Freedom of the Press--Unless, of Course, It's About the Press Themselves

A Daily Mail article yesterday carries this instructive anecdote:

"In 2001 the pair [Rebekah Brooks and Elisabeth Murdoch, media mogul Rupert Murdoch's daughter] were photographed on Miss Murdoch's hen night during which the group of friends was being followed in their white stretch-limo by a Ford Mondeo.

Brooks, then Rebekah Wade and editor of the News of the World [a Murdoch publication], called the picture desk and, using the car's number plate, was able to identify the paparazzo driver.

She called him, identified herself and said that unless he stopped following them she'd see to it that no Murdoch publication would do business with him again.

The Mondeo immediately performed a U-turn and disappeared."