Posted on 05/16/2018 10:19:19 AM PDT by ethom
A CNN reporter holds UK newspapers with the latest Thomas Markle headlines in front of Windsor castle.
As the British press scrambles to follow scoop after scoop from US website TMZ about Meghan Markle's father's attendance at the royal wedding, a consensus has set in among those in the Royal media: The Palace has lost control.
"The palace press aides are like ostriches sticking their heads in the sand and they keep getting shafted up the bottom," said royal pundit and ex-Sun royal correspondent Charles Rae.
Over the last few days, TMZ has been in near constant contact with Thomas Markle, who – according to the website, which quotes him directly – has changed his mind multiple times about whether he'll appear in Windsor on Saturday to walk his daughter down the aisle.
For the royal press pack trying to cover the biggest story in Britain, the problem has been Kensington Palace – specifically the media and PR operation in charge of Prince Harry and Meghan – which has refused to comment on or been unable to verify any of the information reported by the celebrity site.
The Sun's royal photographer of 40 years, Arthur Edwards said the country's news bulletins and newspaper front pages are all using second-hand reports from the celebrity website as their source.
"Nobody actually knows because it's one website in America putting out this news and it could be totally inaccurate," Edwards said. "But we don't have anyone confirming things at Kensington Palace."
"Here's a man who claims to have turned down interviews for £50,000 to £100,000," Charles Rae said. "Suddenly he's got a hotline to TMZ?"
Whether the developments have been verified or not, TMZ has owned the Thomas Markle melodrama dominating the final week of wedding preparations. On Monday, the website reported Markle had made the shock decision to pull out of walking his daughter down the aisle after being exposed for setting up paparazzi photos.
By Tuesday afternoon, TMZ scooped again, this time Markle had changed his mind, expressing a desire to be part of the wedding. Five hours later the story changed once more, with Markle "pulling out because he needed a heart operation".
Apparently after Meghan contacted her father and said she wanted him at her wedding, he said he’d come BUT says he doesn’t know whether the doctors will let him come... this done all through the medium of TMZ and not KP.... extraordinary
Apparently after Meghan contacted her father and said she wanted him at her wedding, he said he’d come BUT says he doesn’t know whether the doctors will let him come... this done all through the medium of TMZ and not KP.... extraordinary
For TMZ, the story is just another opportunity to break news on car-crash celebrity drama, and then follow it hour-by-hour in excruciating detail. TMZ founder Harry Levin had boasted on a recent video segment about the website's access to Thomas Markle – reportedly in contact with him over text message – and denied TMZ had been paying him.
Phil Dampier, a former Sun royal reporter and author of Royally Suited: Harry and Meghan in their own words, said many of this week's troubles were caused by Kensington Palace's failure to bring Thomas Markle into the fold, pointing to the fact Prince Harry still hadn't met his future father-in-law in-person.
"They should have flown out there months ago and met her father, or a senior courtier should have gone out there, put an arm around him and told him how to handle the press," Dampier said.
"They've left him to his own devices and its not surprising he's cracked under the pressure."
According to Dampier, Kensington Palace's attempts to control the British press – Prince Harry has spoken out publicly and forcefully about the tabloids' treatment of his future wife – underestimate the number of times that the foreign press have broken with their conventions. For instance, Drudge Report broke Prince Harry's cover during his service Afghanistan back in 2008.
"Kensington Palace and Prince Harry very much blame the British press and try to control it because of what happened to his mother," he said. "The irony is a lot of the problems are because of the foreign press."
Whether Thomas Markle attends the royal wedding on Saturday or not – at the time of writing, TMZ says he won't be – the intense media interest in Meghan Markle's father is unlikely to end.
"If he doesn't come on Saturday you're going to have every US photographer trying to find a photo of him while his daughter is getting married six thousand miles away," Rae said.
"That's going to be the money shot."
This girl is trash. Harry will regret this.
***They had a more positive impact than any other colonizer by far.****
Spread Christianity, science, medicine and the English language (based on Latin & French of course). From Wiki:
Between the late 16th and early 18th centuries. At its height, it was the largest empire in history and, for over a century, was the foremost global power.[1] By 1913, the British Empire held sway over 412 million people, 23% of the world population at the time,[2] and by 1920, it covered 35,500,000 km2 (13,700,000 sq mi),[3] 24% of the Earth’s total land area.[4] As a result, its political, legal, linguistic and cultural legacy is widespread. At the peak of its power, the phrase “the empire on which the sun never sets” was often used to describe the British Empire, because its expanse around the globe meant that the sun was always shining on at least one of its territories.[5]
In the UK they are called “burger vans”
Lol...they thought Diana gave them pains. Meghan says in Nicholson style...Wait till they het a load of me.
The House of Windsor is a menace, and the more eyes on that pack of useful idiots the better.
Harry got a taste of Vegas and they couldn’t keep him down on the old farm!
We have Mexi food trucks in my barrio.
Good observation. Other that America, is there any country where things are better after the British have left or been kicked out?
Yes, blame the help. “Kensington Palace” my foot. Meg and Harry are solely to blame for the mishandling of her father’s involvement or non-involvement in the wedding.
What does this Ass hat look like?
rumour has it Meghan was a ‘yachting for pay’ girl in her early actress career and may have been involved with Harvey Weinstein at one point...
I wouldn’t be alive if it weren’t for Great Britain. They took my 7 year old dad in and saved him from the Holocaust. I owe them, and I really hate to see what it’s become, but luckily so do a lot of like minded Brits. There are some, just as there are some of us among the Gullibles in the USA.
About what you’d think.
What a great idea! That’s hilarious. AA for royalty. She’d do it, too.
“We are damn lucky to have had Britain to escape from”
I believe it was GK Chesterton who said the same thing about the Roman Empire. For all their faults they were the great purveyors of western civilization.
Chesterton said “there were pagans, and then there were pagans”- the Roman pagan gods were the god of the hearth, the god of the fenceposts. Pretty benign gods as pagan deities go.
Contrast Rome’s gods to that of Hannibal’s Carthage- Carthage was every bit as advanced as Rome but its god was Cronus, to which they burned infants alive like the Phoenicians did for Moloch.
If that came out, I wouldn’t be shocked. I don’t hate the Queen, but I hope this family gets some karma for their past sins.
Maybe the ghost of Diana is directing the show. ;) But she wouldn’t want her #2 son to suffer.
I thought at one time Harry was a fairly decent, albeit randy, young fellow, but obviously he’s not playing with a full one.
Im sure the royal guard knows all about her background and has a story lined up, some of the pictures have already been out I believe...
Little Ms Sparkle simply expected her impoverished father to show up fully suited and booted for her big day. All these years that she has been making the big bucks, has she ever thrown any his way? I'm sure the tabloids will soon inform us. If true, the idea that she is only now trying to salvage the situation about who will walk her down the aisle three days before the wedding is a disgrace on her, and says nothing good about Harry, either.
The Palace ruined it so badly with Charles and Andrew's marriages, in no small part because they apparently have no natural EQ and failed utterly to consider the actual human dynamics of the persons marrying in. In the old days, royalty just beheaded unwanted spouses or in-laws. So I guess this is progress, unless you believe the rumors about what actually caused the wreck of Princess Di.
That is such an awesome story.
I watched about Sir Nicholas Winton
a couple of years back and revisited it again more recently.
Always makes me cry.
One of the children noted in it, I think it was that documentary as I have watched quite a few, the poorer and more common the English person, the more generous and kind they were.
PS: I wouldn’t be here today if not for Winston Churchill. I give him the most credit. My little mom was a London baby born in 1938. She has very clear memories of the later years of the war.
With all their money and free time, why didn’t Harry and Meg fly to southern California at some point to meet Meg’s father? They could have met him in San Diego or somewhere close to the border with Mexico and not had to worry about security in Mexico. Harry supposedly has not met her father to date.
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