Open thread – for comments of general Biased BBC interest:


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773 Responses to Open thread – for comments of general Biased BBC interest:

  1. archduke says:

    Scientists receive death threats for doubting global warming hysteria:
    http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/03/11/ngreen211.xml

    scientists who doubt superstring theory, dont get death threats.

    scientists who doubt global warming theory, do receive death threats.

    yes, its all becoming vastly more clear to me now. this really has gone beyond the pale into the realm of religion. it is not science.

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  2. archduke says:

    thanks for that Ralph Peters link Michael. sure is hard hitting, but true.

    “The Saudis, not the Iranians, are the worst anti-American hate-mongers in the world today”

    damn right. its not the Iranians who are funding “kill the kuffars” hate speech in UK mosques – its the Saudis and their virulent brand of wahabbism.

    and yet, Britain sees nothing wrong with selling that corrupt and evil regime armaments worth billions.

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  3. max says:

    Re: Adam Curtis. The History of Darkness.
    http://normblog.typepad.com/normblog/2007/03/the_history_of_.html

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  4. Anonanon says:

    Ali Dezai of the National Black Police Association is doing very well out of the BBC today. He was interviewed about his new book “Not One of Us” on the Today programme, he’s being interviewed about it again on Simon Mayo right now, and it’s also Book of the Week on Radio 4.

    Someone else has just written a book about being an outsider in a major public organisation but for some reason he hasn’t been rewarded with the full PR treatment. Maybe Robin Aitken is just the wrong colour.

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  5. BaggieJonathan says:

    Global warming is being increased by man, I have no doubt. The fossil fuels and the destruction of the rain forests are bound to have an effect. That is a scientific given – cause and effect. The question however is much more importantly of how much. If in fact these are only a tiny proportion then how important is it.

    Global factors such as vulcanism, proximity of the sun, continental drift and meteorite activity are far more important than anything man’s activity can do.

    The earth has gone through dramatic periods of warming and cooling.

    In fact globally speaking we are in a very cool time for planet earth. We have had numerous ice ages in our recent past and the time we are in now could rightly be described as merely being one of the respites in the greater ice age that covers the few hundred thousand years.

    When the last ice age ended 12,000 odd years ago sea levels rose 300 metres!

    Perhaps some warming would be no bad thing if it fought off the possibility of the return of the ice age, which unless something intervenes would otherwise be extremely likely for future generations to endure.

    This country was essentially uninhabitable during the last ice age.

    The whole thing needs to be seriously looked at with these facts in mind, only then can a proper conclusion be made to the importance and necessity of action be made. Of course nothing of the sort has happened and don’t expect anything to be said of that sort on Al Beebzera above all. Instead they will support Brown’s flight tax and praise and applaud Dave’s suicidal massive tax hike on flights from ignorance not knowledge.

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  6. Ultraviolence says:

    Robin Aitken isn’t an eternal righteous victim we can wring the right political capital out of.

    A quote (on global warming)

    “I’m so dissapointed the end of the world isn’t coming. Its time to get on now. But why? I want it all to end! My last good hope is peak oil.”

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  7. Anonanon says:

    Max – thanks for the link. Nice piss-take.

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  8. Realist says:

    B-BBC fantasy world:

    Jon | 12.03.07 – 2:30 am
    Yep – I was right – Boy Dave is losing it.

    Cameron really is doing his best to lose the next election. The conservatives must ditch him now to stand any chance.
    Posted by Alan Bent on March 11, 2007 10:56 AM

    I am delighted that Cameron looks like loosing the next election
    Socialism is Necrotizing | 11.03.07 – 2:58 pm

    Real world:

    The Conservatives now have a record poll lead over Labour and would stretch it even farther if they were facing Gordon Brown or David Miliband. A Populus poll for The Times, taken last weekend, shows that Labour support has fallen this year and the Tories are eight points ahead

    http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article1475404.ece

    David Cameron’s leadership received a further boost today as an opinion poll showed that the Conservatives had doubled their lead over Labour.

    http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk_news/story/0,,2027700,00.html

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  9. BaggieJonathan says:

    ‘Realist’ – polls taken BEFORE the massive tax hike announcement.

    It is not just that announcement but the growing realisation that New Dave ‘conservatism’ means much higher spending and higher tax than even Brown could dream of.

    As the song goes meet the new boss, same as the old boss – they think we will all get fooled again!

    I wonder what the polls will be saying if taken today;
    or worse still after the inevitable annihilation of them in the media and by Labour, Lib Dems, Plaid, Old Uncle Tom Cobbleigh and all…

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  10. BaggieJonathan says:

    Additional…
    Blair and “New Labour” had 20+% leads over Major’s Tories over a long period of time in order to oust them in a general election.
    Before that Labour had bigger leads than the current Tory one during previous governments but fell back to abject defeat each time.
    I will believe your ‘real world’ when I see the evidence.

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  11. Ralph says:

    ‘polls taken BEFORE the massive tax hike announcement.’

    What ‘massive tax hike’ would that be considering the policy is tax neutral?

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  12. BaggieJonathan says:

    My apologies I should have included this before, poll evidence for my statement above

    http://www.ipsos-mori.com/polls/trends/voting-all-trends.shtml

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  13. BaggieJonathan says:

    How is taxing something out of existence ‘neutral’?

    http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/news/article-23381529-details/Tory%20tax%20threat%20to%20UK%20flights/article.do

    What are the offsetting tax breaks elsewhere proposed?
    I have hunted but can’t find them.

    Considering the myriad Dave proposals for spending increases: health, education, border police force, prisons, defence, married couples allowance, scrapping share stamp duty, police salaries, scrapping inheritance tax, drug rehabilitation, etc. Am I the only one to suspect that either tax is going to increase or that politicians are being economic with the truth in their promises?

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  14. Anonymous says:

    BBC’s Alan Johnston kidnapped in Gaza?

    http://www.irishexaminer.com/breaking/story.asp?j=91139070&p=9yy3937z&n=91139450

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  15. Anonanon says:

    Above anonymous was Anonanon.

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  16. K says:

    Isn’t the BBC accountable for all their staffers who comment here, seemingly, in order to discredit this site?

    I mean the BBC staff leave IP trails (like Mr.Bungluwalla at lgf), don’t they? Can Natalie or someone compile a list of the unpleasant comments they’re making on our pay roll and send it to doughty st. or the Telegraph so that the story of what they’re upto gets out?

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  17. Biodegradable says:

    BBC’s Alan Johnston kidnapped in Gaza?

    It does look that way, so far it’s all over the Israeli media, but nothing from the Mothership:

    http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1173700683851&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull

    I predict he’ll be free within hours saying how well he was treated by these romantic characters with their flashing white teeth.

    He’ll tell us that it’s a reaction against the ‘occupation’ and kidnapping is one of the few options of resistance left to the poor “Palestinians” who don’t have tanks and Apache helicopters to fight back with. Then again I could be wrong.

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  18. Martin Belam says:

    >> Isn’t the BBC accountable for all their staffers who comment here

    As far as I recall BBC staff guidelines for the use of the internet at work allow for a small amount of “personal use” during the day. Unless somebody was being really offensive on here, I’m not convinced it would breach those guidelines.

    Also, given that some of the BBC people who comment on here, like Nick Reynolds, take some of the points raised back into the building and have sometimes got changes made to BBC News web output, isn’t it a good thing that some BBC staff read these threads?

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  19. Martin Belam says:

    @Ralph – “What ‘massive tax hike’ would that be considering the policy is tax neutral?”

    I rather presume that all the people like me who have to fly a lot because of their work won’t consider it personally “tax neutral”, and therefore see it as a bit of a vote loser.

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  20. Biodegradable says:

    K:
    Isn’t the BBC accountable for all their staffers who comment here, seemingly, in order to discredit this site?

    They’re probably paid out of petty cash, or called something like ‘sundry disbursements’.

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  21. Jon says:

    “It’s very clear from the Stern Review, from the latest scientific information, from the impacts we’re already seeing in places like Kenya, that we need very rapid cuts in carbon emissions, and we need the negotiations to start next year and finish at the latest in 2008,” said Andrew Pendleton, climate analyst with the charity Christian Aid.

    http://newsvote.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/6158022.stm

    Here’s the Ex BBC Andrew Pendleton (an “expert” on climate change) again quoting a flawed report by Stren. The BBC never seem to put both sides to this.

    “The theme was echoed by other campaign groups.”

    “Ministers are simply not reflecting the urgency which is being felt in the real world,” said Catherine Pearce, international climate campaigner with Friends of the Earth UK. “We are still not seeing the bold leadership which is needed here.”

    Who the hell are these “camapign” groups? Where do they get their mandate to represent the people of Africa?

    The only “bold leadership” we need to see is someone who will tell these “camapign groups” to sod off interfering with things they have no idea about.

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  22. archduke says:

    weird. still nothing about the kidnapping:
    http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/default.stm

    but its on the front page by jpost.com
    http://www.jpost.com/

    http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1173700683851&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull

    the bureau chief in Jerusalem , Simon Wilson has confirmed that they’ve lost contact with Johnston.

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  23. Martin Belam says:

    Sorry, just to clarify, when I said earlier “Unless somebody was being really offensive on here, I’m not convinced it would breach those guidelines.” I hadn’t read the latest bit of the ding-dong on the “Nobody even mentioned it” thread.

    I have now, and I don’t see any point to anyone who is a genuine member of staff at the BBC being downright rude to people on here like ‘jb’ was/is

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  24. Alan says:

    Just an observation on two different ‘styles’ of reporting of the same story (Mar 12). Which do you prefer?:

    1.)”Bomber wounds three in Casablanca”

    http://news.bbc.co.uk
    (go to ‘world’ then ‘Africa’).

    2.)”Morocco: suicide bomber strikes internet cafe”

    http://www.jihadwatch.org
    (scroll down).

       0 likes

  25. Martin Belam says:

    >> weird. still nothing about the kidnapping

    Yeah, but then again, BBC mistakenly announces ‘capture’ of own reporter and gets it wrong would make them look pretty stupid – I expect like most news outlets reporting about themselves they will want to be scrupulous about getting what they report right.

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  26. Anonymous says:

    Another opportunity to watch The Great Global Warming Swindle (repeated tonight on the digital channel More4).

    “Some of the dissident voices on climate change were rounded up for last week’s polemical Channel 4 documentary made by Martin Durkin, The Great Global Warming Swindle (repeated tonight on the digital channel More4). Whether or not you were persuaded by their articulate doubts, you could not help being struck by the McCarthyite persecution (up to and including death threats) which their non-conformist opinions had attracted.

    Scientists with impeccable credentials, emeritus professors and acknowledged experts in the field being hounded and professionally discredited for their reservations about an established orthodoxy: not a pretty sight”.

       0 likes

  27. archduke says:

    kidnap story is on Haaretz. P.A. officials have confirmed it, but the BBC have not.

    http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/836350.html

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  28. Anonanon says:

    Biodegradable | 12.03.07 – 4:09 pm

    There could be a quick release when they realise they’ve got an ally, but don’t discount that he might be forced to convert at gunpoint. That supremacist bullshit plays well in the Arab street.

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  29. Biodegradable says:

    BBC mistakenly announces ‘capture’ of own reporter and gets it wrong would make them look pretty stupid – I expect like most news outlets reporting about themselves they will want to be scrupulous about getting what they report right.
    Martin Belam | 12.03.07 – 4:20 pm

    I’m more inclined to think that right now the BBC is busily negotiating with the kidnappers and calling every high level contact they have in their little black books to secure his release, and don’t want to say anything publically that could harm those efforts.

    There could be a quick release when they realise they’ve got an ally, but don’t discount that he might be forced to convert at gunpoint. That supremacist bullshit plays well in the Arab street.
    Anonanon | 12.03.07 – 4:38 pm

    They do have a history of kidnapping their allies. They know they won’t put up resistance, won’t try any heroics like attempting to escape, and are more likely to speak well of the kidnappers on their release. I wouldn’t be surprised if Johnstone hadn’t already converted á la Frank (Don’t Kill Me, I’m A Muslim!) Gardiner.

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  30. Biodegradable says:

    Why does the BBC show the Israeli flag on its side here?

    http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/default.stm

    http://thumbsnap.com/v/mQ7A6pcm.jpg

    Because they cropped it out of the pic on this page:
    http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/6441461.stm

    If they just wanted to use the Israeli flag as a link why not do it right – or don’t they know how to use an image editing program to rotate the image 90º?

    £3billion per year for this sort of ‘quality’!

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  31. Anonanon says:

    One thing the BBC can’t do is issue a public plea along the lines of “Alan Johnston has always been sympathetic to the Palestinian cause.”

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  32. Biodegradable says:

    The BBC is now covering it, scare quotes and all:

    BBC Gaza correspondent ‘missing’

    Also:

    Subject: BBC concerned over Gaza reporter
    From: BBC Breaking News Alert
    Date: Mon, 12 Mar 2007 16:55:47 +0000 (GMT)

    The BBC says it is concerned over the safety of its Gaza correspondent Alan Johnston after losing contact with him.

    For more details: http://www.bbcnews.com

    ————————————————

    This e-mail is never sent unsolicited. You have received this BBC Breaking News Alert because you subscribed to it or, someone forwarded it to you. To unsubscribe (or subscribe if this message was forwarded to you) go to: http://www.bbc.co.uk/email

       0 likes

  33. Alan says:

    Some reading for Cameron, Greenpeace and, (forthcoming TV series, ‘Save Planet Earth’) BBC:

    a new book, by Christopher Horner entitled –
    “The Politically Incorrect Guide to Global Warming (and Environmentalism)” Check article of this title (12 Mar) at:
    http://www.frontpagemagazine.com

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  34. max says:

    Re: Alan Johnston
    Also here:
    http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3375563,00.html

    And from the Hebrew version there’s this (which doesn’t appear somehow on the English edition, not that readers of BBBC wouldn’t know it by now):
    Johnson is well known by many Gaza residents. He’s one of the few foreign reporters who actually live in Gaza and even speaks Arabic. Furthermore, he’s known to be sympathetic by most of the Palestinian Organizations and therefore the circumstances of his kidnapping are still unclear.

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  35. Martin Belam says:

    I know people make mistakes when rushing to break news, and hopefully Alan Johnston will be fine, and I shouldn’t laugh, but the Daily Mail has got a fantastic typo on their homepage at the moment – “BBC journalist kidnapped the Gaza Strip”. That is quite some achievement for a lone journalist, even if they do have a 3bn budget behind them

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  36. Biodegradable says:

    Furthermore, he’s known to be sympathetic by most of the Palestinian Organizations and therefore the circumstances of his kidnapping are still unclear.

    I can’t help but think of that scene in Mel Brooks’ “Blazing Saddles” where the black sheriff holds a gun to his own head and says something like, “Don’t nobody move or the nigger gets it!”

    I’m sure Johnson will be fine, he’s probably sitting having tea with his pals right now, having a good laugh.

    “BBC journalist kidnapped the Gaza Strip”

    Why not?

    The BBC has certainly hijacked the history of Israel and “Palestine”.

    By the way, I still haven’t received a response to the complaint I lodged last week about the BBC claiming that the Yom Kippur war was a “counterattack” by the Egyptians.

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  37. jones says:

    michael moore gets the michael moore treatment

    http://www.townhall.com/blog/g/78f3234e-2223-4b3b-854c-3e5ae34da020

    An amusing read for BBBCers

    ij

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  38. Anonanon says:

    See how the Guardian’s Conal Urquhart refers to the gunpoint religious conversion forced upon the Fox journalists:

    The two-week kidnapping of two correspondents from the Fox television network last year led some security analysts to conclude that some Gaza kidnappers were becoming more serious and treating their captives less well than before.

    http://www.guardian.co.uk/israel/Story/0,,2032227,00.html

    Whitewashing dhimmi bastard.

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  39. Biodegradable says:

    The mask slips:

    http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/6442663.stm

    “It is his (Johnston’s) job to bring us day after day reports of the Palestinian predicament in the Gaza Strip,” said the BBC’s diplomatic correspondent, Paul Adams, himself a former Middle East reporter.

    Not even a pretence of impartiality then.

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  40. Biodegradable says:

    On the page carrying the report on the missing stooge:

    LATEST NEWS
    BBC Gaza reporter ‘missing’
    Hamas militant shot dead in Gaza
    PM ‘says Israel pre-planned war’
    Israeli army ‘used human shields’

    Fair and Balanced?

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  41. deegee says:

    Surely to keep with the pattern?

    LATEST NEWS
    BBC Gaza ‘reporter’ missing
    Hamas militant shot ‘dead’ in Gaza
    PM ‘says’ Israel pre-planned war
    Israeli army ‘used’ human shields

    BTW No matter what my feelings about the quality and impartiality of Alan Johnston’s reporting, I wish him a quick, safe return.

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  42. Jon says:

    Worthy only of contempt

    “More to the point, on a personal level, I simply will not take my science or guidance as to the response to it from a man who is wholly unqualified to give it and, for whom environmentalism seems more of a fashion statement than a considered philosophy. His posturing is worthy only of contempt.”
    http://eureferendum.blogspot.com/

    EU Referendum also quotes Janet Dailys opinion piece in the Telegraph – which I highlighted earlier.

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  43. Anonanon says:

    Just discovered this interesting website – the National Tidal and Sea Level Facility.

    Pick any town around the UK and check the annual tidal predictions until 2025. As far as I can tell the sea level around our coast shows no sign of increasing.

       0 likes

  44. sicktodeathofit says:

    ‘BTW No matter what my feelings about the quality and impartiality of Alan Johnston’s reporting, I wish him a quick, safe return.’
    deegee | 12.03.07 – 7:27 pm |

    I second that.

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  45. Biodegradable says:

    I wish him a safe return too.
    But what’s the hurry? >;->

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  46. Biodegradable says:

    deegee | 12.03.07 – 7:27 pm

    I think the BBC would really prefer PM says ‘Israel’ pre-planned war

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  47. archduke says:

    hard hitting documentary on C4 dispatches – about Prince Charles – just finished.

    there’s so many of these hard-hitting documentaries coming out of channel 4 nowadays, that you just wonder why the BBC needs its license fee. its gone so downhill and dumbed down , it might as well be privatised for all i care.

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  48. Anonanon says:

    “Just discovered this interesting website – the National Tidal and Sea Level Facility.”

    Now there’s a sentence I never thought I’d read to myself and think, “Bloody hell, you wrote that you boring twat.”

       0 likes

  49. Bryan says:

    Michael | 12.03.07 – 12:26 pm,

    Thanks for the link to that New York Post article by Ralph Peters. It’s excellent. The Saudis are the biggest terrorists in today’s world. It’s so refreshing to read someone who doesn’t flinch from telling the truth. And his writing has the perhaps unintended consequence of highlighting the fearful, blinkered, PC “journalism” of MSM like the BBC.

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  50. GCcooper says:

    Absolutely shameless “Green” tosh on BBC 1’s news at ten tonight. Having run wall to wall scare stories on supposed anthropogenic global warming for the past few years, they now feign surprise that 20% of the population put “Green” issues as the most important for them (compared with 5% at the last election).

    You don’t say!

    They then switch to the ‘human interest’ angle by showing Happisburgh in Norfolk, which has been disappearing into the sea for decades (if not hundreds of years). The BBC’s conflation of coastal erosion, a perfectly natural process, with ‘rising sea levels’ and GW was deliberate, scaremongering rubbish, designed to skew the debate in favour of the tofu-eaters.

    Mr and Ms average watch this nonsense and, knowing no better (and why should they?) simply lap it up as if it bears some vague resemblance to the truth.

    So, under this relentless barrage of lies and distortions, what will the ‘Green issues are the most important facing us’ contingent be the next time the BBC asks? 25% 35%?

    When on this website we accuse the BBC of bias, too often its minions pretend we mean the party political kind (which, sometimes, we do). But by far the greatest source of bias spewing out of the Corporation today is its “Green” agenda. It is naked, deliberate and without an ounce of counterbalance.

    The BBC’s output is violently skewing British mainstream politics in a “Green” direction (witness the witless – Cameron) and constitutes the grossest abuse of its position in a long and increasingly sorry history.

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