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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I fibbed earlier. I did watch the Andrew Marr show all the way through…. just in case.
However, having stayed on towards the end found our hero ‘did not quite understand’ during an interview with a Government Minister.
And as he asked, and asked and didn’t get any answer, neither did I.
What is the point of such interviews?
Hence I have to wonder what this woman was/is/will be for, or such as him, other than to suck up pay and guaranteed pensions that few others will enjoy.
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So the BBC don’t discuss polls – Why did the BBC news at 8 am this morning just happen to mention that “Labour is up 3 points and the Tories down three”….
The policy is obviously only to mention polls when they shoe a favourable result or trend for socialism
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BBC Views politic page Sunday 10 am. Still no conservatives. Are they some sort of rare species?
Brown will lead way
OTHER TOP STORIES
Brown demands petrol price cuts
Lib Dems demand cut in income tax
UK ‘ignored Iceland bank warning’
Mandelson to take seat in Lords
Race open for new Lib Dem leader
Livingstone backs mayor Met role
Strange, the BBC made great efforts to ensure that the IRA got the ‘oxygen of publicity’ in the 80’s. The had to be heard – so why the problem with the loyal opposition.
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EU Referendum have posted a detailed (and lenghty) post on the proverbial elephant in the room regarding the credit crunch
http://eureferendum.blogspot.com/2008/10/theyve-known-it-all-along.html
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I’m re-posting this in an appropriate thread:
Wonder it doesn’t seem the Beeb has made a story of this:
http://www.chiefexecutive.net/ME2/dirmod.asp?sid=&nm=&type=Publishing&mod=Publications%3A%3AArticle&mid=8F3A7027421841978F18BE895F87F791&tier=4&id=67E20819CD7646C3B380AD60BB17EFAA
“Over 70 percent of CEOs fear an Obama presidency will be a disaster”
I’m pretty sure this would be covered prominently were the results different.
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Would I be wasting my time looking for this story on the BBC’s website?
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1076718/Secret-documents-prove-WAS-No-10-cover-F1-chief-Bernie-Ecclestones-1million-gift-Labour.html
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This can’t be a BBC report, can it?
The BBC usually reports that it’s only men and women civilians who are killed by ‘security forces’ in Afghanistan. Are Lyse and Plett on a break?:
“Taleban killed in Afghan battles”
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/south_asia/7665733.stm
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I’m currently watching the politics show on BBC1. We’ve already had Nick Clegg on spouting utter crap. And now on London’s politics, we’ve got Vince Cable, flip flopping his opinion as the wind changes. Where are the Conservatives? Are the Lib Dems now the official opposition as far as the BBC are concerned? Total bias.
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Anonymous @12:40
Are you suggesting that Tories wouldn’t have been invited to appear on the programme? I suggest that Mr. Vance check that out for us.
Or maybe they’re taking the advice of Parris and Heffer and keeping their head down, (as questions about Hague’s judgement would have been relevant and embarrassing)and it’s not as if they disagree with the Govt. so the public may as well listen to the opinion of Cable fwiw.
Don’t be upset. Dave was on Sky news, and was given more than enough time to make his case for siding with the Govt – with bells on, allegedly.
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Of course, what really bugs most of the posters on here is not that the BBC has bias generally, but that it isn’t the right TYPE of bias.
If overnight, the BBC underwent some kind of radical rethink and reshaped their output to suggest (for example) that the Tories were the greatest thing since sliced bread or implied that John McCain was destined to be the next President or that Israel had a right to defend itself, then most of the posters on here would vanish like the morning mist.
Because that wouldn’t be bias then, would it?
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Bremsstrahlung
Totally incorrect. WE DON’T WANT ANY BIAS EITHER WAY ON THE BBC. WE WANT FAIR AND OBJECTIVE BALANCED NEWS REPORTING. What part of that don’t you get? If we must have publicly funded broadcasting, it must be non-partisan. At the moment, the BBC is infested with soft liberal left sympathises, and their news reporting unsurprisingly portrays that view. There are, ergo, the propoganda arm of New Labour. That must change.
If we must have publicly funded broadcasting, the licence fee must be severely top sliced, and distributed between say four different television companies, to provide the viewer with choice, and hopefully, a wider range of views and reporting than one gets from the BBC.
We don’t want right wing bias from the BBC. We want balanced and fair reporting. Do you get it yet?
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Bremsstrahlung | 12.10.08 – 2:09 pm
“If overnight, the BBC underwent some kind of radical rethink and reshaped their output to suggest… that Israel had a right to defend itself”
No further questions, Your Honour.
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“If overnight, the BBC underwent some kind of radical rethink and reshaped their output to suggest… that Israel had a right to defend itself”
What a statement!!!! Unbelievable. No doubt this person does not know what he he is saying.
King Cnut | 12.10.08 – 2:14 pm
Exactly – I too do not want the BBC to represent any political ideology – right, left or centre.
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I note that the BBC are studiously ignoring the revelations in the Bernie Ecclestone affair that prove that Tony ‘straight guy’ Blair and Labour lied about the £1 million donation they received. Sky think it’s newsworthy, but apart from an obscure link on the BBC web site… nothing. They found plenty of space to report on the Cheltenham book Festival however. Strange priorities.
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Bremsstrahlung | 12.10.08 – 2:09 pm |
if there was an award on biased bbc for the most stupid comment of the week,this would be the winner.
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Bremsstrahlung: during the last years of the Tory government pre- 1997, the BBC was all over the Conservatives like a bad rash. No impropriety, no matter how minor, was left uncovered. The defining narrative was “sleaze” and BBC pursued it with vigour.
In my naivety I thought this was the role of any serious broadcaster — to question, and examine the government, fairly but thoroughly. Strangely as soon as Labour got in the BBC’s role changed, so much so that it has now become little more than the publicity arm of Labour.
Equal treatment for all parties — that’s all the contributors here want.
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BBC MARK EASTON’s blog:
Four of his last nine entries have been about…drugs:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/thereporters/markeaston/2008/10/map_of_the_week_the_mystery_of.html
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BBC Saira Khan’s Video interview with IMRAN KHAN (August 2008)
http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=YcjiZQLRcK0
Update, and non-BBC critique of IMRAN KHAN:
“Not Well-Bowled, Imran Khan”
(by Hugh Fitzgerald)
http://www.newenglishreview.org/blog_direct_link.cfm/blog_id/17526
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Proof that the voter fraud by Democrat and Leftoid groups is not only about merely registering homeless people as Democrats, but gets them to vote as well:
Ohio Homeless Driven to Polls to Vote Obama
Newsnight has lied to you. It’s not just dodgy voter registrations, with “no evidence” that they’ve ever influenced an election. They’re voting.
The huge effort by a pro-Obama group, Vote Today Ohio, takes advantage of a quirk in the state’s elections laws that allows people to register and cast ballots at the same time without having to prove residency.
Newsnight claims that they just make fake voter registrations, with no effect on any actual election. If nobody was going to cast a vote under these fake registrations, what would be the point of the whole thing?
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Newsnight: Theres “no evidence” that any of the fake voters registered by ACORN ever affected an election. Ergo, only Republicans engage in voter fraud.
Reality: I call BS on Newsnight:
Ballots cast in Houston using dead voters’ names
Linda Kay Hill, a homemaker and Louisiana native, died Aug. 2, 2006, of a heart attack, her husband recalled, and is buried at Houston Memorial Gardens in Pearland. But Harris County voter records indicate she •- or someone using her identity •- cast a ballot in the November election that year. Linda Hill of Woodwick Street voted in person on Election Day, records show.
Not just phony registrations, but actual votes using them. Newsnight stands by Palast’s story.
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Is this even news:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/7665925.stm
Who gives a monkeys if a 106 year old nun living in Rome will vote Obama? It’s just pure propoganda. Nothing more, nothing less. A person of 106 is very usually not of sound mind, and has in almost certainly been put up this is.
Another example of the BBC bigging up Obama. The bias is endemic.
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Poor Bremsstrahlung 12.10.08 – 2:09 pm can’t help it if he/she thinks B-BBC is itself biased.
The examples he/she confidently uses to illustrate what he/she thinks of as our outrageous bias only go to show how much influence the BBC has already had on the public, including the unfortunate Bremsstrahlung.
It has indoctrinated generations who think they are still being educated by the finest broadcasting organisation in the world.
The fact that the BBC is resting on the laurels of its once well-deserved reputation, but has let standards of impartiality and accuracy degenerate to what we have today, has escaped poor Bremsstrahlung and his fellow Beeb- followers.
The nudge nudge wink wink conspiratorial togetherness of those that run the show have lulled them and their admirers into assuming that they alone occupy some sort of moral high ground.
Bremsstrahlung, like millions of others, is deluded and cannot help it.
Hm. Bremsstrahlung. Does that sound like the name of a friend of Israel?
What the BBC needs is change. Hope and change.
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Sue,
Bremsstrahlung just means something like “hitting the brakes”. He’s taking a sarcastic swipe at us with his moniker, I suspect.
But he doth protest too much.
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Sue
Bremsstrahlung = “Radiation emitted by a charged particle under acceleration”
Maybe his brain has been bombarded with x-rays.
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Jon writes: “Maybe his brain has been bombarded with x-rays.”
I always wondered how they made trolls.
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George R | 12.10.08 – 3:28 pm |
BBC MARK EASTON’s blog:
Four of his last nine entries have been about…drugs:
This last one is a bit weird, isn’t it? It’s hard to figure out what his actual concern is from this tortured and flawed economic logic about supply and demand.
Wholesale heroin prices are up, less quality smack available (insert joke about BBC habits and rent boys here), presumably because of hoarding in order to control prices in places where they have BBC studios. But then he thinks the hoarders will suddenly release all those drugs at some undetermined date in the future? What does Easton have in mind? Does he think the Afghan drug barons have asked their broker to call them when the pound hits a certain target against the euro or something?
And then when they release all those drugs, what then? The price will go down when the market floods, no more shortages in Finchley where the Radio 6 slobs go to buy their fix. So what? He just got emotional over the idea that everyone will turn to heroin if it becomes a little cheaper.
He spent so much time arguing – wrongly – in favor of his Theory 2 that the Serious Organised Crime Agency called him up and told him that the drug makers were stockpiling it, but in order to control prices in Russia and China, not where his friends go to cop. So Easton’s little venture into Robert Peston territory didn’t work very well.
(Is it just me, or does the “Serious Organised Crime Agency” sound too much like something from a Monty Python sketch?)
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It was only a matter of time before someone blamed Margaret Thatcher for the current woes. Sure enough Robert Preston comes up trumps here.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/thereporters/robertpeston/2008/10/humbling_of_our_banks.html
The fact that she has not been in office for 18 years is nothing. The fact that Labour have allowed this mess to develop on their watch is not mentioned. Nor the fact that Tony Blair and Gordon Brown messed up the city regulation and caused a mess.
No according to the BBC it is all the fault of Mrs T.
We will need another Mrs T to sort this shambles out – that’s for sure.
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It’s EXPLICIT:
the BBC’s ‘Multiculturalism’ involves DHIMMITUDE* towards ISLAM (out of fear of death), and as a corollary, the outright ugly, demeaning representation of CHRISTIANITY. As the BBC is AFRAID to criticise ISLAM, but finds it too easy to criticise CHRISTIANITY, we have the BBC ideological default position where it gives preferential treatment to Islam, such as allowing this sort of representation of Christianity, which the BBC would not broadcast about Islam:
“BBC ‘horror film’ faces religious outcry”
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/3184460/BBC-horror-film-faces-religious-outcry.html
Of course, we had this admission from the BBC’s Mark Thompson six months ago, but nothing has changed as far as the BBC’s pro-Islam, anti-Christian attitude is concerned. In other words, Thompson has done nothing about the BBC’s dhimmitude, as this latest scandal demonstrates. This weak, dhimmi, Thompson should resign.
“BBC’s Mark Thompson says UK broadcasters are ‘over-cautious’ on Islam”
http://archbishop-cranmer.blogspot.com/2008/04/bbcs-mark-thompson-says-uk-broadcasters.html
* For more on ‘DHIMMITUDE’, suggest see:
http://www.dhimmitude.org/
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The BBC is awash with Christianity. It really sticks in my craw. We need a more secular BBC.
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Firstly, Christianity happens to be the State religion, you may not like it and I don’t but it is a fact. As such you just might expect Christianity to figure occasionally on the BBC.
Secondly, what about some evidence that BBC is ‘awash’ with Christianity, its actually pretty difficult to find in the BBC Output these days.
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Which BBC does this whitewineidiot watch? The BBC even admit that they are anti-Christian.
“BBC executives admitted the corporation is dominated by homosexuals. They acknowledged that ethnic minorities held a disproportionate number of positions and said the BBC deliberately encourages multiculturalism and is more careful to avoid offending the Muslim community than Christians, .
Tossing the Bible into a garbage can on a comedy show would be acceptable, they said, but not the Koran, and if possible they would broadcast an interview with Osama Bin Laden, giving him the opportunity to explain his views”
http://www.lifesitenews.com/ldn/2006/oct/06102401.html
“Robin Aitken, a former BBC reporter, has written a book on the subject. He names Christians among the BBC’s “in-house pariah groups”.
“These people,” he says, “will never get the soft interview or helpful publicity.”
http://www.christian.org.uk/news/20080905/media-is-anti-christian-says-sky-news-reporter/
“They can do to us what they dare not do to the Muslims,” he [Dr John Sentamu] said. “We are fair game because they can get away with it. We don’t go down there and say, ‘We are going to bomb your place.’ That is not in our nature.”
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1534086/BBC-frightened-of-criticising-Islam%2C-says-archbishop.html
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David Preiser (USA) | Homepage | 12.10.08 – 5:31 pm |
He’s taking a sarcastic swipe at us with his moniker, I suspect.
But he doth protest too much.
Yes. But troll-traps are not all bad. They often provide the opportunity to say something you wanted to get off your chest.
This time Bremsstrahlung posed as a lefty with fascist leanings saying the things that lefties with fascist leanings often do. So whatever was said to him/her will do just as well for them. Mustn’t waste it.
Kill the Bremsstrah thingy, Brian Chubb, Colin Chase – they all had little clues you could unravel.
Whereas Louis Theroux and Ali G. just try to make a fool out of Tony Benn. When there is no really need to go to all that trouble.
Sock-puppets and pervy trolls were ingenious. But they were banned.
I haven’t seen Hillhunt for ages. I am getting a little concerned, I think someone may be concealing something
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WWL is starting to sound increasingly like a troll.
I am not a Christian (in fact, in some respects I am quite antipathetic to the religion) but even I recognise that Christians get a very raw deal from the Corporation.
Blandly asserting the contrary and feigning anger at it is, I would suggest, simply trolling for a reaction.
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GCooper | 13.10.08 – 12:23 am |
I am not a Christian (in fact, in some respects I am quite antipathetic to the religion) but even I recognise that Christians get a very raw deal from the Corporation.
Blandly asserting the contrary and feigning anger at it is, I would suggest, simply trolling for a reaction.
When has anyone seen a Beeboid giggle about Islam? When has anyone heard a Beeboid say that someone with certain Islamic beliefs shouldn’t hold public office, and that rational people don’t like them? Even when the country in question is Islamic? Rhetorical question, of course, but this is what contrarians like whitewhineliberal conveniently ignore.
That’s not trolling, like those who just come in, drop a stink bomb, then run for cover when their lies are shown up.
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church of england has on any issue going. I don’t think the beeb should be involved in any proselytising. not trolling I assure you. it’s an area where i’m v critical of the bbc.
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The TOADY SHOW is reporting the critisism of former EU trade commisioner Peter Mandelson because of his gravytrain payoff but they seem to have missed the main story for some reason!
Mandelson was involved in some very dodgy dealings with a russian oligarch, payoffs,brown envelopes,backhanders and cash for access etc and the BBC only reports on his massive tax evading pension!
Peter Mandelson left the UK under a cloud and now he leaves the EU gravytrain under a cloud and yet the BBC feels this is not a top story, I wonder how long the BBC will ignore the scandal?
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With all that is in the media infirmament it’s a change from the usual, but I guess it passes for welcome balance…
Defections, temptation and bouncing in the RFK
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/newsnight/petermarshall/2008/10/defections_temptation_and_boun.html
I wonder who they’ll be voting for?
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Today programme’s Paul Wood has just had an interview with a Palestinian prospective suicide bomber who was allowed to make unchallenged claims that the Israelis bomb mosques whilst people are praying in them. Not a murmur from the BBC that this was a false claim. Instead a piece of analysis that the ceasefire could soon be over and that suicide bombing would resume.
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Its an economic miracle folks! Gordon Brown single handedly saves the UK banking system and indeed the whole planet!
TOADY is reporting good news all the way, happy days are here again eh? Everyone is on TOADY praising Brown to the heavens and of course his loyal sidekick Darling, there are no critics invited to comment but then again whats to critisise eh?
Hmmmm, nobody is critical of the Brown plan, I wonder if there are any critics/deniers out there?
The TOADY experts are reporting on the FTSE spike as though its some kind of miracle, of course the FTSE has plummeted by about TWO THOUSAND POINTS over a few months, wiping hundreds of billions of the value of companies, thats not news but a few point spike is lauded as spectacular!
Is it just me or is it a little too soon to be hanging out the f*****g bunting and dancing in the street celebrations?
I wonder why the balance of trade disaster was not thought fit to mention?
I wonder why the national debt mountain was thought fit to be mentioned, the BoE is now stuffed to bursting with worthles ‘IOU’ bits of paper and the gold reserves to back our currency was sold off at bargain basement prices by Brown!
I wonder why the economic collapse and industrial meltdown was not thought important?
I wonder why the TOADIES forgot to mention just how the UK is going to pay off all this debt because the banks are still upto their necks in bad debts and stil hold equity in over valued property which is only going to get worse as asset values fall, the mountain of subprime losses will not just dissapear as if by magic will it? the government has now just poured away tens of billions of taxpayer pounds down a blackhole!
Brown seems to have gambled that the UK property market will rebound instantly and the UK economy would burst into life again and all will be well? What a gamble!
None of these worries make the TOADY list and no critisisms of Browns disasterous mistakes as chancellor were thought important to air, but hey, its good news all the way isnt it, any cynisism is just those evil capitalists trying to insult the ‘dear leader’ isnt it?
When the FTSE spike evaporates as quickly as it appeared will the TOADIES revisit the Brown gamble/blunder for a more measured and critical reading?
I think the TOADY schedule will be too full of man bites dog/evil tory toff stories for that!
HAPPY DAYS ARE HERE AGAIN EH?
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So far all Radio 5 have read out email wise are ones attacking Thatcher and the Tories for the financial mess.
Not a single mention of the Scottish snot gobblers part in all this.
The BBC seems to have a standard email that they read out from lefty losers.
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Arthur Dent | 12.10.08 – 10:49 pm
what about some evidence that BBC is ‘awash’ with Christianity, its actually pretty difficult to find in the BBC Output these days.
Aw come on….. I think the secular lefties in the newsroom are biased too, but it’s foolish to deny that the BBC does more Christian stuff than anyone except Premier Christian Radio.
Radio 4 starts with a prayer, has a thought for the day (often Christian), then has a daily service.
I don’t know if TV still does Songs of Praise…. but I don’t get the sense the BBC exactly ignores religion in its schedules.
The problem is among its ‘irreverent’ comedians and the other set of comedians in news and current affairs.
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Radio 4 starts with a prayer, has a thought for the day (often Christian), then has a daily service
I forgot to add: that’s more than my local (CofE) church does!
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“The BBC seems to have a standard email that they read out from lefty losers”
Martin | 13.10.08 – 9:42 am |
I think a lot of them originate from this lot –
http://www.medialens.org/
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Remember this from BBC reporter, Ms. Lyse Doucet on Afghanistan, about TALIBAN (August 2008)?:
“BBC presenter Lyse Doucet: Media fail to convey ‘humanity of the Taliban'”
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/2613717/BBC-presenter-Lyse-Doucet-Media-fail-to-convey-humanity-of-the-Taliban.html
So much for BBC pro-Taliban propaganda.
Today’s news:
“Taliban beheading ‘tribal elders'”
http://www.jihadwatch.org/archives/023072.php
When will John Simpson ( who is due for retirement)and other BBC top management get rid of LYSE DOUCET and her blatant Taliban propaganda? Send her back to Canada.
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Unworthy Brown invokes Churchill on ‘financial crisis’; Brown does not invoke Churchill on Islam:
“Churchill on Islam”
(Lawrence Auster)
http://www.amnation.com/vfr/archives/004826.html
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BBC gets around to unelected Labour peer Mandelson at last:
“Mandelson in line for EU pay-out”
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/7666482.stm
More critically, Philip Johnston has:
“Why should Peter Mandelson get an EU pay off?”
http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/philip_johnston/blog/2008/10/13/why_should_peter_mandelson_get_an_eu_pay_off
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Will the BBC get around to reporting this about the unelected Labour cabinet peer Mandelson?:
“Peter Mandelson dogged by his link to Russian oligarch”
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article4932191.ece
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Surprise! Another “fierce critic” of GWB has won a Nobel Prize:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/7667190.stm
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Is this a parody?
An environmental expert in St Andrews has warned the year 2050 could see the town’s famous golf course, the Old Course, crumble into the North Sea.
Professor Jan Bebbington, director of the St Andrews Sustainability Institute, has visualised the effect of climate change on Scotland in 50 years.
She was one of several commissioned by the David Hume Institute to predict what would happen in the future.
Her report will be launched at Dynamic Earth in Edinburgh on Tuesday.
Prof Bebbington, of St Andrews University, also visualises a car-sharing nation of vegetarians, a country with evolving values, ‘respected and trusted’ political leaders working form a virtual parliament, and Celtic and Rangers players sharing the same carbon-neutral diet.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/scotland/edinburgh_and_east/7666809.stm
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I happened to listen to Radio 4 betwenn 3am and 4am this morning (travelling to work). It was refreshing indeed, not a single mention of Gordon Brown in any bulletin, even those talking about stock market receovery and bank bailouts. Fast forward a couple of hours and guess who gets mentioned numerous times………
hmm
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