MediaFile

Rupert Murdoch didn’t open the D9 conference this year as he’s wont to do. So, his alter ego did.

Jane Lynch — the acerbic, sarcastic and domineering Cheerios coach of Fox’s “Glee” — stood in for the News Corp chieftain in a brief stand-up spiel for the 600 attendees at the tech industry conference.

The award-winning actress (and very-temporary acting CEO) declared News Corp’s fledgling The Daily will be shuttered because she’d “never heard of it”, announced an investigation into the backgrounds of the Glee cast, and boasted she’d convinced ultra-conservative TV host Glenn Back to stay on at Fox for one final gig as a dying patient on the highly-rated medical drama “House”.

Dressed in a business suit, the “face of Fox TV” enacted a number of other subtle changes whilst the media giant’s powers-that-be were absent.

“While I’m holding the keys to the kingdom, I’ve decided I’ll be taking the next logical step and I’ll be incorporating a comics page into the the Wall Street Journal,” she deadpanned.

News Corp announced on Monday it is expanding its  Capitol Hill government affairs office by promoting veterans Bill Guidera and David Fares to senior vice president and adding two more execs in Kathy Ramsey and Kristopher Jones to the Washington team.

We’ve been assured by insiders there’s nothing afoot here but that it’s a recognition of Guidera and Fares’ work. Clearly, we’ll soon hear if there’s more to it in the near future.

Interestingly, if there’s one country where News Corp could do with better government relations right now it is not the US.  The company could probably do with some extra hands in the UK where News Corp CEO Rupert Murdoch (pictured, left) is dealing with a number of touchy situations in terms of government relations particularly concerning his company’s bid to take full ownership of BSkyB, the British  satellite TV  provider.