Give me my petty dictatorship, please

So the Leveson Inquiry is wrapping up now, and whee, has it been fun everyone! Anyone? No? Yeah, it's been kinda boring, only spiced up once in a while when they told us about something particularly vile the press did. I mean, there wasn't a single A Few Good Men reference. Yawn.

For an inquiry about the press being unmitigated assholes, the press sure liked taking about it a lot. In a way it made perfect sense. Newspapers are anywhere between twenty-four and forty-eight hours behind at the best of times, and they have just not been able to keep up with the frantic pace of the internet, hence the move to more opinion pieces. And also possibly phone hacking. So when there's an inquiry about the press, it's a perpetual story, of the press reporting about the press in one horrible incestuous ball of sleaze. Besides, the tabloids love an 'orrible scandal combined with falling standards, regardless of the source.

Then the covering got quiet as they stopped talking to people who couldn't remember anything at all ever, I wasn't there, I was sick that day, the dog did it, honest – and the press moved onto more pressing matters, like I'm A Celebrity and X Factor. I mean, they're clearly both being fixed! And there's breasts! IN A BIKINI! IT'S VITALLY IMPORTANT WE TALK ABOUT THIS WHILST SHOWING PICTURE AFTER PICTURE OF THESE BIKINI ENCASED BREASTS.

Then it exploded again, because it was time for the inquiry's recommendations, and the press realised, oh shit, we could get our balls legislated off here. And so we've had to deal with page after page of pleas, whining and tub-thumping, decrying the death of free speech. Hey, look, freedom of speech is one thing, but you have to realise; we left it up to you guys to regulate yourselves, and you've sort of done a terribly shitty job of that.

The inquiry basically called for a new regulator backed by law, while mentioning that, whilst we're at it, let's say it nice and loud, that any new laws shouldn't give any government, let alone Parliament, any ability to interfere with what newspapers publish. After all, we have super-injunctions for that. There's been some predictable panic – the press has been free up until now, but I keep flip-flopping where I should be on this fence. On the one hand, the ability to call Nick Clegg the Traitor King and publicly shit on him and all he stands for is awesome. Also, blah blah blah, ability to freely investigate and expose any wrong doing, blah. On the other hand, dear god are tabloids full of utter shite. Biased, racist, vile hate from so many of them. But as much as that annoys me, what annoys me most is the stupidity. They're just dumb for the most part. For some reason, such blatant joy in stupidity and anti-intellectualism annoys me as much as hateful filth seeping from every pore.

But perhaps now I can be an assistance to them. Let me be the first to volunteer to sit on this to-be-created regulatory board. I will be fair. I will be non-biased. I will be pffffft. I couldn't keep a straight face typing that. No. Fuck it. I'll be honest.

Let me be on this board, and I will be a petty tyrant.

It'll be fucking awesome. Let's look at an average day in the office.

'Whatcha hiding there? Come on, hand it over, ah, AH! What's that? That's a celebrity story! I knew it!'

'It's a perfectly fair and valid-'

'No. Nope. No celebrity stories. They bore me. How many pictures do we need of Tom Cruise's daughter? Getting kinda creepy now. Anyway, who cares? I don't. And as far as I'm concerned, if I don't care, no-one does. Look, talk about the Mars rover for a bit. They said they found something for the history books. Speculate. And you said I wouldn't let you speculate anything. And where the hell are you going?

'Well, now that we're done-'

'Oh, we ain't done. This story on the NHS?'

'It's an exposure piece-'

'Ah, no. It's a fear-mongering piece. Look at that language. The revulsion. That lack of factual accuracy. I don't like it. If I look at it real close, it's a non-story you decided that under a weird twisted light was somehow a story about benefit scroungers killing babies. I don't even... ugh. And stop talking about what gives you cancer. I've warned you; only talk about statistics if you're going to explain the sample sizes and relative/absolute risk increases, you dick. Daily Mail you sit the hell right down now!

'Uh-'

'I said no LittleJohn. I fucking warned you about this. I ran out of red ink crossing out every piece of hate he wrote, so I'm just crossing out his name for now. Also remember that front page piece you wrote? Yesterday? Illegal immigrants doing... doing... oh what was it now?'

'Those scum were-'

'Ah, yes, I chased up on your source on that one. Which turned out to be the work experience boy typing on his lunch break. You lied. Again. Front page apology, same font size as before. You'll find plenty of time to correct it on the Naughty Step. Express? Telegraph?'

'Yes?'

'A Princess Diana story? Really? What part of 'rest in peace' do you not get? Just... just drop it. Please. No wait, I'm in charge. Drop it or I'll noogie you. Guardian? Where are you? Ah. How are your subscribers doing?

'Not so well. My mum's sick and didn't pick up a paper, so our revenue was down a third today.'

'Sucks. Anyway, F7. That's the button on your keyboard I want you to remember to press. It's a spell check. Use it. The Sun?

'Yes?'

'I saw your page 3 girl, and one suggestion?'

'...You want me to drop it?'

'What? No. I want you to stop those stupid little 'what the breasts say' thing you do. No one cares what words you put in their mouths. The Times? I'm going to be honest here. Your paper is massive and colossally boring, I spend like maybe ten minutes trying to get through an article when I had no idea what was it about, so I'm assuming it's all fine. I mean, Christ, I don't wanna read it. Huh.Hmm. Oh dear. What did I hit you for yesterday Mirror?'

'Being offensively stupid, sir.'

'Yeah. I did. Yet I couldn't muster the effort to read The Times. Okay, fine, you get to hit me back. No. Wait. Belay that. Bad idea. Instead, you get one pass at being offensively stupid. Eh, let's be generous. You all get one pass. One. Just one.'

Aren't power fantasies fun? Fair and balanced. In that I'll at least admit to being anything but that off the bat, and constantly.