Hari Disgraced
Indy Fantasist Loses Orwell Prize But Announcement Delayed
Johann Hari looked set to be stripped of one of the most prestigious prizes in the industry, but at the eleventh hour the Orwell Prize committee has agreed to delay their formal decision until an investigation is completed by the Indy. Guido noted the row between the two organisations earlier, and it seems the Indy has got it’s own way by successfully gagged its imaginative columnist. The rather grumpy statement makes it pretty clear which way things were heading for Hari:
“After extensive deliberation, the Council arrived at a clear and unanimous decision, which drew from the combined journalistic and academic expertise of its members. It also considered a representation by Johann Hari in its deliberation, and appropriate weight was placed upon it. The Council of the Orwell Prize is fully satisfied that it has adopted the appropriate procedure for an exercise of this kind. The Independent has now requested that the Council consider further representations by Johann Hari before announcing the decision. However, it would appear that Johann Hari is not permitted to make any further representations whilst The Independent’s investigation is conducted.
In these circumstances, the Council of the Orwell Prize has reluctantly consented to delay any formal announcement as to the status of the 2008 Orwell Prize for Journalism until The Independent has completed its own investigation. We will take no further action and make no further statements until that time.”
Waiting two months won’t make this any less embarrassing Mr Blackhurst, if the announcement was that Hari was going to keep it, you wouldn’t have wanted the delay…
UPDATE: Sources are adamant and that statement is obvious: Johann Hari has lost the Orwell Prize. It was even reported as such yesterday. It’s only the Indy’s PR machine causing trouble, and the Orwell Prize doesn’t smell of roses for caving in.
Let him squirm!!!
For another couple of months. If anything this will keep the media focused on Hari’s totally unprofessional breach of his journalistic obligations.
And hopefully, be a constant and painful reminder to each of the other lefty bastards who rallied around him, that their judgement is also seriously flawed.
“a clear and unanimous decision” is hardly going to be he’s innocent.
The clue is in:
“The Independent has now requested that the Council consider further representations by Johann Hari before announcing the decision…”
…further representations wouldn’t be needed, offered or sought if they’d decided in his favour.
Didn’t Hari once work for that other great fabulist, Jeffrey Archer, who at least labels his works of fiction as such!
Hari hasn’t denied re-using quotes from elsewhere. And presumably this must have been one of the strongest arguments for removing the prize.
What on earth could he or the Independent say which would change their mind?
And what if the Independent clear him first?
What happened to the liberals sigh of relief story?
This one?
When will the latent Hari be Coming Up For Air?
The Orwell prize committee are behaving like extreme right wing fundamentalists, Johann does not deserve such treatment for a minor peccadillo.
I’m willing to wait the two months to see the thieving tw@t suffer again
Seems daft to delay the news – whilst now it would barely get high billing in most of the media what with Murdoch frenzy and Norway things may be a lot quiter come Sept. Now might have been a good time to bury bad news.
Sorry but ignore my ignorance, But isnt the Indie relaunhing as the “I” ? If so is he not just being hid away until a fantastic relaunch and he can write under a differetn name?
Maybe Billy Bullshiter or Liam Lies?
The ‘I’ already exists, its The Independent’s version of the Metro free paper, news in brief basically. Its been around a few months now.
Cheers, dont buy newspapers (apart from the last ever cop of the NOTW R.I.P), as i have said lets make sure Hari has a fair trail before his hanging!
Billy doesn’t buy newspapers….
what a shocker
Who still does?
Why pay for yesterdays news?
Perhaps he’ll relaunch as “David Rose”….??
Or the Mary Rose
Sat on a pin…
Why not David Rose or Niko?
Didn’t see comment 43.
I guess they figure Orwell can spin in his grave a little longer before the bleeding obvious conclusion comes. What a pathetic disgrace these people are.
“Waiting two months won’t make this any less embarrassing…”
Rather naive IMO. In 2 months, people will care about it about as much as people care about the Huhne debacle now.
Ie, politicos will shout, the other 59.8million people in the UK won’t care.
Typical appeasement, the bane of this benighted country now!
2 months to keep the story going, 2 months to sharpen the appetite for the inevitable
So instead of just having his Prize revoked now and getting it over with, he’s going to have to wait two months for an outcome we already know about.
Well played, Hari/Indy. You have the lowest circulation for a very good reason.
“clear and unanimous decision… It also considered a representation by Johann Hari in its deliberation, and appropriate weight was placed upon it”
I think the correct response in this situation is WAHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!
He is lucky he is not a household name, I mean imagine if someone like Ken Clarke had said that the sexual abuse of young men was less damaging to them than the sexual abuse of young women?
I believe Johann’s alter ego has explored such issues in an exciting bit of fiction involving fraternal love.
Ken is smart enough to keep that opinion to himself (If he holds that opinion).
Think of the outraged howls from the left if it had been Theresa May who said that instead of Hari?
He is not a household name because no one gives a fuck.
He’ll be a gonner when they find out he wrote Gordon’s Commons speech.
Ed’s blank sheet of A4 paper was a lot easier to copy.
We’ll still be using Johann Hari as a ‘Voice Of Reason’ talking head and there’s nothing you can do to stop us!
In a statement a spokesperson for the BBC said:
“Sod you.”
[Ends]
Are you sure it wasn’t John’s Wendy house?
Chances are it’s actually my Wendy house, along with all the other tax-payers in the UK, as we’re most likely to have paid for everything the feeble Squeaker and his floozie have managed to accumulate.
Clearly the young girl has inherited the sense of entitlement and casual arrogance of her parents.
No, that’s a different one that I gave to charity because I found it too big and spooky!
No, it’s mummy’s brothel
Will the Fees Office be getting the bill ??
So that explains the claims for furnishing and cleaning of Wendy’s house.
One day it may be Wendy Dung’s playhouse (again)…
In the interest of transparancy, they need to release the full text of the “representation by Johann Hari”. That will be amusing.
Can being wrong ever be right? Kathryn Shulz author of ‘Being Wrong. Adventures in the Margin of Error’, debates the issue with columnist Johann Hari
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00v69f9
Is there a precedent that Hari can copy?
“I didn’t do it.”
“You’re all fascists!”
“This is so unfair! I hate you!”
“You’re a racist.”
“No, I won’t go to room!”
“…Johann said to me, staring determinedly, the fiercenss of his wisdom shining upon me with the effulgent grace of a blinding light blistering forth from his brother’s ass.”
Any news as to whether Blackhurst has passed on Mr Lebedev’s invitation to a little sushi to the fragrant Johann…..?
Hide the cutlery. Don’t let him do an Amy or a Britvic.
Guido
I think you should concentrate on the dozens of journalists, policemen and private investigators who will be going to jail for hacking, blagging, bribes etc …rather than Hari who is already dead…
But they’re his friends… and it’s politically unwise to jack off to a friend’s downfall (publicly).
You might say, Orwell that ends well then ??
See post further down, headline already used
http://order-order.com/2011/07/25/johann-hari-orwell-that-ends-well/
I’ll walk to the pavilion then.
Was only being helpful but the third umpire said you hadnt grounded your bat
Possible new careers for Johann:
Copier salesman
Duplicate bridge champion
Blue Peter presenter (‘Here’s one I made earlier’)
Secondhand shop assistant
Recycling operative
Paperhanger (cut ‘n’ paste, cut ‘n’ paste)
Fantasy fiction author….
Librarian?
“Could you direct to the fiction section, please?”
“It’s all fiction, sir.”
Hari is heading the same way as Tendulkar – out.
The comparisons end there: the Little Master is a batting legend whereas Hari is just a batty bell-end.
Think that’s probably enough about Hari. Anything else been going on in the world recently?
Yes, it’s all kicking off. Rebekah Brooks has resigned!
Meanwhile the country is STILL overspending at about £2000 / per second.
Is Tom Watson still claiming for food?
He’ll knock up a tear-stained article about his disgrace and redemption, and sub it for the Orwell Prize in 2013.
‘the orwell prize doesn’t smell of roses’ !
neither does the indy!!
“has got it’s own way”
I bet Hari knows how to use an apostrophe.
Anyway, Hari told me that Margaret Thatcher used to go around at night slapping working class people across the face while dressed in a burkha.
He copied that from somebody else.
Isn’t the Orwell Prize committee an autonomous body? do they decide who wins the prize only if the Independent says so?
Maybe it is an Independent body?
All a bit funny hand shakes if you ask me but then these things are. What about Obama and the Nobel Peace Prize, who next, hard act to follow,
All a bit funny hand shakes if you ask me but then these things are. What about Obama and the Nobel P……Prize, who next? hard act to follow.
I think Piers Morgan is up for a Sainthood.
I don’t think it was what Nobel intended, but they now award it to the person that has lit the biggest stick of Dynamite.
If the Indy doesn’t sack Hari, they open themselves up to criminal prosecution for commercial copyright infringement as they didn’t make him acknowledge his sources. How can he get a fair hearing from them under those circumstances?
The guy’s not a plagiarist; he’s a pirate. They should make him walk the plank, or they’ll go down with him.
The Orwell Prize is Britain’s most prestigious prize for political writing. Every year, prizes are awarded to the work – for the book, for the journalism and for the blog – which comes closest to George Orwell’s ambition ‘to make political writing into an art’. Each Prize is worth £3000.
Hari has done the equivalent of submitting a print into a painting competition
Only 3k? I wouldn’t get out of bed for less than 30k…
Hari has done the same as a sport star fixing matches or drug taking.
+++++++Billy fact++++++
the top 3 run scorers for England in the test match were all born in south africa.
The only way the mother country can get 11 decent cricketers into an England side is to import the sons of Empire. 5-a-side cricket played by real Brits isn’t going to win any tests.
On Sunday evening the BBC even dug up a psychiatrist to say that Breivik was perfectly aware of what he was doing and it was all about leading a Right-wing, conservative revolution. It makes one wonder what the Corporation might have made of it all but for its statutory duty of impartiality.
http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/normantebbit/100098697/being-right-wing-is-about-freedom-not-violence/
Shhhhhhhh
Freedom is the only the way to conduct politics or anyother protest.
Most violence has come from the left over the years.
Billy, I am sure General Pinochet would agree with you.
And Antonia Miranda Blair (convicted war criminal in waiting)…
Diagnosing serious mental illness, still less motivation, from photographs and patchy anecdotes is tantamount to professional misconduct.
Will he now go into politics with such a track record of truth?
I wonder if he will have to give back the interest on the prize money?
At current interest rates, that will be about 9p!
The Orwell Prize committee should have had the backbone to tell the Indy where to shove its delayed anouncement.
Prize chumps, will anybody ever take them seriously again?, any recipient of it in the future would rightly take is as an insult, the equivalent of being given the order of the wooden spoon.
Does the Indy finance this prize? if so, it might explain their reaction.
Like the police officer that fabricates evidence in order to make the accused more guilty, Hari has distorted to truth for his own ends, he has distorted the truth in order to “prove” his point.
Hari should be charged under the Fraud Act 2006
“Fraud by false representation” is defined by Section 2 of the Act as a case where a person makes “any representation as to fact or law … express or implied” which they know to be untrue or misleading.
Kinda feel sad that the little master didnt get a ton at Lords.
Was hoping he’d run himself out on nought and make Agnew cry.
Toenails on TMS at the moment.
It will allow the Not INndy to state, in two months time, “…so, after an extensive investigation we have concluded Mr Hari had deceived us and his employment has been terminated. He is also being stripped of the Orwell prize.”
It’s designed to allow them to pretend (for history and apologists) that they discovered, rather than ignored and encouraged his plagarised articles.
Johann Hari involved in hacking?
“Greek debt saying is “almost certain” to default “
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/financialcrisis/8659591/Euro-debt-crisis-festers-as-Moodys-downgrades-Greece.html
Still trying to work out why this really matters? The guy must have seriously upset Guido in the past!
If you don’t see why fabrication by journalists “matters”, you are beyond help.
Because it’s all fucking made up. Don’t read it.
I wonder if the Indy is any closer getting to the bottom of the strange case of “David Rose”, the sub-editor who apparently shared an Indy phone line with Hari and who appears to be responsible for maliciously changing Wikipedia entries?
This does not reflect well on either the Orwell prize committee or the I-sore. If they have reached a clear and unanimous decision, how could that be in any way affected by ‘independent’ investigation by the independent?
Are the committee saying they have no faith in their own investigation? Is the Independent suggesting the committee investigation is suspect?
Will the committee, therefore, change it’s decision if the Independent does not agree with it?
A plague on both their houses.
Bad move of course. The lawyers have spoken. Either Hari or the Independent on Hari’s behalf are threatening to sue – there is simply no other reason for the Orwell judges to wait.
Hari’s lawyers now have 2 months in which to pressure the Orwell judges into a compromise that either:
(a) allows Hari to return the prize in return for no ruling of fault or
(b) allows the Orwell judges to withdraw the prize without officially giving reasons for doing so, thus allowing Hari to say that he was never found guilty of plagarism.
The longer the Orwell judges wait the less likely their current position will stand.
“Waiting two months won’t make this any less embarrassing Mr Blackhurst, if the announcement was that Hari was going to keep it, you wouldn’t have wanted the delay”
Reminds me of two Lords discussing a third. One states he is his own worst enemy. The reply – Not while I am alive he is not.
Keep up the good work Guido.
It was actually Ernie Bevin who said that (Not while I’m alive…) about Herbert Morrison, grandfather of the fragrant Peter “Hello sailor” Mandelson.
Who gives a flying fuck about some 3rd rate journo’s stories? Why is this so important to Guido? Was Hari fucking Mrs Fawkes by any chance? – it’s the only possible explanation I can think of.
I am getting really bored of this story on this blog. I do not give a fuck about “I-suck-your-dick-if-you-suck-mine-and-give-me-a-little-prize” winners or losers. Hari has now lost it, he didn’t suck enough cock. Guido, if you want to win, you know what you need to do…