Tiger Vs Dragon
10 May 2010 20:00–20:30
BBC Radio 4 (FM only)
The Power of the Poor
In this provocative series of programmes, Mukul Devichandtravels across frontiers, from the controversial new ports China is building inthe Indian Ocean to the poor interior villages of these continent-sizedcountries. He examines whether China’s authoritarianism may in fact be doingmuch more for the poor than India’s sometimes bloody democracy.
or this:
“Sometimes you look at countries like China and youthink, ‘Wouldn’t it be nice to be an autocracy in times like these?'” MattFrei, Americana, September 20, 2009
or even this:
“..the final answer, frankly, is the vigorous use ofstate power to coerce and repress. It may be my Presbyterian background, but Ifirmly believe that repression can be a great, civilising instrument for good.Stamp hard on certain ‘natural’ beliefs for long enough and you can almost killthem off.”
Andrew Marr, The Guardian, Feb. 1999
Why do I have to pay the generous wages of idiots people like Frei and Marr?
Their nasty, illiberal views show contempt for ordinary people like me.
The BBC and the Guardian are regular and reliable sources of such sinister, arrogant, elitist and contemptuous attitudes and comment, but I’m not forced to buy the Guardian so I can choose to buy any newspaper I want without getting a fine and a criminal record.
Repellent people with cranky authoritarian attitudes should be allowed to express their opinions but the government shouldn’t force us to pay them for their bile and bitterness.
The BBC should be forced to adhere to its original mandate purely to report news. Noone needs their cack-handed, pig-ignorant attempts to guide people’s thinking or interpretation of events
“Stamp hard on certain ‘natural’ beliefs for long enough and you can almost kill them off.” Like voting Conservative?
BBC programs should be Pay as you Watch (PAYW).
I for one would be glad to pay to view the gnashing of teeth as these overpaid idiots come to see reality. It could be a kind of nature program – releasing caged BBC journalists to the wild of reality.
I remember when Frei wrote that. Sickening. And I also remember all those BBC reports which were really encomiums to China’s progress and infinitely expanding construction projects in the run-up to the Olympics.
When the Chinese economy comes crashing down next year like the house of cards it always has been, the BBC won’t retract all those reports about how great the Chinese way is. They’ll probably blame China’s real estate bubble on George Bush, too.
It’s odd though.
You’ll note that those extolling the virtues of someone in jackboots telling others what to do, ALWAYS assume they will be in the group doing the telling.
They never think they will be outside the elites amongst the masses.
The Beeboids are the nomenklatura.
Even on radio3 scarcely a day goes by without some mention of the national system of venezualan youth and children’s orchestras. It reminds me of the way East Germany would use international athletics to improve the image of a rotten regime in the eighties.
Those East German ‘women’ athletes!
Grrrrrrrrr… they sure put the man into woman!