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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Worth reading Guido’s latest, comparing brown & nulabour to the dying days of the Ceausescu regime, supported only by the party faithful & the state broadcaster !!! Very Apt
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was watching the football yesterday and the “its all in the database” scare tactics was being constantly broadcast during the adverts
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backwoodsman — isn’t there a very nice wall surrounding the Downing Street garden?
Shoot — that would make a handy Ceausescu-end to Brown his his BBC claque.
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The bBC, and how it legitimise terrorist behaviour as acceptable and just
‘Taleban kill three for spying’
Suspected Taleban militants have killed three men in north-west Pakistan after accusing them of spying for the United States, police say. The bodies were found on a road near Miranshah, the main town in the North Waziristan region. The lawless region is known to be a hub of Taleban and al-Qaeda militants. Militants have killed dozens of local tribesmen and Afghan refugees for allegedly spying for US forces in Afghanistan or for Pakistan.
Two of those shot dead in North Waziristan are reported to be Afghans. The other was Pakistani. One of the victims, aged 25, had been kidnapped several days earlier. Notes found near the bodies said they had been found guilty of spying for the United States forces in Afghanistan.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/south_asia/7811031.stm
Actually bBC those poor people who died were murdered there is no ifs or buts about it. And the funny thing here is when the US decides to kill somebody on death row. The bBC quite rightly reports it as an execution. (Usually with a raft of human rights lobbyists protesting about how America has the death penalty) Yet when terrorists do so outside the law in Pakistan then their victims are deemed traitorous and thus beyond pity or redemption by the bBC.
The bBC, and how it legitimise terrorist behaviour as acceptable and just
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‘Evening Standard, ‘Londoner’s Diary’ on how BBC top job appointment system operates:
“World Service style dithering “:
“SPECULATION intensifies as to who will be appointed the new Director of the BBC World Service. The deadline for applications for the post, vacated by Nigel Chapman, was due to have closed yesterday but surprisingly the closing date has been put back until January 26th – and the position is now to be advertised externally.
Why? The BBC tells me this is due to the high volume of interest in the job. Only last month I reported how some World Service staff had expressed dismay that the job was only being advertised internally in Ariel, the BBC’s in house magazine, so the BBC seems to have had a welcome change of tune.
There were also fears that the BBC’s Director of Global News, Richard Sambrook, was said to be eyeing up
the post himself and how he would have been a shoo in for the job. The BBC press office hotly denied my suggestion that the post was being kept open for Sambrook, claiming that as Director of Global News, the new Director of World Service would report to him and that Sambrook will be involved in appointing someone to the job himself.”
http://londonersdiary.standard.co.uk/2009/01/world-service-s.html
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The latest odds:
“Who will be next to leave the BBC?”
http://www.casinobeacon.co.uk/news-articles/news/2009-01/bbc-050109.htm
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yes i remember one instance in which the kumbaya mob out in style peppered with holywood celebs because a gang leader who had raped and murdered was about to meet his maker.
This chap had written and published a children’s book which was enough to send them all into a frenzy.
Reminds me of the old nazis who exploded into tears at the thought of Hitler being such a dog lover.
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davo:
yes i remember one instance in which the kumbaya mob out in style peppered with holywood celebs because a gang leader who had raped and murdered was about to meet his maker.
That would be one Stanley “Tookie” Williams.
A gang-leader monster convicted of the murder of three people in a 7/11. The elderly Chinese couiple owners, and their adult daughter.
He shot the daughter in the back, before finishing her off with a shotgun to the face.
Of course, none of the celebuscum you mention had one thought of sympathy for the victims.
He was believed to be responsible for many many more murder that those for which he was executed.
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“Britain is an Islamist swamp” (former CIA officer)
“CIA helping track more than 4,000 ‘terror suspects'”
http://www.jihadwatch.org/archives/024239.php
Thos can’t be true, according to BBC 4 TV’s pro-Islamic propaganda tonight:
20:30•21:00 ‘An Islamic History of Europe’
Episode 1
1/3. Rageh Omaar visits Spain as part of his search for the history of Islam in Europe. (R)
21:00•22:00 ‘Science and Islam
The Language of Science’
1/3. How the Islamic world increased scientific knowledge between the 8th and 14th centuries.
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Much of the dhimmi West, including the BBC, seems to put much political trust still (mistakenly) in the United Nations:
‘Fitzgerald: The UN: Thoroughly infiltrated and taken over by Muslims at every level’
[Opening extract]:
“It is hard to think of an organization that has been more thoroughly infiltrated and taken over by Muslims at every level, than the United Nations. It has for decades been filled with such willing collaborators as Edward Mortimer, the former Chief Speech Writer and Senior Adviser, as he billed himself, to Kofi Annan — and for all I know, perhaps he’s still senior-advising and chief-speech-writing for that Innocent Abroad Ban-Ki Moon, especially when it comes to Muslim matters.
“This infiltration can be seen everywhere, from the actual staffing of the U.N. secretariat, to the power of the Islamic bloc, which is the last sizable voting bloc left now that the Soviet bloc has dissolved.”
(Hugh Fitzgerald).
http://www.jihadwatch.org/dhimmiwatch/archives/024246.php#more
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While we’re on the subject of Tookie Williams, here’s some photos of a pro-Tookie vigil held just before they put the animal out of its misery…
http://www.zombietime.com/tookie/
Just look how nasty and ignorant these lefties are! Disgusting. Bear in mind that this is a cold blooded murderer they’re celebrating – the founder of the Crips who, along with the Bloods, have killed more black people in LA since 1980 than were lynched during the whole lynching period of America’s history.
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Poor George Osborne. On News 24 I think he said 4 words before the beeboid cut across him.
also why didn’t the BBC pick up on the Lib Dems about face?
On radio 5 slaphead Vince Cable said the Tory idea to scrap tax on savings was interesting, yet BBC New 24 just had a clip from Clegg saying it would do nothing.
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The BBC lens seemed smeared in Vaseline
Wearing almost as much make-up as Dame Barbara Cartland sweeping into the cocktail bar of the old Dorchester, Gordon Brown thrust himself on the nation’s TV screens yesterday. Dateline Downing Street, soon after brekker.
As his image came crackling through the ether, we saw the wolfish smile of a man who could have just snaffled the last rasher of bacon. Yet it was a face so strongly caramel that the nation may well have responded by lurching for the colour contrast twiddler. If not the off switch.
Efforts had been taken to present Prime Minister Broon as a statesman, a global leviathan rather than some frantic bungler who has just blown trillions of pounds belonging to future generations. He kept talking about abroad, referring to America, Japan, Italy, France. How poor Greenland got to be left out we may never gather.
The camera lens belonging to the BBC1 Andrew Marr Show seemed to have been smeared at the edges in Vaseline, for there was something mellow and soft-sell about the image. Behind Mr Brown, artistically out of focus, was a vase of flowers, genus indistinct but colours a patriotic red, white and blue.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-1105271/QUENTIN-LETTS-The-BBC-lens-smeared-Vaseline.html
Marr and the BBC have tried this trick on a number of occasions.
Remember the school library, the soft lighting, Marr almost on his knees.
BBC biased, who’d ever have thought it!
By the way where has this silly little boy got to.
http://www.sas.upenn.edu/~reynolda/
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From the “You Can’t Make This Stuff Up” department:
BBC acts over light-skinned doll
The BBC is to replace a doll based on the Upsy Daisy character from CBeebies TV show In the Night Garden following complaints it is too light-skinned.
A BBC Worldwide spokesman said it had conducted research after getting “a handful” of complaints that the doll had lighter skin than the TV character.
The BBC would now bring out a version with “a darker skin tone”, he said.
Manufacturer Hasbro has been asked to create a different version that will appear in stores from Easter onwards.
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Upsy Daisy
http://www.itusozluk.com/img.php/995f3574a3fe2c30795b368d8a1af71720806/upsy+daisy
http://www.thetoyreview.com/images/fetched/img-talking-plush-upsy-daisy-166.jpg
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Coldest night of the year. So expect Harrabin to be reporting from some dry part of the world where no rain has fallen for two weeks to remind us all of ‘dangerous climate change’
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Quite amazing that after receiving ‘”a handful” of complaints’ the BBC commissions research and eventually changes the colour of a doll to appease the complainants, while I haven’t had so much as an acknowledgement of the numerous complaints I’ve sent regarding the BBC’s pro-Hamas/Anti-Israel bias over the last few months.
Two final words:
Balen report
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UPSY DAISY DOLL
Now available in a delightful selection of shades:
Honkey White
Gay Pink
Dago Tan
Gandhi Brown
Mugabe Black
Datsun Yellow
Environut Green
See — nothing offensive here.
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Can anyone explain why during “Your Country Needs You” (BB1, Saturday see it on bbc.co.uk/iplayer) Andrew Lloyd Webber and BBC crew needed to fly on a PRIVATE BUSINESS JET to Moscow? Surely there are commercial flights available!
Even forgetting the financial implications which would concern me (how much would that have cost us?) I am surprised the tofu-eating greenies wouldn’t have recoiled at the thought of leaving a larger carbon footprint.
Is seems to me either we paid for the trip, or less likely they faked it and misled viewers.
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FFS has anyone seen Nick “Liebor” Robinson’s latest missive “Torys return to the Fray” on the BBC news website- he is basically saying that the Conservative’s announcements today are the same old shit that lost them the last two elections. Can someone please please get rid of this wanker and stop taking money from my bank account each month to pay for the utter shite that this turd writes?
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BBC Journalist: ‘Grill’ the Israelis
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richardB: Perhaps we should give the IDF a list of beeboids to slot?
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This Day in Pictures
And in Gurgaon, India, a pet monkey clutches the leg of his owner as she plays with a stray dog.
Strange I see a terrified monkey trying to escape a dog whose jaws are around its head.
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deegee 8:07
The dog certainly looks in need of a meal, and how did the caption-writer know the monkey-owner is female ?
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I liked the first picture. For an instant I thought it said –
In China’s north-eastern Heilongjiang province, a sculpture takes shape at the Harrabin ice and snow festival.
If only…
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Yet again we have that useless twat Paxman making pointless statements. He does this every time her interviews George Osborne.
Of course Osborne can’t make a promise beyond the current planned spending plans of Labour as quite rightly we don’t know what other fucking disasters McFatty one eye has planned.
Anyone who thinks Paxman is a good interviewer is an idiot. All he does is go over and over and over trying to make the same point.
I’ve NEVER seen McFatty one eye or any other Liebour minister get the same treatment.
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Paxman was a real wanker with Osborne. When the Tories win the next election Paxo should be the first to go.
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I’ve NEVER seen McFatty one eye or any other Liebour minister get the same treatment.
Martin | 05.01.09 – 11:19 pm | #
Yeah – just watched it. Complete attempt at a personal hatchet job on Osborne – with rehearsed bullet points straight from NULAB HQ.
Still rabbitting on about the bloody yacht.
Compare and contrast with Red Andy’s total blow job on McFatty on Sunday AM.
Still the HYS on the economy cheered me up – 100% virulently anti-NULAB with half demanding an immediate election. Don’t expect that to be up for long.
http://newsforums.bbc.co.uk/nol/thread.jspa?forumID=5871&edition=1&ttl=20090105233134
Your BBC – now is the time for all good licence fee scroungers to come to the aid of The Party
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John Reith spins in his grave: Yes and they don’t give Mandelson the same heat over his yacht trip do they?
If that interview alone doesn’t convince the Tories to slit the throat of the BBC nothing will.
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Martin | 05.01.09 – 11:56 pm
and bear in mind that Paxo was argueing with Osborne over what was basically a ROUNDING ERROR… a mere £5 billion out of a £650 BILLION budget.
in a way , that interview really does show what a pickle the Tories are in when it comes to the BBC. a mere rounding error – a tucking in at the edges – and it turns into a Paxo grilling.
imagine if they proposed something REALLY radical like a flat tax and cutting gov expenditure by 50%.
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Apologies if this isn’t new, but I found Friday, 2 January’s Today programme as nauseating and as predictable in its Weltanschauung as it can be. http://news.bbc.co.uk/today/hi/today/newsid_7807000/7807615.stm shows one of two references to a happy, liberal community of Christians, Jews and Muslims living together in Baghdad in the 1950s and 1960s. But the fact is that, following anti-Jewish pogroms during the Second World War – was Saddam Hussein’s uncle involved? – in 1951 the Iraqi government made the expression of Zionist views illegal and ordered the expulsion of Jews who wouldn’t sign an anti-Israel declaration. This was the origin of a large part of Israel’s Sephardi refugee community, with 100,000 Jews fleeing during the 1950s. After 11 Jews were publicly hanged in 1963, virtually all of the remaining ones fled. That’s quite enough criticism of the quality of Today’s research and on to their introduction of (words fail me) Alistair Crooke as someone who had negotiated with Hamas on the EU’s behalf. Crooke spoke about the inevitability of allowing for Hamas’ perspectives in a peace settlement. One wonders what qualified a man who, in June 2007 in the London Review of Books, described Hamas as “Islamism’s moderates” to negotiate on the EU’s behalf, and ours.
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Not BBC but it seems all the media is at it
“Hamas fighters now a well-organised force ”
“Unlike al-Qaeda and its acolytes that work on an ideology of holy war or jihad, the Islam-fuelled militancy of Hamas is more focused on recovering land lost to Israel.”
By Tim Butcher on Israel-Gaza border
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/middleeast/israel/4127074/Hamas-fighters-now-a-well-organised-force.html
“recovering land lost to Israel”?
I wonder which side of the border these journalists are on? Probably hiding behind the Israeli tanks.
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Jon | 06.01.09 – 2:13 am. The Telegraph is a little out of the B-BBC ambit. Still as the Telegraph doesn’t support online comment I wrote this letter to the Editor.
Dear Telegraph Letters Editor,
Where does Tim Butcher on Israel-Gaza border Last Updated: 7:05PM GMT 05 Jan 2009 gain his information? From a library or archives?
It certainly isn’t from observation because as the byline shows he isn’t in Gaza to confirm that Hamas fighters are now a ‘well organized force’. All evidence seems to show that the Hamas leaders have gone into deep bunkers and destroyed their mobile phones to avoid detection. The thugs of Izzedine Al-Qassam Brigades roam around without direction from the top but that doesn’t stop them killing or kneecapping Fatah members unfortunate enough to be caught by their Muslim brothers.
If as Tim Butcher says, “Foot soldiers show little fear of death and the group’s ideology conveys great respect on what it calls ‘shaheed’ or martyrs, who die for the cause.” then it doesn’t stop them whining about disproportionate casualties. It doesn’t even light a bulb over your correspondent’s head that a ‘soldier’ who doesn’t fear death is more likely to die than one who by training or ideology knows a live soldier keeps fighting while a dead soldier …
The Telegraph should be telling the world that this is a fight that Hamas can’t win. Cheerleading the ‘fighting qualities’ of Hamas only encourages heavier and heavier Palestinian casualties until they taking a lesson from Hizbulla ‘declare victory’.
Yours,
deegee
Rehovot (Nine kilometres from the supposed maximum range of the Grad missiles), Israel
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I’ll say this again:
Paxman is an ignorant joke. Virtually every University Challenge is an embarrassing display of his inability to do basic research before the programme.
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I suppose I’m going to be attacked for pedantry here but I do believe that little things make a big difference:
Sian Williams just now on BBC Breakfast commenting on the film about the Jewish Bielski brothers who fought the Nazis as partisans:
‘Well they escaped from persecution’.
Message to airhead Sian: They escaped from attempted extermination, not just ‘persecution’.
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Will Gordon Brown apologise:
Marks & Spencer, the high street retailer, will announce just under 1,000 job cuts from its stores and head office following its poorest Christmas trading period in years
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/retailandconsumer/4127845/MandS-lays-off-up-to-1000-staff-as-gloom-deepens.html
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Not for the BBC: tall tales about Labour’s lax immigration policy-
‘Pakistani woman given asylum because she’s 7ft 2in tall’
By David Williams
‘Mail’
[Extract]:
” A 7ft 2in Pakistani woman is expected to be allowed to stay permanently in Britain because she claims her height has made her a target at home.
“Zainab Bibi arrived two-and-a-half years ago and has spent much of the time since on benefits.
“She has been able to send money home to her family while Home Office investigators examine her application for political asylum. ”
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-1106082/Pakistani-woman-given-asylum-shes-7ft-2in-tall.html
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BBC loves Brown but hates Blair.
How else do you explain how the announcement of two medals from America of the highest honour to Blair gets reported negatively (OK they hate Americans too), with the Lib Dums claiming it is recent and just down to Bush, when in fact the congessional medal actually goes back to 2003 and is not a presidential medal at all.
Whats more there is a growing love in for Cameron.
How else do you explain their reporting of his claims about labour debts and too much borrowing for the stimulus whilst letting him get away with no comment on Obamas MASSIVELY larger stimulus he is about to get in the US in addition to the huge stimulus they have already done.
Of course they love Obama so they can’t say anything against him.
Even when he stays silent on Gaza, which the BBC is astonished by.
But then that is on top of the recent outrageous coverage of Gaza.
The selective BBC bias goes on getting worse.
Its time the state broadcaster was consigned to the scrapheap of history.
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The BBC is inclined not to recognise the primacy of Islamic Jihad in the aims of Hamas and its Islamic backers, against Israel and its supporters.
So too the BBC relegates any reporting of the strong anti-Jewish threats and violence currently being perpetrated globally by adherents of Islamic jihad, who, the BBC should regard as the enemies of British civilisation and Western values. But no, the BBC plays the dhimmi throughout.
What the BBC misses out, e.g.:
“Mumbai jihadists’ PRIME target was Jewish center”
‘Jihadwatch’
[Extract]:
“When asked during interrogation why Nariman House was specifically targetted, Ajmal reportedly told the police they wanted to sent a message to Jews across the world by attacking the ultra orthodox synagogue.”
http://www.jihadwatch.org/archives/024259.php
‘Synogogues set alight during rise in anti-Semitic attacks in London (and elsewhere)’
http://www.newenglishreview.org/blog_direct_link.cfm/blog_id/18833
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George, you’re quite right. Only yesterday the 10pm news programme showed part of the Hamas leader’s statement but somehow managed to exclude any reference to his threat to Jewish children worldwide. The BBC website http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/7812286.stm only shows the “focused” half of his statement “Israelis have legitimised the murder (yes, that is the word) of their own children” while ignoring the even more emotive, global second half “They have legitimised the killing of their people all over the world by killing our people.” (http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/middle_east/article5454204.ece)
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‘Synogogues set alight during rise in anti-Semitic attacks in London (and elsewhere)’
http://www.newenglishreview.org/…m/blog_id/ 18833
George R | 06.01.09 – 11:36 am
Following a link from that page:
Synagogue set alight during rise in anti-Semitic attacks in London
Reader Views:
I think the BBC – with it’s one-sided, irresponsible and biased journalism – has played a significant part in inflaming the views of extremists in this country. After all Hamas is a terrorist organisation banned by the EU with a Covenant to exterminate Jews, not just in Israel but worldwide. Anti Israel bias is endemic in the Corporate and can be found everywhere from the CBBC website, the main website which focuses only on Hamas, their editorial selections, use of Hamas propaganda over Israeli information, reliance on Hamas sourced images and in-house opinion. They sixth form agitprop agenda is risky and potentially dangerous.
As our public service broadcaster they have a responsibility under their Charter to report the news and not shape it. The levels of journalism are woefully poor right now.
I also hope the police are going to support our Jewish neighbours.
– Ricky Martin, Hackney E8, UK
Is that the same Ricky Martin who comments here?
(I grew up in Amhurst Road, Hackney, E8 )
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The Newsnight political editor is back after a loooong (almost a month since his last post), but I’m sure well-earned break.
Now, what possibly could he lead with?
Tory ‘watch-list’ of ‘potentially embarrassing’ candidates
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/newsnight/michaelcrick/2009/01/tory_watchlist_of_potentially.html#commentsanchor
It is ‘a’ story I guess, but political parties micro-managing, obsessing and trying to rig things internally seems hardly news these days.
Anyway, nice to see leaking is back in vogue again.
Thing is, whatever the merits, or not, of this ‘story’, as a member of the public am I supposed to immediately think ‘who has pulled this chain… again, and why?’ to a story one of our ‘premier’ ‘news’ progamme ‘editors’?
I often have questions for Newsnight, but they rarely seem minded to reply. I guess they operate on different standards to those they expect.
Personally, I would now be hard pressed to give most from BBC “news” the the time of day if this is the level of operation they have sunk to.
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Crick is just pissy because Spelman is going to be cleared over the horseshit nanny story he dug up:
http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/standard/article-23612638-details/article.do?ito=newsnow&
He needed another anti-Tory news cycle.
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Prick is just a wanker. Has anyone else noticed that like Gordon Brown he has very greasy hair and always looks like he needs a wash?
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Islamic jihad getting ever nearer and more threatening to British people (and BBC propaganda headquarters); dhimmi Beeboids only report this:
“Arson attack on French synagogue”
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7813265.stm
BBc doesn’t report all these other attacks:
“Gaza conflict spreads to Europe with Jews attacked”
-not only Toulouse, but Helingborn, Stockholm, Copenhagen, London, Antwerp, etc.
http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/E/EU_EUROPE_GAZA_JEWS_ATTACKED?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2009-01-06-09-50-49
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While Beeboids give their political support to Islamic jihad outfit HAMAS, what they should be doing is to recognise how discredited Hamas is in its irresponsibility:
“McCarthy: Palestinian Statehood Should Be Off the Table” (Diana West):
http://www.dianawest.net/Home/tabid/36/EntryId/691/McCarthy-Palestinian-Statehood-Should-Be-Off-the-Table.aspx
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“Bush’s legacy as a climate criminal will far outweigh his ocean legacy”
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/7812786.stm
A climate loon pronounces….
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Yet Another French Synagogue Attacked (During Trial of Other Attackers); Swedish Synagogue Attacked
“This isn’t just France or Sweden. This is Islam worldwide. America is no less vulnerable, our Muslims no less extreme and no more tolerant. That’s why others–likely Muslims–threw a Molotov cocktail at a Chicago synagogue, last week.
The churches are next on the list. Then, they came for the Christians” . . . .
http://www.debbieschlussel.com/archives/2009/01/yet_another_fre.html
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This’ll get lost with all the Israeli stuff but the BBC Al Franken report could have been written by the DNC. The BBC’s explanation for the reversal of numbers:
“Mr Franken picked up a number of votes because manual recounters were able to determine the intent of voters overlooked by vote-counting machines.”
A reader would get the impression the right result has been reached. However, the Wall Street Journal gives numerous other reasons including:
“25 precincts now have more ballots than voters who signed in to vote”
Oddly enough these favour Franken… the WSJ article ends:
“Mr. Franken as the winner based on the current count, it will be anointing a tainted and undeserving Senator.”
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123111967642552909.html?mod=googlenews_wsj
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BBC link for the Al Franken story:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/7812746.stm
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