OPEN THREAD

This is where you can discuss any BBC-related issue that concerns you. Please use it sensibly, no abuse and no trolls!

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45 Responses to OPEN THREAD

  1. John Bosworth says:

    How about the latest from Justin Webb? Writing about federal appeals court judge, Sonia Sotomayor, soon to be on the supreme court, quoting the San Francisco Chronicle, our Justin purrs approvingly in his blog:

    “…Given the anguish the abortion issue still causes in the US (reflected in comments to this blog) it is strikingly cool of Obama according to this piece – not to have asked about it when he interviewed her!”

    So it’s “strikingly cool” not to ask one of the most important questions? You bet if she was a Conservative pro-lifer she’d have been hung out to dry. President Obama (Justin will not point out) seems to leave a lot of important inconvenient questions, both national and international, unanswered in favour of a broad warm moist Oprah approach.

    Why, oh why (please tell me David Preisser) is Obama being given such a pass by almost everyone in the media? Even O’Reilly on Fox never loses an opportunity to fawn? Is there anyone out there old enough to compare this coverage with the coverage of the other “wonder-boy” president Kennedy?

    Meanwhile, the “strikingly cool” comment once again disqualifies Justin Webb from being thought off as a neutral bystander.

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  2. Dick the Prick says:

    @John – he’s doing some heart wrenching crap on his kid’s diabetes – fair enough – bad shit and all that. But it doesn’t start until June 14th and they’ve been plugging it all week on the world service – hmm.

    @David – on both my computers sometimes I can’t navigate away from this page and have to kill it – not really a problem but, you know, seems like a glitch.

    Have a good weekend peeps – lervely weather. Lager tops maybe the way forward – Allah Uh Ackbar and some other such drivel.

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  3. ukipwebmaster says:

    MEPs allowances:

       1 likes

  4. JohnA says:

    Feedback had some good stuff this week on the hypocrisy of the BBC refusing to reveal how much its presenters get – like 3, 4, 10 or more times what MPs get paid.

       1 likes

  5. David Preiser says:

    John Bosworth,

    The US media is filled with Democrat luvvies, all of whom hated Bush and Cheney so much that they’re doing anything they can to keep their Obamessiah propped up on a pedestal. That sounds familiar, doesn’t it?. That’s how it goes.

    Jack Tapper at ABC and Andrew Malcolm at the LA Times seem to be rare exceptions, and Tapper is almost the only one at the daily White House press briefings who asks questions more challenging than the ones at the beginning of Prime Minister’s Questions about the PM’s schedule for the day.

    As for ol’ Justin’s dopey blog post, his advocacy for harvesting embryos for scientific research is no secret. In fact, next week he’s going to once again use his position as a BBC reporter to advocate for it, and criticize those who aren’t in favor of it. Since the people who are uncomfortable with slicing up embryos are by definition uncomfortable with abortion, it’s a big deal to him. Any time the abortion issue comes up, Webb gets very nervous, because he believes that foolish conservative Christian beliefs have been depriving his son of a cure. Sotomayor is also a diabetic, so there’s a personal connection for him as well. His editor should really pull him from ever covering the issue. Oh, wait….

    Of course, Sotomayor is Catholic, but nobody knows what her level of interest is. She’s activist and far-Left on enough other issues important to the President’s agenda, and she has the added bonus of her ethnicity. The thing is, ol Justin may think it’s rilly kewl now, but what happens if his Obamessiah nominated her because she’s anti-gun and anti-business, and pro-reverse discrimination, and not because of her views on abortion?

    The White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said there was “no litmus test” on abortion, and the President didn’t ask about that specifically. Naturally, since they’re both lawyers, with similar law school backgrounds, they could very easily have had a legalese discussion about the Constitutional issue and precedent. In fact, in Tuesday’s press briefing, Gibbs kept bringing up the President’s interest in finding a judge who respected precedent. That word means something in the legal world, and most shallow journos wouldn’t have a clue. So Gibbs can truthfully say that a specific personal stance on abortion wasn’t discussed, and won’t be, while there can still be a tacit understanding that she’ll be “strikingly cool” about it on the bench.

    You can see the press briefing here. The abortion question comes just after 32:20. But they also bring up Sotomayor’s racialist statement (about which the BBC has been massively dishonest) and her record of the Supreme Court overturning her decisions.

    Justin Webb hopes that she’ll rule in favor of abortion if it comes up. I have no idea what Judge Sotomayor’s views are on the issue, but I do know that since The Obamessiah has already lifted the ban on government funding for embryonic stem-cell research (There was never a ban on it, full stop; private companies have been doing it the whole time, although it’s only one of may stem cell paths these days. Did ol’ Justin ever tell you that? No? He acted as if Bush and the nasty Evangelicals had shut it all down? Yes, he did.), the larger issue of abortion is not really important to the far-Left agenda right now. They’re much more concerned with guns and business and wealth redistribution. I wouldn’t be too surprised if The Obamessiah and Sotomayor just had a quick agreement about precedent, and turned to more important matters.

    In the end, though, the US media won the election (with perhaps a little ACORN voter fraud in a couple of states) as much as any wonderful speechifying by the candidate. They sacrificed their journalistic integrity to do it, and so now they have a huge personal, emotional stake in propping up the Administration at any cost. That sounds familiar, too, doesn’t it?

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  6. Grant says:

    Vancey 12:29
    OK, school is out for the weekend, but what has your post got to do with BBC bias ?

       1 likes

  7. CapnX says:

    Another day another 6pm BBC Tv News throwaway line. Here it it is, “Another day, another MP in the firing line” Oh Mate, don’t you mean “in the line of fire”? Goodness knows where you were brought up

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  8. TooTrue says:

    ukipwebmaster said…

    MEPs allowances:
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X4lmuLI81SU

    2:39 PM, May 29, 2009Arrrgggghhhh, I’m going to make the link clickable on..Then I’ll watch it.

       1 likes

  9. TooTrue says:

    Just watched it. So this UKIP guy Farage is against the EU, but as an MEP he’s collected 2 million quid over the last ten years for “expenses” over and above his salary and pension?

    He’s been in there all this time lapping at the trough and yet he wants to do away with the EU?

    Now I’m really confused.

    Still, I guess if that had been a Labour MEP, the Sky interviewer would have been saying, “Yes, sir, no sir.”

       1 likes

  10. David Preiser says:

    I wonder if Justin Webb will think this is “strikingly cool”?

    Not a Transnationalist. Some (Really) Early Thoughts on Judge Sotomayor

    Similarly, in Center for Reproductive Law v. Bush, 304 F 3d. 183 (2d Cir. 2002), in rejecting a lawsuit challenging the ban on funding for overseas abortions under constitutional and customary international law, Judge Sotomayor disposed of the customary international law argument in a single footnote: “As plaintiffs’ claims based on customary international law are substantively indistinguishable from their First Amendment claims, they are dismissed on the same ground. We express no view as to whether those claims are otherwise viable.”

    Oh, dear. It sure looks like Judge Sotomayor was in no hurry to help the fight against Bush and the Evangelicals on this one, Justin.

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  11. Dick the Prick says:

    David Preiser – you usually chuck USA after your name bud?

    It's really becoming problematic these BBC gadgies having opinions. We read decent newspapers & various blogs to get opinion. When was the last time you read an Editorial in a newspaper? You read the op-eds – everyone reads the op-eds. It's completely fair hacks having opinions but the BBC transmits an editorial line & doesn't allow divergent opinions. The BBC does have talent though but they're all old – lads who know that professionalism & scientific impartiality are crucial but they're all consigned to the graveyard.

    Nick Ross – used to do Crimewatch, set up & sorted the best crime institute in the country after his bud Jill Dando was killed – so it was the Jill Dando Institute at London University. He got replaced by some ex-copper who'd served 8 years in some shithole.

    I can not believe the BBC is so overpriced and yet so disgracefully underskilled. Although Springwatch is good.

    They have been sat there too long. Power plays & pimpdom are the order of the day.

    I'm staunchly Catholic but I sure as hell wouldn't get anywhere near the abortion debate.

       1 likes

  12. ed thomas says:

    Just a note- I’ve deleted a couple of comments above for trollishness. No excuse for such rubbish; no reason to leave it up.

       1 likes

  13. VANCEY TROUGHER says:

    AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

       1 likes

  14. Anonymous says:

    fuck vancey fuck vancey fuck fuck fuck

       1 likes

  15. Craig says:

    The ‘Mail’ website reports “Extremists behind anti-war protest driven off the streets by moderate Muslims”. (http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1189577/Muslim-extremists-anti-war-protest-driven-members-community.html)
    200 ‘moderate’ Muslims confronted and fought with the Luton-based extremists who have been hurling abuse at our soldiers during homecoming parades. (About time, you might say!) Police made no arrests.
    Has anyone seen this story on the BBC? I can’t see it on their website. Will it ever appear?

       1 likes

  16. David Preiser (USA) says:

    Dick the Prick

    I already had a Blogger profile, and was too lazy to mess with it when this site switched over. Everybody knows I’m a United Statesian by now. I don’t pretend otherwise, and my commenting style gives it away anyways. I added it a while back when some defenders of the indefensible demanded that foreigners be designated as such so they could sort us out. Nobody seemed to complain when the switch happened, and I didn’t care either way. It should be back now.

    ed thomas,

    DV’s stalker is obviously checking in to see if his comments are still there, or if anybody reacted. If you delete the comments, it will only encourage him to make more.

    Just start blocking IPs. If this terrorist supporter has to start traveling around every time he wants to feel good about himself, it will start to take more effort than the little ego boost is worth.

       1 likes

  17. ed thomas says:

    Troll (VT)- that’s better, isn’t it? It’s always good to know where people stand.

       1 likes

  18. John Horne Tooke says:

    Too True

    I think you missed the point – my reading of it is that every MEP gets that money anyway and that Farage is actually using it, not to line his own pocket but to counteract all the billions of pounds of propaganda put out by the EU.

    He is even saying that his ambition is to lose that money when we get out of the corrupt club.

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  19. George R says:

    How does the BBC report political opposition to membership of the European Union? -In the case of the BBC’s Mr. Dymond’s subsidised European tour: by indulging in some smears and innuendo -as in the current example of Austria, where the anti-E.U. Austrian Freedom Party is described as “far right”.

    “In search of Europe: Austria”

    (BBC ‘Europe’ page.)

       1 likes

  20. George R says:

    ‘BBC Press Office’:

    “BBC World Service now on FM across Tobago with new relay launch”

    -Pity BBC can’t provide Radio 5 on FM to UK licencepayers.

       1 likes

  21. TooTrue says:

    John Horne Tooke 8:38 PM, May 29,

    Well, I heard what he said. But is it really possible to fight the monster that is the EU from the inside?

       1 likes

  22. JasonS says:

    Well, I fully expect this to be a blog entry pretty soon, but might as well bring it up now anyways…

    BBC offers £30,000 and an apology for Question Time ‘slur’ on Islamic leaders over anti-war protestOf course they didn’t have to earn that £30,000 fair and square, so what does the BBC care? Might as well throw it around like confetti at a wedding, that’s what the Beeb’s all about anyway. Of course I can’t imagine them chucking money at any non-Muslim group someone offended on air. If it were a Christian group for example, you can bet your ass they’d stick to their guns and issue the usual statement about freedom of speech and how they “can’t guarantee that nobody will be offended by remarks on a political discussion show,” blah blah blibbety.

    Message to Muslims: complain about someone speaking the truth about the Religion of Peace on the Beeb and get a nice fat cheque.

       1 likes

  23. JohnA says:

    Today’s Times has as main story a Populous opinion poll showing :

    1 Labour support down to 21%, the lowest ever recorded

    2 On the expenses scandal, 62% see Brown as the most damaged, compared with 5% for Cameron.

    I will wait to hear these figures headlined in the Today programme – especially the public’s trashing of Brown.

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  24. Anonymous says:

    Watching BBC news 24, they just did a paper review with Simon Farnshawe First up was the bail out of motor industry. Second up was the Britain’s Got Talent. And finally he got around to the expenses scandal, and then put the boot in on ex telegraph hack Kirkbride (tory mp). Absolutely no mention of Labour or the Times front page. Strange that, as reading his website he looks like the usual Labour supporting non-entity based on his website – http://www.simonfanshawe.com/wp/?page_id=2. His troughing days off the public teat, I can only hope, will be fast coming to an end when his masters Labour are rightly removed from power.

       1 likes

  25. Llew says:

    Whenever I see these “paper reviews” it always seems to be a Labour supporting journo or presenter reading out the papers (Fanshawe, McGuire etc). Do the BBC have any non-Labour supporters on their books?

    Silly question of course.

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  26. Grant says:

    ed Thomas
    I agree with your deletions this time ! The problem with British schoolkids is that they don’t have enough homework to do !

       1 likes

  27. Craig says:

    Jason S,

    Though the ‘Mail’ mentions it, the BBC’s own online report ‘forgets’ to mention the bit about the £30,000 offer (of, as you say, our money) to the Muslim Council of Britain. (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/8074944.stm)

    The same article, incidentally, ends with a BBC statement:

    ‘In a statement, the BBC said Question Time always had a lively and wide-ranging debate and this was one of its strengths.

    It went on: “On occasion, this results in unfairness to individuals who aren’t there to put their view and this is one of those occasions.”‘

    On that basis can we expect a BBC apology (and a whole heap of taxpayer’s dosh) to be given to the BNP any time soon?

       1 likes

  28. Anonymous says:

    Thanks for pointing that out Jason.

    Question Time has form. It is the front desk of Broadcasting House’s Left Wing Gentleman’s Club. Only on this occasion they mistakenly invited Charles Moore – an articulate representative of the growing power of conservatism and a man who speaks for the unrepresented majority of Middle England, fed up with the mealy mouthed platitudes of the left wing elite that appear in numbers on this show.

    Once again, the Judenfrei BBC is grovelling to the self-appointed representatives of UK Muslims. And once again, they are paying out with our money.

    I recall the acrimony poured out towards Jews on this nasty little “current affairs” show after the Hezbollah and Hamas wars and how an audience purposely packed with a crowd of rentaMuslims (who have not appeared in such numbers since, how strange) made the then US Ambassador cry after a particularly vicious and orchestrated post 9-11 backlash set up by the extremists at the BBC troughers Gentlemans Club on same “current affairs” show.

    No apologies there. Public money was no doubt better spent on Tuscan villas and Jonathan Ross.

       1 likes

  29. George R says:

    In black South Africa, the BBC calls it “Xenophobic violence”:

    “Rainbow nation’s outsiders live in fear”

    (BBC, ‘Africa’ page.)

       1 likes

  30. Anonymous says:

    Did anyone hear the obnoxious Brummie big mouth Adrian Chiles expressing his disbelief at Americans ever voting for G W Bush on his awful early evening show the other evening.

    This is the creep who “told” on young Thatcherette after a private conversation.

    If he keeps this up, he’s be the next Director General.

       1 likes

  31. matt zx says:

    Adrian Chiles! sorry to let you guys down but i nearly ran the b*stard over with a mower by the canal basin in brum when i was working for british waterways !.
    Again sorry !.

       1 likes

  32. Ady says:

    Our country is currently going through a huge constitutional crisis.

    If you participated in this debate instead of getting hung up on irrelevant islamic muppetry you might see a fairly substantial increase in site traffic.

    Just thot I’d mention that.

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  33. adam says:

    nice balanced independent piece on UKIP on the BBC.
    Exactly how they treat the greens…

    http://news.bbc.co.uk/today/hi/today/newsid_8075000/8075012.stm

    the BBC will hang themselves over this. UKIP is growing in popularity

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  34. Craig says:

    Here's some BBC-style speculation to start the day.

    Despite rumours to the contrary, Gordon Brown is not dead. He's been in purdah for a while, but will re-emerge today on the friendly 'Andrew Marr Show'.

    Will Marr’s interview with the Dear Leader concentrate on Labour sleaze? Or this time will the focus be on cross-party sleaze (‘sleaze in general’)? Last week Marr interviewed Cameron & spent most of the interview discussing Tory sleaze.

    Will he ask Brown about his own expenses fiddles?

    Will he ask him about Vince Cable's powerful call for tax-evading Chancellor Darling to go? (http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-1189823/VINCE-CABLE-Its-time-personal–just-Mr-Darling.html)

    If Marr mentions any specific Labour names, will it be anyone other than Hazel Blears?

    Will he mention today’s hot story -Labour MP Frank Cook’s shameful claim for a £5.00 church donation? (Though Balls’s claim for two Remembrance Sunday wreaths is just as scandalous & should be brought up too).

    Will Marr surprise us all & interview Brown with the same vigour he showed when interviewing the Tory leader?

    The fun kicks off at 9 o’clock (the interview will probably start at 9.30?). Be there or be…somewhere else!

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  35. Craig says:

    Sky News at 8.00 leading on today’s opinion poll which shows Labour in 3rd place behind the Lib Dems.

    Guess what? BBC Breakfast News at 8.00 completely ignores it.

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  36. DB says:

    Meanwhile, in the leftie echo chamber… here’s the line-up for a ‘debate’ about constitutional reform at the Hay Festival: left-wing BBC comedian Marcus Brigstocke and two of the BBC’s favourite left-wing talking-head lawyers Helena Kennedy and Philippe Sands, with left-wing Today presenter James Naughtie as mediator. All nice and cosy, like.

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  37. Llew says:

    Marr show..

    Brown allowed to spout lies about what the “Tories” will do in the recession. Marr doesn’t say a word, just lets him trot out typical Labour party political broadcast.

    Last week David was grilled when he made claims about handling the recession.

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  38. Craig says:

    Spot on Llew.

    Marr just shut up & let Brown go on.

    And then – probably because of Jerry Springer telling him at the start of the programme that he had too! – Marr asked Brown about the snubbing of the Queen at the D-Day commemorations, & let him get away with a deeply evasive answer. Why wasn't there a follow-up question?

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  39. Craig says:

    Also on ‘Marr’, why was Ian Duncan Smith NOT on the sofa with Brown at the end? Why only Jerry Springer and Labour peer Helena Kennedy? Did Marr fear a tricky question from Duncan Smith?

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  40. Craig says:

    All this said, the first half of the Marr interview was a car-crash for Brown. This was largely of Brown’s own making. HE just does not get it.

    Marr was doing a fair amount of interrupting too, though nowhere near as much as he should have done. Brown’s answers were set up so many open goals a better interviewer could have scored a century (to mix metaphors).

    In the second half of the interview, however, Marr cut back drastically on the interruptions and Brown was allowed to relax again. Normal business was resumed.

    Marr did focus mostly on ‘cross-party’ expenses and parliamentary reform, as expected, with only a brief mentions of specific Labour Party cases. Purnell and Darling got a mention only in connection with the expected question about Hazel Blears.

    Why didn’t Marr raise Vince Cable’s call for Darling’s sacking? This is surely one of the big new stories of the day.

    Why didn’t Marr come back when Brown claimed his own expenses were squeakly clean? They aren’t. (Note Marr never asked a question about that).

    Why didn’t he press Brown on Frank Cook MP? On Balls? On Hoon? On..?

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  41. Craig says:

    Here are some stats on Andrew Marr’s interview with Gordon Brown. (It may be sunny but I’ve got my anorak on again.)

    Duration of interview: 28 minutes

    Breakdown of topics covered (in chronological order):
    Sleaze: 22 minutes (79%)
    Leadership: 5 minutes (18%)
    D-Day/Queen: just less than 1 minute (3%)

    Number of significant interruptions: 22
    (This, for those who remember the ‘Interruption Coefficient’, is an IC of 0.8)

    Now compare this with last week’s interview with David Cameron:

    Duration of interview: 22 minutes

    Breakdown of topics covered (in chronological order):
    Tory sleaze: 16 minutes (73%)
    Europe: 5 minutes (23%)
    Tory spending cuts: 1 minute (4%)

    Number of significant interruptions: 27
    (This is an IC of 1.2).

    The difference in the ratio of interruptions to duration of interview is statistically significant here & reveals that our subjective suspicions that Marr would challenge Cameron much more than he did Brown are objectively confirmed. Bias proven. QED.

    Now for some sunshine!

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  42. Millie Tant says:

    CapnX said…
    Another day another 6pm BBC Tv News throwaway line. Here it it is, “Another day, another MP in the firing line” Oh Mate, don’t you mean “in the line of fire”? Goodness knows where you were brought up

    6:10 PM, May 29, 2009
    ==================================
    I’m glad you mentioned that. It is all over the BBC. They are forever wittering on about who’s next in the “firing line” (sic), whether in programme trailers for The Apprentice or on Newsnight in the context of the MPs’ expenses. If it wasn’t for the fact that I can’t stand having to fill in a stupid form, I would have e-mailed the BBC about it. (Sky has been at it too, as has Jon Snow on Channel 4.)

    For B’oids, please get it into your b’oidy heads that if you are in the firing line, you are the one who is doing the firing and if you are in the line of fire, you’d better duck quick.

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  43. Llew says:

    Craig, don’t forget the extra 2 minutes Gordon got on the sofa afterwards, the sofa without IDS but with 2 fawning luvvies!

    Excellent breakdown of the bias BTW.

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  44. GenuinelyBrummie says:

    Adrian Chiles is not Brummie, he comes from Hagley in leafy Worcestershire.
    You people are pig f***ing ignorant!
    His father is Jewish can we look forward to anti semitic stuff about him too now.
    There is a despicable minority on this site whose rants are allowed to stand but make it look shockingly bad for everyone else.

       0 likes