[NYTr] Blair's Last Enemy: Freedom of Speech; Wants to Muzzle Internet Journalists Date: Wed, 13 Jun 2007 07:29:50 -0500 (CDT) Via NY Transfer News Collective * All the News that Doesn't Fit [We can't wait to see the intrepid CIA whores from Reporters Without Scruples start baying at Blair, when they have time in between savaging Cuba and Venezuela. -NY Transfer] The Telegraph (UK) - Jun 13, 2007 http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/06/12/nmedia312.xml Blair backs new online journalism regulator * Blair: British media are like 'a feral beast' * 'New forms of media can be even more pernicious' By George Jones, Political Editor Tony Blair hinted today at new restrictions on internet journalism, saying online news coverage had become "more pernicious and less balanced" than traditional political reporting. In a farewell lecture on public life, he said that much of the British media behaved like a "feral beast, just tearing people and reputations to bits". But he had particularly harsh words for non-traditional media outlets, particularly the internet. "It used to be thought - and I include myself in this - that help was on the horizon," he said. "New forms of communication would provide new outlets to by-pass the increasingly shrill tenor of the traditional media. "In fact, the new forms can be even more pernicious, less balanced, more intent on the latest conspiracy theory multiplied by five." The emergence of internet-based news and 24-hour television news channels meant reports were "driven by impact''. He said that there was a need for the distinction between news and comment to be reasserted. With newspapers increasingly moving online, he said the regulatory systems for papers and TV needed to be revised. Currently they are monitored by separate watchdogs. "As the technology blurs the distinction between papers and television, it becomes increasingly irrational to have different systems of accountability based on technology that no longer can be differentiated in the old way," Mr Blair said. The outgoing Prime Minister said senior figures in public life had now become "totally demoralised" by the completely unbalanced nature of reporting. He conceded that relations had always been fraught, but said the situation now threatened politicians' "capacity to take the right decisions for the country''. The Prime Minister acknowledged that he had "contributed" to the deteriorating situation with the media by "spinning" too much in the early days of New Labour. ''We paid inordinate attention in the early days of New Labour to courting, assuaging, and persuading the media,'' Mr Blair said in a speech to Reuters. ''In our own defence, after 18 years of opposition and the, at times, ferocious hostility of parts of the media, it was hard to see any alternative. ''But such an attitude ran the risk of fuelling the trends in communications that I am about to question.'' While insisting that he was not complaining about the coverage he gets as Premier, Mr Blair claimed there was less balance in journalism now than 10 years ago. Mr Blair insisted that there was still a genuine desire for impartial news coverage among the public. "At present, we are all being dragged down by the way media and public life interact,'' Mr Blair said. "I do believe this relationship between public life and media is now damaged in a manner that requires repair. "The damage saps the country's confidence and self-belief; it undermines its assessment of itself, its institutions; and above all, it reduces our capacity to take the right decisions, in the right spirit for our future.'' FULL TEXT of Blair's Jun 12, 2007 speech on politics and the media: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml;jsessionid=UBR44LDI2TX0FQFIQMFSFFWAVCBQ0IV0?xml=/news/2007/06/12/nmedia212.xml *** The Telegraph (UK) - Jun 12, 2007 http://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/main.jhtml?xml=/opinion/2007/06/13/dl1301.xml Editorial Blair's last enemy: freedom of speech The Prime Minister has often cut a religiose figure. In the speeches he is making to mark his retirement, an increasingly confessional note is being registered. So it was yesterday, when he delivered a lecture about the media's iniquities. It was not a "whinge", he protested, and not a complaint: it was an argument, and one in which he admitted that he had sinned, too. He said the relationship between politics and the media was "qualitatively and quantitatively different" today compared with the past: worse than when Baldwin (and how interesting it is to see that Mr Blair has acquired a historical perspective) in 1931 accused the press of exercising "the prerogative of the harlot - power without responsibility". His answer is statutory regulation. Some of what Mr Blair said was true. There are now hundreds of television channels and illimitable sources of news from the internet. In a passage whose hypocrisy would have been devastating had it not been rendered irrelevant by his imminent departure from office, Mr Blair admitted his "complicity" in having used and manipulated the mass media for his own political ends. His protests at what they did to him subsequently are risible. There may be joy in heaven upon one sinner that doth penance, more than upon 99 just who need not, but this is incredible. advertisement He said the distinction between news and comment has become blurred. As a result, he envisages a statutory body such as Ofcom dealing with the press too, dispensing with the gentlemen's agreements of the Press Complaints Commission. We must declare an interest. The Telegraph Media Group, as well as publishing newspapers, has a substantial internet presence that provides news and comment 24 hours a day. Neither in the newspapers nor online is the distinction between these forms of journalism ever blurred. That is why many who do not endorse the conservative political stance of the newspapers choose nevertheless to read them. They know the news coverage is objective. The honesty of that coverage might sometimes cast politicians in a less than favourable light, but, sometimes, facts necessitate that. Nor is the printed press comparable with other media in terms of regulation. There has long been a distinction in law between newspapers, with their role in holding the political establishment to account and guaranteeing freedom of speech, and the broadcasters, who have to be neutral. To seek to bring the press under statutory regulation could only, despite Mr Blair's protestations to the contrary, impair freedom of speech and the liberties of the subject. Yet Mr Blair says statutory control will be necessary because "technology blurs the distinction between papers and television". This is specious: in the eyes of the public, the two are quite distinct. He ignores the point that if people don't like a particular newspaper, they need not buy it. He cannot be so naC/ve as to imagine that putting newspapers under statutory regulation will do anything other than make them, eventually, obedient to the government of the day. He forecast his speech would be rubbished. We do not do that: but, given his record on liberties of the subject, we do find his argument deeply disturbing, founded on false premises and worthy of the strongest refutation. * ================================================================ .NY Transfer News Collective * A Service of Blythe Systems . Since 1985 - Information for the Rest of Us . .339 Lafayette St., New York, NY 10012 http://www.blythe.org .List Archives: https://olm.blythe-systems.com/pipermail/nytr/ .Subscribe: https://olm.blythe-systems.com/mailman/listinfo/nytr ================================================================