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I watched on BBC4 last night a programme on Prime Ministers presented by Andrew Marr, and this little incident sums up what I dislike about Marr.
Jim Naughtie, I felt, gave a very good advocacy of Asquith’s strengths, most notably his steadfastness and solidity. JN showed he can be a measured, intelligent journalist here.
We then go back to Marr and the panel (after Yasmin AB waffled on about Heath). There are some thoughtful comments, but Marr then turns the subject to Asquith’s drinking habits, even when Simon Jenkins rightly dismisses Marr’s emphasis on it.
Marr then, in a decision which most historians would regard as odd, places Asquith and Heath roughly equal.
As I write, the old title for that Gore article is still in Google’s cache. Let’s hope the News Sniffer picks up the change, because it’s a bias classic.
Judge backs Gore film in schools
The BBC World Service carried a report the other night by Roger Harrabin summarizing Mr. Justice Burton’s verdict. What particularly got my attention was the final sentence in the report, which concluded that opponents of the film would use the ruling to “confuse the British public” regarding GCC.
I assume his point there was that the job of confusing the public is one that’s best left to the real experts employed at the BBC.
Mugwump and Bryan,
Yes, we’re not supposed to notice that the film is misleading the public with the faulty science referred to in the judgment. Hence the ruling.
I guess certain inconvenient truths shouldn’t get in the way of The Narrative. But I have to wonder, do the BBC make reports about other trials that include comments like that? For example do we see this sort of thing in a report about the judgment against the surviving plotters of the 7/7 bombings:
“Omar Khyam, 25, Waheed Mahmood, 34, Jawad Akbar, 23, Salahuddin Amin, 31, and Anthony Garcia, 24, were all jailed for life on Monday at the end of the year-long trial.
Those who thought the men were guilty might use this judgment to mislead the British public.”
Didn’t think so.
What’s next, Justice Burton gets sued by the Gore blob for libel? With the laws in the UK being the way they are, I wouldn’t be surprised.
10pm News – the BBC refers to ‘a dwindling group of septics’ and also manages to claim that the ‘North West Passage has been impassable for centuries’ without also pointing out that (a) it HAS been navigated recently on several occasions and (b) the Arctic ice is melting but the Antarctic is expanding….
Yet again more omission and downright lies! I am INFURIATED by this disgraceful behaviour as I am sure a lot of people will be. They just don’t give a damm for impartial and accurate reporting do they?
Over at Devils kitchen:http://devilskitchen.me.uk/2007/10/nobel-climate-change-preaching-prize.html
they have discovered a BBC internal e-mail from Roger Harrabin on how to spin the Al Gore film court case.
I suppose that’s important now he’s got the peace prize.
littledevil: It’s funny how both Science and the Law strive to find the truth about our world, yet of course can never agree on what truth really is.
Big debates about climate science apart… Mr Harrabin is right. The judge disagrees on the nine specific points (although I’d argue at least one of those is more likely than the judge thought, he’s missed some recent research… on the other hand some of the certainties in Gore’s film now look more doubtful) but he does agree with the overall thrust of the movie. Global warming is real, it’s our fault.
In terms of the argument that sweeps the blogshire about MMGW… are the arguments of an ex-president worth more or less than those of a judge? Just because one or other backs up your opinion.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/7042423.stm
“I’m going back to work right now. This is just the beginning,” he said, walking out of the room after less than five minutes, and without taking questions.
Gore never takes questions as they might be inconvenient – ie “why are you telling lies” or ‘you are making a fortune through the various companies you set up to promote climate change policy and carbon offsets’
“His 2006 documentary film, An Inconvenient Truth, was an unlikely box-office hit and won two Oscars – though it was also criticised by a British judge this week for containing nine errors, and for being alarmist.”
err no. It was ruled that it could not be shown unless the deliberate untruths and false science in it were made known to kids when they watched it. Rather different than merely being criticised….
BBC – why tell the whole story? It’s what we do.
http://newsforums.bbc.co.uk/nol/thread.jspa?forumID=3671&edition=1&ttl=20071012224207
Lots of anti Gore comments on the Have Your Say – technical fault will occur in 3..2…1…
[You may not be a number, but nor are you a commenter here if all you have to offer are wild, wild conspiracy theories. Sorry. It’s all a conspiracy of course. The Moderator.]
Matt Frei has just polished Al Gore’s turd at the top of this evening’s BBC propaganda broadcast in the US. No mention anywhere of the difference between “Peace” and “Climate Change”. Mostly just rose-tinted biographical notes, which lead to pointless wondering if he’s going to run for President again. Katty Kay says probably not, and Frei agrees. They’re obligated to muddle through such phony musings, of course. Part of the job (which is part of the problem). But do they have to glow so much when talking about him?
This is followed immediately by David Shukman’s report from the Northwest Passage. He says that everyone up there studying climate change thinks Gore’s Nobel Peace Prize is great recognition of all the hard work being done to get the message out about Climate Change. There are some mumblings, though, about the fact that Gore in fact shares the prize with the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (which Frei forgot to mention in his report, strangely). He labels Gore a campaigner, and declares the UN Panel to be some sort of forum for the investigation into Climate Change.
Shukman then goes on to tell us – without a hint of irony – that the joint recognition of the UN Panel and Gore might lead the public to confuse what the campaigners are saying with what the scientists are finding out.
I had to laugh. Shukman also forgot to wonder how Gore’s questionable film and speechifying (while leaving a gigantic carbon footprint himself) is in any way related to Peace. Not his job, I suppose.
Nobody even bothered to trot out the Nobel Committee’s pathetic rationalization that Global Warming will lead to war, pestilence, and famine. Or words to that effect. Which is probably for the best, seeing as how the Committee just made it up. I couldn’t find anything like that on the official Nobel Peace Prize pages:
“To decide who has done the most to promote peace is a highly political matter, and scarcely a matter of cool scholarly judgement.”
http://nobelpeaceprize.org/eng_com_pol.html
I’ve switched off and am going to go play the cello instead.
David Gregory
You, much like the rest of the BBC, seem to have missed the significance of the the Judge’s conclusions.
He is not some sceptic who picked and chose dubious data to embarrass Gore. He used the report of the Nobel prize winning IPCC and compared it directly with Gore’s film.
He only agreed with ‘the overall thrust of the movie’ because the IPCC report is a strong advocate of MMGW. Judges do not rule on things that are not presented to them, the case against the IPCC report being one such absent thing.
The significance of the ruling is that Gore’s film contradicts, in many important ways, his own side’s science.
Al-Beeb embedded with the Taleban again…
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/south_asia/7042036.stm
David Gregory
You always seem a straightforward sort of guy. I doubt if you can give good answers to the questions below – but please bring them to the attention of the powers-that-be at the BBC.
1 Can you or Reith please explain why the BBC describes Roger Harrabin as its Environmwnt Correspondent when he has NIL scientific background and is (surprise, surprise) an English Graduate from Cambridge with NIL scientific expertise ?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roger_Harrabin
2 Can you or J Reith please explain how Harrabin can be seen as an impartial commentator in “climate change” when he is obviously an advocate of one side of the argument ?
http://www.isse.ucar.edu/newshp97_2/articles.html#article_08
3 Harrabin has dismissed criticisms of the Al Gore film. Has he ever read criticism such as this ? :
Click to access 5539.pdf
4 Can you or JR please explain why Harrabin is entitled to subvert the careful words of a High Court judge :
5 Can you or JR explain why, from the DG, if the BBC has “no line” in climate change, Harrabin puts out for general BBC coverage the following :
6 From tracking the amendments to his Wikipedia entry (which he obviously updates himeself) it appears that Harrabin appears on BBC TV about every 4 months. What is that worth per appearance ? And what on earth does he do in the meanwhile ? (No real need to answer this – the point makes itself)
DG – you are a decent guy. Why do we have to put up (on an enforced licence tax) with polemicists like Harrabin ? Does the BBC not employ anyone in London with a scientific background ? 3000 journalists and all arty-crafty ?
Items 4 and 5 above – where Harrabin tries to spin the careful statements of a High Court judge :
http://a-place-to-stand.blogspot.com/2007/10/al-gore-wins-nobel-for-lying-while.html
To sum it up for DG – WTF is this guy behind the scenes, Roger Harrabin, (and WTF gives him the expertise to comment on the subject of climate change ? WTF does he understand about scientific controversy – or even about the scientific method ?
His clear line is that all debate is over.
That, in a nutshell, is why he should not be employed by the BBC (or by anyone) as a commentator on scientific matters.
More one sided propaganda on climate change on the TOADY show this AM “the scientific dabate is over” “the media are to blame for casting doubt on the concensus” One guest and one interviewer both with the same opinions and views! Why no guest with another view on climate change? Always the same old lies and tired propaganda!
And the BBC wonder why ratings are falling! We dont want to hear soviet style lies and propaganda, we want informed and balanced debate on ALL the issues of the day please!
As a long -standing critic of the BBC’s political correctness and multiculturalism, I have to confess the following, regarding BBC 2’s ‘Newsnight’:
1.)last Wednesday’s programme (10 Oct.) supporting Channel 4’s ‘Dispatches’ “Undercover Mosque” was very good journalism;
2.)last night’s ‘Newsnight’ on the Danish cartoon, “Cartoons Row” was an excellent example of courageous, investigative reporting. (There’s an extended version of this to be shown this Monday, 11.20pm, BBC 2.)
Let’s hope this new ‘Newsnight’ spirit can spread throughout the BBC. It wasn’t a fluke, was it?
Scotland Yard yesterday attacked the BBC’s standards and ethics after an official report found no evidence to support allegations in a BBC documentary that the force covered up claims that a corrupt officer thwarted the hunt for Stephen Lawrence’s murderers.
http://media.guardian.co.uk/bbc/story/0,,2190340,00.html
BBC blinkered, say Scotland Yard
LONDON The battering of the BBC continued yesterday with Scotland Yard calling the organisation blinkered and arrogant (Hannah Fletcher writes).
The attack came after the Independent Police Complaints Commission cleared the police of claims made in a BBC documentary about Stephen Lawrence, who was murdered at a South London bus stop in 1993. The documentary said that the Metropolitan Police withheld testimony about a corrupt officer from the inquiry into the bungled murder investigation that followed. The commission said: “We have found no evidence in support of the allegations made during the programme.”
A senior Scotland Yard insider
said: “It was sensationalism, it was arrogant. They became blinkered into believing what they wanted to believe.” The BBC, however, released a statement saying it stood by its programme. “We considered it our duty to bring these serious allegations before the public and fully reflect the response of the police.”
Mr Lawrence’s family offered their support to the BBC yesterday.
Have your say
Unfortunately this want really come as a shock to many. The BBC is well passed it’s sell-by-date
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/article2648530.ece
dave t | Homepage | 12.10.07 – 10:20 pm |
the BBC refers to ‘a dwindling group of septics’
Tsk. The BBC and it’s anti-Americanism knows no bounds … 😉
David Gregory
‘In terms of the argument that sweeps the blogshire about MMGW… are the arguments of an ex-president worth more or less than those of a judge? Just because one or other backs up your opinion.’
I must have missed out a few years of American History. I don’t remember Al Gore ever being a President.
I do remember Lex Rex though. I seem to remember Mr Gore not even being satisfied by the American Supreme Court, so one can hardly expect his followers to take much notice of a mere British judge.
INSIDE THE BBC SAUSAGE FACTORY
A leaked internal BBC memo below. Note the “high” level of literacy: “principle” instead of “principal”. Sometimes spellcheckers cannot rescue ignorance — or is it just that the BBC would not know a principle if it fell over one?
From: Roger Harrabin – Internet
Sent: 12 October 2007 08:12
Subject: Guidance on Gore and Nobel Prize – please publish.
In any future reporting of Gore we should be careful not to suggest that the High Court says Gore was wrong on climate
The judge didn’t say that. He said Gore’s principle message on climate change was mainstream and uncontroversial. But he asked the government to make it plain in guidance notes to kids that nine points in the film were controversial.
He used the word “errors” but put it in inverted commas because the issues were not factual errors but issues of scientific debate.
We might say something like: “Al Gore whose film was judged by the High Court to have used some debatable science” or “Al Gore whose film was judged in the High Court to be controversial in parts”.
The key is to avoid suggesting that the judge disagreed with the main climate change thesis.
Please pass to presenters because this issue about Gore will arise again.
http://antigreen.blogspot.com/
It sees that the BBC, having been encouraged by the media solidarity in rejecting Hutton, feel that they can ignore any judgement. They can’t ever be wrong.
he Independent Police Complaints Commission cleared the police of claims made in a BBC documentary about Stephen Lawrence,
The commission said: “We have found no evidence in support of the allegations made during the programme.”
A senior Scotland Yard insider said: “It was sensationalism, it was arrogant. They became blinkered into believing what they wanted to believe.” The BBC, however, released a statement saying it stood by its programme. “We considered it our duty to bring these serious allegations before the public and fully reflect the response of the police.”
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/article2648530.ece
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/7042805.stm
BBC delightedly reports a speech by General Sanchez former Commander Iraq Multi National Force in 2003 where he has some nasty things to say about the political leadership and military problems in Iraq as is his democratic right – a right denied to millions in Iraq until the coalition invaded.
BUT he then went on to lambaste the media for deliberately witholding good news, for trying to push the ‘Iraq in crisis’ line all the time and refusing to provide balanced and impartial reports on Iraq. He also said very strongly that we should remain in Iraq until the surge has finished and Al Q are defeated which is closer ever day.
Isn’t it funny how THAT part of his speech was missed by those clever highly paid people at the BBC?
Even the Washington Post reported the first half on their front page and the second part made one small paragraph near the back!
“The other bad thing about this is that, in every news article I read on this, in none of them did they include his scathing criticism of the mass media.
I had to go to Power Line for that, where Mr. Hinderaker actually provided a link to the full transcript of GEN Sanchez’s remarks. So, once again, proving GEN Sanchez’s point on the unethical media, the media selectively reports what fits their agenda.
Also unmentioned is his repeated savaging of Congress and how their idiotic partisanship has caused most of the problems he cites here at home.
Here is the link to the Power Line post:
http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2007/10/018743.php
If anyone’s interested –
yet more juvenile rubbish and appallingly bad photoshops have appeared in The BBC Young Pioneers Handbook:-
http://members.lycos.co.uk/bbcpioneers/
– including “Roger Horror-bin, the Goracle and the green fairies” – and “Will Jane Garvey have to put her clothes on for Wimmin Sour?”
Lana Botney at it again
Alan Yentob has been accused of presenting a film about a reclusive 1960s pop star as his own when the interview was in fact conducted by Stephen Kijak, a US film-maker.
Viewers who have seen the film on Scott Walker, part of Yentob’s Imagine series on BBC1, claim the programme was a “shameful deception” because it left the impression that Yentob had done the interview
The BBC said last week that those who criticised Yentob did not understand the agreement between the BBC and the producers of the original film. “Imagine was made with their full cooperation. There is no question of any deception or underhanded-ness in what was done …it was made with the full approval of the film’s original producers.”
Probably beause..
Kijak said Yentob’s version had brought his film to a wider audience
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/uk/article2652830.ece
It smacks of Col Parker getting Elvis added to songwriting credits. The actual composers accepting that half royalties of a Presley single was more lucrative than full ownership of a Larry Williams release.
We were disappointed that the BBC compounded the issue by choosing to utilise the full weight of their very powerful publicity machinery to inflate disproportionately the importance and value of their findings
Metropolitan Police spokeswoman
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/london/7043064.stm
The headline “‘No corruption’ in Lawrence case” is. I believe misleading.
“BBC Guilty of Sexing Up Race Story” would be better
The Aussie election.
Who is Nick Bryant pulling for do you reckon?
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/asia-pacific/7016666.stm
“As before, John Howard will try to appeal to the paranoiac streak of the Australian electorate.
In 2001, he played on nativistic fears over asylum seekers. Three years later, he tried to exploit jitters over interest rates. Now, once more, he and Peter Costello are trying to frame the election as an economic referendum”
Tories 7 point lead in polls.
Cue interview with Patrick Hennessey pointing out the “encouraging aspects” for Brown within the poll… (on their competence in the economy), so even bad news becomes positive to Labour.
Then MacGuire reviews the paper but fails to mention the stories about second homes tax windfalls in capital gains changes (of which many Labour ministers will benefit) – one can only imagine the furore had these changes been made by a nasty Tory chancellor.
This is the Online headline of our premier news provider:
“Obesity likened to climate change”
Well Al Gore certainly is getting a little chubby.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7043639.stm
There is a dreary familiarity with this now. Why on earth couldn’t they have headlined with something uplifting like “England win likened to climate change” or “England win likened to obesity”?
In reviewing the papers on the Andrew Marr programme this morning, great emphasis was given to the fact that Stuart Dimmock had received financial support from a Tory industrialist for his court challenge to the distribution of the New Msessiah’s film on Climate Change.
They seemed to think that in some way this “poisoned” his campaign and reduced it to a bit of local party political irrelevance.
No-one ever seems to query the potential bias in the Norwegiqan Parliament in choosing Al Gore for the Peace Prize. The Norwegians are a small nation with copious quantities of surplus hydroelectric power, and their support for a campaign that would impose severe restrictions on its industrial rivals is hardly suprising.
Carole Thatcher (bless) didn’t help the cause by making the common mistake of believing that the Peace Prize, like the “proper” scientific awards, was awarded by the Swedes.
Nicholas Hellen has an interesting long piece in today’s ‘Sunday Times’ in which he concentrates on the BBC’s cultural ‘dumbing down’, its extravagance and its drift from public service to commercial activities, including a section on ‘Mark Thompson goes to Bollywood’.There is inadequate discussion of the BBC’s political bias.
Battle for the Soul of the BBC.
I found this story about the upcoming Australian election here.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/asia-pacific/7016666.stm
It includes this lovely paragraph –
As before, John Howard will try to appeal to the paranoiac streak of the Australian electorate.
In 2001, he played on nativistic fears over asylum seekers. Three years later, he tried to exploit jitters over interest rates. Now, once more, he and Peter Costello are trying to frame the election as an economic referendum.
Is there such a word as nativistic? Shouldn’t it be xenophobic or perhaps its just a twist to suggest racist without saying so?
Anyway, I was interested because Australia has the smallest public spend as a percentage of GDP in the world, and its all the current governments fault! – As it happens, the BBC don’t mention it, its obviously not important, everyone knows public spending is a good thing!
Worth a listen, even if just to hear him say the BBC will be smaller in future and there will be job cuts, and that the telly tax paying public don’t want to hear Beeboids whining on about it neither.
BBC Trust Chairman Sir Michael Lyons on Sunday AM
http://news.bbc.co.uk/nolavconsole/ukfs_news/hi/newsid_4230000/newsid_4236700/bb_wm_4236728.stm?scope=nolavconsole&tab=nolavconsole&q=sunday_am&edition=ukfs&mediaformat=bb_wm_&start=&order=
Starts 21mins 15secs into the prog.
The awful (she listens to it) BH this Sunday a.m. ‘…and joining us later to review the papers, Guardian journalist, Jackie (sp?) Ashley.’
While the above is the result of a very rigorous and far-reaching survey of one programme you just know the default is ‘pick up a phone and ring the Guardian’.
And then on Parkinson’s show on strolls John Simpson pushing his latest book and being given a free ride to spit out an anti-American monologue. Not much ‘balance’ evident.
Would only that Rupert Murdoch be allowed to buy out the BBC, maybe just see a slight change of emphasis in the programming.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/7044079.stm
Falconer’s comments were clearly meant to be a criticism of Brown, and yet the BBC have been spun as part of this ‘rally’ for the PM. The tone of his comments is very clear, but nowhere is there a ‘meanwhile, former Lord Chancellor Lord Falconer has warned Gordon Brown…’. They are just smushed into this whole ‘everything’s fine’ message.
Re the judge and Gore. The challenge against Gore’s movie was not that there is no MMGW. It was that, even if one assumes there is a consensus that MMGW exists, the film is full of exaggerations which even pro-MMGW shill scientists do not support.
This is significant because the judge agreed. Even by the undemanding standard of IPCC groupthink, Gore’s film was seriously, and in some cases quite farcically inaccurate on nine counts.
The court did not consider whether the whole MMGW industry is a con or not, and then conclude that MMGW is sound. It assumed a priori that the hypothesis was sound, and considered Gore’s efforts in that light.
The MMGW shills of course want to misrepresent the judge’s remarks as a judicial endorsement of their political stance.
Humphrys defies BBC boss on speaking out
“If a democracy is not well informed, it cannot survive. BBC news is the most important thing the BBC does.”
….well, yes John but what about all that misleading bias?
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/10/15/nbbc115.xml
Today programme was at it again this morning. 07:15 item went, three (or four, I was waking up) business organisations have complained about the Alistair Darling’s changes to Capital Gains Tax (CGT). There were about 10 seconds on the complaints and then a nice cuddly interview, by Sarah Montague, with the boss of Innocent smoothies about how he disagreed and the changes wouldn’t have changed his business strategy. So that’s it then, job done; the complaints are groundless – vote Labour. BBC/NuLab at it again.
CanI point out that I posted a link a while back after the BBC slagged Howard off about immigration. That Labour in Australia also supports Howards stance, something the BBC failed to point out in their reports.
I have put up a new Open Thread. Refresh your browser if you can’t see it.
David Gregory
I just wondered what your take is on the expanding ice in the Antarctic and the very low sea temperatures off Australia?
How do these factors fit into the debate on Global Warming?
Thanks – I’d be interested to hear your response.
I’d be interested to hear if David Gregory can find out why his colleague refers to MMGW-deniers as “dwindling”.
Has a head-count been done? My gut feeling judging from the (D)HYS thread on Goracle’s Nobel prize is that the numbers aren’t “dwindling” at all.
Quite. And another thing to note about that debate is that much of the time it has been “Reactively Moderated” – which is pretty much the closest the BBC comes to free speech.
Sorry, link:
http://newsforums.bbc.co.uk/nol/thread.jspa?forumID=3671&edition=2&ttl=20071015120052
Hi Heron
I think its polite not to clog up the board with endless climate change science. I hope I’ve explained how I work. When it comes to your questions, Google is your friend.