Rupert Murdoch's Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Week

Over the course of literally only a few days Billionaire, Media Baron and all around malign influence on the world Voldemort Rupert Murdoch lost the jewel in his British print crown when he was forced to shut down the 168 year old News of the World tabloid, irretrievably damaged and possibly crippled his enormous power over British politics and culture and now has been forced to abandon a gigantic TV deal worth billions that seemed like a certainty to be approved by government regulators only days ago.

Rupert Murdoch's media group News Corporation bowed to pressure from the public and parliament on Wednesday and withdrew its bid to take full control of pay-TV company BSkyB.

All three main political parties were poised to call on News Corp to abandon its offer in a vote in the House of Commons later on Wednesday.

The move leaves News Corp's key strategy for UK corporate growth in tatters. The proposed £8bn deal has been in train for more than a year, with the first offer tabled in June 2010.

It is the one of the biggest setbacks the 80-year-old media mogul has ever suffered and follows 10 days of revelations about the true scale of phone hacking at the News of the World, the paper Murdoch shut down last week.

With Conrad Black heading back to prison it doesn't seem like a good time to be a ruthless far right media baron. 

But its a very good time for fans of schadenfreude.