21 February 2008

The Daily Mail

I could write about a lot of things today since there's a lot of news that has caught my eye lately, but instead, I'd like to write a review and history of the venerable old publication known as The Daily Mail.

First, for those of you who are reading this outside the UK, British people read papers. I know! Nothing more intellectually stimulating than a good newspaper. It's something that is being mournfully lost in the US, and many of us would love to find a way to sustain the Fourth Estate in the age of 24 hour cable news coverage and easy digital access to online news. Somehow, the UK has managed to hold onto tradition and has many national, regional, and local newspapers.

Not all British papers are created the same. You have "serious-minded" newspapers, often called broadsheets because they used to all be massive in size even though some are now printed in compact or Berliner format, and tabloids. Then there's the so called "middle-market" papers. The Daily Mail is usually placed in this category. The Daily Mail is the second best selling UK newspaper after the tabloid The Sun (which incidentally is owned by Rupert Murdoch).

In the UK, the editorial political leanings are usually open and obvious. For example, The Guardian tends to be Centre-Left, and currently tends to support Labour. The Daily Telegraph tends to be Centre-Right with Tory sympathies. The Daily Mail tends to follow a right-wing editorial stance. For All Intensive Porpoises has a definite left liberal editorial bent and doesn't currently support any political party. Now that that's all out in the open, let's get down to business.

First of all, since its founding in 1896, The Daily Mail has never printed an untrue word. If you read it in the Mail, it must be a fact. Even when they supported the fascists during the periods between the two world wars, they remained true to their readers and to the good of the country. Integrity...it's a word closely associated with this publication.

In recent years, The Daily Mail has managed to balance hard news, advertisements, and bringing the country the news that they want to hear. Currently, you can follow the developments of the Madeleine McCann story almost daily just by glancing at the Mail's front page. It truly is a great service to this little girl to ensure her face is seared into our collective memories and to provide a roadmap to the complicated investigations and salacious developments of this story. Even though people might call The Daily Mail "The Daily Maddy", it's surely all worth it if one person might be able to bring forth the piece of the puzzle to solve this case. The publishers of this paper deserve a medal.

They may also deserve a medal for their coverage of the immigration issue. We are being overrun as a country by benefit sponging Swedes, job stealing Poles, violent and non-conforming Asians, sneaky North Americans, and a whole tide of people with brown faces. While we can't do much as a country about migrants from the EU, and closing benefit loopholes while dealing harshly with the abusers would just deal with most problems brought to attention of Brits in the media, a full scale closure of the borders seems in order. Asylum seekers get set up in posh council flats with tea towels and bog roll supplied while our youth are left to aimlessly wander the streets and cause problems. It's the mere dilution of British values by the unwashed hordes that are causing this problem with crime anyway. By God, thankfully The Daily Mail is there to point it out!

When I talk about immigration with many Mail readers, they gladly point out some polygamist from a Middle Eastern country (I am not sure which because they couldn't name it) was sending benefits to his wives back home or that some classes are being taught in Polish in UK's public schools. It's because of the Mail's diligent ability to point out the failures of the system that we can all easily come to the conclusion that we should scrap the system, even for those exercising their human rights to live with and have normal family lives with a British Citizen. As for the EU migrant worker concern, we'll get to them soon enough, but in the meantime, it's glaringly obvious that the costs of such migration, even if they can't accurately be calculated and offset by any gains by the country for allowing migration and immigration, should be paid for by a totally separate group of people who have little political voice (and probably brown faces). Besides, it's only logical that the way to crack down on illegal immigration is to make it harder to legally immigrate. Like, duh?

The Daily Mail has stood strong in this stance. They opposed Jewish immigration during WWII, and they oppose immigration now.

So, if you want some quality writing about the Bebo suicide cult, the latest news on products that will save your life or make it a lot easier in features that look more like news than advertisement, immigration, degradation of society, and strong Middle English values, check out The Daily Mail's website today.

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