Thursday, April 09, 2009

Mandelson caught spinning on Iraq

Oh dear, the Secretary of State of Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform, spinmaster extraordinaire, Peter Mandelson, has been caught out spinning and has had to issue a clarification because of it.

On the 6th April his department issued a press release titled "Peter Mandelson Leads First Business Delegation to Iraq in Twenty Years" within which stated that Mandy's delegation was the "first British business delegation to visit Iraq in over twenty years". Slight problem, it's not true and they issued a statement saying (my emphasis),
For clarification, this was the first British Government-sponsored trade delegation to visit Iraq in over twenty years, not to be confused with the visits sponsored by the Middle East Association that have taken place within that time period.
I gave the Middle East Association to find out if this clarification was as a result of them complaining about Mandelson's department putting out a misleading statement and was told that "it's safe to assume that, yes".

Spin is dead. Long live spin!

7 comments:

Demetrius said...

Mr. Mandelson would do well to read Sir John Nott's book "Haven't We Been Here Before" published in 2007. It deals with matters in Iraq, and Afghanistan in the past. Sir John is not optimistic.

Lord Snooty said...

Or he made a mistake. Which was corrected when it was pointed out. Who's spinning here, Dizzy?

dizzy said...

Where have you been?

p.s. stop talking complete crap. Press release full of hyperbole equal spinning it, you dick.

Anonymous said...

It's hard to believe Mandy would bend the truth. He's never done it before.

revinkevin said...

It s not spinning it is telling lies.

Sam Duncan said...

No, it's not spinning, it's being an arrogant self-centred bastard. I have absolutely no doubt at all that Mandelson wasn't trying to bend the truth there; he actually believed it. If it's not backed by the government, it doesn't exist. That's the way these guys think.

Lord Snooty said...

Well, maybe you're right on this one. Possibly a bit of Mandy spin involved here.

Where have I been? Earning a living and commenting a bit on Guido's site for a change - I have suffered the indignity of being banned though (I admit I comment in a more robust style there, when in Rome and all that, but seems a bit harsh)!