318 Responses to OPEN THREAD

  1. dej says:

    Oh that’s hilarious!

    since last last Friday night I have been blocked from this site (I’m using a proxy server) and have been blocked from leaving messages.

    Strange that isn’t it?

    But apparently, posting White Supremacist videos, and supporting a Pogrom against Jews Muslims is perfectly okay.

    Gets funnier every day.

       4 likes

    • David Preiser (USA) says:

      Nobody’s banned dez. Try again.

         16 likes

      • ltwf1964 says:

        using a proxy to hide the bbc “work”place ip address 😉

           15 likes

        • Dysgwr_Cymraeg says:

          Yep, hiding behind a proxy, but if that is true, why would he tell us? Me no understand?

             2 likes

          • David Preiser (USA) says:

            The site doesn’t normally block proxy IPs, either. Unless it’s associated with one of those Chinese spammers…..

               1 likes

    • +james says:

      Paranoid mate, the site has been on the blink for the last week or so. And there was me thinking you had hacked into the site to block access for the rest of us.

         12 likes

    • Guest Who says:

      de(a-z)
      Paranoia is knowing ‘they’ are out to get you, and only you.
      Always ‘brave’ to raise the notion of such things on unmodded free sites when a defender of highly censored force-funded one.
      This may therefore entertain…
      http://www.maxfarquar.com/2012/10/grauniad-comment-for-cash/
      It looks like you can even comment.
      Have your credit card handy… if you dare.

         5 likes

  2. +james says:

    Oh dear the BBC night be telling porkies again….

    Jimmy Savile: leaked email casts doubt on BBC reason for shelving Newsnight exposé

    The BBC’s official explanation for cancelling a Newsnight investigation into sexual abuse by Jimmy Savile was cast into doubt last night by a leaked internal email.

    http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/crime/jimmy-savile/9619327/Jimmy-Savile-leaked-email-casts-doubt-on-BBC-reason-for-shelving-Newsnight-expose.html

       12 likes

    • Guest Who says:

      Oh dear indeed…
      ‘ “we may well need to do a bit of managing around this… we should bear in mind how BBC complaints team respond”.
      And this bit of managing would be, Complaints Team #101 classics:
      1) Deny
      2) Decry
      3) Bunker down
      4) Coax out a weasel
      5) Distraction
      6) Deploy the 3rd part hounds
      7) Try to ‘move on’
      8) Find another scandal pronto
      9) Start screening ‘are we too..?’ docos that make the accusations appear less serious or part of a campaign
      10) Announce an internal inquiry
      11) Wait a year until the independent Best Buds Cover-up has discovered that, actually, they were 110% correct and it was the Daily Mail and Fatcher’s fault all along
      12) Quietly stealth edit all archives
      13) Introduce a ‘shop the unfaithful’ staff program
      14) Promote those who observed the Omerta code
      15) Sideline those who squealed
      16) Trawl the internet for dissent and keep files on critics
      17) Wait a few years before producing a revisionist retrospective on it all
      18) Quietly early retire any who may yet prove a liability on full golden parachutes
      19) Move on
      20) Stay as unique as they have been, are and seem destined to remain, ever after
      From what I have seen so far, they are already up to 10.

         21 likes

    • noggin says:

      “The press officer, Helen Deller, writes that “we may well need to do a bit of managing around this” and that “we should bear in mind how BBC complaints team respond”.

      “need to do a bit of managing” hmm highly dubious and suspicious …
      mind you, “how BBC complaints team respond”
      she doesn t have to worry about that! 😀
      a more self protectionist, hypocritical, viewer derisory department doesn t exist at the bbc
      and thats saying something.

         11 likes

    • Guest Who says:

      The current home page edit of that Telegraph headline is rather hilariously ironic given the BBC’s state of denial about the effects of it’s ‘truth won’t fit’ policy on headline accuracy.

         2 likes

  3. As I See It says:

    O/T but then again perhaps it sheds some more light on BBC Savile hipocrisy and the close knit left liberal elite.

    The brothers at the Gruan have this about the BBC’s sudden sacking of 68 year old Jazz presenter Mike Harding.

    http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2012/oct/17/bbc-radio-mike-harding?newsfeed=true

    “presenter Mike Harding, who has been axed as presenter of the station’s folk music show after 15 years, has hit out at its controller Bob Shennan, saying the only time he rang him was to sack him.”

    Meanwhile The Daily Mail has the line

    ‘I’m not Jimmy Savile or Jonathan Ross, so why was I fired?’

    http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2219706/Mike-Harding-Fury-Radio-2-presenter-fired-phone-15-years-BBC.html

    ‘Hypocrisy is the state of promoting or administering virtues, moral or religious beliefs, principles, etc., that one does not actually have or is also guilty of violating.’

       11 likes

    • Guest Who says:

      ‘‘I’m not Jimmy Savile or Jonathan Ross, so why was I fired?’”
      Possibly he did not represent the kind of values the BBC wish to portray in speaking for the nation’?

         7 likes

      • Mark says:

        This seems a bizarre decision on the part of the Beeb, given Mike Harding’s leftist political stance and membership of the Ramblers’ Association.

           8 likes

    • John Anderson says:

      I don’t follow Mike Harding on the Radio – but I remember him many years ago as a comedian/musician. He struck me as very funny in an old-fashioned way, and a good musician. A nice guy. Unless he is not delivering – why on earth would the BBC want to sack him ?

         7 likes

      • chrisH says:

        Not a great fan, but I owe him for introducing me to the mighty Show of Hands amongst other fine folkies.
        Bit of a smug lefty beeboid( But this IS folk , we`re talking about)-so he probably deserved to know the nature of who he`s been working for.
        He has his lesson.
        That said, like Jools Holland he IS a musician, and has been there at the BBC long enough to deserve better than this.
        Deserve Harding-get Brand.
        Hope his pals rally round and boycott the BBC.

           7 likes

        • Backwoodsman says:

          Actually, Harding presented arguably (equal best with Bob Harris Country), the best specialist music on the bbc. The guy absolutely knew his subject and played superb music.
          Well, its like Christmas when I was a kid – bbc slowly being ripped apart by their less than stellar cover up attempt and now labour mp’s dodgy expenses on the agenda again !

             3 likes

          • Pah says:

            Yup, despite his inability to hide his often hilarious political beliefs Harding was the best of the ‘specialist’ music presenters on BBC Radio 2.

            Perhaps the BBC is worried that folk music is ‘too English’ and may not appreciated by those not blessed with that sacred state of being? Sort of not minority enough? Time for more Albanian Nose Flute Orchestra perhaps?

               3 likes

            • David Preiser (USA) says:

              Looks like good old-fashioned agism to me. The younger producers wanted to go “live”, and didn’t like the sound of his old voice. The millions of teenagers and twenty-somethings dying to hear live folk music want a younger-sounding voice, I guess.

                 0 likes

  4. George R says:

    BBC-NUJ’s latest political ‘Viewpoint’:

    “Viewpoint: Explorer [black] Dwayne Fields on black youths in countryside”

    http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-19549239

    BBC-NUJ political ‘Viewpoint’ next week will NOT be:-

    ‘Viewpoint: Tommy Robinson, EDL, on non-Muslim youths
    in Tower Hamlets’.

       13 likes

  5. As I See It says:

    Suppose that a certain evaluation process came up with a result about which some BBC staff and their PC-minded friends were not happy. Do you reckon that the BBC would simply “fix” the process to come up with a different more acceptable result ?

    What our BBC? Surely not. We trust the BBC.

    Those easily bored look away now – this is about the BBC Sports Personality of the Year.

    http://www.guardian.co.uk/sport/2012/oct/18/bbc-sports-personality-of-year?newsfeed=true

    “The BBC has radically overhauled the voting system for the Sports Personality of the Year award following last year’s controversy about the all-male shortlist”

    Oh yes, apparently, there was ‘controversy’ last year. Well I do recall Dame Nicky Campbell throwing a hissy. And then the BBC must have done some phoning around because there were a string of PC campaigners and whiney grievance merchants put on air shouting ‘look at me look at me!’

    “The panel will include three newspaper sports editors, to be rotated annually, including the Observer’s Matthew Hancock. Three BBC Sport executives will be joined by the Radio 5 Live sport presenter Eleanor Oldroyd, the sports broadcaster Sue Mott, three former nominees who this year will be Sir Steve Redgrave, Baroness Tanni Grey-Thompson and Denise Lewis, and the UK Sport chair, Baroness Sue Campbell.”

       7 likes

    • As I See It says:

      Of course we could complain that the list of BBC approved judges are all Common Purpose?

         9 likes

  6. +james says:

    The leaked BBC Savile email..

    article-2219998-15935247000005DC-992_634x585.jpg

       17 likes

    • chrisH says:

      I demand an enquiry!
      This email being leaked is now THE story for all BBC outlets…and let`s hope that we can “manage” to make this THE story!
      Is DLT still on the premises?…will send it by Securicor just in case he`s still prowling the corridors!

         8 likes

    • Guest Who says:

      If that’s for real, it looks like it was a good day to bury the BBC’s reputation for… well… anything… professional integrity, trust, objectivity, commitment to truth, information, education… once and for all.
      I wonder what the ‘below suggested lines’ were?
      The questions being asked to hold the ‘no one knew, no one complained, nothing could be done’ powers to account will be a hoot.

         10 likes

      • As I See It says:

        Below the line…..

        Click to access EMAIL_347314a.pdf

        Jimmy Savile Expose
        1) The allegations have been circulating for years why not run the story when Jimmy Savile was alive
        to respond? (OBVIOUSLY ASSUMING HERE….)
        Mr Savile was a very popular and well-love figure. The individuals were unwilling to go on the record
        prior to Mr Savile’s death for fear of reprisal and felt they would not be taken seriously…
        2) If the individuals featured are credible why didn’t they report the abuse to the authorities before?
        (Could be similar to above answer but you will of course be better informed)
        3) How did you corroborate the validity of your sources? As the country’s most trusted news provider
        the BBC has strict guidelines to ensure accuracy in our output, contributors’ stories are checked and
        double checked as is any relevant documentary evidence. Newsnight adheres to these guidelines
        when investigating stories and we are confident of our journalism regarding this investigation.
        4) Newsnight audiences are flagging isn’t this just a cheap shot, rehashing scandalous rumours to
        get more viewers? Not at all. Newsnight continues to attract good audiences and this year has seen
        some record breaking figures. We don’t simply chase stories because they will grab headlines but
        neither do we shy away from subjects because they be prove uncomfortable viewing. Newsnight gets
        viewers to think again about what is happening in the news agenda and this story is no different.
        5) How is attempting to destroy a deceased popular celebrity’s reputation in the public interest?
        (need to be clear on editorial justification here – would it be along the lines of just because someone
        has a particular standing / persona it shouldn’t mean they cannot be held to account for inappropriate
        actions /behaviour….?)

           4 likes

        • Guest Who says:

          Tx.
          As to the answering of any further questions, such as those below on how the Times’ front page seemed not to make the cut on Today, I suspect one might, at best get: ‘The BBC has the highest editorial standards and with any story an editor has to weigh many things before putting something to air.’
          That, by the way, is from the Newsnight Editor’s one and only early-closed outing a few weeks ago, since when The Editors blog has gone silent.

             3 likes

        • Sir Arthur Strebe-Grebling says:

          the country’s most trusted news provider !!!

             7 likes

        • Guest Who says:

          “It is simply an exchange between a junior press officer and the Newsnight producer asking for further information about the Jimmy Savile investigation.”
          I dunno. Does this come across as ‘asking for further info’?
          I guess if they tell it often enough, there’s a small chance some may believe them on this too.

             3 likes

    • Umbongo says:

      I was only half-listening to the Today review of the papers earlier (around 7:40) but it seemed to me that the review omitted the main story on the front page of the Times with the enormous headline
      Leaked e-mail puts BBC’s Savile defence in doubt.
      Was this so? The replay of the programme online appears to omit the whole review so I cannot confirm or deny my impression.

         13 likes

      • RCE says:

        Yup, I put some petrol in on the way to work so saw the Times’ headline in the shop… Then noticed it wasn’t included in the Toady round-up.

        I think I may ask them why that was.

           14 likes

    • As I See It says:

      Helen Deller
      @helsdell

      Publicist for BBC News. Love new music, war zones & good causes, Brighton & Hove FC fan, girl guide asst leader too. Ps these views are mine & not the BBC’s

         4 likes

      • As I See It says:

        LinkedIn : Helen Deller’s Overview

        Current

        Publicist – BBC News at BBC

        Past

        Head of Comms at Commission for Racial Equality

        Well you could have knocked me over with a feather. PC Liberal elite anyone?

           20 likes

      • As I See It says:

        Leaving the BBC Savile scandal aside, it seems our Helen Tweets some information that her employer agrees is for public consumption…

        Helen Deller

        Congrats to @allegrastratton & welcome to #Newsnight – our new political editor 🙂

        Helen Deller

        RT @BBCNewsnight: On #Newsnight an exclusive on NoW putting hacking lawyers under surveillance – we speak to private detective used and …

        Sorry I got in a muddle in the first two lines of my post. BBC staff often forget this….THE PUBLIC ARE OUR HELEN’S EMPLOYER.

           4 likes

        • David Preiser (USA) says:

          They all do that. Part of the deal, they’re encouraged (told) to do so. I have no problem with that at all, per se. The real problem is how that begins to blur the line between professional and personal.

          It’s entirely possible for Beeboids to tweet announcements about their work or upcoming BBC shows mixed in with personal convo and commentary on public events without betraying their political bias. BBC camerman Andy Alcroft is a model of probity this way. It can be done without too much effort, of one isn’t an extreme partisan hack, as so many of the on-air talent and content producers seem to be.

          They just have to mind their manners to that when one of them tweets something like, “Did you see that ludicrous display last night,” we know they’re talking about sports and not something a Conservative said.

          It’s the BBC’s own crap policy and intellectual failure in management that created the environment for the biased free-for-all, only to crack down on some poor employee when someone notices. Jude Machin was enabled, then smacked when caught doing what she thought she was allowed to do, and had to delete her entire account. And she’s not the only one.

          Having said all that, this Helen Deller doesn’t seem to be tweeting her political bias.

             2 likes

    • David Preiser (USA) says:

      This is all to Newsnight people, isn’t it? Not to BBC top brass. I thought the problem was the segment being cancelled by orders from on high or other pressure? Surely they always have to run things by their legal team before going to air.

      I guess it can be seen as evidence that the BBC was worried about their own reputation, but how is this a smoking gun?

         0 likes

  7. chrisH says:

    Wish Craig was here!
    I lose count of how often the Today presenters say that “people are saying/will want to know/are entitled to know/will be wondering etc…as a means to put sneery skids under their Tory oppo, in order to catch the next news bulletin…and tomorrows Guardian follow up.

    Isn`t it about time one Tory fat cat or banker asked ” which people ,Justin?”-and watch them implode!
    Presumptuous, pompous and as comically predictable as Monty Pythons “Spanish Inquisition”….but the ones that refused to go to Granada or Cordoba.
    Note Mona Saddiqi is on Desert Island Discs next week?…a Muslim woman-listening to music?….does the Taliban know, and will the BBC give me their “grassline” so I can inform them…after all “people are saying “that the BBC sets females up for shootings by publicising their “westernising tendencies”

       17 likes

  8. Alex says:

    See the BBC were in overdrive this morning over Nick Griffin’s tweeting of the address of the gay couple who successfully won damages from a Christian couple who refused them lodgings. Right, so it’s OK for the BBC and the rest of the MSM to publish the address of the Christian couple but not for Nick Griffin to do the same regards the gay couple. I thought we lived in a democracy. I wonder what would have happened if the gay couple approached a Muslim B and B?

       26 likes

    • will says:

      The BBC is keen to give front page coverage to the activities of busted flush (at most) Griffin but are playing down the revelations about the latest expenses scams of our legislators – currently last item on “Politics” page and then only dealing with Bercows cover up attempts.

      Is it because the most prominent fiddler is Socialist MP Linda Riordan?

         14 likes

    • Earls court says:

      Muslim B & B?
      They won’t dare,seeing something very nasty would happen to them.
      If they wanted help from their Rainbow Alliance comrades about it, they won’t get any.

         12 likes

    • Robbo says:

      Yes, I was listening to the report yesterday afternoon on radio 5 about the gay couple and the Christian B&B owners. The Radio 5 person drew attention to Nick Griffin’s tweet, but FAILED TO MENTION that the Christian couple had received a large amount of hate mail and had required police protection for several months. It was actually the gay couple that explained this had happened, apparently in the interests of balance.
      If they hadn’t mentioned it, the listeners would have had no idea, so fair play to them for telling the listeners about this. Basically they did the job that the BBC should have done.
      I see it’s all over the BBC News channel this morning. Has anyone heard any mention from the BBc about the harassment the Christian couple had to put up with?

         18 likes

      • Richard Pinder says:

        I don’t know, it was the first item on the Jeremy Vine show, so I changed over to listen to the Peter Levi show.

           1 likes

  9. Guest Who says:

    http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/timstanley/100185643/obama-describes-deaths-of-4-americans-in-libya-as-not-optimal-now-hes-channeling-mike-dukakis/
    With semantic gymnastics like that, maybe the BBC should ask Obama to handle their internal Savile inquiry?
    He may be free soon.

       12 likes

  10. Dave666 says:

    After getting in last night just after midnight from the community radio station where I have a show, playing the music the BBc hates-i.e. white rock, I turned on BBC 4 to witness in my opinion a re-writing of history (again).
    It concerned why the Allies spent so long in Africa and Italy in WWII. Turns out it was all about British Imperial ambition!!?

       18 likes

    • DP says:

      Yes, the BBC would like to portray the Allies as the guilty ones (Cue incredulous David Mitchell in his Nazi uniform, wondering if they are the bad guys):
      – for years pushing guilt on the British for bombing Dresden,
      – then, when facts and objectivity can no longer be resisted, pushing the guilt on Churchill (though not the Labour part of that coalition govt, nor the subsequent Labour govt) for not publicly acknowledging the sacrifices made by Bomber Command.

         13 likes

    • George R says:

      And the political ‘left’ on WWI:-

      “The Left’s redwashing of the First World War”

      By Ed West

      http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/edwest/100185728/the-lefts-redwashing-of-the-first-world-war/

         2 likes

    • George R says:

      This was the anti-Churchill, WWII diatribe by Paul Reynolds.

      Some cryptic criticisms of his BBC 4 programme:

      1.) He oversimplifies WWII and military complexities of 1942,
      understating Germany’s military strength in Europe and beyond, and
      understating Britiain’s military weakness.

      2. He almost contradicts himself by admitting that an ‘Overlord’
      invasion was not feasible in 1943.

      3.) After Dunkirk defeat, he almost implies British troops should have
      gone back soon after!

      4.) Reynolds supports USSR in WWII, but doesn’t criticise Stalin errors
      as he does Churchill’s.

      5.) He assumes British Empire was moral, political and military
      incumberance without counter views. He admires Labour’s Marxist Stafford Cripps
      in WWII because he was pro-India independence.

      6.) Reynolds seems to admire Egyptian Muslims’ enthusiasm for Rommel and Nazis in WWII!
      Pretty anti-British of him.

      7.) Reynolds applauds American republicanism, and anti-British
      imperialism, as though USA was not an imperialist power by 1940- with
      interests in Latin America and SE. Asia.

      8.) His conclusion likens the grizzly death of Mussolini and his Roman
      Empire in 1945, to the end of Churchill’s British Empire.

      And all this is still available on BBC i-Player.

         4 likes

      • George R says:

        The diatribe was by Prof David Reynolds.

           0 likes

        • George R says:

          Not a BBC-NUJ ‘Viewpoint’ to be allowed next month:

          -‘Churchill was correct in trying to avoid a head-on land conflict with Nazi Germany in Northern Europe in 1942.’

             2 likes

    • Doyle says:

      Did you notice the camera lingering over the muslim grave at Monte Cassino? How predictable.

         3 likes

      • wallygreeninker says:

        The worst (only?) case of mass rape committed by allied forces in World war II was that which occurred after Juin’s Moroccan/Algerian mountain troops carried out the attack which outflanked Monte Cassino.

           1 likes

  11. Sres says:

    http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-20002362

    Have watched the BBC all morning after the Telegraph revelations about MP’s swapping rents, it seems the BBC had buried the above filling from very early this morning in their UK Politics page and it was just a 2 or 3 paragraph side comment with no mention of MPs, even though a Labour MP was troughing to £19k a year.

    About an hour ago it became apparent that a Tory MP was indulging and lo and behold the BBC elevate this story to important, it has been elevated to the top of the UK Politics and has now a good dozen paragraphs with Tory MP & Lib Dem MP details splashed, and lo at the bottom of the page (timed at 11:23) mention of the earlier Labour MP, with a dismissive comment…

       25 likes

  12. chrisH says:

    We could have had Nick Griffin at the BBC far more, and maybe they`d not be in the pickle that they now find themselves in.
    Nick revealed “exclusively” the existence of Muslim sex rings up north a few years back-but all he got was a show trial for his pains.
    Griffin could well have smoked out Savile and scooped the “Investigative Reporter of the Year” -had they given him more than one toxic appearance next to Bonnie Greer on QT.
    Maybe Nick Griffin is the man to do the BBC enquiry after all!

       17 likes

    • Earls court says:

      I can see people like Nick Griffin becoming very popular in the future.

         10 likes

      • Dysgwr_Cymraeg says:

        Nice juxtaposition on breakfast BBC this morning, item on the scheme to take parties of schoolkids to Auschwitz to teach them the horrors of extreme right wing parties like the nazis. Immediately followed by interview with the gay couple who had the B and B problem, so they could focus on nasty nick’s outing of them. Nicely juxtaposed beeb.

           5 likes

    • noggin says:

      http://www.bbc.co.uk/i/b01nbvlm/

      gaulling display on 5live, panto getting all
      BBCGriffinQT stylee, on free speech using the christian B&B couple as the punchbag, tatchell, “OUT-rage”, gay activists, even tearful “sew nice” christian tea ladies …… pitiful ……
      but have a listen from 48 mins

         6 likes

      • As I See It says:

        Dame Nicky can’t really ‘chair’ a debate on this Buggery n Breakfast issue. He has already this morning expressed his own personal opinion that ‘all right thinking people’ believe the relevant New Labour PC law to be correct. Balance, what balance?

           11 likes

      • David Preiser (USA) says:

        Don’t remember the BBC frowning at Spike Lee for re-tweeting (what he thought was) the home address of George Zimmerman in an attempt to incite…some kind of action, wouldn’t want to libel Spike and say what….against him.

        Hell, the Beeboids themselves tried to use Twitter to incite a boycott against a taxi company. Until they got caught by DB, that is.

        At least a grown man called Nicky understood that Christians have a right to their beliefs…”at the moment”. But he lost credibility when he labeled a caller a “defender of the unsavory”, when in fact the guy was defending free speech. One small step towards ending thoughtcrime by eliminating the ability to express unapproved thoughts. Well done, Nicky.

        Except for one, all the callers were doing as noggin says, bashing Griffin for everything else he’s done and said, not a word about the legality of Christians exercising religious freedom. Even the BNP mouthpiece (a real dissembler and unsavory character, from the sound of him) talked about Griffin’s opinions in general and not the issue at hand.

        Nicky gets a tiny bit of credibility back for asking if the WikiHacks release of the BNP membership list – which, I believe, really did cause professional harm to some people – was just as bad.

        Also, well done Nicky for putting words into the BNP guy’s mouth trying to do a little character assassination in the process. What impartiality, eh? He may not have taken obvious sides on the issue of the B&B, but he did take sides against Griffin and a political party. Which amounts to the same thing in the end.

           4 likes

        • Jim Dandy says:

          David

          You’re out of your depth here. This Isn”t a freedom of speech issue. Would you support a ‘no Jews ‘ B&b? No. And rightly so.

          Nick Griffin is a Facist thug. His views have no merit.

             3 likes

          • GCooper says:

            And Eric Hobsbawm was a supporter of, and propagandist for, mass murdering communist thugs.

            So why does your employer consider his views have ‘merit’?

               6 likes

          • RCE says:

            What about his c.2004 views on ‘Asian’ grooming gangs?

            (Not that I expect a reply; too tricky, and its far easier to hide behind a drive-by post that serves no purpose other than making you feel like you’ve defended ‘the cause’ for the day).

               3 likes

          • David Preiser (USA) says:

            Jim, you are too kind. And you’re missing the point. The discussion got beyond whether or not they had a right to ban homosexuals to a level where their right to hold their beliefs about homosexuality was coming under question. It was heading into thoughtcrime territory.

            Are the B&B Christians’ actions legal or not? Nicky seems to think they are. Whether or not you approve is irrelevant. Whether or not I would accept being similarly banned from a place is also irrelevant. If it’s legal, fix it or accept it. If it’s illegal, then there’s no argument here.

            Regarding Griffin, deal with whether what he did is illegal or not, incitement to whatever or not, rather than how you don’t like what he said. Your opinion of his merit in general is irrelevant, as is mine.

            Do you have any thoughts on what I suggest is the BBC’s double standard as to when they criticize twitter campaigns to incite action from followers?

               4 likes

          • johnnythefish says:

            But the intolerants from the militant end of gay rights activism are not fascist, right?

               0 likes

  13. Dave666 says:

    So I’m watching the 13:00 hour news expecting “friend” of the BBc griffin to headline after his tweet. No Saville headlines, the sh*t must have really hit the fan as the investigation widens to living suspects.

    No. No B&B related tweet news..I must have just imagined it.

       4 likes

    • Guest Who says:

      ‘No Saville headlines’
      Loud if not very proud now.
      With a few others spawning off.
      This was interesting:
      http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-19946626
      Caption: ‘Sir Jimmy Savile was one of Britain’s best-loved presenters until claims of sexual abuse surfaced’
      Yes, and if the BBC had managed to keep a lid on it as planned, he may have stayed that way… well.. bar the large and growing number of folk (mostly from within the BBC) whose consistent testimony appears that he was not best loved at all.
      This trust in truth thing they keep on about; bit shaky really.
      ‘Is anyone else being drawn into the scandal?

      Revelations of alleged abuse committed by Savile have prompted claims about other public figures – most stemming from the ’70s and ’80s when attitudes towards sexual abuse were different, compared to today.
      Must be true, the BBC says it is, guys and gals.

         5 likes

      • David Preiser (USA) says:

        Was sexual abuse of teenage girls really tolerated then? Or can we now please extend this twisted moral logic to finally exonerate the US from the stain of slavery and the Jim Crow laws of the 60s? After all, it was a different time. Attitudes towards the civil rights of black people were different.

        I guess we can now excuse Stalin for the purges and mass starvation, and Mao for the Cultural Revolution as well. After all, attitudes towards human life were different then. Pol Pot? Hey, man, it was the 70s, man. They were all doing sh!t like that, man. Different time. Che? Oh, hang on, the Left-wing Beeboids already give him a pass. News of the World phone hacking? Draw a line under it, no need to close it down and start criminal proceedings against top brass, it was a different time when attitudes towards doing anything to get a story were different.

        You know, I’m starting to like this BBC morality after all.

           2 likes

  14. Dave666 says:

    Update.
    Oh no it’s on North west local news after the story about the WWII phosphorus grenade.

       1 likes

  15. It's all too much says:

    What a strange co-incidence. BBC runs a feature article on their web page whining about traveler evictions (what happened afer the evictions…)and low the Dale Farm mob (with their “Swampy” friends) attack DCLG. Almost as if there was a co-ordinated media strategy being executed. I wonder if the BBC has some prepared “lines to take” photo copied and handed out to each swampoid

       10 likes

  16. John Anderson says:

    Over the past 4 years I have never heard a single word of BBC criticism of Obama’s foreign policies. Because the wimp’s appeasing view of the world exactly matches the BBC’s views.

    Monday’s final debate is about foreign affairs and security. So here is a devastating critique of the mess Obama has created – by a former Obama advisor :

    http://hotair.com/archives/2012/10/19/former-obama-advisor-our-foreign-policy-is-a-mess-especially-in-the-middle-east/

       4 likes

    • David Preiser (USA) says:

      Not entirely true. There’s an exception that proves the rule. Mark Mardell frowned at the President eventually agreeing to join the war against Ghaddafi. He also moped about the President’s drone attacks. Of course, his reporting there was massively biased in the interests of defending Him against the charges of dithering, and mostly Mardell was disparaging the US public for wanting an unapologetically aggressive America storming ahead. Even when Mardell disapproves, it’s not His fault, you see. He had a momentary crisis of faith, but got over it soon enough.

      Has there been wailing and gnashing of teeth on Today or from any of the usual R5 suspects about anything the President has done wrong? Not that I’m aware of. Have there been any tweets from Beeboids criticizing Him on any policy? Not that I’ve seen.

      Industrious defenders of the indefensible are welcome to do the research and help us learn more.

         3 likes

  17. Guest Who says:

    As I head for the pub..
    http://tradingaswdr.blogspot.co.uk/2012/10/unravelling.html?
    Webs, weaves & tangles spring to mind.

       1 likes

    • David Preiser (USA) says:

      So I was right about Meirion Jones? Hard to tell for sure, but that’s what it looks like.

         0 likes

  18. Dave666 says:

    Why is the BBc portraying NATO as a “Nuclear” alliance in the independant Scotland borefest. never mind they can turn HMS Neptune into a nice fishing port , as long as they don’t exceed their EU fishing quoto when we pull out our Vanguard class subs. Just think of the extra jobs it will create when they have to set up a new nuclear deterrent base site in England unless of course it is turned into a Guatanamo bay type leased site.

       2 likes

    • Pah says:

      A good point, well made.

      If Scotland goes independant they become a de facto nuclear power.

      Christ! Wee Ecks chubby little paws will be on the button!

         3 likes

    • Dysgwr_Cymraeg says:

      Don’t you lot imagine it’s a done deal if alah salmond wants the nukes out of faslane, they will ALL be welcome in wales, the Milford Haven is custom built for them.

         2 likes

  19. David Preiser (USA) says:

    BBC audiences will be shocked by this, having no idea that there’s a problem with anti-Semitism in France:

    Twitter removes French anti-Semitic tweets

    Over the past few days the #unbonjuif hashtag has been one of the most popular phrases on Twitter among French-speaking users of the service. Many of the tweets bearing the tag contain offensive comments.

    This appears to have started by a neo-Nazi group in Hanover, but the real story should be about how much the French seem to like it. The BBC doesn’t even mention here that there’s a growing problem in France, making this revelation all the more mystifying to BBC audiences. Of course, spending half the news brief on the German neo-Nazi angle helps distract any poor soul who started to wonder.

    There’s also a thankfully impartial mention of the legal angle allowing this censorship.

    Aside from that, I’d like to see a poll of people who rely on the BBC for their news as to how aware they are about anti-Semitism in France.

       3 likes

  20. wallygreeninker says:

    Listeners to Radio 3 of a morning will be treated to Diane Abbott choosing her favourite music between 10.30 and 11.00 every weekday next week. These morning guests usually get a chance to discuss their views on life, the universe and everything besides music. They had the novelist Howard Jacobs on this week – an interesting guy with an enthusiastic interest in serious music – but the Jain peace activist who walked around the world to protest about nuclear weapons they had on the other week made me wonder what criteria they have for choosing these people. Is giving chunks of Radio 3 airtime over to something that sound awfully like Desert Island Discs, with the full piece of music being played instead of just the first thirty seconds, a good idea? Surely ‘Private Passions’ on a Sunday, was enough (although I’m not sure Arlene Philips, who was on that, this week, is quite the kind of culture vulture you’d expect for a Radi 3 audience).

    The account of Abbott’s career, on the programme’s website entry, reads so much like an encomium, I’m wondering whether she wrote it herself.

    http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b01ngp4y

    (you may have to click ‘read more’ for a list of her dazzling accomplishments.)

       5 likes

    • Buggy says:

      Excellent ! Will there be a simultaneous Red Button feed so that I…..errr: WE….can watch la belle Diane making her undoubtedly first class musical selections as well as listen ?

         2 likes

  21. uncle bup says:

    Now it is often said on here that audiences for the likes of Question Time and Any Questions are deliberately stacked with public sector workers, students, and (quote) job seekers…

    I categorically deny that this happens.

    On Any Questions tonight Nigel Farage hit the audience with a few home truths about how ‘green’ subsidies were ramping up energy bills and how utterly pointless were wind turbines, solar panels and the like. He was greeted with shrieks and howls and cries of, ‘NO, NO, NO’.

    It’s obviously not the local civil service offices the BBC raids for its audience, it’s the local nut-houses.

       15 likes

    • chrisH says:

      Just no point in listening any more is there?
      The audiences are true BBC fodder-unthinking sheeple who are continent long enough to read the Guardian, to hound a small shopkeeper or to hold the hand of their “client” in court before taking weeks off on the sick.
      About time the audiences were screened for their paymasters-public sector, unemployed nursers of grievances since 2010(having been happy to just keep coining it in silently, `up `til then!)
      When Nigel spoke of the EU , the wind farms and the fact we make no laws, but the EU gets a Nobel Peace Prize-he was howled down, gasps of horror.
      Imagine Churchill got the same in the run up to WW2…is that any consolation?
      Maybe we deserve the shithole we live in-if years in school and “uni” produce these kind of audiences…did the EU fund that compliance through Greenpeace…if so, a bargain!

         7 likes

  22. Dysgwr_Cymraeg says:

    BBC wales bias:
    Vaughan Roderick ‏@VaughanRoderick

    Mitchell’s badly timed resignation will reinforce the impression that the Government is run by amateurs – Telegraph http://soc.li/KXnxv4R
    Collapse

    Reply
    Retweet
    Favorite

    how do you embed these tweets!

       0 likes

    • David Preiser (USA) says:

      Each tweet has an “Embed this tweet” link next the date when you open them in a tab or window. C & P the code here. If you want the avatar and the fancy formatting to appear as well, add this script right after it (h/t DB):

      [script charset=”utf-8″ type=”text/javascript” src=”//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js”][/script]
      (only replace each “]” with its equivalent , “>”

      – had to do it this or way or it wouldn’t appear). The avatar won’t appear in the preview, though.

      An example below, mostly because we can laugh at someone who obviously relies a bit too much on the BBC and their fellow travelers in the liberal US media:

         2 likes

      • Dysgwr_Cymraeg says:

        ” Each tweet has an “Embed this tweet” link next the date ”
        As Homer Simpson would say:
        Dooooohhhhh!
        I’m damned if I can see any embed this tweet thingy next the date.
        Anyone point me to a tutorial?
        ty for trying DP

           0 likes

        • David Preiser (USA) says:

          Dysgwr, open a single tweet in a new window or tab. It’s not visible in feed view.

          See here, for example.

             0 likes

          • Dysgwr_Cymraeg says:

            Yes DP I see that view in your link. There is an “embed this” link showing.
            I don’t seem to be able to expand the page to that extent. I have an expand link in the tweet, but that isn’t the way.
            How did you open the tweet to appear as a whole page. I’m not seeing an elephant in the room methinks.
            TY for patience.
            Using firefox btw.

               0 likes

            • Dysgwr_Cymraeg says:

              OK then DP, elephant duly spotted, I see it now!

                 0 likes

              • Dysgwr_Cymraeg says:

                   0 likes

                • Dysgwr_Cymraeg says:

                  I give up with all that :
                  [script charset=”utf-8″ type=”text/javascript” src=”//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js”][/script]

                  and i’m not now searching for a job in IT!

                     0 likes

  23. George R says:

    LIBYA.

    Here is a graphic additional ‘RT’ report to INBBC material on Libya:

    “‘War crime’: Gaddafi, his son and over 60 loyalists executed by rebel fighters – HRW”

    http://rt.com/news/libya-gaddafi-execution-hrw-608/

       1 likes

  24. jonsuk says:

    i wonder how many of the professional male dancers on SCD have had bumsex with a man

       1 likes

  25. John Anderson says:

    42-minute review of Benghazi – the appalling decision by the State Department to withdraw proper security in August in spite of repeated terrorist attacks eg on the British Ambassador, vivid account of what actually happened on the night, then a full account of the cover-up designed to protect Obama’s lie that all is well in the Middle East, that Al Q is defeated

    http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2012/10/19/bret_baier_special_on_libya_death_and_deceit_in_benghazi.html

       7 likes

    • John Anderson says:

      …none of which is coming through on BBC reports – the BBC, by far the biggest news organisation in the world

         7 likes

      • David Preiser (USA) says:

        According to our defenders of the indefensible, the BBC isn’t required to report anything that isn’t big news elsewhere. It’s not front page on the NY Times or the Washington Post (or on any page today, for that matter), so no reason for the BBC to see it as a worthy news story. Who cares how important it actually is? Besides, it’s just a Faux News guy and should be assumed a Republican propaganda piece anyway, no need to check.

        Isn’t that right, Jim and Nicked and Prole and the rest of you?

           3 likes

    • Framer says:

      Obama lied in the debate on calling the attack in Benghazi ‘an act of terror’ the day after. He didn’t despite the moderator intervening and saying he did.
      And you can tell from his manner he knew it was untrue.
      Great programme.

         0 likes

  26. David Lamb says:

    BBC cites a history expert in favour of revising the teaching of this subject in our schools. It is placed on HYS for the multiculturalists to defend their ideology and support the indoctrination of children, teach them how to feel guilty over colonialism and wish they were not British. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-20005342

       5 likes

    • David Preiser (USA) says:

      Bah, it was a different time, attitudes towards colonialism were different then. No reason to feel the slightest bit guilty now.

         1 likes

  27. Span Ows says:

    Did a BBC search for Jimmy Savile news and got a few hits as I expected but imagine my surprise when I tried to find those links by looking on the site:
    News page: no
    UK news page: no
    England News page: no
    All the regions (3 more pages): no
    England regions (10 pages): no

       5 likes

  28. George R says:

    Tahrir Square, Cairo, EGYPT.

    -Not for INBBC’s Muslim Brotherhood bureau to report:-

    “France 24 TV succumbs to Islamophobia, says its reporter ‘savagely’ attacked in Tahrir Square”

    http://www.jihadwatch.org/2012/10/france-24-tv-succumbs-to-islamophobia-says-its-reporter-savagely-attacked-in-tahrir-square.html

       2 likes

  29. uncle bup says:

    ‘… and in the next hour we’ll, of course, be having more about Andrew Mitchell’.

    Gotta lurve that ‘of course’.

    And while I’m on… been noticing recently news bulletins starting,

    ‘It’s now one year on from ….’

    A nice device for the droids to disinter, de-maggotise, and blow the dust off their favourite stories, you know, these ones they just can’t let go.

    And Finally… the droids didn’t want to go ahead with their Savile investigations this side of the long grass in case they ‘interfered with the police investigations’.

    Such legal niceties don’t seem to stop the HIGNFY dullards from laying into Rebekah Brooks ahead of her trial.

    Be nice to see them all jailed for contempt..

       6 likes

    • Guest Who says:

      ‘Such legal niceties don’t seem to stop the HIGNFY dullards from laying into Rebekah Brooks ahead of her trial.’
      Ah, but… you see… the concept of ‘watertight oversight’ is ‘flexible’ to the point of being ‘unique’.
      In the right hands.

         1 likes

  30. DavidH says:

    Quite enjoyed Edwina Curry’s paper review on Breakfast this am – focused on the Saville disaster much to the discomfort of tweedle dum and tweedle de (Forgot the presenters’ names)

       4 likes

  31. will says:

    Beeboid reporter’s editorial comment summing up his report on the TUC “anti-austerity” demo tells us that (c) “some say that more direct action is required opposing government policy”. he could have said “that some consider that with the government already spending £1,000,000,000 pa more than they collect in taxes there can be no question of easing up on spending cuts” – but he would not want to give voice to that constituency, would he?

       5 likes

  32. RCE says:

    301 comments.

    A site record?

       1 likes

    • Larry Dart says:

      Nah, back in the early noughties when it was Natalie’s site I remember a thread (an open thread I think) having 900+ posts.

         0 likes

  33. wallygreeninker says:

    Friday’s rampage in Cardiff by a man in a white van was a curious case of lightening striking twice in the same place (sort of). In April eight men were deliberately run over in the same city and the driver charged with attempted murder. I was surprised the crime did not get more publicity at the time and I haven’t come across any reminders about it (along the lines of ‘well fancy that!’) in connection with the current case. I wonder why:

    http://www.taxirank.co.uk/news/taxi-driver-in-cardiff-arrested-for-attempted-murder/

       1 likes

    • Guest Who says:

      I had presumed the reporting of a ‘man’ in this case (as opposed to April Jones’ abductor being instantly publicised) was by virtue of the fact he had been already located. That said, it seems the van was vacated, so who is to know?
      I do hope watertight oversight is not again kicking in.
      What’s Welsh for ‘unique’?

         0 likes

    • Dysgwr_Cymraeg says:

      I’m ultra curious wally, there’s something odd about this murder. This guy was not only running the victims over with his van, he was getting out to further attack them with some kind of weapon. No-one has said what the weapon was, and of course none of the media can yet (it seems ) name him. The case of the murder still making the headlines, I’m just wondering if it will once they can name him.
      Curiouser and curiouser!

         1 likes