Please use this thread for off-topic, but preferably BBC related, comments. Please keep comments on other threads to the topic at hand. N.B. this is not an invitation for general off-topic comments – our aim is to maintain order and clarity on the topic-specific threads. This post will remain at or near the top of the blog. Please scroll down to find new topic-specific posts.
Open thread – for comments of general Biased BBC interest:
Bookmark the permalink.
Thank you, Izzie
Happy New Year all at B-BBC Blogspot from Tim, Al Mansur (Red Zone) West Baghdad.
Here’s to sticking it the Beeb during 2007
Ironically, I’m gonna use a quote from a BBC programme, when they were once great.
“They don’t like it up “em”
Hope it all goes well, Tim.
And happy new year.
Tim
Happy New Year to all B-BBCers!
Let’s keep up the pressure!
Well, the BBC HYS site blocked my comment about Saddam’s execution this afternoon but they are evidently fine with the following semi-literate and offensive offering which likens “israeil” to a dog (at least nobody’s deluded enough to have recommended this):
Added: Sunday, 31 December, 2006, 18:48 GMT 18:48 UK
in my opinion bush n blair should also b hanged as they r the biggest terrorists in this world saddam was a kind hearted person down with bush down with blair long live saddam
dog bush dog blair dog israeil love u saddam
nadeem, kashmir
Ed,
I complained about that comment – it is still on the forum now.
I don’t know if they blocked your comment. Sometimes they are so inundated that they feel it’s OK to just skip whole chunks of comments, probably for coffee or smoke breaks. You can see that from the times the comments are sent. They’ll have a whole sequence of comments a minute or less apart, then there’ll be a gap of a few hours before the next sequence.
Having said that, HYS is nevertheless obviously biased to the hilt. The fact that they published that comment (and countless other gross comments) proves it.
I posted a comment yesterday which also slipped through their net. It was washed away with a whole batch that never made it.
Breakfast this morning. Bowen made a comment about Iraq being a disaster. Eer that’s your opinion Jezza not news. And I can find lots of Iraqis and coalition troops who would say the exact opposite. The only democratic nation in the Middle East apart from Israel and it is a disaster? Oh and the reporter before Jezza claimed that the Israeli soldier kidnapped by the Palis was kidnapped IN GAZA when in fact he was in ISRAEL at the time. Tell a lie often enough and they start believing it themselves…..all this before 0800hrs!
deegee:
No one answered my 31.12.06 – 7:06 am HYS query. There were specific questions but I’ll settle for a general explanation.
Does anyone really know the mechanics of who and how HYS is written/moderated? ❓
I’d still like to know.
.
Dissidents say BBC has caved in to Moscow
Leading dissidents from the former Soviet Union have demanded an investigation into the BBC Russian Service, which they have accused of caving in to pressure to be less critical of President Vladimir Putin’s regime.
They have written to Mark Thompson, the BBC director-general, demanding an examination of what they claim is a string of examples of pro-Putin bias on the taxpayer-funded service, which has a weekly audience of two million.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/01/01/nbbc01.xml
dave t,
John Reith will pop in to tell us it’s just sloppiness.
deegee,
Isn’t there an About Have Your Say link on the BBC site? If there isn’t, there should be.
Maybe the moderators prefer to remain anonymous.
deegee | 31.12.06 – 7:06 am + follow up
I think I can answer some of your queries about moderation as I asked abut this about six months ago – but what follows may be a bit out of date.
There are 6 moderators for HYS. They work for a department called BBC News Interactive.
They’re on a rota that reflects peaks in traffic. So there would be more on duty during the mid-afternoon to evening period when both the UK and US are on-line. Fewer at night and in the mornings.
They have two main responsibilities:
1. To police the rules of HYS.
2. To ensure that the balance of comments posted on screen broadly reflects the balance of opinion expressed in submissions.
So – in the case of a straight question where answers can be classified as either ‘for’ or ‘against’ they keep a running tally of what’s put up and then every half-hour or hour or so they sample fresh submissions to establish whether there’s been any change in the overall balance of opinion. If not, they’d put up an equal number of ‘fors’ and ‘againsts’; if so, they’d weight the proportion of new posts to bring the overall screen position into line with the new balance.
At busy times not every submission can be read. Random scoops are therefore made.
In terms of policing – I believe they do have some computer software that flags-up common expletives/insults and variations thereof. The moderators also watch for posts that appear to be part of an orchestrated campaign or ‘concert party’.
‘World HYS’ (which is also a programme) – is different and is run by World Service.
Hope this helps.
Ed said: “at least nobody’s deluded enough to have recommended this”
only the BBC
Allan@Aberdeen:
Well said, Simone Clarke.
I too like this ex-Tory voting Ballerina and have never seen her dance!
As for the journalist who spent months snooping around, he’d find more dirt under his fingernails than he’d ever find on me.
Well said too. No doubt she would say the same about the BBC undercover reporting team that snooped on her party, and led to the recent court cases. The Daily Mail journalist who wrote this article, Elizabeth Sanderson, struck me as a very bigoted and severely prejudiced woman. She is obviously incapable of raising the subject of the BBC as cockroaches in a critical vein, as she appears to agree whole-heartedly with the idea of a political witch-hunt against the “British neo-fascists” and their “manifesto of hatred”.
What is clear is how the majority of the readers are sympathetic towards Simone, and how the journalist is so out of tune with her own song of malice.The fact that Simone Clarke mentions more than once that it was reading the BNP manifesto that informed her decision, and that the journalist writing clearly hadn’t read it, is obvious. And this is the sort of stuff that the Daily Mail turns out- it reads more like the stuff the Guardian or Independent would publish.
Presumably the editor fears that all this will detract from the Cameron vote so lays on the fear factor in his copy.
The left are the real fascists
BNP ballerina defies rising clamour to sack her
http://politics.guardian.co.uk/farright/story/0,,1980844,00.html
Thanks J.R. for your explanation.
Bryan:
Isn’t there an About Have Your Say link on the BBC site? If there isn’t, there should be.
Nope.
Some browsing led me to the The Editors Blog Sniffing Out Edits – Update
Two points of direct B-BBC interest: A reactively moderated debate means that some users who have registered with us through a simple online process beforehand are able to post their comments directly on the site without first being read by a moderator Anyone tried this ❓
The HYS rules are posted online. Unfortunately (perhaps unavoidably) when a comment is refused/deleted there is no way to know why.
Battle of Belmarsh prison
http://www.thesun.co.uk/article/0,,2-2006600606,00.html
THREE lags routed terror suspects in a jail battle triggered by a row over Christmas celebrations.
Nine Muslims were PUNCHED, BOOTED and WHACKED with snooker cues.
Others fled to their cells to escape.
British prisoners accused Muslim inmates of a “lack of respect”.
The ENB “will be asked to explain how one of its highest profile employees was able to use her position as a platform for the far right party”
If this was the case then how come she was only “discovered” when
“Clarke’s membership became public in reports by Guardian reporter Ian Cobain”
http://politics.guardian.co.uk/farright/story/0,,1980844,00.html
This all sounds like a bit of a witch hunt to me.
Beneath every tyrant and mass murderer lurks a keen gardener. Here Al-Beeb tries to make us feel guilty about the man they had pencilled in for the next series of Gardener’s Question Time.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/6222159.stm
Jon writes:
“This all sounds like a bit of a witch hunt to me.”
You are right. Of course it’s a witch hunt. How else could the BBC continue to employ people like Jeremy Hardy and Mark Steele if it (and its fellow travellers in the printed media) weren’t operating a deliberately discriminatory policy?
Time to push Saddam as a martyr to Islam.
“Saddam Hussein scarcely has an instant to collect his thoughts. He starts to mutter a prayer, but just as he speaks the name Muhammad, the chief hangman pulls the lever and the trapdoor opens.”
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/6221751.stm
“When Saddam Hussein looked in disbelief at the over-sized noose that was fitted by masked volunteers around his neck, the man who helped to put it there by invading Iraq and toppling the dictator was soundly asleep at his ranch in Texas”
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/6219767.stm
Good God the innuendo!
Jon writes:
“This all sounds like a bit of a witch hunt to me.”
I agree, 2007 begins and it looks like there is a new witch hunt trampling upon freedom of speech, and human rights. A ballerina who votes for the wrong political party! Forget cash for peerages, or Islamist terrorist sleepers, an English ballerina who lives with a Cuban-Chinese partner is the new racist! It is imperative that she is punished.
It looks like a new unelected House Committee on Un-British Activities has appeared: Lee Jasper, David Lammy, Inayat Bunglawala, Jon Cruddas, A spokeswoman for the CRE, this special investigating committee rounded up by the Guardian have fired off the first salvos. What a motley crew, give me Jack Turner any day. And what no BBC? No Fergal Keene interview yet attacking the BNP again as he did a few weeks ago trying to seek out her repentance live on radio for her inexcusable thought crimes, no invite on the Today programme for Simone to be cut to shreds by Mastermind himself? Question Time must be quaking in its boots now that Simone has arrived on the scene. Will she replace that ageing lefty ballerina, Deborah Bull (who happens to also be a BBC governor) on one of their panels? Oh dear, now we have some sort of younger attractive political balance for all those regular appearances on BBC 2 Newsnight’s Art Review along with darling of the left, Kirsty Wark. Can’t have right-wing ballerinas can we? It’s not aesthetic. The arts were always thought to be the undisputed province of the left. Well, The Guardian et al, may have taken on a figure in this new witch-hunt that will probably back-fire on them. Let’s face it if people had to choose between Simone on immigration and Lee Jasper or Bunglawala- who would win the popularity stakes? We live in a world where the celebrity factor counts for a lot, they have made a false move here.
It’s a witch-hunt for certain. Do those fools on the left ever think how many more members the BNP will get as a direct result of their attempts to put a woman out of work simply because of her political opinions? Her opinions – immigration is out of control – are in fact a statement of NuLab’s immigration policy i.e. no immigration controls IS the policy.
Happy New Year Everyone!
Jon, Joe, Allan@Aberdeen, GCooper, John Reith, this is for you:
Compare the worst remark that the reporter Ian Cobain of the liberal Guardian could elicit from the supposed racist ballerina Simone Clarke, during seven whole months’ undercover research (i.e. goading):
“During his seven months undercover, Clarke told him that immigration “has really got out of hand”.
http://politics.guardian.co.uk/farright/story/0,,1980844,00.html
Er, that’s it. Now compare the supposed racist ballerina’s remark with the obvious bigotry ascribed to presumably the BBC’s entire Current Affairs staff by the BBC’s ally, The Guardian, no less, following the publication of The Guardian’s original CFQ story:
“The corporation eventually stumped up £20,000 in a libel settlement in 1987 … but the lengthy process made Mr Hamilton a confirmed enemy of the BBC and investigative journalists generally.
http://img184.imageshack.us/img184/8409/19941021guardianp03accocm7.jpg
John Reith I’ve asked you this question once before, but it seemingly prompted your disappearance:
“Surely, if the BBC was staffed by impartial reporters, they would not consider anyone their “enemy”, would they? Is this little slip by The Guardian not actually indicative of how the BBC is in fact stuffed to the rafters with political bigots? People who share the same bigoted DNA as the racists with whom even the BNP doesn’t wish to associate itself?”
http://www.haloscan.com/comments/patrickcrozier/116655503658784435/?dt=1167675094#324832
I’d like your answer please. And, in the light of the Guardian’s seven-month long investigation of the BNP, during which presumably Simone Clarke would have felt relaxed in Ian Cobain’s company believing him to be a friend, do you not agree that the ballerina’s perfectly proper non-racist concerns about immigration confirms her to be nothing of a bigot, unlike the bigots whom The Guardian itself confirms infest the BBC?
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/6222247.stm
Beeb complains that Countryside Alliance may have asked their members to vote in a poll to ban the Hunting Bill etc. And the left wing vote NEVER does the same of course! Then again the number of times so called right wingers can vote on anything or Have Their Say is always limited by the lefties at the Beeb!
How can they write this sort of stuff whining about democracy yet refuse to allow it to those who think differently to their twisted and narrow world-views?
The BBC and Gurdian do support democracy as long as the choice is between Nulabour, Lib Dems and now the Polly Townbee loving “Conservatives”. The BNP is not an illegal organisation, nor are the Socialist Workers Party. Belonging to a legitimate political party is also not illegal.
The funny thing is I (and I suspect most people) had never heard of this Ballerina until the witch hunt started . It is the Guradian themselves that are naive – it is they who have given the BNP the best publicity they could possibly get by thier own efforts.
Is what we are seeing here a new McCarthyism?
“Suspicions were often given credence despite inconclusive or questionable evidence, and the level of threat posed by a person’s real or supposed leftist associations or beliefs was often greatly exaggerated. Many people suffered loss of employment, destruction of their careers, and even imprisonment”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McCarthyism
But alas David Cameron is no President Truman who said “In a free country, we punish men for the crimes they commit, but never for the opinions they have”
dave t | Homepage | 01.01.07 – 2:53 pm
The committee considered taking the Hunting Act off the ballot paper. Oh the arrogance!
However, I wish they had done so because then the anti-EU vote would have come top.
What an interesting reaction we would then have had from our “masters” at the beeb.
Will we see any move to remove Antony Wedgewood-Benn from the politics show ballot?
After all benn is barking mad and has no track record of success in politics so he could only have reached top of the poll as the result of a campaign.
(Probably organised from within the beeb.)
“Is what we are seeing here a new McCarthyism?”
I’d be very careful about using the term ‘McCarthyism’ inappropriately. Senator McCarty’s instincts were correct as inspection of the KGB’s archives has confirmed. Indeed, if anything, McCarthy underestimated the extent to which communists had infiltrated the Truman Administration. The infiltrators handed communism its biggest prize by ensuring that Chiang Kai Shek’s government did not get the Marshall-sized loans to support China’s economy and military, with the inevitable result.
The Establishment has been taken over by the left (education, church, police, broadcasting etc) and they’re using the full power of the state against people like Simone Clarke, and me, and probably most of you.
Allan@Aberdeen: I get your point – but this era has always been seen by the liberal elite as an attack on the left. This was not only upon communists but anyone with the merest hint of a leftist view.
My fear is that we have an “establishment” that tolerates real infringements on democracy but persecutes those who disagree with them and are no threat to democracy.
According to the BBC, Simone Clarke is
highly respected they even have a photo of her
The local cast will be joined by highly respected dancers Simone Clarke and Yat-Sen Chang.
Simone trained at the Royal Ballet School and has won many prestigious Awards including ‘The Paul Clarke Award’, ‘Arnold Haskel’, ‘Markova Bagrit’. She graduated into Sadlers Wells Royal Ballet (Birmingham Royal Ballet) and was promoted to first soloist in 1995.
If it is a choice between the BBC ballerina and the BNP ballerina- I’ll go for Simone
Deborah Bull(BBC ballerina) was hopeless on Question Time on the subject of immigration, spouting New Labour drivel; Simone Clarke,from what I have read is far more acute.
Has any journalist discovered which party BBC ballerina votes for?
“What have the following got in common (apart from all being pampered left-wing humbugs who believe they can run our lives better than we can ourselves)?
Bono (tax exile poverty exploiter)
Anthony Minghella (director of Tony and Gordo In Love)
Thom Yorke (Radiohead “activist”mate of the Moonbat)
David Blunkett (highly unpleasant bearded communist ex-commissar)
Yoko Ono (superannuated luxury hotel protester)
Dr Rowan Williams (traditional anti-materialist unilateralist druid who commendably insists on walking everywhere and wearing goatskins)
Zac Goldsmith (pampered multi-millionaire trust babe who wants us to start walking everywhere wearing goatskins… well, obviously not important opinion formers such as his good self)
Give up?
They’ve all been guest editors on R4 Today:”
http://burningourmoney.blogspot.com/2006/12/tis-season-to-be-biased.html
The bbc still flogging a dead horse.
Ex-communist Slovenia joins euro
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/6222115.stm
The real world:
A doomed currency based on symbolism
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/main.jhtml?xml=/opinion/2007/01/01/dl0101.xml
Supporters of the currency are clutching at the news of Slovenia’s membership, but there is a hollow and perfunctory tone to their jollity. Looking back, their mistake was to rely on mood and symbolism to sell the new currency. Unable to argue convincingly that the euro would make people better off • as, indeed, it has not, bringing slower growth and higher inflation to most participants • they instead concentrated on claiming that monetary union was inevitable.
How funny to look back at the predictions of the Heseltines and Pattens and Kinnocks. Had these men been City forecasters, they would all now be out of a job. But, for some reason, we continue to invite them to pontificate on the BBC, to decorate and defer to them. Odd, really.
From the Daily Telegraph:
I stopped listening to any comment on BBC programmes on any matter of import when they kept inviting Ted Heath to enlighten us. When they added Kinnock’s wisdom to the list I turned off altogether. Those who continue to listen can look forward in the fullness of time to the benefit of the opinions of the current bunch of failures.
Posted by Michael Llewellyn on January 1, 2007 11:57 AM
TPO: in “the real world”, the international money markets prefer the euro over the dollar, which has been collapsing at a rate unseen since the thirties. If we are to condemn the ideological nonsense of the BBC, we should stay clear of the ideological nonsense of the Torygraph, which probably gave a few of its readers in the City fits of laughter – probably relieving the monotony of constant buy orders for the euro and constant sell orders for the dollar. And everyone: the BNP may be a legal party, but it is not a nice one. Nick Griffin is the cleverest party leader in Britain – hardly a high compliment when you consider the competition – but his party is nothing more than rabble, and his attempt to occupy the areas vacated by the Tories will fail because of the manifest inadequacy of its membership. You can see them at every by-elections – large men in white tee shirts, with short haircuts and threatening expressions. If you want a credible conservative party, you should try and found one yourselves. Or else try UKIP.
Fabio
After your rant about the Dutch being subhuman I have no wish to converse, in any way whatsoever, with someone who is clearly in need of help (and friends).
I will not respond to further posts by you.
Fabio P.Barbieri- The BNP may not be a nice one – but it is legal and therefore anyone has the right to associate with it without being persecuted. Do you thing George Galloways respect party is a “nice one”? I don’t see the press or the BBc exposing their members. And by the way I do not support any political party. I personally think that any views should be heard and people can associate with whomever they like within the law
How about this twaddle from the Independent on Jeremy Vine who is about to front the BBCs new look Panorama:
If the BBC had a face, it might well be that of Jeremy Vine. Engaging, Home Counties, youthful, conservative with a small “c”. …He is known for his Christian convictions and laments the “collapse of courtesy” in the media…. There is something about his Christianity, his earnest charisma and Middle-England appeal, that recalls a young, pre-sleaze version of Tony Blair… He has published…two books set in the Church of England.
For those who have not yet had the pleasure of reading Mr.BBC, the titles of these books: “Forget Heaven, Just Kiss Me: The possible history of the impossible vicar Mark. E. Hodder Christian Paperbacks”(1993) and “The whole world in my hands. HCP.”(1994)
“I enjoyed Newsnight,” he says. “It was house style to wipe the floor with interviewees. No one gets out of that studio alive. Newsnight was like playing squash – it’s an explosive exercise.”
Vine on Moses and the BBCs Misson:
“It’s not so much tame as in a strange way more real. I always used to think that news was something that we give to them, the licence-fee payers, and I now realise it goes the other way round, that news is something they tell us. The idea that I might know more than 5 million listeners is preposterous. The BBC goes in cycles. It used to be the Mission to Explain, we stand on the mountain top and hand down tablets of stone, now it’s completely in reverse, we are on a Mission to Explore and we need the listeners’ help in finding out things. It may even be a higher form of journalism, what I’m doing now.”
No controller wants current affairs now, they only tend to take it through the back door, like BBC 3’s F***k Off I’m Fat. There’s virtually no current affairs on BBC 2. It’s a really worrying time.”
Vine on dumbing-down:
“The whole dumbing-down thing is a really old argument. It’s a way of saying ordinary people who pay the licence fee shouldn’t be allowed to watch news they’re interested in and it should all be more highbrow and concocted by people who come from Oxbridge and I don’t really buy that. The BBC is falling over itself to try to reach listeners and viewers who are paying the licence fee but don’t think there is a programme that does what they’re interested in.”
The BBC is in Vine’s DNA:
Last year he was approached to host ITV’s Jonathan Dimbleby Sunday show, with “a lot of money”, but he could not face leaving the BBC. “There’s something in me that keeps me at the BBC. I’m slightly in love with it. It’s allowed me to do some amazing things. I worry that at times I have too much loyalty to the BBC, that it’s woven into my DNA. All presenters should feel part of an insurgency inside the organisation. You get these consensus positions adopted by the people in charge and it’s up to us to be a little bit eccentric and difficult and loud and strange. That’s what presenters should be.”
Pass the sick bucket!
BBC PROPAGANDA FOR THE SOMALI UNION OF ISLAMIC COURTS COMES TO AN END
… But not in the way that the BBC would have wanted.
Funny how the Somali Islamic Courts gunmen who the BBC would still have us belive are so popular …
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/africa/6223283.stm
“Some analysts say the UIC’s popularity stemmed from its ability to transcend the clan enmities that have bedevilled Somalia …”
are now bugging out of their so called “stronghold” in Kismayo. Where the BBC had promised us they would make their last stand and draw in their enemies … “like they did to the Americans at Mogaduishu.”
Its clear that this is far from the truth which is that a Taliban style collapse has occured, mainly because the Islamic Courts do not have the support of the people in they areas they occupied.
In fact even on Al Jazeera, a station that has back the Islamic Courts they are now brodcasting the celebrations held by people in the areas liberated from the Islamic Courts.
Given that Al Beeb models itself on Al Jazeera I was expecting a little of the truth to be shown through gritted teeth in their. But it seem instead that the BBC has kept an the truth buried by minimising its reporting from Somalia. (Much in the same way the the Hezbollah demonstrations were pulled off its broadcasts when they didnt seem to be going to plan).
You can count on Al Beeb to cover up the truth when the truth is a rejection of Islamic rule by the people.
I’m still chuckling at Fabio’s rant about poor inoffensive Kylie. Especially the bit where he uses Bob Dylan as an example of ‘proper’ music!
“Who’s Bob Dylan, Dad?”
“He’s the one at the end of the ‘We Are The World’ single, Son. The one who can’t sing.”
During his seven months undercover, Clarke told him that immigration “has really got out of hand”.
http://politics.guardian.co.uk/farright/story/0,,1980844,00.htm
Enough to make any Gruaniad reader swoon over his muesli !
Jon 7:44 pm
The BBC exposing their members? Save us from this horrible sight!
“BBc exposing their members” A bit of a double entendre their in the best Carry On tradition – sorry.
Jon – Norman Tebbit was a Today guest editor in 2003 (though he didn’t try to impose a right wing agenda.) Aside from him, as far as I can see there have been no “unsafe” guest editors. They’ve had Fergie, who’s a sort of ex-royal, but yer royals are very safe. And as for Zac Goldsmith, what more could you look for in a “Conservative” guest editor ? But I don’t think they’d have let Jimmy Goldsmith do it !
BBC: SOMALIS ARE FORCED TO CELEBRATE
BBC At its Orwellian best. It hasnt taken Al Beeb long to condemn the defeat to the Islamic Courts. According to the BBC the only people to benefit will be drug dealers, warlords, and football fans. Wonder how women like Ayman Hirsi feel about this.
Having admitted that the BBC “analyists” were caught with their pants down (which ironically is shown at the bottom right of the article) the BBC line about crowds cheering the removal of the Islamic Courts is that they have been “forced” to celebrate.
Funny how BBC never reported anyone being forced to support the Islamic Courts. The BBC is yet to explain that despite their “massive popularity” the Islamic Courts had no Somali lifting a finger to fight for them. Surely Jihad isnt supposed to be like this?!
The BBC claims these are “anxious times” now that the Islamic Courts are gone.
The people most anxious are the Islamic propagandists at the BBC. Their Somali staffers like Mohamed Olad Hassan an AP Stringer.
[Olad Hassan is the same reporter that gave voice to Bin Laden labelling anyone siding with government troops as a traitor]
http://www.lasvegassun.com/sunbin/stories/w-af/2006/jul/03/070305180.html
Now that Olad Hassan looks to have an uncertain future in a Somalia free of teh Islamic Courts – no doubt he other like him be re-located to London in a jiffy.
Meantime you can read his biased analysis HERE:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/africa/6217007.stm
“Other people, however, feel they have no option but to join in with the waving crowds.”
Twenty-eight-year-old Abdullahi Aden says he supported the Islamists but now he has changed his mind.
“I was supporting them because of two reasons: they restored the peace here and they had the principle of ruling the nation into Islam.
“But now I do not have an option. There is a Somali saying, ‘If you can’t beat them join them.'”
Chuffer,
If Dylan could find recording studio executives who didn’t know who he was and send them a demo CD they’d collapse in helpless laughter at the idea of recording him.
Dylan’s magic is in his poetic imagery and his composition rather than his voice, and if he rides at times on the glory of his past – well, he’s certainly earned the right so to do!
A JEM FROM BBCs: HAVE YOUR SAY
HYS is a joke as a forum for free thought. But sometimes the BBC gets so desperate for support for its pro-Islamic drivel that it has to run with the type of informed comment set out below.
http://newsforums.bbc.co.uk/nol/thread.jspa?threadID=5077&&&edition=1&ttl=20070101220933
Added: Sunday, 31 December, 2006, 22:53 GMT 22:53 UK
hii all this is my frist mail and massage, i Read many mail about war of somalia , i,m somalia man i see many of you, you don,t have any Idia of information about it, listene what i tel you ,somalia has one broplem that is to fight clean to each other Islamist or weak govermant, now in the capital 89% of islamist are in the city, they soprt their clean , so this poeple no one can help except (ALLAH)GOD,top broplems is without Education, so every goverment and group they will fell thier Target,
adam, cairo
Lee – “He [Zac Goldsmith]chose to back the Tories because Labour has become “the party of big business”, he argues. ”
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/politics/4544600.stm
Well thats good enough to get invited on by the Beeb.
But what does this now say for the Conservatives?
On the HYS subject, the comment Ed mentioned in his 01.01.07 – 1:13 am post is still up on the Saddam forum in all its uncensored glory, despite my complaint. Yet HYS “moderators” censored a comment of mine on Saudi Arabia.
So now we know that’s it’s not acceptable to call Saudi Arabia an “Apartheid State” but it’s acceptable to call Israel a “dog”.
Thanks for clearing that one up, BBC, as you continue your irreversible slide into dhimmitude.
Sorry Anonymous | 01.01.07 – 10:28 pm | was me.
Re: Prophet Abraham vs. Prophet Ibrahim
Could there be some internal BBC wrangling over how to refer to this Prophet?
Here (time stamped Monday, 18 December 2006, 10:15 GMT — yeah, yeah, I know BBC time stamps count for diddlysquat) we have the BBC in full Dhimmi-speak with the Prophet referred to as Ibrahim…
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/country_profiles/820515.stm
(“Muslims believe Mecca was founded by the Prophet Ibrahim”)
While here…
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/4180965.stm
…(Time stamped Wednesday, 27 December 2006, 20:56 GMT) we have him referred to as Abraham, the name the vast majority of telly tax payers would know him by.
What gives?