Interesting to see how BBC Radio 4 covered the Damian McBride resignation this morning. The line being peddled was that this sort of political “gossip” handles all the time and that the blogosphere which broke the story (Congrats to Guido, of course) is dominated by right wing blogs! There was also a total acceptance of the fabrication that no one else in No. 10 knew anything about McBride’s scheming. Even when Brown’s cabal has caught out, as in this instance, the BBC can be relied upon to do what it can to preserve those in the bunker.
GOSSIP AND RIGHT WING.
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… the BBC is putting the Damian McBride/ Dolly Draper on its main news page on the website, but the bang-up-to-date, state of the art, uniquely funded Three Billion Nicker Moan is entitling the fuss as:
No 10 ‘smear’ messages published
Not those quotation marks, brothers and sisteres, for there is some doubt about the smeariness.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/7995515.stm
And generating that doubt is the BBC’s job.
And there I was having a bad mood morning…
Also note the up-to-the minute quest into are political blogs powerful
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/west_midlands/7235272.stm
is from February 2008.
No news of the resignation as I comment yet.
How up-to-date is the BBC a history passes it by?
“And now, here are some messages for our friends overseas:
Marcel has a new bicycle.
Marcel has a new bicycle.
Pieter must go to the bridge at midnight.
Pieter must go to the bridge at midnight.
It’s a toughie is this one. Radio 5 and BBC news have been pretty good on this. Can radio 4 be expected to be on the ball? Apparently Lance Price can’t tell the difference between right wing and Conservative.
I think a lot of folks have been caught out by what’s just happened. Damage limitation by ZaNu has been atrocious and the Tories have kept quiet (which may be clever or bunny in headlights).
The blogs have graduated.
Will the bbc stop to ask themselves WHY the serious political blogs tend to be ‘right wing’? Could it be, by any chance, that they are filling a rather important blank spot in the state broadcaster’s repertoire?
Oh, now it’s a resignation on the BBC website.
Thank God.
And now on with the rationalizations, unless they break the habit of a lifetime and do it right?
No Marr Show today, so how will they handle it?
I left this comment on another thread before this one was posted…..
http://www.haloscan.com/comments/patrickcrozier/872572139331369707/#459971
Seriously, we need to find out who McBride’s BBC friends were and get them to quit too.
Robert
“filling a rather important blank spot in the state broadcaster’s repertoire”
Recently, in conversation with three elderly ladies with no Internet knowhow, it was apparent that all their political/social opinions were the opinions of the BBC (and the rest). When told a couple of facts and shown a couple of blogs, they were astonished, and altered their views in a trice. They just had no idea that the things in the back of their minds, buried by the diet of soft junk put out by the media, are actually at the front of the minds of some others.
There are millions in this position. Millions.
Preposteroso, you are spot on.
It scares me how effective their propaganda is on much of the population. I have a friend who’s political views, environment views etc completely match the BBC’s. The only place he looks at news is on the BBC and he thinks everything they write is gospel truth. There are millions who unquestionably accept what they hear on the beeb.
Actually I don’t think Radio 5 has done a good job. They seem to be playing it down and just now the very stupid Gabby Logan had to issue a grovelling apology (no doubt from BBC lawyers) that there is no evidence that the emails were hacked.
I am intrigued as to how (the why is obvious) the MSM is allowed (well, that’s pretty obvious too) to get away with the odd notion that what ‘they’ deal in is objective truth, whilst anything from the blogosphere is gossip, tittle-tattle, etc.
Especially, and quite clearly, when it’s completely the other way around.
At almost any turn, what I see from the MSM is agenda dressed up as fact, from blatant spin to the selection of deniable interviewees such as Stephen Pound who can spout whatever they feel like unchallenged.
And such as the Guardian seem to have stuck it as far back in the online section as they can, with some blogs ‘closed’ early when things seem to be less to their tastes. I am not betting on a BBC HYS any time soon.
One thing seemingly ignored by all these ‘reporters’ and ‘commentators’ is to what extent most, if not any of these bits of information from such as Guido are in way inaccurate which, surely, is fairly key, if in the process of being willfully obscured.
The truth hurts. Thank heavens.
I’m glad someone’s onto the ‘hacked email’ claims.
Iain Dale is wondering in the papers this morning about the lack of left-wing blogs. Something to do with originality of thought, I suspect!
…that there is no evidence that the emails were hacked.
QED.
If there was never any doubt as to their veracity, why does it become an issue whether they were hacked or not?
QED
Because there’s an agenda at the BBC to try prove that the blogs are disreputable. Several of the reports I have heard this morning have thrown hints in that direction.
Equally, the BBC is not saying that the emails show that McBride was clearly taking to Draper about an agreed strategy, not a theoretical approach.
Here Radio 5 try to smear Paul Staines here. Pathetic BBC
http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b00jsjk7/Weekend_Breakfast_12_04_2009/
Go about an hour in (after 7am news)
The BBC are pathetic.
The BBC have clearly decided that the bigger story is as I stated last night that the emails were ‘hacked’ regardless of the truth or not.
Smear Guido and Iain Dale is the BBC agenda now.
Peter:
I am intrigued as to how (the why is obvious) the MSM is allowed (well, that’s pretty obvious too) to get away with the odd notion that what ‘they’ deal in is objective truth, whilst anything from the blogosphere is gossip, tittle-tattle, etc.
Because that’s the nature of the beast. The left of centre ‘trinity’ on moral behaviour. Or ‘The Righteous’ as they have become known.
Their moral superiority is shown in their arguments. Or should I say, lack of argument.
Anyone who believes our country is being overrun with immigrants is a ‘racist’.
Anyone who believes in the ‘nuclear’ family is a bigot.
You knwo the rest – ‘homophobe’ is the next in line.
The problem is they have NO morals. Only the lust for power.
Listening to Broadcasting House this morning the emphasis seems to be on the word ‘smear’ without the stress that the stories were being ‘invented’ so that non-bbbcwise listeners would think there was an element of truth in them.
BBC News 24: Is there a big political story today? Nope, not on BBC News 24 there isn’t.
Because there’s an agenda at the BBC to try prove that the blogs are disreputable.
Much more disreputable are the MSM who have lived on the crumbs thrown their way by this vile man & his ilk for many years.
I can’t be arsed to read the NOTW in detail but they seem to be wriggling over the similarity of an McBride/Draper plot & a story they have previously printed – no doubt sourced from McBride.
Yet yesterday Guido was being scorned by the BBC for the low standards of bloggers,because per BBC, unlike real journalists, bloggers do not check out the story from other sources before publication.
Martin | 12.04.09 – 10:29 am
You’re right. The 5 Live coverage has been disgraceful.
But it’s fun to listen to – I particularly enjoyed the bit when the beeboid tried to trip up Guido by asking if he always got two sources for his stories….. I don’t think they were expecting the reply:
Well I haven’t made any mistakes like the BBC’s Andrew Gilligan did on the Today programme.
You could tell thet went home.
will2001: “…Yet yesterday Guido was being scorned by the BBC for the low standards of bloggers,because per BBC, unlike real journalists, bloggers do not check out the story from other sources before publication…”
Of course the BBC never get stories wrong do theY? Remember Mark (Sheena) Easton and the BBC spouting crime figures that turned out to be false because Downing Street (McMental) ordered them released?
The BBC as usual just took them at face value then the following day had to eat humble pie.
Whats this place going to do when the Tories win the next election??
The BBC tends to follow the dominant UK political doctrine nowadays so tory influence at the beeb will be quite marked after a few months.
He who pays the piper calls the tune etc.
The BBCs rot really set in with Thatcher, the miners strike and the Falklands war.
It was downhill all the way after the 1980s started, although the downhill speed has increased quite rapidly and markedly over the last 10 years.
Do the tories believe in globul warming??
…should be a hoot. lol.
ady: Don’t think so. The BBC suspect the Tories will either scrap the tax or take away much of their funding.
The BBC won’t like that. Do you know how much a good rent boy costs these days? How could a beeboid survive on say just 100K a year?
Cocaine isn’t free you know 🙂
The tories will use the beeb for propaganda, just like labour, and they won’t scrap the licence fee.
This is now the future of the BBC.
Four $billion welfare bananas a year creates a lot of welfare dependents, including plenty of top tory and labour gangstas.
It’s free money from the unwashed peasants, and no government EVER passes up on free cash from the serfs.
ady:
The tories will use the beeb for propaganda, just like labour, and they won’t scrap the licence fee.
This is a tongue in cheek comment, right?
But the off chance that you are deludedly serious: how exactly will the “tories” use the BBC when the same marxists, socialists and assorted leftoids will still run the place.
Ah, you mean the way the BBC supported Maggie Thatcher and suppressed any dissent against her.
Oh right. I getcha!
ady: I’m not so sure. There is a lot of hatred of the BBC within the Tory party. The problem in the past was how to find a funding mosel for the BBC.
Well of course with the switch to digital it’s easy. If like me you have Sky, your BBC channels get blocked unless you’re willing to cough up £15 a month for the BBC. It’s so easy to do with the switch to digital, there is no excuse.
Even the BBC should welcome it. The BBC keep saying what great value for money they offer, they should have no fear of people NOT taking up BBC subscription
Martin:
will2001: “…Yet yesterday Guido was being scorned by the BBC for the low standards of bloggers
And they should know about low standard political blogs, seeing half their lefty “news” dogs seem to have one.
ady:
The tories will use the beeb for propaganda, just like labour,
ady | 12.04.09 – 11:48 am | #
——————————————-
Strange, I don’t recall them being sympathetic to the Tories when either Thatch or Major were pm.
You’re effectively saying that once the Tories get in, there will be a mass change in BBC groupthink, because that’s what you’ll need.
Martin “Well of course with the switch to digital it’s easy. If like me you have Sky, your BBC channels get blocked unless you’re willing to cough up £15 a month for the BBC. It’s so easy to do with the switch to digital, there is no excuse.
I’ve never heard of that. I don’t pay the extortion TV tax, but the BBC channels are not blocked on my sky box!
Jack Bauer: Sky can block BBC channels to any set top box. So if you don’t pay for extra £15 a month the licencing authority inform Sky and you get blocked.
I imagine cable operators and Freesat etc can do the same.
Nah, ady’s on the ball – ofcourse the Tories will use the BBC for propoganda – standard ops.
I think the BBC may have problems smearing Guido – he’s got pretty broad shoulders and is quite a canny lad.
Dick the Prick:
Nah, ady’s on the ball – ofcourse the Tories will use the BBC for propoganda – standard ops.
How?
Preposteroso | Homepage | 12.04.09 – 10:19 am | #
Kegs | 12.04.09 – 10:27 am |
Recently, in conversation with three elderly ladies with no Internet knowhow, it was apparent that all their political/social opinions were the opinions of the BBC (and the rest).
Quite so. But it isn’t by any means confined to elderly ladies. There are plenty of people who don’t have internet connection, true, but there are also millions who do, who don’t use it for news or political debate. I only wish they could be persuaded, but even the most intelligent people still stick to the BBC and have faith in its reliability.
However, what you said about creeping doubts in the back of people’s minds “buried by the diet of soft junk put out by the media” is quite true. Maybe there’s hope.
Matthew d’Ancona in the Telegraph:
……the party has completely failed to grasp the anarchic power of blogging, the capacity of peer-to-peer contact to undermine conventional authority and the potential of the web as a tool of libertarian dissidence. If your approach to politics is coercive and centralising • which Labour’s is • today’s web must be completely alien terrain.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/columnists/matthewd_ancona/5141509/The-Damian-McBride-scandal-shows-just-how-out-of-touch-Labour-is.html
“When told a couple of facts and shown a couple of blogs, they were astonished, and altered their views in a trice.”
Bring it on, as they say.
ady
Do you think that the corridors of the BBC will be overflowing with empty champagne bottles after the next election if there is a change of government to the Conservatives?
A large number of BBC employees 1n 1997 are now in the “service” of the government/Labour Party and many still in employ co-habit with those in the same “service”. It would appear to require a massive clearout at the Augean stables to effect a change in the institutional left bias at the BBC.
Perhaps a good start would be to terminate all employment advertising with the Guardian.
Sutekh – very good point. I predict the BBC will agitate endlessly to oust the Tories when (and if) they get to power. Look at how they’ve treated Boris – a mixture of exclusion and smears. There is a culture of righteous discrimination against Conservatives at the BBC and that won’t change with a change of power. They might make it very hard for Cameron to govern – and they’ll do it piously in the name of editorial ‘independence’.
I find Guido quite crude and arrogant usually. He oftens does come across as right wing yes, whatever right wing means, but he has gone after Tories too. The proof will be whether he spews his bile at a future Conservative govt in the way he does at the current lot.
And I should have mentioned the extraordinary treatment of Ken Livingstone, who is treated as if he’s still the Major of London (and Boris is some usurper). This was made absolutely clear in BBC treatment of Bob Quick’s resignation. Ken was on Newsnight and Toady as if he’s still in power. When Boris called into Toady (the only way he could get his voice heard) there was mass indignation and cries of political interference. The inversion was quite amazing.
FFPS – Guido is an independent blogger with a libertarian outlook. He exposes corruption as and when he finds it in all political parties. He’s the Jonathan Swift of our times. “Savage indignation” motivates him – not party political tribalism.
The proof will be whether he spews his bile at a future Conservative govt in the way he does at the current lot.
Fat Face Penguin Seal |
You honestly think that if the Cameron and the Tories win we’ll have a “conservative” government?
Ho ho ho.
Oscar,
Guido is not the only blogger motivated by savage indignation!!
Your points re Boris and how the rancid BBC will agitate against a Conservative govt are spot on!
Oscar, I think he is also motivated by vanity and his ever swelling ego. His website is like one giant personality cult in places. I like the fact he, and others, expose some of the shambolic and frightenin things that our leaders try to keep quiet, but I just don’t like his approach. But that’s just me. To me, he’s just a loud mouth.
Jack Bauer, you’re probably on the mark there! But who knows, Bush ran as a centrist in 2000 and he moved to the right once in power. Cameron and co might have to tone down anything remotely ‘right’ just to get near No. 10. But I agree with you, if Cameron were a ‘conservative’ he would push for smaller government and less state interference for a start, and I haven’t seen much evidence of that yet.
Bush ran as a centrist in 2000 and he moved to the right once in power.
Sorry, but you’re 100% wrong.
Bush ran as a conservative in the Primaries, as a “compassionate” conservative in the campaign, and moved BIG SPENDING liberal stateist once in power.
Ted Kennedy wrote his Education Bill, for crying out loud. His illegals’ amnesty push was only defeated after a massive outcry led by conservatives.
True — he had a war to run after 9/11,, but that was hardly ran from the “right.” despite the lies from the left.
Cameron is an almost perfect Bush clone, talks conservative (sometimes); carries a big wet welfare state stick.
Just watched News 24. fat bint beeboids seemed exasperated at the ‘right wing blogs’.
“Are these actually read by anyone other than the Westminster village?” she sighs
Then she demands “who controls these blogs…?”
Ah so as I predicted we know JUST WHERE the BBC is wanting to go.
It is doing its usual thing of trying to move the story away from Liebour sleaze and on to how the BBC (no doubt) and Liebour scum can get control of the blogs to prevent McMental being outed next year.
Funny that when the left wing blogs were printing bollocks and lies about Palin in the US election the BBC didn’t seem to mind spouting that shite, did YOU Justin Webb and Matt Frei?
Yep where is this Guido is a Tory bollocks coming from? The BBC. If you lot that have never read Guido take a look he’s dumped on plenty of Tories.
Guido states he detests ALL politicians. Not a bad view in my opinion and we should never take the world of any politician.
It’s the BBC and their leftie mates that are trying to smear Guido as I predicted.
Gerald Brown: Good point. Most of the fat dopey bitches in Nu Liebour keep their own surname so it’s hard sometimes to link who is married to who.
But I’m sure there was a post a while back linking beeboids to Liebour people.
There are far more people at the BBC married to Liebour politicians than the Tories that’s for sure.
Jack Bauer, I agree that Bush was a big spending, big government politician. Thats why I laugh when so many seemed to compare him to Reagan and traditional conservatives at times. He was on the ‘right’ on social issues, and on foreign policy. And that’s what he was quiet about in the campaign, yet went gaga over once in the job. That ultimately was his undoing – he went too far to the right on these issues. On size of government, spending etc – yes you are right, he was not a conservative. And we’ve drifted way off topic here…
I have to laugh when I hear of the BBC being sniffy about the supposed low quality of blogs.
If you want to see real lowness of blog quality, take a look at the BBC’s own North America Editor, so called. (If ever a man needed an editor, it is he.)
Yes, it’s the idiotic and ignorant Justin Webmonster who is far too lax and lazy to actually write. Instead, he resorts to the inane posting of links to other people’s writings, with no clue to their content or the point of referring the reader to them. “See ‘this’ and ‘this'” is the very negation of communication and the mark of low quality. And to think he gets paid for this! The amateur blogger doesn’t.
I am tempted to call him the Eddie the Eagle of journalism but to be fair, Eddie put a lot more genuine effort and dedication in than the lazy Webmonster ever did, and was far more amusing and interesting.
Martin @ 2:18.
Yes, everything must be “controlled” -and edited and censored and deleted if possible. But who controls the controllers? Only the BBC is the rightful arbiter of all media – ask any beeboid.
By the way, preposteroso and Kegs at around 10:00 I’ve had just the same experience, even with relatives who’ve said, typically, “Well we just stick to BBC news – they usually get things about right, don’t they?” – not realising that the biggest censorship (my opinion) is through omissions.
McBride’s Downfall – highly recommended if you want a good laugh:
Mike Spilligan: Exactly. The BBC is the most untrustworthy bunch of left wing tossers around. Look at the lies and fixes they’ve been up to, not to mention the embarrassing situations where beeboids have spouted Liebour propaganda as FACT (like the crime statistics I posted about) only then to have to withdraw it.
The BBC hasn’t done PROPER journalism for years, instead it thinks it can spout what crap it likes as facts and gets uppity is anyone dare suggest bias.
Smear Guido and Iain Dale is the BBC agenda now.
Martin | 12.04.09 – 10:50 am | #… and others.
I exaggerate for effect, but within reason really I could care less if Guido is the b*stard love child of Attila the Hun and Ms. Mussolini, so long as what he comes up with is on the mark.
Which, it appears, he usually is.
And if another trots along with a bit of a history involving Lenin and Ulrike Meinhof I’ll give him/her the time of day too, if they manage to capture my audience with veracity, skill and humour.
However, the likes of Martin’s Pharoahesque TBB’s seem to kick off on the wrong foot almost immediately. To start, possibly through history and hence total lack of experience, trying to do it off their own bat is an alien concept. First you need a cabal of sisters, and some women too, all around for group support. And then, and this is key, you need to be funded, preferably by the taxpayer, to do it all… first.
Then, once up and running, and wondering why the only hits you get are from the glee club or some sent your way by a piece in Aunty, it may start to sink in that no one is interested in the ”right on” message, especially if spun to order from Labour central’s skunk works. And while humour is a great tool, it’s not usually so effective when wielded by tools to an audience that has a choice of what they pay for and/or look at/listen to.
So then you go on the warpath demanding pogroms to leave you back in charge, as is your birthright.
Hence the BBC – and some others – seem (mainly because their cushy parade of useful fools is getting dumped on from a high height) to have the odd notion that so long as the ‘right’ boxes are ticked it doesn’t actually matter if the rest of the story in which they are complicit partners is a complete fabrication.
A dashed odd way to run an objective news broadcaster, IMHO.
Especially one expecting my support to fund them, uniquely or otherwise.