Peter Robinson, keeping the press accountable – Caption Competition

Never mind the “unpleasant odour” rising from Northern Ireland’s libel law (and the urge to censor), there’s something a little stinky coming from Peter Robinson’s call for the media to show more support for Stormont. As Orwell said, “journalism is printing what someone else does not want printed: everything else is public relations.” Surely we don’t need more photos of politicians standing around with cheesy grins, Stormont’s main output? I look forward to seeing your captions for the empty speech …

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Draconian press laws in the EU’s new Presidency…

“”Reporting on crime that “doesn’t serve the interest of the democratic public” must be restricted to 20% of the time devoted to news.”” That would be nice wouldn’t it, simply removing the inconvenient news by not reporting it. Believe it or not, that is one of the planks of an authoritarian new media law recently introduced by a European Union country, a country that takes up the EU’s Presidency as of today. And it gets worse. A “media council has been created, …

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