Purnell: seeing is not believing

It's not the crime of the century but James Purnell (the Blairite Culture Secretary - as in Tony Blair, remember him?) has been caught with his pants down. It seems he turned up late for a photo-op at Tameside Hospital and so agreed to "merging" a photo of himself with that of three other MP's who visited the hospital. The cack-handed result can be seen here. Purnell claims he thought "merging" meant that the two photos would be run side-by-side (sorry, James old chap, that's not what merging means). To clinch it, Purnell put the doctored photo on his own web-site for all the world as if it was the genuine article. Bang to rights, I'd say. A little embarrassing for the boy wonder since he has recently been criticising TV broadcasters over various phone-in scandals, et al (The most egregious of these obviously involved the misnaming of the Blue Peter cat. Callers voted to call it "Cookie" but this apparently is slang for the female genitalia, so they named the pussy Socks). Of course, this sort of thing is by no means new. During the last US Presidential election campaign a doctored photo showing John Kerry apparently speaking at an anti-Vietnam war rally alongside "Hanoi" Jane Fonda was widely published. And of course there is the infamous case of Trotsky, erased from history, as shown here. I think the main point here is that it shows Purnell lacking in the most elementary media-savvy (OK it shows he is a liar as well); he has been tipped as a future Labour Leader, but on this showing he is as dim as a 40-watt bulb (then again, there was Kinnock...)