Martin Cloake - the NUJ rep - misses the point: the capitalist impulse of corporate media demands headlines that sell. That is what capitalist media is for: to make money for the owners. Truth or reality simnply do not matter to them if there is a juicy scare story that will shift a few more copies from the newstand.

In the run up to Mayday the anti-capitalist movement in general, and the WOMBLES in particular - were subjected to a co-ordinated campaign of harrassment and intimidation by uniform and the secret political police of Special Branch. People were visted at home by Branch offering bribes, people were tailed to and from meetings, got door-stepped by gangs of pigs with film crews, their neighbours were questionned, petty arrests were made to glean information. A Chilean who attended a public meeting (surrounded by obvious undercover secret police all talking into their jackets) was shocked: he said the last time he had sen this sort of thing was just before the fascist general Pinochet's coup in chile in 1973.

This hassle was accompanied by a series of inflammatory press statements made to selected scum jounos on the Evening Substandard and the Torgraph (among others) in order to get across Tory Blair's zero-tolerance bull shit. The agenda was clear: dissent in this country is only allowed if you do nothing to annoy the state or its security apparatus. Journalists - including no doubt many NUJ members - happily colluded in one of the most blatant ever attempts to stifle legitimate opposition: if this had happended overseas the corporate press would have been the first to start bleating about state manuipulation of the news agenda: but in the UK, they were happy to uncritically reproduce every bit of shit given to them by the pig Mike Todd and others.

No attempt was ever made by any of these "journalists" to contact the WOMBLES. ever heard of balanced reporting? The Sale of the Century action was developed through a series of truly public meetings. All details were posted on the web site. But the journalists - given a deliberately inaccurate report from the the pig Todd - saw an easy story and went for it - are they lazy, stupid, ignorant or just pig collabotators?

We can can look ourselves in the mirror knowing we took to the streets on Mayday for something we believed in, to the point where we were prepared for beatings, gas and plastic bullets to be used against us. Wearing body armour and helmets was not an escalation: it was a reasonable response to anticipated state violence. We have clear consciences: I doubt if any journalist could say the same with regard to Mayday.

It is going to be difficult for journalists to get a story from anyone involved in actions now: they have exposed themselves as the pig state collaborators they are. They are simply not trusted. Shame on them! The best thing they can do to help is to resign and do something worthwhile for a change: like medical experiments....