Sunday 16 May 2010

You call this news?

What is it about the Daily Mail and the Mail on Sunday that makes me so angry?

Well, I'll take this morning's edition as an example. It has run a story about some insulting remarks made by the man in charge of the Football Association's 2018 World Cup bid.

Now, what he said was insulting. What he said was stupid, it was offensive. However, he was engaged in a private conversation with a former employee who was also, according to the story, a former lover. The private conversation was, lo and behold, recording in order to sold to the paper.

It's a honey trap, it's disgusting and it's self-defeating. Does the Mail hate foreigners so much that it doesn't want them visiting England in 2018? Is the Mail worried about the English team losing to foreigners on home soil, about being shown up in our own backyard?

Of course not. It all boils down to one thing, the man in charge of the World Cup bid is a Labour Lord.

In the interest of petty party politics and vain self-interest, the Daily Mail has done more harm to the World Cup bid than any individual could ever do. When we fail to win the bid we should not blame the FA, we should not blame Lord Treisman, we should blame the Daily Mail.