OK, this is now the weekend Open Thread and bumped up the order a little bit! Enjoy…
Open Thread
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- MarkyMark Dec 19, 15:19
Midweek 18th December 2024
‘The Democrats Freak Out Over Cartoon Joe Biden’s Lead’ Ep. 202 Cold Open | Our Cartoon President https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_YrFULMj5qQ - moggiemoo Dec 19, 14:52
Midweek 18th December 2024
When you say pods, does it stand for piles of dog shit? - atlas_shrugged Dec 19, 14:43
Midweek 18th December 2024
Here we go again. Batshit bonkers Californian Gavin Newsom declares state of emergency in California over bird-flu: https://dailysceptic.org/2024/12/19/gavin-newsom-declares-state-of-emergency-over-california-bird-flu-outbreak/ “It comes… - MarkyMark Dec 19, 14:34
Midweek 18th December 2024
Thee haughty tyrants ne’er shall tame: All their attempts to bend thee down, Will but arouse thy generous flame; But… - MarkyMark Dec 19, 14:27
Midweek 18th December 2024
“The law of the wise is a fountain of life” “The welfare of the people is supreme” “Right lives by… - MarkyMark Dec 19, 14:23
Midweek 18th December 2024
“The incident happened on Monday, 4 December 2023 at an address in Wandsworth. Eleto arrived at the victim’s home and… - JohnC Dec 19, 14:06
Midweek 18th December 2024
She is just thanking God that Starmer means she is not the worst PM in history. Just as Gordon Brown… - JohnC Dec 19, 14:02
Midweek 18th December 2024
BBC front page news: Family’s £3,500 Lapland holiday dream shattered https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/ckg3llqq41wo The holiday dream was shattered because it didn’t snow.… - MarkyMark Dec 19, 13:54
Midweek 18th December 2024
“Emery hides out at Carey’s family home but leaves when false footage on the BBC shows him kidnapping his daughter.… - Lucy Pevensey Dec 19, 13:48
Midweek 18th December 2024
Digg, someone should investigate the HOC for alien pods. It’s getting harder to believe they are human.
Categories
agw anti-American anti-conservative anti-Israel anti Israel. pro Palestinian Antisemitism BBC - sickeningly biased at all times. BBC agenda BBC bias bbc bias and balance. bbc bias by omission BBC censorship BBC Question Time BBC selectivity bias Biased BBC climate change dhimmis general thread immigration Islam israel Mark Mardell obama obama bias Obamalove open thread pro-labour pro-palestinian pro EU pro Hamas pro Islam pro Labour bias pro Obama PRO OBAMA AT ALL COSTS. pro Obama BBC agenda question time question time live Richard Black save gordon. USA politics US economy US News US politics US presidential elections
Splits in the coalition*?
http://blogs.independent.co.uk/2010/07/24/once-again-late-and-grudging-bbc-admits-error/
*Different one:)
I busted Laura Kuenssberg as being biased in this same direction during the inquiry, just two days before she made that error. I sense a pattern. And Laura Kuenssberg is considered to be the top candidate to replace Nick Robinson (if he’s actually leaving).
Yep I think many of us have been all over the dopey jock bints bias, she’s actually worse than Toenails if that’s possible.
She’s much, much worse than Robinson.
David,
She was on the Daily Politics last wednesday in place of Nick with no explanation and it seems unlikely he would be off on holiday before the recess but, who knows ? She was so awful, I missed Nick !
The BBC portrayed (shilled for) Obama as a President who could heal the racial divisions in the US – but all we see is more racial argument than ever happened in the Bush years. Endless false and disgusting racebaiting from Pbama’s side. And the BBC is well up there trying to suggest that the Tea Party movement is racist.
Here’s a REAL MAN who has a genuine healing message. He’s not in the BBC’s style, however – he’s a Republican candidate, an ex-soldier who was proud of looking after his own men. He has been invited to address quite a few Tea Party meetings – one can easily see why, he has character and robust views about the proper place of government. A REAL post-racial candidate.
And I don’t think the BBC with its yellow streak would welcome his views on Islamic terrorism, Israel, etc – especially as he quotes Thatcher on socialism :
http://cubachi.com/2010/04/14/lt-col-allen-west-on-hannity/
But the BBC mindset would go crazy with his frankness on jihad being the essence of Islam :
and here is Colonel West in a YouTuble clip watched over 2 million times :
“CHARGE”!
Quite a guy eh? Obviously the leftist media are already getting ready to destroy him, itll be a Palin job on steroids I think.
His crime is being a black man of the right and that in the eyes of teh left makes him a non person, so much for the lefts anti racism ethos, goes about as deep as the skin of an apple.
Uncle Tom !
West on Israel :
Colonel West is the Free World’s Great Black Hope
What to do, what to do?
It seems while most in the MSM have for some reason memorised every character & scene from ‘Brokeback Mountain’, they seem oddly surprised plus a bit deflated not all others have as well.
Hence asking pols with wives who are actually women which character they most are like seems not to have resulted in quite the cat-fight responses the sisterhood seem to have hoped for. ‘Haven’t seen it’ kinda stops the attempt dead in its tracks.
They really should try moving in more circles than currently.
Haven’t seen it either but, if what I’ve been reading about the BBC’s new drama series (and seeing an advert for it – disguised as a debate – on ‘Newsnight’) is right, doesn’t it feature Sherlock Holmes and Dr Watson?
Well, Andrew Mar just kept it going.
They do like their little ‘in’ jokes, eh?
The BBC has spent a huge amount of time and effort to do a detailed report on US military drones killing terrorists in Pakistan. And what a shock – even though The Obamessiah has killed more than three times as many people as Booooosh, the BBC report concludes that it seems to be working, and probably has the tacit approval of the Pakistani government.
Now that we’re in The Obamessianic Age, ramping up the war, taking the war to yet another country, and targeted killing from long distance which results in the death of innocents is no longer a crime against humanity. No critical editorializing, no voices of dissent, nobody from Human Rights Watch in evidence, no fretting over “International Law”, nothing. Has anybody seen a fuss about this made on Today, or Newsnight, or anything of the sort? Where are the anti-war protests these days?
I’ve always said the Beeboids aren’t really anti-war, they’re just against ones involving Republicans or Margaret Thatcher. Nowadays they’re impartially reporting on the success of a US military operation that has killed three times as many people as when Bush was in charge. Thanks, BBC!
I can’t find anything wrong with the latest installment of Franz Strasser’s pro-immigration propaganda series. The only problem is the main one: it’s a puff piece designed to distract you all from the concerns about illegal immigration, which still hasn’t been mentioned at all in this series. As long as the BBC keeps this focused exclusively on happy legal immigration stories, it’s a dishonest piece of propaganda and nothing more.
Correct me if I’m wrong anyone, but am I right in thinking that there was absolutely no significant coverage at the BBC about this groundbreaking event?:
http://www.friendsofisraelinitiative.org/events.php
Robin Shepherd describes it as ‘the most important initiative of its kind in decades’. Yet apparantly not the in-depth coverage that it warrants on the TODAY programme. Perhaps Naughtie and Humphrys were intimidated by the heavy hitters they’d be having to deal with? Not people these anti-Semitic bullies would wish to get into a fight with. Pretend it didn’t happen. Instead get Lord Patten to do their dirty work for them in Gaza.
I don’t think that horde of BBC staff in the US have gor round to reporting one of the hot stories over there – the exposure on DailyCaller.com that from about 2006 until recently there was a listserv “chatroom” called Journolist where about 400 leftie journalists swapped views about how to promote their cause – especially how to promote Obama, attack Palin, attack right-wing journalists with accusations of racism etc. They were effectively an unpaid section of the Obama campaign.
Some of the revelations about what they siad have been disgusting. A bit like the ClimateGate emails – conspiracy to bend things. Coordinating attacks, or coordinationg cover-ups of Obama’s friends and associates.
And Journolist included – actively – some pretty important journalists. Out of 400 – here are some 65 names. Many of them are readily recognisable even to a Londoner.
http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2010/07/known_journolisters.html
There is a Guardian scribe on the list – Michael Tomasky. I don;t know if the BBC were invited to join. But as they take their US feed from people on the Journolist it would not have mattered, we’d have got the Journolist-conspired bias anyway.
Even the Ombudsman at the Washington Post thinks the Journolist activities stank – discrediting proper journalism :
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/07/22/AR2010072206024_pf.html
There were – from what we know so far – two Guardian bloggers on JournoList. Daniel Davies was also part of the conspiracy, and ranted about how afraid he was of Fox News. Pathetic, but true. I mean, that really is sad, and speaks poorly of his intellect. Even a fellow JournoLister sees no shame in posting about it.
I’m thinking if there are two Guardianistas on it, there must be a Beeboid in there somewhere. Ezra Klein (who started and ran it) said somewhere that he didn’t allow any on-air reporters into the group, so if there was a BBC employee on JournoList, it would have to be a producer or someone from BBC News Online.
David
You had posted about Journolist at the start of this thread. How is it that all those BBC staff we are forced to pay for to report on the US are somehow oblivious of the Journolist story? “Journolist” already gets over 600,000 hits on Google – but the BBC pretend they are blind to the controversy. Which has been bubbling away in the columns of the washington Post, the BBC go-to opinion source.
Enough to make a cat laugh.
That was David Jones at the top of this thread, not me.
Thank you!
As I have said before , just too many Davids on this website !
For Africa Not British Broadcasting Corporation (ANBBC):-
-Africa trumps Britain.
“Brown calls for African century.”
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-10750077
What about calling for a British fortnight?
Did Brown condemn the AU’s decision not to endorse the ICC’s call for Al-Bashir of Sudan to be tried for Genocide , but to invite him to the conference ?
What is Brown doing there anyway ? In what capacity ? Do his constituents have interests in Uganda ?
Anyway, I expect his resignation as an MP just before or after the Labour Party conference ?
The BBC headline yesterday was that Brown was saying that broadband internet is the key to Africa’s future.
Most people would say “what utter crap”. The BBC presents all these ideas (which we’d be paying for) without any question. The BBC lives on public money, and sees no need for limiting how much of the taxpayers’ money is thrown around, no matter how stupid the cause.
Send Israeli flotilla to Turkey.
Islam Not BBC (INBBC) would not report this:
“The flotilla wars: one stunt begets another”
http://www.spiked-online.com/index.php/site/article/8981
No, INBBC censors the above and pushes its usual anti-Israel line
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-10741416
Here’s a little test for Andrew Marr and Paddy O’Connell.
When they do their paper reviews this morning, how will they handle these headlines?
– Mail on Sunday: Harman helped Labour donor in visa trouble
– Sunday Express: BBC’s secret pension pot
– Telegraph: Axe falls on NHS services
Will they shine a very bright spotlight on the third headline but try to glide over or simply ignore the first two?
Surely, even Paddy O’Connell can’t just ignore the Mail‘s main story? Can he?
Craig beat me to it:
BBC’S SECRET PENSION POT
FAT CAT BBC director general Mark Thompson and his executive directors are pocketing cash from a “secret pension pot” while asking staff to accept cuts in their own retirement packages.
http://www.dailyexpress.co.uk/posts/view/189027
First up on his ‘review’.
Scorned and dismissed in a few seconds. Most loyal.
Mr. Marr neither understands it nor has one. Apparently.
Well from reading it, he wouldn’t have one, as it claims it’s a secret pot for the organ grinders, not the monkeys they keep comfy enough to stay in line.
As to his inability to understand it, well, I guess that is how you get to host a major political news programme.
Seemed pretty straightforward to me.
Obviously more time required to interpret such events… or move on.
Yes, Marr did the completely predictable in his run-down of the newspaper front pages.
As you say, he dismissed the Sunday Express‘s story as “a story about the BBC’s secret pension pot, which I neither understand nor have myself”. (Nick and Naga had also had a little joke about it on Breakfast).
He then detailed the main stories in the Independent, the Times and the Telegraph (“another axe story, here its ‘Axe falling on NHS services’ – despite the fact that they’re supposed to be ring-fenced”). Then he moved on to the Sunday Mirror and the News of the World, then the People for some gossip. He didn’t show the Mail‘s front page, so he didn’t mention the Mail‘s main story about his dinner party guest and acting leader of the opposition Harriet Harman, her donor and his illegal immigrant wife.
How completely unsurprising of Andrew Marr.
Craig,
I read the NHS article. NHS managers trying to preserve their own non-jobs at the expaense of clinical services.
It will be a real test of the coalition to see if they are ruthless enough to ensure a massive culling of managers and an improvement in clinical services.
Well, Paddy O’Connell – unlike Marr – did mention Harriet Harman in his newspaper review, and he didn’t mock the Express‘s BBC story. So Paddy O’Connell 2, Andrew Marr 0.
That said, there was a brief revival of Broadcasting House‘s old Gordcasting House persona as a comedian from the Now Show gushed over how “chipper”, “relaxed” and “pleased” Brown looks in Africa and Paddy chipped in one of his characteristic pro-Brown ad libs: “And whatever else was said about him, he’d done a lot of work in Africa regardless of what he was doing in the UK”. Yes, said the guy from the Now Show, it’s “refreshing” to see him doing something “valuable” like that.
Brown pops out from the loony bin and the BBC are all over him with two fawning items on the webpages and endless news briefs. Do you think that they still consider him PM?
Whenever Alistair Darling was interviewed by Marr in the months leading up to the election, Marr would always slip in a little praise for Darling (such as “You famously gave a gloomy but accurate account of what might be coming ahead of the recession as it was about to hit us and you were pretty much proved right…”).
Darling is on again today. Will Marr try to get him the credit for the upturn in the economy?
Well, this is how Marr previewed the interview just now on ‘Breakfast’:
“Also Alistair Darling, talking about the economy and whether in fact he had put in place the things that produced a slightly better economic situation.”
I think it’s safe to predict that Darling will get an easier ride than Jeremy Hunt – and that Marr won’t be giving any compliments to the latter.
Same-sex flatmates of the world, gird your lions!
Seems that the BBC’s main ‘thrust’ is all that can be read into two men getting on well and/or sharing social arrangements.
I will have to revisit my early 20’s and business partnerships in light of the homo-erotica that just must have simmered.
Guessing that yes, Mr. Darling will be probed less on his role in the sexual tensions that lead to his party and cabinet’s disfunctional behaviour, but more fed how he dun good and handed over a great economy on a plate.
Sorry, a bit Benny Hill, but they did start it and it’s too hard to resist.
Mr. Marr, having talked to Tom Jones, finds ‘all his organs throbbing’.
Oo, missus.
Marr’s introduction to his smooch-in with Darling:
“New figures on Friday confirm that the British economy has been growing in recent months faster than at any time in the last three years. Does that therefore mean that the medicine applied by Gordon Brown and his chancellor over the past two years did in fact work, because on the other hand there were certainly fierce disagreements between the two of them as to exactly what the required medicine was? So who called it right?”
Typical Marr. Imply Labour called it right, and then give an “on the other hand” that isn’t really an “on the other hand” at all but a get-out-of-gaol-free card for Labour.
“So who called it right?” That’s the question. Was it Brown or was it Darling who “called it right?” That’s the choice on offer from Marr. I can think of other options and answers.
Marr bowled soft question after soft question at Darling, starting by asking him general questions about the economy and the new government’s actions. He didn’t interrupt and the interview ended with laughter all round.
Marr thinks you’ve all forgotten that Darling had some differences with Gordon Brown over the economic situation and what to do. So if he starts trying to celebrate Darling’s genius, it means that Mr. Brown really did have it all wrong and nearly destroyed everything. Let’s see how long this attention on Darling lasts.
Islam Not BBC (INBBC) does report this, about a possible legal threat to a Tory MP who opposes the burqa:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-10750908
But, INBBC does NOT report this:
U.K.: Muslim known for justifying the killing of U.S. and British soldiers is quietly reappointed as “main link between the Metropolitan Police and the Muslim community”
Completely ignoring Llew’s plea last week for a halt to the BBC’s endless discussion of the burqa, here was Naga on Breakfast this morning: “It’s twelve minutes past 8 and we’re asking should it be illegal for women to wear a niqab, a burka which covers the face in public?”
Well I am not surprised they brought the subject up yet again – the goal was wide open for them to have another shot at those nasty, law breaking Tories, using their great friends at Liberty.
Incidentally, do Liberty mouthpieces actually go to bed or have lie-ins in the mornings. When I read late last night that their lawyers had warned Phillip Hollobone about his potential illegal activity, you just knew the BBC would quickly be on the speed-dial. Sure enough, at silly-o’clock this morning there’s the Liberty mouthpiece on the BBC sofa.
There is an excellent expose of Shami Chakrabarti in David Ickes book (yes I know) “Human Race Get Off Your Knees” He also has the BBC confirmed for what we know to be its universal left bias.
Marr has done the paper review without one mention of the Obama story on the Times fron page, or the Hariet Harman helping an illegal immigrant Labour donor.
The cheek of Andrew Marr!
Question to Jeremy Hunt: “Are we going to see a Fox-style broadcaster in this country? Are you going to remove some of the impartiality and fairness parts of broadcasting legislation to allow more parti pris?”
Marr is hardly innocent when it comes to “parti pris”.
And what utter crap, considering MSNBC has been openly, unashamedly partisan for years now, and especially since the election. Same with CNN. Both these US networks can be seen reflecting BBC attitudes on nearly all political reporting. If Marr is going to point to Fox as the only partisan broadcaster in the US, he is a liar.
Islamic jihad in East Africa, but not to: Islam Not BBC (INBBC).
INBBC has a ‘report’ on East Africa which:
1.) avoids explicit reference to Islamic jihad murderers there; for INBBC such people are merely ‘militants’;
2.)already lays the propagandist groundwork for blaming the victims of Islamic jihad, not blaming the perpetrators of it:
[Extract] –
“The BBC’s East Africa correspondent Will Ross says there is concern that any offensive against al-Shabab could increase the number of civilian deaths and make the AU mission extremely unpopular with the Somali population.”
{INBBC’s Mr. Ross does not speculate on the ‘popularity’ of the Islamic jihadist murderers in Somalia.]
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-10753009
Seven extremely eminent scientists pour cold water on global warming alarmism :
http://www.populartechnology.net/2010/07/eminent-physicists-skeptical-of-agw.html
I bet Richard Black will lead with this story tomorrow – if not tonight.
Not. Black has a version of Orwell’s Memory Hole down which he shoves things even before they become a memory.
Black doesn’t know any scientists and probably does not read scientific journals. He probably has not heard of Dyson.
Americana on Radio 4 has as special guest Howard Raines. That’s a New York Times edotor who was forced to resign after the scandal of false journalism concerning Jayson Blair.
Of course Raines ascribed much of the opposition to Obama to racism – and tars the Tea Party with the racist brush. Not a single word from the BBC guy about the possibility that people may be sick and tired of Obama’s damaging policies. The BBC KNEW that would be Raines’ FALSE line.
Who will they have on next week ? Dan Rather maybe ?
I see that Howell Raines was a leading member of Journolist. And it was Raines who played a leading part in accusing the Clinton campaign of racism. Funny the BBC did not raise any of this ? – maybe that would have limited his time to repeat racism slurs against opponents. Or maybe Journolist is another big news item that has gone down the Memory Hole before it was even mentioned on the BBC.
America has been waking up fast to the proensity of Democrats to play the race card at every opportunity. Time the BBC woke up too.
Errm, the BBC plays the race card for the Left, its something they dont want the public to wake up to.
Raines was relentless in playing the race card but he wasn’t the only one on yesterday’s Americana.
After speaking to one liberal, James Reynolds went on to talk to another – author Richard Ford (of ‘Independence Day’ fame), who said much the same sort of thing: “There is bigotry. Look at the Tea Party Movement, working itself as hard as it can, pretending it’s not what it is.”
The BBC is relentless.
Intriguingly, the BBC website’s review of ‘expert verdicts’ on the first 2008 presidential debate featured no fewer than three people from the JournoList crowd:
Matthew Yglesias of ‘Think Progress’, Ezra Klein of ‘The American Prospect’ and Michael Tomasky of ‘The Guardian’.
That’s out of a total of eight ‘experts’.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/7639103.stm
well spotted.
So out of 8 experts we have 3 knoiwn members of Journolist, Daily Kos then gets another comment even though its owner Yglesias (a nutter) is already quoted, and then Arianna Huffington is thrown in. So the left gets 5 out of 8 – including Yglesias and Klein whom I believe are callow youths ? Gerachty and Hewitt are the only known right-wingers on that list ?
Yep, that’s how the BBC takes a balanced view of the US scene. Including not a single comment from the major UK press, 2 from miniscule-circulation papers.
Excellent spot Craig, that’s the sort of analysis we miss.
Howell Raines? He’s the one who drove the New York Times’ credibility into the toilet in the first place over fake reporting and an excessively Liberal agenda. He resigned from the paper in disgrace over it, and these (mostly young) clowns still look up to him? Oh, that’s right: he’s as frightened of Fox News as the rest of them.
Unreal.
Oddly – the Americana presenter failed to mention that Raines had left the New York Times in utter professional disgrace.
Someone like that should be persona non grata at the BBC. A pariah.
But no – they invite the creep to call decent US citizens in the Tea Party movement pariahs.
No shame at the BBC.
UK interest rates to stay at record low ‘until 2014’
That’s the headline at the BBBC, which on reading made me curse the coalition that they could carry on this idiotic policy of intentionally supressing interest rates to keep borrowing disastrously low and continue Brown’s policy of punishing the thrifty and rewarding borrowing.
Then you read the article and it turns out the interest rates aren’t actually going to stay at record low at all, it’s merely a suggestion from someone who supports the last governments disastrous monetary policy and since the BBBC agree with him it’s attributed to “a leading economic forecaster” and the shite keeps on flowing “rates would need to be kept low to counter-balance the government’s spending cuts” so it’s just another cuts-bad Brownite monetary policy good.
It’s not as if it’s difficult to headline the article “UK interest rates should stay at record low until 2014” is it. A tiny change in the headline would be a step toward objectivity and transparency, but that’s probably a step too far for some.
BBC ‘Politics’ page censors out this report on its Labour luvvy, Harman:
“Immigration and the perils of the block vote”
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-1297449/MAIL-ON-SUNDAY-COMMENT-Immigration-perils-block-vote.html#ixzz0ujrZdEN8
Behold the diversity of the JournoList
A Paler Shade of White – the JournoList Conspiritors
Sorry, make that the lack of diversity of the JournoList. Out of 101 people pictured in the above link, there are 2 black guys, not even one quarter of the JournoListers are women, one person of Korean descent, two people from India. One Obamessiah economic advisor (guess what the “o” in JournoList stands for). Almost half of them are Jews. It’s almost enough to drive one into self-loathing.
And there’s at least one more white male (Daniel Davies from the Guardian) not pictured, to make the lack of diversity even more appalling.
Where are the clucking Beeboid tongues? I know they think this will go away. It won’t.
Searches for JournoList mentions over the last month (excluding misspellings of “journalist” in the case of the BBC) –
Results
Google: 850,000
Huffington Post: 26,900
Washington Post: 20,200
Guardian: 18
BBC: 0
I left a comment on a World Have Your Say blog asking when the BBC will deal with JournoList. The comment has of course been deleted.
Something has to be done about the BBC. But what? We are helpless.
A series of podcasts made as rebuttals to BBC reporting on various issues, leading up to a book?
This cartoon shows the effect/objective of JournOlist :
http://powerlineblog.com/archives/assets_c/2010/07/RAMclr800-072610-protection.php
Whether they were directly involved in JournOList or not, the BBC lined itself up with the protect-Obama camp all through the election.
Good cartoon!
Well if anyone wants to know why we’re losing the war in Afghanistan (if not lost by now) you’ve only got to see the media reaction to the latest Wikileaks story.
You see our soldiers sometimes kill civilians and that’s really bad (no shit Sherlock)
Can anyone remember a war where civilians were not killed? Considering you can’t tell the difference between one bushy bearded twat and another, how are soldiers supposed to?
It’s why our soldiers need to be removed right now, could you imagine our media operating in WW2? Oh dear the Dam Busters didn’t carry out a spectacular raid, they killed a load of civilians which would be the BBC headline for weeks. The BBC would demand that Guy Gibson be charged as a war criminal (no doubt with Shami Shami Shami goading them) and Winston Churchill and Bomber Harris would be aggressively interviewed by Sian Williams on breakfast TV.
We will never fight a proper war again as our own media will be against us, the Falklands was the last war where the MoD managed to keep the media scum out, although as we know the BBC still tried to get British forces killed.
Sorry, this is going to be a long one – but as this Open Thread is probably about to close, I can dump it here without causing you all major scrolling problems over a few days!!
David P. wrote: “I’m thinking if there are two Guardianistas on it, there must be a Beeboid in there somewhere. Ezra Klein (who started and ran it) said somewhere that he didn’t allow any on-air reporters into the group, so if there was a BBC employee on JournoList, it would have to be a producer or someone from BBC News Online”.
Someone like the BBC’s Max Deveson, maybe?
“Max Deveson is the BBC News website’s Washington reporter. He joined the BBC in 2001…He has an obsessive interest in the US and its politics and was particularly excited to land an interview with Ted Kennedy on his first assignment in Washington this year.” (BBC biography)
If Max Deveson wasn’t a part of JournoList he really should have been, given his extraordinarilly biased coverage of the Democratic and Republican conventions in 2008. Just take a read of all his entries from the BBC website’s convention diaries:
Democrats: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/7586851.stm
Republicans: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/in_depth/americas/2008/vote_usa_2008/7598835.stm
They could have been written by any JournoLista, as they follow their collective agenda pretty much to the letter – as I shall now spell out at tedious length!!
At the Democratic convention, Deveson talks to no-one but Democrats and Democrat supporters, including several Obama strategists. His commentary throughout the four days of the Democratic conference is wholly favourable towards the Obama campaign. There is not a whiff of criticism of Obama from Max. His final post concludes that he’s a senator of “substance”.
Deveson quotes and links to Ezra Klein of the ‘American Prospect’ (and JournoList fame).
He has digs at the Clinton side and links to Politico and another article by a JournoLister, Mike Allen.
He suggests that the divisions between Clinton and Obama supporters may have been exaggerated: “Maybe it was a media-created narrative. Maybe the divisions within the Democratic Party between the Clintonistas and the Obama-ites never ran particularly deep.”
And talks to a reformed Clintonite: “Her favourite section of Mr Clinton’s speech was the part where he apologised for the comments he made during the primaries about Mr Obama’s unreadiness for the presidency.”
He exults in the “non-stop series of jibes at John McCain” from Bill Richardson, using the word “zinger” of one of them. Earlier, he enjoys more jokes at McCain’s expense: “speaker after speaker tore into Mr McCain. His multiple homes were a favourite subject for jokes.”
He attends the Jon Stewart show (every liberal’s favourite, he says).
He also attends a foreign policy debate and reports on it seriously.
He talks to an Obama-supporting journalist, Lynn Sweet of the Chicago Sun-Times (“who I was lucky enough to be sitting next to during the speech”)
He attends the Big Tent, “a specially-created space on the fringes of the convention for bloggers to blog, and left-liberal activists to discuss their pet issues,” where a few familiar names gather: “There’s a lot of variety on display up on the platform, with speakers ranging from old media stalwarts like Jonathan Alter from Newsweek and Paul Krugman of the New York Times to internet upstarts like Markos Moulitsas of the Daily Kos and Arianna Huffington of the Huffington Post. We’re even graced by the presence of a genuine liberal hero – Ted Sorenson, speechwriter for John F Kennedy. ”
He reports from an anti-Bush, anti-McCain protest.
And finally, he’s still sote about 2000, talking of Al Gore and “his narrow loss (depending on how you look at it) of the 2000 election”.
Paul Krugman was interviewed quite a few times on the BBC – including the Today programme. Always introduced as “a distinguished economist” – NEVER introduced as an arch-leftie columnist of the New York Times.
Pop his name into ‘Search’ on the BBC website and its the same story there John:
“the eminent economist Paul Krugman” (Gavin Hewitt)
“the respected economist Paul Krugman” (Gavin Hewitt)
“Nobel Laureate economics guru Paul Krugman” (Paul Mason)
Krugman’s backing for Labour’s economic policy might also have something to do with it.
… and he gave them the soundbite that Captain Insensible’s ‘rescue’ of the banks was approved by a Nobel Prize winning economist no less.
So when Captain Insensible was wrecking the economy by gross over- spending and turning his bad eye to the irresponsibility of the banking sector and the asleep-at-the-wheel Bank of England… someone remind me, where was Paul Krugman then?
Krugman got his Nobel for the same reason Jimmy Carter did: for spekaing out against George Bush.
Compare that to Max Deveson’s coverage of the Republican convention. It couldn’t be more different. It is almost wholly negative.
He spends much of his time attacking the Republicans – especially Sarah Palin – for attacking the media. (It is a theme of several of his posts). He talks to CNN’s political correspondent Candy Cowley, who is sniffy about this “tactic”. (Ms Cowley doesn’t seem to be a Republican supporter).
He highlights “plenty of grumbling within the press corps about the Republicans’ attempts to close down journalistic inquiries about Mrs Palin” and links to Joe Klein, another JournoLista for evidence.
He rehearses all the accusations against Sarah Palin and spends a lot of time mocking her. Apparently, she “confused” some delegates in Georgia” and “I did notice that the word “nuclear” was spelt “new-clear” for her on the teleprompter”.
While Max exulted at Democrat jokes at John McCain’s expense, he displays a very different attitude to Republican jokes at Barack Obama’s expense, using the word “mocking” or “mockery” several times, and talking of “rabble-rousing” from Rudy Giuliani and Sarah Palin.
He goes to another foreign policy forum (though he sounds less enthusiastic about it). He uses it to rehearse a whole list of criticisms by Democrats of John McCain under the guise of listing how the Republicans are countering (or not countering them) – a clever bit of propaganda – and ends with another dig at Sarah Palin.
He is full of snide digs at Republican delegates, especially Palin supporters (“Sarah’s my number one,” says Ladonna from Georgia, clad entirely in denim with sparkly-rimmed glasses. “Jenniffer (no, that’s not a typo)”).
He attends anther anti-Bush rally.
Now Max Deveson may very well not be involved with the JournoList crowd. All of this is circumstantial evidence. But even if he isn’t he is a very biased BBC reporter.
I’ve e-mailed Max to draw his attention to the JournaList story and ask him if he’d like to post an article on the subject. Wonder if he will!
Reading through Max Deveson’s articles on the BBC website throws up another interesting name.
“Once you get out of the convention period,” writes polling analyst Nate Silver”
(http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/7630331.stm)
“Polling analyst Nate Silver projects that Mr Obama will poll two or three points below his state-wide vote in the second district”
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/us_elections_2008/7673505.stm
Nate Silver is another name on the JournoList list.
Max has just replied that he no longer works on the BBC’s Washington desk & will pass on my request for the story to be covered by some-one who does to the relevant department. I’ve now e-mailed back to ask him, just out of curiosity, whether he ever heard anything about JournoList in his Washington days.
Of course, all this could just be coincidence piled on coincidence.
Excellent work, Craig. Yet another reason never to trust the BBC on US issues.
Good move
Thanks John.
Two more JournoList names from Max’s BBC web articles to add:
Jonathan Chait of the ‘New Republic’
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/us_elections_2008/7730485.stm
Ta-Nehisi Coates, the ‘Atlantic Monthly’
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/8166278.stm
Max Deveson has now moved on to be a senior analyst at the BBC’s Political Research Unit, and was the man who compiled the ‘Where They Stand’ guide for the BBC website’s UK general election coverage. That’s comforting to know!
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/talking_point/8605173.stm
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/election_2010/8515961.stm#subject=key&col1=conservative&col2=labour&col3=libdem
Craig
OK, Max used lots of quotes from the JournOList crowd. Did you see any serious right-wing columnist mentioned anywhere ? Or don’t the BBC even recognise they exist, that they are regarded as very senior journalists ?
There are only 27 articles in total by Max. In addition to the JournoListas, there were mentions for the following commentators, which I’ll attempt to label politically as best as I can (you can probably fill in the gaps!):
Larry Sabato, Professor of Political Science at the University of Virginia (in two articles), non-partisan
John Zogby, Democrat-supporting political analyst
Steve Kornacki, liberal columnnist for New York Observer and salon.com
David Sirota, liberal author and columnist
Tom Holbrook, professor of political science at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee
Bob Bennett, Democrat advisor
Sean Quinn, pollster (and colleague of Nate Silver at fivethirtyeight.com)
Josh Goodman, Governing.com
James Surowiecki, New Yorker
Prof. Neil Henry, Dean of the Journalism School at the University of California, Berkeley
Walter Isaacson, Time
Michael Kinsley, liberal writer at New York Times
Are there any conservatives there?
The one article (out of 27) that definitely does feature conservative voices is a post-election piece called ‘Who leads the Republican Party?‘, which quotes David Frum and Peter Wehner from the Ethics and Public Policy Center.
I sent my first e-mail to Max Deveson at 9.23 this morning. He replied saying that he had changed jobs and would forward my request for the BBC to report JournoListgate at 9.25. Thanks Max.
I sent my second e-mail asking him (very innocently) if he had himself heard anything about JournoListgate while he was working in Washington at 10.49am. He still hasn’t replied and I have the growing feeling that he won’t!
None of those names is recognisable as from the right. Which shows UTTER bias by Max ?
Even David Frum is a RINO, was arselicking Obama as fondly as the democratic “journalist” claque.
Wikileaks?
The BBC seem to have forgotten their former caution about spreading STOLEN/LEAKED information, you will remember that the BBC witheld the CLIMATEGATE emails for a long time citing legal issues however when thousands of STOLEN secret files are put on the internet about the conduct of the Afhgan war then the BBC are in like Flint, no hestitation and no legal excuses about problems publishing stolen material, funny that eh?
Climategate files STOLEN and wikileaks files are RELEASED!
Different files and different treatment by the BBC, no legal issues publishing and using secret stolen files this time, just hell for leather shoot from the hip damaging stories about the NATO campaign in Afghanistan.
Do we see two different sides to the BBC? You betcha ass we do folks!
So now we know that the BBC excuses for hiding the climategate files were pure lies and obfuscation by a biased BBC.
Oh BTW the BBC had a guest defending wikileaks and he mentioned “principled leaking”!
Ooooh really? I wonder if wikileaks would publish leaked climategate data and emails and secret files or would it just refuse on “principle”.
I wonder what political ideals and loyalty wikileaks opperate under
excellent point – and if Wikileaks revealed Climategate-related material you can be sure the BBC would be loading its reporting with plenty of disclaimers about the reliability of the information and squealing about how it was acquired
Oo, goody, a newy… and a goody… for my every-growing collection of BBCsisms: ‘principled leaking’.
That makes a nice aquatic metaphorical counter-complement to ‘watertight oversight’, eh, Mr. Black?
Part of the ‘Bad unless we like it, so it becomes good’ meme.
Sadly a guest (who, if I may ask?), but I am sure one from the ‘can be relied on’ iPhone speed-dial.
Also a wee postponement of that new level of journalistic rigour promised following that science bod lifting other folks work and passing off, as… writing… original, verified… subsatntiated… stuff… is… just… sooooo… hard.
But they are the ‘envy of the world’. Apparently.
Must be all those standards they have.