Sunday, February 12, 2012

Is Mutiny Waiting in London for Rupe Murdoch?


What happens when you have a newspaper mired in scandal, several of its key personnel arrested, and a gaggle of unruly journalists suspicious that you're about to throw them to the wolves?  That's the predicament that has Rupert Murdoch winging his way to London to supposedly rescue his beleaguered Sun newspaper.

The Murdoch conglomerate has stumped up tens of millions of dollars in compensation payments in an attempt to contain the phone hacking scandal that besets the empire, but the impact of the latest arrests in the highly sensitive areas of the Defence Ministry and the military are expected to inflame opposition to Murdoch and News Ltd in Britain.

...the anger was almost palpable among journalists because the arrests were reportedly the result of millions of emails that News Ltd had given to the police investigation into the phone hacking scandal and payments to police. Paying police for information is illegal in Britain.
Journalists and the National Union of Journalists interpreted the arrests - 10 staff from The Sun so far - as tantamount to staff being thrown to the wolves in an attempt by the company to distance itself from practices that were said to have been widespread across all British media for decades.

Murdoch, of course, has demonstrated his ease at dodging blame and laying it all at the feet of his trusted employees when he appeared before a Parliamentary committee over the News of the World scandal.   As far as Rupe is concerned, "the buck stops here" principle in no way applies to himself, never, ever.  Team Rupe has good reason to be leery of the bossman.

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