(Image Source BagNews)

 
BY YOUYOU ZHOU
 
ANCHOR CHRISTINA HARTMAN
 
The News of the World phone hacking scandal has dominated media outlets for the better part of a week. But it took an odd turn when the  media unanimously switched their focus to Murdoch's wife Wendi Deng after the parliamentary hearing on Tuesday. 
 
While the testimony was taking place, British activist Jonnie Marbles tried to throw what looked like a shaving-cream pie in Murdoch's face. Video footage shows Deng, 42 and married to the 80-year-old Murdoch for 12 years, jumping up and lunging after the attacker faster than anyone, taking an open-handed swing at Marbles who was arrested shortly thereafter."
 
 
From then on, the scandalous political and business story has had a new, more entertaining angle. Salon observes --
 
"The second it happened, you know every editor in the US and the UK immediately assigned someone the Wendi Deng story. And because the stories had to be ready for the morning papers or the morning shows, they all ended up as interchangeable biographical sketches based on previously published profiles."
 
"Born in China, Wendi came to the U.S. at 18. The love affair with Murdoch began under a cloud of scandals as well. They married only 17 days after Murdoch's divorce became final with his second wife of 31 years. But Wendi is far from a trophy wife. She graduated from Yale with an MBA and was working at the Murdoch empire when they met. She's interested in his business. He's flattered. He says he wants to know her. Together they have two young daughters."
ABC
 
Following the incident, the term "slap!" soon started trending on Twitter. MSNBC comments, it may have temporarily saved Murdoch.
 
"Had Wendi not slapped him, had he gotten the shaving cream pie in the face, maybe things would have been different, but her jumping in and saving him from that I think really turned a lot of people's images around, turned people's minds around from looking at him, looking at him as a human being. "
 
While the western media regard Wendi Deng as a model wife protecting her husband, a blogger on the Chinese social networking site Renren expressed different views.
 
"Wendi Deng in Chinese means an ambitious, opportunistic woman who could sacrifice anything to achieve her goals. People usually don't like her. Conspiracists believe she actually hired the attacker and acted in order to get Murdoch's heritage."
 
No matter how the media is portraying her her, Deng has become folklore hero on Twitter.
 
The social networking site was abuzz with comments, ranging from mock reports of Putin declaring her his head of security, to speculation that she might secretly be Batman. 
 

Business News: Wendi Deng Media Focus

Wendi Deng: Media Focus, Twitter Hero

July 20, 2011
(2:24)
After defending her husband with a mighty open-handed strike in the Parliamentary hearing, Wendi Deng has become the center of media attention.
   
TRANSCRIPT

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