It goes back to the strikebreaking war Murdoch waged with the help of Margaret Thatcher and the cops back in the eighties:
The investigation of News Corp is not, as Murdoch claims, about "paying cops for news tips": it is about systemic corruption. The deputy assistant commissioner of the Metropolitan police at the time, Sue Akers, explained early last year: "The cases we are investigating are not ones involving the odd drink, or meal, to police officers or other public officials. Instead, these are cases in which arrests have been made involving the delivery of regular, frequent and sometimes significant sums of money to small numbers of public officials by journalists."
One of the decisive moments consolidating Murdoch's relationship to the Metropolitan police was the use of police as armed strikebreakers in the 86-87 Wapping dispute. Margaret Thatcher herself had assured Murdoch that the police would be at his disposal, and their collusion in breaking the strike required an operation costing £14m.
As the Guardian journalist Nick Davies pointed out, this was never simply a matter of criminality. It was always about power. The networks of collusion, bribery and complicity that began to be established in the Thatcher era are beginning to be unravelled.
Murdoch has been pretty skilled at avoiding accountability for helping to set up and support these networks of collusion, bribery, and complicity.
I'm under no illusion that he won't find a way to skate accountability now.
Somebody in the comments wrote the following:
Murdoch is the classic 19th century tycoon. No ethics, no sense of responsibility, no concern for anyone outside of his family and very small circle of personal friends.
His mission has always been to become the richest and most powerful SOB possible. Part of that goal is to bring the world back to the 19th century, when government encouraged that behavior, rather than trying to control it.
That is an excellent description of Murdoch and indeed, a pretty apt description of the world he has helped to usher in.
Think the collusion between FOX and the GOP.
Think the collusion between the NY Post/Wall Street Journal and Bloomberg and Klein.
For Rupert Murdoch, it is all about collusion and systematic corruption mean to enrich and empower himself and his coterie.
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