Two such very bad men...

Rupert Murdoch, Tony Blair and me | Media | The Guardian:

Monday 17 March 1997

The chief whip, Donald Dewar, took me aside. "Have you heard about tomorrow's Sun?"

"No."

"Murdoch is coming out for us. I know you've got strong views on the subject, some of which I share, but I'd be grateful if you could refrain from commenting."

I agreed – until 2 May.

Tuesday 18 March 1997

Sure enough today's Sun is covered in "We back Blair". Inside there are two pages of justification. Every word reeks of cynicism. If we had the guts, we should keep quiet until 1 May and strike with deadly force in the first week. We won't though. We haven't neutralised Murdoch. He's neutralised us.

Extracts in Guardian from the latest volume of his diaries, former MP Chris Mullin recalls how New Labour failed to curb the power of News International's 'Sun King'

BBC Money Box spills the beans: rich will get richer and the rest will get stuffed

BBC News - Will the 2010s be a 'lost decade'?: Money Box presenter Ruth Alexander uncovers an interesting fact about the post-crash economy - we're not actually all in this together...

Annual wage growth will be slow in the first half of the coming decade and will then pick up to 3% in the latter years, according to John Philpott, chief economist at the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development.

"That would take the median wage in 2020 to around £34,000," he believes. "People would be a bit better off in real terms, although not as well off as they were in the 2000s."

But he adds the caveat that "during this period to 2020, we're also [likely to see] an increase in the tax burden".

And, as he points out, averages can hide some hard truths. People in the top ten per cent of earners will see their wages grow more than those on lower incomes.

"At the lower end of the pay distribution, it's possible that people not only won't be any better off in real terms by 2020, but could actually be worse off."

...and the actual broadcast is on iPlayer http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/console/b013f6qg for the next few days...

Unsafe in their hands

Andrew Lansley's NHS reforms are unworkable, says review chief | Society | The Guardian:

"The prime minister has become concerned that the bill's promotion of competition has allowed its many critics to claim that the health service will be privatised, undermining Tory attempts to detoxify their reputation on the NHS."

Ooops.
Too late.

Metro readers oppose Britain's military role in Libya

Majority of Metro readers oppose Britain's military role in Libya
http://www.metro.co.uk/news/858630-majority-of-metro-readers-oppose-britains-military-role-in-libya

The majority of Metro readers believe Britain does not have a duty to intervene in Libya, according to our latest Urban Life poll.

Fifty-eight per cent say Britain is wrong to intervene in the civil war while only 30 per cent say it does have the right.

 I picked a Metro up off the floor of the bus on the way home yesterday evening and was impressed and a little surprised to see this - just as MPs voted 500-13 to support the air strikes.

At the mercy of thieves...

If was a Libyan rebel I'd be cheering the cruise missiles heading for Tripoli perhaps as much as the poor Palestinians cheered on Saddam's scuds.

 But here's what I am saying: if I watch a thief breaking into your house, beating you up and stealing your stuff - and he then turns up at mine offering to help me stop another thief doing the same to me, I can know for sure that he is a thief - and he's also operating a protection racket, for which I am sure I will pay, probably quite soon, with the contents of my house. I may not be able to say it, because I am at the mercy of thieves. I would hope that my real friends down the road apiece would be circumspect in their praise for this thief or that, and that they would be working to overthrow all thieves, in every town. I really do hope the Libyans get freedom and democracy out of the western thieves. I hae ma douts. I'm against thieves.

We're at war again!

Bahrainis cannot be subdued for ever | Brian Whitaker | Comment is free | guardian.co.uk:  Bahrainis cannot be subdued for ever | Brian Whitaker | Comment is free | guardian.co.uk

Saudi Arabian troops arrive in Bahrain to prop up the monarchy against widening demonstrations
"While much of the world has been preoccupied with questions about a no-fly zone over Libya, Arab Gulf states have been busy establishing what might be called a 'no-protest zone' in the Arabian peninsula."

I wonder who supplied the weapons. Yay for freedom and democracy.

The internet is over - or it's now Web 3.0...

SXSW 2011: The internet is over | Technology | The Guardian:

"The big idea O'Reilly is touting is 'sensor-driven collective intelligence', but since he coined the term 'Web 2.0', he seems resigned to people labelling this new phase 'Web 3.0'. If Web 2.0 was the moment when the collaborative promise of the internet seemed finally to be realised – with ordinary users creating instead of just consuming, on sites from Flickr to Facebook to Wikipedia – Web 3.0 is the moment they forget they're doing it."

SAS? Libya? Diplomatic mission? You could not make it up.

(Steve bell cartoon here)

SAS-backed Libyan diplomatic mission ends in humiliation | World news | guardian.co.uk:
"'I can confirm that a small British diplomatic team has been in Benghazi,' said William Hague, the foreign secretary. 'The team went to Libya to initiate contacts with the opposition. They experienced difficulties, which have now been satisfactorily resolved. They have now left Libya.'"

Honestly.

Time to disown Blairism and point out Tories have no mandate

The coalition has sneaked a coup on a sleeping public | John Harris | Comment is free | The Guardian:

"What are we faced with? A polite kind of coup, in the service of an all-encompassing project that Klein and her followers surely recognise, and of which Friedman would be proud. The Labour party seems punch-drunk, and racked with confusion about how much the coalition has taken from peak-period Blairism (a simple solution: disown those aspects of your disgraced past, and start truly opposing). (my bold - Malky x)  Every lurch to the free-market right shreds the idea that the Lib Dems are there to pull the Tories back to the centre. With Lib Dem backbench MPs and such grandees as Shirley Williams, I keep having the same conversation. They say they oppose some policies, but are heartened by others, and all is just about OK. In response, the old hippie phrase comes to mind: you are either on the bus, or off the bus. 

It speeds on, anyway. And it really is the most amazing thing: not just that this most illegitimate of revolutions is happening, and fast, but that we are sleepwalking into it."

(cartoon Grinding the faces of the poor - by Malky x - ;-) after Hograth)

Not another bloody Sunday in Stornoway

Western Isles' Sunday shutdown likely to fall foul of new equality law | Society | The Guardian:

"Councillors in remote Scottish islands could be challenged over hardline religious policies banning work and play on sabbath"

Oh yus.

Gideon Osborne - the man with with an arse at both ends of his nose

BBC News - Unions are 'forces of stagnation,' says Osborne:
"'I regard these people as the forces of stagnation, when we are trying to get the British economy competitive again, moving forward again.'"