and finally


Now for something completely different Need to change tack? Try


Marchamont Needham, says Chris Proctor


B


eing a journalist is hard enough without having to turn your coat inside out while you type. Yet this is precisely what happened to


colleagues on the East End Life a few


months ago. After five years of the Tower Hamlets council freebie cheerleading for the directly-elected mayor, Lutfur Rahman, it was suddenly expected to report on his being deposed by an Election


Commissioner who upheld allegations of electoral fraud and bribery. Not since Animal Farm had such a rapid change of editorial direction been required. The scribes adopted a softy-softly approach,


seeking a place of greater safety as they adapted to a new landscape. First reports of Mr Rahman’s downfall were ascribed to the Press Association. The following week authorship was attributed to ‘Our Reporter’. Eventually the paper felt confident in quitting the bunker and reverting to its former policy of bylines. Hats off to a smooth change of direction, but these folk still look like amateurs compared with my journalistic hero Marchamont Nedham. He also went under the name of Needham, recognising the benefit of a spare name to a shady type.


This splendid gent set up a publication called Mercurius Britanicus in 1643 and began penning the most scurrilous satires against the King. He published Charles’ private papers when they were captured after the battle of Naseby, adding biting commentaries. Three years and one allegation of the monarch’s tyranny later, he was banged up. Happily he was released after a couple of weeks on the understanding that he’d never write again. Whilst out on bail, Marchamont bumped into the King, to whom he declared a hitherto well- concealed admiration. Later that year he set up a new publication with the marvellous sobriquet of Mercurius Pragmaticus where he attacked the Parliamentary faction with vitriol he had previously reserved for the monarch. This was not appreciated, and in 1649 he was arrested and sent back to pokey. This period of restriction gave him time to


contemplate; and to perceive the way the wind was


blowing. Before the end of the following year he had sworn the Oath of Engagement, written a highly pro-Commonwealth anti-monarchy ‘Case of the Commonwealth of England Stated’ and established himself as principal editor of the state-run newsbook Mercurius Politics. In effect, he became Oliver Comwell’s Alistair Campbell. He held this position for a decade, until General Monck issued a decree whereby Marchamont was ‘discharged fromWriting or Publishing any Publique Intelligence’.


Needless to say, when the monarchy was restored, our hero emerged unscathed. After a prudent retreat to the Netherlands, he was awarded a pardon and took up political pamphleteering for the Crown, largely comprising attacks on the Earl of Shaftesbury, the leader of the Whig opposition.


One can only applaud such elasticity of mind. Margaret Thatcher’s image makers must have wished for these gifts ahead of her meeting Nelson Mandela in 1990. Then he was deputy leader of the ANC, a party which two years previously she had branded a ‘typical terrorist


organisation’. It must have been tricky to


explain that she had only called him a terrorist in a caring way.


Tony Blair had a different approach to such potential embarrassments. He answered a different question. Thus, asked if he should have invaded Iraq when it had no weapons of mass destruction, he said yes, he was delighted to have removed Saddam Hussein from power. And imagine the Soviet message-mongers in 1939 when the arch-demon Hitler was, thanks to the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact, suddenly transformed into the best buddy from Berlin. ‘Correction: In yesterday’s edition of Pravda the German Chancellor was described as a ‘depraved psychopath’. This was a typing error and should have read ‘decent, charming and erudite gentleman’.


More recently, I have greatly sympathasised with Greek spin maestros who within a week changed from the line that the European Union could stick its austerity up its Aristotle; to saying that poverty is probably a jolly good idea.


Any fool can make an absurd decision. It takes a professional to turn it into a sensible strategy.


26 | theJournalist


MARK THOMAS


Page 1  |  Page 2  |  Page 3  |  Page 4  |  Page 5  |  Page 6  |  Page 7  |  Page 8  |  Page 9  |  Page 10  |  Page 11  |  Page 12  |  Page 13  |  Page 14  |  Page 15  |  Page 16  |  Page 17  |  Page 18  |  Page 19  |  Page 20  |  Page 21  |  Page 22  |  Page 23  |  Page 24  |  Page 25  |  Page 26  |  Page 27  |  Page 28