Enigin Power

Max Clifford And The Power Of The Press

The John Terry story is the latest in a series of scandals that have dominated the British tabloids and enthralled and horrified the nation in equal measure. When Vanessa Perroncel found herself the vilified figure at the centre of the media storm there was only one man that she could turn to: Max Clifford.

Max Clifford is a deeply controversial figure but there can be little doubt that as a man who decides what goes into newspapers and what stays out of newspapers, he is one of the most powerful men in British society today.

Clifford is the publicist supreme, the man who had perfected the art of ’spin’ whilst Alastair Campbell was still writing for soft porn magazines. He is a deeply driven, principled man full of contradictions: he is both a fire fighter, expert at protecting his clients and stopping stories making it into the public domain, and arsonist in chief ready to expose celebrity indiscretions when he sees fit.

Max was born in 1943 into a very poor background. Leaving school with no qualifications, his quick wit and mastery with words found him a job as a journalist at the age of 15. From there he became a publicist for EMI and by the age of 27 had founded his own PR company, Max Clifford Associates.

Even at this tender age his client list was hugely impressive counting Frank Sinatra, Marvin Gaye, Muhammad Ali and Marlon Brando among his clients.

Clifford’s particular brand of media manipulation first hit the heights in 1986 when he created spectacular publicity for his client, the comedian Freddie Starr. Clifford spun the fabricated story that Starr had eaten the pet of a young woman called Lea La Salle. The ensuing headline “Freddie Starr Ate My Hamster”made the front page of The Sun and has now passed into media legend.

Clifford’s principles took centre stage in the Nineties when the left-leaning Clifford blamed the Conservative government of John Major for the lack of treatment afforded to his daughter as she fought against juvenile arthritis. He vowed to bring down the Tory government and his succession of scandals against Conservative ministers helped to create the climate of sleaze that saw them lose power to Tony Blair’s Labour Party.

Whilst his work has made him a very wealthy man, Clifford has often worked for free to protect ordinary members of the public that he believes have been harshly treated by the media or corporate giants. A woman who had been a contestant on television’s ’The Weakest Link’ and had been subsequently exposed as a prostitute found an unlikely ally in Clifford who worked for free on a positive media campaign for her, claiming that he had felt sorry for her.

Clifford’s work remains controversial, the public perception is that he is creating stories rather than reporting them. Whilst he now says that most of his work involves burying stories rather than encouraging scandal, the great and good are still in fear of the man who can end their careers with one flourish of his pen or one impromptu press conference. From impoverished school boy to media manipulator-in-chief and political kingmaker, it is unlikely that we will ever see the likes of Max Clifford again.

I feel that I should update you on a new website that I have found that is really great called enigin advice. It is about the power of climate change in big businesses today, all of you guys who read this blog may find it quite interesting!

Power to the People

In “The West”we enjoy the benefit of living in democracies – well for the most part and of course one person’s democracy is another’s dictatorship. Overall though we tend to believe that democracy is the way forward for the world as a whole and that those poor people who have the misfortune to live in undemocratic states should be helped to overturn their masters and join us in our world of freedom and liberty.

But should we question whether our western ways really are right for the world and indeed whether some of the peoples of the world are ready for democracy?

We only have to look at Africa to see where “democracy”has gone frightfully wrong! Mugabe would describe himself – at last to the outside world – as a democratically elected leader. Most right thinking people in the west would have a slight bone of contention with that! Sadly many african countries, where democracy has been imposed by the ever so humble former colonial powers are now struggling with their new found freedoms. The Presidents and Prime Ministers have made themselves Creosus rich while the people suffer. This model though has history.

In the seventeenth century England became a democracy. Charles the First was deposed and eventually beheaded and parliament began to rule. However it wasn’t long before the new political leaders in England were behaving in exactly the same way as the modern day leaders of the new african democracies. The seventeenth century members of parliament voted themselves huge financial rewards and attempted to lengthen their own terms of office. It was only Oliver Cromwell who stopped it and how did he do that? Well basically by making himself dictator!

If we have learned one thing from history it is that there are people who want power and wealth and will do anything to get it. For them living a “good”life is not important. They want to “make their mark”by fair means or foul. The west is never more than a few steps away from this either.

We should all remember the “Power Corrupts”.

You can see this very fact in all this talk about the enigin scam, a few people with misplaced power feel it is thier personal right to jugde others. I have to say that I really like Enigin, and am a little bit upset at all the bad press they are getting right now.

The Power Of Spin vs The Truth Of War

Politicians have become cut off from the real world, remote from everyday truths: reality seems variant upon the words of spin doctors so that it becomes impossible to know what is truth and what is fiction. The ongoing Chilcot enquiry into the Iraq War however continues to show what happens when the power of spin comes into conflict with the brutal truth of war.

When Britain went to war in Iraq in 2003, in support of their United States allies, they were doing so in opposition to both international disquiet and vehement protests from the public. Faced with this public outrage the leading politicians of the day, in particular Labour Prime Minister Tony Blair, needed to show that a declaration of war was unavoidable if Britain was to remain safe from a real and imminent threat from Iraq. The way that Blair and his power brokers did this has become increasingly controversial and is now being tested in front of a public tribunal that could destroy the reputation of both Blair and the current PM, Gordon Brown.

In the months leading up to the war it seemed to many that Blair was being led to an inevitability of conflict by his close friend, the American President George W Bush. People on both sides of the political divide were growing wary at Blair’s increasingly jingoistic stance and it seemed that he was waiting for a chance, any chance, to create a scenario where conflict could not be avoided.

In September 2002 Tony Blair released the now infamous statement that gave the green light to war: Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction that could be launched against the United Kingdom within 45 minutes.

This report provoked a media frenzy and popular opinion turned in favour of war. As the war progressed and these ’weapons of mass destruction’ remained illusive the talk turned to the need for ’regime change’ within Iraq. Seven years later, the regime change has happened and Sadam lies dead along with thousands of soldiers and civilians. Tensions in Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan and Syria are still at fever pitch and there is the daily threat of suicide bombings and other terrorist atrocities. There is no end in sight to the presence of Western troops in the Middle East.

It is against this backdrop that the Chilcott enquiry is attempting to discern the truth behind the reason to go to war. The evidence itself shows that there were no weapons of mass destruction, that there was no 45-minute threat and that the invasion of Iraq was illegal under international law and yet a succession of political heavyweights have given evidence in unrepentant fashion, sticking firmly with discredited spin and aiming to provide obfuscation rather than clarity.

The truth of the matter seems to me to lie in the old adage that ’power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely’. Tony Blair was a popular and successful Prime Minister but he did not have the benchmark event in his Premiership that would make his mark on history. It may be that he was almost jealous of the role that Margaret Thatcher had played in winning the Falkland’s War for Britain. Blair wanted a Falklands of his own and as his power grew so did his ego. With George Bush jr fired by a desire to surpass the achievements of his father it was inevitable that these two power hungry politicians would join forces at some point.

Less than a decade after the dreadful war in Iraq, events are coming back to haunt Blair and it must be assumed that Bush too will eventually have to face judgement on his role in a war that saw countless lives lost for no purpose than to illustrate the deadly power of political spin.

Before I go, I am aiming to sort out something for my mother for her Birthday. When I was talking with her the other day she said that she would like a new batch of running accessories . Anyone know of a reliable place to get them?