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Here's the latest on News Corporation CEO Rupert Murdoch's troubles in the U.K. where he denied to a British court that he's ever used his political power to get favorable treatment for his business interests. I sincerely hope we see some fallout over this scandal carry over to the United States after the damage his corporation has done to our political system in this country with leading the way in propagandizing the American public.

Rupert Murdoch tells British court his political clout is overstated:

Media mogul Rupert Murdoch denies using his News Corp. newspapers to advance his business interests. 'I've never asked a prime minister for anything,' he says.

He's hobnobbed with every British prime minister of the last 30 years but says he wields no undue political influence. His scandal-loving tabloids strike fear into the hearts of decision-makers, but he denies ever using his newspapers to advance his commercial interests.

Media mogul Rupert Murdoch cast himself as the very model of a modest, upright newspaperman Wednesday, insisting in a London courtroom that any suggestion to the contrary was based on lies and legends.

Here was his chance, he said before a judge, to set the record straight: that for all the talk of his political clout through publications like the mass-market Sun, he never took advantage of it, and that he expects those who work for him to adhere to high ethical standards.

"That is a complete myth, that I used the influence of the Sun or supposed political power to get favorable treatment," Murdoch testified, declaring, "I've never asked a prime minister for anything."

And as for allegations of corporate misdeeds, "I try very hard to set an example of ethical behavior, and I make it quite clear that I expect it," the Australian-born billionaire said.

Forget that the reason he was summoned to appear in court in the first place was because of the phone-hacking scandal engulfing his giant News Corp., which sparked a judicial inquiry into media practices. Or that dozens of journalists at Murdoch-owned papers have been arrested in wide-ranging investigations into illegal reporting methods, including bribing police.

The man at the top remained unruffled at the inquiry through four hours of questioning on his media empire and its effect on public life here in Britain, where Murdoch, 81, owns several national newspapers, including the Sun, the Times of London and the Sunday Times.

Much more there so go read the rest. Video above is from BBC World News' coverage of the latest on the scandal.

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More trouble for Uncle Rupert and his son James as the inquiry into the hacking scandal continues.

British Cabinet Minister Becomes Focus in Murdoch Inquiry:

The long-running tabloid newspaper scandal that has shaken Rupert Murdoch’s global media empire delivered a new jolt on Tuesday as its powerful and lucrative television operations moved to the center of a British judicial inquiry with disclosures that a senior cabinet minister, or at least an aide claiming to speak for him, worked covertly to help win approval for a $12 billion takeover of the BSkyB network.

A trove of newly released e-mails pointed to hand-in-glove collaboration between a lobbyist for Mr. Murdoch’s News Corporation and the office of Culture Minister Jeremy Hunt, the official designated to pass judgment on the BSkyB bid. That deal, which would have crowned Mr. Murdoch’s 60-year media career, was scuttled last year as the scandal over illicit phone hacking exploded, and now appears out of his reach for years, if not permanently. Read on...

James Murdoch on the defensive over BSkyB bid:

James Murdoch came to the Leveson inquiry to defend his reputation, and ended up spending much of the remaining six and half hours on the stand in effect defending the culture secretary, Jeremy Hunt.

But his robust defence of News Corporation's insider lobbying tactics was not matched by such a sure touch elsewhere, as his evidence revealed him to be incurious about phone hacking and uninterested in newspapers.

The media mogul said that his chief lobbyist, Frédéric Michel, was simply "doing his job" in his briefings again and again on titbits obtained from ministers and their special advisers with regard to the BSkyB bid. For all the information he received, Murdoch remained sceptical.

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This weekend on PBS's The McLaughlin Group, we were treated to host John McLaughlin hoping for the return to the days of special prosecutor Ken Starr investigating another sex scandal. McLaughlin asked his panel what the probability that another special prosecutor would be assigned to investigate the recent sex scandal with members of the Secret Service hiring prostitutes and was met with a resounding "No!" by every one of his guests.

Pat Buchanan, who is still a weekly regular on this show on PBS despite his firing from MSNBC, told McLaughlin that there's no need for a special prosecutor unless the government is failing to do their job and investigate the matter themselves, which is not the case here. And Mort Zuckerman, who they had placed on the wrong side of the aisle as usual with Eleanor Clift, responded that "one Ken Starr was enough" in his lifetime.

That did not deter McLaughlin from proclaiming that there was an 80 percent chance that one would be assigned.

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Following up on her reporting from last week where Rachel Maddow called Herman Cain a "performance artist and "the practical joke no one is getting", Maddow took us for a little walk down memory lane on the scandal ridden Tim Phillips, Jack Abramoff, Ralph Reed and Grover Norquist who all have ties to the Koch brothers and Herman Cain's campaign manager, Mark Block.

Cain's headaches with these charges of sexual harassment or possibly sexual assault after the accusations made today are not the only troubles his campaign is facing by far.

As Rachel reminded us, we recently had Cain the complaints filed against his campaign by CREW, calling himself "the Koch brothers' brother from another mother.":

On Friday, Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) filed a complaint with the Federal Election Commission (FEC) over allegations that Prosperity USA had illegally funneled donations to the Cain's campaign through Americans for Prosperity. At the time, Prosperity USA, the Wisconsin arm of Koch-backed Americans for Prosperity, was operated by Cain campaign manager Mark Block.

"It is not sufficient for the Cain campaign to investigate itself," CREW executive director Melanie Sloan said in a media advisory. "Rather, the FEC -- the federal agency charged with enforcing campaign finance laws -- must look into the matter."

Cain first met Block while working as a speaker for Americans for Prosperity in 2005.

The New York Times has more on the allegations against the Cain campaign here -- Cain to Review Links to a Nonprofit.

With the news that convicted lobbyist just got out of prison and is now out there trying to sell his new book as we just saw during the 60 Minutes interview this weekend, it was nice to see all of them called out properly for just how big of crooks they are.

Rachel reported on Tim Phillips and his ties to Jack Abramoff and Ralph Reed back in March of this year and she did a nice job of going back through some of that material in the segment above.

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Keith Olbermann took the night off on Current TV with his fellow former MSNBC contributor David Shuster filling in for him, which makes me wonder if Shuster might be one of the next people to be announced as one of Current TV's new lineup as they bring in new shows.

Speculation aside, Shuster talked to Media Matters' Eric Boehlert about the scandal with News of the World and how that has been covered at their American "news" channel, Fox News here in the U.S., and as Boehlert and Shuster noted here it's either been all but ignored or their coverage has tried to deflect it as part of some problem that has nothing to do with the media company's legal problems.

You can read more at Media Matters and how this story has been covered by our corporate media here -- REPORT: How CNN, MSNBC, And Fox Are Covering News Corp. Hacking Scandal*:

News Corp.'s long-simmering phone-hacking scandal has reignited, throwing its global media empire into turmoil. As allegations of hacking into private citizens' voicemail increase, media and tabloid practices have been called into question. With a large and influential presence in the United States, News Corp. and its subsidiaries (including Fox News) should be under intense scrutiny in the American press. A Media Matters analysis has found great disparity in the amount of coverage given to the scandal by CNN, MSNBC, and Fox News.

Analysis: CNN Covered News Corp.'s Hacking Scandal In More Than 100 Segments

CNN And MSNBC Report On News Corp. Scandal More Than Twice As Often As Fox News. According to a Media Matters analysis**, in the nine days since the News Corp. phone-hacking scandal reignited, CNN reported on the developing story in 108 segments, MSNBC covered the story in 71 segments, and Fox News covered the story in 30 segments.

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This is really just a disgusting story, and it's good to see these people finally being walked off in cuffs.

Bell officials arrested as prosecutors are set to file criminal charges:

At least eight city of Bell officials were arrested Tuesday morning, a source said, as L.A. County Dist. Atty. Steve Cooley prepared to announce criminal charges in the municipal salary scandal.

[Updated at 10 a.m.: Former Bell City Manager Robert Rizzo, whose high salary sparked the outrage that led to the investigations of the city, was among those arrested in the sweep. No details have been released, but a source not authorized to speak publicly about the case said that Rizzo; former Assistant City Manager Angela Spaccia; Mayor Oscar Hernandez; Councilmembers Luis Artiga, Teresa Jacobo and George Mirabal; and former Councilmembers George Cole and Victor Bello were among those arrested.

[Updated at 11:22 p.m.: Cooley filed charges against eight Bell officials Tuesday, alleging that they misappropriated $5.5 million in public funds. Rizzo has been charged with 53 counts of misappropriation of public funds and conflict of interest.

Among those arrested were former city administrator Robert Rizzo, former assistant city manager Angela Spaccia, Mayor Oscar Hernandez, councilmembers George Mirabal, Teresa Jacobo, Luis Artiga and former councilmembers George Cole and Victor Bello. Read on...

Here's more from CBS News, when this scandal first broke back in July.

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Well, here's what you get when you allow the crimes of the Bush administration to go unpunished. Alberto Gonzales coming on the T.V. playing the aggrieved victim card. As Jon explained the other day...

Bush Lawyers Escape Justice. Again.:

On Wednesday, prosecutor Nora Dannehy announced she would bring no charges against Alberto Gonzales, Karl Rove, Harriet Miers, Monica Goodling or any of the key players behind the purge of 9 U.S. attorneys. That scandal, part of a larger effort to target Democratic politicians and suppress Democratic voter turnout, will go unpunished despite the key roles of Rove and Miers, and the apparent perjury of former Attorney General Gonzales. Read on...

Mary over at EmptyWheel's place has more on the letter sent to John Conyers. Final Jeopardy Answer: Something That Doesn’t Obstruct or Impede Justice:

The investigation (not of the U. S. Attorney firings despite misleading headlines) into the Iglesias firing is done. bmaz is ready to change his name to Carnac and Holder’s Department of Justice has shot off a letter-ary masterpiece to the House Judiciary Committee (HJC). As per Carnac’s bmaz’s predictions, no charges.

What bmaz could not have predicted, but did link to in his post, is the actual content of the letter sent to Conyers. I don’t think anyone would have predicted the cavalier way in which Holder’s DOJ reaches its seemingly predetermined decision, while providing a roadmap to other legislators who’d also like to get a prosecutor fired for political convenience. Dannehy and Holder explain to Members of Congress – if a Federal prosecutor isn’t filing or refraining from filing the cases you want, feel free to covertly conspire to get him fired. As long as you don’t make any misguided attempt to “influence” him before you get him fired, you’re good to go. Oh, and btw, phone calls to him at home to fume over his handling – not to worry, those doesn’t count as an attempt to influence.

Stripped and shorn, Holder and Dannehy have said –

1. We aren’t gonna investigate anything but Iglesias and we aren’t saying why: “The investigative team also determined that the evidence did not warrant expanding the scope of the investigation beyond the removal of Iglesias.”

WHAT EVIDENCE? They freakin didn’t expand the scope of the investigation to see what evidence there was, then they decide, oh well, we don’t have any of the evidence we didn’t look for so we shouldn’t look for it since we don’t have it … whatever.

2. Hey, yeah, Domenici DID make a contact to smack on Iglesias about the handling of a matter currently in front of the USA’s office but: “The evidence about the call developed in the course of Ms. Dannehy’s investigation, however, was insufficient to establish an attempt to pressure Mr. Iglesias to accelerate his charging decisions.”

So similar to the lack of intent to torture – I mean, if Domenici in good faith thought he was just gathering intel on the status of political prosecutions … um, let’s move on.

Read on...

Our own Jon Perr has more at Perrspectives Alberto Gonzales Plays the Victim. Again.:

For generations of political junkies yet unborn, Alberto Gonzales will be forever remembered as the man who declared "I do not recall" 55 times during a single day of Congressional testimony. But to his legacy of blessing detainee torture, authorizing the illegal domestic surveillance of Americans, presiding over a political purge of U.S. prosecutors, making a bedside visit to strong-arm his gravely ill predecessor and repeatedly lying to Congress, the former Bush Attorney General had added a new title: victim.

Gonzales' latest playing of the victim card came in the wake of the news that Bush holdover prosecutor Nora Dannehy would not bring charges in the U.S. attorneys scandal. After the release this week of the six-page letter Harper's Scott Horton deemed, "another audacious whitewash at DOJ," Gonzales' lawyer George Terwilliger said his critics "owe him an apology." Read on...

Transcript via CNN below the fold.

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With a little over a month to go before the Arizona primary election on August 24th, John McCain finally faced off against his rival J.D. Hayworth and Tea Party candidate Jim Deakin in their first debate. As I wrote about back in March when J.D. Hayworth appeared on Rachel Maddow's show, John McCain's willingness to cover up Hayworth's involvement in the Jack Abramoff scandal when he chaired the Indian Affairs Committee is coming back to bite him once again.

Once again Hayworth claimed that McCain not bringing him up during the hearing proved his innocence in the matter and he went so far as to chastise McCain for calling him corrupt in one of his campaign ads. As I asked back in March, how's that cover up working out for you now John?

Moderator: When you were in Congress you were one of the biggest financial recipients of disgraced lobbyist Jack Abramoff, then there is you acting as a pitch man, which has been brought up from a questionable firm promoting free government money. Your critics such as Senator McCain have questioned your character, in fact today the McCain campaign sent out a release calling you J.D. Huckster. How do you respond to that?

Hayworth: Well, you know it’s really sad to see John McCain who should be revered as a statesman basically reduced to a political shape-shifter. John you’ve changed positions so much in this campaign, maybe we ought to set up an extra podium for you depending on which John McCain is going to answer which question.

Now the fact is rather than dealing with insults and I invite everyone because of my limited time here to go to the website jdforsenate.com to see extended explanations of that, but let me explain, this should be about the issues, about Mr. McCain’s record, yes on amnesty, coauthoring cap and trade, yes on the bailouts and the accompanying earmark spending involved there and of course no to tax cuts that help reinvigorate our economy.

John has a record that he does not want to run on. That’s why he’s engaged in this kind of attack ad and frankly it’s really unbecoming to you John. You’re not a statesman any longer. You’re simply a political shape-shifter.

Moderator: Senator McCain.

McCain: There you go again. Just as I predicted at the beginning of this debate, facts are stubborn things. Congressman Hayworth was one of the big spenders. He told people like Jeff Flake and me who were fighting against this earmark and corruption, he called us jihadists. He sponsored earmarks. This is corruption in Washington. My friend Dr. Coburn says it’s the gateway drug to corruption and that is one of the reasons why J.D. Hayworth was voted out by his constituents, because Republicans let spending get out of control. I fought against my own President and against my own majority to eliminate pork barrel earmark spending and I’m proud of my record.

[…]

Hayworth: John if you had told the truth about Barack Obama the way you’re spreading falsehoods about me, you might be President of the United States right now. The fact is John McCain is caught in cynical attack politics in Washington D.C. and one other note John; you chaired the Indian Affairs Committee hearings into undo influence of lobbyists. Never did my name come up. Never was it uttered.

John it’s sad you’d stoop to this. Shame on you. Arizona deserves better.

As I noted back in March, for more on McCain's cover up of Hayworth's role in the Abramoff scandal go read Dennis G's excellent post at Balloon Juice The Grifter and the Coward…. McCain should be ashamed alright, but not for calling Hayworth a huckster.

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Jonathan Alter made some good points about why the Republicans are being ridiculous going after the White House and Sestak for this trumped up scandal on Real Time. It's criminalizing politics and if you're going to go after Obama and Emanuel for this, then there's a long list behind them to go after as well.

And Patrick Ruffini's tired line about campaign promises is wearing thin. That's not an excuse to scandalize everything and they obviously don't hold their own politicians to the same standard. As our team member Jamie pointed out to everyone when he was watching this last night "It's funny though that no one mentions how George W. Bush was going to 'restore the integrity of the Oval Office', and we all see how that went." Ain't that the truth.

I like Bill Maher's suggestion for a compromise at the end of the clip.

Alter: George H.W. Bush's political director Ron Kaufman said recently that if this was a crime that every president going back to George Washington, should go to jail. This has been done in politics forever. It will always be done in politics and there's actually nothing wrong with it. Nobody's ever been prosecuted under this.

Ruffini: Here's the problem.

Maher: Do you agree with that.

Ruffini: Wasn't Obama supposed to be different? I mean wasn't the... the Bush administration was hyper-political. They were using their political office to fire, you know, supposedly fire the US Attorneys...

Maher: And they did.

Ruffini: ...and instead, you know, we were basically... when Obama got in we were going to put all the politics over at the DNC, get it out of the White House...

Alter: Who said that?

Ruffini: ...and then you have Rahm Emanuel...

Maher: But that's not really... now wait a second. That's not really (crosstalk) that's not really a good analogy. Firing the federal prosecutors, okay, a federal prosecutor, a non-political job with a very important function, okay? This is, this is politics. This is people on your own team. This is one Democrat saying to another Democrat, "Maybe you'd be better over here and we'll elect this guy"...

Alter: Patrick your man Ronald Reagan about twenty years ago, his political director Ed Rollins actually bragged in the newspaper that they were trying to get Senator Hayakawa from CA to not run for reelection by offering him a federal job. It's just, to politicize, to criminalize politics is insane. (crosstalk)

Ruffini: But Obama had held himself up to a higher standard I think during his campaign.

Rachel Maddow talks to Sinead O'Connor about the Catholic Church's abuse scandal. As Rachel noted in the previous segment:

MADDOW: Last month, Pope Benedict issued a pastoral letter of apology to the Catholics of Ireland. But the church took the extraordinary step of actually having the letter read aloud at Sunday mass all over Ireland.

Sinead O‘Connor, for one, is not accepting the apology. In a “Washington Post” op-ed last month, she wrote this, quote, “Benedict‘s apology states that his concern is, above all, to bring healing to the victims.”

“Yet he denies them the one thing that might bring them healing, a full confession from the Vatican that it has covered up abuse and is now trying to cover up the cover up. He suggests that Ireland‘s victims can find healing by getting close to the church, the same church that has demanded oaths of silence from molested children.”

“As Ireland withstands Rome‘s offensive apology, I ask Americans to understand why an Irish Catholic woman who survived child abuse would want to rip up the pope‘s picture. And whether Irish Catholics, because we dare not say, ‘we deserve better,‘ should be treated as though we deserve less.”

Transcript of the interview below the fold.

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