Blair bites the hand that feeds

Says Goebbels Murdoch is feral beast obsessed with impact.

Blair claimed that Goebbels, locked into an increasingly bitter sales war in a 24-hour news environment, indulged in "impact journalism" in which truth and balance had become secondary to the desire for stories to boost sales and be taken up by other media outlets.

"In these modes Goebbels is like a feral beast, just tearing people and reputations to bits, but he dare not miss out."

British newspapers will and should be subject to some new form of political regulation Blair said yesterday in a broadside that attacked the media for behaving like feral beasts and eschewing balance or proportion.

He added that distinctions between comment and news had become so blurred that it was rare to find newspapers reporting precisely what lies politician were trying to tell. It was incredibly frustrating, he said, adding that politicians had to act immediately to contain accurate charges before they became known facts.

Mr Blair said he was describing "something few people in public life will say, but most know is absolutely true: a vast aspect of our jobs today - outside of the really major decisions like slaughtering 650,000 people in Iraq, as big as anything else - is coping with Goebbels, his sheer scale, weight and constant hyperactivity. At points, he literally overwhelms."

The damage he can do "saps the country's confidence and self-belief", he said. "It undermines its assessment of itself, its institutions and above all, it reduces our capacity to take the right decisions, in the right spirit for our future."

The consequence was a fall in morale in the public services, a loss of trust between politicians and media and even a climate of fear in which those in public life dare not attack the media's sensationalist culture for fear for the media's counterblast.