Tabloids Category
The news as told by the UK’s tabloid press – The Sun, Daily Express, Daily Mail, Daily Mirror, Daily Star and News of the World.
Cowboy Bin Police And Rats
“BEWARE of the cowboy bin police!”
So says the Mail’s front-page headline.
But before we can learn how to spot the cowboy bin police – clue: non-regulation eight-and-a-half gallon hats and rubbish rustling – some background is needed.
Last Tuesday, the Mail introduced its readers to a campaign: “As fortnightly refuse collections are imposed on one in three homes – and more are threatened – the Mail launches a campaign to save the WEEKLY bin round.” Readers were invited to “JOIN THE GREAT DUSTBIN REVOLT.”
This is the Mail’s “Great Bin Revolt”. It’s rubbish. It’s your rubbish. It’s British rubbish.
Plans are afoot for new bodies, called “joint waste authorities”, to take over the duties of rubbish removal from town halls. Unelected bodies will be responsible for refuse collections. And this will never do.
To put the tin lid on the argument, the Mail talks of “controversial recycling schemes which mean collections once a fortnight”.
Stopping short of tales of bubonic plague, the Mail produces a picture of a rat and a card readers can cut out and despatch to their local politicos.
It reads: “Dear Council Leader, I wish to register my objection to councils abandoning weekly rubbish collections in favour of emptying bins fortnightly. I urge you to consider the public health consequences of this practice and guarantee to provide a weekly service for all of tour council tax payers.”
And if this is not enough – and there is some chance it might not be – the Mail offers all readers a sticker they can affix to their bins and rust bucket cars. “THIS BIN NEEDS EMPTYING EVERY WEEK,” says the legend.
Of course, customising your wheely bins might place you in breach of the law and result in non collections. And it could happen. The rules are fierce.
As the Mail now reports, “The Bin Police will have powers to slap £100 on-the-spot fines on householders who put out rubbish too early or leave their bin lids open.”
Oh…
“The Bin Police will wear uniforms and operate in the same way as traffic wardens – but there are no rules to prevent councils hiring ill-trained and unsuitable individuals for the job.”
The Mail fails to tell us what form this training takes and readers are unable to decide if this is a career for them.
There is talk of targets. There is talk of fines. There is talk of the bin police not being checked for criminal convictions. Criminals in our bins. Not in this world!
As Hugh McKinney of the National Family Campaign says: “There are no rules here to stop councils using cowboy bin police.
“The victims of this proposal will often be families with young children who have more rubbish than anyone else and who will be the easiest to find and pick on.”
Native American families especially…
Posted: 28th, April 2007 | In: Tabloids | Comment (1)
Tally-Ban!: Prince Harry In Iraq
FRESH from manoeuvres at Stamford Bridge and nightclubs various, Prince Harry is now in grave danger. But the question is not why but who will get him first?
The Times says Iraqi insurgents are plotting to trip Harry up. Last week the enemy killed two British soldiers in Iraq. And this, says the Times on its front page, was a “dry run” for an attempt on Prince Harry’s life.
Harry is set to patrol parts of Iraq in a Scimitar reconnaissance vehicle, of the same type in which the soldiers were killed by a roadside bomb. That was the fist time British soldiers have been killed in a Scimitar as result of enemy action, says the paper.
But will the insurgents really get at young Cornet Wales? Or will sections of the Iraqi police, turned onto the idea of kidnapping and then ransoming Harry, get him first?
The Times says British soldiers are under orders not to wander around their Iraqi-run Camp Sparrowhawk in Maysan Province base for fear of being kidnapped.
But Harry wants to go. The Mail’s front page talks of Harry telling his friends: “I’M NOT AFRAID TO DIE.”
And you already know why not. No virgins await Harry. He’s not martyr. But as this “confidant” says: “Harry is not afraid to die, because of his own mother’s tragic death.”
And so another possibility enters the fray – Harry will forget to put on his seatbelt and perish in a car accident.
Harry in Iraq is looking like an episode of the old cartoon Dastardly And Muttley, with Harry trying to outwit and survive the Vulture Squadron. (“Nab him – jab him – tab him – grab him – stop that Harry now!”)
But this is no joke. There are many ways to die in a war zone, none of them pleasant. Should Harry be allowed to go?
“HARRY: LET ME FIGHT OR ELSE,” says the Sun’s front page. Or else..? Or else Harry will: a) dye his hair mauve, b) scream and scream until he is sick or c) make his own way to Iraq, wander across the border with Iran and shoot the first thing he sees?
Harry says if he is not permitted to fight he will quit the Army. He is no ceremonial goat. He is a trained fighter.
So let him go. The presence of Cornet Wales in the ranks will add a renewed sense of purpose and cohesion to operations.
At the very least it will give the fighting forces something new to talk about?
And if Harry can be issued with a non-firing gun and some melting boots, the other soldiers may soon get the quality equipment they crave…
Posted: 27th, April 2007 | In: Tabloids | Comment (1)
Lily Allen Makes Victoria Beckham Smile With… (Picture)
SAYS Lily Allen on Victoria Beckham in the Star (Pic: The Spine): “She never ever smiles.
It’s always the same expression with her lips stuck out as far as she can push them.
I’m going to put Vaseline on them to make her smile next time there’s a camera.
Then we can find out whatever it is she’s hiding in her mouth.”
What is in Vicky’s mouth?
Posted: 27th, April 2007 | In: Celebrities, Tabloids | Comments (6)
Set And Match: David Beckham And Victoria Beckham’s Lauren Outfit Fit
“POLO Ralph Lauren is pleased to announce that Brooklyn and Romeo Beckham wore the children’s Wimbledon blazer by Ralph Lauren to the christening of Geri Halliwell’s daughter Bluebell, 22nd April 07.”
We are pleased that US designer Ralph is pleased. And we look over the garment.
The blazer, of course, is a mainstay of the American sporting scene. Not too long ago, golfer Zach Johnson was having the Master’s green jacket draped about his shoulders before a fireplace in the Butler Cabin at Augusta.
You can’t get much wear out of that – Johnson had to return it to the official wardobe, where it hangs in perpetuity. You can buy a green blazer at many gentleman’s outfitters, but not an official one. And not one that can be worn in polite company with marble denim or a pair of Comfi-Slax.
But can it be that Wimbledon is grasping the full nettle of official tailoring and bringing out a range of Wimbledon chic?
It seems this is the case, and Mirror readers learn that for £250 their litle Armanis and Jakes can dress like a regular of the All England club, and, as we have learned, like Romeo and Brooklyn Beckham.
But Victoria and David are unhappy. It’s not the purple colour and white piping or even the cut. It’s those pictures. A source says Victoria and David went “apoplectic” when they learned what Lauren had done.
“Neither of them gave their consent for his – as far as they are concerned they went to a friend’s private christening with their kids. It’s one thing if they are on the red carpet or at showbiz bash, but this is just ridiculous – and totally irresponsible.”
For sure. It’s not as if Victoria and Day-vid advertise their children, or talk about them in any way to TV interviewers and in glossy magazines. The boys might be gorgeous, amazing and totally incredible with names that are beyond the reach of others, but they do not ask to be photographed and admired.
As the source says: “It is upsetting for them as parents to constantly have to deal with photographers taking snaps of their kids – Romeo espcially gets upset with the flashbulbs go off.”
It’s not like he’s asking for it, dressed innocently in his £250 Ralph Lauren jacket, available from all food tennis outlets.
He’s just a fantastic little boy in a to-die-for contemporary, elegant and stylish jacket that embodies the traditions and spirit of Wimbledon and all that is great about…
Ralph Lauren has apologised.
Posted: 26th, April 2007 | In: Tabloids | Comments (3)
Prince Harry’s Iraq Victory Parade
WHO having seen Prince Harry imbibing the courage of the Dutch, and the full range of spirits on offer at various London watering holes, would have guessed that he would not fight in Iraq?
But this is the story as the Sun uses its front page to give cheer and heart to the Iraqi insurgents.
In “HARRY WON’T FIGHT”, readers here and over there learn that “Army chiefs” are reviewing the decision to let the flame-haired prince loose on the enemy.
There is talk of “increased violence” against British troops. And the risk that Harry may return to Blighty less than intact is causing his superiors concern.
The Sun mentions the highly publicised threats issued by the enemy. They say they will kill Harry. They say they will kidnap Harry and chop off his ears. They say that 9/11 never happened, the world is flat and Noel Edmonds is the best thing on British telly.
When the enemy speaks it is hard to know what to believe. But the Sun says Harry could be a magnet for suicide bombers and snipers. Can he be allowed to go and place himself and those around him in so much danger?
But how does this stack up against what the Sun says is Harry’s dream to fight for his country?
It is a puzzler. But we suggest that Harry carries on as is for now. The war will soon be over and Harry – who was last night on manoeuvres with Chelsy Davy in London for football’s Champions League match between Chelsea and Liverpool – will get his chance to fight.
With the enemy defeated and Iraq whole again, Iraqi bar managers and club impresarios will need a brave celebrity face to show the locals that Baghdad is the London of the Middle East.
Cometh hour of victory. Cometh Harry…
Posted: 26th, April 2007 | In: Tabloids | Comment (1)
Queen Elizabeth’s Carbon Footprint: Budget Travellers Go To Seed
NEWS that Her Majesty the Queen is to offset the carbon emitted by her flight next month to the US is all very admirable.
In “GREEN QUEEN,” the Mirror notes that for the first time the Queen’s flight will have a carbon offset.
The Queen’s spokeswoman says the figure has yet to be calculated. Readers who wish to help with the sums should note that the Queen and her husband will travel by BA Boeing 777 aircraft. They will be accompanied by 35 lackeys. Number of bags and weight of crown is not reported.
Jim Scott of Save Our World says “It is a very good example for Her Majesty to set.”
It is. And very good of us to pay for it. As the palace spokeswoman tells the Mirror: “It’s public money so it must conform to carbon offsetting in terms of Government policy.”
But even without the public purse paying for trees to rub out Liz’s carbon footprint, she could surely fund the planting programme from her own pockets.
Can the same be said for the rest of us?
It’s not hard to see the day when budget travellers are unable to offset their carbon emissions and therefore unable to fly.
Just how many house plants do you need to offset, say, a fortnight’s trip to Benidorm for a family of three? Does elder son Wayne’s bag of herbal smokes and his spare bedroom marijuana farm figure in the balance? And is it wise for the budget traveller to secure a packet of marigold seeds about their person when making a rip by jet? The customs of the future may require this and more.
Or will Her Majesty give us some of her extensive forests and lands to plant on?
Is it not fair and proper that we should be able to save the planet as she does? And doesn’t carbon turn into diamond?
Posted: 25th, April 2007 | In: Tabloids | Comments (2)
Not So Clever Trever: Izzadeen Goes And Omar Bakri Returns
“’BEHEAD Our Boys’ cleric arrested in terror raids,” says the Sun, the words hanging over the picture of an open-mouthed Abu Izzadeen.
With hook-handed Abu Hamza in jail and “mad mullah” Omar Bakri in Lebanon, hopes were high that Izzadeen would step into these shoes and become the recognisable face of Muslim extremism.
But now we read that Izzadeen, nee Trevor Brooks, has been arrested over claims he incited terrorist acts overseas.
Izzadeen showed some promise when he heckled a speech given by Home Secretary John Reid. In September last year, Reid gave a talk in East London. Izzadeen arrived and, as the Express reports, criticised Reid for entering an “Islamic” area.
As we say, Izzadeen had promise. Blessed with equal parts lunacy (he called the 7/7 bomber “completely praiseworthy”) and bloodlust (“He who joins the British Army… he is a mortal Kaffir. His only hokum is for his head to be removed”), Izzadeen’s career as Nutter Number One was shaping up well.
But now Izzadeen is under arrest. And, as the Mail reports, he is not alone. Izzadeen is joined in the back of the police van by five other men, all former members of the outlawed Al-Muhajiroun group formed by – that’s right – Omar Bakri.
Inexplicably, the Sun has not heard from Bakri. But we hope the reintroduction of the Bakri name leads to his re-emergence in the tabloid press.
Whisper it, but these days it hard to find an Islamic nutter you can rely on…
Posted: 25th, April 2007 | In: Tabloids | Comment (1)
Daily Mail Planet: Gliese 581 Is The New Earth
“THE NEW EARTH,” announces the Mail on its front page.
“Does the discovery of a planet just like ours means there IS life out there?”
Mail Readers are offered a picture of a lump of round rock coated in cotton-wool swirls of cloud and gas.
Inside the paper, the Mail’s telescope is on full beam. And it likes what it sees.
“It’s got the same climate as Earth, plus water and gravity. A newly discovered planet is the most stunning evidence that life – just like us – might be out there,” it trumpets.
Mail readers are forgiven for expecting the accompanying pictures of Gliese 581 to feature a gentle sloping village green, an open Post Office and a figure in blue giving a smaller figure dressed in shorts, shirts and school tie a clip round the ear.
The Mail’s science editor, Michael Hanlon, notes, “Small waves lap a sandy shore and on the beach something stirs.”
If this Gliese 581 is like Earth, might it be that this stirring something is a human just like us, or, to be more precise, just like a Mail reader?
Dressed in laundered shirt (sleeves rolled up – the Gliese sun is ten times the size of our sun and it’s shirt-sleeve order), pressed shorts with crease down the front, sandals and white socks, this kindred spirit dines al fresco on his perspiring cheddar cheese and piccalilli sandwich.
Perhaps the telescope at La Silla in the Chilean Andes which detected Gliese 581 can be recalibrated to pick up sounds. What odds the figure is humming the bars to Land of Hope And Glory while a song thrush perched on the boughs of a nearby pear tree chirps: “Early One morning, just as the sun was rising, I heard a maid sing in the crater below”?
Interestingly enough, the Mail says Gliese is 20 light years away and locals would be listening to the Earth sounds from back then. And yes, that means a hearty dose of Margaret Thatcher swinging her handbag against Neil Kinnock. It is also the year of Kilroy’s TV debut.
But what if Gliese is no Daily Mail Planet? What if the figure on the beach is, say, a Polish immigrant who has got to Gliese 581 first, or a Jade Goody-Osama bin Laden chimera?
What then? Is there then hope for mankind?
Posted: 25th, April 2007 | In: Tabloids | Comments (19)
If The Shoe Fits: Two Victoria Beckhams In LA
WITH Victoria Beckham looking at Los Angeles through gritted teeth, the search is on for her replacement.
And the good news is that we have the technology to replicate Vicky. And what with Vicky being comprised of jus two dimensions, the cost is minimal.
As the Mirror reports, Camilla Shadbolt has turned herself into Victoria Beckham. And it only cost her £70,000.
For a small fraction of David Beckham’s weekly wage, Camilla has transformed herself into the image of Her Poshness.
And the look works. Camilla tells us that when visiting a shoe shop in Japan she was swamped by fans. “In the end the shop owner had to take me into a back room just to get away from the crowd,” says she.
She goes on: “They were treating me like royalty, bringing me all these different styles and waiting on me hand and foot. It was embarrassing.”
It is spooky, indeed, to note that Camilla has not only got the Vicky look but the Vicky patter down pat. Camilla is just as normal as Vicky. And Vicky is just as ordinary as Camilla. Please, no fuss. No really. No, Stop. No. Over here. Stop.
And now Camilla is in Hollywood. Camilla, and her former boyfriend Beckham-alike Andy Harmer, have been dispatched to Los Angeles to see how the locals react to them.
In Sky One’s Beckhams Go To Hollywood, the bogus Beckhams will show how they blagged a £9,000 necklace, conned their way into the Ivy eatery and queue-jumped at an elusive club.
So close is the resemblance between this cut-price Posh and that Posh, we fear the real Day-vid may not be able to spot the difference and make a marriage–threatening faux-pas.
And that Americans will start thinking all British women look like that…
Posted: 24th, April 2007 | In: Tabloids | Comment (1)
GMTV TV’s Scam And Opera’s ‘Premium Rat’
“PAYBACK,” announces the Mirror’s front page. “GMTV promise refunds to viewers ripped off in phone quiz scandal.”
But surely there is no scandal. Only yesterday Opera Interactive Technology was telling Mail readers of its own “preliminary investigation”.
The company which runs GMTV phone quizzes, and whose executive Mark Nuttall is said to have issued an email telling staff “Make sure they never find out you are picking the winners early!”, is now ready to pay viewers the £40million it “conned” out of them?
Perhaps the company’s preliminary investigation was not as thorough as it could have been, and certainly not as probing as that conducted by the BBC TV show Panorama?
GMTV viewers used to dealing in hard facts, the very people versed in answering dialing premium-rate phone lines to answer questions along the lines of “What colour is red?” and “Are you alive?” are likely to be confused.
As GMTV tells the Mirror: “We are determined to reimburse viewers who believe they have lost out.”
The qualifier “believe” seems churlish in light of this largesse. Especially since GMTV may well have to pay back the money from its own pocket. The Mail says GMTV staff fear the move will cost them their jobs.
For now, GMTV has terminated its contract with Opera and found “irregularities” in the service provider’s system. All its phone-in contests have been suspended. And, as the Mail says, GMTV is looking at launching legal actions against Opera.
Perhaps Opera chief executive Gary Corbett – Panorama claims he saw the aforesaid Nuttall email – can enlarge on the matter?
But the Mirror says he has “refused” to comment on the story. But if you see him, you can ask him about the matter.
The Mirror has a picture of Corbett on its front page. And a larger picture of the man said to be worth £75million inside beneath the headline “PREMIUM RAT”.
Maybe one of the Opera staff said to have been suspended in light of the company’s “further investigation” will speak on Corbett’s behalf?
Or one of the hard done by GMTV viewers may like to escape their institution and track Corbett down.
As the Sun says, Corbett’s may well be at his £1million mansion in Winsford, Cheshire. The property features a 3-hole golf course.
If he’s not there, Corbett may be at his £1,5million property in “a posh Birmingham suburb”. This residence houses Corbett’s ex-wife. Track her down and she may be only too happy to tell all.
Posted: 24th, April 2007 | In: Tabloids | Comment (1)
Ahmadinejad Hostage Arthur Batchelor In Gun Drama
NO little shock as Able Seaman Arthur Batchelor, friend to Faye Turney’s mother figure, is pictured not wearing in his Man At Ahmadinejad suit.
It was believed that having been captured and then set free by Iran’s fashion conscious leader, 5ft 2in tall Batchelor would wear his suit every day without fail thereby cementing his celebrity as the Iranian hostage who survived to sell his story. Never mind the length, admire the quality.
But here he is in the Mirror clad in a canary yellow shirt. Around his eyes is held a green and white tea towel. A gun (reportedly fake) is held across his throat.
Being kidnapped once is unlucky, twice suggests carelessness, a fetish for such role playing or a ploy to maintain his fame.
The Mail has a similar picture. And, as ever, it shows that Batchelor is grinning from ear to ear. This is the grin of defiance readers last saw when Batchelor was displaying his ping-pong skills to his Iranian captors.
Reading on we learn that Batchelor has been captured in a Plymouth nightclub. By our estimations this is well outside Iranian national waters. But while we await confirmation of that, Batchelor appears dressed in a nightie.
Navy types, like Batchelor, are believed to favour women’s wear, but surely this is going too far. As Faye Turney showed us and the Iranians, we already have genuine females in the military and this kind of cross-dressing is no longer required to make life on the ocean wave that bit more bearable.
A spokesman tells the Sun: “Arthur Batchelor has been through a very traumatic experience and is just letting his hair down. [See Turney’s headscarf]. This was in his own time and we do not police navy personnel in their own time. We cannot comment on what he might or might not do in his own private hours.”
Best not to, anyhow – at last not until Batchelor has signed release forms to allow the Navy to feature excerpts from this upcoming book, “Letters From Tehran – The Horror…The Horror”…
GMTV Phone-In Quiz Scam
THIS question to viewers of GMTV.
Did you enter the phone-in competition because:
A) You have been warned off calling the emergency services and “nice-sounding” Gary at the pizza delivery firm and enjoy speaking to your last remaining friends, GMTV presenters Andrew Castle and Kate Garraway?
B) You know that the answer to the tie-break question ‘What colour is red?” is not ‘blue’ and not ‘yellow’ so is most likely to be ‘red’
C) You thought you could win and did not realise that the question, more loaded than George Bush at a frat party, is a scam?
The answer is C.
As the Sun reports (“BIGGEST TELLY QUIZ ‘SWIZ’ YET”), GMTV viewers are said to have spent £45,000 a day entering a contest only half who had spent around £.180 a time had any chance of winning.
According to evidence unearthed by the BBC TV show Panorama, the winner is picked well before the contest ends. (GMTV appears on broadcast rival ITV.)
Estimates put the GMTV haul at £10million-a-year, and the scam has been running for four years.
“GMTV £40M PHONE SCAM,” announces the Mirror’s front page.
But before readers besiege GMTV’s officers and turn over to watch In The Night Garden – the trippy children’s TV of choice for people on prescription and recreational medications – they should know the con was hidden from “station bosses”.
The phone contests are run by Opera Interactive Technology. And Panorama claims Mark Nuttall, sales director of said company, reportedly sent an email to staff saying: “Make sure they never find out you are picking the winners early!” The investigation also claims Nuttall’s email was sent to his company chairman Gary Corbett.
For its part Opera tells the paper of its own preliminary investigation: “The conclusion is that there is not a shred of truth in any of the allegation.”
No word is heard from Mr Nuttall, and readers are invited to guess (for free) what he is doing now.
Is he: A) Laughing it all off as an honest mistake by Panorama; B) Consulting lawyers; C) reading the Mail’s front-page headline: “MILLIONS DUPED BY ‘FIXED’ PHONE-IN”?
The institutionalised, suggestible, medicated and other GMTV viewers are invited to press your keypads now…
Posted: 23rd, April 2007 | In: Tabloids | Comments (5)
Virginia Tech Killer Cho Seung-Hui’s Family And A British Connection
VIRGINIA Tech murderer Cho Seung-Hui continues to fascinate.
On the Sun, readers learn of student Colin Lynam Goddard. He was shot three times by Cho and survived.
Colin is talking to the Oprah Winfrey show from his hospital bed. In between Oprah’s staple fodder of dieting news, car giveaways and book-plugging therapists, her viewers get to see the victim in his hospital bed.
Says Colin: “I just looked on the ground and acted like I was dead. I thought if I looked at him, then he’d know I’m here, I’m alive.”
And this is not all. Colin’s father is British, he’s the son of a Leicestershire engineer.
This story has global appeal, enough reason for the Sun to cover it on its front page.
And in the Telegraph (“We saw our grandson being carried from the scene, say British couple”), Ruth Goddard, of Melton Mowbray, Leics, says: “We got a phone call from Andrew [Colin’s father] telling us Colin had been shot but wasn’t going to die.
“We were so relieved when we discovered the bullets had missed every vital organ, although it had shattered his femur. We haven’t been able to talk to Colin yet.”
Oprah Winfrey has. They should give her a call, or tune into her show.
Meanwhile, over in the Mirror, readers get to hear from the murderer’s family in South Korea.
In the front-page story “WE ARE GLAD HE IS DEAD”, Cho’s grandfather, Kim Hyang-Sik, says: “It’s better not to have such a child in the family.”
“Son of a bitch,” says he. “It serves him right he died with his victims”.
Kim’s sister, Kim Yang-Sun, remembers the “very quiet” boy, the “loner” with autism who “never showed any feeling or motions”.
She goes on: “The reaction of my brother was that Seung-Hui was a troublemaker and it served him right that he died because he caused his mother a lot of problems.”
His uncle Chan Kim adds: “He wasn’t like normal kids. We were worried about him not talking.
“Both his parents knew he had mental problems but they were poor and they couldn’t send him to a special hospital in the United States.”
Readers are so turned onto a new area of investigation – the state of mental health care.
Which, incidentally, is not something that’s ever talked about when other mass murderers in, say, Iraq and Afghanistan are wrecking lives…
Posted: 20th, April 2007 | In: Tabloids | Comments (8)
Madonna And Grace – A Twist In The Tale
MADONNA stands with what could be her latest child, Grace.
Once again we admire Madonna’s post-baby figure and look forward to a new DVD celebrating how she got her tummy back and how you can too.
For now, though, we coo over the new baby.
In “HERE’S THAT GIRL” the Sun shows readers the first picture of the “kid who melted Madonna’s heart”.
This celebrity ultrasound reveals Grace to be an even-faced child.
A “friend” tells us: “She saw footage of Grace and asked for another 15 minutes.”
Encore, indeed. Perhaps this time round Grace could do it with feeling, break dance or sing “All I want for Christmas are my two front teeth”.
And it’s not like Grace doesn’t have competition. No, not from David Banda, the Malawi native adopted by Madonna last year but from the hundreds of orphans singing and dancing for Madonna. She’s inspecting the grounds at the orphan day centre in Mphandula, which she spent £1.6milion on and they’ve put on a show.
The Sun says the venue can provide sustenance for up to 4,000 children. That’s a lot of singing and dancing. Eat your heart out, Simon Cowell.
But Madonna is not with Grace, says her representative. The Sun hears the spokesperson deny that Madonna has met with Grace “and has no plans to adopt her or any other children”.
But still they sing. Still they dance. And over in the Mail, the headline question is: “Will Grace be the sister Madonna wants for her little boy?”
The publicist says no. But friends say yes and that Madonna plans to start a “rainbow family”.
While we wish Madonna the best of luck finding a green and orange child, and not being upbraided by social services for turning a child blue, Madonna is said to be considering two other girls from the same orphanage.
Sadly, no photographs of Child B and Child C are on view and we are left to wonder how Madonna is reviewing the situation. Is one of them purple? Is one of them violet?
And are they right now singing and dancing with gusto, hoping against hope that Madonna will take them back to old London town where David Banda-Twist resides?
Take it away girls and boys:
I’ll do anything
For you dear anything
For you mean everything to me…
Posted: 20th, April 2007 | In: Tabloids | Comments (3)
Come Back Banksy And The Art Of Words
“WE take a tough line on removing graffiti because it creates a general atmosphere of neglect and social decay which in turn encourages crime.”
So says the Transport for London spokesman, reacting to the news that his champions of clean walls have just painted over a Banksy original.
Banksy is the street artist whose works, as the Mail says, fetch five figures and more at sale.
His picture was of John Travolta and Samuel L Jackson in Pulp Fiction mode holding bananas in a menacing manner.
The image has been one of the few bright spots near Old Street station in central London, a dour, grimy and altogether unwashed spot that presses its filthy nose up against the neighbouring bright glass and neat steel lines of the City.
Now Old Street is unappealing and devoid of humour and light. Congratulations TFL on bringing the misery of the Tube up to street level. Job done.
Says a fan: “This piece was the most iconic of Banksy’s work. It’s inexcusable that it’s been ruined.”
And this is not the first time this has occurred – not the first time this year.
The Mail fails to mention that back in March 2007, Bristol’s Neighbourhood Renewal Team was told to remove graffiti. So the Banksy original, painted on the side of garages in the artist’s native Bristol, was covered with a coat of thick black paint.
Someone has sprayed the words “Wot no Banksy?” over the paint. The painted-over London work now features the line “Come back”.
Words that may or may not be art?
Posted: 20th, April 2007 | In: Tabloids | Comment (1)
Coyle Up And Die – Jesse Metcalfe And Girls Aloud Singer Are Dumped
NOT too long ago, OK! looked on as Girls Aloud singer Nadine Coyle and Desperate Housewives chest Jesse Metcalfe gazed into each other’s eyes.
It later transpired that Jesse had a drinking problem and the glaze on his eyes may have been rooted in something more intoxicating than love.
Jesse went to rehab. Nadine talked of her pain. Theirs was a true love that would endure. It was so perfect that it just had to.
And now news in the Mirror that Jesse has been “dumped”. This will surely be crushing news to Metcalfe who can be seen walking hand in hand with another girl.
To the Sun this other looks remarkably like the actor’s ex, the porn-star-named Taylor Anne Mountz.
Someone close to Nadine tells the Sun that the singer won’t stand to be treated badly. “She’s a feisty Irish girl who will not stand for it,” they say.
But things move on fast in the world of perfect celebrity couplings and in the Mirror the affair is over.
“It’s over between Jesse and me…There’s no point hanging on when it gets to this stage,” says the heartbroken singer.
Indeed not. What with all the trips to Jesse’s home in Los Angeles, and ensuring the meetings are captured on camera, Nadine may be better of without the “rat”.
Posted: 20th, April 2007 | In: Tabloids | Comment (1)
Rosie Boycott’s Sticky Buds And Other Environmental Disasters
YOU have to admire Rosie Boycott’s garden.
The Lily of the Valley, the hawthorn blossom, an “exuberant” clematis called montana Elizabeth, the huge marijuana bush.
Only joking. The days when as editor of the Independent Boycott campaigned to legalise cannabis, earning herself the nickname ‘Rizla Rosie’, are long gone.
Of course, if she did want to grow cannabis plants in her garden the balmy weather and dry conditions could make her cottage in the Somerset countryside the hub of a cottage industry.
In “Spring…the new summer”, Boycott, the Mail’s new gardening expert, shows us round her splendid garden.
She notes the delicate green of the horse chestnut leaves as they unfurl from “sticky buds”. No, not those kinds of buds. Rosie has moved on.
“The first flush of leaf” has “spread cautiously over the oaks,” writes Rosie. “I’d normally expect to see all this growth around the time of my birthday, in mid-May.”
But this is April and the birthday cake has not yet been iced.
Rosie is walking amongst the flowerbeds making note of all things blooming. Hello, trees, hello sky, hello magnolias, tree peonies, osmanthus, aubrietia, pear blossom, primulas, white leucojum and crocus. Rosie Fotherington Thomas is taking it all in.
“How many kinds of sweet flowers grow in an English country garden?” goes the popular refrain. “Lots in my garden,” says Rosie.
“For days, we woke to misty mornings, which quickly gave way to long, sun-filled days. We wore T-shirts, ate picnics, thought of going swimming.”
Rosie’s garden is in full bloom. It looks just dandy. Indeed, such is the housing issue that the picture of the Boycott retreat framed by foliage and flower may well solicit an offer.
But all is no so green on Rosie’s side of the fence. Rosie knows that “droughts in Africa will mean starvation for millions”. And: “Hedgehogs are waking up from hibernation at the wrong time and starving to death because they can’t find food,” says she.
Rosie talks of nature taking “millions of years to work out her intricate patterns” – an evolution that is now “changing before our eyes”.
Are we humans to blame for this unravelling of nature? The implication is that we are. But later in the Mail, the paper’s Science Editor, Michael Hanlon, tells us that some of the claims of global warming have been “sexed up”.
Tales of environmental apocalypse capture the attention but can exaggerate the problem.
Says Boycott: “We’ve been blessed with one of the most magical Easters on record, we mustn’t be lulled into thinking that all this ‘warming business’ will mean only a better time ahead.
But in the meantime, why not stop and smell the flowers? And if you are worried about it all, pick a few buds…
The Martyr And The Fame – Why Virginia Tech Killer Cho Seung-Hui Did It
“CRAZED killer Cho Seung-Hui poses with his weapons in a shocking photo sent to TV news chiefs DURING his university massacre.”
So says the Sun’s front page. After the cod tributes to the murdered, the paper leads with Seung-Hui and the headline: “TIME TO DIE.”
Cover you ears, eyes and mouth families of the victims as the Sun shows the “maniac” who brandishes his guns in a ready-made news package sent to American broadcaster NBC.
The Sun draws readers’ attention to the Walther .22 semi-automatic and 9mm Glock the “massacre madman” used to kill and maim.
What with spiralling levels of gun crime in the UK, readers need no telling which is which, only that these are Cho’s weapons of choice.
Cho is the Mirror’s front-page “KILLING MACHINE”. There are “MORE AMAZING PICTURES INSIDE”.
There’s “wild-eyed” Cho with a hammer. “The “callous killer” holds a knife to his throat. “IN HIS SIGHTS,” says a caption beneath a shot of Cho aiming a gun towards the camera.
“ARMED FOR A MASSACRE,” says the Mail’s front page. Once again Cho looms out. No head shots of the victims today. This is all about Cho.
“Words of mass murderer who retuned to his dorm after first shooting to pose for sickening self-justifying photographs,” writes the Mail’s teaser.
If sickening, why show them? Do we need to know? Do Mail readers need to be sickened?
The Express does feature the victims, albeit alongside the familiar shot of Cho aiming a weapon. Readers see Maxine Turner, Erin Peterson and Austin Cloyd. And Emily Hilscher, known to have been the fist to die, the girl Cho was believed to have been obsessed with.
But she did not date Cho. Hilscher’s close friend Tommy Pendleton says Emily was “not related to the shooter in any way”.
But now she is part of the story. Hilscher is part of the lead story that thanks to what the papers term a “madman” is now a thing shaped by Cho’s words and pictures.
“I’ll be a martyr like the Columbine two,” says the Mirror’s headline. “It hears Seung-Hui pay tribute to “martyrs” Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold. They wanted to be noticed and to show their power and contempt for what they saw as their inferiors. They killed 13 people at Columbine High School.
Their murderous spree formed the basis for an Oscar-winning film. Cho made his own movie…
Cash for Harems – The Benefit of Muslim Polygamy
THE Mail has a story its editors must have dreamed about – “Polygamous husbands can claim cash for extra wives.”
This means wives – of which the Mail tells us a Muslim man can have four – can claim benefit as dependents. Good news. All is fair in this tolerant nation.
But this is the voice of Middle England. This is Islam and perceived benefit injustice in one story. Great days at the Mail.
And the story is illustrated by this picture from the Carry On film Follow that Camel.
Yes, that’s right – it’s Cash For Harems!
Now look out for thousands of unmarried mums and dads take up the veil.
The story goes like this:
“Polygamous husbands settling in Britain with multiple wives can claim extra benefits for their “harems” even though bigamy is a crime in the UK, it has emerged.
Opposition MPs are demanding an urgent change in the law, claiming that the Government is recognising and rewarding a custom which has no legal status and which is “alien” to this country’s cultural traditions.
Officials said yesterday a review was now under way into whether the state should continue to pay out income support, jobseeker’s allowance and housing and council tax benefits to ‘extra’ spouses.
Islamic law allows a man to take up to four wives, providing he can provide for them fairly and equally. But British law only ever recognises one spouse, while bigamy is punishable by up to seven years in jail.
However, if a husband and his wives arrive and settle in Britain having wed in a country where polygamy is legal, then the UK benefits system recognises his extra wives as dependents and pays them accordingly.”
Posted: 18th, April 2007 | In: Tabloids | Comments (3)
Cho Seung-Hui And His Victims
GUNMAN Cho Seung-Hui stares out from the Mail’s front page. To his left is one of his first two victims, 18-year-old student Emily Hilscher.
Under the headline “THE DEADLY INFATUATION” readers learn that detectives “believe” Cho was obsessed with Hilscher.
The 23-year-old South Korean, dressed like a “boy scout”, killed Hilscher. He then killed Ryan Clark, a student who had “rushed to help her”.
Cho began his rampage. He killed 30 more. And this, as the Mail notes, “makes him the most deadly murderer in American history”.
Only, it doesn’t. It doesn’t even make Cho the deadliest killer in a school in American history. The most prolific killer of them all is Andrew Kehoe who murdered 45 people in the Bath School disaster, the name given to three bombings in Bath Township, Michigan, USA, on May 18, 1927.
Kehoe left a note on which he wrote: “CRIMINALS ARE MADE, NOT BORN.”
Cho also left a note. The Mirror takes a look at it and conjures the front-page headline: “YOU MADE ME DO THIS.”
As is the way with mass killings, the paper adds mug shots of the victims to its front page. They surround a larger image of Cho’s head.
But only 22 of the killed are shown. Where are the rest? If the Mirror is to make us remember and pay some kind of cod tribute to the dead surely each of the victims should be listed.
But the Mirror’s places impact over dignity. “Virginia killer rants at ‘rich kid’ fellow students in suicide note,” comes the teaser.
Often when the nutcase has finished killing he kills himself and leaves us guessing as to why he did it. But Cho left a message.
In his missive he wrote of “debauchery” and “charlatans”. He wrote “Ismail Ax” on the inside of an arm. The papers spend no time analysing this. The Sun says it’s “believed to be a religious reference”.
There is an anecdote about how when asked to write his name and introduce himself to the class, Cho put down a question mark. “Is you name ‘Question mark?’” asked the professor. Cho did not reply.
He’s a “warped weirdo” says the Sun. His is the “FACE OF HATE”.
There is a page dedicated to Hilscher. The Sun has trawled the web to find news of how the teenager was well liked and wanted to be a vet.
“SLAUGHTER BY WEIRDO,” says the Sun sensitively. Cho had produced “disturbing images” in his creative writing class. He was taking “high doses of anti-depressants”. He’d been accused of stalking women and setting fire to his dorm.
Every move he made is now suggestive of the brewing horror, a timeline of events and non-events leading to the madness.
But little is really known. Much less understood…
Posted: 18th, April 2007 | In: Tabloids | Comments (4)
Middleton Volleys And Prince William Is Missing
UNUSUAL of the Express to place its front-page headline “32 SHOT DEAD BY JEALOUS GUNMAN” alongside a picture of Kate Middleton holding a tennis racket.
On one side massed death and on the other a smiling Kate making time amid the carnage for a game of bat and ball. Kate’s a girl who keeps a cool head in a crisis.
“IT’S ADVANTAGE MISS MIDDLETON,” says the Express. “Kate serves up a smile…but where’s William?”
Ooer? Where is Wills? The most obvious place to look is in one of the darker corners at Elements nightclub, Bournemouth. But he’s not there.
“Students lined up against wall and executed,” says the Express.
Where’s Wills?
“Kate’s show of strength,” says the Express on Page 3. “Wills is real loser, say friends.” A friend of Kate’s says the split was by mutual consent. “Kate is made of sterner stuff. She is gorgeous, great fun and a catch for anyone. It is his loss.”
“Should William have married Kate?” asks the Express. Readers are invited to call in and vote “Yes” or “No”.
It is not believed the results of the phone poll will influence William and Kate in any way but you can never tell. And the rate of 25p from a BT landline is surely a small price to pay for the future King’s chance of happiness.
But where is Wills? While Kate brandishes her new racket, the hunt goes on.
The Express kills time by producing “THE ROYAL REJECTS”. Reading this Kate will find out what happened to Prince Charles’s former loves.
Lady Jane Wellesley, Charles’s girlfriend of 18 months, didn’t want another title. What happened to her? The Express does not say. Like William, she too is missing.
The paper has better luck locating Davina Sheffield. She married a stockbroker. Amanda Knatchbull dated Charles on and off for five years and is said to have refused his proposal “gently” and “immediately”. She married a property developer. And then there is, as ever. Princess Diana. Her whereabouts is a matter of heated debate and conspiracy theory.
So Kate’s future is clear. But where is William?
Frustratingly, we do not get an answer to this question. And all the Express can throw up is a file photo of Wills in his Army fatigues.
We invite readers to cut it out and stick it to a lamppost, a nightclub door or a Brazilian girl’s bra.
Wills, if you are reading this, get in touch….
Posted: 17th, April 2007 | In: Tabloids | Comments (2)
Virginia Tech – Unbearable Truths
“THE VIRGINIA TECH MASSACRE,” announces the Sun’s front page.
There is a picture of a victim being carted from the scene. Blood trickles down a bare leg. Four thickset police hold the victim’s limbs – two on the feet, two on the arms.
No stretcher. The victim’s body slums in the middle. The police are armed. One is wearing full body armour. Yet none of them are touching the bloodied parts. They take hold of the victim’s shoes with their gloved hands.
Are they squeamish? Is it against health and safety procedures for an officer to touch an undressed wound? Or are they uncertain of what to do?
More police carrying another body on the Mirror’s front page. And another on the Mail, this one a woman.
Then a statement and a question: “He lined the students against a wall, then the executions began. As 33 die in America’s worst ever shooting, what price the right to bear arms?”
Questions at a time like this? The Mail should gather the facts before the analysis can begin in earnest.
The killer is shooting. He is in the engineering department. Armed with two 9mm automatic handguns he enters the dormitory at West Amber Johnston Hall, housing 895 people.
Students are lined up. The firing begins. When the shooting ends, 32 are dead and 29 are hurt.
No newspaper goes into the rooms full of bodies. Not yet. But they imagine the scene, the weight of evil hanging overhead. The smell.
The Mail publishes a picture of students in a classroom at Virginia Tech. “A terrible toll in the country where the gun is still sacrosanct,” trills the headline.
And then the stories. There are lots of stories, and there will be many more and they will be told many times.
Engineering student Josh hears “screaming through the walls”. Panic. “Then I head shots down the hallways.” Forty or 50. He jumped from a window to escape. “Then I heard shots through glass – and that’s when it hit me that I had to get out of there.”
Matt Waldron sees a girl jump from a top-storey window. She hits the ground. She isn’t moving.
Matt Matoney sees “an ungodly amount of ammo” on the killer’s vest. “People were throwing desks and whatever they could to barricade the door to stop him coming through,” says he.
Student Suxanne Higgs tells the Mirror: “We’ve heard that the shooter was jealous over a girl who as with someone else.” This is the Mirror’s “jilted gunman”.
Student Kenny Nesselrodt says: “I understand the guy went to her dormitory first and shot his girlfriend because she’d broken up with him.”
Then nothing for two hours. The killer enters a French class. Nesselrodt goes on: “I’ve heard it was his own class. Maybe he figured ‘I’ve already killed so I might as well kill again.”
There will be much analysis to come. But perhaps this student has hit upon the answer to the many questions that will come – not ‘why?’ but ‘why not?’
Posted: 17th, April 2007 | In: Tabloids | Comments (4)
Prince William, Two Other Women, Princess Diana And Britney Spears
WILL Prince William (GSOH, own teeth, good prospects) regrets dumping Kate Middleton (former Princess Diana look-alike)?
“Has Wills made a massive mistake?” asks the Express on its front page.
“I just want to have some fun and do what other blokes my age are doing,” the paper hears Wills tell a, er, “confidant”. “I’m too young for all of this.”
Playing The Field
Wills is 24. And when other men his age were touching up Brazilian girls, nightclubbing, going skiing and having a laugh with not a care in the world, Wills was with Kate.
So they split. But the Express says they may yet get back together. In “why the Prince and Kate may one day have a fairytale wedding” the Express looks back at the stock it has put in Wills and Kate – the new Diana, lest we forget – and says maybe they will marry.
Or, perhaps, William will find another woman – if he hasn’t already.
“WILLIAM AND TWO OTHER WOMEN,” says the Mail. And we are re-introduced not to Ana Ferreira and Louise Agar but to two “society beauties”.
Readers lean of Wills’ “serious ‘flirtation’” with another woman and how he has been seen “kissing and cuddling” a blonde in a London nightclub.
Which blonde. Which club? The Mail does not say. And it is left to the Sun to “ROLL OUT THE DOUBLE-BARRELS” and introduce readers to a bevy of gels.
The Diana Factor
Here comes blonde Isabella Ansthruther-Gough-Calthrope. She’s 26. “She was the first cover girl of pose Country Life magazine to appear with a belly button ring.” She has a Diana factor of 5.
It’s Holly Branson, 25. Daughter to billionaire beard Sir Richard Branson, Holly is blonde and was once voted the nation’s No.1 breeding stock in a TV show to decide who Wills should marry. With her showbiz connections, she has a Diana factor of 7.
And there’s Britney Spears. Potentially blonde Britney has two sons, a troubled past, dysfunctional parents and tattoos. We give her a Diana factor of 9. “IF EVERYTHING FAILS, SOMEONE ELSE IS BACK ON THE MARKET,” says the Sun.
This may of may not be a joke. The thing with the Sun is it is hard to tell and truth and parody can overlap.
Take the paper’s ever-so-humble-ma’am Royal snapper Arthur Edwards. He is making ready to speak.
And note this is the same Edwards who all the way back in March 2007 told us: “She [Kate] is a private citizen and she is in love with Prince William and I am sure that one day they will get married, I have talked to him about this.”
Now Arthur looks on and tells us: “I hope Clarence House help Kate through this difficult time. She should not be left alone.”
Indeed. We can’t have Kate, a private citizen, being allowed to return to the bosom of her family and retreat from the limelight unaided by the Royals.
What Kate Does Next
To emphasise its caring nature, the Sun publishes a picture of Kate arriving at her parents’ Berkshire home. She is carrying a box. “ONION RINGS,” says the message on its side. And we know what she means.
Kate should not be left alone. She should not be allowed to suffer. The Royals should not abandon her as they abandoned Diana.
And we should nor have to see pictures of Kate crying over so much heartache, pain and chopped onions…
Picture: Hack
Posted: 16th, April 2007 | In: Tabloids | Comment (1)
The Middleton Class – Why Prince William Dumped Kate Middleton
FAREWELL Kate Middleton, The People’s Girlfriend, to Prince William.
Not that Kate ever stood a chance of being Williams’ wife. You see, it’s all a matter of class, breeding if you will.
In “SNOBS WHO DID FOR KATE”, the Mirror looks at the “mates” who “sneered” at Kate’s mother.
It hears “snobby jibes” and “snotty pals” mock Carole Middleton’s past as an air-stewardess. “Doors to manual” they would sneer as Kate moved out of earshot.
A Royal “insider” says of the Middleton matriarch: “She is pushy, rather twee and incredibly middle-class. She uses words such as ‘Pleased to meet you”, ‘toilet’ and ‘pardon’”.
As readers know, the correct terms are “Hello Ma’am”, “What do you do?” and people in polite society never go to the little princess’s room but employ a wallah to do it for them.
“COMMON TAUNTS CAUSED KATE SPLIT,” says the Star.
Mirror readers learn that Carole has a habit of chewing gum. It is our studied belief that Carole should be shot until dead, skinned and her entrails fed to Prince Charles’s organic pigs. We admire Her Majesty’s restraint.
Nonsense, says Arthur Edwards, the obsequious Royal snapper. “It tells us more about the snobbery of the commentators than about the Royal Family.” He cites the success of middle class Sophie Rhys-Jones, wife to The Weed In Tweed that is Prince Edward. If they can enjoy a successful marriage, anyone can.
But the Mail’s A.N. Wilson will not be denied. “She’s got more class than these sneering snobs,” says he.
“How would you feel is your son introduced you to his girlfriend’s parents, and the mother said ‘pleased to meet you’ rather than ‘how d’you do?’ Or asked to use the toilet, rather than the lavatory or the loo?”
Why, says a Mail reader, we’d line her up against the privet and plunge a gardening fork through her heart. Is not life about standards? Without standards, how can we aspire?
Wilson moves on. He says the Queen reportedly “’couldn’t believe it’” when Carole Middleton behaved in such a fashion.
Wilson writes: “Being married to the head of State calls for qualities which middle or working-class women are just as likely to have as the daughter of a duke.”
The Mirror’s Royal raspberry James Whittaker does not agree. Says he: “I just don’t think she had the breeding quite honestly and I’m not being snooty I’m being factual.”
Facts. The lifeblood of newspapers…
Posted: 16th, April 2007 | In: Tabloids | Comments (20)
Any Girl Will Do – Joseph Stars And Den Of Vice
“DREAM SHOW VICE SHOCK,” says the Star’s front-page headline, and we are engrossed and intrigued.
A picture of Any Dream Will Do host Graham Norton adds to the sense of shock. Can it be that the presenter of a BBC talent show to find the lead in a stage musical is – gulp! – straight?
Reading on the truth becomes no less fanciful as readers learn of how “vice girls” are “sneaking through a side gate” of the mansion where the show’s 12 finalists are staying.
“Everyone is in shock about the hookers,” says an insider. “The moaning and groaning goes on all night.”
So Joseph is a goer, or a go-go-go goer, as fans of Joseph And The Amazing Technicolour Dreamcoat might have it?
Inside the paper and there is a picture of a woman. She is smoking a fag. She is wearing knee-high boots. She is leaning against a wall. A leg is cocked. She is a “model” pretending to be a prostitute, or a vice girl, as is her wont.
And her type have been using the back of the mansion to service clients.
And, no, not one of the show’s contestants is involved as either a hooker or a punter. They are in the clear. And Norton’s sexuality remains a matte of innuendo, waved phallus and crass joke.
The story is that the show’s stars are being disturbed by the sounds of rented copulation.
A show insider says this is “no laughing matter”.
“These boys need their sleep. The last thing they need is to hear hookers carrying on with punters right on their doorstep.”
Is it? Joseph is the Biblical story of the son of Jacob, a man with 12 sons, one daughter and four wives.
Surely the sounds of sex put the show in context, and the stars in character…
