As the phone “hacking” saga gets its debate in the House, and now a Standards and Privileges Committee investigation, new levels of hysteria have been reached. Tom Watson is demanding that Rupert Murdoch to be called before Parliament to answer for himself. Don’t hold your breath mate…

Given journalists left, right and centre are openly admitting, sometimes live on TV, that the practice of listening to other people’s answer-phone messages was widespread, you must wonder how papers like the Observer and the Mirror are justifying their Coulson onslaught. Back in 2002 a crowded room of showbiz reporters cheered and laughed as a Sun hack blamed Vodafone, who were sponsoring the event, for their lax security that enabled the Mirror to get their exclusives. When the Guardian wrote it up back then, they knew exactly what was meant and didn’t bat an eyelid.

Labour’s case is undone by only targeting News International and making this a big bad Murdoch attack. If they were really as concerned as they are pretending to be then they wouldn’t be focussing their fire on just one publication…