An army of professional liars

Just when you thought your opinion of British tabloids couldn't get any worse, the Leveson inquiry lends a helping hand:

One of the more striking aspects of last week's testimony was just how many of the published stories that had proved so hurtful and damaging were simply not true – as with the manipulation of a photograph of Miller playing with a terminally ill child so as to make her look drunk and incapable, or the portrayal of Sheryl Gascoigne as having cut off the contact her ex-husband Paul had with their child, when she had done no such thing. Or, much worse, the printing of pages and pages of lies about the McCanns, which gives an entirely new twist to the old adage about not letting the facts stand in the way of a good story.

To make things even more bizarre, this incredible record of fabrication happens in a country with some of the most restrictive libel laws in the world. Simon Singh had to spend thousands to defend the right to talk about the lack of evidence for some chiropractic treatments, while the red tops can print any old junk.