An Alternative Perspective Not Heard On The BBC, And Context For The Debate

It seems like we’re about to get a deal of some sort to temporarily alleviate the debt crisis. I say temporarily, because there’s no telling how it’s all going to work out over the next two years. In any case, it’s not done yet, so it’s a couple days early to start mocking the BBC’s coverage with “Lo! The Conq’ring Hero Comes”. What I’d like to do is provide some examples of the exact same budget issue the country has been experiencing at the state level. The BBC has mostly ignored all of this. It’s important, though, to bring this up for two reasons.

1. Spending a moment on how individual states solved their problems provides some helpful context with which to understand the national debate.

2. The reality of what’s gone on at the state level basically puts the lie to what the BBC has been telling you about the national issue.

First up, Wisconsin. Many people here will remember the BBC’s wild-eyed coverage of what went on in Wisconsin a few months back, when a Republican governor was, as the BBC put it, trying to pass an anti-union budget. Searching this blog for Wisconsin-related content will provide plenty of evidence of the BBC’s biased coverage, telling you how awful Gov. Walker’s plan would be for honest public sector workers. I don’t even want to get into how the BBC censored all news of violent and hateful rhetoric from the Left, in stark contrast to the way they focused on every fringe outlier in the Tea Party protests they covered.

In any case, the state had the same budget crisis the country is facing: too much spending, not enough money coming in. The Governor and the Legislature decided to cut spending. The BBC wasn’t happy. So it’s important to check in now to see how things turned out.

Apparently, pretty well. It seems that, by saving money, the state was able to save lots of teachers’ jobs they were going to lose the way things were going. Not only that, but the state itself went from being deep in the red to nosing into the black. It’s possible, you see, if you don’t listen to the likes of Ed Balls or Harry Reid or Mark Mardell. I’ll let the Lt. Governor of Wisconsin, Rebecca Kleefisch, explain.

(After just looking at her and hearing the first three words out of her mouth, tell me Ms. Kleefisch wouldn’t absolutely drive the Beeboids like Justin Webb insane.)

Who’d have thought, eh? Not the BBC.

There’s something else they never told you about the situation in Wisconsin: the Democrats’ budget would have added $1.7 billion in spending, leading to a $1.4 billion deficit. Yet the BBC advocates against people who oppose this kind of thing. Mark Mardell has described the national version as borrowing enough money to continue governing. No other viewpoint on the issue is allowed without qualifying it as “extreme” or “right-wing” or “protecting the wealthy”. So Wisconsin is one example of the BBC’s ideology causing them to get it wrong when they reported on the beginning of the story, wrong in the middle, and then go silent when the result is something that goes against their ideology.

It would be very instructive in figuring out the national debate if one were to look at a concrete example of a success. No wonder the BBC censors it.

Let’s look at another example, one which the BBC barely touched on because there was no loud union agitating to support: Ohio. This state is worth looking at because it’s one of those bell-weather states, which many pundits watch to predict national voting trends (probably a variety of reasons for this, but that’s for another time).

Ohio hasn’t been doing well in recent years. Last year, unemployment was one of the highest in the country, and had a negative credit rating from Standard & Poors. However, last November, Republican John Kasich got elected – with the help of a Tea Party trend in the state, where they won a majority of Congressional seats and state legislature spots. Care to guess the result? The BBC won’t tell you, so I will:

After getting elected, Gov. Kasich (a former Congressman and then…*shudder*…a Fox News talking head) passed a budget which reined in spending. S&P raised the state’s credit rating.

Standard & Poors Ratings Services upgraded Ohio’s debt rating just one day after it put the United States on “creditwatch negative” on what it calls a rising risk of policy stalemate in the debt limit negotiations.

For Ohio, the rating was revised from “negative” to “stable” after Gov. John Kasich signed a new budget the ratings agency says will essentially balance the state’s finances for the next two years. S&P also said Ohio is experiencing a modest economic recovery which has stabilized revenue.

In making the upgrade, the agency also assigned a “AA+” long-term rating to Ohio’s $416.75 million general obligation bonds.

“After a significant decline through the recession, Ohio’s economy is steadily recovering,” according to S&P’s statement issued Friday.

Who could have imagined? No need to borrow more, no need for class war. Well, actually Ohio did repeal its estate tax. The class warriors hate that.

Contrary to the opinions espoused across the spectrum of BBC broadcasting, neither Wisconsin nor Ohio needed to borrow more money to continue governing, and spending cuts had positive effects. And none of that “too much, too soon” nonsense. Oh, and the credit rating went up not because of more borrowing but because of a solid short-term plan. Again, not what the BBC has led you to believe.

Texas, with its Republican governor and legislature, has had a budget surplus for like three years running. And that state has led the country in job creation by a long mile. And – oh, the horror – it’s a low-tax state. No wonder Rick Perry is a popular dark horse candidate for President these days. I know, the BBC never told you any of this.

How about Nikki Haley in South Carolina? Yep, now there’s a budget surplus. Is she a “Tea Party darling” too, BBC? Wake me up when they acknowledge her accomplishment. Same goes for Mitch Daniels in Indiana.

So there you have some reality, some context in which to understand the national debate on the debt crisis. Real solutions, real results, all the opposite of the BBC’s propaganda. Did any of these Governors send out the attack dogs like the President has? Did any of these Governors demonize their opponents the way the President has? No, for they are leaders, not mere instigators, and what’s more, have actual plans and sound policies, not just speeches and rhetoric.

This is the reality at the state level, and thank goodness the Founding Fathers had the wisdom to enshrine the level of state autonomy that they did. Too bad the BBC censors news of things that don’t fit their ideological agenda, while telling you the opposite is the only way to save the country.

Who’s being intransigent again, BBC?

DERELICTION OF DUTY


Alison Hastings, ex editor of the Newcastle Chronicle and former member of the Press Complaints Commission, is BBC trustee for England. She is also chairman of the BBC Trust’s editorial standards committee, and as such arguably holds the corporation’s most important position in the adjudication of complaints about BBC bias – in effect she is the final arbiter. One of her most significant tasks over the past fortnight was in the publication of the Steve Jones report into the BBC’s science coverage, the key finding of which by the political activist author was that BBC journalists must work a lot harder in excluding or banishing to the absolute margins the views of those who do not accept that “climate change” has been primarily caused or made worse by the burning of fossil fuels.

In effect, this was a landmark paper, in that it was aimed deliberately at shutting down free speech and honest debate so that those political activists who want a green revolution can have open mike. So how has Ms Hastings – who from her CV casts herself as being robust and fair minded – responded? The deeply disturbing answer is here. First, she tells us patronisingly and confrontationally in her intro that according to the “influential” IPCC’s 1997 report, it is 90% certain that “climate change” is caused by humans (it did not say that, actually, but she is clearly following the “never let the facts get in the way” school of journalism). Then, in the key section of her argument, she states:

He (Steve Jones)identified a real challenge for broadcasters in accurately reflecting the latest scientific thinking, thanks to the peculiarities of scientific debate. That of keeping pace with the evidence, and in particular in taking care when reporting to distinguish between opinion and well-established fact or consensus. This doesn’t mean that BBC reports will not feature people who do not believe climate change exists. And it is emphatically still the case that the BBC must rigorously scrutinise any issues it reports – after all, scientists can get it wrong. But when something moves from opinion to well-established fact, viewers should be aware of this, and the broadcaster must adjust its coverage and its approach to achieving impartiality accordingly. Both facts and opinions have their place in science – indeed any – reporting, but the audience must be clear which is which.

High-sounding words, probably drafted by Ms Hastings herself; but they are an utter disgrace, more so because they have been written by someone who is the key guardian of the standards a taxpayer-funded £3.5bn operation supposedly aimed at generating balanced, impartial journalism. In effect, she has thus sanctioned an intensification of the efforts by Richard Black and his cronies to stifle dissent (exemplified in agitprop such as this); she has elevated the utterances of the IPCC to unassailability, despite evidence like this, which shows the IPCC writers to be nothing more than second-rate agitators; and she has said the opinions of at least 50% of those who fund the corporation (according to the BBC’s own poll!) are those of the madhouse.

BBC accountability? It’s a sick joke.

OPEN THREAD


It’s Friday, we’ve arrived at the end of another week and shortly, the end of another month here on Biased BBC! The blog has been really buzzing in recent times and my thanks to you all for keeping the conversation going. In truth there are not enough hours in the day to capture every instance of bias from the State Broadcaster but we certainly try to do our very best. My thanks to all fellow writers, to all who send me so much material, and of course most of all to our legions of readers who come here and are so  loyal, informed and perceptive. It does encourage me so much and gives me the motivation and strength to keep this thing going. OK – the floor is yours…off you go!!!

OFF MESSAGE BUT BRILLIANT!

I listened to this interview with Terry Smith on Today this morning and chuckled all the way through it. His analysis is spot on, I agree with every word. There was a stunned silence when he politely explained to the BBC interviewer that the so-called Public Sector cuts have not impacted to any significant degree, yet. He excoriated the Eurozone folly that Merkel and Sarkozy are seeking to pull.  Make sure you listen – I am sure this was NOT what the BBC were looking for!!

GROUND CONTROL TO MAJOR SCAM….

BBC seem remarkably coy about THIS. I wonder why? I would have thought the suggestion that the Global Warming cult has been exposed might have warranted a headline or two. Apparently not;

“Study co-author Dr. Roy Spencer, a principal research scientist at the University of Alabama in Huntsville and U.S. Science Team Leader for the Advanced Microwave Scanning Radiometer flying on NASA’s Aqua satellite, reports that real-world data from NASA’s Terra satellite contradict multiple assumptions fed into alarmist computer models. 

“The satellite observations suggest there is much more energy lost to space during and after warming than the climate models show,” Spencer said in a July 26 University of Alabama press release. “There is a huge discrepancy between the data and the forecasts that is especially big over the oceans.” 

In addition to finding that far less heat is being trapped than alarmist computer models have predicted, the NASA satellite data show the atmosphere begins shedding heat into space long before United Nations computer models predicted. The new findings are extremely important and should dramatically alter the global warming debate.”

 Yes, they should. Put together with the muzzled CERN data on cosmic rays, thedata case for AGW is getting rickety. But we’ll see if the AGW faithful arecapable of allowing new data to impact and inform their world view. I suspectthat that may be too much to ask of such a young religion

TIME MAY CHANGE, ATTITUDES STAY THE SAME…

A Biased BBC reader has brought this remarkable story to my attention. The bias may be ancient history but it is still shocking..

“I have just read some astounding information contained in a book review by Frank Keating in the latest issue of the “Oldie” magazine. I was going to post it on the next open thread but I’m wondering if it is deserving of greater prominence. Here is the relevant part of the review: 

“Ryan’s fine piece of work is quite mind-bogglingly revealing of place, time, Britain and the BBC – just take for starters this baldly frank opening memo, written seven months before the Games, which had BBC Programme Controller Cecil Graves warning the Head of Sport, ‘Lobby’ Lotbiniere: 

“The point about this, of course, is that Abrahams is a Jew. He is our best commentator on athletics. But the question arises as to whether we should do this. We all regard the German action against Jews as quite irrational and intolerable and on the score we ought not to hesitate, but should we, as between one broadcaster and another, put aside all views of this kind and take the line that however we regard another country’s attitude to be, it would be discourteous to send over a Jewish commentator to a country where Jews are taboo?” 

It gets much worse. Abrahams did go to the Games – and daily commentated on most of the events. Except, of course, those in which Owens took part. Incredible. [end of review]

Those pesky Jews, right?

CALEDONIAN MANIPULATION…

In Scotland, the BBC seem to have been hoist on their petard with regard to how they have treated Ally McCoist. Here is a thoughtful expose of how the BBC worked their manipulation..

The Rangers manager was the victim of a quite brazen manipulation of video footage that left the viewer with the impression that McCoist had a flippant attitude to the very real and very serious problem of bigotry.  

Footage from an answer to one question was deliberately positioned to make it appear the answer was given to another different question. Viewers were presented with images of a smirking Ally McCoist apparently not taking the issue of sectarianism seriously. 

Last season of course Mr McCoist was involved in a touchline altercation with Celtic manager Neil Lennon that sparked a major investigation by authorities into the problems of bigotry in Scottish football and wider society. The result was an announcement that new legislation will soon be introduced to combat the malaise. The weekend just passed was the opening weekend for the SPL and excitement was high. 

It’s against this backdrop that the BBC’s actions ought to be placed. Sectarianism is not a Scotland wide phenomenon, it is centred mainly in the West of Scotland. However its tentacles spread far and wide and there are smaller pockets of bigotry and examples of sectarianism in many communities in the East and North. The manifestations of this problem has witnessed young men murdered and others maimed. On Old Firm match days the casualty wards are at breaking point as the collateral damage is carried, dragged and wheeled in. 

So, for the BBC to manipulate a news item on this subject in the way it did was not just folly, it was downright reckless. The question is though why this was done?”

RED TAPE IDIOCY

The BBC has been giving acres of space today to that nice Vince Cable in his quest to get rid of red tape. Of course, as usual, he has uttered not a peep about the biggest source of the deluge – the EU, and Martha Kearney did not even mention this when she interviewed him on WATO.

Shame, too, that BBC reporters missed the irony of this. Even while the bonfire under regulations was allegedly being lit, Mark Kinver tells us of new labyrinthine government “guidance” for organisations on “reporting greenhouse gas removals and emissions from domestic woodland creation” as part of the sacred climate change battle. The spanking new, 10-page, red tape extravaganza opens:

This annex provides guidance on reporting greenhouse gas removals and emissions from domestic woodland creation and should be consulted when investing in, and/or maintaining, any UK-based woodland project for carbon purposes, as an additional option to overseas projects that comply with DECC’s Quality Assurance Standard for Voluntary Carbon Offsetting. This annex sets out who should report on woodland emissions/removals and how you should report them. This guidance does not cover how to report removals or emissions associated with ongoing management of existing woodland.

Of course, Mr Kinver, reporting the new rules in the context of even more new insane bureaucracy from climate change fanatics the Woodland Trust, does not spot the irony, and is instead much more keen to push the RSPB’s perspective that – wonderful as the new red tape is – far more drastic measures are needed to save us all from the perils of temperature rises. As usual, you could not make it up.

WHAT’S MY NAME?

No, I’m not talking about one of pouting and posing Rihanna’s hits but rather this curious tale the BBC has put out this morning that some children are going to nursery school without knowing what their name is. I admit this does seem bizarre and I accept Frank Field brought the topic up in the first place but the item they ran does suggest that this actually is the case. So far, so good. The BBC were quick off the mark to get the Headmaster of the school concerned to explain that these kids who do not recognise their own name are “white” children – whatever that is meant to suggest. A pre-emptive strike lest any of us bring up the impact of immigration, I wonder?

Jean Gross, the government’s communication champion for children, agreed that anecdotally “we do have a problem” and teachers were increasingly concerned that it was “getting worse”. She told Sarah Montague that hidden speech difficulties were sometimes to blame, but other times children were not getting “wide, rich dialogue” from their families, partly because parents “don’t know how” to talk to their young ones.

Hang on. HOW have we arrived at the point where some parents do not know how to talk to their children to the degree that the kids cannot even recognise their name? Has the breakdown of the traditional family unit – cheered on by the anything goes BBC – had any impact on this? I suspect that there is a lot more to this story than the BBC seeks to portray and wonder what your views might be?