…doesn’t mean the Beeb has to agree. This “story” is bogus. President Bush, after all, was not slow to declare a state of emergency along the Gulf Coast. Mayor Nagin’s reaction to this “news” is laughable and hypocritical but the Beeb is happy to serve us New Orleans sludge.
Update: DFH, one of our B-BBC commenterati has two very helpful posts here and here. Auntie can’t get away with what she once did.
namely construct a water pipeline from Wales to England.
Sorry, I thought Birmingham got its water from Wales…………but frankly there is not an inexhaustible supply to lose 33% in the pipes and to squander so much.
The TV licence fee could eventually be axed and replaced by a tax on personal computers, according to a new report from the Department for Culture, Media and Sport.
In announcing the findings of the Whitehall’s review of the BBC’s Charter, Culture Secretary Tessa Jowell told ministers that the government was content with the traditional licence – but only in the short term.
“Although not perfect, we believe it remains the fairest way to fund the BBC so it will continue throughout the next Charter. In the coming months, we will have to decide on the right level for the fee after 2007 – but beyond that, we have to take account of the rapid advance in technology and media consumption,” she said.
In future, if a large number of people are downloading audio-visual content from the internet, and watching it on their computers or mobile phones, rather than using traditional TV and radio services, it may be difficult to collect and enforce a licence fee based on television ownership.”
http://hardware.silicon.com/servers/0,39024647,39128359,00.htm
lead story – international:
its gitmo , again
“pentagon reveals guantanomo names”
http://news.bbc.co.uk/
like – wow. staggering. earth shattering.
where is chris morris when you need him?
So, she wants to replace an unjust poll tax on TVs with an even more unjust poll tax on personal computers? Here’s a radical thought Tessa – the people who watch the BBC should be the ones who pay for it, and those who don’t watch it don’t pay.
Radical and edgy, yes.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/4773124.stm
Third headline on the front page. This is the third most important story on the world at this moment? Oh, really?
Or rather it is a chance for the BBC, like the Independent, to plug their anti-war line as loudly and forcefully as possible.
The BBC is a £3.2bn tabloid, nothing else.
Rick,
Believe me there is plenty of water in Wales, you might say it is awash with it.
Welsh Water has announced plans to invest an additional £41m in reducing the risk of flooding, improving the environmental performance of waste water treatment works and increasing water resources in certain areas. 13-Nov-2001
rob->
its sometimes interesting to see how other countries are reporting the tessa jowell affair
have a look here:
http://www.rte.ie/news/2006/0304/britain.html
note the berlusconi mugshot.
This is really wierd – I just switched on the TV and watched a snippet from BBC World (I’m not in the UK). A main story was that Bush had been warned of “practically all the things that could go wrong”. They showed bits of the vids (with a chap saying that the levees could be “topped” and inferred that this means “breached”.
They got Nagin watching the video and looking looking “perturbed” and “disturbed”.
I thought that this particular baby had been put to bed already.
What the hell is going on?
Deepdiver
managing supplies without the need for restrictions on customer demands. There has not been a “hosepipe ban” in Welsh Water’s region since 1990.
http://www.dwrcymru.com/English/About%20Dwr/main.asp
Rob,
A newly-arrived Martian looking at the situation would be thoroughly confused:
He would see a bunch of barbarians blowing up women and children and invoking the name of their ‘God’ as they commit their unspeakable acts of terror, and going on worldwide rampages when their ‘religion’ is ‘insulted’.
Then he’d turn his head and see the leaders of the victims of these barbaric attacks timidly refraining from mentioning their God, and, on the rare occasions that they do, being harshly condemned by their own people and their own media.
Truly, he would think, this is a world gone mad.
And he’d be right.
Deepdiver,
I think what’s going on is the tactic of repeating a lie over and over again until it becomes the truth.
the tony blair “god” comments , are a minor news story. there’s nothing majorly important about it – we all know that Blair is a Christian. we’ve known that for years now.
and yet it’s the NUMBER THREE news story on the bbc. another chance for the bbc into to “anti-war” mode.
next week, blair says , shock horror, that he’s a “socialist”.
so this week , we’ve had a lot of non-news from the beeb
1. gitmo
2. katrina
3. blair “god”
i thought the bbc’s job was to inform the public, rather than peddle half-arsed agenda seeking crap.
“quite frankly, i’m coming more and more to the opinion that the BBC is on the side of the enemy. an enemy that would love to destroy the liberties and freedoms our ancestors have struggled for centuries to attain.” : archduke
Welcome to the club!
Media ‘sensationalising science’
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/4771154.stm
ha ha…
i wonder what “media” they are referring to?
Of course it couldnt possibly be the “we’re all going to die of bird flu in a mass global warming disaster arrrrrgh!!!!” BBC ?
this is what passes for their “science” news page:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/default.stm
thankfully, i have the internet to find out real science stuff – such as the 2nd red spot on Jupiter press release by Nasa.
Re: letter in The Times today from Will Wyatt (feb 7)
BBC still uses the word ‘believe’ in connection with Christians whereas the history of Islam is treated as fact.
See following story:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/4772364.stm
“Christians believe the church, one of their holiest sites, marks the place where the birth of Jesus was foretold.”
The point I wish to make over water meters is that the BBC appears to be giving the impression that “water shortage” is nationwide, it is not it is local in the South East where water supply has been mismanaged apparently for years. This is what the BBC should highlight, the in -efficiency in the South, not scaring everyone.
Welsh Water only needs to use 5% of rainfall for water supply, Thames and Dover etc. can’t cope, Why?
If water is such a scarce commodity why does global warming predict that London will be flooded as the ice caps melt?
HMS Jowell jettisons ballast:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/4773468.stm
Still sinking though.
Private Eye’s take is suddenly not so outlandish as first thought:
http://www.private-eye.co.uk/pages.php?page=cover&
oh dear. the sums of money involved in jowellgate appear to be far bigger than previously reported
blog reports on registered users only Financial Times story:
http://governancefocus.blogspot.com/2006/03/complex-web-of-deals-at-heart-of-mills.html
quote:
There are at least two versions of this paper trail: one set out by Italian prosecutors investigating whether Mr Mills accepted an alleged bribe of up to $1m from Silvio Berlusconi, Italy?s prime minister, and the alternative account described by Mr Mills, who has denied the bribery allegations.
Depending on whose story you believe, the string of transactions either began with $2m transferred by a money management group in the Bahamas, as alleged by the Italian authorities, or, as is described by Mr Mills, $1.6m in a Swiss bank account.
The provenance of the money is disputed. In Milan yesterday, people close to the investigation spoke to the Financial Times.
They confirmed that they were investigating whether Mr Mills received up to $1m from Mr Berlusconi, a bigger sum than reported previously, in return for favourable testimony that he gave during corruption hearings against the Italian prime minister.
According to the prosecutors, who have used analysis conducted by KPMG, the audit firm, about $1m of the $2m transferred on the orders of the Bahamas group was used on business dealings with Diego Attanasio, a shipping magnate.
Hussein admits responsibility, not guilt
http://www.csmonitor.com/2006/0302/p01s03-woiq.html
Is this the “Tessa Jowell” defence?
Sarge, I have enough experience of umbrella vacations in the green hills of Wales to know you are right………….the 33% loss related to Thames Water.
If the people in the Southeast plugged their leaks they might solve their problem
There are occasions when an unchallenged statement by an interviewee on the BBC simply takes the breath away. On last night’s news (Radio 4 22.00), the issue of grammar schools was discussed and it turned out that the great majority of parents in NI support the retention of selective education based on the exams taken by children at about 11 years of age (bit of background for our American contributors): those who pass go to the more academically rigorous grammar school, and the others re-sit at 14-years so that developmental rates are evened out (NB this latter fact was not reported).
However, one of the headmasters of the lower scholls which takes those who don’t pass the 11-plus exam said that such exams were “a form of child torture”. This was the last word on the matter.
By his logic any examination is “child torture” and therefore children should stick to finger-painting until they are 16. It would simply be “torture” to stretch them in any way. This also means that educational “achievement” would be equal, i.e. equally bad, so the egalitarians would be happy.
Well then I hate to think what the frequency of testing in modern schools could be described as. At least the 11+ was one exam not a battery of tests as Labour has made the Grandgrind Existence – and these tests are pointless because they have no objective credibility.
Northern Ireland is being shafted by London, but they would have done with with McGuinness as Education Minister anyway with Stormont…….it is just that Labour and Sinn Fein McGuinness are in harmony on this policy.
Nothing to do with the BBC, just more idiotic lefty garbage; “Dont stop flying, just dont feel good about it”
http://travel.guardian.co.uk/news/story/0,,1723123,00.html
Bono, Geldof and the entire sixth form grab bag of ecobollocks.
No Government Minister has complained that John Prescott’s ‘build at all costs in the rich south-east especially in Conservative controlled areas’ did not take infrastructure or utility considerations into account. Hence 1 million more homes using an average of 150 litres of water per day ends up as an awful lot more water needed. But, then JP failed his 11-plus so no one can blame him.
The BBC stealth edits the Katrina video story – very badly. (One of the top links at Memeorandum at the moment, too!)
Media ‘sensationalising science’
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/scien…ure/ 4771154.stm
ha ha…
i wonder what “media” they are referring to?
Of course it couldnt possibly be the “we’re all going to die of bird flu in a mass global warming disaster arrrrrgh!!!!” BBC ?
this is what passes for their “science” news page:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/scien…ure/ default.stm
thankfully, i have the internet to find out real science stuff – such as the 2nd red spot on Jupiter press release by Nasa.
archduke | Homepage | 04.03.06 – 12:29 pm | #
Archduke
When put like that, it makes you wonder if we really need the BBC at all.
I’ve just read this piece of bbc crap from Nick Assinder
Political Correspondent
Bringing God into politics
Analysis
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/4773852.stm
Analysis? This is infantile rubbish dressed up as a news story. It appears that Blair’s revelation that he is a Christian on an ITV chat show, and that he believes in God
“raises the prospect of inflaming Arab opinion which often links Christian western leaders with suggestions of a “crusade”…
But the British people have long appeared cautious, if not downright suspicious, of politicians who claim to be motivated by faith.”
Oh yeh as if the British people were suspicious of Winston Churchill in the Second World War fighting the Nazis, whoever wrote this is simply dumb, dumb Assinder!
Every time Islam is mentioned on bbc tv or we see images of a Mosque we hear the customary nasal grunting of “God is great”, as if this is a pleasant noise, when in fact it always reminds me of cats whining. Just as the bbc delight in making us hear Islamic women screaming. But TB as a Christian, who we have seen frequently in Churches, from delivering a sermon at Diana’s funeral to accompanying his catholic wife at the Vatican, all of a sudden it is forbidden to mention this fact. He mentioned the word “God”.
Has any enterprising bbc journalist ever considered asking if Alistair Campbell is a pagan or, horror, call News of the World at once, is he also a Christian too? ( Or that this policy might have something to do with the strict separation of Church & State. No, it’s too much of a strain for the grey cells. These Islamist loving lefties simply want to bash Blair with the bash Bush brush, and scream “Crusades” Oh, and “Assinder” doesn’t sound like a Christian name to me?
h suggestions of a “crusade”…
Go look at the masthead of the Daily Express……..there is displayed the Free Trade Crusader from the Beaverbrook days.
Nowt wrong with The Crusades…..take a look……http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2005/118/52.0.html
After all a “Crusade” is just a “Jihad”
The lunatic emphasis on “The Crusades” simply illustrates yet again that there is no grievance these people won’t mine for political benefit. How on earth can any journalist go on about “anger” about the Crusades and not laugh?
Its all getting so depressing, that I thought I would try a think in a more hopefull way
It is sometimes good to look back into the years since the war, and realise that it never was that good.
It started with rationing and lotts of bomb sites to rebuild.
Then a period of rapid decline in British industry, and its almost compleat takeover by union power. By the sixties most of British industry was nationalised, and losings Billions a year. The left seem to be everywhere.
By the seventies rampant inflation wiped out the value of our savings. All this living under the constant threat of a nuclear holacaust. The list of wars in this period is countless but include. The Korean War. The viet-nam war. Suiz crisis. Biafran war. Various middle eastern wars. Grekoturkis war. Indopakistan war. Mozambique, and of cause the cold war.
Then the sainted lady battled and largly beat most of these historical problems, while avoiding the Nazi type solutions of the opposition parties and the EU.
Then Tony Blair and his “new” type of socialism arrived and buggered it all up again.
The positive thing is that she did it by trusting the British people to do it for themselves. You dont have to be a genius to do that. Just as good because DC is no genius. It can be put right because it has happened before. This country has been in a mess as long as I can remember, but things can get better.
Thatcher was strong but still neaded allies, friends and the support of party, country and ministers to do the “right” thing. It took long years of socialist abuse to concentrate the minds of the people.
Remember that bit in BBCs hitch-hickers guide to the galaxy. The bit when the space craft they are on suddenly STOPS flying out of control. Arther Dent askes “why is it now flying OK”. Ford Prefect replys ” we just left all the controls alone.”
I am beginning to think that Paul Reynolds is a bit of a subversive at the BBC. Programmes like Today present the Gitmo prisoners as meek and mild, misunderstood, victims of torture etc etc. All the Al Q lies amplified by the BBC. They just led their Radio 4 weekly arts review prog tonight on a play about one of these poor dears.
But up pops Paul Reynolds with this article, showing quite clearly that one of the guys released from Gitmo last year is a barking nasty Islamist. Should have been shot, some would say – that would have been acceptable under the rules of war. It qwas not possible to charge him here in the UK – but his passport was taken odff him, basically to stop him travelling back to join Al Q in Afghanistan or Iraq.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/4774566.stm
“we just left all the controls alone.”
ha ha. class post there Gary P.
the Tony Blair non-news “god” story now has a (d)hys
http://newsforums.bbc.co.uk/nol/thread.jspa?threadID=1217&&edition=1&ttl=20060304194223
good lord – the minds of the media types must be incredibly tiny. this , quite frankly, is *not* a news story.
its pathetic.
the Tony Blair non-news “god” story now has a (d)hys
And I’ll bet it stays up there for weeks on end, while threads about Islamism that everyone wants to read are stuffed into the cyber-garbage-bin.
dumbcisco -> that Paul R article is eye popping. definitely goes against the grain of Al Beeb.
Chriss Hitchins talks a lot of sense, as normal. However I think he is missing the point.
The Conservative Party never was what he or me would like it to be. He has lost his patience and a part of his mind. Sensitive person is Hitchins.
The British Conservative Party IS The British Nation at the time it is called to serve it. Whatever that is by then. Or god help us all.
The BBC presents the Gitmo prisoners as poor misguided souls, innocents caught up in the rush of war.
Bloody liars. The BBC useful idiots swallow the Al Q lies, hook line and sinker.
The Paul Reynolds article I posted links to a PDF of a Tribunal examinationn of the evil Abbasi guy, and his written statement to the tribunal. Everything is recorded – and it is plain to any honest reader that this man is evil. He denies that Al Q committed 9/11, he regards the Americans and the Jews as evil, he is Allah’s soldier. He openly admits joing the Taleban to fight against America.
What even the BBC should see is that there is some form of due process in the way he has been handled. He had access to legal advice, he had pen and paper, he is examined by a Tribunal. Some of the trappings of civilisation.
By contrast, any US soldier who had been caught by the Taliban in Afghanistan would have simply been shot.
We have a fight between Western civilisation and Al Q barbarity dressed up with a veneer of PR and legal mumbo-jumbo. The BBC chooses to fight against Western civilisation, to back evil creeps like Abbasi and the sanctified “Tipton Three” (Police Be Upon Them.)
And we are forced to pay the BBC clowns who swallow all this human rights rubbish, who refuse to accept that there is a war going on and people like Abbasi are our sworn enemy.
Here is the Abbasi snivelling PDF :
Click to access Set_5_0465-0672.pdf
Did we really nead the BBC to be concentrating on TBs religious fanatisism right now. This is the agenda of Islam, and it is a very dangerous agenda. I dont believe that this war has anything to do with Christians vs Muslims. That is what the enemy want their followers to believe.
Why TB is doing this is just to weird to understand. Can he be getting so desperate he is going for the Christian vote? Or has he started batting for the other side, in more ways than one?
Does he not understand that most of us think all religious people are a bit mad. The only reason we trust any of them, is because they have not done anyone anyharm here, for a while.
It is part of British protestant culture to go to church, pray and NOT believe a word of it. All of our greatest leaders for the last 200 years have been of this type of faith. Including Churchhill and Thatcher
Gary P -> indeed. that could be well be the source of the problem in dealing with Islamism. For if TB is a man of faith, it is not illogical to conclude that he respects other faiths, and always sees some good in them. Prince Charles is of that deluded ilk as well. There seems to a clique of like minded folks in the current British elite that think that way (e.g. Lord Birt).
Whereas an atheist , like Thatcher, wouldnt give two shits about closing down mosques and deporting several hundred imans, in the interests of national security.
have any of the “behead those who insult islam” folks been arrested yet?
and can you imagine Thatcher ever allowing that to happen?
nah – fat chance. the whole bloody lot of them would be locked up now – with one way tickets to Gitmo organised.
And by the way – David Cameron is also rumoured to be a “man of faith” too. so , dont expect a Thatcher revival too soon.
How about this for selective reporting. Paul Reynolds publishes the real deal on Feroz Abbasi including what amounts to his warped confession, handwritten in excruciatingly boring detail and shown on the PDF linked to the Reynolds article.
But the main BBC story on the documents just released in the US – the story linked on its webpage – has this nonsense about Abbasi – claims that he was fed pork, guards had sex near him, he prayed facing north rather than towards Mecca etc. Poor diddums – or bloody liar, following the Al Q training manual found in Manchester – “lie and claim you were tortured”. NIL MENTION of his confession to being Taleban.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/4773396.stm
oooh – good find dumbcisco…
it deserves a thorough fisking.
The Gitmo prisoners get better fed than most UK pensioners or hospital patients :
http://www.cnsnews.com/Nation/archive/200603/NAT20060302a.html
Close-up pic of Chimpy McBushHitler caught playing cricket in a most unfortunate pose has made it to the front page – it must be the weekend again! The weekend editor shows such bias it’s beyond parody.
Gary Powell
You are right again. I think your comments are spot on.
the lie by omission:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/4773396.stm
note the 2nd paragraph:
********************************
Repeatedly cited his rights to be called a prisoner-of-war under international law. Was told by a US colonel: “I do not care about international law. I do not want to hear the words international law again.”
********************************
sounds damning , doesnt it? the usual “Americans dont give a damn – they’re all fascists arent they” kind of angle?
now read the paul reynolds article
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/4774566.stm
see how that 2nd paragraph above was taken out of context.
from the reynolds article:
************************************
The hearing itself was almost wholly confrontational. Feroz Abbasi asks: “May I have my legal representative present please?”
To which the president replies: “No you may not. This is not a legal proceeding. It is a military tribunal.”
After further exchanges in which Feroz Abbasi refers to Islamic and international law, the president says he “appreciates your concern for our souls” but concludes: “This is not Islamic law. It has no authority here” and “I don’t care about international law. I don’t want to hear the word International Law again.”
The prisoner is finally ejected, stating as he goes: “All your actions will come before Allah… and Allah may forgive you and Allah may punish you.”
********************************
jake-the-peg : get a load of the “in pictures” of bush playing cricket
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/in_pictures/4775096.stm
nearly ALL of them , have bush pulling “chimp” faces.
dumbcisco:
“He denies that Al Q committed 9/11, he regards the Americans and the Jews as evil”
Not so outlandish – I reckon at least 30% of the Guardian and Independent readership would agree with that, at least to a certain extent. Replace “Jews” with “Israelis” (as a simple cosmetic gesture) and I think a lot of them would be comfortable with that.
archduke:
I look forward to pictures of Menzies campbell or Gordon Brown playing cricket, complete with halos of course