The view from the perspective of one of the world’s media giants is, at the very least interesting. His empire is under public attack at a key point connected to the source of his wealth and the seat of his power. For the moment he stands firm in public, outraged and demanding of resolution, backing his people whom he regards as extended family and to whom he is intensely loyal.
In private he dwells in pensive fury. Pensive because he knows where things could go; fury because he knows that his own ruthless and determined streak has been misunderstood and taken too far. The crisis, for Murdoch, has three elements. Money, crime and power.
Money is easy. Shares will lose value, revenue may drop a little from its world total of $20 billion and the takeover of all the shares of BSkyB may be blocked, become too expensive, or be otherwise impracticable. The News of The World is a damaged brand, because it is a scandal sheet which has become itself the scandal. But time, a clear out, contrition and a revamp can put all that right. In total the money is a nuisance, but can be managed.
Crime is tricky, because it is now outside the control of the family. Individuals should bear the brunt, as corporate crime would be difficult to prove or to prosecute. Those individuals are already earmarked, or if not, those to be protected certainly are. Rebeka is with the latter and the hapless Andy Coulson is clearly the chief fall guy. But in the end the guilty are punished and the business moves on.
Power is the big one. This is the essence. Up till Thatcher and her war with the unions, Murdoch had the amount of influence accorded to newspaper proprietors the world over. But then he took on and roundly defeated the Fleet Street unions, led by the feisty Brenda Dean.
With aggressive tactics, which included firing 6000 striking workers, setting up a complete new production facility at Wapping, bringing an Australian haulage firm, TNT, to distribute papers by road, doing a no strike deal with the ETC and working closely with the NPA, under Lord Marsh and with the support of the Thatcher government, Murdoch delivered, following on from the failed miner’s strike, the decisive blow to trade union power in the UK. From that moment he was politically the Gold Standard.
His support determined the future of governments. In his bank he stored the fortunes of his business, but in his palm he held the fortunes of political parties. All sought his ear, craved his backing and attended his soirees. He was, literally, among the most powerful twenty men and women in the world.
Suddenly all that is changed. No politician on this side of the Atlantic can afford to be seen in his company or at a function organised by any of his minions. MPs discover that their careers will be enhanced, not by supporting him, but by attacking him and all he stands for. This will get worse as public enquires begin.
That is what will hurt Rupert Murdoch the most. All the rest may be fixable, but the influence, the ear bending, the sense of command and the power to control the big political picture has gone. Whether he cares enough to try and retrieve it will determine, more than anything else, what happens next.