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 also be moderated. Any suggestions for stories that you might like covered would be appreciated! It’s your space, use it wisely.
General BBC-related comment thread!
Bookmark the permalink.
You would have thought by now that the biggest wankstain on the planet (Michael Prick) would have given up with Caroline Spelman. But not. He’s at it agian on his blog.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/newsnight/michaelcrick/2008/06/camerons_problem_with_women.html
Re: Spelman facing expenses inquiry
Many, if not most, women working a full-time (or more) job would regard the cost of a nanny as an activity directly related to their jobs. Perhaps if Caroline Spelman had been on the correct side of the political fence the BBC would be supporting her on feminist grounds?
Interesting that even Crick admits that “Caroline Spelman is not a hugely important member of David Cameron’s front-bench team”.
So that would be “not a hugely important” MP and a ten-year-old expense claim in sea of other, much larger, dubious claims. Sounds like the biggest story on the planet to me.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/newsnight/michaelcrick/2008/06/camerons_problem_with_women.html
Joel: “Homer Simpson logic.”
Maggie Simpson argument.
Jason: “The following story is big in the US at the minute…it has emerged that Obama campaign staffers shooed two headscarf-wearing Muslim women out of view of the cameras at an Obamarama event in Detroit…here is it as reported by the UK Times.”
It was also reported in the Guardian, Independent and Telegraph.
Memo to BBC:
Several commenters here have rightly criticised the BBC’s variously erratic, biased, erroneous, inconsistent use and abuse of inverted commas/quotes on its website.
The following BBC example, in a website headline, referring to Ms. S. Chakrabarti, is certainly biased and erroneous:
“Liberty director demands apology”
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/7463925.stm
That BBC example of a headline should demand the use of quotes around the ‘L-word’ here as the reference in the BBC headline is to a specific organisation, the National Lottery-subsidised ‘Liberty’ organisation and not to any misleading notion of abstract ‘freedom’.
Now, of course, if the BBC had written a report questioning, in terms of philosophical liberty, Ms. S. Chakrabarti’s threat to sue a Labour Cabinet Minister, then, of course, a headline which uses the ‘L-word’, without a capital letter and without inverted commas, would be grammatically legitimate, as in this ‘Independent’ headline today:
“What a liberty! Chakrabarti in threat to sue over Tory ‘smear'”
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/what-a-liberty-chakrabarti-in-threat-to-sue-over-tory-smear-851017.html
(Of course, the ‘Independent’ headline would have been clearer if it had said: ..”threat to sue Labour over ‘smear’ about Tory”, but don’t get me started on the ‘Independent’ way of doing things.)
Yet again the Beeb interprets the right to reply a little differently to the rest of the media:
The Mirror: “Transport Minister Tom Harris blasts Brits being too “bloody miserable”
Metro: “‘Miserable’ voters slammed by MP”
Mail: “Stop being so miserable”
Guardian: “Britain has never had it so good, minister tells ‘miserable’ voters”
Press Assocation, carried by Channel 4, Standard etc: “‘Miserable’ voters slammed”
BBC: Minister defends ‘miserable’ jibe
Martin: You made me chuckle:)
I told someone at work about the Gaza (toy )rocket photos, and he said, “perhaps the BBC used the photo in good faith as they are attributed to World News & Features”.
So I did a search in Google for “World News & Features”
A google seach shows 40 hits from an outfit called http://www.worldnf.tv, all about Hamas. Be warned, Google advises with each link “This site may harm your computer.”
He was great as Det. Columbo though.
Jack Bauer | Homepage | 17.06.08 – 11:39 am
Nope, that was Peter Falk.
Last night BBC News was covering that Israel might be planning a strike against Iran.
No mention, though, of the amazing fact that the Israel-Hamas ceasefire has lasted for more than a day. And that Israel is starting to have diplomatic talks with Syria, Iran and Lebanon.
I have been away from the TV for a while, and been getting loads of encouraging news about Middle East diplomacy from reading the FT.
Diplomacy in the middle east – huge news! I can’t believe to find no mention of it on the BBC TV channels.
Am I being really naive?