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!
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looks like some commenters on the bbc blogs cant even read, especially when it comes to their blinkered knee jerk anti-americanism.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/talkingamerica/2008/09/venice_beach_couldnt_be_more.html
comment:
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I am losing all hope, here: Ms. Jordan Peagler is “a fiscal conservative and an economic liberal,”
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whereas she actually said:
“I’m a fiscal conservative and an social liberal.”
Debbie Schlussel..”A Great Question on this 9/11 Anniversary: Why Doesn’t China Butt-Kiss Muslims Like We Do?”
http://www.debbieschlussel.com/archives/2008/09/a_great_questio.html
Radio 4 News at 10 is coming from Afghanistan, complete with bloody Lyse Doucet.
All very very negative, of course.
On 9/11, I find this sick.
BBC Newsnight is currently twisting 9/11 into a footnote in an American crusade of slaughter against Muslims.
Sickening.
And BBC Newsnight is on the anti “Boosh” attack as well. Biggest dick is Mark Urban.
Shame we can’t have a “war on the BBC”
Great piece on the News at Ten.
I imagine the BBC bigwigs heard that Alaska’s indigenous people are opposing offshore drilling, so they dispatched a film crew forthwith.
On arrival the reporter took some arty shots of the gas pipeline and joy of joys a handy polar bear, it was all going so well.
Until….. the locals made it clear that they opposed the drilling because they do not want their whale meat contaminated.
Then those wonderful indigenous folk shot the polar bear for supper.
The Beeb needs to learn that an indigenous American is still an American.
newsnight right now keep saying the bbc mantra of the “so called war on terrorism”.
i really dont understand this “so called” nonsense when the u.s. military has a service medal for it
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_War_on_Terrorism_Service_Medal
Yes that was so fucking funny the locals blowing the Polar bear away.
I couldn’t stop laughing. Shame they didn’t take the beeboids out as well.
LGF “where were you on 911” thread
http://littlegreenfootballs.com/article/31225_Where_Were_You_on_September_11/comments/#ctop
well worth a read. some of the stories are incredibly touching.
Brent crude down to $98.24, a six month low.
Best not to mention it as it might blunt the PM’s latest fuel policy initiative.
Haven’t been around in a while, so sorry if this is a repeat, but did anyone cover this story about Hindus and Sikhs complaining about al-Beeb’s pro-Islamic bias:
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/media/sikhs-and-hindus-accuse-bbc-of-promuslim-bias-922482.html
41 shows about Islam since 2001, only five about other Asian religions. For god’s sake that is unbelievable. 41 shows? For three percent of the population?
Richard Littlejohn..”Whenever terror suspects are arrested here, the BBC floods the area with reporters anxious to reassure us that they are lovely mummy’s boys, who devote their lives to charity work and playing cricket”…
Singing la-la-la won’t make these jihadists go away
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1054788/RICHARD-LITTLEJOHN-Singing-la-la-la-wont-make-jihadists-away.html
Info for BBC to report:
Islamic revenge against a teddy bear in Sudan-
http://www.newenglishreview.org/blog_direct_link.cfm/blog_id/17009
Nick Robinson on the TOADY(freak)SHOW is saying that all the recent polls bring comfort and good news for the Prime mentalist, I couldnt quite believe my ears when he suggested that the electorate didnt wish for a change of leader and they wanted the McMentalist to carry on getting on with the job of getting on with the job of getting on with the job etc, as he is the best qualified to steer the ship the the economic storm(that he created).
Has Nick been talking to Captain Courage again?
Nick somehow ‘forgot’ to mention that the polls are the worst for Labour since records began and the Prime Mincers ratings with the voter are so terrible it seems the voter would rather be fed to the lions than vote NuLabour.
I wonder if Nick realises what a laughing stock he has become second only to comrade wingnut Marrrrr.
THE BBC: NO EXPENSE IS SPARED TO PROTECT OUR SOCIALIST COMRADES, SO PAY UP YOU PEASANT MUGS!
Here we go: the BBC and their ‘MILITANTS’ in Pakistan (no mention of ISLAMIC JIHADISTS).
The main thrust of the BBC political line here is NOT to emphasise the murderous actions of the al-Qaeda and Taleban there, in the UK or the USA, but to concentrate on any political splits between Pakistan government and the West.
The ISLAMIC JIHADISTS there will be pleased with this BBC report.
“Bush ‘approved’ Pakistan attacks”
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/south_asia/7611287.stm
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/south_asia/7611287.stm
The BBC uncritically propagandises this report which supports mass immigration of low-skilled people:
“Migration fears unjustified, OECD”
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/7608198.stm
But, in contrast, this analysis, below, points to the flaws in Brown’s mantras in immigration:
“Brown has exploited Immigration to hide from deep problems” (Fraser Nelson).
http://www.spectator.co.uk/the-magazine/features/2075031/brown-has-exploited-immigration-to-hide-from-deep-problems.thtml
Did anyone hear “The Reunion” BBC Radio 4 Friday morning 12th Sept? I switched on & was appalled to hear the BBC giving a platform to disgraced, discredited Holocaust denier David Irving. I switched off in disgust.
I thought there was a prohibition on BBC reporters writing for newspapers?
It seems it doesn’t apply to Justin Webb, who is allowed to opine in print as well as on the air.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/columnists/guest_contributors/article4735147.ece
GCooper | 12.09.08 – 11:07 am
There’s already been some discussion about Webb’s article on the Mock The Week thread. Even though he’s the BBC’s North America editor it’s clear that he doesn’t feel the need to waste his precious time and effort writing this stuff for the BBC’s own website. He obviously feels he does more than enough to justify his salary with an occasional blog post linking to the latest Sarah Palin smears; his extended opinions cost extra, hence the Times article.
I didn’t originally notice that Webb’s article is promoting his new book. It twigged when I just checked my inbox and discovered an email from Justin Webb encouraging me to go to Amazon to buy it.
Cassandra | 12.09.08 – 9:22 am
Nick Robinson on the TOADY(freak)SHOW is saying that all the recent polls bring comfort and good news for the Prime mentalist, I couldnt quite believe my ears when he suggested that the electorate didnt wish for a change of leader and they wanted the McMentalist to carry on getting on with the job..
I expect this is the same poll that everywhere else has been interpreted as saying that Labour are dead certs to lose the next election whether they replace the useless McBean or not….. i.e. it’s Labour the public’s fed up with, not just its leader.
Of course the BBC could never bring themselves to admit that.
If the real electorate will not support the socialists, the BBC will invent a new, imaginary electorate that does.
Susan | 12.09.08 – 5:21 am
“41 shows about Islam since 2001…”
Better make that 42: “Other programmes in the science collection include… Science and Islam, looking at the scientific and intellectual tradition of the medieval Muslim world.
http://www.digitalspy.co.uk/broadcasting/a130067/bbc-four-unveils-new-science-programmes.html
A couple of nights ago R5’s Rhod Sharp on “Upallnight” in desperate search for a knock McCain/Palin story, interviewed a representative of a lefty Vet organisation. Their complaint was that Palin had put troops lives in danger by giving the date of her son’s deployment to Iraq. So what’s this from the BBC?
Track Palin is being sent to Iraq to serve in the Stryker Brigade Combat Team of the 25th Infantry Division.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/7611625.stm
Would that be tent #25, Row D?
xlr 11:56am.
Yes.
Robert Spencer, of ‘Jihadwatch’ has exposed all this for years:
“Hyping Islam’s role in the History of Science”
http://jihadwatch.org/dhimmiwatch/archives/007439.php
And from Spencer’s small book , ‘The Politically Incorrect Guide to Islam (and the Crusades)’:
“The flowering of Islamic culture is the stuff of legend. Muslims invented algebra, the zero, and the astrolabe (an ancient navigational instrument). They blazed new trails in agriculture. They preserved Aristotelian philosophy while Europe blundered through the Dark Ages. In virtually every field, the Islamic empires of bygone days far outstripped the achievements of their non-Muslim contemporaries in Europe and elsewhere.
“Or did they?
“Well, not quite. Unless copying counts.”
(Robert Spencer,ibid, p87).
I have just completed the ridiculous BBC Trust survey, as many other posters have done I have sprinkled my responses with queries as to why I have to pay for a left-wing, anti-English and anti-Catholic organisation.
A CNN morning news anchor has just done a James Naughtie:
http://corner.nationalreview.com/post/?q=MDg4ZTExOTUwOTQxNGEwM2UzYTI1ODQ0OTM2ODdhZmM=
Would that be tent #25, Row D?
will | 12.09.08 – 12:14 pm | #
Heavens, do keep up. It’s not like there are not all sorts of precedents already set.
Their public has a right to know… if only to set the fuses right.
Webb’s Times article on the moment of the USA’s move into modernity
Terri Schiavo was allowed to die. And in opinion poll after opinion poll most Americans felt, with sadness but with conviction as well, that the courts had been right.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/columnists/guest_contributors/article4735147.ece
Pity the hip modern media could only tell their audience that Terri Schiavo was being “allowed to die”, rather than she was being deprived of water & would die of dehydration.
I thought there was a prohibition on BBC reporters writing for newspapers?
GCooper | 12.09.08 – 11:07 am | #
The exception that smooths the fool?
Will: That vet interview was nothing more than another anti Palin lie peddled by the BBC.
He said that her son wasn’t being sent to Iraq on 9/11. As far as I’m aware SHE addressed the troops as that was the official start of their deployment.
I’m sure Palin couldn’t have arranged for hundreds of troops and their families to all be paraded if it wasn’t an official engagement. Something planned BEFORE she became the VP pick.
And if as the lefties at the BBC suggest she was a last minute choice and not vetted how could that deployment date be made up? That was already the date her son had!!
The BBC must think we’re thick.
I did email Sharp and told him to fuck off. Did’nt get a reply though 🙂
Hilariously bad article here –
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/magazine/7610413.stm
It begins:“What is this experiment about, Daddy, and is it going to blow up the Earth?”
That was the question many parents collided with as scientists prepared to flick the switch on the Large Hadron Collider in Switzerland.
And it doesn’t get much better.
“Whip out of job after leader call”
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/7613086.stm
What you meant was “Whip forced to resign after call to challenge leadership”, BBC?
That looks too negative against GB though, i agree…
To add to the discussion a few days ago about Palin’s down-syndrome child, and that deeply unsettling sentence in the BBC report (“This was an un-dogmatic, accessible Sarah Palin – the conservatism hovering in the background, visible in the presence of her Downs syndrome child, the child she insisted on having despite her knowledge of his disability”) here’s James Taranto in the Wall Street Journal:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122113849516123327.html?mod=Best+of+the+Web+Today
In their defense, one might note that Sarah Palin, too, is using Trig as a symbol. But there is a world of difference between humanizing a political candidate and dehumanizing a 4-month-old baby.
None of this can be explained in terms of political calculation. Scorning a woman for declining to abort a disabled child is likely to be about as persuasive to voters as burning an American flag. These ugly sentiments have to be sincere. In a way, that makes them even more disquieting.
“Well sorry the rule of law is not an optional extra. There are circumstances where the individual should be prepared to break the law but when it happens they must expect to face the consequences. If the state is complicit in crime then we live in a very unfree society & that is what has happened here.
There is an emotional but no moral difference between the blackshirts being allowed to attack Jewish shops or southern courts refusing to prosecute lynching & Greenpeace being given writ to attack those they do not like.”
http://a-place-to-stand.blogspot.com/
“BBC to search for budding leaders”
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/7610164.stm
“Presumably following the BBC’s ‘multiculturalism’, the proportion of ‘hideously white'(Dyke)participants, especially male ones,(Harman) allowed to succeed will be strictly limited:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-507454/BBC-hideously-white-number-black-executives-drops-time-low.html
http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/news/article-23522829-details/Erin+Pizzey,+champion+of+women's+rights,+says+radical+feminist+plans+to+let+victims+of+domestic+abuse+get+away+with+murder+are+an+affront+to+morality/article.do
Will Brown have a chapter on ‘The Elephant in the Room’?:
“Brown writing book on Britishness”
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/7553713.stm
“EU flag and anthem revived by MEPs”
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/2823052/EU-flag-and-anthem-revived-by-MEPs.html
Not a word of this on the BBC news, why was no one arrested?
Walthamstow, east London: Radical Muslims speech warn of another 9/11
Among the speakers were a number of former members of the banned group al-Muhajiroun, once led by Bakri from his council home in Edmonton, North London.
The most incendiary speech was delivered by Saiful Islam, from Luton, Bedfordshire, who praised Osama bin Laden and al-Qaeda for their “courage” in retaliating against the “dictatorship and oppression” of the West.
He spoke against mainstream bodies like the Muslim Council of Britain, who condemned the September 11 and July 7 attacks, accusing them of “selling their souls to the devil”.
Mr Choudary talked about the black “flag of Sharia” flying over Downing Street by 2020, saying 500 people a day were converting to Islam.
He laughed that Muslim families in places like Whitechapel and Bethnal Green in east London were having “10 or 12 children each”.
MORE..
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/2826537/Radical-Muslims-warn-of-another-911.html
On the BBC’s latest ‘Newswatch’ video (of 12 Sept.), the BBC has a self-assessment of its AFGHANISTAN news coverage, following some BBC viewers’ criticisms; the ‘straw man’ criticism was whether the BBC was too embedded. The question I wanted to get an answer to is whether the BBC reporters
there are ideologically embedded with the British or with the Taliban.
A key criticism: that the BBC’s Ms. LYSE DOUCET had propagandised about the ‘humanity’ of the Taliban in a speech she gave in Edinburgh recently, was censored by the BBC. Too hot to handle. Doucet’s ideology is reflected in her reports from Afghanistan, now that she is back there.
In fact, programme presenter, Mr Snoddy made no criticisms of the THREE BBC reporters on Afghanistan. 1.)Mr.LANGAN,(a la Johnston and Hamas), praised the treatment which the Taliban had given him when held captive by them for three months;he particularly praised the fact that they allowed him to listen to BBC World Service, which he found (as a BBC employee) particularly informative; the Afghan national, and BBC reporter, 2.) Mr. RAZAQ, (whose ideology can be guessed at), urged that the Taliban be regarded and reported as a repected and conventional army; and 3.)Ms. DUUCET, avoided repeating her ‘humanity’ Taliban propaganda. (She must have been surprised by the widespead negative reaction there was to this in Britain):
http://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/news/article1602644.ece
Instead, she adopts a ‘neutral’ approach on the war: ‘different people want top know different things’. Is she on the side of the West or the Taliban?
(See video at ‘Watch Now’. UK access only.)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/newswatch/ifs/hi/default.stm
While the ‘Guardian’ propagandises its readers to intervene in US election (in state of Ohio, in particular), to push for an Obama vote, the BBC has run its phoney world-wide poll at someone else’s expense to pressure for Obama too, as ‘EU Referendum blog’ points out:
These ‘EU Referendum blog’ comments, in an excellent conclusion, show the hypocrisy of both the ‘Guardian’ and the BBC-
“Who should decide – Part 2”
[Extract]:
“So we come to the last and, for us, the most important point. Does Mr Freedland ever mention the fact that in Britain around 80 per cent of the legislation comes from the European Union with the Parliament, even if it is aware of it, unable to strike it down? Has the BBC ever conducted a poll about the fact that legal decisions in Britain can be overthrown by the ECJ and legislation properly passed in Westminster can be declared invalid by the same body?”
http://eureferendum2.blogspot.com/2008/09/who-should-decide-part-2.html
From BBC News:
‘Brown attacked on pensioner deal’
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/7612852.stm
“The PM made his promise on Thursday when he unveiled a £910m energy saving plan agreed with the power giants. But when Heather Tarn, 60, from Beaconsfield in Buckinghamshire, called the government’s helpline she was told Mr Brown had made a mistake… Mrs Tarn, [b]A CONSTITUENT OF A CONSERVATIVE MP[/b], was told by the government helpline that she was not eligible for cavity wall insulation.
What does the political alleigence of Mrs Tarn’s MP have to do with anything? It wouldn’t, by any chance, be a means of implying that Mrs Tarn is being influenced by the Conservatives to criticise the Governement would it?
This comes as the political manoueverings against the Prime Minister by the Labour party have only now been deemed newsworthy enough to warrent the leading article, way behind other news and current affairs websites. Another example of the BBC’s institutional political bias.
We’ll have to wait a little longer th find out which group committed these latest killings and injuries in DELHI today:
“Explosions shake Indian capital”
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/south_asia/7614280.stm
A recent report from NDTV (India), put the number of deaths at 9.
Of course, the BBC should ignore any threats from Islamic groups, as were issued after the recent Bangalore killings:
“India: Muslim leaders insist media should not associate recent bombings with Islam”
http://www.jihadwatch.org/archives/021968.php
3:38 pm update from Wall Street Journal –
“New Delhi explosions kill up to 15” (Paul Beckett)
[Extract]:
“Indian Mujahideen, a group which police say is a front for the Students Islamic Movement of India — a terrorist group banned by the Indian government since 2001, has warned in the past that Delhi would be a target. Shahbaz Hussain, a senior SIMI leader when the group was banned in 2001, was arrested Aug. 25. A 32-year-old cyber-cafe owner in the city of Lucknow, Uttar Pradesh, police say he is the sender of emails attributed to Indian Mujahideen. Rajasthan police say he was the mastermind of the Jaipur attacks on May 13 that killed more than 60 people.”
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122131527213432213.html?mod=googlenews_wsj
Got the idea, BBC, on this sort of reporting?
Climate Change Corporation correspondents round the world are using our tellytax to comb scientific journals for any news, however contentious, however ill-founded, about ‘climate change’. It seems that they are at their mission day in and day out, and it’s now their biggest priority. Anything they find makes it to the laughably entitled ‘science and technology’ section of the BBC website, without an ounce of counter-opinion or common sense.
The latest nonsense comes from the otherwise able reporter Phil Mercer in Australia, who has found a green nutter who says that Australia is going to be hit in future by ‘bigger waves’. Cities are going to be wiped out, although government climate change minister Wong (aptly named!) does point out an upside, that there will be better surfing and cheaper ‘renewable’ electricity.
Our intrepid Mr Mercer ends up with a mini sermon – that Oz needs all the help it can get in electricity generation, because it’s one of the ‘world’s worst emitters’ of greenhouse gases.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/asia-pacific/7608867.stm
Just completed the BBC Trust licensing survey and made my views on the BBC very clear.
I came across this one on Have Your Say. I found the link from somewhere else in the BBC News section.
Should Gordon Brown continue as party leader?
Party leader? Is there only one party like in communist China? Do they mean the BBC’s party?
Some of the comments are straight out of the Labour Party Spin Guide!
Shadowmancer author: BBC banned me because I’m Christian.
The Rev G P Taylor, who has sold millions of books worldwide, claims that a producer at the corporation told him they couldn’t be “seen to be promoting Jesus”.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/religion/2910437/Shadowmancer-author-BBC-banned-me-because-Im-Christian.html
URGENT. HELP WANTED.
Sometime B.C. (before computer) I have in my file a fax to the Today programme dated 07.04.05:
“Did my ears deceive me? The former Chairman of the Governors (Gavyn Davies) admitting that the BBC has a left wing bias on your Today In Parliament item between 6 and 7 a.m.
What an obvious subject for an in-depth interview by John, probably best with himself holding a mirror”.
I believe the extract came from a select committee that Mr Davies was called to be questioned at. Can somebody somewhere produce the actual quote which would be an ideal addition to the quotes on the right hand side of the site.
Somebody will also surely be able to identify his connection with the Labour Party. Did his wife work for Mr McBean?