Editor’s Note: For those of you following the phone hacking scandal that Planet Waves covered Friday, you’re familiar with the name and face of Rebekah Brooks. She was, until Friday, the head of the News International division of News Corp, the division that runs all of Murdoch’s newspaper properties in the UK.
She was also editor of News of the World at the time of the phone hacking, and is now obviously being arrested based on evidence that she either knew about the crimes or directly participated in them. When we see the (immediately, as in two days ago) former CEO of a major international corporation taken into custody for committing crimes against people, that is a sign of progress. Here is why Murdoch is shitting bricks right now: she might cut a deal with prosecutors. This article is today’s coverage from The Guardian in the UK. — efc
By Vikram Dodd , The Guardian.
Rebekah Brooks has been arrested by police investigating allegations of phone hacking by the News of the World and allegations that police officers were bribed to leak sensitive information.
The Metropolitan police said a 43-year-old woman was arrested at noon on Sunday, by appointment at a London police station.
Brooks, 43, resigned on Friday as News International‘s chief executive. She is a former News of the World editor and was close to Rupert Murdoch and the prime minister, David Cameron.
Brooks was due to give evidence before MPs on the culture select committee on Tuesday.
An arrest by appointment on a Sunday by police is unusual.
In a statement the Met said: “The MPS [Metropolitan police service] has this afternoon, Sunday 17 July, arrested a female in connection with allegations of corruption and phone hacking.
“At approximately 12.00 a 43-year-old woman was arrested by appointment at a London police station by officers from Operation Weeting [phone hacking investigation] together with officers from Operation Elveden [bribing of police officers investigation]. She is currently in custody.
“She was arrested on suspicion of conspiring to intercept communications, contrary to Section1(1) Criminal Law Act 1977 and on suspicion of corruption allegations contrary to Section 1 of the Prevention of Corruption Act 1906.
“The Operation Weeting team is conducting the new investigation into phone hacking.
“Operation Elveden is the investigation into allegations of inappropriate payments to police. This investigation is being supervised by the Independent Police Complaints Commission.
“It would be inappropriate to discuss any further details regarding these cases at this time.”
Half – adding my “thanks”. Really appreciate your voice on this. It IS all about “what it/they/us/I can get away with isn’t it? – and taking a powerful player/s down is always part of that game. It is no different a game than the marital abuse I suffered as in “be charming and manipulate the most vibrant alive intellegent woman you can find and then do your best to destroy her until you feel all-powerful and in total control.”
Those situations are destined to eventually blow up one way or another – but the victim count is high.
Thank you again. This is a powerful time we are in, only a question of how “power” ends up manifesting and who has or does not have it, yes?
Half De Witte:
Thank you for the gentle teaching. It leaves me grateful and humbled with no need for umberage. You really are something else.
Another way of putting this is about what any stories emerging in the world teach us. The one story may teach us all the relevant facts and factors in play through thorough investigation and honest recounting but the conclusions will either be used to feed:
a) some point of view about the bad things in the world, the flaws, the dangers, the risks etc or
b) a recognition of what we can/must learn about ourselves in order to grow and transcend and contribute in a loving way.
Same facts. One approach manifesting and serving ego – the other extinguishing it.
Manda,
You raise the crux issues with your questions.
Two observations:
1) We must always watch for what is creating ‘reality’.
If it isn’t you shaping then it is likely that something external is shaping you.
2) Higher ground, justice, distance and detachment, moving power around or neutralizing..
Anciently, Taoism and Buddhism and recently the works of the likes of Eckhart Tolle, are excellent at ‘selling’ the crucial detachment component of the piece. The ego achieves nothing – even in recognition and articulation of ‘truths’.
It is crucial to be first disconnected from what you observe. When what is observed does not then feed ego it becomes possible to imagine something that the Taoist, Buddhist, Tolleian paradigms would relegate, if not dismiss as vain – and where their Achilles Heel lays – Social Ethics.
As far as I am concerned there is no Social Ethics without commitment to Dharma. But it’s not reducible to Dharma only. Truth, if meaningful, implies action. And that action’s role in situations, as we find a la Murdoch, is ONLY to dramatize that truth – without remainder. The action serves only the truth – anything else distorts, is EGO.
The stakes are incredibly high. Reporting for the sake of it then becomes dangerous because any distortions support egoic responses rather than liberative.
Half
half — as always, great points. “the orchestration of prestige and denigration is a societal tsunami” — so then, how does one keep from getting swept away? is there a way to higher ground that includes “justice,” or is it only reachable through distance and detachment?
is there a way to neutralize power, or does it merely get shifted around?
When we see the (immediately, as in two days ago) former CEO of a major international corporation taken into custody for committing crimes against people, that is a sign of progress.
——————————————————————
I’m not sure it is necessarily progress! It helps to keep in focus that the orchestration of prestige and denigration is a societal tsunami – and that this is itself a media bastion.
Key players in any society attract/accumulate secret resentment (the nature of the power of the beast is that one can be hoisted upon one’s own petard by a soon-to-be-stronger, replacement beast). Such resentment finds eager expression in first exposure and then ridicule/carnage.
The public humiliation/flogging is a means of manipulating the destructive forces involved in a way that strengthens the structure of power, rather than truly endangering it.
There is a voyeurism emerging in this ‘scandal’ that shows me the power reflex is alive and well. Everybody knew this kind of thing went on but again, the real crime is getting caught and/or pissing off the wrong people – who were happy to collude in disguising crimes until the time came for expediency and/or revenge to hang a certain someone out to dry..
And then… the people PARTY in the catharsis of projected, pent up, resentment and rage! Scourging the ‘victim’ and completing once more the vicious cycle.. power rests easy.
Amanda – It’s the same thing. Think of it this way: Scotland Yard is the vernacular, and Metro is the official.
is the head of metropolitan police the same as the head of scotland yard? or do we have two police resignations in one day?
Just heard that the head of the Metropolitan Police has resigned over this! Heads are rolling…
Shebear: how about Tilda Swinton as Rebekah?
Today I picked up a Sunday NYT and am now reading it in bed like a great novel–all on a grey Sunday morning in Berkeley. The relish over the facts as they are revealed reads like an epic.
Also following the Twitter feeds of Michael Wolff, who wrote the biography of Rupert Murdoch. He’s comparing the structural re-alignment in the UK post-“Hackgate” as Russia during the fall of the Berlin Wall and life after Communism.
Breaking news — Hackgate the movie is production.
Hugh Grant is David Cameron and Colin Firth is………….Hugh Grant!
Hmm, wonder who’s going to play Rebekah?
😉
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=wFufrqhp0eE
Oops, forgot to include France24:
http://www.france24.com/en/20110717-police-arrest-news-international-rebekah-brooks-murdoch-phone-hacking-scandal
Additional background on Brooks at:
http://english.aljazeera.net/news/europe/2011/07/201171594749717406.html