Morning all. I’m broken hearted to read that political giant Sarah Teather is to stand down and was pleased to hear BBC Today run a glowing political obituary for the hamster faced one. It appears one of her “proudest” moments was getting a “British” constituent out of Guantanamo Bay. She will be missed…!! Anyhow, here is a brand new and one time OPEN THREAD for you all to enjoy. Now off you go ..detail the bias!
MONDAY OPEN THREAD
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Remarkably incurious report here from the BBC
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-24011595
‘Syria abductors release Italian and Belgian’
This has not been a big story here – so do tell, what is it all about?
‘Mr Quirico, 62, a reporter for the Turin-based daily La Stampa, entered Syria from Lebanon on 6 April saying he would be out of touch for a week’
Poor chap. So tell us BBC, who was holding these two fellow EU citizens of ours?
“This is great news for all media workers who risk their lives in war to tell the truth in extreme situations.”
Still it all worked out ok. Someone up there must be looking out for the Journos. But who kidnapped them?
‘The men were reportedly together when they were taken – it is not clear who was responsible for kidnapping.’
Really? Some one must have known who was holding them. … Otherwise how come their release could be negotiated?
‘(Italian) Foreign Minister Emma Bonino met the men as they arrived at the Francesco Baracca military airport in Ciampino, south-west of Rome.’
So do tell us BBC, why can’t you tell us who kidnapped these two?
Might it be because it was the rebels who were holding them? And what was the quid pro quo?
Ever wondered why the Syrian rebels have been getting such a good press?
Very good:)
So, BBC, presumably who actually abducted them would fall under ‘not news’?
That’s the thing about a lot of the BBC’s output. It’s not just biased, it’s fails even as basic journalism. Here’s a basic fact that’s been left out of the report – if it’s not bias, where these guys off Journalism School the day they covered journalism?
they covered journalism?
Nope they like all the rest in the BBC covered journalism ! actually they covered it in a blanket stuck it in the corner and kept an embarrassed silence about it !
This is the BBC reporting the Middle East. We’ll have to wait for someone to distribute a press release before the BBC ‘reports’.
The BBC rolls up again with what they consider their top story for the UK: Safe Sex amongst Prisoners.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-23985456
The Howard League, once again, seems to be the BBC’s charity of the month. Quite why the Howard League or the BBC think that 99% of the country actually give a shit, I don’t know.
Are the BBC the promotional arm of the HL now?
No its just that they have a duty to their liberal left elite fellow travelers( all traveling luxury class of course and mostly at your expense) to promote all and every liberal left cause, no matter how little it actually matters to ordinary British people. You see in the lofty heights of the BBC we ordinary folk don’t matter , unless we were to stop paying them their money. It would be a very different matter then.
Clearly the BBC feel that the everyday person on the street’s big worry is to ensure that prisoners can engage in bum fun safely.
I’ll sleep so much more soundly now, knowing criminals can get their oats safely while banged up…
Phew, what a relief.
Thanks for that BBC.
Is Mark Mardell falling out of love with Barack Obama?
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-24012411
This week, and the one that follows, could be the days that break a president.
If Barack Obama escapes humiliation that will be enough – there is no sense that even victory in Congress will leave him in an enviable position.
The next few days will see Mr Obama stripped, all the flaws of his presidency on display, all the strengths of his personality strained to their limit.
His dazzling way with words, his skill as an orator, is beyond doubt. They will be deployed to the full, in the six big TV interviews he has planned, in the address to the nation on Tuesday night.
But recently his words have lost a little of their ability to glamour the listener. The magic has faded with repetition. In some, familiarity has bred contempt.
Even worse for him, the words that are the most important are the hardest. They are the ones he speaks in private, on the phone or in person, to the politicians who hold his fate in their hands. And he’s been notoriously bad in persuading Congress of anything.
He ignored the groundwork for years. This a city where, far more than in British parliament, the political is personal.
Just about every senator, every representative has a keen sense of their own importance. Any one would find attention from the president flattering. To those who deal in power, it is currency.
Buttering up an ego today can grease a deal tomorrow. But Mr Obama doesn’t like glad-handing, back-slapping and inquiring after sick spouses. He hasn’t built up the relations that would allow him to cajole and threaten.
But it is worse than that. Most of us are best at persuading others when we feel passionate about a cause. Listen to President Obama in St Petersburg and it is not always clear that he has persuaded himself.
No, Mardell is mostly blaming the politicians in Washington for being unworthy. The Obamessiah is too good for them. He doesn’t like the back-slapping and ego-flattering these hyper-partisan bastards require. Mardell’s not suggesting that the President is really a cold-hearted, arrogant operator who doesn’t care about people and isn’t interested in dealing with those whom He thinks are beneath Him. He’s just too pure. Mardell uses the term “failed”, but it’s not much a criticism once he explains how awful Washington is and doesn’t offer the President’s personal characteristics as flaws.
And of course, it’s not really the President’s fault that He hasn’t yet convinced the country to go to
war“proportional” Obombing because He doesn’t really want to do it. That’s true. He doesn’t. But Mardell won’t criticize Him for trying to lead the country into a military action He doesn’t want to do. Why is he doing it then, Mark? It’s bizarre. If nobody wants to do this, why is He doing it? If losing the vote in Congress is a failure, and backing off now is a failure, whose fault is it?Mardell’s hinted a little bit in past blog posts at what’s really happened, made a couple of gentle suggestions that the President boxed Himself in, but that’s over now. Now that the President is in crisis, he’s forgotten all about that and is looking for ways to blame others for His failure. If Congress doesn’t vote for Obombing, it won’t really be His fault, you see.
Belgian and Italian journalists held hostage in Damascus and released today tell us that they have proof that the poison gas attack was not the work of Bashar El-Saad.
Here is the story from RTL
http://www.rtl.be/videos/video/456817.aspx
They’re claiming the President is wrong? Racists.
Newsdesk, Sarajevo 1914: Archduke Franz Ferdinand found alive. World War I “fought in error”
How come the enormous resources of the UN, Obama, EU, whoever, keep repeating the obvious that Sarin gas killed thousands, but seem remarkably short on any evidence as to who released the gas, whether accidentally, or possibly deliberately as a black flag operation. Nothing from the intelligence services, but these journalists turn up with the story “it was the rebels” wot done it.
Smacks of WMD all over again. Why would Bashar gas women and children and earn universal revulsion? Is he that stupid? Well the unlimited cruelty of the savage mind, and indifference to human life of the “cult of death” is entirely capable of mounting a black flag operation, or even making a disasterous mistake.
We see once again government brushing aside the burden of proof and papering it over with political rhetoric. Seems Saint Obama is a warmonger after all.
We bombed Libya and engaged in (illegal?) regime change for less. Being a Nobel Peace Prize laureate means not having to say you’re sorry.
‘His dazzling way with words… is beyond doubt’ This phrase says all one needs to know about Mardell, if his tongue got any higher up the royal fundament it would be coming out of Obamas ear!
Countryfile – Sunday night, featured TWO paeans to energy subsidy farming – both totally biased without a whisper of the case against.
First a feature on solar farming which bemoaned the recent reduction in feed-in-tariff subsidies and how the UK was ‘behind’ Spain and Germany in the amount of energy we get from solar ( needless to say there was no mention that Germany has the highest energy bills in Europe and Spain is near bankrupt due energy subsidy payments). And of course no mention of how solar subsidies force everyone’s bills higher ( according to countryfile the subsidies are magically ‘paid by the Government’ ). And no mention of the high cost compared to conventional power generation. At least the presenter had the grace show us his own roof top solar installation and to brag that he would be paid 44p/KWH for the next 25 years.
Then onto the next piece about how great biofuels are! Again, not a word against – not from any of the many organisations which now admit biofuels DO NOT reduce CO2 and are merely forcing food prices higher.
Attrocious bias.
I noticed the presenter said he had spent an incredible £14,000 on some awful looking panels. He wouldn’t be making any profit until after 2020. Clearly we’re paying these idiots far too much if they don’t baulk at the insanity of these schemes.
Notice that by way of ‘balance’ he asked a few houseowners without panels why they didn’t have them. The only answers allowed to air were ‘because they don’t look nice’ and ‘because I’m too old to see a return on them’. Completely failing to address any of the more substantive arguments against such as
1) They are uneconomic at these lattitudes producing negligible power during the short cloudy days of autumn, winter and spring. If the power they generate were fairly valued at wholesale rates they would NEVER pay for themselves.
2) The power they produce is intermittent and requires 100% backup from costly fast responding conventional generators.
3) They load subsidy costs and backup costs onto other bill payers (mostly poor people).
4) They do not reduce CO2 since the diesel backup generators required are less efficient than traditional power stations which would otherwise be used to supply the power
5) The lack of any global warming this century must surely call into question the point of the whole hugely costly ‘decarbonisation’ of UK energy.
For the ‘renewable’ nightmare in Germany…read the Spiegel article…extract below… (link above in English version)
‘For society as a whole, the costs have reached levels comparable only to the euro-zone bailouts. This year, German consumers will be forced to pay €20 billion ($26 billion) for electricity from solar, wind and biogas plants — electricity with a market price of just over €3 billion. Even the figure of €20 billion is disputable if you include all the unintended costs and collateral damage associated with the project. Solar panels and wind turbines at times generate huge amounts of electricity, and sometimes none at all. Depending on the weather and the time of day, the country can face absurd states of energy surplus or deficit.
If there is too much power coming from the grid, wind turbines have to be shut down. Nevertheless, consumers are still paying for the “phantom electricity” the turbines are theoretically generating. Occasionally, Germany has to pay fees to dump already subsidized green energy, creating what experts refer to as “negative electricity prices.”
On the other hand, when the wind suddenly stops blowing, and in particular during the cold season, supply becomes scarce. That’s when heavy oil and coal power plants have to be fired up to close the gap, which is why Germany’s energy producers in 2012 actually released more climate-damaging carbon dioxide into the atmosphere than in 2011.
If there is still an electricity shortfall, energy-hungry plants like the ArcelorMittal steel mill in Hamburg are sometimes asked to shut down production to protect the grid. Of course, ordinary electricity customers are then expected to pay for the compensation these businesses are entitled to for lost profits.”
It’s an absolute disgrace that only happens because most people don’t know whats going on. They are kept in the dark (or soon will be if this nonsense continues) by the MSM which in itself should be looked at and as for our MP’s, it looks like a lot of them have their fingers in the honey pot and are doing very nicely out of it. Where is a great leader when you need one?
Listening to his “progressive” unelected wife Samantha, who understands only that daddy Reginald Sheffield make a million a year out of renewable subsidies from his windfarm, and that what is daddies will eventually be hers. Always follow the money.
I loved the floating question, “has the UK missed the boat?”, as if there was some magic earlier age when money was falling off the trees to pay for solar panels. Of course governments can turn subsidies on and off at will but they never come for free.
What struck me about the film as opposed to the commentary was the way the clouds swept across the sky producing shadows on the ground. The effect of this on a solar panel would be to rapidly change the output by an order of magnitude. Can a country’s energy supply remain stable if a significant amount of its power is sourced from large arrays of panels?
Yup – and the only voices heard were pro-solar. At one point he said “we tried to get a government energy minister to talk to us but no-one was available so here’s a representative of the solar industry instead”. Laughable. How about some balance? Surely they could have got someone not wholly in the pay of Big Green to give a different perspective? Someone from the Taxpayer’s Alliance? The GWPF? A spokesperson from one of the many local groups opposed to wind and solar subsidy farms in their area?
As an aside to this has the BBC ever looked into the stunning eff up with Solyndra in America? Another way the sainted one siphoned off millions of tax payers money into a black hole.
Lardell is unhappy about Obama’s chances this week:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-24012411
He tries to portray the president in a good light, but ultimately the article is a catalogue of Obama’s many failing during his time in office. One gets the impression that Lardell is crushed by the fact that he’s finally noticing his idol’s clay feet.
Things must be bad for the BBC at the moment. The usual trolls haven’t even been able to find any grammatical error to focus on, let alone to try to repudiate any of the evidence provided here for days. Are they all on leave? Are they victims of BBC cut-backs?
As none are on staff (I know this ‘cos they say so), it may be explained by the nature of freelance contracts, where 30 to (more likely) 90 days in arrears of invoice is the norm.
It’s just possible those once relied upon to sign the chekkie won’t be doing so soon, and when so much is based on a nod and a wink in a corridor on matters of millions, the absence of paperwork for a £19 (going rate for a 37-hr week) off-books trawl around t’internet may not be covered by the auditors.
Hence caution favours the wise.
Until OFCOM pops up its shingle and those re-hired from CECUTT can sign off on £100 petty cash without any receipts again, things may well be patchy.
We’re coming for you.
‘We’ being..?
The men in white coats .
I’m not as assiduous a listener/viewer of BBC as others but this weekend I tuned in to Radio 4 news (Sunday at 9:00 am) and peeked at News 24 on TV at various times to find out what had happened in the Australian election. Nothing – absolutely nothing. In the absence of info from the BBC I assumed (correctly) that Australian Labour (Labor?) had been humiliated. It’s an exact replay of the “reporting” of the results of the Wisconsin gubernatorial recall election last year. If the BBC’s favourite doesn’t get in it’s not news (and BTW posting an article on its website does not – in the real world – fill the reporting void created by the BBC’s editorial choices.
They will report on lessons the British Labour Party must learn if it wants to win the General Election – I do not mean fiddling the boundaries, packing marginal seats with immigrants, and lobbying to reduce the voting age to twelve, I mean getting the “correct thoughts” message out to the serfs.
Naughtie has flown off to the States again, to duplicate what Mardell and all the rest of the BBC staff over there are paid to do. His brief snippet this morning did at least include an interview with a critic of Obama – but his intoduction was atrocious, lashing out at the Tea Party again as if they are the root of the problem ! Bloody childish kneejerk attitude by Naughtie, nothing to do with serious journalism.. No mention of the fact that large numbers of Democrat Congressmen are opposing Obama on Syria or sitting on the fence.
The BBC really are afraid of BogeyMen, aren’t they ?
It will have cost a packet to send Naughtie over to the US again. The least he could do is some proper research – it is all there, all across the net., day after day.
I resent more the number of people the BBC sent to Buenos Aires last weekend to cover the choice of Olympic venue next decade. The sports editor on BBC 1 News, another chap for Radio 5, that’s one too many, but how many more I missed giving their 30 second report?
According to Private Eye, they flew 100 people out to South Africa to cover the impending demise of Nelson Mandela despite already having a fully-staffed office in Jo’burg. Not sure if they are still there.
Wonder how many will be fighting to get in and report the PAC inquiry this afternoon?
As an aside, anyone know a legal way to watch it live that is not via broadcast media? Or at least get a blow by blow transcript only a bit delayed?
All the Beeboids already working the US beat, and none of them is qualified to record a short interview that would be good enough for the Today audience?
Hasn`t Justin Webb just returned from another cosy jolly.
The BBC are obviously keen to chase those autumn colours on the leaves…but make us pay for it!
Scum…
Judging from his Twitter feed, Evan Davis was in the US last week, and still may be.
(carried over)
Hows all that hopey-changey, the world loves you when your in charge stuff now bBC?
Why TF dont we have bulletins like that in the UK?
No wonder the BBC/Huhne/Guardian shitstix want Murdoch?Fox forver banished from these shores.
Speaking “truth to power” like this makes you real enemies.
Great piece of telly-as our friend says-WTF don`t we ever get polemic like this, without posting pioneers like Leha here9and not for the first time as I recall!).
Thanks Leha-God Bless and keep up the good work!
When seeking to interpret events, always check Fair and balanced Fox News. Occasionally a lefty dope journalist slips in, like their hopeless take on the Abbott election ( “He’s going to abolish the tax on “pollution” “- Eh? CO2? Stop breathing if you are that worried) But mostly their heart is in the right place.
The best part is at the very end….”Give it back!”
One of the warships listed is the USS Barry. 🙂
Listing quite badly the last time I checked. 🙂
She is fantastic.
It’s no wonder the liberal, lefty hand wringing, latte sipping metro-sexual types don’t want Fox News…they are afraid of the truth, the truth cannot be allowed to burst the liberal safety bubble.
While I’m on: what is the point of “news where you are”? On the local London news last night at 10:30 or thereabouts we had only two items: the BBC anti-coalition propaganda re its poll of 101 NHS trusts and the sad news that a nonentity is to resign her parliamentary seat at the next election. Both these items were (more than) covered in the national news: repetition only served to highlight the paucity of the interest in the information transmitted.
They couldn’t go telling the good folk of that London the little stories that never make it into the national (and international) news….y’know, those stories about rapey enrichment….stabby enrichment…muggy enrichment…burny enrichment…ect.
Quick, er…um….find a story about ducks!
Scrap the licence fee – and drag British TV into 21st century
THERE is a simple solution to the scandal that is currently engulfing the BBC, centering around the size and scope of payoffs to former staff and the implication that public money was squandered. The answer is to reform the way the BBC is funded, and to allow it to spend its own money hiring and firing people as it sees fit, just like any other company.
Why, in 2013 and in an age where people can download hundreds of thousands of films and TV programmes on demand from around the world, is the corporation still financed through a compulsory (if you want to watch any kind of TV) licence fee? Why do we pay for one of the world’s biggest broadcasters via a tax? Why not finance it via a normal, freely chosen commercial fee, just as we pay for Sky or all sorts of other services?
The BBC is not a normal broadcaster by the definitions of the 21st century – it is simply the mass media propaganda arm of the British state. The idea of a television tax is as anachronistic and unjust as that of the window tax during 1696 to 1851. The Left firmly believes that people should be forced to pay for their destruction; quite literally in China where families are forced to pay for the bullets used in executing family-member criminals. An extreme comparison yes, but the underlying mind set is similar.
Interesting comments.
The notion of an ad-model that can go subscription to get rid of ads would seem to have merit, and cut the rug from a major pillar of the ‘we need to pay for Mark Byford’s pension’ brigade.
This is only my view, but I would be happier paying the Fee if the BBC were truly impartial in news reporting and far less socially engineering (at times almost communist-like) in their drama output. But with their current make up and ideology, I cannot see that happening. For example, they report with eagerness and alacrity on Tory funding but sympathetically on Milliband’s position. They report happily on Labour’s cry for higher living standards and jobs but bearly mention the growing economy in a favourable manner. They report fully the school places ‘crisis’ but fail to give over more than a fraction of that curiosity to the immigration link. They cover the tragedy in Syria with only passing mention of serious crimes by rebels including summary executions, and become circumspect when dealing with attacks on Egyptian Copts. They largely repeat Israel as the aggressor (for no apparent reason) and almost always add their “illegal” occupation as a valediction to every report.
Their drama is always hackneyed and predictable, with social engineering rife; they seem keen to get a liberal message across in virtually every programme, be it underlying or overt. Children’s drama is no exception, indeed perhaps the BBC fancy more fertile minds are found there. Their comedy on both radio and television is typically left-wing snarling and mockery rather than well scripted or ad-libbed humour, (more rabid the later the hour).
No doubt this is society generally but my gripe with the BBC is that they commit to being impartial, whereas everyone else specifically doesn’t.
Just switched on to watch The Daily Politics. Guest of the day: the sveldt and camera-shy Diane Abbott. Switched off.
Imagine if that was on a pay-on-demand basis?
They may feel moved to extend the number of names in the producer iPhones.
Abbott, champagne socialist and racist
‘Andrew, I have nothing further to say’…
Didn’t stop her waffling though, did it?
Astonishing that Lardell has finally realised that the autocue reader in chief is hopelessly lost and has backed himself into a corner into promising that the USAF will act as Al Qaeda’s air force.
strange times indeed !
‘And so as the minutes draw closer to the start of Ed Miliband’s speech I’m getting more and more moist’.
Ok light editorial hand by yours truly there, but droids and in this case droidess try and just now and again get outside the bubble ffs.
The nation really really really does not give a toss.
BBC “Today” (& it seems VD) quick to provide a tie-in to the house journal’s (theguardian) tear jerker by liar Huhne. ” It was all Murdocks revenge” it appears. It requires Guido to point out the initial attacks on the pathetic tw*t by the non-Murdoch titles -Huhne got only a sympathetic audience from Montague.
http://order-order.com/2013/09/09/exclusive-to-all-papers-murdoch-huhne-affair-conspiracy/#comments
Heard that one – all about a large corporation dominating the media and pursuing its own agenda.
Nothing further 😉
Harry Mount suggests that Huhne should have crawled away into a hole somewhere. He certainly should not be a guest on the Today programme.
http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/culture/harrymount/100070608/chris-huhne-is-suffering-from-pathological-narcissism-disorder/
Yes, scandalous.
HUHNE gets easy political ride on BBC-NUJ ‘Today.’
Huhne was not challenged by ‘Today’ as he continues in denial about his crime, and instead he blames a section of the media for his plight.
I note that ‘The Guardian’ has given him a regular column to comment on current events: his first choice- HIMSELF and a section of the media’s ‘injustice’ against him!
HUHNE-Beeboids-‘Guardian’:
– birds of a political feather, flock together.
“‘It was the Press’s fault I went to prison’: Shamed Huhne blames the media for speeding points scandal”
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2415728/Chris-Huhne-blames-media-speeding-points-scandal.html
Isn`t there some law about banning people from profitting from their criminal deeds…hence the likes of Mary Bell not getting columns in the Guardian?
Hate crime!…hate crime!…
The comments are worth read ,this was my favourite
aron lipshitz
3 minutes ago
People are so unkind to Huhne. He didn’t, as far as we know, have gay orgies with rent-boys like Mark Oaten, nor did he fiddle his expenses to pay a catamite like Laws, he has not yet been found to be a kiddy-fiddler like the bloke with the weird beard or accused, yet, of habitually using his position to grope female party workers, nor does he keep a giant African dominatrix, like one senior Scottish Lib-Dem; his expense fiddles have been relatively modest and he hasn’t come out as an out and out anti-semite, yet. That he is a pathological liar, a scheming backstabbing little shit and totally unsuited to hold any position of authority in the private or public sector is just a function of being a member of the political class today. Without politics where would scumbags like this find employment?
Did Huhne ever give us the money back for that trouser press he claimed of us all back in 2009?
Surely his valet would need it to iron his Guardian for him!
Just another TWOCer,but too scared to hotwire on a chavvy estate himself.
The Green Police surely ought to throw him back in chokey for unnecessary waste of Gaias blood(petrol to you and me)…he MUST know that speeds over 55mph make the polar bears cry!
Inspired!
What a load of utter drivel from the sycophant Mardell…
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-24012411
For a minute there, I thought Mardell was actually offering a criticism. He once suggested in a blog post and in an appearance at the BBC College of Journalism that perhaps the President just wasn’t very good at the personal aspect of politics, so I was thinking maybe it’s dawned on Mardell that His arrogance and failure to really work well with His own party, never mind reach across the aisle, might be responsible for the lack of support now. But I was wrong. It turns out that The Obamessiah is simply too good for ’em:
Even worse for him, the words that are the most important are the hardest. They are the ones he speaks in private, on the phone or in person, to the politicians who hold his fate in their hands. And he’s been notoriously bad in persuading Congress of anything.
He ignored the groundwork for years. This a city where, far more than in British parliament, the political is personal.
Just about every senator, every representative has a keen sense of their own importance. Any one would find attention from the president flattering. To those who deal in power, it is currency.
Buttering up an ego today can grease a deal tomorrow. But Mr Obama doesn’t like glad-handing, back-slapping and inquiring after sick spouses. He hasn’t built up the relations that would allow him to cajole and threaten.
It’s not His failure, really, you see. It’s theirs. If only the people in Washington weren’t so unreasonably political, they’d be eager to support Him without needing to be caressed and cajoled, right?
It’s an absolute joke as this President is the most political one we’ve had in generations. Not only that, but the concept that “the personal is political” came out of the far-Left feminist movement, and it’s still mostly a mantra of the identity politics crowd. That clearly includes this President and His fellow travelers. It’s not about egotism in the way he suggests. Mardell actually expects you all to believe that the President isn’t like that. Stunning bias, and Mardell’s ignorance once again on display. He doesn’t understand the Humpty Dumpty concept, either, which even children can grasp, so I’m not surprised.
Mardell gave a similar report on Today this morning, outlining that the President has a hard road ahead of Him. No blame ascribed though, as it was just a brief pre-recorded spiel with no time to expand.
Sarah Teather …..the hamster faced one
Lovely. A bit like the red faced Dinosaur David Vance?
Unfair to both hamsters and dinosaurs
Poor Sarah Teather she was so hopelessly out of her depth even as a junior Minister it really wasn’t funny. Her boss Mr Gove is one of the few ministers with any balls and any desire to make a difference. A true Liberal (I know there aren’t many in Cleggys merry band) could have done amazing things in that office and had the full backing of Mr Gove. Instead she seems to have spent the last couple of years trying to keep out of the way and not be noticed. Had she been a Tory I doubt Mr Gove would have kept her for even a month but she was a token Lib Dem woman and had to be kept.
Serious question here folks : Why does someone like Mrs Teather even want to be a politician ? She seems to have no ideas and not even enough social skills to be a parish councillor .
Money. Being a politician used to be a vocation, now its an extension of college debating societies and for the offspring of twats.
Make the salary for MP’s a flat 35k per year and then see how many Sarah Teathers stand.
Ah, those little asides, don’t you just love them?
In this morning’s Today programme, James Naughtie couldn’t help but get a dig in against the BBC’s favorite straw man “The Tea Party”.
Naughtie said “Republicans aren’t looking at this (the war decision) simply through the prism of the Middle East, particularly those associated with the Liberation Tea Party movement (who find) it UNTHINKABLE TO HELP OBAMA IN HIS HOUR OF NEED.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b039p84p (around 1:50:00)
Here’s my point: even if the Tea Party are against most things Obama, which they are, it is not personal but substantive. They think he’s a rotten President because he makes rotten decisions. However, I’m sure if they agreed with him on a point (like war vs peace) they’d back him.
But it’s worse than that in this case. “Jim” is suggesting that the Tea party would put their antipathy for the President above the good of their country? In other words commit treason in order to further their personal agenda.
Because this sentence is embedded in his cue material I think it makes it a subject open for discussion. But is it discussed? The hell it is. That allegation was smuggled into the paragraph simply to defame the Tea Party without giving them redress.
Seasoned interviewees (like Anne Coulter or Mark Steyn) are aware of this nasty creepy little trick and would refuse to answer “Jim’s” first question before taking him to task about his allegation – though cowardly journalists use this trick mostly in front of recorded interviews when the victim has no redress.
This is the kind of stuff that the BBC gets away with every day. Disgraceful.
The “Libertarian Tea Party” is it now? Whatever. It’s the common theme in all BBC reporting about US politics: There can be no legitimate opposition to any of the President’s policies. All opposition to Him must have some nefarious ulterior motive. It’s one thing to admit that surely there are some Republicans reticent to give aid to a President whose policies they abhor, but this is an indictment of the entire party, and US public who voted for them – and from whom they’re getting millions of phone calls and emails right now – by extension: racists who don’t give a damn about national interests, and simply don’t want to go to war led by someone not like them.
No memo needed to passed along to the Today producers for Naughtie to suggest this, no conversation with Mardell or Paul Adams or Steve Kingstone was required. They all think this way on their own, so the institutional bias occurs naturally.
On the other side, let’s be clear about what Naughtie and Mardell and Dymond and all the rest of them are also saying: It’s okay for Democrats to vote for war out of purely partisan motives, and a devotion to a man rather than any national interest. It’s amazing that these Beeboids can accept going to war for reasons other than national interest when it’s in support of a man and not their country.
The Tea Party, and Libertarians more generally, scare the shit out of the BBC. When your entire world view is predicated on government being a force for good, and more government being an even greater force for good, the typical libertarian belief in minarchy is anathema.
Whilst there is definitely an element of Obama as the virtuous paragon whose every move is unquestionable, I think there is also the element of hatred for the politics of people who instinctively want the smallest state possible as an expression of the public good.
The BBC feels visceral hatred for the tea party and libertarians, and this would hold true regardless of who was in power. Its the same reason they hate UKIP – just as the tea party started off wanting to reduce the size of the federal government, UKIP wants to reduce the influence of the EU political superstructure on the UK. Beeboids are horrified by these objectives, and will do whatever they can to paint the people espousing these ideologies in a bad light.
Indeed. Mardell sees hypocrisy and stupidity in anyone who takes a stand against Big Government because they still want taxpayer money to fund the Defense Dept. the police, and the Fire Dept.
In case anybody doubts that Mardell’s a die-hard far-Left Statist, read this piece where he tries to make the case the wealth redistribution is a fundamentally conservative policy. And here’s Mardell claiming that ObamaCare’s “individual mandate” requiring everyone to purchase a health care policy is the same thing as the government requiring people to by car insurance if they want to drive a car. And here he is giving his approval, even while pretending he isn’t, of the President’s very Statist position that nothing is possible without the State helping you.
This is his personal political bias, not impartial reporting. That’s the danger of having this sort of titled editor: they’re not really reporters so much as they are opinion-mongers writing editorials.
Those “little asides”?
I think that we should be gathering them as we go-the devil truly is in the detail of their “garnishes”.
So it was this morning that I heard that George Osborne was going to give a “politicised” speech, later in the day about the folly of the likes of Ed Balls and Stephanie Flanders.
Yet Harriet Harman was going to merely give a speech(presumably not politicised) which was to warn the TUC that division in their seamless Socialist patchwork of theirs would “let the Tories in”.
Anybody able to tell me why Osbornes is politicised-but Harmans is not?
The BBC love throwing these little barbs in(“left-leaning” etc, c.f “right wing”)…as if they will influence us all and prevent any more Tony Abbotts or Sarah Palins.
Any more news on UNITE not paying their corporation taxes then these last two years?…any sign of Occupy there at Bournemouth with swarming Beeb lefties like flies around the cowpat?
Nah-why would they?
The Osborne-Harman bit came in the 7a.m news headlines on Radio 4, by the way!
According to BBC economics editor Stephanie Flanders Ed Balls has not made a complete fool of himself.
“Maybe things would have been better, the past few years, with a different chancellor at the helm. We will never know.”
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-24018349
Mind you Steph also wrote a post telling us that the Greek bailout had worked!
Flounders likes nothing better than dissembling when it comes to labour’s economics policies. Notably absent in her ‘analysis’ is the question about whether even more austerity would have helped growth; instead, we’re treated to the tired keynesian axiom that government spending is a positive force for economic growth, so any growth we’re seeing now is despite, rather than because of, fiscal prudence.
Without the BBC’s constant proselytizing about the dangers of the cuts, which amounted to free PR for the labour party message (despite the fact that it was those jokers that imploded our economy), the coalition would have had much more room to cut government waste more aggressively. I suspect that Flounders is well aware that the reductions in these wasteful transfers (government ultimately can only ever transfer wealth between different groups; it never creates wealth over and above what the private sector would have done with the money instead) are what is driving UK growth now, but no good neo-marxist can ever bring themselves to admit this truth.
Her piece is quite blatant in its efforts to defend Balls’s untenable position (the arguments he put forward in 2010 have been demonstrated to be false, but Steph heroically tries to rewrite history in her column) – this type of piece being written in support of a conservative chancellor or shadow chancellor would be unthinkable from the BBC.
Clearly influenced by good memories of ‘Ed the Bull’ – either/or any views expressed are purely my own and not endorsed by bbbc.org
And Flanders is pretending that Labour would have magically made an extreme policy shift in 2010, even though they had to be dragged, kicking and screaming, into admitting much later that maybe they would have had to do some cuts after all.
It’s almost as dishonest as Mardell claiming we’ll never know who came up with the Sequester idea.
My little contribution to Flanderings blog got moderated away
Subject:
Mr Osborne turns a corner
Posting:
Stephanie, get over it, you and your boyfriends were wrong.
I’m still on good terms with many of my exs’ too and will always look to build them up rather than slag them off – Steph but for Yvette you could have been an historic figure!
Still no mention of the Nobel Peace Prize from Mardell or Naughtie or anyone else.
And now Mardell’s successor as BBC Europe editor, Gavin Hewitt, is saying that if the EU doesn’t support His Obombing campaign, it will have failed as a political institution.
Your license fee hard at work.
His closing sentence is “What is less clear is whether it has the will or the ability to act decisively in the face of an international crisis.”
The only reason this is an international crisis is because Obama wants to start an unjustified war on Syria, over the objections of the UN security council.
The malleability of the left-liberal position on starting wars is both astonishing and frightening – there can be no doubt that if the US had a republican president in the white house, the BBC and other leftists would be howling about the west being dragged into another middle-eastern conflict that can only serve to destabilise the region further and to create a new wave of jihadist terrorists seeking to harm the west.
But somehow, just because we have the great black liberal hope in the white house, entire institutions like the EU are suddenly irrelevant if they fail to rubber stamp unjustified and arguably illegal military actions.
The BBC are wilfully blind to the hypocrisy in their beliefs.
I don’t remember any “Iraq fatigue” when we were bombing Libya with the explicit intent of regime change. Nor do I remember the BBC worrying about whether or not the President had the authority to do it without a vote from Congress. The BBC doesn’t want you to remember that, either.
Wrong on every count.
Will INBBC report this on FRANCE?
Or would such a report upset its politically favoured ‘left’-Islam alliance?:-
“French schools to get ‘secularism charter’”
(video clip).
http://www.france24.com/en/20130908-france-schools-get-secularism-charter
“European Education”(2006)-
[Opening excerpt]:-
“In France, Muslim students refuse to study World War II, the Resistance, and the murder of Europe’s Jews. They disrupt classes, and refuse to read, those writers — Voltaire among them — whom they think, or have been told to think, were ‘anti-Muslim.’ Their refusal to follow the syllabus of the Ministry of Education disrupts not only their own education, but that of others in the class or in the school.”
http://www.newenglishreview.org/blog_direct_link.cfm/blog_id/292
The BBC covering up foreign crime, again, possibly racially motivated too:
Attack in London could leave woman blind in one eye
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-24014232
Is it the police covering up the ethnicity of the thugs?
Not so:
http://www.standard.co.uk/news/crime/oxford-street-punch-attack-could-leave-woman-blind-in-one-eye-8804325.html
Police say the woman was attacked by three black men who ran off towards Tottenham Court Road
Priority is social cohesion, not news reporting. Funny, it doesn’t appear in the BBC’s Charter. Employ a basketcase full of lefty journalists, that’s what you get. OFCOM won’t a blind bit of difference. They will be stuffed with ex-luvvies who endorse the need for such things.
“Priority is social cohesion, not news reporting.”
Except where Stephen Lawrence is involved.
Margaret Hodge: ‘I’m not having any more lies this afternoon’
And what fun seeing all those shysters at the top of the BBC squirming and blaming each other! Sack the lot of them and close down this dysfunctional organisation!
So she’s sacked her tax adviser?
No I don’t think Lady Dodge lied. She just refused to answer any questions (not that the BBC were likely to ask many – with the exception of Brillo)
over 300 violent uaf leftists got arrested by the met police on satarday at the edl demo in tower hamlets,by the way, only 14 edl supporters got arrested,now i only knew about this because it was reported on channel 4 today.not a peeps from the bbc about the 300 arrests except the fact tommy robinson got arrested,if 300 edl supporters got arrested you can bet that the bbc and 5 live would have had blanket coverage of this and phone ins on nicky campbell and vicky derbyshires shows.i cant understand this silence from the bbc on this matter.are they trying to hide what happened in tower hamlets on satarday.
Not even that, the 14 (arrested for violence) were “mostly” EDL.
I wonder, was it on the basis of that famous BBC ‘split’ definition?
While the BBC is focused almost exclusively on intransigent, hyper-partisan Republicans refusing to help the President in His hour of need for purely partisan (and possibly racist) reasons, here’s some reality the BBC doesn’t want you to know:
Jim McGovern On Syria: Obama Should Withdraw Request For Authorization
Rep. Jim McGovern (D-Mass.) said Sunday that the Obama administration should accept that it doesn’t have the necessary support in Congress to authorize use of force in Syria and should stop asking for a vote.
“If I were the president, I would withdraw my request for the authorization at this particular point,” McGovern said on CNN’s “State of the Union.” “I don’t believe the support is there in Congress. I think people view war as a last resort, and I don’t think people think that we’re at that point.”
McGovern opposes intervention in Syria, along with other Democrats who have gone against the party line by opposing President Barack Obama.
Is he a racist? Also, the two Senators from Mass voted “present”. This is John Kerry’s home State. Yet the BBC keeps moaning about how any opposition to His Obombing Plan is due to nefarious ulterior motives.
Some lefty shill called John Kampfner is getting a free half hour at our expense to tell us all that Britain is now a small country, that needed to back dear Obama-and now is a Euro embarrassment and as reduced as the Tories made us over Suez-even Munich.
His psy-ops puff us sheer Lord HawHaw..its on Radio 4 as I write( What Syria means for Britain…8pm Radio 4-9/9/13) and is the usual bedwetting MauMau agenda-only using Syria as the shroud of shame and not Kenya.
How the hell do we let the BBC get away with this OCD on how to make this nation fit only for the likes of Teather, Huhne and Balls/Cooper…as well as all associated Beeboids?
Kampfner ever asked the Russian to give Britain a name -an equivalent of “cheese-eating surrender monkeys please Sergei!”
He declined-Russia has a dignity that the BBC lost long ago-but he hopes we`ll tweet in something to give to the Today hacks sometime soon(people are saying Minister…yada yada)
Utter disgrace-string these traitors up somebody!
BBC Mark Mardells site:
Syria arms offer: Game changer or morass?
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-24025325
is talking of the latest proposal as possibly a “one day wonder,” it could just as well vanish, so too, if it happens, if there is any
provocation and the latest warnings of a “false flag chemical attack on Israel from Syria”- of attacks actually carried out by the rebels (nb. not Assad regime).
The UN inspectors were, after all, in Damascus as this most recent chemical attack took place. The announcement today that the Syrians agree to the Russian plans (backed by the UN gen. sec.), would be a similar moment (a one day wonder) for implimenting such a false flag operation- don’t you think?
Therefore please be aware of reports over night which claim that the Assad regime has attacked Israel, very logical move right now don’t you think? Imagine the reaction from the US Congress. The rebels will naturally think that their false flag operations have worked so effectively in the past, so the RT report, is quite worrying. They are quite capable of doing this maybe they think they are helping John Kerry here?
So, if we do one day of Obombing, and the President declares Mission Accomplished, how will we know if all of Assad’s unapproved capabilities have been thwarted? We don’t even really know what he has now, and the people who told me not to trust BusHitler about what Sadaam had are now telling me to trust The Obamessiah about what Assad has.
Mardell seems uninterested.
SYRIA.
-Reporting recently without preconceptions and with impartiality, Bowen does come up with some useful reports like these:-
(various video extracts)
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-23941269
Of course, Beeboids have to politically move away from Obama, and from Al Nusrah agenda to achieve that.
Looks like reality has forced the BBC to spend more than two minutes on the plight of Christians in the Middle East, although what a coincidence that the case study they found was worried about losing all that wealth. Bowen almost had to drag the relevant Christian part out of her.
Also, it’s a bit OTT to compare this to Rwanda simply on the basis of the number of refugees being reported. The UN has its own financial agenda, but this is a bit much.
Was that the same report ( I saw on BBC 1) where Bowen mentions that somebody blames Assad for Maaloula, Assad is possibly to blame for allowing the al Qaeda-linked rebel group back into Maaloula so as to put direct pressure right now on the American congress or bible-belt, or some such conspiratorial nonsense. Notice how the BBC go out of there way to seriously question facts when it suits the narrative.
Norway: General Election
From the BBC Web Site:
Norway’s centre-right opposition has won the country’s general election.
Labour leader Jens Stoltenberg, prime minister since 2005, admitted defeat following Monday’s poll.
He is to be replaced by Erna Solberg, who heads the Conservative Party. She may depend on the support of the anti-immigration Progress Party to form a government.
It was Norway’s first general election since attacks by a far-right extremist killed 77 people in 2011.
What on earth has the final line got to do with the main story? Are they suggesting that the Brevik Party won?
BBC-speak, ‘right’ equals ‘wrong’.
Shoe-horned non-sequitur asides can get pretty blatant.
I was intrigued quite why Patten & Thompson’s Catholicism was mentioned in the PAC pre-show stir-up.
John Kerry: U.S. Attack on Syria Would Be ‘Unbelievably Small’- http://world.time.com/2013/09/09/john-kerry-give-up-your-chemical-weapons-syria/
This is a major development, yet the BBC appear to have overlooked it.
Jeff
John Kerry Is Getting Relentlessly Mocked For Saying Syria Strikes Will Be ‘Unbelievably Small’
Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/john-kerry-syria-unbelievably-small-intervention-war-assad-2013-9#ixzz2eRTWvi6q
That might be why…
I hope the BBC’s reviews of Tuesday’s newspapers give a proper feel for a bunch of the front-page headlines.
Independent huge front page headline :
“Licence to waste taxpayers’ money”
– with subsidiary headlines such as
“Mark Byford paid an extra 500,000 so he would not be worried about his future”
“Furious Tory MP blasts “the most bizarre game of “Whack-a-Mole ever seen” ”
Times second main headline :
“Accusations fly as BBC bosses argue over payoffs”
Guardian second main headline :
“MPs berate “incompetent squabblers” at the top of the BBC”
The “I” main headline :
“MPs rage at BBC’s 25 million pass the buck”
“Oops, We Must have missed that
Meanwhile, back at the Grauniad Labour says……….”.
What’s the betting the Murdoch Sun & a few other less quoted publications get full billing all of a sudden, as they seem to be less ‘controversial’ today.
Actually interesting which papers have run big.
And the silliness continues:
TURN AWAY FROM ‘RED LINE’? Obama willing to try ‘diplomatic track’
Obama tells Fox News’ Chris Wallace US is willing to negotiate with Russia and Syria over proposal to have Syria turn over chemical weapons to international control, taking a sharp turn from his ‘red line’ on eve of speech.
Remember that Red Line He didn’t mean but then He really meant that He didn’t actually make because the world made it for Him but He had the authority to act but then had to ask Congress about it but then said He might act anyway? He didn’t mean it. But He meant it, really, so Assad had better watch it. Putin says he’s got it covered, but Reagan said trust, but verify. But “when I make a decision”, Assad had better watch it.
Watch the video of the interview if it’s available to you. If this is all Assad has to fear, he’ll probably outlast the BBC.
Unless Mardell has finally joined the real world, he will praise this to the sky. This is classic, awesome Obamessiah smart diplomacy at its best. It was NOT caving in the face of a probable rejection from Congress, or an admission that the cosmetic Obombing plan was going to make Him look like an idiot. This is was His plan all along, and only hyper-partisan enemies doubted Him. We shouldn’t care how many people Assad kills, as long as he doesn’t do it in an unapproved fashion.
Obama moves in mysterious ways
I believe this is called ‘flip-flopping’. Quite astonishing incompetence: letting various off-autoqueue ad-libs dictate US foreign policy. First it was the red line that never was. Then limited strikes, then regime change, then let’s call the whole thing off.
Obama & the BBC: a match made in heaven:
http://www.newsbiscuit.com/2013/09/09/obama-urges-military-intervention-in-bbc-civil-war/
‘we now fear the BBC is harbouring weapons of mass distraction’
This was of course meant in jest.
The preposterous Mardellian-style reporting of Obama’s marvellous deeds was replicated by ‘Jim’ Naughtie, reporting from Washington, on the BBC’s R4 ‘Today’ programme before 7 am. Obama hadn’t put a foot wrong apparently, and Kerry’s gaffe was not a gaffe at all. They were statesmanlike manoeuvres and clever ploys which hit just the right note, etc. etc. A more dishonest piece of reporting you would be hard pressed to find – i.e. until the next time on the BBC.
Speaking of what’s on the BBC, a US chum sent me this…
http://americanoverlook.com/m/article.php?id=1218
I don’t recall hearing about it, and the video embed doesn’t seem to work on my browser.
Is it anywhere on the BBC by chance?
I don’t know what her politics are but I suspect she doesn’t share my English nationalism and my libertarian views but boy! she was good to hear. Her dislike of Obama and his hypocrisy and US influence I do share.
I can see why this wasn’t broadcast on the BBC though – it’s Irish politics, not ours.
Will the BBC ever report what is happening to the Christian communities at the hands of Muslims ?
http://frontpagemag.com/2013/theodore-shoebat/christians-butchered-in-guinea/
The overnights are in, and a rich seam. Sadly the drive-by Flokkers appear still a bit bereft, and are now obsessing about gallantry, or lack of, in the rough and tumble world of blogs.
Oddly, they seem not to be taking to task one Mr. Katz, late of the Guardian, now BBC Newsnight, who seems to be having a ‘FirstMonthAtWorkUs Horribilis’ beyond being a poster boy for the Graun/BBC ties that bind…
http://order-order.com/2013/09/10/ian-katz-rachel-reeves-direct-message-fail/
Quite why a senior editor is using twitter for such things who knows, along with why a BBC employee of such profile appears to be conducting his professional operations on a personal (if not views my own, etc) BBC-branded account, and it seems he’s already running out of ideas, on top of using viewers videos as content fillers…
Ian Katz
@iankatz1000
Week two of new life as @BBCNewsnight editor…lots happening today but anything you specially want to see tonight?
Majoring with the Huhne was inspired, then, being wall-to-wall with all complementary Murdoch-hostile outlets. It’s like the mindset that brought us McAlpine was not such another time. Maybe licence fee payers should brace for more £189k++ non-programming cost write-offs fora future PAC round?
http://order-order.com/2013/09/10/watch-psycho-huhne-newsnight-interview-in-full/
That, and what Arctic Monkeys do with their washing (not AGW-related). He and Newsnight tweeted a lot on this. After the great One Direction furore.
Katz’s Twitter page is not branded BBC, though, so isn’t an officially sanctioned account, meaning it’s beyond the rules. Sort of. He doesn’t have the requisite “views my own” disclaimer, but he’s still violated the rules about not doing anything stupid and making the BBC look bad, even if accidentally.
But this is a pretty weak non-story. Calling her boring damages Newsnight’s impartiality? I can’t take that seriously. Nothing partisan about that at all, just a comment about her performance from an entertainment perspective. This is nothing compared to what his colleagues have contributed to the “In Their Own Tweets” page. Is it because Reeves is a Labour darling now so must be given all due deference?
‘…meaning it’s beyond the rules…. but he’s still violated the rules…
Ah well, when the BBC sets the rules it’s only fair that only they can violate them.
That a senior BBC Editor has some odd personal/professional branded twitter page that may or may not be official and has not weasel clauses is a real red flag. Especially if he can’t work it.
As to being a weak non-story… if you say so.
Nothing to doing with political skew; if you are arguing this does not damage Newsnight’s already Marinas Trench level professional reputation, I beg to differ. She was a guest and he dissed her. If she was a boring political blank is irrelevant. They all are now.
Ms. Stratton has trashed a single mum, the programme has trashed a Lord and used £189k++ of public money to buy off that one, and Eddie Mair tries his outer Paxman by simply being obnoxious, and now this?
Quite how a show based on the calibre of guest interviews will exist if all they can attract is pop stars to hang with… gawd knows.
If it’s a non-story it seems to have become one across a few newsrooms. Maybe, to quote A. Journalist, to some it was news.
As its stands it has worked out just about as well as it could. She was boring, he was a tactless berk, and now Labour looks petty and the BBC spineless. No losers other than the deserving for me.
They’re enforcing the rules in this case only because it’s a Labour darling and their friends in the Party made a couple of angry phone calls.
Paul Mason never had to apologize for tweeting his clear political leanings, and Gavin Esler never had to apologize for suggesting that Sarah Palin bore some culpability for that assassination attempt and killing spree in Tucson. Both of those are much worse than saying a guest was boring. No harm done to Newsnight impartiality there?
People the BBC listens to didn’t complain, so no problem there.
Not bias but just a curious bit of broadcasting. Huhne on Newsnight last night. I know he had written in the Guardian that his downfall was all Murdoch’s fault and that anything anti-Murdoch fits the BBC agenda. But his lack of contrition and his arrogance is beyond belief. A very soft interview by Paxman – barely challenging Huhne’s belief that as 300,000 people lie about who was driving their car, it was OK for him as a minister, to do the same. And it was Murdoch’s fault that he was caught sleeping with his campaigns’ director not his fault for sleeping with someone that wasn’t his wife. No pressure on him to answer questions about it. Apart from the time the interview took that Newsnight didn’t have to spend discussing their top brass – what was the point?
‘Apart from the time the interview took that Newsnight didn’t have to spend discussing their top brass – what was the point?’
Asked and neatly answered in the same sentence, Deborah.
Maybe if there was a band called Misdirection Ian Katz and his kindergarden kids would get them in too?
And re-KATZ:-
“BBC forced to apologise after editor brands MP guest ‘snoring boring'”
http://www.standard.co.uk/news/politics/bbc-forced-to-apologise-after-editor-brands-mp-guest-snoring-boring-8806087.html
Peter Rippon just looks better and better with each passing day, doesn’t he?
It’s all relative. Which, being the BBC, starts a whole new line of thought…
In contrast to Beeboid Paxman on Huhne, here’s Littlejohn of ‘Daily Mail’:-
“Huhne do you think you are kidding?”
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-2416401/RICHARD-LITTLEJOHN-Huhne-think-kidding.html
Reading across the whole gambit of political media & comments left it was very very difficult to find any support for Teather & the general consensus is that she’s just a precious little thing from a privileged background & education who had never held a “proper” job (only a couple of advisory positions in charities) who when handed a Ministerial position was found to be woefully out of her depth and she was so embarrassing they had no other choice but to remove her & true to the spoilt little girl she is she then went into sulk mode & has been desperate to get her own back. If Ms Teather is as principled as she claims (again the main comments against her) why hasn’t she left now in a seat that due to boundary changes she would have certainly lost anyway at the next election and creted a by-election?. No she has stayed on to sit on her backside and take over £120 plus expenses pay for 18 months & by going at a General Election secure the £50k parachute payment that MP’s only get when they step down at that stage & two extra years on an over inflated pension.
Great to hear Jeremy Bowen on ‘Today’ referring to islamic jihadist maniacs as “the pro-western armed opposition”.
Are you sure they’re “pro-western”, Jeremy?
‘Jeremy Bowen on ‘Today’ referring to islamic jihadist maniacs as “the pro-western armed opposition’
Some would be keen to get that clip, and then ask the BBC how he has arrived at that description.
But they’d probably ban them.
No wonder Cameron is happy with the status quo.
Well that’s what they told him, so it must be true
Almost a quarter of men ‘admit to rape in parts of Asia’ – http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-24021573
Erm, except that when you read the article, you find that they don’t. That’s merely a feminist interpretation of a feminist study.
Sorry BBC, but I refuse to believe that 25% of men in large parts of Asia are rapists.
Jeff
Maybe one of our currently ‘resting’ seekers of truth and demanders of substantiation may be prevailed upon to check around the office and come back with credible sourcing?
Have a little listen to this bitty on the ‘Today’ programme:- http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b039px7n
at 53m 44s and especially 57m 10s.
Lots of ‘Asian’ elephants running around in this radio room.
The horrific figure of 75% of the offenders where from Pakistan origin was only because the crimes occurred in Asian ‘enclaves’, i.e. East London, parts of Yorkshire, etc, etc. Oh, that’s ok then.
Where was obvious the obvious follow up question about the religious aspect of theses atrocities in our country.
Humphries:- ‘we will need more research done’, how about some honesty instead, aired on the BBC? Fat chance!
More or Less please.
Or is Tim Harford/the OU too “chicken to even try it”(to quote St Strummer of Bridgwater!)
‘merely a feminist interpretation of a feminist study”
Not sure if Ms. Mazumdar is likely to be one, but one has to wonder if our Tulip is yet another of the BBC’s legions of cubicle and telephone muchkins (like that bird who managed to ‘earn’ diddly squat in the real world for a week using her market rate talents) who gets called a ‘reporter’ on day 1?
‘Not sure if Ms. Mazumdar is likely to be one’ –
From the uncritical article – treating a survey’s findings as if they were fact – and from the fact that she’s a BBC reporter, I wouldn’t be gobsmacked if it turns out she’s a Guardian-reading feminist… 🙂
Jeff
You wouldn’t know it from listening to Nicky Campbell & his BBC Radio 5 Gangshow this morning after 8am but yesterday there was some big news story about the BBC.
BBC on-line has a section named Newspaper Review so they can’t help but mention the news.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-24027909
Some nice pithy phrases from the non-BBC/Guardian journos. I favour this one….
Quentin Letts, writing in the Mail, says the “guardians of the airwaves” were “clawing at each other like polecats in a water butt” as they tried to blame each other for the redundancy packages.
Again the use of ‘quotes’ amuses.
I’m sure they’ll say it was to sample what someone (FT) has said and in no way trying to editorialise upon what is, no doubt, a scandal.
I also note:
‘The Mail agrees that it should be replaced – “but not, God forbid, by that nest of politically correct Blairites, Ofcom”.’
The blind, unapologetic god like worshipping of Obama by the bbbc is truly staggering. Everyone knows that they do truly believe that the sun shines out of every one of his orifices but how can they not criticise him for actually telling lies and mis-truths (the ‘red line’ issue is the finest example (of many)). Has the quality of western politicians fallen to such a low level? I now find myself having respect for Putin. He has (apparently) behaved in a very mature ,statesman like way throughout the whole of the Syrian crisis. I particularly enjoyed the subtle way he made the attendees for the G20 summit look as though they were naughty schoolchildren having been sent to the headmaster for a dressing down.
I found it particularly nauseating to watch the out of touch executive from the bbc/bbc trust being questioned by the PAC yesterday. Has any one of them EVER done a day’s work in their lives? Or have they just sat on their fat arses and taken as much public money as possible during their entire lives?
Sorry to rant, I feel slightly better now
Can anyone imagine the flow of vitriole emanating from the bbbc had this be a republican or conservative president. Of course, Cameroon has made himself look as pathetic as possible throughout the whole of this crisis
“Has the quality of western politicians fallen to such a low level? ”
The problem with western politicians now is they feel they have to be liked, as with Obama, rather than respected. You don’t have to like Putin to have a grudging respect for him.
The BBC, having invested so much in liking Obama, cannot now admit to itself that liking him isn’t enough. Hence the blind worship, rather than admit that the Emperor has no clothes.
That was meant to be a reply to An English Gentleman.
Guido understands that this landed in Ian Katz inbox this morning:
“We would like to express our anger and disappointment at your tweet following Newsnight’s interview with Rachel Reeves. It is completely unacceptable for a senior BBC editor to have expressed this view, whether or not you intended for it to be made public. It is vitally important that the Labour Party, our Shadow Cabinet and Newsnight viewers have confidence in the impartiality and fairness of your programme, and the criteria on which guests and interviews are judged. This incident undermines that confidence and it is important that this is redressed. Although a tweet of apology has been made, a full written public apology should be made by the end of the day.”
Don’t they know that tweets by BBC staff don’t count?
‘Don’t they know that tweets by BBC staff don’t count?’
They do now.
Wasn`t he speaking in a personal capacity?..the Evan Davis and Dianne Abbott defences as I believe they`re to be called?
Katz might be the usual Guardian monkey pre-chewing his peanuts for the Labour Party-but he is correct-the likes of Reeves are hypocritical slimy clones who were ex-bankers or what have you…so we need no lessons from her, Ummah etc re “what the Tories are doing”.
Because they not only caused it-but they have done rather well out of it all, when they worked in the City.
That such ciphers and gobshites DID tank the economy is no surprise-that they are helped to get away from the wreakage by BBC helicopters on a daily basis is the bigger scandal.
Yes, she was boring-what are we debating then?
‘Yes, she was boring-what are we debating then?’
Wasn’t aware it was always a debate, but I saw this as very much a win-win.
Labour drone outed as such by mortified BBC host. Purpose on purpose reverse Claymore. Heck of a deal.
Purely as a matter of professional competence the use and abuse of twitter by BBC employees remains a matter of interest.
One might also pause to ponder how the supposedly premier news magazine of the supposedly most trusted news broadcaster in the world is going to attract guests of any calibre if they have a reputation for doing over those who grace their studios.
Just seen a piece on BBC news channel about Jaguar Rover in Solihull, where there are plans to produce new vehicles and increase production.
The BBC reporter asked ‘don’t you think you might be expanding too fast, bearing in mind we’ve just had a recession and….’.
There is no doubt that these dumbass reporters have all been marinated in the BBC’s poison liquid and are thus required to cast doubt in the minds of viewers on any good news story and undermine confidence. It’s part of the narrative they share with their bedfellows the Labour Party that the recovery is not real and chances are it could fail at any moment- they wish it I believe.
The poor guy being interviewed was stunned and will I think regret his answers – he was in such awe of the BBC that he felt he had to say ‘you are quite right that…’.
The BBC is a national disgrace. Will that interview be seen round the world?
This is a more straight-forward report-
“Jaguar to create 1,700 new jobs”
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-24018350
“Jaguar Land Rover add 1,700 new direct jobs and further 24,000 in supply chain”
http://www.londonlovesbusiness.com/business-in-london/investment/6269.article?
Plan B in action !
Ah that famous enterprise culture, as evidenced by the BBC and its “business correspondents”.
Yesterday I heard some woman from Lloyds having to put up with a Today monkey( prep school-Oxbridge-BBC…so never having had to earn a living…just sponge of daddy and Auntie)…her bank is becoming a TSB.
Was this because of the PPI stuff then?…it would not have been due to Brown and Darling forcing it to buy HBOS etc, via a pliable chairman at a Burns Night do would it?
No mention of the EU either-classic BBC!
One wonders why everybody behaves and puts up with smears and abuses by rogue BBC clowns with microphones for mouths…it`s got to turn one day hasn`t it?
Is St. Margaret the best MP ever?
Jeremy Vine
Oh that we all had a legally bullet proof glass house to spout off from!
I guessed it could only be hodge the dodge he was talking about rather than The Blessed Maggie.
It being the BBC and all.
Five Live currently banging on about the housing shortage. No mention of the cause of this whatsoever.
They had someone ring in from Oxford where of course ‘students’ get the blame.
http://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/3955/france-secularism-charter
http://www.france24.com/en/20130908-france-schools-get-secularism-charter
strangely no BBC report on this, nothing on their euronews either
Gavin Hewitt … no
other top stories … no
also in the news … no
world service news … no
special reports … no
why? … well maybe this
http://www.newenglishreview.org/blog_direct_link.cfm/blog_id/292
come on slow coach bbc 😀
even the laughably named independent has it.
http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/comment/young-and-disaffected-muslims-will-view-french-securality-schools-charter-as-simply-the-status-quo-8805727.html
Just as I was thinking “with one bound he (Obama) is free”, Mark Mardell opines: “It is not exactly “with one bound he was free””. As Mardell is usually wrong, I know I’m right.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-24027243
Mardell purrs: “At the end of the process he could just look like the smartest guy in the room”.
Though I hate the humiliating situation the President’s “red line” statement has put the United States, (a statement made during the election to make him sound tough) it’s good to know that what Mardell and the BBC thinks doesn’t matter.
What matters is what Putin, Assad, the Mullahs in Iran, the Chinese, the Israelis and the Saudis think – and we all KNOW what they think.
The truth is that the academics who run the American government with all the experience of lengthy debates in the faculty lounge have been outmaneuvered by thugs. So much for Liberal experts who view a world they think exists through a glass blindly, ignoring the world that actually exists.
I should think that every politician is Britain is breathing a sigh of relief about Parliament’s “no” vote. If you’re in a tough spot the last person you want on your side is the current US President. I’m very afraid all friends and allies of the US will now be examining how best to avoid dealing with President Groucho and his brothers in the State Department.
Meanwhile Mardell will feed the Today/Question Time/PM/5 Live talk machine with platitudes leaving the BBC audience to climb the stairs to bed feeling safe with their nightly cup of Horlicks and the Shipping Forecast.
Even here the disgusting Mardell can’t help but let his personal bias cloud his reporting:
The hawks in Congress may not like this but many Democrats will.
WTF? What happened to all that talk of Republicans not wanting to go to war under the direction of
a black manthis President? What happened to all that talk about Iraq fatigue and all that? It’s the effing Democrats who have been calling for war, and only what’s left of the Republican establishment leadership begrudgingly went along with it. Only McCain has been hawkish on his own, really. Sure, most Democrats are willing to start killing people out of pure devotion to a man rather than for any national security or foreign policy interest, but that’s not the point. And the BBC is fine with that anyway.Look at the most recent whip tally and see what an absolute partisan LIAR Mardell is:
Where Congress stands on Syria
What a complete failure as a journalist this man is. And as always, the BBC US President editor remains true to the job title I’ve given him:
The real danger would be getting dragged into a long-running mess, where weapons inspectors are given the run-around and Mr Obama looks gullible.
Yes, the danger isn’t what might happen on the ground, or that Assad can carry on killing people in other ways. No, the danger is that The Obamessiah will look bad.
Okay, lurking journalists, here’s where you come in and tell me I’m reading things that aren’t there, or that I just don’t understand how news works.
Even the Left-wing New Republic, which is owned by a former Obamessiah campaign strategist, is saying this doesn’t make Him look good.
The Syria Solution: How Obama Got Played by Assad and Putin
Last night, President Barack Obama, who, just over a week ago, had said he was ready to act, tells the nation’s cable watchers that he’s now discussing this bogus plan with Russian President Vladimir Putin, and that he’s “going to take this very seriously” while also not letting up on the drumbeat of military strikes while. On Tuesday, Syria said it had accepted Russia’s proposal and France said it would seek the UN Security Council’s backing for the proposal.
This, in other words, is no light at the end of the tunnel. This, to borrow a phrase from a Congressional staffer at his wits’ end, “is an unmitigated clusterfuck.”
Mardell seems to be just about the only “journalist” in the world who sees this as a potential triumph for the President. Well, perhaps not the only one, as it seems like most of his BBC colleagues are still singing from the same hymn sheet.
Never sure the BBC really thinks through matters of precedent.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-24022774?
Now, if I were some toe-rag looking for 15 minutes of infamy…
Bit like that recent dietary ‘explanation’ from that Syrian jihadist commander.
If, perhaps, with a smidge more bleeding heart material.
Oh yes, I recall Tom Symond’s mugger story
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-18739151
It all sounded rather worse at the time – I mean before his restorative justice report.
Fascinatingly all the BBC stock photos of knife clutching muggers and handcuffed hoodies used in these reports are of youths with hideously white hands. Home Affairs at the Beeb eh?
But Mr Symond’s mugger was black – here’s his photo
http://www.tottenhamjournal.co.uk/news/crime-court/holloway_teen_jailed_for_knifepoint_robbery_of_muswell_hill_bbc_correspondent_1_1498317
Bear it mind – just incase in future he doesn’t go straight
Tx for that.
Nice to flesh out the story with a few.. pertinent extra facts.
I almost thought the BBC had a reporter just for Muswell Hill which, projecting countrywide, could have explained the staffing and budget.
And one really shouldn’t, but this did raise a smile: ‘The self-emplyed teenager’. And not just for the typo.
A history of Conservative thought is being broadcast on Radio 4 every lunchtime as I write.
Just heard part 7-and though it`s not as bad as it could be(this is the BBC after all)…I do feel that the curled lip approach to the “Tories” re getting female voters , their fear of Socialist takeover etc is a bit much.
I heard some piece from the BBC last night about Venezuela-and Socialism can and does end up in nationalised shops. That it did not in Britain in 1945 may well be thanks to the “Tories” running up this flag, so voters could warn Labour off doing this. Anne McElvoy doesn`t see this possibility.
As to husbands being moved around the country and having to serve the State(another warning from the Tories in the 1920s re Labours intentions)-easy divorce and abortions, free love-this warning to prospective Tory women has long passed become a tragic reality…yet the Tories get no thanks for this either.
It`s as if Lenin, Stalin, Ceausescu, Mao, Pol Pot, Chavez and Nasser, Hussein, Gadhaffi have never existed-all are socialists..or were at any rate.
Not a dreadful hatchet job by the BBC-but hardly reflects just how right the Tories of the 1920s were about Labour.
And why do we get the likes of Tristram Hunt(New Labour MP) to give us HIS take on what it all means…why no Andrew Roberts or Niall Fergusson for example?