Tuesday 21 December 2010

Media Quotes of the Year: The General Election


The Sun brings out its big guns to support the Tories: "SIXTEEN Page 3 Girls in all their glory represent the very image of freedom in this country. But if Labour or the Lib Dems win the election, this could be the last time they are allowed to pose together. MPs Harriet Harman and Lynne Featherstone will move swiftly to change the law and ban Page 3 forever."

Channel 4 News presenter Krishnan Guru-Murthy in a Frontline Club discussion on the General Election and use of social media by political parties: "If you have a 'Twitter strategy' it is probably shit,"

Chris Condron, head of digital strategy at the Press Association, also at the Frontline Club, on the General Election: "It won't be Twitter wot won it."

Piers Morgan in his Mail on Sunday column backs Gordon Brown:
"He hasn't deserved the appalling vilification he's received, and it would be wonderfully sweet justice if come election night he scrapes home against all the odds. He's getting my vote, that's for sure."

Sky News
producer Tami Hoffman blogs about hearing Gordon Brown's gaffe in Rochdale: "So headphones still on I watched him stride off to his car, and heard a very forceful slam of the door followed by a pause and then 'That was ridiculous'. Gruff, annoyed and most definitely on camera. And then: 'She's just a sort of bigoted woman who said she used to vote Labour.' After days and days of my nose pressed to the coalface of election producing it was a magic moment."

Lord Mandelson in The Times on the Gillian Duffy 'bigot' affair: "Gordon followed my advice, but afterwards, when he stepped outside into the midst of the throng of waiting media, my heart sank. What he was saying was instantly undermined by the return of a classic Gordon idiosyncrasy: the appearance of a broad grin, very often in an inappropriate context, when he was nervous. In this case, he grinned as he was saying that his remarks about Mrs Duffy had left him mortified. The effect was unfortunate."

Alastair Campbell to Sky's Adam Boulton: "Adam, I know that you've been spending the last few years saying Gordon Brown is dead meat and he should be going anyway ..."

Adam Boulton to Alastair Campbell: "Don't keep telling me what I think. I'm fed up with you telling me what I think, I don't think that."

Guardian corrections column: "A Guardian transcript gave this as Alastair Campbell's parting line to the political editor of Sky News, Adam Boulton, during a television encounter this week: "Adam you are a pompous little arse." From further listening to this near-inaudible endpiece, it now appears that Mr Campbell's words were: "Adam you are as pompous as it gets".

Guardian cartoonist Steve Bell on new Labour leader Ed Miliband: "He has huge potential for caricature. Like John Prescott and unlike Tony Blair, his face tends to betray what is on his mind. Most politicians put on a guarded expression, but his face is more open and seems to let his feelings show. He has been caught gurning a couple of times, and looked like a rabbit caught in headlights just before the result was announced. That is great, not just for me as a cartoonist but for politics."

Stephen Glover in the Independent:
"Mr Cameron can only depend on The Times and The Sun, and their Sunday stablemates, with whose owner, Rupert Murdoch, a deal has been sealed in blood. They will support the Coalition until it is broken on the rocks."

Dan Sabbagh in the Mirror:
"The Murdoch empire now takes the view that David Cameron owes it for supporting the Tories at the Election - although the party's lack of an overall majority would indicate that News Corp's supposed power to influence public opinion may be largely an illusion."

Tomorrow: Paywalls, Rusbridger, Murdoch and all that

Previously:
Quotes of the Year - The Regional Press

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