from Saturday’s Daily Mail:
The BBC faced more claims of New Labour bias Friday night after giving prominence to Downing Street’s instant denial over the latest twist in the cash-for-honours scandal.
Rival ITV News led its 6.30pm bulletin on Thursday with allegations that police had found deleted e-mails on a second computer system linked to the probe.
The Mail was also working on making the story its front-page splash Friday.
But the BBC’s Ten O’Clock News spent less than 20 seconds on the story Thursday evening. When it did get round to the story at 10.20pm, the broadcaster decided to focus on the Government’s instant rebuttal.
On Thursday night’s programme, Dermot Murnaghan told viewers: “Downing Street has denied new claims about the cash-forhonours inquiry.
“ITV News and the Daily Mail claim that the police had uncovered a second computer system within Number 10 in which e-mails appeared to have been deleted.
“This evening Downing Street denied the existence of the system and said the story was untrue.”
A BBC spokesman said: “The story was reported extensively and the coverage was balanced and impartial.”
The criticism comes a week after Newsnight faced accusations of bias over its treatment of the story. The show led on an embarrassing e-mail between two Conservative Party members rather than the news that Ruth Turner had been arrested in the cash-for-peerages case.
Hat tip to commenter Alan-a-gale.
This gets curiouser and curiouser.
There’s no denying (though I imagine “Reith” might try!) that the BBC has played down the joyous sight of the water rising around Bliar and Co’s necks, but it’s a little more complicated than straight pro-ZaNuLab bias, I feel sure.
I’m not one of those who subscribes to the belief that the BBC automatically supports Labour. Indeed, if anything, at present, I’d have said it supports the LibDems, because it will, instinctively, support the most ‘liberal’ line on any given issue.
Moreover, for all the ZaNuLabour hacks burrowed into the Corporation’s rotting carcass, there are plenty who have never forgiven ZNL for Iraq and the Hutton affair. They, surely, must be rubbing their hands with glee at the prospect of the Dear Leader being hounded from office in deep disgrace?
Can any Kremlinologist throw some light on this? Clearly, something strange is afoot.
And, “Reith” please don’t even bother with the ‘not newsworthy’ line. I’ve hardly stoped laughing since the last time you tried it on!
It’s obvious. Gordo “Gordon” Brown, the BBC-supported Crown Prince of the labour party, is also up to his fat neck in the same scandal. THey’re protecting the labour party to protect him, presumably in the hopes of a reciprocal amount of protection when he becomes PM. The assumption being, of course, that nobody else will take on that role in the meantime…
If Labour falls, Brown won’t be PM. Worse, those ghastly tories might get in and then revert to form* as evil racist right-wing bigots, cutting taxes, tightening immigration control, even taking us out of the EU. They might even scrap the telly tax!
No love is lost on Blair these days, but protecting him protects their knight in shining armour, so they hold their collective nose and push the story back in to the mire.
*With Cameraon at the helm this isn’t likely, except in the mind of a terrified BBC hack clinging desperately to the public teat. But stranger things have happened…
I think they’re not pursuing Tony ferociously because the BBC is a consensus type organisation and there are enough Nu Labour hacks in the BBC editorial hierarchy to prevent it. While you can have the odd story that isn’t within the consensus (there’s even one at the moment pouring cold water on the Stern Review) a vigorous and repetitive pursuit of Tony wouldn’t achieve the necessary consensus. Since the BBC’s broad church runs all the way from Jeremy Hardy to Auntie Kirstie, any political position from SWP to Nu Labour loyalist isn’t going to be the subject of a concerted BBC attack. Outside that broad church you’ve got no defenders at the BBC and so attacking you won’t upset the consensus approach. They really do believe they’re unbiased you see, so if they come across dissent from within the BBC, they’ll water the story down to make sure they’ve got both sides of the fence covered. The only problem is that they don’t get out much, so they assume anyone to the right of the furthest right person they employ (say Kirstie) must be a nutter who they can safely ignore.
‘I think they’re not pursuing Tony ferociously…’
He got much more of a grilling than Marr gave Brown but of course if you read the BBC Politics website the top story is about him not being finished yet.
They really do believe they’re unbiased you see
No. I don’t think they do.
They just have commited left-wing beliefs that cannot be argued with and have to be considered absolutely right and therefore any views outside of this are to be ignored, derided or portrayed as unacceptably right-wing etc. AND becasue they want to dominate any public debate with these left-wing beliefs to try to influence people.
They are left-wing idealogues, and anyone with commited idealogical beliefs, be they political or religious, will treat differing opinions the same way.
They don’t really believe they are in the centre, they just believe they are righteous.
And as Labour is the mainstream left-of-center political party, and are less likely to take there sodding licence fee away, they are doing much to help them. Not just by burying bad-news for them, but also attacking the Tories, when they can, even if it is a non-story. And leaving them out of the debate altogether by hardly giving them any airtime.
If you contrast that with their coverage of the previous Tory government. The differences are very stark. The headlines of the major new s bulettins were full of critical storei on teh major domestic issues, with Labour shadow minister, trade Union officials and left-wing pressure groups, given loads of air time to Tory bash.
Political domestic issues are routinely ignored by the BBC these days, and when they get a mention the Conservative view of it, is left out most of the time.
They are partisan towards the Labour party, because of ideoligical sympathy and because many influential BBC people have direct involement, past and present with them or other left-wing groups.
The BBC went for that ‘Woodward and Bernstein moment’ when Gilligan tried to bring down the government.
The Hutton report did Auntie a lot of damage (I think more than they like to let on).
There will be no BBC fingerprints if the ‘Cash for Honours’ row demolishes Labour.
PaulC. That’s wrong.
Gilligan, just made a claim on Radio four and Blair and Campbell blew it up into the Hutton enquiry.
Gilligan was merely stating what the cocnsensus left-wing ant-war, opinon was.
They weren’t trying to bring down Blair and his government. Why? because it would have meant them being replaced by a Conservative government.
It was never the BBC’s intention to bring down Labour (perhaps Blair) it is still their intention to try and Keep Labour, under Brown, in power.
Lee Moore [3.48 pm] You say, “The only problem is that they don’t get out much, so they assume anyone to the right of the furthest right person they employ (say Kirstie) must be a nutter who they can safely ignore.”
Exactly so. I think you have neatly encapsulated the problem. But geezer [5.46 pm] also has a point when he says “They don’t really believe they are in the centre, they just believe they are righteous.”
“it is still their intention to try and Keep Labour, under Brown, in power.”
But should it? What right do the BBC have in backing political parties?
Of course the BBC has no right to back individual political parties.
But only the political parties of the Left can be relied upon to support the kind of parasitic existence in which the BBC indulges itself. Hence the BBC’s reluctance to broadcast any scandal which might threaten the continuance of New Labour in government — despite their lovers’ tiff over Iraq.
Geezer – I’m sure you’re right that there are biased lefty ideologues at the BBC who know they are biased lefty ideologues. But I don’t think this is true of all, or indeed even most, of them. For example, I don’t think Andrew Marr thinks he’s biased. I think he thinks he really tries to be unbiased. What’s more I think he really tries to be unbiased. It’s just that he fails from time to time, and being a lefty he fails in the lefty direction. Sure there’s some deliberate bias there, but I think the Jeff Randall quote up on this page has it right. They think they’re on the middle ground. They just don’t have enough folk in the organisation to disabuse them of this delusion.
Lee Moore.
Even BBC people will have, at least, a rudementary understanding of the British political spectrum. Marr and co aren’t exactly stupid.
The Left- wing urbanites, who inhabit the BBC, will spend most of their lives with their heads up their own arses, but they will be at least a bit aware of what the rest of the country may actually be thinking, They just don’t see the need to represent those views if they clash with their own. The BBC’s bias, is mostly about a lot of like-minded individuals using the power of communication, that the BBC has, to influence people in a very undemocratic way. They consider themselves as preachers for a cause, not middle-of-the-road opinion makers.
It was always a target for, left-wing, Oxbridge graduates, who wanted to get a job that gave them unlelected influence over much of the public and they recruited the same type of people and so it goes on…
Until you have the BBC you have now. Not full of people who don’t know any different, but an organisational culture that has been deliberately created for the same opinions to be repeated throughout most of it’s output by people who are fully aware of what they are doing.
Are members of the Labour or Conservative party or any other political party, unaware of alternative opinions, or course not. So why do people think the BBC staff are not?
Yes – the BBC are aware of other opinions, they cannot label all the opposing views as coming from the “Daily Mail” readers. Do they not read their own (D)HYS? Do they not produce opinion polls? It is not that they are unaware of what public opinion is – it is that they chose to ignore it. Why? Maybe because it is self-preservation. Look at the recent HYS about the increase in the licence fee.
And this is the reason IMHO why the Labour Party are still high in the polls, because if the BBC were unbiased and reported what was really happening they would surly be in single figures now. But the BBC need the Labour Party and the Labour Party needs the BBC. Why else did it renew the charter even after Hutton. Any other party would have scrapped it completely.
The Daily Mail’s editor pointed out that the BBC effectively destroyed the credibility of messrs Hague, Duncan-Smith and Howard so Cameron has decided that he shouldn’t do anything to annoy them. What annoys and dismays me is that no recent leader of the Conservative Party (the so-called opposition) ever dared to take on the BBC head-on: that’s why I won’t be voting Tory. If a more capable leader, say Michael Howard, had challenged the BBC directly, he would have achieved a measure of victory. How could he lose?
Allan@Aberdeen says:
“The Daily Mail’s editor pointed out that the BBC effectively destroyed the credibility of messrs Hague, Duncan-Smith and Howard so Cameron has decided that he shouldn’t do anything to annoy them.”
The only thing that surprises me about Dacre’s statement is that it took him so long. I was saying the same on B-BBC months ago: and I was by no means the first to see what had happened.
Cameron is the direct product of BBC bias at work, not just in its direct news output, but across the broadcasting spectrum, including its ‘entertainment’ programmes (notably ‘comedy’).
Maybe Cameron is not the lefty he portrays himself to be. Could he be a realist. We have seen in the past, and no doubt Cameron is aware at how the BBC had destroyed the conservatives. Could he not be playing them at their own game,. After all you do not see him speaking on contentious issues. It could be that he is gambling that if he is not outspoken as Howard was the BBC do not have the ammunition to destroy him. If so it is a gamble that may isolate many conservative voters, but pick up many from the centre.
Perhaps it’s worth noting that tonight, Sunday, there is not a single mention of “cash for honours” on the BBC’s News (sic) Online’s front page.
This, despite the revelation in today’s dead tree media that Bliar has, for the first time, been allegedly linked directly to the scandal.
Here we have what is possibly the culmination of a series of ZaNuLabour financial scandals and the one that could well see Bliar tipped out of office – possibly even to find himself scheduled for a trip to the Old Bailey.
And what does the BBC do to keep us informed?
Nothing!
Jon writes:
“Maybe Cameron is not the lefty he portrays himself to be. Could he be a realist.”
This is what a lot of Cameron’s apologists like to claim.
However, as time goes by and the vapidity of his ideas (such as they are), start to be revealed, it becomes harder and harder to believe it.
It might be working in so far as ‘acceptable’ Tories (Gove, Portillo, Maude etc) get increased, and slightly less antagonistic, coverage from the BBC, but the public mood has turned.
If this ever had been the right policy it isn’t now. People want a firm stand on immigration, crime and tax – all traditional Tory strengths.
Cameron might have won the BBC vote – but he has lost the country in the process.
Cameron’s game is obviously to not give the BBC a stick to beat him with. I blame him for that. Look at Newsnight’s feeble attempts to help Labour out of the Turner story. Also, it is not so much the Conservatives don’t say anthing on major issues, but the BBC et al. don’t publicise it if they do, for obvious reasons.
The Tories may as well sit back for now and let Labour implode, why give the Beeb opportunities to shit on them instead of labour.
And frankly, any Tory voter who says “i’m not voting” is playing into the BBC and Labour’s hands because Apathy will keep Labour in power. If people want change they have only one choice.
The BBC are deliberatley creating a sense of apathy, because they know that is the only way to keep this shower of shit in office.
Should have said “DON’T blame hime for that”
Geezer says:
“And frankly, any Tory voter who says “i’m not voting” is playing into the BBC and Labour’s hands because Apathy will keep Labour in power. If people want change they have only one choice.”
We’re drifting off topic, but I have to say that is the worst reason I can think of to vote for any party – because you have no choice.
If a Cameron government would be indistinguishable from a ZaNuLabour or LibDem one, what would be the point of it?
Despite what Cameron and his increasingly desperate lieutenants are saying – and what the BBC are playing down – there has been a significant grouping of Thatcherite and libertarian Conservatives within the UKIP.
UKIP may not win the next election, but it may bring the Conservative party to its senses for the one after.
Sorry but New Dave Conservatism seems to involve bracing all of the worst things rather than the best just because he wants to pander to the BBC and the guardian – but when the chips are down even they wont back him.
All spin and vacuousness has had its day, but he is embracing it as everyone else is moving away from it!
If they were to win they would not change anything for the better.
Dave and his cronies silence over the poor tax oops I mean license fee was truly shocking.
Al Beeb detests Blair but they think they will get a much better prospect out of Brown, even here they are making a misjudgement.
It was the Brown camp that was talking loudest that this license fee was probably the last and that radical change was on the cards for state broadcasting next time.
They were only getting what they were this time because the government was using the BBC to help with the switch to digital.
I suspect that the liberals and hard left will in reality get little more change out of Brown than they did out of Blair, so expect some very disappointed Al Beebers…
Cameron’s assumption seems to be that the right will vote for him because it has no choice and the middle will vote for him because he’s Tony Blair without the lies, corruption, and sleaze, and that this will win.
What he does not seem to have contemplated is that the right will vote for UKIP instead, depriving him of office, but this looks like what’s happening. Thus in today’s poll in the Telegraph his lefty Tories are pottering along on 38% while the minor parties have gone from 8 to 13%. Most of that 5% rise is, I suspect, traditional conservatives drifting away.
The depressing thing about Cameron is the intellectual cowardice. He thinks that he has to move towards the middle to get elected. Thatcher in contrast moved the middle towards herself, which is why we have a Labour party that doesn’t dare repeal her trade union reforms, or nationalise anything, or adopt a CND-dictated defence policy. She moved the centre rightwards whereas Cameron seems determined to move the right centrewards.
He must not be allowed to succeed and the only thing that may convince him of this is if UKIP loses him 50 seats at the next election and leaves him without a majority. As others have said, there’s no point voting Conservative to get another Labour government, nor because there’s nobody else to vote for. I want the whiny liberals in the centre to have to vote Conservative because there’s no choice, not genuine Conservatives.
This thread is a bit off topic but, for once, you can’t blame the BBC for the sliminess of Cameron on “Today” this morning in his response to the Catholic/gay dispute. Cameron suggested that letting the matter stew for 4 years to allow the Catholic adoption societies to adapt to the new dispensation will solve the difficulty. As you can see once a PR spiv always a PR spiv. For the Catholics – rightly or wrongly – this is a matter of principle: something beyond Cameron’s ability to recognise, let alone act on.
Notice the similarity between Cameron’s attitude to the adoption row and his treatment of his previously unequivocal undertakings. At the time of the Tory leadership elections he undertook unequivocally to have the Conservative MEPs leave the EPP bloc in the EU parliament in “weeks rather than months” if he was elected leader. Subsequent to his elevation to leadership, the “Conservatives” decided to maintain the status quo and possibly re-visit the whole matter in 2+ years when a new bloc “might” be constructed (or, more likely, not, because with a bit of luck everybody will have forgotten about Cameron’s pledge and the matter will have gone away). Jeff Randall of the Daily Telegraph sums up Cameron in this article. Even the great British public, faced with the worst government for generations, is not convinced by Cameron if this poll and this commentary are anything to go by.
Umbongo
But did you notice how when the discussion turned to the question of Muslims and “Britishness”, Dave said he wasn’t into “bullying” or putting taks on anyone’s lawn – which is precisely what the new gay adoption regulations do to the RC Church’s lawn.
Perhaps the bishops should put the odd landmine under their turf, after all it works for the Muzzies. Perhaps the bhoys over in N Ireland have got tons of gear they could recommission….. the Beeb’s always been in favour of community policing after all.
RR
Cameron does what Blair did/does. He looks at the polls – or talks to his focus groups – on any particular issue and tailors his statements/policies to suit the occasion. Policy developed from principle is not a characteristic of PR spivs, hence Cameron’s contradictory statements.
Umbongo –
You’re right of course, but the sheer nerve of his effectively contradicting himself within a couple of minutes was breathtaking. Dunno how much longer I’ll be delivering leaflets for the local Tory here, and we’ve an election in May. Doesn’t seem to be too much point, really. He don’t do principles, it seems.
‘If a more capable leader, say Michael Howard, had challenged the BBC directly, he would have achieved a measure of victory. How could he lose?’
The BBC would have misreported his challenge, gone after everything he did, and given air time to the most inane anti Tory stories they could find.
There are two things that stop the BBC from attacking Cameron as much as they would like, one he wasn’t in the Commons pre 1997 so no ‘same old Tory’ dross, and he hasn’t really released any policies for them to lie about.
Only a fool would give the BBC something to lie about this early on.
Quite right Ralph.
Cameron is doing this because he f*****g has to.
Narrow-minded dickheads, who think that a strident right-winger, can possible survive in the current climate, are imbeciles.
Like it or not, The centre ground is where the votes have to be gained.
pandering to a balatant right-wing agenda wouldn’t pull in more that 35% at most. The liberal/left anti-tory broadcasters, would have a field day you morons. Not enough people read the Daily Mail!!!
UKIP voters are electoral dross. They think that losing the Tories a handful of seats, will make the Tories pander to them. F**k-wits!
And the worst kind of voting is not Voting for a party because “you have no choice” But idiot protest voting in a General election that helps a victory for your least favoured Party!
The same poeple then protest louder than anyone about the rotten Government, that they, indirectly helped backk into office.
Utterely Moronic!
Geezer,
The only trouble with your foam-flecked analysis is that kissing up to the “middle ground” – actually the soft left – isn’t working either, is it?
Cameron is becalmed on 38%. He may have gained 10% from becoming a branch of Labour Party, but meanwhile, he’s lost 5% from the right. So he still has no chance of winning power. And if he did, what difference would he make?
Or do you think that he’s a secret Conservative, and that once he gets in, he’ll “regress” and nobody will mind all the lies he told to get in?
Geezer:
Gilligan did not put forward ‘the cocnsensus left-wing ant-war, opinon’ (sic), he put forward a very specific charge.
He claimed that Blair lied to Parliament and then Gilligan said that he had ‘sources within the intelligence community’ to back his claim; a walking, talking, breathing piece of evidence in a position to know (this prompted the media hunt which ended up pursuing Dr Kelly).
Even in these degraded times, if you lie to Parliament you are expected to shoulder your bat and walk.
the_camp_commandant:
Geezer,
The only trouble with your foam-flecked analysis is that kissing up to the “middle ground” – actually the soft left – isn’t working either, is it?
Cameron is becalmed on 38%. He may have gained 10% from becoming a branch of Labour Party, but meanwhile, he’s lost 5% from the right. So he still has no chance of winning power. And if he did, what difference would he make?
Or do you think that he’s a secret Conservative, and that once he gets in, he’ll “regress” and nobody will mind all the lies he told to get in?
the_camp_commandant | 29.01.07 – 6:44 pm | #
They haven’t put forward any major policies yet, so how the fuck can he be lying about anything yet?
I know lots of Tories who bitch and moan about how Cameron has had to cave into the left-wing media. The Beeb, especially. But they know that to change things you have to do it from being in government so they are not stupid enough to waste their vote in a general election.
Look at Hague, with his anti-Euro agenda. Worked a fucking treat in 2001!
And Howard, he only made up a small amount of ground despite facing, which were to most of the public, a bunch of liars.
If you want to get at the Beeb and deregulate broadcast news media and get at the left-wing consensus you can only do that from government not from the sidelines.
Idiot right-wingers can’t understand that, to get your argument across, it has to be done in an atmosphere of balanced debate and fair representation, mainly carried out in broadcasting. The BBC, ITV, Sky, News International, as it stands, will not allow the Conservatives, Right-wing or Cameronesque Liberals to dictate the news agenda and have a reasonably amount of airtime to make their case. They have a pro-NuLab agenda and they are going to stick to it. Cameron and friends know this. I vote Tor ecasue it’s the best way to fuck NuLab and a Tory government is more likely to take the government of this country, in a direction I would approve of. More likely than that bunch of wankers we have in charge at the moment.
It’s a simply intelligent choice for most voters to make. By the tiem of the next election, there will most likely be a much greater mood for change, and very few will be wasting ther votes on Dustbins like UKIP.
Maybe Cameron’s gamble will not work – which other party in opposition could sit back when they’ve been handed all this sleaze and corruption by New Labour on a plate? We all know why the BBC won’t report it and maybe there is more being said by the Conservatives on this matter than is being reported by the BBC. The problem is with such a biased state broadcaster how the hell can the ordinary voter make a valid judgement.
Coruption and sleaze by democratic elected politicians should be high up there on the BBCs agenda – they are a public service and have no right quashing stories that they and there lefty friends don’t want anyone to know about.
If this was Communist East German state television no-one would be surprised but a British one!!!
Ralph | Homepage | 29.01.07 – 4:27 pm
Re Howard
The BBC would have misreported his challenge, gone after everything he did, and given air time to the most inane anti Tory stories they could find.
But isn’t his exactly what they did do? Wasn’t it during the Howard campaign that a Tory candidate(?) was accused of saying the English were now a mongrel race? As the BBC well knew it was Robin Cook who said that and the Tory who was chastising him for it. Didn’t stop Al Beeb from calling the Tories racists.
We have to face facts. The BBC will never support the Tories (an nor should they), or even give them an equal and fair hearing. In BBC speak Tory = evil.
As for Cameron, he won’t win. He may become Prime Minister by default when Brown loses the election for Labour but it won’t be a win.
Cameron “won’t win” because Al Beeb, Sky, ITN won’t allow him the positive exposure, the way they did with NuLab in he nineties.
But giving brodacast news (led by the Beeb), big right-wing sticks to beat the Tories with, for the next 3 years, will cause most damage. So, Cameron has to play it safe. It’s very shitty and undemocratic, but that is why this site exists, because of the damaging influence of the BBC on democracy and the fact that we are forced to pay for this.
geezer
Until the last 12 months no Tory leader adopting any policies would have made any difference, BBC or not. The electorate didn’t want to know and they didn’t want to listen to the Conservatives no matter what they would have said. At last peoples’ eyes have been opened to the sheer shambles and dishonesty of the present administration with daily revelations of the absolute crap this government has produced in education, the NHS, the justice system and so on.
At last people are prepared to listen to an alternative view and what do they get? They get a slimy PR spiv who’ll say anything he thinks (mistakenly as it turns out) which might gain him a couple of votes. At this point, against this government the Tories should be at least 10-15% ahead of Labour probably nearer 20%. All Cameron can struggle to is 7% – not enough to form a government without LibDem support. If this is the reward for supporting high tax, no grammar schools, “green at any price” policies then it’s not much of a bargain.
I’d rather another 5 years of Brown’s mendacity and incompetence if it means that the Tories dump Cameron and in 2012/2013 we get a Conservative government worthy of the name. A Conservative government led by Cameron would be a continuation of BluBlairism with all the dishonesty and ineffective grandstanding we’ve come to know. The BBC would love it.
“I’d rather another 5 years of Brown’s mendacity and incompetence if it means that the Tories dump Cameron and in 2012/2013 we get a Conservative government worthy of the name. A Conservative government led by Cameron would be a continuation of BluBlairism with all the dishonesty and ineffective grandstanding we’ve come to know. The BBC would love it.”
Utter bullshit.
Vote fucking Labour then! Your not a Tory. Your just a right-wing idiot or NuLab astro-turfer.
This is typical of the unsofistocated anti-Cameron crap. He will not be granted all the Bullshit spin that Labour have had, because, broadcast news, the best vehicle for such things, hate the Conservatives. So why don’t you wake up and stop bullshitting.
Cameron is an ex public-school boy, and an Oxford graduate and is about the same age as Blair was when he took over the Labour party, It doesn’t mean he is a fucking Blair Clone just because on the surface, he a bit Blairish.
Winning elections is the most important thing to the Tory party, as it should be.
And if Blair hadn’t massively increased the number of people living off the public sector, The Tories, probably would have a bigger lead. But increasing the pulic sector share of GDP from 30% to 42% ensures lots of extra Public sector voters. The only way to arrest that growth and send it into reverse, is get a Tory government elected. And that won’t happen by pandering to a minority of die hard right-wing voters.
Perhaps if the Beeb were to actually ask for example why Brown always dives for cover (heads off to India etc) whenever a difficulty arises for the government then we might actually see just what kind of PM we will be getting. Come back the good old days of political editors who actually ask the hard questions!
Geezer said – “But increasing the pulic sector share of GDP from 30% to 42% ensures lots of extra Public sector voters”
Don’t bank on it – I work for the public sector and I have never voted Labour in my life. I would rather scratch through the mud for food than vote for the end of my liberty.
Gordon Brown is a sack of shite, who has destroyed peoples pensions, and raided their takehome pay….
He is utterly despised in the UK, and will be I feel, the UKs “Nixon”…….a liar, cheat and rthiefe…who will get his justice through utterly public humiliation…..
He is no “leader”…or he would have seen Bliar off months ago….he is a little boy, hiding in the shadows, who will balls up the Leadership as soon as he takes office…….
He is useless………other than to ruin hard working peopels lives, so he can give money away to his coree voter groups……CHAVS living on state benefits, and lifes other losers, to whom he is giving money and freebies…taken off hard working people…..
He is already a loser, Blair has owened his arse from Day 1…..and of course, he will be too much of a coward to hold an election….so we can call him a dictator….
The Sun was right…last one out, switch off the lights…..Britain is dead……soon to be a wastleand of Gays and Women hiding in the shadows, as Islam marches on………
But the BBC would rather talk about Jade Goody….my my, no wonder the rest of the world laughs at the BBC……it is a sad sad joke……a pathetic dirty smudge of its former self…….
No wonder it has never taken off in the States…….they know cheap crappy PBS when they see it, and thats what the BBC is…cheap, shitty PBS broadcaster…..only in Britain do the British think it is greatly respected……..the rest of the world…just ignores it…..lol.
Dellusions of Grandure = BBC…….
Truth is, the BBC is OBSOLETE!!! 🙂
‘Cameron is becalmed on 38%.’
In the past 38% would have given the Tories a working majority so in the scheme of things it isn’t that bad a position to be in.
‘He may have gained 10% from becoming a branch of Labour Party, but meanwhile, he’s lost 5% from the right.’
The polls don’t back that up. The Tories are taking votes away from Labour (and the Lib Dems) because it’s where their voters went in 1997.
If 5% of the right has left why is UKIP doing so badly?
http://politicalbetting.com/index.php/archives/2007/01/30/why-is-ukip-failing-to-cash-in-on-the-publicity/
Umbongo
Excellent post.
Geezer seems to be arguing that Cameron has to sound like a lefty for the next three years to be sure of getting in. Let’s imagine that intellectually cowardly strategy works, so he wins in 2009 / 10. What are his choices once in power?
He will either have to act like the Heathite lefty he has sounded like – huge taxes, huge public sector, stealth absorption by Brussels, etc. – for four years at that point. Or he’ll have to say Ha, fooled you! Here are my real policies! More prisons, small state, academic selection, immigration controls, abolition of the BBC, withdrawal of public sector job advertising from the Grauniad, expulsion of Scotland from the Union, etc.
Those are the choices.
In case 1 above, I don’t want him in power, thanks. If I wanted that I’d vote Labour, so that Labour is left in charge of the ghastly mess it has made, is damned by it, and gets utterly discredited for a generation.
In case 2 above, he will most definitely have to lie to get into power and he will be destroyed for it, so he will last one term. And in that term, all Labour’s lies and incompetence will come home to roost and he’ll secure for the Tories the blame for the nasty medicine required to fix it.
If he wins next time, he will hand bullets to the enemy for years to come. Winning the next election would be like Labour winning in ’92: within 6 months they’d have been utterly discredited economically, because White Wednesday would have happened to them instead of to Major. Cameron in many ways reminds me of John Major: easygoing, affable chap, but bumbling, inept, complete buffoon, stupidly proud of winning the last election in the world you’d ever want to win.
I don’t want the Conservative party in power, I want a Conservative government, and I’ll wait until 2013 or so if need be.
Given that Labour will have a reduced majority, I think it will be possible for the opposition parties and dissident Labour MPs to wreck most of the more obnoxious aspects of Brown’s intended programme, so the Tories will be able to talk for 20 years about the ineptitude and corruption of the Brown administration. Isn’t that a prize worth fighting for?
Ralph,
I very much doubt that “that’s where their voters went in 1997”.
About 2,000,000 Conservative voters have just disappeared since 1992. They’ve stopped voting Conservative and they haven’t started voting Labour.
I’m one of them and I’m going to vote UKIP. It’s the closest thing there is to a conservative party.
‘About 2,000,000 Conservative voters have just disappeared since 1992.’
You evidence for this is?
The BBC’s response to the Mail’s story has now been posted on the BBC Editor’s blog:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/theeditors/2007/01/substantiating_stories.html
(I work for the BBC)
[Deleted for excessive profanity]
[Deleted for excessive profanity]
Goodness me, what a well-reasoned point of view. I take it that your something to do with higher education Carl, or possibly write for the gruniard?
Hi Nick. Since the BBC are responding to criticism today could you do me a favour and ask Peter Barron to reply to my email from last week please? I don’t expect he will answer my straightforward and reasonable questions properly, but the courtesy of a reply saying so would be appreciated. Thank you.
People who are afraid of profanity, are afraid of words.
I assume you don’t have the ability to either look beyond the profanity or perhaps use the hash key to edit out the words which so offend you.
You lot are the gimps who probably cheered when Lenny Bruce died.
You’re still mad f#####s who don’t know what you’re talking about and would last five minutes in real journalism…
As for TPO’s response…
“I take it that your something to do with higher education Carl”
No – but then, looking at “your”, it appears you never even completed higher education. Glass houses, don’t throw stones, etc…
Who said anything about being “afraid?” Do you have to swear to make your point seem more impressive?
Where is this “real journalism” you speak of? Not at the BBC, that’s for sure.