… yesterday’s Radio Four Test Match Special (for foreign visitors, the BBC’s wonderful cricket show – cricket being a ball game) was the first time that a commentary box guest has picked up an accoustic guitar and sung a song about the pleasures of heroin, to appreciative applause from the commentary team.
Surely ….
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Now you really do sound like a bunch of blue rinse grannies.
Pathetic.
Some – just some – of the US press are starting to question whether they should carry on presenting Iraq as a quagmire. They distorted the Viertnm conflict especially the Tet offensive, and now they are distorting Irq by only reporting casualties.
Just like the BBC, HawHaw and her drip-drip-drip of miserableness.
http://www.weeklystandard.com/Content/Public/Articles/000/000/006/008zeyyr.asp
Nothing like the Michael Yon pieces ever reaches our screens.
Another article that indicates the left/liberal leanings of most journalists – and questions whether journalism is a profession in any real meaning of the word. More opinions than news, most of them, and some of them totally unprofessional.
http://wwics.si.edu/index.cfm?fuseaction=wq.essay&essay_id=120801
People doing impromptu versions of `Golden Brown` on the BBC airwaves isn’t helping the situation either.
Never a frown, eh, Hank?
I rather like that song, silly ol` me thought it was an ode to a fair maiden.
I`m beginning to think that if the West gets much more decadant, Islam is going to start looking pretty attractive to ordinary folk.
More signs of empire-building at the BBC.
http://media.guardian.co.uk/site/story/0,14173,1558369,00.html
They pretend that their growth is “organic”. But then they ask for above-inflation increases in the licence fee to fund expansion into new areas, crushing competition.
When BT was privatised it was told to REDUCE its prices year by year below inflation. The RPI minus X formula, with X being set at 5% initially. Compounding meant significant REAL cuts in prices.
That is the sort of regime the BBC needs. It should be told to fund its new stuff from economies on the old stuff (John Birt used my favourite word “bloated” last week). And further funding of new activities should come from sales of its rich archives.
If the licence is to continue until subscription can become a major basis of BBC funding, the licence fee should be reduced by up to 10% per annum in real terms. To help the BBC adjust to leaner, more commercial times.
The BBC is currently slicing the Goose that Laid the Golden egg into tiny little downloadable sizes……
The Digital Age will be the death of the BBC, for they are currently putting massive effort into getting themselves “on-line”…yet they have no new material worth downloading anyway….
The BBC is just the old, crusty, dusty Blue Rinse Brigade of the Media world….desperately clutching to the old fasioned Licence Fee for they know they are not worth it, and we would’nt pay if we did’nt have to.
A poll carried out for ITV News, said that a staggering 95% of the UK public, want the Licence Fee Abolished….so that should let you know how isolated those BBC-Loving voices really are…….
They are without doubt much loathed in the UK, and they will fade away to nothingness…..They should have gone to subscription rates when they were popular…as it is, by the time they eventualy switch over, they will be so un-watched, and un-trusted….no-one will bother to pay for it……
It’s getting that way in the UK now….people are turning away from the BBC in their hundreds of thousands……people are just sick of their preachy nonsense and endless repeats….
Only the BBC wil invite Multi-Millionare Pop-Stars on stage to preach about poverty…..only the BBC will use an grossly obese “Celeb” to preach about starvation….
I just don’t think the BBC realise just how stupid they look…….it’s just pathetic….
Proof? There is a show on tonight called “BRING YOUR HUSBAND TO HEEL”…where a famous dog trainer, shows women how to use dog training techniques….to control “their men”….
Sounds progressive to you? Or like stayle old tack sexist game shows of the 70s……
Beebs Past it………it just makes cringe now….a total national embarassment.
My wife already has me trained…but now I’m deaf she has to be careful when saying ‘SIT’ as I then have a mess to clean up….
The new BBC line is that it is INEVITABLE that the Iraq constitution will be rejected at the referendum. And therefore that Iraq is heading towards civil war.
That is how they put it on the Tody programme even when speaking to the Sunni speaker of the Iraqi Parliament who agrees that the matter should be put to a vote.
But to be fair, they also had Salman Rushdie on the Today programme criticising the so-called leaders of the UK Muslims – saying that there is no single indivisible community, that the MCB etc do NOT speak for Muslims. The same people that the BBC has always been stroking.
Maybe that is the new groupthink at the BBC, following the John Ware Panorama programme ?
I’d like to admit that `Bring Your Husband To Heel` looks like it could be the most appalling BBC show since that hideously PC Jasper Carrot sitcom that was narrated by a boy in a wheelchair.
It’s the kind of show that makes Michael Buerk’s recent comments on the battle of the sexes look perfectly reasonable.
Could just as easily have been an ITV show, but that’s no excuse.
Can anyone imagine the fury a show called `Bring Your Wife to Heel` would cause?
for Marc:
I see that Marc,captain of the USS Neverdock has a posting which quotes the Daily Telegraph attacking the BBC over Iraq:
This is what the Telegraph said on 28 August:
“To listen to the BBC’s coverage of Iraq’s tentative steps towards a constitution is to become deeply depressed. The BBC creates the impression that the talks about the constitution are bound to fail. The country is heading towards civil war between the Shias, the Sunnis, and the Kurds: three irredeemably opposed groups itching to kill each other.”
Let us therefore look at what the Telegraph itself said about Iraq on 26 August.
The Headline?
“Iraq on brink of meltdown
By Oliver Poole in Baghdad
(Filed: 26/08/2005)”
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2005/08/26/wirq26.xml
with regards
Paul Reynolds
BBC News Online
Like I’ve said before the BBC’s Iraq coverage is not particularly different from any other MSM source.
To Paul Reynolds,
Yes sadly, the BBC is not the only media reporting doom and gloom in Iraq.
The Telegraph article doesn’t excuse the BBC from its total bias in its reporting on Iraq.
A bit of a school yard excuse, eh Paul? “They were all doing it so I did too.”
Remember the focus of the post and this site is the BBC and not the Telegraph.
Here’s a challenge for you Paul.
Give us a link to a positive and unbiased BBC story on Iraq.
There’s tons of good news out of Iraq but you won’t find it from the BBC.
And Paul, Scott has a question for you over at his site.
Why is it that the BBC has had 6 stories in 6 days about Pat Robertson’s idiocy but the BBC have yet to do a single story on Cindy Sheehan’s past idiocy, focusing instead on her anti-war camp outside Bush’s home?
http://theamericanexpatinuk.blogspot.com/2005/08/pat-cindy-and-beeb.html
To Marc:
As you admit the BBC is not alone in reporting the problems of Iraq, why do you single it out for attack?
It was indeed ironic that the paper you used to criticise the BBC, the Daily Telegraph, itself had come to the same conclusions!
You ask for a positive story on Iraq. Here are a couple of examples of how the BBC news wesbite tries to relflect the day-to-day lives of ordinary people:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/shared/spl/hi/picture_gallery/05/middle_east_iraqi_actress0s_day/html/1.stm
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/shared/spl/hi/picture_gallery/05/in_pictures_baghdad0s_kerrada_street/html/1.stm
There is a whole website section devoted to post-Saddam Iraq:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/in_depth/middle_east/2002/conflict_with_iraq/default.stm
As for Cindy Sheehan and Pat Robertson, both stories are important. I have said to your colleague Scott Callahan at The American Expatriate — and he has accepted this — and I have also said on B-BBC before, that I am just not going to get into every story you raise, especially stories which I have not dealt with myself. I am not the editor but an ordinary hack! There are mechanisms for you to take up your comments directly.
I noted with interest the lead story in the Observer today. It turns out that Sir Michael Jay, the permanent secretary at the Foreign Office, warned the government a year ago that Iraq was fuelling anger among young Muslims in this country — Sir Michael of course joins MI5 in this analysis.
with regards
Paul Reynolds
Mr Reynolds
The Telegraph and Sunday Telegraph have a MIX of views about Iraq. The BBC is irredeemably negative.
Why do you step aside from the Cindy Sheehan story ? It has become a touchstone of BBC bias – of media bias. The BBC has been all over Sheehan like a rash. They LOVE it.
And Justin Webb’s story, now going the rounds on the World Service, scraped the barrel.
On Iraq and 7/7, there is a very important distinction between saying that Iraq inflames passions, and saying that it is a CAUSE of terrorism, of mass murder. The BBC in its sloppiness fails to draw the distinction enough.
Mass murder is an evil act that cannot be excused away by political reasons. It is CAUSED by people having an extremist viewpoint, a total lack of moral compass. And THAT is at least partly caused by the preaching of an aberrant strain of Islam that justifies violent jihad including deliberate attacks on civilians.
But of course the BBC would not wish to say that. And until laatterly the BBC has given endless platform to people like the MCB spokemen who are apologists for terrorism. It took Ware’s long-overduue Panorama to correct the balance.
I do hope you do not mind us using the T word. We very much mind it that the BBC tries to avoid it – until it cravenly exchews its weasel words when under frontal attack by the British people.
“Bias – what bias” !!!
Of course you’d never describe Labour’s open door immigration policies as fueling anger in young British citizens.
In fact I couldn’t see any articles where restricting immigration received any support and plenty where restriction immigration got scare quotes.
BTW: My own point of view of immigration closely tracks this.
http://66.102.9.104/search?q=cache:WG93e63o1RQJ:news.ft.com/cms/s/ba2d0874-869e-11d9-8075-00000e2511c8.html+auction+immigration&hl=en
There are 3 million pages at the BBC website. Producing the odd page to prove or disprove something is entirely unconvincing.
What matters is the general way the BBC treats the news, how it broadcasts it on TV and radio, how it balances its discussion panels and audiences, what it fails to cover and what it flogs to death, the tone of its interviewers, which stories are linked on its main home and international webpages.
We have eyes and ears. We can see and hear how the BBC distorts the news. Reference to the odd obscure website story is hardly the point.
To Paul Reynolds,
I single the BBC out because they are by far the biggest and the worst.
The BBC reaches millions around the world in many languages. The BBC is spreading its anti-American, anti-Israeli and biased message around the world.
And despite what you say Paul, I have two long posts that prove the BBC is what I say it is. Check out my “Case Against the BBC” on my blog roll.
Your first link is to a BBC photo shoot about an Iraqi actress.
Your second link is to a BBC photo shoot of ordinary Iraqis. But even here the BBC couldn’t resist themsleves and the first pictures caption says:
“Kerrada Street is the main road in one of Baghdad’s smarter areas. It is often in the news because of a bombing or an assassination.”
Your third link PROVES what I’m saying. Look at the list of stories to choose from.
An Islamic Republic of Iraq?
Race is on for Bush in Iraq
America’s ‘dwindling coalition’
Iraq’s descent into quagmire
Hopes and problems of drawdown
Cost of conflict hits home in US
A woman soldier’s war in Iraq
Bombers one step ahead
An upside-down place
Failed delivery
Zarqawi’s insurgency
Paul, can you give us one link to an unbiased BBC story that talks about good news in Iraq. Good news like Chrenkoff puts out here:
http://chrenkoff.blogspot.com/
I know you can’t go into every story and carry the load for the BBC Paul. You don’t have too. All were asking is to comment.
Do you agree that the BBC is deliberately ignoring the negative side of Cindy Sheehan so as to portray her in a much better light?
As the world’s new anti-war protest poster child, you must have an opinion on the bias the BBC is showing here.
Re:MSM Bias on Iraq
I do not think it is accurate to say that all the MSM are negative on Iraq, the Times has carried positive stories and The Economist has not got carried away with the Vietnam/Quagmire angle. Both have contemplated the possibility but both believe that a suucesfull conclusion is probably more likely.
Both publications, incidentally, are the only ones I would actually pay for. Unlike the BBC, which I have to pay for but cannot find anything worthwhile on it.
To Paul Reynolds,
There’s no doubt that Britain’s tolerance of radical Muslim clerics allowed them to use Iraq as a recruiting tool.
The BBC’s, most other media’s, constant portrayal of Iraq in a negative light, no doubt contributed to that as well. The radical clerics would have had a harder time if the true picture of Iraq was being told.
If Iraq was the reason for the 7/7 attacks as alleged, what was the reason al Qaeda tried to fly a plane into Parliament on 9/11? That was long before the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. And I don’t think Blair had even met Bush yet.
Without Afghanistan or even Iraq, what was the motive for that aborted attack on London?
http://ussneverdock.blogspot.com/2005/07/britain-iraq-not-cause-of-attacks.html
What do you think al Qaeda was planning on doing with the thousands of terrorists (some from Britain) they were training in Afghanistan?
To say that the Iraq War `created` an extremist would indeed be ludicrous.
To say that the Iraq War had absolutely no effect on any extremist crimes, including the London attacks, and had no effect on when and where the extremists committed their crimes, or their twisted reasons for doing so, would be a presumption, not a fact.
It would, indeed, be wishful thinking on the part of those for whom such a connection would intrude upon their pro-War agendas.
It is a possibility that the Iraq War pushed proponents of Islamic fundamentalism into extreme violence. It may have been that the attack would have happened without the Iraq War (indeed, that is what I BELIEVE), but if the possibility remains that the war was a key factor in turning rhetoric into mass murder, then that possibility should be explored.
Exploring motives should not be confused with perpetuating justifications.
By investigating the possible motives of a crime one does not excuse the crime.
I do not believe that the Iraq War was a cause for the London Attacks.
That doesn’t mean I want to bury my head in the sand and discount the possibility because it does not suit my agenda.
Mr Reynolds
I see you bring up the Iraq is what is done it argument:
“I noted with interest the lead story in the Observer today. It turns out that Sir Michael Jay, the permanent secretary at the Foreign Office, warned the government a year ago that Iraq was fuelling anger among young Muslims in this country — Sir Michael of course joins MI5 in this analysis.”
I would like to ask you two questions:
1. Do you believe that this is true? After all, the Pew Global Attitudes survey reveals that support for Osama Bin Laden and the support for terrorism is down in the world, since the invasion of Iraq. There could be a number of reasons for this. Perhaps the muslims now cannot blame America for suppressing democracy in the region and there have been genuine moves towards democracy in the Lebanon and Afghanistan.
2. Do you think it is valid for muslims to hold the view that the liberation of Iraq is bad? If so why? The “arab” street seems angry when the West fails to intervene (Kosovo, Chechneya) and when it does intervene (Iraq and, eventually, Kosovo). Why does it make a boy of Pakistani descent living in England that a man who killed more muslims than any Western leader is overthrown and that 80% of the population turn out in a democratic election.
Marc
You asked for a “positive” story about Iraq. I sent you a link to one — an interesting account of an actress and her life. I thought it gave rather a good impression about how ordinary Iraqis exist today.
We do not seek to give “positive” or “negative” stories, about Iraq or anywhere else. We seek to give realistic stories. This was one.
I also sent the link to pages and pages of stories about Iraq from wi=hich you have chosen the titles of a few. I urge readers to check for themselves.
re Cindy Sheehan. You ask if the BBC is deliberately ignoring the “negative” side of her story.
What does “negative” mean?
Your use of the words “positive” and “negative” are revealing, Marc. That is the world as you see it. The world as we report it is different. It is neither one nor the other but a lot of both and a lot in between.
with regards
Paul Reynolds
To Paul Reynolds,
Paul, you left a comment on one of my post thining I had mistaken the Guardian for the BBC. I don’t think so. The Guardian was reporting on the BBC program Question Time.
Read my reply comment and see if I’m right or wrong. If I’m wrong I’ll correct it.
http://ussneverdock.blogspot.com/2005/08/britain-rushdie-clashes-with-galloway.html
Thank you.
Here’s a link for anyone who thinks the “Mother Sheehan” story is just reporting.
http://littlegreenfootballs.com/weblog/?entry=17266_How_Phony_Can_They_Get&only
I call it “wag-the-cat” where an unpopular media create a ficticious stop-the-war mass movement to divert attention.
The blogosphere can be led, just as easily as cats can be herded. Expect another medja blow-out.
To Paul,
We do not seek to give “positive” or “negative” stories, about Iraq or anywhere else.
Paul the fact that you can say that with a straight face speaks volumes about the BBC.
Paul, read my post “The Case against the BBC” on my blog roll. It proves that not only does the BBC report negative stories about Iraq, the BBC has used well known anti-war activists to fabricate alleged war crimes by the US. I have an email from Sarah Brown apologizing or one such report.
The third link proves what I’m saying. Yes by all means readers to to Paul’s third link above and see for yourselves.
Shouldn’t the BBC be seeking to report on good news from Iraq, Paul? Shouldn’t we be getting the whole story – the truth.
Again, the fact that you can’t tell the differnce between positive and negative stories, speaks volumes about the BBC – and does not bode well.
What about the aborted attack on London on 9/11 Paul. What was the motive for that? It couldn’t have been Afghanistan or Iraq or even Bush – he hadn’t even met Blair yet.
Paul, here is the BBC story using a well known anti-war activist, Jo Wilding, to allege war crimes by US troops.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/3653223.stm
I exposed Wilding, after 5 mins on Google, here:
http://ussneverdock.blogspot.com/2004/04/formal-charges-against-bbc-formal.html
Here is Brown’s email apology.
Dear Mr Landers,
Many thanks for your e-mail regarding Jo Wilder’s piece on the ‘Iraq: Your experiences’ page. All e-mails on our pages are vetted before publication, however her background had not been made clear to us and, therefore, we have now removed it from the piece.
Many thanks for drawing our attention to this oversight and we apologise if we have misled you on the issue. I hope this does not prevent you from reading our site in the future.
Kind regards,
Sarah Brown
Broadcast Journalist
BBC News Online
http://www.bbcnews.com
sarah.brown.01@bbc.co.uk
Now what’s wrong with this picture?
Brown: “we have now removed it from the piece.”
Yes, they removed it from ‘Iraq: Your experiences’ page, but left the entire article up! Follow the link, the entire fabricated story is still there.
And who, besides be and my blog readers, know of this?
Marc, of course the BBC reports negative stories from Iraq.
I’ve yet to find the positives in a roadside bomb that kills a dozen soldiers, the murder of an Iraqi politician, the beheading of a hostage or the failure of an entire political and religious group to agree to a national constitution.
Unless you mean that every death is a sacrifice for democracy?
I suppose that’s the kind of `positive` spin you’d like to see.
Shearer’s Raised Hand,
I was thining more along he lines of stories on how many schools, power plants, water plants, water treatment plants, swerer upgrades have been built, the fact the oil and electricity are above pre-war levels, the growing economy which is allowing Iraqis to own cars, TV’s, air-conditioners and fridge freezers, etc, etc.
By the way the explosion (no pun intended) in electrical goods is one of the reasons for black outs despite electricity being at record levels.
http://chrenkoff.blogspot.com/2005/04/good-news-from-iraq-part-25.html
Note that is part 25 in the series. And he does one Afghanistan as well since the BBC ignore that as well.
Speaking of Afghanistan, what happend the that quagmire, that Vietnam?
Oh, yeah, another success story the BBC want to ignore.
Did you know it took the US 13 years to fianlly approve its constitution?
Paul Reynolds
You give a link to the story of the actress in Iraq as an example of how the BBC is not biased. But….I actually complained to the BBC the day this story was linked from the main news page. Of the 11 photos accompanying the story guess which one was used on the front page to illustrate the story? Regular browsers to this site will not be surprised to find it was photo 9, a close up of what is, to someone who has not yet read the article, a picture of a woman being strangled. So, a link to a story on Iraq is next to a picture of a woman being strangled, drip drip drip goes the propaganda.
And more:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/magazine/4187118.stm
On Fridays column from Pete Clifton, editor of the BBC News website, they have the results of their request for people to contact them with their comments on BBC journalism. They say that common concerns included:
too left wing
mouthpiece of the UK government
too many clichés in TV news reporting
mindless two-ways between presenters and reporters
not enough context for major stories
assuming too much knowledge
dumbing down
too serious, not catering for the “average” person’s interests
anti-Bush
not enough investigative reporting
too cautious, holding back information on important, breaking stories
Things people at BBBC will no doubt recognise. But, which of these concerns did Mr Clifton go on to examine in the rest of his column? Yes, he picked on the really important finding from this survey, ‘being too cautious’. As I said in an earlier post, its those BBC ostriches again, if we ignore it, it will go away. They just don’t seem to get it/care. As with Paul Reyonlds it is the complete inability to admit there might be a problem, even when their own surveys tell them there is.
Ooops. Sorry about the spelling. I’m rushing as I’m commenting on two blogs and trying to write my own!
Positive stories could be for example, the opening of a school, the increased economic propsperity of the average iraqi citizen, the huge leap in electricity demand etc etc etc. Few if any of this news is being reported from Iraq by organisations such as the BBC yet it is impossible to deny that such events are occuring. Is it impossible for you to appreciate this Shearer’s Raised Hand?
SRH
The Sunnis are NOT united in opposition to the constitution. For example, the Speaker of the Parliament is Sunni and wants it now to go to a vote. His reasoning ? Because he knows Sunni opinion is split. That the self-appointed Snni spokesmen do NOT fully represent Sunni opinion. Their attempt to veto the constitution had to be faced down.
THAT is the measure of BBC doom-and-gloom, they want to give the impression that it is inevitable that the referendum will lead to rejection. Right now it is NOT inevitable. Just like it was not inevitable (in spite of what the BBC was portending) that there would be a poor turnout for the January 31 elections.
They NEVER apologise for their egregious errors, their misreadings.
Their incomplete reporting that verges on lies.
You’re right J.G.
They have been at it so long the either can’t see their bias or they won’t admit it. Either way is bad.
Hopefully, the blogsphere here in the UK will grow and gain influence like the ones in America.
In fact, Scott Burgess can propably take credit for the first big media scalp by a blogger in the UK – even though he is American.
His blog post not only got the reporter involved fired but the Guardian’s senior news editor as well.
If we keep at it and grow, we will one day force the BBC to change its ways as well.
If not heads will roll – just ask the Guardian.
Marc:
“schools, power plants, water plants, water treatment plants, swerer upgrades have been built, the fact the oil and electricity are above pre-war levels, the growing economy which is allowing Iraqis to own cars, TV’s, air-conditioners and fridge freezers, etc, etc.”
All stories that deserve coverage, yes.
But if the BBC gave the same coverage to the construction of a new water treatment plant as it did to the death of a US or British soldier, or Iraqi civilian deaths, that would be disgusting.
Something has to lead, and unfortunately a tragic death (or, to be more accurate, many tragic deaths, military and Iraqi) comes before stories that, if repeated too often, would resemble corporate PR advertisements:
“We at the BBC understand that soldiers, civilians and Iraqi police are dying everyday at the hands of brutal terrorists, but, as this water treatment plant and shining new school prove, things are much better than than they were before!”
Perhaps Shearer, but then troop losses in Iraq are by any historical comparison remarkably low, not that this fact is highlighted too often/ever by the BBC.
jg
“mindless two-ways between presenters and reporters”
is exactly right but too left-wing
is the main sin from which flows all others.
Shearer’s Raised Hand,
Ah yes, but to leave those stories out gives a totally false impression of what is really going on in Iraq.
Just the way the BBC wants it.
That depends.
The war against Saddam yielded extremely low casualities by historical comparison.
But the occupation of post-war Iraq has yielded remarkably high casualties by historical comparison.
It is a question of balance.
If the reporting of D-Day was just a body count of allied troops, we would have brought the troops back home.
There have been very few British deaths in the Basra region. So lots of room for some reporting on how the oil wells have started to flow, how there is now a free press with hundreds of papers and lots of TV and radio stations, how the marshes have been reflooded, how British servicemen are helping with medical and education projects, how there is now FREEDOM !!!
But most of that is GOOD news. So it gets underreported on the BBC, because the BBC by and large was against the invasion and is against the coalition.
When did Caroline Hawley last report on what is happening on the ground in the Brit-controlled areas ? THAT is a measure of her poor, unbalanced reporting.
did iraq fuel anger with the pakistani population in britain?
elements in this population are hostile and ready to make trouble given the chance.the excuse is irrelevant.
I will concede that the BBC could definitely do more stories about new schools and water treatment plants instead of focussing on the daily death toll.
SRH
You had one serious mistake in your mock BBC report. You used the word “terrorist” The BBC NEVER uses the T word for the headchoppers and suicide bombers in Iraq. They re militants.
Please get your BBC NewsSpeak correct.
“We at the BBC understand that soldiers, civilians and Iraqi police are dying everyday at the hands of brutal terrorists
But the BBC do not see anyone dying at the hands of “brutal terrorists”.
The BBC devalue the elected government by treating the “brutal terrorists” as a legitimate force.
The BBC then have the nerve to obsess about Iraq causing the London bombs, without considering that they have done nothing to ram home to the Muslim youth of this country that the vast majority of Muslim civilians killed in Iraq are killed by the hands of anti-democratic terrorists.
Well, even Nick Cohen in the Observer disagreed with the BBC on that one, as do I.
However, even the top US military brass refers to them as `insurgents.`
Here’s a saign that there is some serious money and lots of media-manipulation behind Cindy Sheehn :
http://www.documentaryblog.com/lightscameraprotest/?p=19#comments
Anon, you said: “the BBC do not see anyone dying at the hands of `brutal terrorists`”
Every time I switch on Newsnight I see the aftermath of a particularly nasty suicide bombing.
So if I’m seeing people dying at the hands of terrorists/insurgents and the BBC are showing it, I’m not sure how the BBC don’t see it.
Unless you were merely stressing their reluctance to use the word terrorist?
Anyway, I’m going in circles so I’ll stop, but I think we can at least all agree that `Bring Your Husband to Heel` is a gross waste of our license paying money.
That is one serious bit of kit Cindy and her “volunteers” have.
It looks like model PSSI22.
Thousands of dollars a week to hire, even before the staffing.