<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD W3 HTML//EN"> <HTML> <HEAD> <META content=text/html;charset=iso-8859-1 http-equiv=Content-Type> <META content='"MSHTML 4.72.3110.7"' name=GENERATOR> </HEAD> <BODY bgColor=#ffffff> <DIV> "The Real Mafia" <A href="http://www.socialistworker.co.uk">www.socialistworker.co.uk</A> "IS BRITAIN Being Run By A Gay Mafia?" was the Sun's disgusting headline last Monday. A filthy mafia does run our lives. But it is not gay people in the Labour Party and the BBC. The mafiosi are super-rich businessmen whose ugliest face is Rupert Murdoch, the media baron who owns the Sun. Murdoch's media empire stretches across the globe, suppressing the truth, influencing governments and defending his interests. It is shrouded in secrecy. Murdoch moves his money from one offshore account to another. He conspired in the 1980s to destroy print workers' jobs. He wins favours from Tony Blair at regular private liaisons. Blair tried to get the Italian prime minister to clear the way for Murdoch's expansion into Italy this year after one such meeting. Murdoch is one of a few thousand fabulously wealthy individuals whose companies dominate the world. Their families are intermarried. They inherit their billions from their parents and pass it onto their children. They bail each other out even as they squabble over how to profit from the misery of millions of ordinary people. And they are overwhelmingly heterosexual. This mafia spins a web of lies to hide its power and divert ordinary people's frustration onto scapegoats. So Murdoch's mouthpiece, the Sun, invents a "gay conspiracy". His equivalents in Germany in the 1930s targeted "Jewish elites". The Sun says trade secretary Peter Mandelson is gay. It claims that this makes him likely to do secret deals with Nick Brown, the agriculture minister who was outed in the press this week. In fact, Peter Mandelson and Nick Brown are scarcely on speaking terms, let alone friends, following a minor row inside the cabinet between the prime minister and the chancellor. <HR> <H1>LABOUR'S BUSINESS CONNECTIONS</H1> IF MANDELSON is involved in shady deals it is to do with his closeness to big business. He is big pals with Elizabeth Murdoch and is due to rule on whether her father can take over Manchester United. But to ensure New Labour's continued support Murdoch threatens to drag other Labour MPs through the mud like he did with former Welsh secretary Ron Davies. Most of Nick Brown's and Mandelson's constituents in the north east of England say they don't give a damn if their MP is gay. A poll this week found 56 percent of people think homosexuality is "acceptable". Blair claims that he is against bigotry. So why doesn't he stop writing his regular columns in the Sun? That, of course, would mean turning against the business mafiosi he has taken an oath to protect. </DIV></BODY></HTML>