Reviews Category
We don’t just report off-beat news, breaking news and digest the best and worst of the news media analysis and commentary. We give an original take on what happened and why. We add lols, satire, news photos and original content.
The Masturbating to Mary Tyler Moore Society Is looking for new members
You can The Mary Tyler Moore Masturbation Society, the group created by James J. Kagel of Cleveland, Ohio. Proving our theory that any weirdness you’ve thought of someone else has formed a group for, Kagel invites other fans of Mary Tyler Moore’s “beautifully curved, ever so shapely, silken, creamy smooth, seductive, velvety soft, long, lean, graceful, tantilizing [sic], erotic, sinuously sexy LEGS” to join him in a tribute toss.
Kagel’s interest in MTM began when he watched The Dick Van Dyke Show as a lad.
There’s chance, of course, that you already know all this, being as you are a member of MTM Legs (“for your jacking pleasure”).
Spotter: Richard Metzger
Posted: 27th, September 2015 | In: Celebrities, Key Posts, Reviews, Strange But True | Comment
Rolf Harris: 76p a day for a victim is much less than the promised £200,000
As the police distance themselves from ‘Nick’, the man who claims to have witnessed murder by VIP paedophiles, the Mirror delivers the front-page news that Rolf Harris “pays his youngest abuse victim just 76p a day compensation”.
He gives her pocket money?
The Daily Star (see above) said she was in line for £200,000. Other papers put the figure at £70,000.
Rolf Harris’s youngest sex abuse victim is being compensated with a pathetic 76p a day for her nightmare ordeal spanning four decades. Wendy Wild has finally accepted £22,000 after months of wrangling from the fallen star -who still refuses to apologise from jail for his sickening crimes.
How much would have been right? Isn’t £22,000 and the sight of your abuser being sent down for his crimes enough?
“I’ll never again be afraid of the dark,” says Wendy, 54, who believes she can now find closure at last. “And I’ll never again see the twisted image of that two-faced man in my nightmares.”
Backing her is her older brother Paul, who was at the same children’s disco where Harris pounced on his sister, putting his hand up the frightened youngster’s skirt and fondling her after she asked for his autograph.
Furious Paul, now 57, has today released a picture of Wendy taken shortly before the devastating attack.
Harris is rich. Should be pay more because he could afford to?
On his [Paul’s ] advice, Wendy rejected Harris’ first and second offers of £12,500 and £18,000 as insulting and insufficient from a celebrity worth millions. She told her lawyers they failed to reflect her torment.
But she accepted £22,000?
Paul told the Sunday People: “The man in the street should know what Harris is really like. I don’t use profanities so I’ll stick to calling him a ‘git’ which sums him up.”
Nonce is better. Rapist is good, too.
“Not once has he apologised to my sister, or accepted his guilt and considered what he’s put her through for nearly five decades. But Wendy will now accept his money because it will help her find some kind of closure.”
…
He says: “Wendy won’t talk about it all, but I will – because Rolf Harris needs showing up for the kind of person he is.”
Don’t we already know what kind of person he is?
The Mirror reports on a letter and photo of a young Wendy that Paul sent Harris. He wrote:
“This family photo was taken of my little sister when she was seven, shortly before you sexually abused her. She is now the mature woman who, at your trial, described her lifetime’s torment as a result of what you did to her. While the £22,000 you have now agreed to pay Wendy is paltry, worst of all is your failure to still say sorry to her for what you did. For this reason, I’m enclosing this picture of her as a child which I want you to study and reflect on your actions and the ripples that continue to this day when you dropped that one particular pebble into that innocent pond.
“Hopefully, you might find it in your heart to apologise to her? Are you man enough to write back to me, saying sorry to Wendy for what you did to her as a child? It’s only what she deserves and would mean more than your paltry settlement.
“I hope you are.”
Is sending a picture of a child to the paedophile who abused her a good idea? Do we expect Harris, a convicted git/nonce, to weep and seek salvation? Surely not. We want him punished and removed from society. He has been. Harris is clearly a revolting man. He has referred to his victims as “money-grabbing woodworms”. A song he wrote included the line “Perhaps you think you’re pretty still, some perfumed sultry wench?”
Ms Wild replied with a song of her own, which was republished in the Mirror, a paper willing to broadcast her words and in so doing keep the paedo frenzy alive:
“You chose me, remember, 40 years ago, you put your dirty hands on me and have not let me go.
“Now you are complaining through the papers, whingeing you are innocent, from your cushy jail. I still live with the nightmare of your dirty act while all you seem to care about is your millions staying intact.
“Threats from you don’t seem to stop and continue to be said, private investigators watching me, fill my heart with dread.
“All of this has taken its toll and it’s me that’s had to squirm.
“Just when I thought you could get no lower, you say I am a worm.
“If you think your latest song will make you another hit, you’re wrong.
“You’re just a sex offender. Now put that in a song and sing it.”
Why is Ms Wild’s pain front-page news when so many have suffered and the police are hunting for VIP peados in Westminster? Is it because the trawl has stalled? The story of a huge cover-up has not progressed as the Mirror and others would have liked. Having invested so much stock in the story of a powerful cabal of murderous paedophiles at the heart of power and found nothing of substance, the Mirror sticks with what it knows and presents every small morsel as a sensation in the hope that it’s enough to satisfy a voracious hunger for proof.
Posted: 27th, September 2015 | In: Reviews | Comment (1)
Liverpool: since March Rodgers’ Reds haven’t beaten a team higher than 16th in the Premier League
Liverpool are not all that good. For a club that has spent vast sums of cash, Brendan Rodgers team are pretty dire. The current league positions of the past five team Liverpool FC have defeated since mid-March are:
Bournemouth – 16th (and they were very, very lucky to beat them)
Stoke – 17th
Aston Villa – 18th
Newcastle – 19th
QPR – relegated.
Surely Brendan Rodgers is doomed.
Posted: 26th, September 2015 | In: Liverpool, Reviews, Sports | Comments (4)
Watch people use virtual reality porn for the first time
Porn is everywhere:
BaDoink, a leading online adult entertainment company, has been an active pioneer in the virtual reality space – attempting to bring virtual reality porn to the masses. They recently hit the streets of San Francisco, California to give passerbys their first virtual reality experience, using the Samsung Gear VR with a Samsung Galaxy 6.
Posted: 26th, September 2015 | In: Reviews, Technology | Comment
Watch The Simpsons intro in the style of a 1990s VHS video
Spotter: Flashbak
Posted: 26th, September 2015 | In: Reviews, TV & Radio | Comment
Truther Watch: Jeremy Corbyn says 9/11 was ‘manipulated’ (in the Daily Telegraph)
Is Jeremy Corbyn a 9/11 Truther? The Telegraph says:
Jeremy Corbyn has claimed that 9/11 was “manipulated” to make it look like Osama Bin Laden was responsible to allow the West to go to war in Afghanistan.
Couldn’t Tony Blair have just downloaded a dossier? Why kill so many?
In comments that will raise questions about his suitability to lead the Labour Party, Mr Corbyn appeared to blame George Bush and Tony Blair for using the September 11 attacks in New York to allow them to go to war.
In a series of further articles, Mr Corbyn also appears to endorse controversial conspiracy theories about a “New World Order”…
What did he say?
In the 2003 article for The Morning Star newspaper, Mr Corbyn wrote: “Historians will study with interest the news manipulation of the past 18 months.
“After September 11, the claims that bin Laden and al-Qaida had committed the atrocity were quickly and loudly made. This was turned into an attack on the Taliban and then, subtly, into regime change in Afghanistan.”
So he’s not a Truther, then. Although the Mail tweaks the words to say:
Corbyn’s conspiracy theory: 9/11 attacks were ‘manipulated’ to make it look like Osama Bin Laden was responsible, says Labour leader
The Tele adds:
However, in previous years he wrote a series of articles which appear to have endorsed the conspiracy theory about the “New World Order”…
We can find no link to the original article. Can you?
Posted: 26th, September 2015 | In: Politicians, Reviews | Comment
Woman guilty of growing bladder cancer preventing marijuana to help sick husband
Good news for all tree lovers. London has a new “forest“. The Sun says a forest was “discovered” in a “remote part of Kingston, south-west London.”
The doubly good news is that this is a “forest of cannabis”. The less good news is that these days a forest need only be “the size of a football pitch” to qualify.
PC Sarah Henderson says the woodland looked like “a small forest of Christmas trees and was complete with a gazebo”. It sounds a pretty idyllic spot. So the police have destroyed it.
No-one’s been arrested. But if you want a look at the kind of hardcore villain growing weed these day you could do worse than look to Rawtenstall, Lancashire, where Jeanette Hurst, 58, has been arrested for growing marijuana plants.
Mrs Hurst’s husband Roy has cancer. She was using the weed in a bid to alleviate his suffering. At Burnley Crown Court, Mrs Hurst has pleaded guilty to production of a class B drug and also intent to supply to her husband. Her nursing earned her a 18 month community order. She says:
“It’s been 15 months of sheer hell – just hell. I just wanted it over with. I don’t know how Roy got through it but I have been having to put myself on the back burner because of him. I’ve been so worried about him.”
Mr Hurst has bladder cancer.
In other news:
Cannabis users were 45 percent less likely to contract bladder cancer than their more abstemeous peers, according to the National Cancer Institute (NCI) – a branch of the National Institutes for Health.
Such are the facts.
NHS balls: Margate Hospital fast-tracked RAF man in ‘ofensive uniform’ for cultural reasons
When RAF aircraft engineer Mark Prendeville, 38, was injured at work he was taken to A&E at Margate’s Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother Hospital in Margate, Kent.
What happened next is little unclear.
The Sun: “AttenSHUN!EXCLUSIVE: Hospital moves RAF man over ‘offensive’ uniform”
AN RAF sergeant taken to A&E after a training accident was moved by hospital staff who said his uniform would upset other patients… workers twice ushered him into empty corners, claiming his camouflage fatigues may offend other patients
The source of the story appears to be Mark’s father Jim, 63, a former Sgt Major with the Irish Guards:
“Mark was moved because of his uniform — he was told that twice. The first time, they asked him to move around the corner. Then someone else came out and took him around another corner so no one would see him. They said they didn’t want to upset people in the hospital. The words they used were, ‘We’ve lots of different cultures’ coming in. Mark was quite annoyed, but he’s a quiet lad and he didn’t want to kick up a fuss.”
Well, that desire not to cause a fuss is today’s front-page news.
Comrades took the married 38-year-old — a war veteran of both Iraq and Afghanistan — to A&E, where a member of staff ushered him to an empty corner of the waiting room. Dad-of-one Mark, wearing camouflage fatigues, was then moved again round a corner by another worker.
He was sat away from all other patients.
Well, maybe.
Daily Mirror:
Aircraft engineer Mark Prendeville, 38, was taken to an empty corner of the waiting room before being moved behind a corner by hospital staff – form fear of upsetting the “different cultures coming in”
The Mail:
Staff moved him to sit in a corner before asking him to sit behind a wall.
Daily Express: “Outrage as hospital moves injured RAF veteran out of A&E because he was wearing uniform”
A spokesman for East Kent University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust apologised to Sgt Prendeville for “any embarrassment”.“A member of the armed forces in uniform attended our A&E and was asked by a member of staff if he wanted to sit inside the department rather than the waiting room. This employee was acting in good faith because previously, there had been an altercation between a member of the public and a different member of the armed forces in uniform.”
Rather than having to sit with the riffraff in A&E, Mr Prendeville was taken inside the department.
And there can be nutters in A&E. Take these stories from July 2015:
A hospital patient threatened to “kill” staff as he assaulted two nurses, a court heard. Aaron Stewart, of Bentick Court in Manvers Road, Sneinton, also grabbed one of the nurses in a headlock, clenched his fist and said he would “smash you all up” after being admitted to the Queen’s Medical Centre with a cut hand.
And:
A doctor and nurse were attacked by a violent patient high on drugs. Jennifer Coxon, 25, also shouted vile abuse at other patients waiting to be assessed at the Accident and Emergency Department of Manchester Royal Infirmary.
Might it be that Mr Prendeville was given treatment faster than those not in uniform?
Posted: 26th, September 2015 | In: Reviews | Comments (3)
Womanizer: the utterly weird German aid to masturbation that looks like a kazoo
Female masturbation is presented as a good thing. Men who toss off are, well, tossers but in the mainstream media dildos and all manner of devices are symbols of female emancipation. And now there is the Womanizer. Yeah, there’s a masturbation aid named after a man who uses women.
And get a load of those adverts. Only young, fit women use the vibro toss:
Use the womanizer® for orgasmic stimulations – alone or together with your partner, on the go or at home. You will always experience a novel feeling of lust – persistent and intense.
On the go?
Women witness waves of ecstasy which cause moments of absolute loss of control. The womanizer lets your body quiver with excitement.
Use on the go? But first check no-one’s stood behind you on the escalator (and your laces are done up).
Posted: 25th, September 2015 | In: Reviews, Technology, The Consumer | Comment
‘Rampaging’ Arsenal balls: The Sun and Mail’s story on Spurs ‘shame’ show how much they hate football fans
The Press love to present any rowdiness at the football as a terrible thing. Last night Arsenal fans in the ‘away’ section were kept behind at Tottenham’s ground. These police-induced lock-ins are not supposed to be cause for merriment. They are moments when the police lock innocent people in/up for crimes not yet committed. A few Arsenal fans thought it a fun idea to reach over the barriers and peel off the sad mottos that puncture the Spurs concrete, messages like ‘Come On you Spurs’, ‘The Game Is About Glory’ and ‘To Dare Is to Do’.
The Sun says the “yobs” have “shamed” football.
ARSENAL face another FA charge after their supporters ripped up perimeter stadium signs and HURLED them at Spurs fans.
No. The signs were not hurled. No Spurs fans were injured because the signs were hanging over the heads of other Arsenal fans, who were cheering. And most Spurs fans had already left the ground.
Arsenal got 3,000 tickets for the match – the same allocation they always get. This is the lay-out:
ESPN saw the came thing:
Kept behind after the game, some away fans pulled away parts of the “This Is Our Club” boards on the first tier of the Park Lane stand at Spurs.
Although it too slips into hyperbole. Miguel Delaney rebrands the Spurs ground White Hart Lane as ‘White Hate Lane’:
Undaunted by facts, the Sun ploughs on:
The disgraceful scenes marred the double of hero Mathieu Flamini which sunk their bitter rivals.
No. They didn’t.
These were “shocking incidents”.
No. They were not.
But the Mail demands more.
‘Rampaging‘ fans?
Sami Mokbel at least gets one fact right:
The signs hurtled down towards the lower tier where other fellow Arsenal supporters were located.
What utter balls.
Posted: 24th, September 2015 | In: Arsenal, Reviews, Sports | Comments (2)
BBC crisis: Jimmy Savile cover-up, Alan Yentob’s ‘omerta’ and the Kids Company troughers
Jimmy Savile’s rotting corpse continues to bob around the news. Today the Sun has news of “BBC boss Yentob and the Savile cover-up.”
We know the BBC failed to investigate claims their favourite uncle was a paedophile. Liz MacKean, the excellent reporter who wanted to reveal the story on Newsnight, was quashed. She is no longer on the hard-hitting (it says here) news show, which somehow managed to survive the scandal.
But what else? The Sun’s Harry Cole writes in what the Sun calls an “Exclusive“:
BEEB boss Alan Yentob said the journalists who exposed the cover- up of the Jimmy Savile scandal were “traitors to the BBC”, one of them has sensationally claimed.
And:
Respected former producer Meirion Jones claims the remark about him was made to another employee after he contributed to Panorama’s exposé “Savile — What The BBC Knew”.
Jones worked with MacKean on Newsnight. He no longer works on the show.
Mr Yentob, 68, strongly denies making the comment. The film by Mr Jones and colleague Liz MacKean revealed the corporation’s bids to stop Newsnight exposing Savile as a predatory paedophile who struck on BBC premises.
They can’t both be right. Maybe one them has misspoken or mis-remebered or whatever modish PR-made word covers this wort of thing?
In an article for Spectator Life magazine, Mr Jones said: “A BBC colleague abused as a child wrote to Tony Hall [director general] to complain about the Savile affair. In his email he says he approached Yentob just after Panorama broadcast a film about whether or not there had been a cover-up at the BBC. He claims that Yentob denounced us. ‘Liz MacKean and Meirion Jones are traitors to the BBC,’ Yentob told him.”
So much for Cole’s “exclusive”.
The story in The Spectator’s new offshoot is called “The Pasha of Portland Place“.
…I heard Alan Yentob had been seen prowling the corridors, leaning on Newsnight, haranguing the reporter Lucy Manning and escorting Camila Batmanghelidjh into the Today studio. After Savile, it should have been abundantly clear that managers shouldn’t interfere with investigations close to home, but here was Yentob trying to influence the Batmangate probe into the charity he chaired. It also felt a bit like the Panorama investigation in 2013 into Comic Relief’s dodgy investments. That was delayed after celebrities appealed to the great and the good in the BBC.
…
A BBC colleague of mine who had been abused as a child wrote to Tony Hall to complain about the Savile affair. In his email (copied to me) he says he approached Yentob just after Panorama broadcast a film about whether or not there had been a cover-up at the BBC (the film included clips of Liz MacKean and me talking about what the BBC knew). He claims that Yentob denounced us. ‘Liz MacKean and Meirion Jones are traitors to the BBC,’ Yentob told him. He strongly denies saying this, but it wouldn’t be the first time he had complained about people breaking the BBC’s code of omertà.
The BBC will eat itself.
Posted: 24th, September 2015 | In: Key Posts, Reviews | Comment
Chelsea and Arsenal: Wenger moans, Mourinho hurts, the match gets replayed?
Arsenal manager Arsène Wenger is not yet over his side’s 2-0 defeat away to Chelsea last Saturday. The red card referee Mike Dean showed to the Gunners’ Gabriel has been rescinded by the FA – and Chelsea’s Diego Costa has been handed a three-match ban for the red-card he should have earned – but Wenger says it repairs only “5 per cent of the damage” done.
He says:
“[Revoking Gabriel’s red card] just shows they decided after the game what should have happened during the game. They have repaired 5 per cent of the damage that has been done to us. Instead of us playing 11 against 10, we played 10 against 11. It does not help us too much [now].
“I have watched the game again and it is better I do not talk about it too much. There were some things that were really surprising. Some incidents were handled very lightly and not seriously. I am still angry. I am in a job where sometimes I have to swallow things that are not right.”
On the other side of the heated debate, Chelsea manager José Mourinho is unimpressed with the FA:
“Now we know something which is that retaliation is allowed now. You can do it…. This kind of situation goes much, much, much, much more deeply and the team is hurting, obviously.”
Maybe it would be best to replay the match?
Nutella addict punched man who told him ‘No more for you’
The Burbank Leader reports on the 78-year-old man assaulted by a shopper he told ‘No Nutella for you’. Alene Tchekmedyian notes:
Burbank resident Derrick Gharabighi, 24, had snagged several samples when the elderly shopper told him to take just one, said Burbank Police Officer Cindy Guillen. That’s when Gharabighi reportedly punched the man in the face, leaving him to be hospitalized with a one-inch cut and swelling above his eye, Guillen said.
Gharabighi faces elder abuse charges.
Spotter: Arbroath
Copyright balls: PETA sues over monkey selfie
No pig has sued for being given the wrong sperm. No budgie has called the lawyers for going to an owner they did’t get along with. But give it time. In news from America (natch.) a representative of the rare crested macaque monkey who stars in that fabulous “selfie” should be coining it in.
Naruto, the six-year-old macaque who lives free in the Tangkoko Reserve on the Indonesian island of Sulawesi, snapped the selfie in 2011. The camera had been left behind by British photographer David Slater. So it’s his photo, right. Wrong, say the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA).
The complaint filed in U.S. District Court in San Francisco says:
“Naruto has the right to own and benefit from the copyright … in the same manner and to the same extent as any other author.”
Slater says he’s “rather bemused”.
“I am sympathetic in my book for animals having rights to property in some circumstances, but in no way do I mean copyrights. Their focus seems more aimed at making me out to be a criminal than someone who loves and respects and fights for animals. … I have to wonder what are the true motives behind this attack on me.”
Celebs for hire: Keith Chegwin will be your mate at a Stag Do
Keith ‘Cheggers’ Chegwin is a man for hire. Anyone seeking mates and funsters for a Stag Do can hire the former children’s telly entertainer:
He’s been at the top of his game since he first burst energetically onto the screen in Swap Shop and remains one of the nation’s favourite stars.
DJ, presenter, host, actor singer and raconteur, Cheggers is one of life’s natural performers and a top bloke to have as part of your stag party. His boundless energy, quick fire gags and fearless attitude make him the perfect guest at any gathering. He also has a reputation as something of a party animal and will fit in happily as ‘one of the lads’.
Why? It’s utterly bizarre, no? I love star spotting. If saw Cheggers in the supermarket or pub I’d nudge whoever I was with are invite them to share my enthusiasm. But to actually have him come over and sit with you, play games and lark about is weird and desperate. It might work if you all get Keith Chegwin masks, including him.
You decide your activity, tell us your destination and we’ll check availability to include Cheggers as a surprise guest to join in one of our great stag challenges such as;
Bubble Football
Go Karting
Quad Biking
Rage Buggies
Inflatable Games
Somerset Challenge
Welsh Games
Wrestling School
Paintball
Clay Pigeon Shooting
You can line up for action alongside this TV icon and set Cheggers as you [sic] target of excellence, those that score more than Keith or post a faster time are safe, but anyone who gets beaten by Keith has to pay a Stag Forfeit.
Beaten By Keith. Now there’s a Stag Do TV-shirt. As for Keith’s own love-life, you can see his wedding to Maggie Phibin here. It ended in divorce.
Posted: 23rd, September 2015 | In: Celebrities, Key Posts, Reviews, The Consumer | Comment
Football pundit Jamie Redknapp picks Watford and Norwich to go down and stay up
Jamie Redknapp is the chirping football pundit
Jamie Redknapp, September 20, Daily Mail:
Normally at least one or two of the promoted sides look like relegation candidates. This year I’d hate to pick one out. Watford, Norwich and Bournemouth have all played good football and scored some superb goals…
Jamie Redknapp, August 5, Sky:
Relegation: Sunderland, Norwich and Watford
Why pick one when you’ve already picked two of them?
Posted: 23rd, September 2015 | In: Reviews, Sports | Comment
Cormega Zyon Copening: teenager guilty of sexually exploiting himself
Cormega Zyon Copening, 17, from North Carolina, has admitted child pornography charges. His crime? Keeping two naked photographs of himself on his phone. He is now a registered sex offender.
His girlfriend, Brianna Denson, 16, was charged with making a photograph of herself for keeping it on her mobile phone. She avoided a jail sentence by pleading guilty to disseminating harmful material to minors.
Both are perverts of the lowest order. It’s a good job the adult police got to those naked photos of the teenager before the lynch mob did.
Oh,brave new world.
Posted: 22nd, September 2015 | In: Reviews, Strange But True | Comment
David Cameron wins the youth vote with cocaine-fueled pig sex
David Cameron was once at a party where people were taking drugs. Probably. In “PM at coke party — Cameron embarrassed as stars did lines”, the Sun’s James Beal says Dave and Sam Cam were at at a party at a mate’s house. Someone who can remember being there tells the Sun:
“There were a lot of big names and A-list celebrities there. It was a pretty wild night and Dave and Sam were having a few drinks. As the night wore on, it became obvious quite a few people had been taking drugs.
“There were guests snorting cocaine in various rooms and in the toilets. Dave and Sam never touched the stuff. But you could see they were uncomfortable. I don’t think they felt they could intervene. The extraordinary thing is the guests didn’t feel they were doing anything wrong by taking drugs around the PM.”
Why would they? Indeed, it’s a pretty sound indictment of Dave that people feel relaxed in his company. No news of anyone slapping their dick in a dead pig’s face, as alleged in Lord Ashcroft’s book Call Me Dave, who also says Dave can “scratch a pig’s back so effectively that the creature sighs”. From Dave? From the pig? From the pollsters at Tory HQ, delighted that Dave is so actively wooing the youth vote.
Another “friend” arrives:
“I’d be astonished if Dave had not taken cocaine at some point. He’s been around it for a long time. He told me once about it being handed round at a Cotswolds dinner party. People were leaving the table and returning with bright eyes and dusty fingers.”
Dusty fingers?
“He was uncomfortable about it being so open but did not object. It was before he was an MP in 2001, but probably around the time he was a candidate. Cocaine was in plentiful supply in the late 1990s. If you were in your late 20s or early 30s and you were not taking it, you were in a minority. Once he decided to go into politics, my sense is he sought to move away from that crowd.”
George Osborne is away.
Posted: 22nd, September 2015 | In: Politicians, Reviews | Comment
VIP Peados: police believe what they want to and seek to control media
The story that three children were murdered by VIP child abusers in Westminster is based on the words of ‘Nick’, a man who says that he had witnessed the sadistic abuse.
The Metropolitan police said the stories of a cabal of wealthy and powerful perverts raping and killing children for sport were “credible and true”. Circumspection and all other barriers to guilt were done away with. The police were on the side of the angels. The conspiracy was fact.
The Met’s spokesman has now reduced the temperature:
“We acknowledge that describing the allegations as ‘credible and true’ suggested we were pre-empting the outcome of the investigation.”
You can read the full report hereunder (via):
The Metropolitan Police Service (MPS) recognises the media’s and the public’s interest in its historic child abuse investigations, and in particular, in Operation Midland. The focus of this investigation is on allegations of the homicide of three young boys. There are also allegations of sexual abuse but the MPS has made clear from the outset that this is, and remains, a murder investigation.
No bodies. No evidence. No proof. But that’s not to say no crime was committed.
The historic nature of the allegations means this is a complex case where the normal avenues of evidence-gathering from CCTV, DNA and telephone data, are not open to us. These cases take time, but the public can have confidence that allegations from witnesses will be investigated thoroughly. We can all see the legacy that has been created by police and other authorities who appeared not to take allegations seriously in the past and the impact that has had on the confidence of victims to come forward.
Appeared not to have been taken seriously by police in the past. Now the accused appear to be guilty.
There are particular challenges where details of the allegations and those facing accusations are in the public domain. This can create potential conflicts between media and criminal investigations, and have an impact on vulnerable witnesses and those accused. This has been especially true in Operation Midland, and we wish to highlight to the media and to the public the risks that our investigation may be compromised. We raised this concern when we initially appealed for more witnesses and it continues to be an issue. We also need to clarify our investigative stance in cases of this kind
When you go looking for victims – advertising for them – the investigation becomes a trawl.
Our starting point with allegations of child sexual abuse or serious sexual assault is to believe the victim until we identify reasonable cause to believe otherwise.
It is now. It was for long the police’s position to disbelieve the victim. What we want is for the alleged victim to be treated in an even-handed manner. Accepting a claim as fact is as wrong as to dismiss it as a lie.
That is why, at the point at which we launched our initial appeal on Midland, after the witness had been interviewed for several days by detectives specialising in homicide and child abuse investigations, our senior investigating officer stated that he believed our key witness and felt him to be ‘credible’. Had he not made that considered, professional judgment, we would not have investigated in the way we have.
But considered and professional judgements have not always been correct. It was a considered a professional judgement not to investigate Cyril Smith. It was a considered a professional judgement to investigate Jim Davidson, nicking the entertainer as he flew INTO Heathrow Airport. And there’s Paul Gambaccini, the BBC DJ falsely accused of sexually abusing two boys between 1978 and 1984. He was arrested and locked in a cell. That was a considered and professional judgement.
“I was accused of having sex with two males, whom I have never known in my life, in the decade before I started having sex with males,” he says. “It was completely absurd and yet I lived under the jackboot of the Metropolitan police for a year…The Metropolitan police, which we must now expand to include several British police forces, and the Crown Prosecution Service, have reduced our beloved country to the moral equivalent of Russia.”
The Met continues:
We must add that whilst we start from a position of believing the witness, our stance then is to investigate without fear or favour, in a thorough, professional and impartial fashion, and to go where the evidence takes us without prejudging the truth of the allegations. That is exactly what has happened in this case.
Rubbish. The police have an agenda. Just ask Paul Gambaccini. And why have no police been interviewed under caution?
The integrity of our investigation is paramount, and the public can have confidence that allegations of homicide are being investigated thoroughly. Our officers have the resources to test all the evidence, and we have not yet completed this task. It is then for the Crown Prosecution Service to make a decision on whether to prosecute. More significantly, only a jury can decide on the truth of allegations after hearing all the evidence.
What about if the accused is dead?
We should always reflect that in our language and we acknowledge that describing the allegations as ‘credible and true’ suggested we were pre-empting the outcome of the investigation. We were not. We always retain an open mind as we have demonstrated by conducting a thorough investigation.
What utter drivel.
In this respect, our approach in Operation Midland is the same as if we were investigating a contemporary rape allegation.
If that’s right, God help us all.
Anyone familiar with the history of child abuse and rape investigations will recall that for many years, the first instinct of investigators appeared to be to disbelieve those making the allegations, which had a negative impact on people’s confidence to report to the police or other authorities. This undoubtedly led to crimes going unreported and un-investigated, and we do not want to return to that situation.
And now it’s the total reverse. The police are still biased but in a much improved way.
The media has shown in recent years how important they are in bringing issues concerning historic abuse to public notice and has been both challenging and supportive of the way in which police and the criminal justice system have adapted our approach.
Unless the police have gagged the media.
Reporting has also rightly questioned the official response to allegations. The media is also valuable in witness appeals and to show possible victims that they can have confidence their claims will be investigated.
Always good when the police tell the media what their job is. Not in the least bit chilling.
What can be overlooked, at times, is that those making allegations are very often vulnerable individuals. A useful definition of ‘vulnerable people’ is set out in the Ofcom code for broadcasters (8.22). It is important to note that the police must take account of this vulnerability at all stages, irrespective of whether the allegations can be substantiated or not. We ask the media and those asked to comment to do likewise. We also think the press should consider following Ofcom’s approach by amending its code to recognise that vulnerability in reporting of crime is not just a matter of the age of witnesses or victims.
From praising the media the police now want the media brought to heel.
Our other main concern is the risk that media investigations will affect the process of gathering and testing evidence in our criminal investigation. In recent weeks, one journalist reporting on Operation Midland has shown the purported real identity of someone making an allegation of sexual assault to a person who has disclosed that they have been questioned by police concerning those allegations. This action has a number of potential impacts.
Note to police: do you recall arresting Jim Davidson in the full glare of the TV cameras?
First, for those who have made allegations of sexual abuse, it is extremely distressing to discover that their identity might have been given to anyone else, particularly if that is to someone who may be involved in the case. Secondly, possible victims or witnesses reading the article may believe their identities could be revealed as well, which could deter them from coming forward. Ultimately, that could make it harder for allegations to be proved or disproved.
Yes. there are laws that cover that sort of thing.
This might not just deter those who could provide information for this investigation but also concern anyone thinking of coming forward with sexual abuse allegations. Finally, the potential disclosure by a journalist of a name may possibly hamper an investigation. Names will be disclosed by police to those involved in the case, but that will be at the appropriate time for the investigation depending on how those lines of enquiry progress.
Yes, yes. This we all know.
We do understand that there are occasions when people making allegations of crime – including sexual abuse – disclose their own identity to the media and disclose facts associated with the case. Again, we ask that the media exercise care and caution when these are the circumstances and recognise our earlier point about vulnerability.
Again the police portray themselves of guardians of right.
We would also like to make it clear that the Metropolitan Police Service does not name or confirm names of those arrested or interviewed. That is our clear policy. We will be as open as we can be about policing activity – for example confirming arrest activity – but not confirming the names of individuals. If a police employee revealed the name that would be a clear breach of policy and dealt with in the appropriate manner. Moreover, the Commissioner told the Home Affairs Select Committee in March that he supports the proposal for granting accused people anonymity until charge.
Nick-Nick.
We expect the challenges for media and police alike to continue once witnesses start to give evidence to the Goddard Inquiry. We think it is important, therefore, to offer this context now so that journalists and police officers can continue to do their job, and pursue a shared interest in justice for victims and fairness to those facing allegations.
In other words: the PR exercise goes on.
The Times adds:
Operation Midland has drawn criticism since police forces leapt on unsubstantiated abuse claims against Edward Heath, and the former MP Harvey Proctor condemned as preposterous the allegations of torture and abuse put to him by officers. The home of Lord Bramall, 91, a former chief of the defence staff, has also been searched by officers working on Operation Midland. He has described the accusations put to him as “a load of rubbish”…
There are known to be big internal concerns at the Met that the £1 million Dolphin Square investigation is based on flimsy evidence, is being pursued partly because of external pressure, and is diverting homicide detectives away from frontline inquiries.
Midland is one of a number of inquiries that began after Labour’s deputy leader, Tom Watson, said in the House of Commons in 2012 that there had been “a powerful paedophile network linked to parliament and No 10”.
Well, Watson’s now the Labour Party’s deputy leader. The conspiracy theorist has a bigger chair.
“Nick” approached police last year after speaking to the Exaro News website. He said he had been abused by a group of people after being taken to Dolphin Square and had witnessed three boys being killed. One was said to have been stabbed with a penknife and another run down with a car. The witness is understood to have given some 70 hours of videotaped interviews over several days to detectives. Many of his claims have since appeared in the newspapers and the BBC has broadcast an interview with him. It is thought, however, that police have not identified any likely victims of the alleged murders nor searched for bodies. The account of another witness who initially seemed to corroborate Nick’s account has since been ruled out.
Lest we only highlight the police’s PR-driven purge on paedos, it;s worth recalling Theresa May’s response to news of a conspiracy: “There might have been a cover-up.”
Such are the facts.
Posted: 22nd, September 2015 | In: Key Posts, Reviews | Comment
Man who slipped into a pothole buried alive by road workers
We’ve seen road workers misspell words and paint lines over dead animals. But this is a first: workers constructed a road over a man who had fallen into a pothole in Katni, Madhya Pradesh, India.
Road workers did not spot 45-year-old Latori Lal as they filled in the hole with hot tar and it was levelled with a roller.
Locals potted Lala’s shirts poking from the road. The driver of the roller and one other workers have been arrested.
YouTube link. YouTube news video in English.
Posted: 22nd, September 2015 | In: Reviews, Strange But True | Comment
Chelsea Balls: Diego Costa charged with violent conduct, Arsenal charged with failing to control players, FA triggers a small forest to die
The FA have slapped their danglies down on the desk this afternoon by chucking disciplinary charges at absolutely everybody involved in Saturday’s ding-dong between Chelsea and Arsenal.
Both Diego Costa and Gabriel Paulista have been charged with violent conduct, while both Chelsea and Arsenal have been charged with a failure to control their players.
Link to the FA statement is here…
All parties have until Thursday, 24th September to respond.
The FA statement in full:
Following the game between Chelsea and Arsenal on Saturday [19 September 2015], The FA has taken the following disciplinary action.
Diego Costa has been charged for an alleged act of violent conduct which was not seen by the match officials but caught on video. The Chelsea forward was involved in an incident with Arsenal’s Laurent Koscielny in the 43rd minute of the game. He has until 6pm tomorrow [Tuesday 22 September 2015] to reply.
Off the ball incidents which are not seen at the time by the match officials are referred to a panel of three former elite referees. Each referee panel member will review the video footage independently of one another to determine whether they consider it a sending-off offence. For retrospective action to be taken, and an FA charge to follow, the decision by the panel must be unanimous.
Arsenal defender Gabriel has been charged with improper conduct for his behaviour following his dismissal, whilst team-mate Santi Cazorla has been warned for his behaviour following his sending off.
Finally, both clubs have been charged for failing to control their players under FA Rule E20.
Both clubs and Gabriel have until 6pm on Thursday [24 September 2015] to reply.
The amount of paperworks should signal the end of small forest. And it should keep the bloated FA nice and busy.
Posted: 21st, September 2015 | In: Arsenal, Chelsea, Reviews, Sports | Comment
How do get rid of an unwanted dog in Texas: shoot it on Facebook
A woman from Troupe, Texas, asked her Facebook friends:
“I need someone to come shoot my dog, nobody here has the heart to do it! We will provide the gun!”
Mad, indeed. What Texan doesn’t own a gun? Like you, we too smell something stinky, and it’s not the 3-year-old Saint Bernard/English bulldog mix named Cinnamon.
Nicholas Pet Haven of Tyler, Texas, took the bait. He called Troup PD. They called the Smith County Animal Control. Between them you’d think they had loads guns. But they didn’t shoot the dog. They saved the dog that kept getting in the garbage.
“It’s devastating,” said animal shelter coordinator Nanette Moss. “I work with these dogs every day. They are my life, and when she walked through my door it just broke my heart. She’s a sweet dog and how can somebody shoot a sweet dog?”
Well, no-one. No-one shot the dog. But the woman got rid of one to a good home.
Posted: 21st, September 2015 | In: Reviews, Strange But True | Comment
Chelsea Balls: Diego costa ‘likes to cheat’ says Kut Zouma
Kurt Zouma has come out in support of his much-maligned Chelsea teammate Diego Costa as the fallout from the striker’s contentious performance in Saturday’s 2-0 win over Arsenal continues to…well, fall out.
Althought, when we say “comes out in support”, what we actually mean is “inadvertently admonish as a cheat”.
Footage of Zouma’s post-match interview with BeIN Sport is currently being stripped from Youtube like wanno, but thankfully Eurosport were quick off the mark in the transcribing stakes.
It begins with BeIN Sports reporter Carrie Brown asking Zouma: “Of course Arsenal will feel hard done-by, they will claim you should have had a player sent-off in Diego Costa but this is a player that’s famed for riling other players isn’t it? Are you surprised that they reacted in this way?”
To which the Chelsea defender duly replies:
No, we’re not surprised because we know Diego. Everyone knows Diego and this guy likes to cheat a lot and put the opponent out of his game.
That happened in the (Arsenal) game but he’s a really nice guy. We’re proud to have him, like the other players, and we’re happy to win this game today.
Costa is currently waiting to hear from the FA disciplinary commission as to whether he will face retrospective punishment for his conduct against Arsenal.
We’d advise Kurt Zouma to keep his character reference to himself in the mean time.
Posted: 21st, September 2015 | In: Chelsea, Reviews, Sports | Comment
Pig sex legend David Cameron is a lightweight Rebecca Loos
British Prime Minister David Cameron placed his penis inside the head of a dead pig. Well, so says a ‘serving MP’, who adds, anonymously, that Cameron tapped the dead pig’s maw to enter an Oxford University dining society as a student. The club was the Piers Gaveston, so named after the apparently edgy lover of Edward II.
It’s not all that debauched, though, is it? Had the pig been alive at the time and had Cameron been trying to off it by choking the thing to death, you might have a story. As is it, we’ve got the kind of aside any abattoir worker would laugh off as ‘kid’s stuff’.
The anecdote features in Call Me Dave: The Unauthorised Biography Of David Cameron by Michael Ashcroft and Isabel Oakeshott.
Which makes us wonder if either writer ever read Hunter S. Thompson’s Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail 72′, the writer’s reportage on the 1972 presidential campaign. Thompson writes:
In both the Ohio and Nebraska primaries, back to back, McGovern was confronted for the first time with the politics of the rabbit-punch and the groin shot, and in both states he found himself dangerously vulnerable to this kind of thing. Dirty politics confused him. He was not ready for it….
This is one of the oldest and most effective tricks in politics. Every hack in the business has used it in times of trouble, and it has even been elevated to the level of political mythology in a story about one of Lyndon Johnson’s early campaigns in Texas. The race was close and Johnson was getting worried. Finally he told his campaign manager to start a massive rumor campaign about his opponent’s life-long habit of enjoying carnal knowledge of his own barnyard sows.
“Christ, we can’t get a way calling him a pig fucker,” the campaign manager protested. “Nobody’s going to believe a thing like that.”
“I know,” Johnson replied. “But let’s make the sonofabitch deny it.”’
Also in Fear and Loathing: On the Campaign Trail ’72, published in 1973, Thompson turns to the subject of journalism:
So much for Objective Journalism. Don’t bother to look for it here — not under any byline of mine; or anyone else I can think of. With the possible exception of things like box scores, race results, and stock market tabulations, there is no such thing as Objective Journalism. The phrase itself is a pompous contradiction in terms.
In Better Than Sex: Confessions of a Political Junkie, the fourth volume of his Gonzo Papers originally published in 1994, Thompson adds:
There are a lot of ways to practice the art of journalism, and one of them is to use your art like a hammer to destroy the right people — who are almost always your enemies, for one reason or another, and who usually deserve to be crippled, because they are wrong. This is a dangerous notion, and very few professional journalists will endorse it — calling it “vengeful” and “primitive” and “perverse” regardless of how often they might do the same thing themselves. “That kind of stuff is opinion,” they say, “and the reader is cheated if it’s not labelled as opinion.” Well, maybe so. Maybe Tom Paine cheated his readers and Mark Twain was a devious fraud with no morals at all who used journalism for his own foul ends. And maybe H. L. Mencken should have been locked up for trying to pass off his opinions on gullible readers and normal “objective journalism.” Mencken understood that politics — as used in journalism — was the art of controlling his environment, and he made no apologies for it. In my case, using what politely might be called “advocacy journalism,” I’ve used reporting as a weapon to affect political situations that bear down on my environment.
So about that pig… do you believe it to be true?
Posted: 21st, September 2015 | In: Politicians, Reviews | Comment