Please use this thread for comments about the BBC’s current programming and activities. This post will remain at or near the top of the blog – scroll down for new topic-specific posts. N.B. this is not an invitation for general off-topic comments, rants or chit-chat. Thoughtful comments are encouraged. Comments may be moderated.
Every BBC report I have heard this morning about “Howard’s End” has cited Iraq as a key factor. But is it? This is the thing with the BBC: are they just spinning their dislike of Howard or was Iraq really a significant factor? For example, why didn’t Howard lose in 2004, when things in Iraq were already not good? My feeling is that the Australians wanted a change after a decade, and Rudd seems a reasonable alternative.
Sadly, even though we pay vast sums to the BBC to bring us accurate news reporting and analysis, I just don’t know whether I can put faith in their reporting.
We do get accurate news reporting from the BBC. The faults with the BBC’s news arise from what they choose to omit from their broadacsts completely and what they choose to add in the form of ‘analysis’.
The ‘analysis’ is the weakest part of BBC news. Unfortunately it is the part of which the BBC is most proud. Mere reporting of the facts alone is beneath them – they need to give us the benefit of what they regard as their expertise and insight.
The BBC go to an Australian election party in London. The script is predictable:
“Then came the biggest whoop of the morning so far as the results from Bennelong – the seat of Prime Minister John Howard – suggested he might lose out to former TV host Maxine McKew.
“If Howard loses his own seat, this is just going to be brilliant,” said Rebecca, wearing a T-shirt emblazoned with Kevin 07 – the slogan used by the Australian Labor party and its leader Kevin Rudd.
“It’d make for an even better party.”
It’s fair to say that there was nobody at this flat – a bad boomerang throw away from the home of Australian Rupert Murdoch’s Wapping newspaper site – who wanted John Howard to win.”
It’s fair to say…..
It’s fair to say…..
I wonder if the Austrailan host of the party full of Rudd supporters is a friend of someone at the BBC?
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7110750.stm
Any Questions:
“Sounds like you stuffed the hall here”
Edward Stourton on the rapturous applause following Nick Clegg’s list of things to vote for the Lib Dems on (you know, Iraq, environment etc).
There are two alternatives:
Either most people do agree with Lib Dem policy, or the Any Questions venue is actually stuffed with Lib Dems. No prizes for guessing which is the case.
How do the BBC select their audience? Why is the audience never reflective of the political outlook of the British people?
A glimmer of hope:-
Murdoch wants to make Sky News like Fox.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2007/nov/24/bskyb.television
Wait for the Beeboids and Guardianistas all bleating in unison, “we can’t have BIASED news reporting” – as if we hadn’t had it for about the last forty years.
Did anyone catch Newsnight last night? I caught the tail-end of the show and as the presenter (don’t know her name) was about to read out the day’s market news, there was some sort of technical glitch; but she pressed ahead anyway and informed all who were watching that “it’s holiday season in the US and the markets are closed, and the DOW unchanged.” She then went on to say, “you’ll have to trust me on this.” Except the markets were not closed in the New York yesterday (the “US holiday season” being Thanksgiving that was on Thursday)and while it was a short day of trading (the market was open for 5 hours) the DOW was actually up 181 points or 1.42%!
This is extremely sloppy, unprofessional work, and to add “you’ll have to trust me on this” before reporting obvious inaccuracies really sums up the Beeb.
Given that that’s two successive days of horrendous mistakes on the BBC’s reporting of the Dow, I think it would be better if the BBC just left it to competent news organisations – like Sky.
I only now noticed the entry concerning a cock-up with market numbers on Thursday as well – truly appalling. But I suppose at least they gave correct market numbers, if a day late, in that instance. Last night they insisted the NY market was closed and there was no trading at all; and finished with, “you’ll just have to trust me on this.” In case anyone needs another reason not to trust the BBC.
Here’s the Newsnight editor, writing after Thursdays cock-up. Oops.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/theeditors/
Just in case you were in any doubt, here’s how the BBC Radio 4 news headline went at 6pm:
“John Howard, WHO SUPPORTED THE INVASION OF IRAQ AND REFUSED TO SIGN THE KYOTO TREATY, has lost the election”
It’s the subtle, nuanced approach of the Beeboids that is worth the licence fee alone.
Anyone read this in the Guardian? They don’t like it up ’em, do they?
Quote Sunny Hundal: (Guardian)
“Let me be clear on one point: I believed in the BBC not because of its supposed liberal bias but because I view it as as serving the public good. A vibrant democracy needs independent and non-commercial media outlets driven by a commitment to editorial balance. It may be imperfect and its licence fee may be a tax, but using the latter argument to favour privatisation is feeble, since we pay a whole variety of taxes to incompetent institutions that are supposed to enshrine the public good.
The BBC has always come under attack from the political right and left for its supposed bias towards the other side.”
I agree with “commitment to editorial balance” that’s the whole point.
I have yet to read a convincing argument from the ‘left’ or from liberal minded Guardian reader that shows right wing bias. Can someone point me in the direction of a blog or articles showing that the BBC has anything other than a trendy liberal bias? It’s my belief that if the BBC was unbiased there would be similar amount of complaints from all sides, but this doesn’t seem to be the case.
http://commentisfree.guardian.co.uk/sunny_hundal/2007/09/liberals_abandon_the_bbc.html
I predict there will be enormous amounts of gloating in the media because a staunch Anglospherist and ally of the United States has lost, as predicted, his fifth election.
http://eureferendum.blogspot.com/2007/11/why-is-it-humiliating.html
Has al-Beeb reported on this case of a horrible racist attack perpetrated by “Asians”?
http://www.courtnewsuk.co.uk/online_archive/?name=John+Payne&place=stepney&courts=0
Or is it another replay of the Kriss Donald case? Why isn’t this victim’s mug featured prominently on the al-Beeb’s website for days on end like little Damilola Taylor’s was a few years ago (that is, until it was discovered that Damilola was actually offed by “Asians” and not the evil whiteys that the Beeb had assumed — then he mysteriously disappeared from Beeboid prominence.)
I notice again (BBC Radio 4 News, 18.00 today and the Website, that in the rport about the loss of data discs in Scotland they are referring to the “Scottish Government”.
I assume they mean what the “Scotland Office” in Whitehall still appears to call the Scottish Executive?
One swallow doesn’t make a summer but
a swarm of jelly fish off the West Coast of the UK is, according to the BBC a harbinger of Climate change.
On the bright side there will be no salmon farms to attack & jelly fish are the staple diet of the critically endangered leatherback turtle, which will be able to lay on Scottish beaches to save the effort of crossing the Atlantic.
Reg Hammer • thanks for the plug. Forgot to drop a link here myself yesterday.
To save you scrolling back up Reg linked to my post at:
http://monkeytenniscentre.blogspot.com/2007/11/bbc-turks-who-killed-christians-are.html
Re John Reith’s Guardian link: Note how the right-wing bias of Fox is stated as fact, while the left-wing bias of other stations is described as ‘perceived’.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2007/nov/24/bskyb.television
Even the stories about media bias are biased!
Re Howard: I’m going to try to find some stories to stand this up, but I’ll think you’ll find that when pro-US leaders like Sarkozy and Merkel are elected the BBC doesn’t mention their pro-US stance as being a factor, instead citing domestic issues such as the economy. But when a pro-US leader loses, it has to be because of his pro-US stance. Howard was 68 for God’s sake, and had been around for years • isn’t it possible that Aussies just wanted a change? I see it as similar to when New Labour ousted the Tories: the Tories had done the ‘dirty’ work of finishing off socialism and its associated ills, and Britons decided they wanted a government they could feel all warm and fuzzy about, without having to rely on it to actually do anything. Now Rudd’s in office it’ll be interesting to see whether he sticks with his promise to sign Kyoto, thereby causing massive damage to the Australian economy and ensuring that he’s kicked out next time, or whether he finds a way of weaseling out of it.
MattLondon – the Scottish Executive was recently (in September 2007) ‘rebranded’ and now has the official monicker of ‘The Scottish Government’.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/6974798.stm
I expect that when the New Labour edifice eventually comes crashing down, hacks will blame Iraq.
I mean, it’s not as if the Blair and Brown administrations have displayed any incompetence, is it?
Sproggett
FYI
Unfortunately the Scottish Executive (for that read the SNP) does not have the authority to change the name unilaterally without changing the relevant laws in Westminster that set it up.
So legally it is still the Scottish Executive.
I could start calling myself Athelstan but it’s not legal unless I go thought the correct channels.
BBC dead chuffed at Labour victory in Australia. ‘humiliating’ we are told.
“The BBC’s Phil Mercer in Sydney says this is a humiliating defeat for Mr Howard and a day Labor has waited many years to see.
Its supporters are hoping Australia will become more compassionate under Kevin Rudd, our correspondent says. ”
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/asia-pacific/7111479.stm
Oscar | 24.11.07 – 12:01 pm,
Yes, and I see that in this article by Martin Patience
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/7104008.stm
Hamas’ (in connection with Annapolis) is described as, Opposed to the conference – and they haven’t been invited anyway – saying that it will do little to further Palestinian national aims.
Bullsh*t. What Hamas actually said about the conference was this:
“We warn the whole region . . .against harming Al Aqsa, meddling with our basic rights, or tightening the siege” on Gaza, al-Haya told the crowd. “We warn of a huge explosion, in which Palestinians will blow up in all places . . . No seas or barbed wire will prevent that.”
Now maybe the BBC can claim that it found one Hamas spokeman who made the mild comment reported by Patience, but the real reaction is obviously the one I quoted above, which I believe was reported in the Boston Herald.
As usual, the BBC is lying by distortion and omission of facts. And, as usual, it is to the advantage of the terrorists.
On the subject of the election, the propagandist BBC was in full swing on the World Have Your Say programme on Friday afternoon in the form of the agenda-driven Peter Dobbie who was doing everything he possibly could to swing opinion towards Labor:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/worldhaveyoursay/2007/11/green_election_indian_intolera.html
So I sent him a comment, keeping it short because he probably wont publish it, having ignored my comments before:
Knock, knock, Peter Dobbie, anybody there? The BBC is supposed to be impartial, remember? Why then were you pushing your “green election” agenda so strenuously during the programme? And why was the very first e-mail you read out critical of Howard for not signing Kyoto?
You weren’t trying to influence the voters on the eve of an election, were you? The BBC would never do something that underhand, would it?
No doubt the corridors of the BBC were strewn with empty champagne bottles after the election.
lURKINGBLACKHAT,
Yep. You’re spot on.
I probably misunderstood the gist of MattLondon’s posting.
I thought he was asking why the Scottish Government was being described thus.
On second reading, he was actually questioning the BBC’s decision to use the ‘new’ name in news reports given that the ‘Scottish Government’ is not a legal entity as such.
I have clearly drunk far too much gin today.
Re my 10:00 pm post, here’s the link to the Boston Herald article on Hamas:
http://www.bostonherald.com/news/international/middle_east/view.bg?articleid=1045262
It’s originally from the Associated Press. Funny, the BBC is usually quite keen to copy stuff verbatim from the AP.
The BBC seems to just make up the news.
Listening to BBC World the other night on the radio, they headlined that one of the major issues in Australian election as the Iraq war.
Nothing could be further from the truth!
Every commentator in Australia has been surprised by how much the Iraq war was not an election issue.
The report was voiced over by a single anti-war protester, whose sound bite was never even reported in the Australian media.
The dishonesty of the reporting was breathtaking.
More double standards from theBBC.
We’ve seen the BBC gloat over the Spanish Government get kicked out because of the war in Iraq, we’ve seen the Aussie’s change Government because of the war in Iraq (according to the BBC)
However, can anyone think of a Country with a Government that supported the war in Iraq and in fact was THE biggest supporter next to the USA, yet the BBC seemed to be supporting this Government?
Anyone want to take a guess at who Government this might be?
Should the BBC get more techno-savvy they could follow the example below to allow us 100% success in making HYS comments, & when our comments get no recommendations we will realise that we truly are wingnuts.
If you make a comment on an article posted at SFGate, and if the site moderators then subsequently delete your comment for whatever reason, it will only appear as deleted to the other readers. HOWEVER, your comment will NOT appear to be deleted if viewed from your own computer! The Chronicle’s goal is to trick deleted commenters into not knowing their comments were in fact deleted.
via
http://littlegreenfootballs.com/weblog/
One dimensional reporting from the BBC here concerning the BNP being voted by Oxford Union to appear at a student debate.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/oxfordshire/7110758.stm
What strikes me as amusing about this article is the way BBC contempt for Jews is briefly set aside so that they can roll them on as victims when it aids the BBC caus:-
“Stephen Altmann-Richer, co-president of the Oxford University Jewish Society, said that while freedom of speech was important it was “overshadowed in this instance”.
“I don’t think these people should be invited to the Oxford Union, by having them speak, it legitimises their views,” he said.”
I’m amazed the BBC can find ANYONE Jewish who will talk to them nowadays.
Johnathon Marcus – BBC diplomatic correspondent – given free reign to dictate his own anti-american views on Iraq by misconstruing Bush’s comparison of the Iraqi war to that of Vietnam.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/7109929.stm
Yet more BBC anti-American, pro Palestinian propaganda passed off as news when it is nothing more than personal opinion.
I still cannot find any clauses in the public broadcasting charter that states that journalists should be allowed to extoll their views unchallenged and unbalanced.
Doesn’t stop them though does it?
What strikes me as amusing about this article is the way BBC contempt for Jews is briefly set aside so that they can roll them on as victims when it aids the BBC cause:
Yes, indeed, quite like they trot out Christian priests and bishops every once in a while to push an anti-war or pro-mass-Third-World-immigration perspective, then it’s back to relentless ridicule and scorn once their usefulness has passed.
[Off topic.]
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/thereporters/briantaylor/2007/11/two_jobs_browne.html
Maybe I’m reading this wrong, but it seems to me that the point of this blog post is to tell us we should stop making such a fuss about having a part time defence minister. Apparently Des says it’s not a problem so we should just swallow his words…
Sorry if this has been brought up before – I must have missed it if it has been.
Seeing how the BBC loves to run criminal stories about the Tories i wonder if they will run with this one;
http://www.theasiannews.co.uk/news/s/1025237_benefit_cheat_has_kept_council_seat
Al-Beeb has been beating the funeral drum all week about the allegedly weak upcoming Christmas shopping season in the US due to the supposed economic concerns of consumers. Yesterday was the beginning of the Christmas shopping season in the US –and sales were up more than 8 percent from last year’s first shopping day:
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=aPrwprvdNoQw&refer=home
I always laugh whenever Al-Beeb is cheated of its longed-for portion of schadenfreud. They so obviously were rooting for a bad Christmas season for U.S. retailers, it was truly pathetic.
Seeing how the BBC loves to run criminal stories about the Tories i wonder if they will run with this one;
http://www.theasiannews.co.uk/ ne…pt_council_seat
At first I thought al-Beeb had ignored this story because it was the “there’s-nobody-here-at-the-weekend-to-report-on-this” syndrome.
But no…the story has been around for days and al-Beeb hasn’t seen fit to report on it:
http://www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/news/s/1024354_guilty_councillor_keeps_job
Would they have been this slow for a Tory? Ha!
Beeb this morning busy spinning that the current situation is not of this government’s making.
Just ‘events’ dear boy
The state of the armed forces, the policy to combine HMRC and cut jobs, the ineffectual regulatory regime that permitted the NR fiasco…..
I notice the BBC have toned down (i.e. stealth edited) their reporting yesterday regarding Rudd & Blair’s shared Christian beliefs.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/7109692.stm
I guess this editing is because of the story running today about Blair being a “faith nutter”. The BBC don’t want to imply that Rudd is also a “faith nutter” , or am I missing something? Instead we now read (without any reference to Blair) that he is “A committed Christian, with a neat turn in sound-bites”
Although Nick Bryant, who probably provided the copy for the earlier web page, still writes on his blog:
For me, though, this election most resembles Britain in 1997. There are the distinct similarities, of course, between Tony Blair and Kevin Rudd: the fiscal conservatism, the muscular Christianity,
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/thereporters/nickbryant/2007/10/confounding_elections.html
“Muscular Christiany” What is that? Do we read of “Muscular Islam”? Does this mean ‘militant’? Amazing how the BBC ministry of Truth operates isn’t it. Blair and Rudd should not be spoken of in the same context regarding religion today.
In the Sunday programme Roger Bolton discussed the Oxford University’s forthcoming free speech debate with Luke Tryl and a Jewish student, Stephen Altmann-Richter.
Luke Tryl, always keen to mention that he finds Irving and Griffin’s views abhorrent, also always insists that they must be heard so that they can somehow be defeated by debate. If imprisonment has not deterred them from expressing anti-semitic holocaust denying views, is it likely that a debate will defeat them? At best they will be ridiculed, but still given a platform. But their views – what’s to defeat? Have Roger Bolton or Luke Tryl got some doubts?
Roger Bolton did not ask ’ Why choose to give this platform just to Jew haters? Why not have, say, Lars Vilks who is writing a musical poking fun at Mohammed?
What about Nonie Darwish or Ed Husain? What about Martin Amis? (That free speech debate has degenerated into an argument about whether Amis is a good writer.) Instead of asking Luke Tryl why he couldn’t put an Islamophobe in the debate, Roger Bolton actually accused the Jewish student of threatening a violent protest.
For dessert Roger Bolton asked the Jewish student (I paraphrase) what was so special about denying the holocaust?
The BBC and Universities seem to agree on which version of free speech they dare to promote.
Read this:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/main.jhtml;jsessionid=TJXA3XWNSPPMXQFIQMGSFFOAVCBQWIV0?xml=/opinion/2007/11/25/do2501.xml
and then tell me how Humphreys has the neck, after all those Today Programme sneers and inuendoes about Tony Blair and his faith, to write such a column?
Like David, I noticed the “Blether with Brian” BBC blog, in which the BBC Scotland correspondent decides to take sides in the Former Military Chiefs v Labour Government argument (no prizes for guessing on which side.)
But he seems to go beyond taking sides • it’s quite hard to construe this comment as meaning anything other than “Lord Boyce is lying about what the troops say to him.”
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/thereporters/briantaylor/2007/11/two_jobs_browne.html
“Admiral Lord Boyce, who retired as chief of the defence staff in 2003, said it was an “insult” that the prime minister had chosen to make Des Browne serve as Scottish secretary in addition to his main role as defence secretary. Further, Lord Boyce said this was the message he was getting from the troops. Hesitant though I am to question the gallant peer, I find it a little difficult to conceive that Britain’s troops • whether in Basra or barracks • are fretting about Des Browne’s workload or about the implications of Cabinet deployment.”
On the radio this morning, I noticed a tiny change in the irritating (and extremely biased) meme that the BBC have been promoting so assiduously ever since it all started going pear shaped for Gordon. For a couple of months, when some new horlicks arises, it’s been “..and this is really surprising, given Mr Brown’s reputation for competence” or “Mr Brown will need to make sure that this doesn’t dent his strong reputation for being able to deal with a crisis, which he established over the summer” or suchlike. This morning it was “blah blah blah, reputation for being able to deal with a crisis, that Mr Brown’s supporters have claimed”
Et tu Beeboid
This morning the report from Australia was a laughable pack of lies.
The World Service shouted ‘New Era In Australia’ with obvious joy over Labour’s victory.
Actually its the same old era. Labour had to campaign on Thatcher policies, prommising not to change any of Howard’s policies.
The BBC was jubilant, and kept mentioning ‘tensions with Washington over an Iraq pullout’.
Why.. do they think the Bush admin is as petty as them? Ausies will still fight in Afghanistan, and will only pull out sometime next year.
Then Al-BBC asked about compassion for immigrants.
Under the horribe Tory Conservative administration of Howard non-White immigration exploded, against the wishes of most Austrlians, non-Whites flooded into the county. As a result it experienced an epedemic of drug crime.
For a moment I thought I was listening to the Social Workers Party broadcast.
Yes, they seem to be noticeably more enthusiastic about Mr Rudd’s win in Australia than they were about Mr Harper’s win in Canada.
I did hear a slot on BBC yesterday where they interviewed three Aussies, one an ALP abroad fellow and two journalists, and all three said that the decisive issue was Work Choices, which seemed to be some kind of labour deregulation thing. None of ’em mentioned Iraq or Bush. One mentioned climate change but said it came a long way behind Work Choices.
Reg Hammer | 25.11.07 – 1:08 am
Talking of contempt, the BBC’s Paul Adams had this to say, as part of a report on the UN in Lebanon, when mentioning Israel’s shelling of a UN post:
Israel apologised, saying it was a mistake, but eight months on, UN personnel barely conceal their contempt.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/programmes/from_our_own_correspondent/6552701.stm
And Adams barely conceals his contempt for Israel (or for Jews) by claiming that such concealment applies to others. And the contempt is also evident, of course, in his careful avoidance of the reason for Israel’s shelling of the UN post – namely that Hezbollah had (typically) set up Katyusha launchers next to it in order to attack Israel’s civilian population. But Adams evidently has no contempt for such actions.
Strange thing about this From Our Own Correspondent programme that the BBC keeps inflicting on us is that whichever BBC “journalist” writes it, it is always the same – whimsical reminiscences aimed at indoctrinating people in the BBC’s particular bias under discussion. It is also a sort of coming-out-of-the-closet club for BBC hacks keen to trumpet their allegiance to the enemies of Western civilization.
Anyone who wants a compact guide to BBC bias, will find a rich source of material on the FOOC page:
http://search.bbc.co.uk/cgi-bin/search/results.pl?scope=all&edition=i&q=From+Our+Own+Correspondent&go.x=27&go.y=11
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/7111649.stm
This entire article is based on Straw’s apperance on Sunday AM this morning. There’s no opposing Conservative view, even though David Davis was actually on the programme with Straw (and destroyed him). It only mentions the two recent opinion polls that are the kindest to Labour – no mention of the one with a 9pt. Conservative lead.
It’s not a news story, it’s just Labour puff (without counter) dressed up as such!
Apologies if this has already been discussed.
“BBC phone review gives all-clear “
blares the BBC headline. But when you read the article you find this:
“Deloitte spot-checked six shows out of a possible 98 that use such lines. ”
The Beebs headline is even more a farce when you read the last line of the report.
“Deloitte was not commissioned to give an overall judgement on the programmes using premium phone-lines themselves. ”
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/7109447.stm
In addition to my last comment, I’d like to add that this non-story is now on the BBC front page. Not only does it put Labour spin right at the front of the news agenda, it also gets the dreaded ‘Black Wednesday’ in there to make sure people haven’t forgotten those nasty Tories.
Panorama walk-out over McCann film
Why did TV journalist David Mills, the producer of a Panorama film on the McCann affair, quit the project before it was transmitted last week? The Observer’s David Rose reveals the inside story of the latest row to hit the BBC’s flagship show
http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2007/nov/25/bbc?gusrc=rss&feed=media
Bryan | 25.11.07 – 11:30 am |
You are oversimplifying the story about the Israeli destruction of the UN post.
The day the post was destroyed the UN headquarters at Naqoura phoned the Israelis 10 times to warn them that their shells were falling dangerously close to a UN observer position, and every one of those 10 times the Israelis promised that no more shells would fall close to the Khiam post. Then an Israeli aircraft arrived and fired a rocket at it.
Had the Israelis made clear they intended to destroy the post because of the proximate Hezbollah, then the observers could have been withdrawn or moved to another OP.
But instead they promised the attacks would stop – so the UN forces remained.
Perhaps this explains the contempt felt by colleagues of the UN soldiers?
“David:
In addition to my last comment, I’d like to add that this non-story is now on the BBC front page. Not only does it put Labour spin right at the front of the news agenda, it also gets the dreaded ‘Black Wednesday’ in there to make sure people haven’t forgotten those nasty Tories”
Pravda dear boy, Pravda!