Keith Jackson - Rangers turning the cameras on journalists is a sinister move.

[ian1964 10,761]

keith jackson‏*@tedermeatballs 2h

2 hours ago

 

Donald Trump and Kim Jong-un would fit right into the mad world of Scottish football

 

Monday column: boycott newspapers, intimidate journalists. And you thought Trump and Kim were narcissists!

 

https://twitter.com/tedermeatballs

 

 

Lifted the article from FF:

It's not too late to save humanity.

 

Just because Donald Trump has a stubby, stunted finger hovering over a fat red button, it doesn’t necessarily follow that the end has to be nigh for the rest of us.

 

 

Nor for that matter, must we accept as inevitable the thermo nuclear destruction of the planet just because in the similarly absurd Kim Jong-un, Trump is pitting his peroxide steeped wits against a nemesis who displays even less of a grip on reality than the moron in the White House and his candy floss wig.

 

Meanwhile, the rest of us are left to watch this ludicrous double act threaten our own existence and to wonder how on earth we allowed ourselves to get to such place, where the lunatics are not only in charge of the asylum but ready to blow it to smithereens.

 

So we distract ourselves for as long as possible in whichever way we can.

 

The hopeless pessimists drink to forget as if there really is no tomorrow. The hopeless optimists go the gym while, in their sweaty folly, refusing to acknowledge the possibility that there might not be.

 

And some of us go the football.

 

Well, those of us who have not yet been banned from doing so.

 

And it’s only then that the thought occurs. Perhaps this despotic double act of Trump and Kim have missed their true vocation.

 

Maybe they belong right here in the madhouse of Scottish football. Perhaps they would take one look at what goes on in this country’s top flight - and some of the characters who thrive in this environment - and realise that their own narcissistic tendencies are strictly second division by comparison.

 

Yes, Trump might sit on a toilet seat made of 24 carat gold, plotting the end of civilisation as the world falls out of his bottom. True, Kim may be aiming his entire arsenal at all points from Guam to Guantanamo Bay while not being sure if they will clear the fence at the end of his own back garden.

 

But they wouldn’t know Armageddon if it smashed them in the face. Isn’t that right Mr Regan?

 

Because less than a fortnight into a new season and our own lot have unleashed the kind of chaos that would make Trump and Kim blush and plead for a moment of calm reflection.

 

In the space of just 10 days we’ve already had a flurry of red cards - there were six on Saturday alone one of which was handed out after Kirk Broadfoot tugged on a rival striker’s top knot.

 

We’ve had all manner of managerial spats including the likes of Jon Daly, Brendan Rodgers, Derek McInnes and Martin Canning - as well as Saturday’s rammy between Pedro Caixinha and Neil Lennon which saw the Hibs boss being reported to the police.

 

 

One manager has been sacked already, while one club’s chairman has been the subject of an alleged assault.

 

Among all this anger and bad blood, we’ve had calls for this newspaper to be boycotted by a group of Rangers fans which is precisely the sort of thing Trump would have endorsed.

 

And, not unrelated, there have been some other highly curious goings on concerning the media at Murray Park, where Rangers have started training their own cameras on the press men who are despatched there to ask questions of manager Pedro Caixinha on behalf of their respective readerships.

 

There is a sinister sub text to all of this. Ask anything too difficult and the club reserves the right to put it up online in order that the support can act as judge and jury.

 

Again, this sort of intimidatory tactic will be right up Jong-un’s street but it does not reflect well at all on those who are making decisions on Rangers behalf.

 

It resulted in a mass walk out of football writers from Caixinha’s pre-match briefing ahead of Saturday’s visit from Hibs and it will most likely happen all over again when the media are ‘welcomed’ back to preview this weekend’s lip smacker of a match up with Hearts.

 

As if Rangers - and Caixinha - don’t have enough on their collective plate without going out of their way to look for fights because already this next league encounter looks very much like a must-win match for a manager who has never been too far from the firing line since his arrival here.

 

If there are people around him who are pressing his buttons and abusing their own positions in the process then he should be smart enough to identify them and to keep a safe distance.

 

Because right now Caixinha appears to be taking in all manner of bad advice.

 

On Saturday, after losing his first match of the season just two games into the new campaign, he lashed out at Lennon while also depicting himself as some sort of outcast in Scottish football although quite why he feels so put upon or victimised remains something of a mystery.

 

All this stuff might strike a chord with those among the Ibrox hardcore who dislike Lennon or who wilfully dismiss any sort of criticism of Caixinha as xenophobic axe grinding.

 

But the more salient Rangers observers will have greater concerns about the manager’s failure to reorganise his team properly following Ryan Jack’s red card.

 

By leaving two men up front he allowed Hibs to dominate the middle of the pitch and as a result Rangers resorted to shelling long hopeful punts up the park in the off chance that they might benefit from the break of a ball. Lennon wasn’t just outraging him and assistant Helder Baptista. He was outmanoeuvring them.

 

The bottom line here in all of this is that Caixinha has already lost his first three points of the season - weeks after overseeing arguably the worst European humiliation in the history of Scottish football. He can stamp his feet until he’s blue in the face but in this game respect has to be earned.

 

Should Caixinha suffer a similar fate next time out at home to Edinburgh’s other half, then he’ll need a great deal more than just handily placed pantomime villain to take the heat off. And we’re only two games into a new season.

 

Yes, all things considered, it really has been an explosive beginning to the latest instalment of Scottish football’s never ending soap opera. Trump and Kim will fit right in.

 

But for now - or at least until they get here - let’s hope it’s just the game that’s back with a bang.

Edited August 14, 2017 by ian1964

[aweebluesoandso 290]

Keech right enough, when your so called Newspaper perpetuates constant lies against the club and support. Clean up your own house before you call others dirty, you scruffy fecker.

[Uilleam 5,960]

Ha! What a self important and precious little arse wipe this guy is. He's a 'football writer' (and not a particularly good one at that), who works in the football backwater of Scotland.

 

I have seen many, many press conferences where journalists -proper representatives of that profession, I may say- are seen on camera asking questions of leading politicians, and the like.

Quite why the football press pack in this country should require, or even be afforded, anonymity is beyond rational explanation.

Edited August 14, 2017 by Uilleam

[Bluedell 5,679]

Journalists deliberately writing misleading or factually incorrect articles is even more sinister.

[Big Jaws 570]

Just more click bait from a complete clownshoe. I expect to see a lot more of this sort of thing from the usual suspects because they know their publications are going down the toilet fast.

Edited August 14, 2017 by Big Jaws

[StuGers 477]

It's like North Korea? Of course it is Keith and it's your fault. Your paper prints Fake News stories that they would be proud of.

[Big Jaws 570]

I was going to just leave my comment about click bait as it stood but I want to say more.

 

From the headline its laughable what this guy is suggesting. We're monitored every moment of the day. We're filmed going to work, coming home from work, on buses, trains and walking along the street especially if you live and work in a city. if you work in a bar, bank or post office and many other jobs where one might interact with the general public or where cash is stored you're filmed while you're AT work too. Our online publications and comments on social media are monitored, stored and scraped in databeses along with the now obligatory telecommunications message one might receive when calling a help line of any sort that 'your call will be monitored for training purposes'. All of which are ripe pickings for advertisers.

 

These journalists are the very people who've been telling us repeatedly for the last 10 years and more that its a good thing for security and that if we have nothing to hide then we've got nothing to worry about! Yet somehow, oddly enough, when Rangers film a press conference and the cameras and recording devices are not only pointed at the Rangers staff member its taken as an altogether more sinister development.

 

Gies peace Mr Jackson... If you've nothing to hide you've nothing to worry about!

[SteveC 150]

He is an appalling journalist, an atrocious writer of prose and seriously deficient in wit. To be fair, however, his talent for self-parody has now reached the level of genius.

[JohnMc 2,801]

I'm confused by this, what's the issue here? Our press conferences are filmed and broadcast online, is that right? In the past we've had the image of the manager/player/whoever is 'giving' the conference on the screen while some disembodied voice from behind asks a question. So now, instead, we get to see the person asking the question, so what's the problem here?

 

Seriously, is this about not wanting their image to be broadcast? Do they believe there's something sinister behind this and it's done to out them off asking 'difficult' questions? I'd have thought a fair number of supporters would welcome difficult questions being asked. Anyone able to throw some light on the issue?

[SteveC 150]

I'm confused by this, what's the issue here? Our press conferences are filmed and broadcast online, is that right? In the past we've had the image of the manager/player/whoever is 'giving' the conference on the screen while some disembodied voice from behind asks a question. So now, instead, we get to see the person asking the question, so what's the problem here?

 

Seriously, is this about not wanting their image to be broadcast? Do they believe there's something sinister behind this and it's done to out them off asking 'difficult' questions? I'd have thought a fair number of supporters would welcome difficult questions being asked. Anyone able to throw some light on the issue?

 

There isn't one. He's just making one up so he can have a go at Rangers in general and PC in particular. It is what he does, and this defines his role in society for which he is handsomely rewarded. Yes, you are right, that does say a lot about Scottish society.