  Ah, The Sun. Looks like they've gone and got themselves in the shit again. This time, it's all due to Roo-mania. You see Rooney has signed on with The Sun and sister paper NotW. This could be seen as naive and a bit stupid, because a lot of football fans have never forgiven the paper for printing, as they declared, "The Truth" about the Hillsborough disaster in 1989. As Rooney has started to get a bit of stick for this and The Sun would hate their new cash cow to become vilified, Rebekah Wade, Murdoch's whore The Sun editor and wife of one-note actor, Ross Kemp, decided on this editorial.
IT is 15 years since The Sun committed the most terrible mistake in its history. By making grave and untrue allegations about the behaviour of Liverpool fans during the Hillsborough disaster, we enraged the city. But more importantly, we tarnished the memory of 96 soccer fans who had tragically lost their lives. And our carelessness and thoughtlessness following that blackest of days made the grief of their families and friends even harder to bear. We long ago apologised publicly to the victims’ families, friends and to the city of Liverpool for our awful error. We gladly say sorry again today: fully, openly, honestly and without reservation.
If there was any way we could take back our erroneous words of 15 years ago, and by so doing ease the deep anguish we caused to so many people in mourning, we would do it. But there isn’t. We can only hope that time will be the great healer. Sadly, for some people in the city of Liverpool, forgetting — never mind forgiving — is impossible. If they want to hate The Sun, then that is their right. We are hardly in a position to blame them.
What we find impossible to take, though, is the way some of Liverpool is turning its anger on one of the greatest footballing talents the city has ever seen. Wayne Rooney is one of Liverpool’s finest sons. At 18, he is the nation’s hero of Euro 2004 and has the potential to outscore England legends like Jimmy Greaves, Bobby Charlton and Alan Shearer. On Merseyside, his name should be the toast of every pub, street and school. Instead, he is being vilified by some Liverpool and Everton fans. We can understand the grief of those who lost loved ones at Hillsborough.
We do not condemn the outspoken words of men like John Glover, whose son died in the tragedy, for his loss entitles him to hold any opinion he wishes. But the words of other fans leave us in despair. Wayne Rooney was just three years old at the time of Hillsborough. He and his fiancee Coleen are devastated by this unfair backlash. He should not be punished in 2004 for a mistake The Sun made in 1989. Don’t visit our past sins on him.
One view on a Liverpool website is that by telling his life story in The Sun, Wayne has “signed his soul away to the devil.” Another is that he has “accepted 30 pieces of silver.” For goodness sake, give the lad a chance. It’s not as if Wayne’s the first footballer from Merseyside to talk to The Sun. We have enjoyed a good working relationship with many players and managers over the years. And nearly all Liverpool-born celebrities regularly talk to Britain’s favourite daily newspaper. What The Sun finds most depressing about what is going on in Liverpool is the way trouble is stirred up by the local papers, the Post and the Echo. Who owns the Post and Echo?
None other than Trinity Mirror. The same company that owns The Sun’s rival, the Daily Mirror. The misery being inflicted on Wayne Rooney is a crude effort by them to make commercial gain. We hope that the people of modern Liverpool, a city of spirit and sophistication, are not taken in. A brilliant young athlete, a credit to his club, his city and his country, is being pilloried by the very people who should be hailing him a hero. And The Sun of 2004 no more deserves to be hated on Merseyside than Wayne Rooney does.
For a start, most of today’s staff weren’t on The Sun in 1989 and today’s Editor was a 20-year-old student. Many of the callers to BBC Radio Merseyside have acknowledged that fact. Fifteen years is a long time. It is 11 years longer than the First World War, nine years longer than the Second World War. We cannot believe these protests properly represent the opinions of the majority of men and women in Liverpool. No one will ever forget the terrible Hillsborough tragedy, nor those who died and their loved ones.
But trashing a young man of whom everyone should be proud is not the way to honour their memory. It is time to move on. So, just to clarify: * It was fifteen years ago. We've decided to finally apologise in some fashion. * Because it was fifteen years ago, we hoped you would have forgotten by now * No-one would care if it wasn't for The Mirror getting you wound up. As a reminder - here's a story from the Guardian website: It all started on the Wednesday following the Hillsborough disaster in April 1989, when MacKenzie was about to make what he later described as a "fundamental mistake".
According to Peter Chippindale and Chris Horrie in their definitive history Stick it Up Your Punter - the Rise and Fall of the Sun, MacKenzie spent an unusual amount of time deliberating over the fateful headline for that day's paper. "MacKenzie then did an enormously uncharacteristic thing. He sat for fully half an hour thinking about the front page layout. " According to the book he pondered two headlines, one that was rejected reading "You Scum", and the one that was eventually used - and was to prove the biggest disaster for the paper's reputation and sales: "The Truth". A team of about 18 journalists and photographers had been send to cover the story, and although reporter Harry Arnold sought out MacKenzie to caution against reporting allegations as truth, MacKenzie pressed on. Having decided to lay the blame on the fans' doorsteps, there was no stopping him.
Under the headline "The Truth" there were three subheadings: Some fans picked pockets of victims Some fans urinated on the brave cops Some fans beat up PCs giving the kiss of life The story read as follows: "Drunken Liverpool fans viciously attacked rescue workers as they tried to revive victims of the Hillsborough soccer disaster, it was revealed last night. "Police officers, firemen and ambulance crew were punched, kicked and urinated upon by a hooligan element in the crowd. "Some thugs rifled the pockets of injured fans as they were stretched out unconscious on the pitch. "Sheffield MP Irvine Patnick revealed that in one shameful episode a gang of Liverpool fans noticed that the blouse of a girl trampled to death had risen above her breasts. "As a policeman struggled in vain to revive her, the mob jeered: 'Throw her up here and we will **** her'" The story went on: "One furious policeman who witnessed Saturday's carnage stormed: 'As we struggled in appalling conditions to save lives, fans standing further up the terrace were openly urinating on us and the bodies of the dead. " A 'high-ranking' police officer was quoted as saying: "The fans were just acting like animals.
My men faced a double hell - the disaster and the fury of the fans who attacked us. " Kenny Dalglish, then Liverpool manager, later addressed the story in his autobiography: "When the Sun came out with the story about Liverpool fans being drunk and unruly underneath a headline 'The Truth,' the reaction on Merseyside was one of complete outrage. Newsagents stopped stocking the Sun. People wouldn't mention its name. They were burning copies of it. Anyone representing the Sun was abused.
"Sun reporters and photographers would lie, telling people they worked for the Liverpool Post and Echo. There was a lot of harassment of them because of what had been written. The Star had gone a bit strong as well, but they apologised the next day. They knew the story had no foundation. Kelvin MacKenzie, the Sun's editor, even called me up. "'How can we correct the situation?
" he said. "'You know that big headline - 'The Truth',' I replied. 'All you have to do is put 'We lied' in the same size. Then you might be all right. ' "Mackenzie said: 'I cannot do that. ' "'Well,' I replied, 'I cannot help you then.
' "That was it. I put the phone down. Merseysiders were outraged by the Sun. A great many still are. " It was four years later that the then publicity-averse Kelvin MacKenzie went public for the first time about the calamitous decision to call Liverpudlians liars and thieves who preyed off the dying and dead. "I regret Hillsborough," he said.
"It was a fundamental mistake. The mistake was I believed what an MP said. It was a Tory MP. If he had not said it and the chief superintendent had not agreed with it, we would not have gone with it," he told the Commons national heritage committee in January, 1993. However, the Hillsborough survivors' group felt his words amounted to a less than sufficient apology. And while Rupert's cunt Wade wasn't at The Sun 15 years ago, let's just have a quick reminder of what she has achieved in her time.
*Nearly got The Soham case thrown out after printing Huntley's picture in story about paedophiles during the trial *Had to come clean that the paper often paid police for stories *The 'Bonkers Bruno' headline *Signed Rio Ferdinand to a Euro 2004 Column - before he got banned And last, but not least: *Achieving the lowest sales in 30 years Which, of course, is a record which could be beaten after this half-assed apology. 
