On the basis of the facts and evidence before the committee, we conclude that if at all relevant times Rupert Murdoch did not take steps to become fully informed about phone hacking, he turned a blind eye and exhibited wilful blindness to what was going on in his companies and publications. This culture, we consider, permeated from the top throughout the organisation and speaks volumes about the lack of effective corporate governance at News Corporation and News International. We conclude, therefore, that Rupert Murdoch is not a fit person to exercise the stewardship of a major international company. [more inside]
posted by Trurl
on May 1, 2012 -
27 comments
10 O'Clock Live is a show currently airing on Channel 4 in the UK. It could be considered a British take on the Daily Show, but longer, weekly, with more discussion, and performed live. MeFi favorite
Charlie Brooker is one of their presenters, along with David Mitchel, Lauren Laverne and Jimmy Carr. While focused on British issues, the show sometimes covers international topics, and is wildly funny. Here are some highlights:
Charlie Brooker: On Gaddafi - On Berlusconi - On the 'Big Society' - On Sarah Palin -
On the iPad 2 - On the English Defense League & the Daily Star - On Ed Miliband (Leader of the Labour Party, beating out his brother David) - On Prince Andrew
David Mitchell: On political hyperbole - On language in the media - On encouraging rich people to immigrate - On what to do with the Olympic Stadium
Jimmy Carr: As Berlusconi - On Product Placement
Lauren Laverne: Guide for new democracies - Inside the brain of Ed Miliband - British PR companies helping tyrants
Everyone on David Cameron on The One Show (this one's awesome) [more inside]
posted by JHarris
on Mar 24, 2011 -
84 comments
The Works of
Swede Mason: "
Jeremy Clarkson," "
Get in the Back of the Van," "
Jungle All The Way," "
Bill Wyman's Metal Detector," "
Put the Lotion in the Basket, *" "
Got The Sucka," "
The Gobshite, *" "
Squashed Thingy," "
Spare Me The Madness," and the pair of tracks based on
Neighbors deaths "
Coffee And Croissants" and "
Todd....Dead."
[more inside]
posted by flatluigi
on Oct 13, 2009 -
14 comments
Colour on the Thames is a 7 minute film shot in 1935 using
Gasparcolor, one of the many early forms of tinting black and white film. Beside
Colour on the Thames, which provides a wonderful view of 1930's England, the only film made in Gasparcolor I could find online was
Colour Flight by New Zealand artist Len Lye, an abstract cartoon set to instrumental 1930's pop music.
The story of Gasparcolor is in itself interesting, for instance touching on Nazis, Hungary between the wars and early color animation.
posted by Kattullus
on Jan 27, 2009 -
12 comments
The NHS at 60. The National Health Service is 60 on July 5th. Take a look at documents, audio and video related to the birth and growth of this "radical plan."
posted by fire&wings
on Jun 28, 2008 -
5 comments
Applications for UK visas are
being denied for ridiculous reasons, says an independent monitor report. Among the reasons: never having been on holiday before, "failing to complete pivotal areas of Section 6", and "plan[ning] a holiday for no particular purpose other than sightseeing.
BBC readers contribute their stories - from potential bridesmaids being told that they were only going to marry English men like their sister was doing, to not having good enough German.
posted by divabat
on Jun 21, 2007 -
61 comments
"The German invasion of Britain took place in July 1940, after the British retreat from Dunkirk". We see, documentary-style, members of the Wehrmacht trooping past Big Ben and St Paul's Cathedral, lounging in the parks, having their jackboots shined by old cockneys, and appreciatively visiting the shrine of that good German,
Prince Albert, in Kensington Gardens.
Kevin Brownlow and
Andrew Mollo's film "
It Happened Here", with its
cast of hundreds (.pdf), imagines what a Nazi occupation might have been like — complete with underground resistance, civilian massacres, civil strife, torch-lit rallies, Jewish ghettos, and organized euthanasia. Shot on weekends, eight years in production, made for about $20,000 with nonactors and borrowed equipment and Stanley Kubrick's help, "It Happened Here" was originally envisioned by
Brownlow as a sort of Hammer
horror flick about a Nazi Britain. Thanks in part to
Mollo's fanatical concern with historical accuracy, however,
it became something else. The most remarkable thing about this account of everyday fascism is that it has no period footage.
Brownlow's 1968 book about the film's production, "
How It Happened Here", has recently been
republished. More inside.
posted by matteo
on Feb 12, 2006 -
16 comments
In 2001 America
destroyed the Kabul offices of al-Jazeera with two smartbombs; officials said it was an accident. In 2003 America
destroyed the Baghdad offices of al-Jazeera with missiles; officials said it was an accident. Now, two British civil servants are on trial for leaking a memo revealing that Bush intended to bomb al-Jazeera...
at their headquarters in allied Qatar.
posted by Pretty_Generic
on Nov 22, 2005 -
155 comments
Blair loses in the Commons for the first time since his election in 1997. MPs refused to pass laws allowing terrorist suspects to be jailed without trial for 90 days, and Blair's parliamentary majority of 66 turned into a minority of 31. The government has been holding back on the vote for months in an attempt to persuade their party to back the Prime Minister - they failed.
posted by Pretty_Generic
on Nov 9, 2005 -
38 comments
Feed Me Better Jamie Oliver (UK fat tongued food wizard) campaigns to ban the junk food and get fresh, tasty and, above all, nutricious food back on school dinners menu.
posted by Spoon
on Mar 17, 2005 -
47 comments
Britain - Stamping Out Terrorism. One Peaceful Protestor At A Time. "The Home Office proposes "to make it an offence to protest outside homes in such a way that causes harassment, alarm or distress to residents" [
PDF &
HTML] This sounds reasonable enough, until you realise that the police can define "harassment, alarm or distress" however they wish. All protest in residential areas, in other words, could now be treated as a criminal offence. The government will also seek to "suggest remedies" for websites which "include material deemed to cause concern or needless anxiety to others"."
posted by Blue Stone
on Aug 3, 2004 -
29 comments
Met by "howls of outrage" and questions about his sanity,
Michael Meacher, the ex-Environment Minister for the UK, known mostly for his opposition to GMOs, and revelations about the less than honest and upright behaviour surrounding the issue, has spent some time thinking, free from the constraints of Ministerial duties.
"
the PNAC blueprint of September 2000 states that the process of transforming the US into "tomorrow's dominant force" is likely to be a long one in the absence of "some catastrophic and catalyzing event - like a new Pearl Harbor". The 9/11 attacks allowed the US to press the "go" button for a strategy in accordance with the PNAC agenda which it would otherwise have been politically impossible to implement."
- Commentary - Commentary - Commentary
posted by Blue Stone
on Sep 6, 2003 -
24 comments
Diego Garcia islanders await call to go home. 'Cherry and thousands of other islanders were the victims of a brutal depopulation strategy by Britain in the 1960s and 1970s which sought to hand over an empty island to the United States for use as a key military base. The depopulation campaign ended in 1973 with the removal of the last islanders, who were dumped on the quays of the Mauritian capital, Port Louis ... '
The Chagos Islands: A sordid tale. 'The story involves "bribes" from the United States, racism among senior civil servants, and the UK Government deceiving parliament and the United Nations.'
The Chagos archipelago: Decolonisation and human rights., by the Southern African Human Rights NGO Network, includes a brief history of the islands from original settlement by French settlers and African slaves. 'For a people as a whole to be actually victimised by the act of forced eviction from their homeland must be the most humiliating, supreme injustice and degrading treatment any people can be made to undergo. '
posted by plep
on Jul 29, 2003 -
4 comments
How to kill terrorists without anyone knowing. An
enquiry into collusion between the British army and both loyalist and republican paramilitaries in Northern Ireland has revealed that undercover agents may have been responsible for several assassinations, including lawyer Pat Finucane. By creating army units immune from the usual checks and balances, the government kept its hands clean. This is an account from someone who was involved.
posted by Summer
on Apr 16, 2003 -
17 comments
Blair, the war criminal Tom Dalyell, a Labour MP with over 41 years of service in the House of Commons has voted with his Labour Party constitutency to call for Blair to reconsider his postion as party leader. He further states that he believes "[Blair] should be branded as a war criminal and sent to the Hague".
posted by lometogo
on Mar 27, 2003 -
22 comments
