86 Responses to OPEN THREAD…

  1. George R says:

    While BBC fat cats look after themselves, they express faux concern for the poor:

    “Ethiopians attack BBC’s doom-laden coverage”

    http://www.thefirstpost.co.uk/56503,news-comment,news-politics,ethiopians-attack-bbcs-doom-laden-coverage

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  2. George R says:

    Somalia jihad pirates, and British navy.

    BBC’s reporter Paul Wood naively asks:

    “Why have the world’s most advanced navies failed to end piracy in the seas around Somalia?”

    http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/africa/8371139.stm

    ‘Mail’s Max Hastings pursues a non-BBC tack:

    “A cowardly Navy, a cautious SAS and Britain’s humiliation by a pirate rabble”

    Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-1230314/A-cowardly-Navy-cautious-SAS-Britains-humiliation-pirate-rabble.html#ixzz0XlrBDKob

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    • Fat Face Penguin Seal says:

      I haven’t seen you raise the issue of pirates before Georgie; do pirates only interest you when they are jihadi pirates?

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      • Philip says:

        Are there any other kind?

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      • cassandra king says:

        I am the heretic here, I have some sympathy with the plight of the local fishermen who have seen their catch and livlihoods dissapear into the holds of the factory ships that hoover up vast quantities of the fish that used to be basis of the fishing comunities in the area.
        Its not too far fetched to suppose that the naval presence is simply guarding the organised industrial theft of the natural resources of a group of poor people who have no navy to protect them.
        I suggest that the EU fishing policy is partly to blame, the EU boats are encouraged to fish away from EU waters because there is no limits imposed on boats in those waters.

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        • David Preiser (USA) says:

          Sure, but let’s not deny the cultural and socio-political climate that makes the area a haven for pirates.  If Somalia wasn’t run by people whom we aren’t allowed to mention while frowning, one wonders just how bad this would have gotten in the first place.

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        • Martin says:

          Yes like EU scum hoover up our fish as well. Let’s nuke the EU.

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  3. George R says:

    Fat Face PS

    There seem to be a lot of issues you don’t notice.

    Please try to keep up.

    “What piracy? This is the same old jihad.”

    http://pajamasmedia.com/blog/what-piracy-this-is-the-same-old-jihad/

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  4. George R says:

    And so, the BBC propaganda for the Hajj, and Islam re-commences:

    “Muslims brave swine flu to make Hajj pilgrimage”

    http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/8375605.stm

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  5. eddyoc says:

    The BBC demonstrated yesterday that it was prepared to give up any pretense of impartiality in it’s opening salvo of the election campaign on Newsnight last night.

    The theme, why those “racist Tories” obviously. How desperate they have become with the thought that a Cameron government might just threaten their funding.

    Shameless

    http://boycottthebbclicencefee.wordpress.com/2009/11/24/shameless/

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  6. Niall Tullow says:

    Eddy,

    Do you really believe that an elected Call Me Dave would threaten the BBC’s funding?

    He is even more of a member of the Notting Hill lovey posse than Blair or Mad Jock McMad could ever hope to be.

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    • Martin says:

      Again (how many times do I have to type this?) Cameron might be wet about the drug addicts at the BBC, but there are PLENTY in the Tory party who will strike once they get power. Expect Lord Tebbit to slaughter the BBC and its funding.

      No more expensive Cocaine for the beeboid tossers.

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      • John Horne Tooke says:

        Sorry Martin – Cameron is the new face of the “conservatives” – the new people who are being selected, those on the A List are less tory than the tory “wets” in Maggies day. There is nothing being kept under wraps they are Blue Labour. Even after the email leaks from CRU Osbourne is still making speeches on cutting CO2 quicker than Labour. The old guard has gone – never to return.

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      • John Horne Tooke says:

        Martin – here is a Tory who does get it. But again he is the minority.

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        • Martin says:

          There are still Tories lurking to kill the BBC. They are simply waiting thier turn.

          Cheers for the link.

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      • Niall Tullow says:

        Sorry Martin but your living in cloud cuckoo land.

        If Call Me Dave wins the next election then all the old ‘nasty’ Tories will be sidelined by The Blairlites and the Cameron babes that surround him on that basis that they have been proved to be right and the ‘dinosaurs’ wrong.

        As such the Noting Hill lovies of the BBC the Conservafakes will all get together and work something out that probably will involve extra funding for the BBC as long as the Conservafakes get an invite to the champagne parties.

        It is only if Call Me Dave loses and Cameron is culled and real Conservatives once again take control of their party that the BBC will suffer in any way.

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  7. Abandon Ship! says:

    World Have Your Say, and its time to start collecting firewood for when the heretics are burned at the stake (carbon footprint permitting):

    “The Copenhagen summit looms, survey after survey says you think global warming is the most important subject so why can’t we have a debate without the climate change deniers getting involved ?”

    http://www.bbc.co.uk/podcasts/series/whys

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  8. thespecialone says:

    BBC earlier allowing the Lib Dim MP Simon Hughes to spout on about climate change.  Basically when the beeboid was interviewing Hughes and asked him what he thought about the public not believing the climate change scam; Hughes said well he cannot understand the public because ‘the science is there, it is proven’.  Beeboid didnt bring up that the hockey stick has been shot to pieces, the emails that the whole blogosphere have read and the geeks are looking at the code and think the ‘scientists’ at CRU of the UEA are stupid.  Hughes, allowed to LIE on BBC NEWS about climate change.

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    • Martin says:

      Climate change means the following to the corrupt drug taking politicians

      1. More legislation and hence more jobs for the boys

      2. More taxes to spend on immigrants to buy more votes

      3. A chance to destroy the capitalist system and simply have a ruling elite made up of all politicians (the EU is already going down this road)

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  9. David Preiser (USA) says:

    Gavin Hewitt is telling a lie right now on his blog and spinning the problem of multiculturalism on its head.

    Europe’s identity crisis

    He discusses a proposal in Germany to get future immigrants (what happened to ‘migrant’, Gavin?) might have to sign and “integration contract”, wherein they agree to attempt to become part of German society, get a job, accept German values of equal rights for women, etc.  Obviously the Germans have the same concerns most people here do.

    In different forms ideas like this are surfacing across Europe. The concern is that significant parts of European cities exist as “parallel societies”. There is not a shared identity and so there is not a common citizenship. Politicians are concerned that if communities do not relate to each other it is easy for rumour and prejudice to flourish.

    Sound pretty reasonable, and reflects the problem so many are complaining about in the UK, no?  But Hewitt won’t have any of that, so he tells the multicultist’s lie instead:

    Initially one of the basic tenets of multiculturalism was that newcomers brought with them their own culture, which was respected. Increasingly, however, the mood is changing – migrants are expected to integrate and embrace a country’s basic values.


    Notice how he spins it in a way that the host country (read: you racist white Brits) seems to no longer be tolerant.  In fact, the only bits of immigrant cultures people don’t want to tolerate are the mistreatment of women, ghettoization enforced from within, and religious groups who preach the killing of citizens of the host countries.

    What Hewitt works to deny is that the immigrants and the supine multiculti politicians are the ones who create these parallel societies which breed resentment on both sides, and not the average citizens of the host countries.

    The Beeboid even manages to work in a blame on the usual white suspects when bringing up an example of intra-community violence:

    In 2001 I covered riots in the northern British town of Oldham. The far right acted as provocateur, but a mainly Muslim enclave called the Glodwick estate battled with the police.

    Five years later I returned. What struck me was how separate the communities had become. As far as I recall, the school in the estate did not have a single non-Muslim pupil.The headteacher told me that she could not talk to some of the mothers because they rarely left their houses. Occasionally the children were put on a bus and taken to another part of town so they could meet children from other cultures

    And what cultural forces have led to this, Gavin?  Hint: it’s not the racism of white Britons.

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  10. Roger C says:

    Isen`t it amazing, the Poll Tracker has made a return appearance now that the Tories are having a bit of poll trouble. It disapeared when Cameron was doing very well after his conference. No bias then at the BBC?

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    • Bob says:

      the poll tracker is always available for you to see, perhaps not on the front page but you can find it

      2% shift = poll trouble?

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  11. david cross says:

    jonathon ross will still recieve his six million pounds per year from the tax payers when the conservatives get in .

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  12. Saint Etienne says:

    BBC news 24 did a piece a few minutes ago re HM’s visit to Bermuda.  Full of the usual patronising ‘oh how quaint, would have been far more out to see her 50 years ago’ claptrap when the reporter, while blundering on with his piece that was almost entirely dedicated to independence, admitted a ‘significant’ number of Bermudans wanted to stay British.

    Interested in what makes Bermuda tick and not knowing too much about it generally (unfortunately) I checked out it’s politics on the web afterwards.  

    The last major poll conducted this Summer found 66% of people in favour of keeping her Maj as head of state.

    Significant indeed BBC.  Pretty much ruined the whole hypothesis of your 5 mins of fame didn’t it Mr Inconsequential Left Wing Aparatchnik?

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  13. George R says:

    BBC Report:

    “School lessons to tackle domestic violence outlined”

    http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/8376943.stm

     The BBC doesn’t mention whether its Labour government will set up (as an extra cost of mass immigration and ‘multiculturalism’), a team of non-Muslim educationalists to go into Muslim schools (and the many schools in Britain where there are Muslim children), to disavow such parts of the Quran as:

    “[Quran 4.34] Men have authority over women because Allah has made the one superior to the others and because they spend their wealth to maintain them. Good women are obedient. They guard their unseen parts because Allah has guarded them. As for those from whom you fear disobedience, admonish them and send them to beds apart and beat them. Then if they obey you take no further action against them. Allah is high, supreme.”

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  14. George R says:

    The BBC, Straw, Megrahi, Libya and Islam.

    In the following pro-Labour, pro-Islam, BBC ‘impartial’ report, the 270 victims of the Lockerbie bombing are not even mentioned!

    Straw denies Megrahi interference”

    http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/8375359.stm

    Alternative, non-BBC report, from September:

    “Jack Straw admits Lockerbie bomber’s release was linked to oil”

    http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/politics/6140801/Jack-Straw-admits-Lockerbie-bombers-release-was-linked-to-oil.html

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  15. George R says:

    Islamic Saudi Arabia:   death sentence for fortune teller.

    BBC’s strongest comment about it: Saudi Arabia “is a deeply conservative Muslim nation.”

    BBC report:

    “Saudi Arabia urged to quash witchcraft death sentence”

    http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/8378483.stm

    (And we can’t expect any public condemnation from Labour’s Jack Straw.)

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  16. Enzo says:

    plenty of bias tonight in andrew marrs liberal love-fest history show, bbc at 9. what really got me was his talk about appeasement in the run up to ww2 – he justified it first of all, and then mocked those who criticised the war mongerers in the government at the time! there were also many subtle digs at wallace simpson for being american – these yanks coming over here, stealing our king etc etc.

    utter filthy nonsense. no wonder the kids these days are all dumb idiots with that rubbish being fed to them.

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  17. David Preiser (USA) says:

    Andrew Neil must feel like a lone voice in the wilderness at the BBC.  He gave that fatuous former Home Secretary a seriously hard time over the Government giving a load of cash to an extremist group.  Absolutely hilarious, and good for him.  Of course, anyone merely reading the “live blog” from Emma Griffiths, they would have absolutely no idea of either the actual subject matter or how J Smith bobbed and weaved and passed the buck, or just what the actual point of the questioning was.  Sanitized to the point of misinformation.

    Other than that, Nick Robinson once again misleads about Mr. Brown’s performance.  When he says he’s as surprised as anyone about that school being brought up, it lowers the bar for Brown.  He knows that, of course, but doesn’t care.  He should have just said that Mr. Brown wasn’t prepped, it threw him off, that’s how it goes, and left it at that.  As always, he can’t help but sympathize with the politician about whom he’s commenting or reporting.

    But when Robinson takes care to point out that Ed Balls clearly knew about the school in question and was trying to help out his boss, Robinson is implying that it’s really a non-issue.  If Robinson knows about it, he should say so.  If not, he’s being misleading.

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  18. George R says:

    BBC ‘Newsnight’: electioneering for Labour.

    Paxman has used  interview tactics which have been blatantly biased attitudes favouring two Labour MPs this week: McShane, the other night, and Balls tonight.

    Paxman was certainly cosying up to Balls on the issue of Labour’s politically soft attitude towards Hizb ut-Tahrir, (HuT) an issue which Cameron had rightly raised in Parliament today.

    What Paxman and Balls know about the threat from HuT, seems to be very little. Even the ‘left of centre’ blog, Harry’s Place, has this:

    is Hizb ut-Tahrir receiving Government funding?”

    http://www.hurryupharry.org/2009/11/25/why-is-hizb-ut-tahrir-receiving-government-funding/

    Cameron rightly intends to ban HuT from activities in Britain (as other countries do).

    BBC ‘Newsnight’ needs to investigate HuT and its threatening global reach, not to give unfair treatment to Tory security concerns on this.

    What Labour (and the BBC) turn a blind eye to: 

    “Music, Chess and Other Sins”

    http://www.meforum.org/2415/music-chess-sins

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  19. deegee says:

    Is placing a monkey’s head on a black woman ‘racist’?  
    Michelle Obama racist image sparks Google apology  
    It’s somewhat confusing because BBC illustrates the article with a picture of Mrs. Obama at her very best. Have your say   
     
    Why is it racist to photoshop an ape (poorly I must say) on a black person but art when a portrait of George W. Bush is created from monkey heads and then projected on a giant billboard in Manhattan?


    The Chimpy-Bush image was a standard of rhetoric against the former President but I don’t recall the BBC protest even when Kevin Anderson captioned a photograph of G.W.B.  
    Angry chimp or a president at the top of his game? Nor did the BBC find Steve Bell’s charicature of Bush as a chimpanzee a problem, describing it as iconic.


    Perhaps we shouldn’t forget that Google didn’t draw the image it merely (as with the BBC) drew people’s attention to it. 

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  20. deegee says:

    BTW In case you didn’t know it’s raining in Mecca.

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  21. Gerald says:

    Not bias, in fact probably exactly the opposite but I do not think that I was dreaming this morning around 8 o’clock when Terry Wogan told a joke about turkeys and the White House, which for those with a humour by-pass, when it comes to non-whites, might have found a little risque.
     
    He will be greatly missed when he leaves his breakfast time show. One of the few on the BBC seemingly prepared to often express the view of the politically incorrect majority on many topical matters in his asides.

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  22. George R says:

    BBC soon demotes the economic significance of DUBAI debt problems and big impact on Britain, Europe and world stock markets and currency values.

    Bloomberg has:

    “European stocks slump most in Seven Months on Dubai concern”

    http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601085&sid=a4YrmkgIGm8k

    2.) Rod Liddle had this a few months ago:

    “Sordid reality behind Dubai’s gilded facade”

    http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/middle_east/article6716543.ece?token=null&offset=0&page=1

    3.) BBC report:

    “Dubai under scrutiny after debt payment delay”

    http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/8380105.stm

    -In its report (above) Bloombergt mentions that Dubai is one of the main owners of the London Stock Exchange (BBC doesn’t):

    Who owns London Stock Exchange?

    Recent figures for the two largest shareholders:

    1. QATAR 26%

    2.) DUBAI 20%.

    Don’t keep all this quiet BBC.

    You have no political motive for keeping it quiet, do you, BBC?

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  23. David Preiser (USA) says:

    Mark Mardell is useless.  His latest blog post is about being overwhelmed by his first experience of the Thanksgiving phenomenon in the US.

    What is he overwhelmed about?  Is it the fact that this is the one actual secular holiday (not created by Hallmark) on which the basically the entire country is united in celebration?  Is Mardell overwhelmed by all the expressions of thankfulness from folks high and low? Does Mardell discuss how Thanksgiving is enjoyed and shared across the spectrum of class and race and religion and all those things the BBC wishes could be transcended?

    Of course not.  This superficial idiot talks about the food.  All he can write about is the deluge of recipes for turkey and fixin’s.  Not even the slightest hint that your BBC North America editor has the remotest clue as to what Thanksgiving is about, or what it really means to us United Statesians.  Mardell realizes that there’s some sort of history behind it, but as far as this postmodern relativist snob is concerned, we’re just blindly going through the motions because it’s an ingrained ritual, without understanding any deeper meaning.

    Yet more evidence that Mark Mardell’s personal biases make him unsuited to his position, and cause him to fail in informing you about the US.

    Happy Thanksgiving to anyone here from the US, and to all Biased BBC inhabitants.

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  24. Gerald says:

    Having praised Yesterday in Parliament yesterday it was normal service resumed today with the principle item being assertions regarding Lord Ashcroft, weakly dealt with by the Speaker. I suspect Nigel Farage could spring a surprise in Mr Speaker’s constituency.

    Over on Have Your Say the question of BBC payments to “talent” is being extended in several messages which could well be thought suitable to “recommend” by visitors to this website.

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  25. John Anderson says:

    David Preiser

    My main impression of Thanksgiving is that families come together to celebrate,  often travelling long distances for a big annual reunion.

    How on earth can Mark Mardell not see that ? 

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  26. George R says:

    When will the Islam-compliant BBC criticise Gordon Brown for his economic plans to Islamise the British economy through the myth of ‘Islamic economics’  and ‘Shariah-compliant finance’?

    “The Vice President and Prime Minister of the UAE and Ruler of Dubai, His Highness Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid al Maktoum has met with British Prime Minister Gordon Brown in the UK.
    According to the national news agency WAM, the two leaders discussed strengthening ties in education, investment and commerce. They also reportedly talked about working together to minimize the effects of the global economic downturn.
    Prime Minister Brown is said to be impressed by the quick recovery the UAE economy has made.””Sheikh Mohammed meets Gordon Brown”http://www.dubaieye1038.com/News/Pages/NewsDetails.aspx?ListID=dc34944f-841d-4741-9d3d-1c8bbd0d06fb&ListItemID=1371 But the BBC’s Stephanie Flanders tells it differently:”Dubai not too big to fail?”http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/thereporters/stephanieflanders/The article is OK as far as it goes, but there is no reference to Labour’s and Brown’s role in contributing to the myth of Islamic finance and making the British economy susceptible to it.

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  27. Enzo says:

    thanksgiving is more useless yankie drivel that our kids get forcedfed over here thanks to the tv. i say we celebrate BRITISH customs and traditions, not any others – islamic, european OR american. let the yanks have their own silly days off, there country is going down the toilet quicker than even we are.

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    • John Horne Tooke says:

      Which British customs are you reffering to? Christmas, Easter, New Year?  If we are being fed “useless yankie drival” then who do you blame the Americans or the fact that no decent British programmes are being produced to cater for 1000s of channels 24 hours a day. Blaming a nation for what programmes come onto our TV is hardly justified.

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      • Enzo says:

        yeh i blame the americans – this yobbo culture on our streets is english kids imitating the american black kids with their guns and their rap music. this lovie dovie touchee feely shite is all american – witness all that nonsense about jade fat cow goody, and well everyone since diana; all american style over the top nonsense that infests the country.

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        • Teddy Bear says:

          Hmmm, so the binge drinking culture that has become the nation’s tradition must be due to the time when American Indians got blasted on firewater.
          What really contributes to the downfall of this country more than anything is people who are too lazy to think things through and take solace in blaming others for their situation.

          The Alcoholics Anonymous Prayer puts it best.
          To have the strength to chose those things we must.
          To have the Serenity to accept theose things we cannot.
          To have the wisdom to know the difference.

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          • Enzo says:

            binge drinking has gone on for hundreds of years – and binge drinkers kill themselves, not others like hoodie scumbags or jihadis.

            to make this country strong again we need to get out of this mindset that ‘america is so great, america is our great ally, america will help us with this this and this’. thatcher bossed reagan. she didnt take no BS from him. she stood firm . we were friends with the yanks on our terms, not theirs. blair and brown failed that. we need out of the EU , and to tell america to play to our tune or get lost. america itself is going nowhere since they started cosying up to other countries too much. and that happened way before obama, hes just taking it to another level.

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            • Teddy Bear says:

              Woops – it should say
              To have the strength to change those things we must.
              To have the Serenity to accept those things we cannot.
              To have the wisdom to know the difference.

              Binge drinkers are often violent and threaten everybody, which make towns not a friendly place to want to stroll through on a pleasant evening – so I wouldn’t be too quick to dismiss it on the effect it has on our ‘culture’, rather than try to blame everybody else for our state. It damages society enormously because of the degenerate beings created by it and the resulting decisions made by them.

              I don’t have a problem with ‘America is great’, because I know that much greatness has come from there. Lots of crap too, but we have a choice to adopt what’s good and renounce the rest. Can’t blame them for our choices. Much like one can enjoy fish and chips as well as curry, sushi, hamburger, – other cultures make us richer, providing one takes what’s good from it.

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  28. George R says:

    “BBC drops plans for shocking ballet about ‘deformed Pope'”

    Instead, the BBC decides to run with a spoof of Islam?

    Only kidding, of course.

    http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1231275/BBC-drops-ballet-broadcast-finding-contains-deformed-Pope-rape-molestation-violence.html

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  29. George R says:

    BBC’s approach to assessing ‘faith schools’: don’t separate out Church of England schools, for example, from Islamic schools –

    “Faith schools ‘strong on community cohesion'”

    http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/education/8381090.stm

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  30. ibjc says:

    Has anyone seen the article from Mann regarding past climate anomalies. He talks about the MWP being a natural event and the planet responding to cool down.
    Am I having delusions here?

    http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/8381317.stm

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  31. Will says:

    Last night’s Newsnight discussed “BBC – the future”. A BBC poll showed the licence fee to be the most popular future (38% opting for it). A discusion followed with the preening Bradshaw & his Tory shadow. It took just a couple of minutes for Bradshaw to persuade Esler to switch te subject  to a knock the Tories session. But before that the Tory had used Strictly & Gavin & Stacey as examples of what justified the licence fee system. There is no hope!

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  32. Teddy Bear says:

    David Mitchell of ‘Peep Show’ told a ‘joke’ about Anne Frank on a Radio 4 programme he was chairing  – ‘Anne Frank’s last diary entry was: “It’s my birthday and dad bought me a drum kit.”’
    I actually think that Mitchell is usually a talented humourist, even if not necessarily reflected in this ‘joke’, and I don’t believe he meant any offense, but in the strange times we live in – and the BBC seemingly sensitive only to the Holocaust deniers combined ‘don’t offend our religion’ crowd, it’s understandable that some people found it offensive. 50 listeners called or wrote in to complain.
    The BBC response was this:
    The BBC received almost 50 complaints about the comment, which Gillian Walnes, executive director of the Anne Frank Trust, called “thoughtless” and “offensive”.
    Today, Ms Raphael said: “We never broadcast anything to deliberately give people offence and while I do understand and appreciate that some people did find this offensive, I stand by the decision to broadcast it.
    “Personally I did find this funny. I don’t think it was trivialising the Holocaust, it wasn’t trivialising the nature of her death or the situation they were in.
    “For me it actually captures some of the extraordinary spirit of that remarkable girl, Anne Frank, and there was a certain note of affection towards her. After all she was young and if she was a teenager now she might have got a drum kit. It was satirising the situation they were in.
    “We are sorry we distressed them but that slot has millions of listeners and a small proportion were disturbed but I genuinely think the majority found it funny.”

    There are also relatively a small number of extremist Muslims living in this country that found the Mohammed cartoons offensive, and considering the millions that would have found them humourous I don’t recall the BBC running them.
    As for the response “For me it actually captures some of the extraordinary spirit of that remarkable girl, Anne Frank, and there was a certain note of affection towards her. After all she was young and if she was a teenager now she might have got a drum kit. It was satirising the situation they were in. is about as inane as you can get.
    What she doesn’t seem to get is that she’s not a teenager now, and never survived her teenage years then, largely because of something that started then that is very similar to what the BBC is contributing to TODAY.
    Radio 4 defends David Mitchell Anne Frank joke

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  33. Ed (ex RSA) says:

    The BBC reports disaprovingly of “chemical castration” of paedophiles and certain rapists in Poland – one can almost hear the enlightened London hacks’ contempt for backward, reactionary Poland.

    Anyone else find the use of the term “chemical castration” oddly overdramatic for this hormonal treatment which is completely reversible?

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  34. Grant says:

    Teddy  19.28

    Exactly.
    It is funny because Anne Frank was a Jew and the BBC is institutionally anti-semitic.
    None of the spineless lefty comedians, who seem to multiply like rabbits on the BBC,  would have the guts to tell a similar joke about a Muslim. 
    Blatant BBC bias.

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    • Teddy Bear says:

      Perhaps if the climate in the world made events that led to the Holocaust impossible it could be seen to be funny. But since the BBC know full well, and are in fact assisting the rise of the next one – it really isn’t funny.

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  35. George R says:

    British Islamic Broadcasting Corporation:


    “The BBC is seeking submissions for its annual Muslim Writers Awards, calling for ‘creative, interesting, and exciting submissions from writers across the country’.

    “All entrants must be Muslim.
    “Do broadcasters in Pakistan – or any other Muslim nation – have a Christian writers award? “

    Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-1231311/Muslim-Council-Britain-leader-life-peerage.html#ixzz0Y9OuvqSL

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    • Scott M says:

      A quick Google shows that Ephraim Hardcastle is, not unusually, completely wrong.

      While the MWAs are listed on the BBC’s Writers Room website along with numerous other third party writing competitions, the MWA website is separate from the BBC.

      That’s what you get for trusting the Daily Mail to be impartial, I suppose… If you’re looking for impartiality, of course, rather than a prop for one’s own prejudice.

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      • George R says:

        So is the ‘impartial ‘ (see climate ) BBC touting for Muslim Writers Awards, or for Christian Writers Awards, or what?

        The ‘Daily Mail’ columnist seems to have hit a BBC nerve.

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        • Scott M says:

          “The ‘Daily Mail’ columnist seems to have hit a BBC nerve.”

          If you really wanted to hit a BBC nerve, wouldn’t you rather it involved not making stuff up? 

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          • George R says:

            Who’s ‘impartial’? Not the BBC. Even though it, and its apologists, simplistically repeat that mantra.

             It gives political preferential treatment to Islam, Labour, EU, Obama, on British licencepayers’ money; and then BBC critics are scolded for pointing this out! The BBC apologists try to dictate that we licencepayers should not interfere with the BBC’s political output !

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      • deegee says:

        It would seem that the BBC publicised but didn’t organise this award.

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        • Teddy Bear says:

          Explain then why the BBC with all of its international staff HASN’T covered this story, but the Mail has:
          A 16 year old Christian girl has received 50 lashes in Sudan for wearing a knee length skirt. The judge ordered her sentence to be carried out immediately without even notifying her parents. Sudan law forbids this kind of punishment to under 18’s and the government states that there should be more leniency to other faiths from other parts of the country than the strict Sharia law around Khartoum, where the girl and her family were visiting.
          The question for us is – why isn’t the BBC reporting it?
          I knew when I saw the article in the Mail that there would be no mention of it on the BBC even before I looked.
          Why do the BBC need reporters all around the globe if they don’t report the pertinent stories that we need to know about and address?

          Fifty lashes for the teenage girl who wore an ‘indecent’ knee length skirt in Sudan

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  36. deegee says:

    Militants, militants, militants. It’s rare for the BBC to use the word Terror (and variations) but in this speculation Russia train crash investigation examines bomb theory  by Richard Galpin it uses the word 4X. A bomb may have been planted by terrorists!

    What a pity we have to read to the very blast sentence to discover who these ‘terrorists’ might be.

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  37. deegee says:

    Militants, militants, militants.To be read with the preceding comment.
    The Israeli military has carried out an air strike on the Gaza Strip, targeting what it said were Palestinian militants preparing to fire rockets into Israel.

    No, they didn’t. The IDF said they were terrorists.

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  38. George R says:

    BBC ‘Newsnight’ has second thoughts about ignoring Hizb ut-Tahrir.

    Last Wednesday, Paxman fronted a pro-Labour version of a ‘discussion’, which derided Tory criticism of Labour’s tolerance of the role of Hizb ut-Tahrir in British society, including schools.

    But last night, ‘Newsnight’, after some investigation, shifted direction somewhat. Even the left of centre ‘Harry’s Place has this:

    “Newsnight: Close links between Hizb ut-Tahrir and ISF School”

    http://www.hurryupharry.org/2009/11/28/newsnight-close-links-between-hizb-ut-tahrir-and-the-isf-school/

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  39. North Northwester says:

    Thanks  to my pal Jade for a timely reminder that Dan Brown isn’t the only utterly inexplicable mystery of publishing. See the BBC web page <a href=”http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/south_asia/8382132.stm”>here.</a>

    Odd; how incurious the BBC is about the motivation behind the remarkable sales of one particular out-of-copyright book.
    We know a song about that, don’t we, children? 

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    • David Preiser (USA) says:

      Good find.  I was amused to see the collection of books that caught our intrepid, unbiased reporter’s eye:  a truther book, a popular ficiton novel by a Communist-sympathising author, and, of course, His Word.  This further begs the question of motivating factors.

      And the Beeboid dutifully notes that the illegal copy of Lonely Planet – owned by the BBC – is of poor quality.  Good boy, you’ve ticked all the right boxes.

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  40. dave s says:

    An interesting item on Newsnight Review Friday.
    Sarah Palin’s book. I know she is a figure of fun and loathed by the liberal left with a passion so I persevered with the talking heads.
    All of them hard line lib/left except for Michael Gove so their views were utterly predictable.
    You could almost sense their warming to Gove as he seemed to be looking for their approval , almost as if he felt that these people are the ones who matter, whose views count and who really are the ones best able to judge a maverick like Sarah.
    It is the condescending reasonableness of the lib/left that is so enervating. To gainsay them is to be by definition an unreasonable man.
    Sad that a man like Gove who has, I hope , different views feels constrained to play along with the nonsense .
    It does not augur well for the Cameron government if it should come to pass.

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  41. deegee says:

    Revision to my post earlier. Apparently my reference was to Revision #4 and the story is now at Revision #9 (Revisionista)

    You will all be pleased to hear that Russia train crash ’caused by bomb’. The bomb apparently manufactured, placed and exploded itself without human agency. The possible links to Chechniya remain the last sentence.

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  42. George R says:

    Multicultural madness continues, courtesy Labour, and BBC:

    Labour: Britain’s not black enough (because we say so) and so continue mass immigration.

    BBC: Radio 4 is too white.

    “BBC to review ‘too white’ Radio 4”

    http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/6678051/BBC-to-review-too-white-Radio-4.html

    (BBC Radio 4 is not too white on my black radio.)

    One issue the BBC’s anti-white ‘multiculturalism’ does not extend to:

    Is the BBC’s ‘Asian Network’ too ‘Asian’?

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  43. ryan says:

    Sunday morning .. Tim Wilcox, 10.18am Sunday

    BBC News 24

    “A Democratic Party report into a US senate committee it highly critical of the failure of the Bush Administration and its military commanders to use all available means to pursue and capture Osama Bin Laden … the report says this had enormous consequences including laying the foundation for the protracted Afghan insurgency”

    Why is a partisan report news? Would you expect the Democrats to be complimentary about the Republicans?

    This is about aportioning “blame” and they are pleased to heap blame for what they believe is an inappropriate war on the former President.

    I guess we should expect this from the BBC.

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  44. deegee says:

    Alan Johnston is back in the Palestine Authority apparently having learnt nothing from his Gaza experience.

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  45. Philip says:

    Weekend stuff from me:

    Swiss vote to ban Minarets – an outbreak of common sense in Eurabia?

    Mein Kampf being sold on the streets in Dhaka – al-BBCeera manage to write a whole article about it, without mentioning the ‘J’ word; claims drivers only read it bcoz dey is bored, innit?

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  46. Simon Fay says:

    Being a fan of some old school popular culture my eye was caught by an item in Radio Times –

    “The image of Victorian music hall has suffered from the cosy nostalgia of the long-running TV series The Good Old Days.”

    That TV show was a bit before my time but I follow your drift so far.

    “Singer and songwriter Billy Bragg investigates Britain’s first pop culture, uncovering the surprisingly modern wit and irreverence behind Britain’s original urban folk music. The programme includes specially recorded performance by Billy in historic Hoxton.”

    So now a more-or-less-extinct form is being gentrified with help from the Beeb, cutting off the proles from another part of their heritage by reconstructing it in an ‘acceptable’ form.

    Makes me think of the flyer I saw for a fishery run by a tosser blogging from a trawler (so he claimed) about “having passion for fish”

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  47. Simon Fay says:

    Whoops, forgot the link

    http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00p3090

    BBC R3 29/11 22.00 GMT

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  48. Heads on poles says:

    Radio 4 news at 6pm.
    David Cameron apologises to the commons for getting some of his facts wrong regarding the accusation of public money being given to some mad group or other.
    The way it was worded was that the whole story was wrong – it wasn’t, simply which department gave the moeny.
    Stinking bias.

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  49. David Preiser (USA) says:

    Can we have a new open thread please?  This one is lost near the bottom of the page.

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