As we all know, the BBC provides us with a rich vein of culture, high class entertainment and topical humour. But more often it provides us with biased dross – detail your thoughts on it here…
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- MarkyMark Nov 22, 12:04
Midweek 20th November 2024
“blazed a trail for Rayner” – to New York with Lord Alli! - Zephir Nov 22, 12:00
Midweek 20th November 2024
[img]https://i.postimg.cc/qMVTNrjc/the-muppets-2.avif[/img] - Flotsam Nov 22, 11:34
Midweek 20th November 2024
Because of climate change hysteria, the BBC and media’s backing of junk science, the rubbishing of people questioning the “science”,… - MarkyMark Nov 22, 11:29
Midweek 20th November 2024
Ed Miliband plays ukulele song about wind turbines https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ctENk0t_DQ8 - vlad Nov 22, 10:57
Midweek 20th November 2024
Elon Musk’s brilliant response to British MPs: “I’ll summon you, actually”. (link below) They are like some impotent old monarch… - Deborah Nov 22, 10:18
Midweek 20th November 2024
If I remember correctly, Prescott junior was the producer/editor (I don’t know the difference) for Look North, the local news… - vlad Nov 22, 10:05
Midweek 20th November 2024
On the BBC News site. “Chris Mason: How Prescott blazed a trail for Rayner”. So we’ve got him to thank… - G Nov 22, 10:01
Midweek 20th November 2024
Somebody got the barricade on the door wrong. It should be on the outside………… - Philip_2 Nov 22, 09:57
Midweek 20th November 2024
Labour government claim to be cleaning up! Sadly they are… pigs in troughs… Revealed: ‘Climate change’ brothers, (more than one… - atlas_shrugged Nov 22, 09:48
Midweek 20th November 2024
Why does Marcus not use the ‘sexual emergency’ defence, because that is what the illegal invaders use when they are…
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Given the unfolding events in Libya and what with scores of BBC personnel hiding in hotels watching what’s really going on courtesy of Sky rolling news and other broadcasters, maybe it’s time for them to earn their keep.
Therefore I suggest that next week’s BBC-QT on thursday comes live from Tripoli.
Chaired by Al-Bowen we could have on the panel Gaddafi himself, Mr. H. Chavez, Mr. G. Galloway, Mrs. G. Logan and in the interests of balance – Daffy Duck (Mr. C. Pattern).
Can’t Wait !
Bonus points if any of them say anything remotely sensible, and even more points if Bowen doesn’t suffer from apoplexy before the show finishes.
john
Given the unfolding events in Libya and what with scores of BBC personnel hiding in hotels watching what’s really going on
********************************************
A few years ago I was in Indonesia at Presidential election time – as there was a fair chance of it all kicking off on the day the world’s media were there in force. My own hotel, barricaded, was at the roundabout which was the ‘Tahrir Square’ and I had a bird’s eye view of the ‘students’ milling about below waiting for the result. I was in no hurry to get anything closer than a bird’s eye vie either.
I was alternating between CNN and BBC 24 for the coverage.
On came Matt Frei with, ‘… and from up here I can see…’.
I thought, ‘B******’s just along the corridor’.
Clearly Matt was quite content with a bird’s eye view as well.
Listen With Bup will be back after half-term.
BBC 5Live 10pm News and a piece about the upcoming Queen’s visit to Ireland. So who do the BBC call upon for their expert commentary? Not the BBC’s royal correspondent but Gerry Adams.
Yes for an opinion on the first royal visit to Ireland for 100 years the BBC choose the man who lead an organisation intrinsically linked in the public’s mind with the terrorist organisation that blew up and killed the Queen’s uncle, Lord Mountbatten, in 1979. Only the BBC, only the bloody BBC would think that was a good idea.
More and my thoughts on what one should or should not say about Gerry Adams – http://notasheepmaybeagoat.blogspot.com/2011/03/only-bbc.html
Yes, BBC go to guy is Provo godfather but please remember that impartiialty is in their genes. Or maybe jeans.
i thought that the BBC couldn’t sink any lower,but I was wrong.The BBC hate the Queen and her country.I wish that someone has the guts in the government and complains,but whats the point it wont be shown on the BBC.
I had thought the BBC depravity could no longer surprise me, but I was wrong – this has shocked me to the core!
Yes, one thing that does ‘jar’ from time to time listening to R5L are the ‘news values’ of their bulletins.
Recently the BBC used the rising cost of oil to pedal their climate change/oil free future crap with the help of Jeremy Leggett http://www.jeremyleggett.net/ and an imaginary time machine on the Jeremy Vine show (02/04/11).
According to Leggett, in the future there are going to be so many forms of renewable energy sources and they are going to be so easy to use (contrary to the claims of the sceptics he says), we can look forward to a wonderful hippy dippy oil free utopia by 2026.
Unfortunately he fails to say what these renewable energy souces are are. Pixie dust or squirrel tears perhaps?
Looks like we will have to wait until 2026 to find out what they are.
This work of fantasy can be found 1hr and 38mins in. It’s very comical… Just thought i’d share :0)
http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/console/b00yrvd9/Jeremy_Vine_Jeremy_discusses_keeping_in_touch_with_your_parents
Aaah no actually the regime scientists have been working on a new type of power generator, it takes all the wishes and dreams of the political classes and turns them into electrical current, so far it has been able to generate 0000000000.00000000.1 volts but hopes are high that by 2100 we will all the power we could ever dream of and it will only cost a few measly trillion pounds to achieve it.
I can generate power!! Just by shuffling across the kitchen rug in my slippers, I can generate sufficient power to give the cat a considerable belt, especially if I touch its ears or nose. Mind you, it’s not particularly comfortable if I inadvertently touch the stove, first. I can even produce sparks in the dark! Eureka! This discovery must have tremendous potential and has to be marketable. Now, where did I put the Huhnatic’s number…
By the by, has anyone noticed that if you “like” posts, then reply to one, all your “likes” disappear, and you have to re-“like” them all?
Yes – oops! My ‘like’ disappeared! 🙂
And it seems that after a while they ‘reappear’!
How the leftwing mantra at the bBC which hates Imperialism (As long as it is Anglo Saxon) bends over backwards in which to excuse it when the guilty are Chinese.
China says it will boost its defence budget in 2011
Anybody read the latest synopsis from the bBCs so called defence experts on the growing might of China. So what does they have to say;
Well for a start while China is spending more on weapons, they aren’t spending as much as the Americans and the weapons they are buying are only for defence as the experts say China isn’t a threat to anybody and the chance of war with anybody is very slim.
They then talk about how some of this spending is to secure the seas which China depends upon in which to import raw materials and export finished goods. One of which is a group of uninhabited Islands called the Spratleys.
And the bBC finishes off its slant eyed view of Imperial China with this snippet:
“”Territorial claims are a secondary concern for China compared to domestic economic growth and stability,” said Mr Innes-Kerr.”
Wasn’t there a British PM who flew across the channel a few years back and received a similar speech from another peaceful country which at the time was also rearming.
And here is what the bBC isn’t telling you:
While the world was watching the Korean war, China invaded Tibet in 1950 and still occupies it.
While the world held its breath during the Cuban missile crisis , China invaded India over disputed territory in the North.
While the world was watching the Iranian revolution in 1979, China invaded Vietnam.
While the bBC bitches about how Pakistan will fight to the bitter end in which to gain Kashmir, what they don’t say, is part of the state which they annexed from India , they gave to China in 1963.
Currently China has a huge Military presence opposite Taiwan (Thousands of missiles, Planes, Soldiers and ships) in which to try and intimidate that it is better to be red than dead.
About those Islands which the bBC doesn’t name, well they are the Spratley Islands and they are situated in between the bottom part of Vietnam, the Philippines , Malaysia and Brunei. (About 200 miles from each) China is over 1000 miles to the North. Here have a look at the map at Chinese claims to the area. Is that Imperialism or what? But the bBC doesn’t mention how far away China is from the area. Now contrast that with how the bBC has no problem mentioning how far the UK is from the Falklands but how close Argentina is.
Back to the bBCs view that China doesn’t represent a threat to anybody. Well, China see’s its biggest threat not as the US. But India. It has managed to ring fence India with client states who it arms , in return for military bases. So Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh all use Chinese weapons, all have Chinese bases on their soil. In order to distract India just a little bit further, It arms Pakistan on the cheap. (Otherwise how could they afford the 4000 plus tanks, (and growing) 2000 Planes and those nukes) while the bBC this week has really pushed the boat out in explaining just why the Uk should continue to send Aid money to Islamabad. (Just for the info we have retired all our CVT fleet, mothballed a large number of our APCs got rid of the 432s, halved our tank fleet to under 200 and our combat aircraft numbers have been whittled down to under 200)
So concerned have the neighbours become over the Chinese, that they in turn have rearmed. (Yup a mini arms race) Malaysia, Thailand, Vietnam ,Indonesia and Australia are all rearming. (Problem is nobody can really afford to do so.) The most popular aircraft is the Russian Su 30 with 3 of the above (China makes 4, in ) flying them.
I do so enjoy reading how liberals see America and not China as a threat. Yup the country which the other month said it would have no problem launching a pre-emptive nuclear attack on another nuclear armed state. Which bullies its smaller neighbours , which occupies another country, which runs over its protesters with tanks, which chops up prisoners for spare parts, which turns a blind eye to despots (Sudan/Iran/Iraq/Burma/North Korea) and is currently running riot in exploiting Africa is somebody we can all trust over its increasing military budget. Shame they never look at the British military in the same way.
It’s almost as though the BBC want Red China to take over the world. Did you hear the joy in their voices when they reported that China had overtaken capitalist Japan and would soon overtake the hated USA in economic size?
Yes, that was so obvious
‘Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.’ said George Santayana. What about those who deliberately ignore the past?
I have to confess that I have a mild addiction to the paper reviews, and tend to tune in to these on morning ‘news’ shows, inbetween the rest of the agenda, pap and ratings fodder masquerading as professional ‘reporting’.
In mitigation, I have realised that one thing that lures me to these slots is the certain knowledge of where the ‘guest’ is coming from, and on SKY it is a planet far, far away, with a Mehdi Hassan (suit & sneer) or Jon Gaunt (slump & grump). Pure extremes to fire up the emails.
The BBC does it too, with a slightly different cycle, being more a Kevin Maguire/Michael White combo. And only reads out one set of emails.
And the teleprompter readers seem more empathetic to their opinions too.
Whenever I switch on the BBC’s Breakfast paper reviews it seems to be Kevin Maguire, or Olly Mann, or Simon Fanshawe. Quite a small pool of “talent”.
Caught Mr Bowen confabbing with Mr Humphrys on the TODAY programme about Lybia this morning.
Mr Bowen seems remarkably nonchalant about the prospects of Gaddafi reasserting his power compared to his comments about events in Egypt and Mubarak’s ‘regime thugs’. Strange when you look at how bloody Gaddafi’s attempts to cling on to power have been compared to the relative bloodlessness of what took place in Egypt.
Could Mr Bowen’s nonchalence, nay, one could even say guarded admiration for Gaddafi’s resilience, compared to his anti-Mubarak attitude, have anything to do with the fact Mubarak was a friend of Israel and Gaddafi is an enemy?
Do you remember Jeremy Bowen’s reverential interview with that other enemy of Israel, Bashar Assad of Syria, last year? There’s still an excerpt from it on the BBC News website:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/10337261
And talking of Syria, there’s an article by BBC reporter Lina Sinjab on the website called Syria: Why is there no Egypt-style revolution?. She writes, “So far, there have been few calls for President Bashar al-Assad to step down. Although Syria faces similar problems as Egypt and Tunisia, the young president enjoys popularity here.” Is young Assad (aged 45) really popular? Have his “reforms” really “satisfied many”? How does she know, when Syria is such a fierce police state?
he must be popular after all he has not signed a peace traety with israel.
When Bowen speaks to the likes of Assad and Gaddafi it is ‘anti-Semite shall speak unto anti-Semite’.
Unless things have changed since I last checked, Syria does not allow permanent foreign correspondents. When the regime feels it wants to use the foreign media for some kind of message (In this case,’move along, nothing to see in Syria’) it allows a small number to enter, controls who and what they see, who they can talk to and that always with a minder – and then escorts them out.
Lina Sinjab simply does not know. The BBC, rather than lose the privilege of being manipulated by the Syrian regime plays along and self censors.
This is why Government needs to introduce legislation to govern the way our media reports in such dictatorships. The BBC and others are quite simply collaborating with despotic regimes.
If a free market needs regulation to act in the public interest, so does a free media.
Anyone else listening to Today. Astonishing blatant hatchet job of potential Republican candidates for US presidential election – a diatribe of negative muck racking. Coda refered to “dignified” Obama.
Now they are twisting LSE / Lybia story to attack all corproate sponsorship.
Socialism in action Today.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/dailypolitics/andrewneil/2011/03/a_new_newspaper_price_war.html
I day. 17 comments.
Closed.
As one poster who scraped in during the window says: unique.
Richard Black’s latest report (EU backs away from 30% emissions target, leak shows) is as one-sided as ever.
The side that wants higher target gets the lion’s share of the quotes, namely “Baroness (Bryony) Worthington, director of the campaign organisation Sandbag” (Labour), and a “group of bosses from leading energy companies” who “urged the commission to go for at least 25%.”
Black argues their case too, contending that research shows higher targets will be more “cost effective”.
The other side gets one paragraph, consisting of 18 words: “But energy commissioner Gunther Oettinger recently declared that going above 20% would lead to the “de-industrialisation” of Europe.” (Shouldn’t that point have been explored over a few paragraphs?)
Including even that much for the anti-side means that they can tick the box marked ‘gave space to both sides of the argument’
News at 10’s coverage of the Barnsley bi-election was as to be expected:
A piece about the new Labour MP’s past and what a great assett he’ll be to the Party, followed by a quick rant by Red Ed.
Channelling Martin (where is he ??) I’m guessing that a “bi-election” would be a Beeboid’s wet dream come true.
😉
Don’t you mean “bi-erection”?
Just read Cameron’s speech to the Community Security Trust:
http://www.thejc.com/news/uk-news/46044/david-camerons-speech-cst
He has quite a lot to say about anti semitism, placing the blame squarely on Islamic extremism, but not Islam. He goes on to say: “And we’ve even passively tolerated these segregated communities behaving in ways that run completely counter to our values. So when a white person holds objectionable views – racist views for instance, we condemn them. But when equally unacceptable views or practices come from someone who isn’t white, we’ve been too cautious – frankly even fearful – to stand up to them.”
Nothing about this on the BBC of course, but nothing about it on the Conservative Party website either, in spite of the comment “we’ve been too cautious”.
Cameron and the BBC are made for each other.
Must have seemed to be a risk worth taking, inviting no friend of the left, economist Tim Congdon, on to the Today programme with the brief to rubbish the thoughts of that known Osborne toady Mervyn King. But when Congdon starts to lump Brown & King together in our downfall it’s “thank you” Mr C & time to hurry on to the performing dogs report
The interview on the Today website cuts off before Naughtie’s ‘thankyou’ but you can hear it on the i-Player (at 1.49.35). The surprise and disappointment in Naughtie’s tone of voice is well worth re-hearing.
‘It’s very important that this debate is much more balanced than it has been so far.’
News just in for you Tim, mate, the BBCC doesn’t do ‘balance’.
Questions are currently being asked about why a British designer is anti-Semitic and how did he become so polarised. Well with News articles like this from the bBc it isn’t hard in which to find fault with the Jews:
Row over Israel gas reserve tax
The above link takes you to a video link where Iranian ‘Mohammad Manzarpour’ who used to be a Human Resources manager in Tehran opines over how Israel has changed its tax system towards oil companies from one of tax breaks to one of paying Tax (to around 50%) on their profits. Yet while the title states American companies they interview..Jewish companies. (That’s because only 1 American Oil company (Noble) is involved in the drilling of Oil.)
Now I’m all for diversity but come on bBC get somebody whom I can bloody understand. Call me ugly, call me a bigot but the fact remains I want to hear somebody speaking English which I can understand. Instead you allow somebody who sounds like a window licker to air a very biased report about how bad Israel is for upping its tax on Oil companies which isn’t how the same tax rate taken against US Oil companies elsewhere are reported:
Venezuela
Bolivia
UK
Funny how the champions of liberty in those countries can do likewise and the bBC doesn’t bat an eyelid.
Then there’s the clip in the end where the allegation is made that actually the new gas fields found off Israel actually belong to Lebanon and that Israel (backed up by showing a picture of an Israeli gunboat) is prepared to back up its theft of oil by force. Where actually the Oil fields if looked at on a map are well away from Lebanon, Egypt and Turkey who have all stated it belongs to them. But ref that Israel claim about going to war in which to protect its claim what the bbC doesn’t state is it was made in reply to this statement from Hezb-allah:
Hezbollah’s Executive Council head Hashem Safieddine said the militant Islamist group would not allow Israel to pillage what it considers Lebanese natural gas, Haaretz reported. “Lebanon’s need for the resistance has doubled today in light of Israeli threats to steal Lebanon’s oil wealth,”
And here another snippet Mohammed of the bBC doesn’t want you to know:
“Maps from Noble Energy show Leviathan within Israel’s waters. An official with Norway’s Petroleum Geo-Services, which is surveying gas fields in Lebanese waters, told The Associated Press that from Noble’s reports there is no reason to think Leviathan extends into Lebanon”
Yet again another non story from the bBC in which to slate how Israel is taxing Oil firms, on that note when was the last time you saw the bBC champion BP, Shell or even Exxon? But when they are sparing against Israel they can only be victims.
And we all wonder why the British are becoming polarised against Jews. Years of character assassination from the bBC has ensured that Jews can only be evil while in the mirror universe they inhabit Islam is promoted as a religion of peace.
Powerful post Pounce.
Just to add a couple of things about Mohammad Manzarpour of the BBC Persian service. His Facebook account shows that he “likes” Che Guevara. More significantly, he also added his name to an anti-war petition, along with Galloway, Benn, Pinter et al, protesting about possible US/UK action against Iran.
(On the company he worked for as a Human Resources manager, Atieh Bahar Consulting, this article from the Progressive American-Iranian Committee alleges very close links to the Iranian regime).
Quite a powerful post of your own Craig.
In fact between what Pounce and you have posted I think it might make a very good main post??
Would certainly be very convenient for me to forward the collated info to various Zionist organisations and MPs.
🙂
Yes, it’s up there now Hippiepooter. Pounce’s comment deserves the widest currency.
Will the BBC be warning against an anti-Jewish backlash?
Superb post, Pounce. In a normal situation of competing claims the matter would be negotiated. Lebanon which through a combination of domestic fear and ideology refuses to engage in negotiation.
Radio 4 news @ 14:00, just heard the reader give the surname of Nigel Farage a French inflection. One would never accuse beeboids of maturity.
“BBC spent thousands on ‘leaving party’ for top executive moving next door”
-i.e. Ms JANA BENNETT, Ex-‘BBC Vision’ director on £415,000.
This is how BBC-NUJ doesn’t cut, cut, cut own extravagances.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/tvandradio/bbc/8355233/BBC-spent-thousands-on-leaving-party-for-top-executive-moving-next-door.html#
I’m going to write to the BBC suggesting that they cover the TV liscence fee on an episode of ‘Rip Off Britain’.
A little something I am amazed is not front page news. Here is the link to a scan of the Torygraph:
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2011/03/04/the-empire-strikes-out/
Here is the BBC’s coverage of it (audio):
http://news.bbc.co.uk/today/hi/today/newsid_9410000/9410485.stm
A quick googling reveals that this is not the first time Steve Holliday has raised this issue:
http://business.timesonline.co.uk/tol/business/industry_sectors/utilities/article5380590.ece
I have been aware of this issue, mostly due to Dr North’s blog, EUReferendum. Does anyone think this story won’t sell newspapers?
I also note that there is no mention of the EU’s large combustion plants directive.
Dateline London with Gavin Esler today continued its usual practice of stacking the panel with voices from the Left. The BBC website’s left-wing American writer-in-residence Michael Goldfarb was back again, along with a couple of Arab journalists (Mustapha Karkouti and Abdallah Hamoudi) and excitable water melon Johann Hari of the Independent. (No Atwan this week, praise be!)
The run of journos from the British press so far this year is following the usual Dateline pattern – a clutch of left-wingers followed by Janet Daley, then another clutch of left-wingers followed by another from the Right. Here (with colour co-ordination) is the updated list:
5/3 Johann Hari (Independent)
26/2 Isobel Hilton (Guardian/Independent)
19/2 David Aaronovitch (Times)
12/2 Yasmin Alibhai Brown (Independent)
5/2 Janet Daley (Sunday Telegraph)
29/1 Polly Toynbee (Guardian)
22/1 Ned Temko (Observer)
15/1 Adam Raphael (freelance)
8/1 Ann Leslie (Daily Mail)
1/1 Polly Toynbee (Guardian)
25/12 Tim Montgomerie (ConservativeHome)
18/12 Steve Richards (Independent)
11/12 Polly Toynbee (Guardian)
4/12 Simon Jenkins (Guardian)
27/11Will Hutton (Observer/Work Foundation)
20/11 Polly Toynbee (Guardian)
13/11 Janet Daley (Sunday Telegraph)
6/11 None
30/10 Yasmin Alibhai Brown (Independent)
23/10 Michael White (Guardian)
16/10 David Aaronovitch (Times)
Given that Dateline usually touches on UK politics as well as international affairs, that deeply skewed guest list is surely proof of bias on the programme’s part. As is the dominance of writers from those low-circulation left-wing newspapers, the Guardian/Observer and the Independent.
Today’s discussion ended with Murdoch and BSkyB. The range of views we heard?
Johann Hari: “Basically the more of Murdoch media, you know, you consume, the less accurate your worldview is…The more of our media we give to Rupert Murdoch the more systematically misinformed we are.”
Michael Goldfarb: “Now there’s the bad Rupert – that’s the one who licenses Fox News to effectively propogandise for fascistic ignorance. I can’t be calmer than that because it’s a neo-fascist worldview they put out.”
The other point of view? Unheard.
Johann Hari: “Basically the more of Murdoch media, you know, you consume, the less accurate your worldview is.
*********************************
A yes, the same Johann Hari who did a right-on-squared cry piece in his own rag about the poor Somali fishermen who were forced to resort to thuggery, piracy, and murder.
‘The more of our media we give..’
Beyond the delusional, tunnel-vision idiocy of the daft claim on worldview accuracy from any other source than the one Mr. Hari mandates, i was unaware that ‘we’ were giving anything to Mr. Murdoch. He may well be buying stuff; stuff that is not ‘ours’ and it is for ‘us’ to purchase off him if we are so minded.
On the other hand… as far as I can gather, with the BBC ‘we’ are forced to ‘give’ to a bunch of social engineers whose views a few folk, such as Mr. Hari, happen to share. Which, using Craig’s useful colour scheme of ‘balance’ on guest invites, not not seems to mean a lot of red corners enjoy top table priority to spout, but when adding up ABC ratings, a rather skewed ‘representation’ of UK public readership preferences.
A disconnect I’d be interested to have explained by any of the currently rather mute vulture groupies or, indeed, the ‘talented’ (if this piece of brown-nosing is to be believed: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/columnists/matthew-norman/8362725/Jeremy-Hunt-off-to-a-flier-but-can-he-go-the-distance.html ) Mr. NaughtieMarr.
‘..not only..’ :-[
Michael Goldfarb: “Now there’s the bad Rupert – that’s the one who licenses Fox News to effectively propogandise for fascistic ignorance. I can’t be calmer than that because it’s a neo-fascist worldview they put out.”
wasn’t he just describing the intolerant “liberalism” of the lefties?
BTW How did you put colour into your posts?
The only way I know how to do it is by typing it first onto a Google Blogger ‘New Post’ page and then copying and pasting it into the comments box here. Anyone with a Google blog profile can do it, but it means setting one up (a dummy blog) if you haven’t got one.
EGYPT.
Just as BBC misses out Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, so too it misses out continuing Islamic persecution of Christians:
Egypt: 4000 Muslims chanting “Allahu akbar” torch church, attack Christian homes
Another one for Dez.
So, the acquittal of all but one of the terrorists involved in the New Year’s Day massacre in Alexandria, attacks by the Egyptian army on two separate Coptic monasteries, some soldiers chanting “Allahu akbar” as they opened fire, a Coptic priest stabbed by a mob “chanting Islamic slogans”, now this (also reported by France 24) – all since the all-singing, all-dancing revolution. Yet in Beebworld Egypt seems to consists only of happy-clappy, I-want-to-teach-the-world-to-sing Muslims and their Christian friends.
A rounded picture please BBC, not just fingers-crossed wishful thinking and censorship.
Dezdimoana will just do the BBC ‘ray of light ‘shuffle as we all know that’s when they put on their ‘we are the world ‘ ‘things are getting better /glass is half full’ liberal basket case head and proceed to tell you that you are being silly and need to calm down as you are scaring the horses and the self exploders feelings may get hurt !.
But remember this BBC mind cleaner cannot be used in conjunction with the words ‘Tory’ ‘Murdoch’ Israel’ ‘Thatcher’ or any content using ‘Islam’ and ‘bad’ , as this will cause a glitch in Dezzie and he/she will will jam in a Tourette’s/Boyle left turning spiral and need to be purged with a Grundion enema !
P.s I have notice that dezzis appearances on here coincided with the surfacing of zebedead or what ever on Bishop hill the Mail and Telegraph comments sections and starts screaming greening ?? hmmmmm
Don’t talk to me about the Zedsdeadbed cretin (otherwise known as “Deadhead”) She, he, it crops up regularly on Bishophill, where they are sick of her, him or it. Likewise on the Daily Mail, she/he/it generally succeeds in upsetting all and sundry, making him/her/itself thoroughly unpopular, and reporting (and having removed) the comments of other posters who don’t agree with her/him/it.
A complete prat.
i know what you mean natsman mind it’s posts are a work of pure joy if you want to show yer mates what a real tosser writes like!
I had to switch off Radio 4 in disgust as this afternoon’s play was about Vanunu. I consider him to be a traitor to his country, which was and still is facing a real existential threat, and I think he deserves the punishment he got. Why this obsession with Israel?
Off- topic, I recently heard that a large percentage of London’s water is kept flowing with the aid of – wait for it- Israeli software. This must cause a problem for the boycott brigade. see:
. http://www.mfa.gov.il/MFA/InnovativeIsrael/TaKaDu_software_keeps_water_flowing-March_2011.htm
I gave that play about 10 minutes today.
10 wasted minutes. The idea of mentioning that Vananu was a traitor is not the sort of context that the writers would offer – nor the BBC drama people who want “edgy left-wing” drivel paid for by an audience that is decidedly not skewed to the left.
The BBC’s obsession with the nasty Government cuts doesn’t seem to resonate with themselves one iota if this lunch-time was anything to go by.
At 12.15 on BBC 1 it is Football Focus (and yes I do have an excuse, my son popped around to fix my Compator and made me put it on) but guess what ?
The third-rate presenter Dan Dare, or what-ever his name is, went to – and get this – New York to have a five minute chat with Eric Cantona.
Fascinating though this was and enjoyable no doubt for all the BBC flunkies in attendance, the interview was nothing special.
Indeed a comprehensive feature with Cantona now in charge at the New York Cosmos was conducted by the New York Times over two weeks ago on their Soccer Blog.
So,
Cuts, cuts, cuts and cuts are a very bad thing, yet the BBC are good, very good, and therefore austerity measures don’t apply to them.
I mean, who knows who the BBC’s Football Focus might want to interview next, let alone where and at what cost ?
The Andrew Marr show disappears further up its own fundament each week.
What’s up with the producer’s iPhones? Did they only spring for 2k memories on ‘guest’ invitees to hold six addresses tops?
It’s either Emma T or barking Scots luvvie on wimmin’s issues (pref. from a carbon exempt location, paving they way for a bit of nepotistic launching of a career in ‘human rights activism’ (UK Notting Hill branch) and on to ‘politics’. No doubt taking a Miliband (see next) career path. I do note that the 45yo Mr. D has thought, after screwing up the country with his PPE social engineering, thinks now is the time to crawl up out of the bubble and see what the real world is like) or a Miliband on politics.
Or a government pol where ‘Um, ah’ Marr invests his £600k trying 1/10 of a Paxman, asking the same cretinous question over and over, before giving up as he has been told it would not be appropriate to put folk in danger by doing so.
And speaking of money, ‘Um, ah’ and the BBC continue to show their grasp of fiscal reality outside the public sector bubble.
Money, it seems, ‘gets found’. That’s it.
No suggestion as to where, with a finite limited amount in the kityy, from.
And such a question not asked of a key player in the previous clown show who blew it all on everything from aid to Gaddafi to indulging enforced market rate talent pay packets that those who are reguired to fund it can’t know about.
I’ll tell you where some of such money can come from Marrshmallow, and £600kpa can be much better invested than on you and your sorry show, which will not be missed outside the boudoirs of Islington, the Merc dealerships of Liberia or comfy Presidential sofas of Tripoli, currently hosting the lard butt of ‘I don’t know, I just ‘work’ here’ Bowen.
“‘I don’t know, I just ‘ work’ here’ Bowen”. Lol.
That perfectly sums up his answers to Andrew Marr’s questions. What do you know about the rumours about members of the SAS being captured in Benghazi Jeremy? Dunno Andrew, I’m not there.
Then on being asked whether all the early reporting from Libya (by “people”, not naming names or news organisations such as the BBC) was wrong to have told us that Gaddafi had very few supporters and that nearly all of the country was against him, Bowen’s replied, “Well, I wasn’t here at the beginning. I’ve been in Tripoli since Friday of last week, so just over a week.”
Bowen avoided answering Marr’s question, preferring not to say – despite all his expertise as BBC Middle East editor! – what sort of level of support he reckons Gaddafi has overall. Charles Glass earlier (during the paper review with fellow left-wing, anti-Israel campaigner Annie Lennox) had said outright that he thought Gaddafi was overwhelmingly hated by the Libyan people. Bowen clearly preferred not to stake his reputation, or earn his large salary. by giving us an informed guess – possibly because he hasn’t got a clue, having just rode in on a camel after years spent in and around Israel.
Given all the major news stories the Marr Show could have covered, to have invited one guest – Annie Lennox – to do the paper review just because she’s guest-edited the Observer magazine in honour of the 100th anniverary of the International Womens’ Day, and then to have set up an interview with another – Emma Thompson (and her adopted Rwandan son, who sounds as if he’ll a Labour Party candidate in London in some five years time!) – to talk about women and Africa, also in honour of International Womens’ Day, shows the BBC’s skewed priorities in action.
“Or a government pol where ‘Um, ah’ Marr invests his £600k trying 1/10 of a Paxman, asking the same cretinous question over and over, before giving up as he has been told it would not be appropriate to put folk in danger by doing so.”
Here’s that exchange:
ANDREW MARR: Can I ask first of all about these reports that an SAS group has been apprehended in Benghazi, trying to protect a British diplomat, and are now under guard there?
LIAM FOX: Well I can confirm that a small British diplomatic team is in Benghazi. We are in touch with them but it would be inappropriate for me to comment further on that for reasons I’m quite sure you understand.
Er, apparently not.
ANDREW MARR: Can I just ask, however, whether they are considered to be in danger and whether they have actually been arrested?
LIAM FOX: Well as I say we are in touch with them but I’m not going to make any further comment on that,
ANDREW MARR: Right. I’ll try one other go at this..,
I’m not an experienced BBC interviewer/reporter, but isn’t it standard policy for government officials not to talk in detail about sensitive ongoing situations like this? If so, why was Marr pressing Doc Fox?
Whoops, it didn’t stop there. There was even more from Marr soon after:
ANDREW MARR: Without pressing you on who the people are and their status or anything like that (which he had already done), it’s fair to say these people were part of that process?
LIAM FOX: Well, as I say we have a small diplomat team in Benghazi. I repeat that we are in touch with them but that is as far as I’m willing to go.
I agree. The Andrew Marr show surpassed itself with vacuousness. Jeremy Bowen’s report brought us precisely nil, Annie Lennox and Emma Thompson contributed incoherent babbling and extreme gurning, and the Manic Street Preachers offered the musicality and sincerity of David Brent. David Miliband might have had something to say, but he wasn’t saying any of it.
I am quite interested in how people on the telly manage their lips when they’ve finished saying something. They often bring them together sharply and suck them in. Andrew Marr stretches his out horizontally, as if they weren’t wide enough already. David Miliband now has an unattractive habit of tensing his priggishly at the end of each bout of verbiage. Maybe he’s been working on that whilst away from the public eye hoping that one day it will blossom into a full-on Gordon style facial spasm.
Because Marr is an abject piece of garbage. It’s far more important to him to get a Tory Govt Minister to make a howler than the lives of British Subjects abroad. Utter garbage.
And possibly Craig because Bowen doesn’t want to undermine Gaddafi. Maybe there is a genuine prospect that the Lybian opposition could create a genuine democracy that wouldn’t be hostile to Israel after all?
Is this a sarcastic comment? How do you know the intention of the rebels? Because Cameron, Obama & the media think they are all potential liberal democrats?
Any replacement Libyan government will be as much or even more hostile to Israel as Gaddafi’s Libya.
Always time for a Gaytacular carnival at the Beeb. Apparently ’15 floats were dedidcated to opposition to Australia’s laws on same sex marriage’.
Mr. BDSM chain-mail mask looks a treat. try explaining that one to the kids (come to think of it they’ll probably be able to explain it to you).
News of earth shattering importance.
Or go to the blog and read about something that really is important.
Philip, your post is an essential read.
That the BBC (among far too many others) thinks its ‘job done’ just to pass on such lies without challenging (or even examining) them says a lot about its journalism these days. Our islamist enemies must rub their hands with glee whenever they spot such lies being passed on in that way. Thank goodness for the blogosphere.
Stephen Davies has barely been off the BBC since he came out. It’s an interesting story true but not the most important sports story surely. So I was interested to hear the cyclist Graeme Obree being interviewed this afternoon and what was the key point to make? Yes he is gay as well. Oh and who was being ‘profiled’ this morning on 5Live? Michael Cashman – gay and a Labour activist. It’s relentless on the BBC, isn’t it?
“BBC WASTES £23,000 ON US JUNKET”
http://www.express.co.uk/posts/view/232849/BBC-wastes-23-000-on-US-junket
What’s on your mind…
Ooook, it eat that attempt. Try #2 (note to self, copy before hitting post):
afneil Andrew Neil
Civil war rages in #Libya but Sunday Times devotes half page 1 and all of pages 2&3 to Kate Middleton wedding dress. Hello!!??
One can share Mr. Neil’s outrage at the trivial, distracting unprofessional tripe that is the mainstay of the UK media we are subjected to, but there is a difference between ratings-obsessed whoring, and agenda-driven lies and edits-by-omission.
The BBC, of course, is unique in managing both on an hourly basis.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1363475/BBC2-plans-axe-daytime-shows-replace-news.html?ITO=1490
‘triffic.
We pay more.
They do less.
The only thing that improves is the bonusses and pensions.
And all there is to show for it is more, er, ‘news’.
Oh ooh !
Now that is really going to piss off the BBC-2’s largest demographic isn’t it ?
Excellent news !
“Bosses at the BBC have blamed the coalition Government for the cuts after it was decided the licence fee would be frozen until 2017.”
Well, there’s a surprise!
One presumes Mr. Hammond & Mr. Darling are aware of this, being the kind of able pol who source their info from but one source:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-coventry-warwickshire-12658942
Best blame the Yanks…
http://www.engadget.com/2011/03/06/electric-car-sales-watch-281-volts-and-67-leafs-sold-in-us-duri/
Kudos to Mr. Neil, a rare BBC employee who, even if snookered at the time, at least knows when weasel words need checking and addressing…
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/dailypolitics/andrewneil/2011/03/when_is_a_turbine_subsidy_not.html
Not sure how long this thread will be allowed to last mind. I am fearful of even double digits considering the topic.
Once the sanitisers from senior management get back from their Dorset second homes or weekend skiing, pretty sure the shutters will come down.
What really pisses me off is that this is $39 million of taxpayer money down the toilet (NB: pdf file), thanks to The Obamessiah throwing huge amounts of money at environmental-approved industry. What a complete waste. No mention of that from the BBC, of course.
Navistar decided to abandon the electric vehicle scam for the time being in favor of a more efficient, alternative-fuel combustion engine for their vehicles. If nothing else, the current economic depression is weeding out the crap in a hurry. I hope the company didn’t simply pocket my money and ran a two-year Potemkin program to hide the fact. In any case, no mention of that waste of a load of taxpayer cash from the BBC, either. Of course, as this is yet another incident of the Obamessiah failing to create the promised jobs with all that green energy nonsense, the BBC will censor anything even remotely dangerous to the Narrative.
I bet Navistar told Lord Borwick something like, “Sorry, man, but the everybody’s hurtin’ over here and nobody’s buyin’. We just can’t give you the orders right now.” And the BBC swallowed it whole.
Broadcasting House, Radio 4’s Sunday morning alternative to the Andrew Marr Show, has a history of banker-bashing (and Labour apologism).
This morning’s show sounded from its introduction as if it was going to break with this tradition and offer a pro-banker perspective as well as an anti-banker perspective. (The issue was Bankers v. Regulators.) It didn’t work out that way though.
First we had former FSA regulator David Jackman, who left his job at a bank for ethical reasons and believes that top bankers earn too much. Presenter Paddy O’Connell (who makes regular anti-capitalist cracks) went far beyond the tenor of Mr Jackman’s remarks to ask, “And when you got out did you feel you were a natural born regulator, a sort of Eliot Ness style person who could put aside this grubby profit-making and get on with sorting out right from wrong?”
Typical of Paddy to describe a branch of private enterprise as “grubby profit-making”.
This was a friendly interview however, as Mr Jackman was on Paddy’s wavelength. Paddy pushed a line about bankers being “carnivorous” in contrast to “more thoughtful” regulators. To regular Broadcasting House listeners, it will come as no surprise that Paddy didn’t ask the bank critic so much as a single question from a pro-banker perspective.
(Googling Mr Jackson shows that he’s now the director of The Ethical Space and an expert for the Commission for Sustainable London 2012.)
OK, so we got the critic of the bankers first. So next up was someone who used to be a regulator but who now advises hedge fund managers to put the pro-banker case. However, alarm bells rang with me as soon as Paddy said that this man was going to be anonymous, “We’re not using his name this morning”. As soon as I heard that I guessed that we were not going to get what impartiality demanded – an equally-weighted voice from the other side of the argument.
A sample of the interview will show the bias:
ANON: I was poached. I was working at the regulator and one of the firms that I used to go and see and supervise liked what they saw and decided they wanted to poach me.
PADDY: I mean that is..really..er..er..a complete joke, isn’t it? In the sense that if you’re effective they bought you!
ANON: Er, yeah. You could describe it like that. Yes.
PADDY: I mean where does this leave the sort-of job of the regulator if every time the firms find they’ve got a good one on their tail or just overseeing them they can come to them and make an offer they can’t refuse? (nice Mafia reference there!)
ANON: Well clearly it’s difficult for the regulators because they’re left with probably not the ideal people.
Some defence of bankers! The man did try a bit later, but he was not very convincing. (Hope he wasn’t a BBC fake!!)
Again, not one of Paddy’s questions came from a pro-banker stance. Instead we got loaded, left-wing questions like this: “I mean if you have to remember when you felt most principle was it when you were fighting for a fair playing field for all investors and companies as a regulator or was it when you were fighting to maximise profits for hedge funds, as you effectively do now?”
If anything’s “a complete joke”, it’s Paddy O’Connell’s not-even-half-hearted pretence of impartiality.
Mark Steyn criticises Obama for suggesting that the murder of the US airmen in Germany was some kind of stray and inexplicable accident. Which is exactly how the BBC treated it.
http://www.investors.com/NewsAndAnalysis/Article/564996/201103041845/Why-Are-We-Still-In-Germany-.htm
Last week Marcus “I rarely fly for environmental reasons” Brigstocke went to Cornwall to do some filming at the Eden Project. On this occasion at least he didn’t fly, choosing instead to take the train. During the journey he tweeted his glee over rising oil prices, the immediate effects of which are of little concern to members of the smug eco-activist arsitocracy as they travel in first class comfort (as he couldn’t resist telling the Guardian’s Leo Hickman) . I don’t know who he was making his film for, but I hope BBC licence payers (or the Eden Trust charity) are not picking up the bill for that first class ticket:
“arsitocracy” – slip of the keyboard, but I like it.
‘At speed form a first class window. Bliss’
Speed. And 1st class.
Spoken like a true Guardian environmentalist.
I amazed they were not moaning at having to stay in the UK instead of a slow food cruise to Polly’s Tuscan villa or for a quick evening doubles match chez Kirsty.
And what does he think powers his diesel engined train as it leaves the electric wires somewhere near West London to travel all those miles west? pixie dust? magic air? Hypocritical green lefty cretin. I presume he wants all railways electrified and a dozen nuclear power stations built to feed them when the oil runs out.
I see he spells Brunel incorrectly and is typically disparaging about him.
Brunel would have regarded him as beneath contempt.
Brigstock displays the typical reaction of the uncreative parasitical class for those men would actually know how to build a culture and contribute to the arts of civilisation.
Our predicament is that the Brigstocks and Hunhes are now in charge and wish to force us to embrace their retreat to an age where we suffer and they live in 1st class splendour.
In all its reporting on LIBYA, INBBC misses this:
“Libya: Jihadis and criminals roaming streets”
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/africaandindianocean/libya/8364981/Libya-Jihadis-and-criminals-roaming-streets.html
Yes, how can BBC correspondents in Benghazi (like Jon Leyne) be missing what the Telegraph‘s man is reporting? Too busy gloating over the British government’s “embarrassing miscalculation” over the SAS incident perhaps.
Gloating?
1814 Described by UK Foreign Secretary William Hague as “a small diplomatic team”, the British men were detained when they were found with guns, explosives, maps and passports from four countries. Mr Hague said they had tried to initiate contacts with the rebel leadership, but experienced difficulties and had now left the country.
Why were they not issued with tennis rackets? Why was Israel’s use of foreign passports an issue for days of condemnation but Britain’s use skipped over.
This should be fun:
Sexual Sadist Denise Barnes Strips Bradley Manning Naked Over Sarcastic Quip
Seems like The Obamessiah might not be returning the USA to high moral standards after all. Manning (the Wikihacker) made some sarcastic remark about how he could commit suicide if he wanted using the elastic from his underpants, so they’re stripping him naked. The Leftoids are screaming torture, comparing it to Abu Ghraib.
What will the Beeboids do now? Criticism of their beloved Obamessiah, defense, or censorship? I know where my money’s going.
The BBC boasts that it’s the world’s largest broadcast news organisation, yet it’s failed to report this yet. It’s the usual story.
My guess is that they’ll keep quiet about it for a few days then bury a mention of it in the penultimate paragraph of an article on a different but related story. Unless the Guardian really kicks off about it, then they’ll have to spin it for Obama.
The Guardian is already up in arms about it, as is the Independent. The Telegraph‘s Washington correspondent reports it. The BBC knows about the story because it’s all over the New York Times, Washington Post and, yes, the Huffington Post. So why the silence Mr Mardell?
r4today BBC Radio 4 Today Sir Oliver Miles, former UK ambo to Libya: ‘A lot of explaining to do’ over UK closing embassy in Tripoli and alleged SAS role in country
There is explaining to do, later, and I suspect the current crop in charge little better than the last. But much is down to the embedded civil service.
But as all is up in air and ongoing… and dangerous, I am finding the MSM’s wheeling out of a ‘former’ to snipe at any British attempts to handle stuff downright sickening. With the BBC leading the ‘charge’.
It’s almost like they want folk to fail or get hurt in war zones to score some petty points.
It really does seem like that sometimes.
Following on from Andrew Marr yesterday, Jon Sopel was up to the same thing on the Politics Show, asking the same question over and over again to William Hague – just as sensitive negotiations were going on to free British servicemen and diplomats from a potentially very dangerous situation:
Sopel: ..I asked him what more he could add to reports that British diplomats were being detained in Benghazi in Eastern Libya.
Hague: There is a small diplomatic team in Benghazi. I can confirm that. We are in contact with them. It’s inappropriate to comment further on that at the moment.
Sopel: Are they free to leave?
Hague: As I say I’m not going to comment further on that at the moment. That’s all the information I can give you as we’re talking.
Sopel: I understand the sensitivies of it. Perhaps you could explain what they were..what the aim of the mission was when they went there?
Hague: Well again I’m not going to go into the details about that.
Surely this line of questioning was inappropriate? Now they’re safe, the BBC is obviously free to hold its own inquest into the incident but surely not while the Foreign Office is in the middle of delicate negotiations with armed rebels, and certainly not with the foreign secretary himself at the height of those negotiations.
The rolling 24 hour news cycle can be a bit of a menace at times – if the news organisation doesn’t choose to behave responsibly.
But… ‘the public has a right to know!!!!’
Notwithstanding that this member of the public can wait a bit until folk are safe, or until facts are actually in, there’s the small matter of BBC ‘selectivity’.
Immediate petulant hassling during an ongoing op… no problem.
But… having allowed yet another pol to spout pure porkies that actually suit the narrative, then found a small measure of cojones when the blogosphere erupts… a niche blog backwater ‘correction’ that isn’t even accurate.
I presume that if these clowns ever get held hostage they’ll soon be clamouring for a news blackout until safe (by the BBC handing the keys to the transmitters over, probably), or… ‘watertight oversight’.
‘Selectivity’ indeed.
When the Chandlers were freed by Somali pirates, the BBC held off for some 5 or so hours – unlike Sky – from reporting on the release until the couple were safely out of Somali airspace. They were criticised for the delay at the time (including by me!), but Frank Gardner came on the News Channel to explain why they’d held off:
“What happened today is that our competitors, who shall remain nameless, decided 5 hours ago that they would just go with it anyhow, even though the Chandlers weren’t out of Somalia. We decided, my bosses decided we would stick with the superinjunction and not report until they’d taken off and were safely airborne and off out of Mogadishu.”
That was a good call. That was then though, this is now.
BBC-NUJ’s political agenda posing as ‘news’, e.g. GERMANY.
1.) BBC-NUJ does NOT have this:
“Minister insists Islam ‘does not belong in Germany'”
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/minister-insists-islam-does-not-belong-in-germany-2234260.html#
2.) But BBC-NUJ pushes this political agenda instead:
“Does Germany need more powerful women?”
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-12662182
And now for the news.
“Someone who went on a motorcycle journey 60 years ago with (darling of the left and mass murderer) Che Guevara dies.”
Very tragic for his family, sundry Tired old Trots, and the BBC.
But… news?
Edit: the history dept of my local school has half a dozen paintings on the wall of (I suppose) ‘great men’. For some reason, along with Churchill, MLK, Nelson M, Gandhi, they saw fit to have pictures of Lenin (or it might be Marx, my bad) and Che Guevara.
Teechurs, dontcha lurve em. I suppose we should be grateful that Pol Pot, Stalin, and Gadaffi weren’t there.
On Sunday Radio 4 was carrying just 4 news items at the hourly “headlines slot” – and this ridiculous man was one of them. How they gushed about him ! As you say – it was not NEWS of any significance – it was BBC Trits pushing one of their heroes.
Maoist love in on the bbc news site.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-south-asia-12637562
Why am I paying for this?
The BBC News website may have a well-staffed Washington unit but it doesn’t seem to be doing as much work as it used to. (Not necessarily a bad thing given the generally biased nature of its political coverage). So when it does produce an anonymous piece that makes it to the home page of the whole BBC website, they must think it’s an important story. Here it is:
US Muslims protest over hearings
Under a photo showing the hand of a female Muslim protestor in New York, on which the word ‘PEACE’ is written, we hear of how “Muslims braved the rain” to protest against this week’s Congressional hearings on the US Muslim community.
The article gives plenty of space to the views of the protestors but only a little space to Republican Congressman Peter King. It uses the protestors’ allegation “Xenophobic behaviour” as its sub-heading and ends with some classic BBC editorialising: “Mr King’s language on this subject has often proved inflammatory, our correspondent says, and many believe the witnesses he has called to speak at the hearings do not represent mainstream Muslims.”
Not a balanced article.
It’s ridiculous because King’s concern is exclusively about radical Islam, and not the guys who run the bodega down the street from me. Yet – as always – the BBC conflates the two, and takes sides in the debate.
Rep. King is standing up against this agenda, and is taking serious heat for it. He’s not the BNP, doesn’t scream about hating Islam, full stop, or anything of the sort. He doesn’t want to stoke Islamophobia, but does want to call out the Mohammedan establishment in the US for letting hate fester in their midst, and possibly even encouraging it. This is necessary for Social Cohesion, but the BBC just can’t find the space to fit that viewpoint into their reporting. Typical.
BBC-NUJ-Labour censors (as usual) items critical of immigration:
“Populus reports an unutterable truth”
Rod Liddle
http://www.spectator.co.uk/rodliddle/6746038/populus-reports-an-unutterable-truth.thtml
Yes, when Rod Liddle writes of “the excellent Populus survey carried out for the Searchlight Educational Trust (and which received a lot of press attention last week)”, he’s not wrong about it receiving a lot of media attention. The Guardian, Mail, Mirror, Sky News, the New Statesman and Express were among those who covered it. Check the BBC “News” website however and you’ll find…nothing.
As you say, censorship.
Again had the misfortune to be in the car earlier with the ever-predictable ‘Jeremy Vine Show’ stirring things up in a triumph of heat over light.
This was a very sensitive issue, namely the consequences (many, varied and all heartbreaking) of 23 week term premature baby services.
First up the author of a controversial report, that has got the pulses of ratings-attuned broadcast producers racing.
After setting her up as much as possible with a near fictional introductory sound bite, the first thing she had to come out with “That is not an accurate representation of the report or what I have said”.
Score one for education and information.
Sadly, she was either inept, unused to public speaking or so on the back foot thereafter, she really didn’t come across well subsequently.
Especially when, to aid in the ‘balanced discussion’ of what is a hugely complex and sensitive issue: the father of just such a 1 in 100 child, accusing the report author of wanting to kill babies.
It kind of spiraled downhill after that. Where, at the very least, was a representative of a more balanced view, to assess ideals vs. realities on the listeners’ behalves. Zero. Pure contention.
Interestingly, the bloke also was some rich medic, who managed to wangle all his top-of-the-line mates to the difficult birth, so his daughter is only a little bit disabled and now enjoying skiing trips. Great stuff.
But the point the woman was trying to make seemed to be more post birth, in the real world, where realities of triage and available resources do not provide such a happy outcome.
So, yet again, the BBC moderator chirps up with what is fast becoming a mantra: ‘Why can’t more money be made available to ensure the expertise is on hand?’.
Per Mr. Marr’s wishing up more money for the military, one could suggest that Mr. Vine’s nice package could go a long way to staffing up a pediatric unit… if he’s that concerned. And offering.
There was much the same discussion on Nicky Campbell’s Big Questions yesterday.
Here the expert (probably the same one), Dr Daphne Austin, was being shouted down by the emotionally wound-up parents of Ellie, another of those 1 in 100 babies. Not easy to watch. (Very dramatic, great for ratings though.) At least there was a range of voices on both sides, including Richard North (also shouted at by the angry parents), so that was a definite plus for Nicky Campbell’s programme, and Nicky gave both sides roughly equal time.
However, Nicky asked the expected question to Adam Wishart, a director who helped Dr Austin make a film about the issue, after the parents had first spoken: “I mean she’s a beautiful little girl. Maybe she’s one in a hundred, maybe she’s one in two hundred, but isn’t it worth it for little girls like Ellie to make that effort, to use those resources, to use all our know-how, to make sure there are children like Ellie.”
Does anyone else find that sort of question, even if asked in such a caring tone of voice, deeply unedifying?
I am also intrigued, having listened to the R2 top of the hour news, as to what ‘sources close to the BBC’ actually are.
Not very keen on unattributed anything as the basis for reports, but when these seem almost clearly as being exclusively from petty partisan opponents of those the BBC does not like either (or made up in the edit suite to save time waiting for the press release), to make petty political points under the guise of secret ‘news’, it simply smacks of negative campaigning.
Not an impartial news broadcasters remit, I would suggest.
Instead of the violent rhetoric and hate speech coming from an increasing number of union supporters and anti-Republican activists around the country, or discussing how the US Army is using Abu Ghraib tactics on a US soldier accused of espionage, or how the ATF is running guns into Mexico and the hands of drug gangs, what does the BBC think is so important they put it on Newsnight, Mardell’s blog, and just now the News Channel?
Sarah Palin’s chances of running for President. Your license fee hard at work.
Someone over at Mardell’s blog was too quick for me but hopefully in second place on the comments field will be this:
Oh no, not another post about Sarah Palin!
There’s a furious debate in America about the Abu-Ghraib like treatment of Wikileading US soldier Bradley Manning on Obama’s watch, there’s the conflict in Wisconsin with all its violent rhetoric, there’s the major story about how the ATF is alleged to be allowing U.S. guns into Mexico (etc)..
…and yet all we get from Mark is another post about Sarah Palin!
Still it will doubtless keep a lot of the regulars happy.
Thanks for so clearly presenting the bullets David!
BBC-Democrat-‘Newsnight’: Ms Long, still using the old lies about Sarah Palin and Arizona.
“Will Sarah Palin run for president and can she win?”
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/newsnight/9411955.stm
Long stories ‘Newsnight’.
BBC-Democrat-‘Newsnight’: forever Obama!