Incidentally, even if the reporter wasn’t jewish, when did it become OK for the mayor of London to go around calling Conservative journalists ‘Nazis, bigots and reactionaries’?

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The premise of the piece is that Livingstone has helped to create the atmosphere of which he has fallen foul: “But a climate in which one off-the-cuff insult can be considered grounds for censorship and censure, in which public figures jostle for position to see who can condemn the most loudly, and in which this kind of circus passes for public and political debate, is no good for any of us. Livingstone helped bring us to this situation, but it won’t only be him who pays the price”.

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Mayor hits at Mail’s Nazi theme party

Hugh Muir and Sam Jones
Monday February 21, 2005
The Guardian

Ken Livingstone will today ratchet up his row with Associated Newspapers by highlighting published claims that staff there threw a fancy dress party in which they dressed up as Hitler and members of the Third Reich.

After a week of criticism which followed his outburst likening a Jewish Evening Standard reporter to a Nazi concentration camp guard, the mayor of London will seek answers from Associated about a party 13 years ago to mark the end of Sir David English’s period as editor of the Daily Mail.

According to an acclaimed biography of the company, written with the assistance of some of its senior executives, the event had a Nazi theme. In the book, An Unlikely Hero: Vere Rothermere and How the Daily Mail was Saved, the biographer S J Taylor writes that when Lord English stepped down “he gave a party wherein he and all his editorial staff dressed up like Hitler and various members of the Third Reich. A memorable appearance of the newspaper’s drama critic Jack Tinker as Goebbels brought the house down”.

The claim has been repeated several times by the satirical magazine Private Eye, most recently a fortnight ago, and has been seized upon by another of Associated’s enemies, the Daily Express. The two papers had a deal which obliged the Express to stay away from stories about Associated’s past support for Hitler, but following the Mail’s publication last Friday of mafia threats to the Express’s publisher, Richard Desmond, the agreement seems to have been set aside.

Mr Livingstone and the Daily Mail, Associated’s flagship paper, have a long and bitter history. Though it has paid relatively little attention to him at City Hall, the paper was one of his main tormentors during the 1980s when he led the Greater London Council and was derided as “Red Ken”.

A source from the mayor’s office said of the claims in the biography: “These allegations are very serious and pose immediate questions Associated must answer. The questions the mayor is likely to ask today include, does Associated deny this event took place? If it took place, which members of the present staff of Associated Newspapers were present and how were they dressed? What action did Associated Newspapers take against those involved in this event?”

The mayor is keen to mend fences with the Jewish community. He is likely over the next 24 hours to express regret for what was said during his encounter outside City Hall a fortnight ago with the Evening Standard reporter Oliver Finegold. His officials have privately sought meetings with Holocaust survivors who have criticised him. The Board of Deputies of British Jews and the Commission for Racial Equality have both referred Mr Livingstone’s outburst to the local government watchdog, the Standards Board.

But his comments now will fall well short of apologising to the Evening Standard.

Associated Newspapers declined to comment last night

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I am amazed that this issue has gained so much attention. Column inches in the daily papers maybe but to attract the attention and time of so many top politicians that they make public statements about this! There really are more important things in life. Not that any of you lot will believe me, Boris. Of course my C.V. doesn’t come with the words “daughter of” at the top of it. Enjoy the election.

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http://www.thisisdevon.co.uk/displayNode.jsp?command=newPage&nodeId=142718&contentPK=11870118

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In fact Ken was attempting (rather badly) to make a serious point, but it was not put very well and it was an unfortunate example. None the less, are all people in this country who say “‘following orders’ or ‘doing your job’ is not an excuse, look at the Nazis” going to be accused of anti-semitism?

Ken is guilty of many things, but in this case it is insensitivity. He is right not to offer woleful half-apologies in the Blair mode, but to hold his ground in this media-storm and then apologise in his own time for the (relatively minor, all things considering) mistake that he has made.

The people who say that Boris is vacillating and not a proper conservative are being foolish:

Firstly, this thing of attacking your opponent for any and everything they do without a sense of proportion and decency is a horrendous recent development in global politics and seems to be particularly worse over the Atlantic. Just have a look at all those US bloggers ranting and raving at each other without rhyme or reason and ask yourself if you want us all to decend to that level because if we just jump on someone everytime they do anything because they are in a different political camp then we are headed in a very nasty direction. All of us.

Secondly, if we whip up excitement and hysteria over small things then we risk creating a climate where we ourselves become victims to this kind of thing, because the loudest and most uncrupulous politician (or journalist) will be successful.

Well said Boris. Ken should be attacked for his real faults.

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