evidence of his heterosexuality (?) in rebuttal of the suggestion he is gay. This was an unmitigated PR disaster. He has now fanned the...

Dr John Alroy, a palaeobiologist at Macquarie University in Australia – and a right cheery bugger – has published a paper in Science to say we’re doomed. The Earth has gone through three mass extinctions in it’s history. Having studied the evidence, Dr Alroy believes we are currently goring through a new mass extinction event that will be worse than any previous ones Worryingly, other scientists concur with his conclusions Read more here - http://tinyurl.com/27sjqu6 Well that’s that, then. No point in cutting the grass this weekend – I’m off to the pub instead !...

Further to my recent articles about Fox News’s bankrolling of the Republican Party and Jon Stewart’s exposé of the connections between Fox News and the “Ground Zero Mosque's” alleged Saudi financier, some more information is continuing to come to light about the sheer scale of what is actually going on behind the scenes. Firstly, let’s start with Fox News’s connection with the Republicans. It goes far beyond the $1 million which the channel’s parent company News Corp has now been confirmed to have donated to the Republican Party: Via ‘Media Matters for America’: "In recent years, at least twenty Fox News personalities have endorsed, raised money, or campaigned for Republican candidates or causes, or against Democratic candidates or causes, in more than 300 instances...

Mark Thompson photographed with memo revealing Andy Coulson's 'concern' that BBC gives context to cuts coverageThe BBC has been forced to defend its impartiality after Mark Thompson, the director general, was photographed yesterday going into a meeting in Downing Street to discuss a season of TV and radio programmes about the government's spending cuts.Thompson was photographed carrying an internal email from Helen Boaden, the BBC News director, saying that she had had lunch with Andy Coulson, the coalition government's director of communications, at which he had expressed concern "that we give context to our Spending Review Season".Boaden's email went on to provide Thompson with briefing notes on the season – which begins next week across BBC TV, radio and online services – for his...

Former deputy prime minister says police refused to tell him whether his phone was hacked by News of the World journalistsJohn Prescott today called for a judicial review of the conduct of the Metropolitan police force in relation to the allegations of phone hacking against the News of the World.The former deputy prime minister was speaking after the paper confirmed it had suspended a journalist while it investigates new allegations of the unlawful interception of voicemail.The police have come under pressure after the New York Times quoted unnamed detectives alleging they had cut short their investigation because of their close relationship with the News of the World.Prescott said the police had repeatedly refused to tell him whether his phone was hacked by News of the World journalists...

via Miss Cellania P.S. – how many guys were watching the shirt ?...

An un-named Atascadero woman was arrested for ‘driving under the influence’ after she crashed her car into the garage at her home. The cops handcuffed her and placed her in the back of the car to take her down to the station. It’s what happened next that makes this story ‘unusual’ . . . The woman managed to wriggle out of the handcuffs. When the cops noticed her hands were free, they pulled her out of the car and fastened another pair of cuffs on her but could find no trace of the 1st pair either in the car or on her person. Female officers eventually recovered the missing cuffs from a ‘body cavity’ after an intimate search of the woman at the station. [she now faces an additional charge of petty theft over the cuffs] Source . . ....

Odd thing, that while the media can find pages of space to discuss the fact that an unknown advisor has resigned and a senior minister is not having a gay affair, few can find any space to mention the New York Times and their story about Andy Coulson, who remains the media supremo in Downing Street, but was the editor of the News of the World when various reporters were illegally accessing mobile voicemail for celebrities and those in the public eye. Coulson has always denied knowing anything about it, but the New York Times claims that the paper had...a frantic, sometimes degrading atmosphere in which some reporters openly pursued hacking or other improper tactics to satisfy demanding editors. AndyCoulson, the top editor at the time, had imposed a hypercompetitive ethos, even by tabloid...

• Calls for judicial inquiry after reporter is suspended• Latest phone hacking allegation dates from earlier this year• Four targets poised to sue police over failure to warn themThe government tonight came under pressure to set up a judicial inquiry into the phone hacking scandal at the News of the World after the paper confirmed that it has suspended a journalist while it investigates new allegations of the unlawful interception of voicemail.The prime minister's media adviser, Andy Coulson, has denied a report in the New York Times which claimed he freely discussed the use of unlawful news-gathering techniques when he was editing the paper and "actively encouraged" a named reporter to engage in illegal interception of voicemail messages. Coulson has always denied knowing of any...

Gov Jan Brewer, who steered through Arizona’s controversial anti-immigration law, fails to impress in TV debate amongst candidates seeking to be the next Governor of the State. She flounders in her opening remarks – then at the end of the debate she refuses to respond to a challenge from her democratic opponent to admit she lied about bodies being beheaded in the desert. When reporters pressed her to make the same admission afterwards – she refused to answer, then did a runner -...

Sackings, strike threats and a bitter battle for supremacy engulfs French TV channelWhen launched four years ago France 24 was billed as a "CNN à la française": a television news channel that would counter the influence of Anglo Saxon media and make the voice of France heard around the world.In recent days, however, that voice has sounded rather more anguished than authoritative.Engulfed in rivalries and recriminations, the newsroom has been plunged into crisis, with one union threatening a  strike and another planning a vote of no- confidence. Journalists mutter about a "battle of the bosses" fuelling dissent. One even likened the atmosphere to the Saint Bartholomew's Day massacre: vicious, unrelenting and very, very, bloody.Since last week, when rumours of sackings and...

Press Complaints Commission confirms it was told two months ago that journalist was under investigation over new claimThe News of the World is facing a fresh allegation of phone hacking against one of its journalists, the Press Complaints Commission confirmed today.The commission was informed by the paper just over two months ago about the allegation, and the journalist involved has been "suspended from reporting duties".Stephen Abell, the PCC director, confirmed today that the press regulator was informed in by the paper in June "of the existence of the recent allegation of phone-message hacking against the reporter". Abell said that the PCC was prevented from launching its own investigation because the allegation was "the subject of legal action".The new claim was revealed late...

Does Italy allow you to get away from being ‘George’, one of the world’s biggest celebrities?It’s much easier for me to hang out with friends at a restaurant in Laglio without 50 photographers showing up. I also get to practise my horrible Italian and my friends and I do everything but talk about the film business. But unfortunately it’s turning into a tourist Mecca now so I have to be a little more careful… I don’t really worry about that though. Whenever I want, I can stage a diversion and invite Brad and Angie and their 15 children to come over. Then I can sneak away to the other side of the lake by boat and do whatever I want.George Clooney interviewed by Polly Holder and Carol Mann in the Daily Mirror, 7 March 2010.[link]In an exclusive interview, Clooney says: "It’s...

The BBC has lost it’s court battle to prevent an autobiography being published that would reveal the identity of The STIG. Turns out it is Ben Collins, a Formula 3 driver. Who? Yeah, me too. (Guess the BBC couldn’t afford to get a Formula 1 driver) For those who don’t know, the BBC carries a motoring show called Top Gear which features 3 middle-aged/old men acting like adolescent schoolboys presenting a show about cars. One feature of the show is that the driver – The Stig – that test-drives the fast cars being discussed has up till now been a ‘mystery’. (Not much of a mystery, I have to say – I’ve seen his name bandied about many a time.) Anyhow, now that he has officially unmasked himself, it seems many of the fans of the show...

An elderly man, a cancer survivor with a heart condition is suing cops in Marin County after he was tasered 3 times in his own home. Peter McFarland and his wife were returning late at night from a charity function when he slipped on the steps leading to his front door, injuring his leg. His wife called paramedics who helped him inside and treated his injured leg. Mr McFarland joked to the medics that if he had a gun he would shoot himself – a clear reference to the fate administered to horses that break their legs. Unfortunately for Mr McFarland, the joke was lost on the paramedics who called the police. Two cops arrived to take McFarland to hospital – in handcuffs if necessary – for evaluation since ha had evinced suicidal tendencies. When Mr McFarland declined to...

My Voice colleague Iain Roberts has already blogged about this afternoon’s big political news that William Hague’s special advisor Christopher Myers has quit his post following allegations — vehemently denied by both — that they might be having an affair. Iain writes: “We at Lib Dem Voice wish both the Hagues and Christopher Myers well,” and I agree 100%. However, there are two further points I’d make. The questions were fair enough… Paul Staines blogged about the issue on 24th August, using the Freedom of Information Act to ask three questions inquiring as to the suitability of Mr Myers acting as the Foreign Secretary’s special advisor. In this he was within his rights, no matter the juvenile nudge-nudge-wink-wink (‘Just...

Social networking site under fire over intention to run giant new data centre mainly on coal-powered electricitySocial networking website Facebook is coming under unprecedented pressure from its users to switch to renewable energy. In one of the web's fastest-growing environmental campaigns, Greenpeace international says at least 500,000 people have now protested at the organisation's intention to run its giant new data centre mainly on electricity produced by burning coal power.Facebook will not say how much electricity it uses to stream video, store information and connect its 500m users but industry estimates suggest that at their present rate of growth all the data centres and telecommunication networks in the world will consume about 1,963bn kilowatt hours of electricity by 2020....

As recently discussed on Pickled Politics, last week Jon Stewart and The Daily Show brilliantly exposed the fact that the unnamed person Fox News had been repeatedly claiming was allegedly financing Park51/Cordoba House (aka the “Ground Zero Mosque”) and with implied ties to radical Islamist extremists was actually the Saudi Arabian Prince Al-Waleed bin Talal, the second-largest shareholder of Fox News’s parent company News Corp and an individual closely affiliated with News Corp's primary owner Rupert Murdoch himself. Fox News have subsequently completely dropped their stories about the shadowy "unnamed financier", and are apparently also refusing to respond to post-Daily Show queries about the matter. Nevertheless, the issue raises the following questions: · Why is Prince...

[Spotted at Miss Cellania]...

Last year's pay packet was the media mogul's smallest since 2003 owing to a smaller performance-related bonus While Rupert Murdoch's British newspapers laid off journalists and fought their way through a global advertising recession, the Australian-born media mogul endured a modest degree of personal belt-tightening – his take-home pay dropped by 6% to $16.8m, or £10.9m.Although still a hefty sum, Murdoch's annual pay packet was his smallest since 2003. The 79-year-old billionaire's salary was unchanged at $8.1m, but his performance-related bonus fell 20% to $4.4m. He got stock and share options worth $4.05m and he enjoyed $275,117 worth of personal use of a corporate jet.The figures were revealed in documents filed with US regulators yesterday by News Corporation, the parent company...

When one journalist decided to be honest about cultural difficulties in his Sussex hometown, he didn't expect to be called a racistIt started in the way of so many journalistic projects; a lunch between a writer and an editor. With the election of President Obama, we seem finally to have reached the post-racial stage, the editor remarked ironically to David James Smith. Not quite in Lewes where I live, he told her. Why don't you write about it, she said. Light touch paper. Stand well back.Smith was ready for flak, he tells me. Every member of his family knew that things might get rambunctious. A family of dual heritage (he's white English, his wife Petal is black and they have four children) writing about the cultural and racial difficulties they encountered in provincial Sussex, having...

Twenty years after helping defeat apartheid, the eminent writer is fighting government plans to muzzle South Africa's media'Where do you get your energy from?," I ask Nadine Gordimer, Nobel laureate and lifelong fighter for freedom. This is probably a naff, ageist question, and I wonder how the 86-year-old, who has a reputation for intellectual rigour bordering on fierceness, will react. Happily, she is not insulted. "Who knows where you get it from?" she says. "You must muster your resources and do what you have to do."What she feels she has to do at the moment is oppose the South African government's draconian proposals to muzzle the media. A new protection of information bill and media tribunal are seen by critics as the greatest threat to press freedom since the apartheid era.If...

Attendees at the Glen Beck’s ‘Restoring Honor’ Rally speaking on camera...

Corinne Day's photographs of a young Kate Moss caused a huge outcry – then became the defining fashion images of the 90sSo familiar, so utterly redolent of their time have they become, that it is hard to recall just how alien, shocking and strange Corinne Day's photos for the June 1993 issue of Vogue seemed at first. Edgier magazines (i-D, the Face, Dazed and Confused) had already documented the aesthetic that was sensationally labelled "heroin chic". But when the mighty Vogue published Day's pictures of a vacant-faced Moss clad in low-slung tan tights, posed next to a radiator which resembled her build, a hurricane of disapproval was unleashed.Day died last Friday, 27 August, aged 48, from brain cancer. She will be remembered for her close association with Moss at...

The USA Dept of Homeland Security has announced plans to allow law enforcement and civilian agencies to use Spy Satellites to monitor US citizens at home. There are concerns of course about the invasion of privacy involved and worries about the potential for misusing the power unless there are appropriate independent oversight and checks and balances in place. However, in the war against terrorism, and organised crime, it would be foolish not to use all the ‘tools’ available ?...

Given that it was such an awful weekend weather wise, I spent much of my time this weekend reading and lounging about in the house, particularly on Sunday which is no hardship, since reading the papers is one of the joys of any weekend. A favourite of mine being Kent on Sunday, which this weekend has story (page 5) concerning Dr. Ellie Lee a lecturer in social policy, at the University of Kent, not entirely sure what err social policy is as an academic subject but assume that it is some woolly minded, vaguely political sort of stuff, that conditions and trains young students to become one of those irritating bland politicians or bureaucrats, like the Millibland brothers or any of the half wit local authority bosses were so familiar with. According to Dr. Ellie Lee, assuming I'm reading...

Source . . . http://e-edition.metro.co.uk/home.html...

Now here’s a clever design – a bike and a pushchair in one...

A former civil servant with the Dept of Works & Pensions, fell off his new swivel office chair (clumsy clot) 2 years ago and struck his head against the wall. He has now instructed lawyers to sue the British Government on his behalf claiming he has been left 80% disabled as a result of the fall. Apparently he has experienced a ‘general downgrading of intellectual functioning’ – specifically, “slowed speed of information processing, impaired executive function, severe verbal communication difficulty and mild to moderate word-finding difficulties” Source . . . http://tinyurl.com/38ekjrr Hhmm, still got enough intellectual functioning to chance his arm spot a money-making opportunity engage a firm of solicitors ?...

Today, Aug 31 2010 marks the end of US ‘Combat’ missions in Iraq. (50,000 troops will remain in Iraq to help train and support the Iraqi army) According to one source (http://icasualties.org/) a total of 4,416 US military personnel have lost their lives since the US-led invasion of Iraq in 2003, and many thousands more injured. History will judge whether or not their sacrifice was worthwhile In the meantime, here is a tribute to the fallen....

Panjabi wins best supporting actress award for role in The Good Wife as Mad Men takes best drama series gongHugh Laurie, Judi Dench and Ian McKellen went home empty-handed from last night's Emmy awards, leaving Archie Panjabi to fly the flag for British acting talent.London-born Panjabi picked up the outstanding supporting actress award for her role in The Good Wife as the US honoured stars of the small screen at a lavish Los Angeles ceremony.The 38-year-old, who made her name in British hit films East is East and Bend It Like Beckham, won the Emmy for her role as a law firm's in-house private investigator in the hit TV show. She beat fellow The Good Wife actor Christine Baranski and Mad Men's Elisabeth Moss.Michael Sheen was nominated for outstanding lead actor in a mini-series or TV...

Cadaver dogs perform a grim but essential task – locating the presence of human remains, even minute particles of human remains. In America, the cadaver dogs first achieved national recognition in the aftermath of 9/11, helping to locate partial remains and thus confirm the death of missing people. These dogs have gained a considerable fan-club,...

Lord of the Rings is one of my favourite books and I loved the film adaptation. As some of you know, I’m a great fan of Celtic Women. Here, their version of Siuil A Run has been married to some scenes from Lord of the Rings to make a tribute to Arwen and Aragon. One of the regular contributors to Madhatters has a feature on her blog where readers are invited to submit a song to her Blogger’s Jukebox. I posted this vid there yesterday Go check out her site and submit your own music vid to her jukebox or leave a comment or two – http://starlaschat.wordpress.com/...

Lawyers acting on behalf of Dr Conrad Murray, who has been charged with involuntary manslaughter over the death of Michael Jackson, may request that the singers body be exhumed to permit further tests. An autopsy ruled that MJ died from an overdose of the sedative Propofol prescribed by Dr Murray. His lawyers are challenging that conclusion and hope further tests on MJ’s body will show the singer could have died from other drug use. Jackson’s family are apparently not thrilled at the prospect of Michael’s body being exhumed Source . . . http://tinyurl.com/3yctl2z...

18 people have died hunting mushrooms in the mountains of Northern Italy – 17 in nine days, six in 48 hours. With weather conditions promising a boom season for shrooms this year, hunters are keen not to give away the location of their secret troves and have been donning camouflage clothing and going out at night to avoid prying eyes. According to a spokesperson, the deaths appear to be the result of hunters tripping while on a high slippery slope. Source . . . http://tinyurl.com/39oo2ny...

Why dads should never be left to look after kids on their own...

Lib Dem Voice has polled our members-only forum to discover what Lib Dem members think of a variety of key issues, and what you make of the Lib Dems’ and Government’s performance to date. Almost 600 party members have responded, and we’ll be publishing the full results of our survey in the next few days. A week ago, the news media’s silly season alighted on a suggestion that Charles Kennedy was about to defect to Labour, and flogged the story for all it was worth. LDV asked: The news media this past weekend was dominated by suggestions – which appear to have emanated from the campaigns of one of the Labour leadership contenders – that Charles Kennedy was about to defect from the Lib Dems to Labour. The story was immediately dismissed by Charles and the party....

thanks to Ratty for this one . . ....