OPEN THREAD


Mid- week and time for a fresh open thread such is the speed that these fill up with your excellent critiques!

Bookmark the permalink.

123 Responses to OPEN THREAD

  1. ap-w says:

    Just when I thought Moaty had been done to death by the BBC (well, I know it was really the police but you know what I mean) there is a report on the scattering of his ashes the tone of which wouuld befit a war hero;

    Gunman Raoul Moat’s ashes have been scattered by his family in a river near where he spent his final hours.

    Only “close family members” were at the “private ceremony” (what sort of turnout is that for a celebrity guunman?). Unlike his funeral, which was attended “by about 120 mourners”

    Why the need to report on the scattering of his ashes two weeks after his funeral? 

       0 likes

    • Martin says:

      The scumbag got what he deserved, the very fact he’s revered by ugly fat wimmin with 4 kids who lives on benefits says it all.

         0 likes

  2. David vance says:

    They love Moaty like we loath him.  🙂

       0 likes

    • ap-w says:

      I note that they have now totally re-written the piece on the website about this. The tone of the orignal report was very misguided. 

         0 likes

  3. Pounce says:

    The bBC and its so called defence experts:  
    North Korean plane crashes in China  
    Military experts said the plane appeared to be a MiG-15, an aircraft used during the 1950-53 Korean War.  
     
    Really? It looks nothing like a Mig 15 . It looks more like a Mig 21  
    But then what do I know,I’m not a bBC defence expert

       0 likes

    • Pounce says:

      I see the bBC clones who frequent this MB have changed their Mig 15 article; 
      Military experts said the plane appeared to be a Soviet-era fighter jet, which were used during the 1950-53 Korean War. 
       
      Err bBC clones, the Mig 21 didn’t fly until 1955 and didn’t come into service until 1959, bBC defence experts indeed.

         0 likes

    • Martin says:

      Well they could get ‘experts’ like the dozy cow Kate Silverton who wanted to be seen as a ‘proper journalist’ then got to do some reporting from Afghanistan and didn’t even know the names of the vehicles the army were using, she referred to them by their colour. lovely.

         0 likes

      • Roland Deschain says:

        All women refer to vehicles by colour. It’s genetic.

        “What kind of car have you got?”
        “A red one.”

           0 likes

        • Millie Tant says:

          A flaw in the logic somewhere, old boy. I can tell a Peugeot and a Merc. Imagine! And Pounce has pointed out before the Beeboid who couldn’t tell the front end from the back of a tank. I am tired pointing out that Beeboids cannot tell the difference between the firing line and the line of fire.

             0 likes

    • deegee says:

      Quite possibly the BBC reporter never visited the crash site or saw the remains of the plane and is relying on agency reports from journalists who also never visited the crash site or saw the remains of the plane. Shades of Scoop.

         0 likes

    • Grant says:

      But why would a N. Korean warplane be flying in Chinese airspace ?

         0 likes

  4. Guest Who says:

    Just back from hols, so apols if already covered…

    http://blogs.pressgazette.co.uk/wire/6896

    Another aspect of ‘unique funding’ is suggested, whereby Aunty eventually only runs repeats 24/7 and hence pays its window watchers solely to come in and post tweets in support of their personal views, all neatly paid for in golden terms by… er… the rest of us.

    Not sure this is not already the case, mind.

       0 likes

  5. Dr A says:

    Did anyone catch  the Stephen Fry programme that followed Today his morning? IT provided a fascinatingly awful insight into how the BBC positions debate and creates the parameters for political discussion.

    Ostensibly about language, Fry’s programme was actually a feminist polemic. It came across as a hilariously stupid  half-hour rant about Gender Politics – I honestly thought I’d stumbled upon satire when I turned it on – but the more I reflect on this the more insidious it appears.

    What we had was ideology, pure and simple – a  po-faced, humourless, idiotic lefty feminism that spews out the infantile, reductivist nonsense that has “men are powerful and greedy” and “women are weak, submissive and innocent”.

    And the BBC, because of its power, are able to respectabilise and normalise this crap. How? Firstly, by running it in the first place in such a prominent slot. And secondly by getting of of their “big guns” – the Patron Saint of Shallow Intellectualism  Stephen Fry – to present.

    Frankly I think Fry is grossly overrated and grating on the nerves. And his desperate attempts this morning  to be acceptable to the scowling Professor of Gender Studies out being  “a gay man” was risible. Only in Beeboidland – honestly, you couldn’t make it up ! 
     
    Try and catch it on iPLayer- it provides yet another example of how utterly detached the stinking, stealing BBC is from the audience that is forced to fund it. It also exemplifies how intellectually corrupt and redundant the BBC has become.  Likewise, the humourlessness of the Professor of Gender Studies (which, like the BBC, we pay for) is an absolute treat. 

       0 likes

    • Millie Tant says:

      I can’t stand Stephen Fry. He’s so full of himself, looks down his nose and he is no feminist either, so I wonder what they are playingt at.  Will listen later.

         0 likes

    • David Preiser (USA) says:

      If it was anything like Fry’s shallow, self-indulgent programme where we had to listen to him convince himself that it was okay to love Wagner’s music, I’m glad I missed it.

         0 likes

    • ap-w says:

      Dr A

      From what you say I guess you might take issue with the title of the programme: “Fry’s English delights”

         0 likes

      • Dr A says:

        @ ap-w

        Well it was grammatically perfect….

        No, I just object to the arrogant and doctrinal way the BBC brainwashes is audience. The banal can be evil, as the BBC demonstrates time and again.

           0 likes

    • Chairman of Selectors says:

      Fry is beyond tedious, but nothing comes close to lefty heaven as that relentlessly ghastly QI. Most weeks, the panel is staffed by fully paid up members of the insane left (Brand, Davis, Fry, Bill Bailey and the genuinely hateful Jeremy Hardy – the list goes on and on), funded naturally, by us mugs. The whole programme is so relentless ghastly and right-on it mskes my eyes bleed. The wife seems to think it is amusing bua sadly grasps the blatant leeft wing bias in every question. On the rare occasion someone not of the insane left is on (Jimmy Carr), you can almost feel the hostility aimed at him from Jo “only white people casn be racist” Brand and Fry himself. Fry is an ex-con. I have nothing but contempt for him.

         0 likes

      • Chairman of Selectors says:

        Apologies for my sloppy typing.

           0 likes

      • ap-w says:

        You are very right about QI. I also have a wife who for some reason watches it and there is nothing more tedious than coming into the room and seeing all the dreary bores you mention, and you can chuck Sean Lock, Phil Jupitus and David Mitchell into the mix too. It has just become a mutual backslap for a cosy select group who all think the same. I remember seeing one special “European” edition of the programme, where the lefty bores had to say whether the outrageous stories about the EU read out by Fry were fact or fiction. Surprise, surprise, they were all fiction and the researchers could apparently not find any examples of ridiculous EU rule making.  The only thing I would take issue with you is on Jimmy Carr – I don’t know if you saw his appearance on Question Time a while ago but he is as much as a lefty bore as all the others.

        But worst of all the lot is Frankie Boyle, who I think has now had a little spat with the BBC. He genuinely thinks he is free from the politically correct conventions of modern comedians. Except he isn’t. In an interview I read he said that there are somethings he wouldn’t do jokes about “like racism”. Now I wouldn’t joke about racism either, but why does he feel comfortable doing jokes about children with Down’s Syndrome but not racism? Because he is as much bound up by the up-their-arse trendy conventions as to what is acceptable as the rest of them.

           0 likes

        • Millie Tant says:

          Nothing would induce me to watch QI and certainly Jimmy Carr would be no incentive for me to change my mind. Smartarses all of them.

          I have made that very point before here about the hypocrisy of Frankie Boyle only to be told that he insults everyone regardless. I know damn well he doesn’t.

             0 likes

  6. Gosh says:

    Have you guys not seen this

    http://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/news/local-national/uk/video-bbc-weatherman-gives-middle-finger-gesture-live-on-air-14914288.html

    a vidoe of bbc weatherman giving the middle finger, and they had to apologise?

       0 likes

  7. George R says:

    Islam Not BBC (BBC), Islamisation of Britain and the ending of free speech.

    The UK Coalition government, the anti-British ‘Left’, the Police, the National Union of Journalists (inc. INBBC branch?), etc., etc.,  all intend to stop the English Defence League fom having a protest march in Bradford, on 28 August.

    This is how the EDL reported an earlier demonstration:

    “English Defence League Mobilise In Bradford To Give A Hero’s Welcome To The Yorkshire Regiment”

    http://www.englishdefenceleague.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=225:english-defence-league-mobilise-in-bradford-to-give-a-heros-welcome-to-the-yorkshire-regiment&catid=42:feature-stories

    This is the ‘rational’ response of the National Union  of Journalists, which includes thousands of INBBC members, to the EDL:

    “NUJ joins the calls to stop the EDL ”

    http://www.nuj.org.uk/innerPagenuj.html?docid=1708

       0 likes

    • Cassandra King says:

      Whats the difference between a pile of rancid sh*te and the NUJ/SEJ/BBC/MCB?

      At least the rancid pile of sh*te has a use.

         0 likes

    • dave s says:

      The EDL really frightens the liberal left. This fear is leading them to reject any engagement with the issues the EDL raises and simply scream out for state backed repression. Short term ,which is the limit of their ( the libleft) reasoning ability, it may be a successful policy. Long term it is disastrous. The EDL may well be many of the things the libleft complain of but the core issue is going to have to be addressed sooner or later. The EDL know what this is. The majority population also knows. You know and I know.
      Another example of the flight from reality of the ruling elites.
      In the end only a police state will preserve their state of illusion. And  police states never last.

         0 likes

      • David Preiser (USA) says:

        If you’re interested, this is relevant to your point.


        Second-Class Americas:  How the Left Helps Create the Right it Fears and Despises

           0 likes

        • dave s says:

          Yes it was interesting. Thanks. I looked up Thomas Jefferson “and that the will of the majority- the natural law of every society- is the only sure guardian of the rights of man” The current power structures both here and in the US no longer trust us- the majority. Thus they are led to attempt to silence us first by disapproval but when this no longer works by force. The police state is the natural end to all this.
          How long have we got? That I do not know but I fear the worst.
          We will all have to choose which side we are on. The BBC has already chosen the side of the evasion of reality and truth.

             0 likes

      • It's all too much says:

        Amazing how different the BBC attitude is to islamic ‘activists’.  The EDL and vilified, but old Hooky and his mates need to be ‘understood’ ‘tolerated’ and, if they manage to avoid beheading someone for a few weeks, they should be handed a load of cash to ‘de-radicalise’ them.  Crikey, the BBC ‘celebrates’ them abd their contribution to a vibrant society.

        I find it amazing that they apply a blanket prejudice against the EDL.  Unfortunately the EDL have the ‘wrong’ opinions.

           0 likes

      • 1327 says:

        The left (and indeed the British establishments) attitude to the EDL always amuses me as it seems to alternate between ignoring them totally and then suddenly going overboard and making out that unless we ban a march they will take over the British state.

        I was out one weekend the other month and came across a small EDL demo outside a fast food outlet that had made all its chicken halal without telling anyone. It looked a pretty peaceful demo with a couple of bored Policemen watching it while drinking coffee in their car. It appears these demos appeared outside fast food outlets all over the region that weekend and were mentioned on various local internet forums. But they weren’t mentioned at all in the local paper or on any of the local TV news shows. It was it appears a non event that vanished down the memory hole.

        Oddly however the media is really bigging up the Bradford demo and I have a feeling if the EDL don’t provide the violence then someone pretending to be them will.

           0 likes

    • Maturecheese says:

      How is it that islamic groups ‘protesting’ get an altogether kinder approach when it comes to the msm, especially the BBC, yet when the people that actually BELONG HERE protest its an other story.

      I am amazed that the establishment have got away with suppressing the burning issue of mass immigration this long.  What disappoints me is my fellow countrymans apathetic attitude to it most of the time.  Most of our major cities now look like foreign countries and as far as I’m concerned already lost but what really bothers me is our towns and villages are following suite.  We really are led and ruled by Bastards.

         0 likes

    • Pierre says:

      Compare the report on the EDL march to the report on those cuddly ‘climate protestors’:

      http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-bradford-west-yorkshire-11010074
      http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-edinburgh-east-fife-11020007

      The EDL report concentrates on opposition to the march, while the climate camp report allows one of the organisers to call for people to join them! Clearly, all protests are equal, but some protestors are more equal than others.

         0 likes

  8. Umbongo says:

    Picking up on Pounce‘s comment on experts, Bill Emmott was the economics expert interviewed by Hugh Pym on Today this morning concerning the possibility of trade wars between the US and China.  Interesting though the discussion was – and Emmott is nobody’s fool – neither thought to mention the benefit to the US of China effectively subsidising its exports to the US by keeping its exchange rate artificially low.  By so doing the Chinese continue letting the US get more Chinese goods and services while, in exchange, China gets fewer US exports and more – and rapidly devaluing – US government paper.

    As Tim Worstall ( http://timworstall.com/ ) among others has written,  exporting is the hassle we go through to get our hands on what we really want ie goods and services from abroad.  In other words the only value of exports is that they allow us to import.  Accordingly, instead of giving the Chinese grief over their undervalued currency, we – and the Americans – should persuade them to lower the value even further thereby allowing us to export less to import more of what we want.

       0 likes

    • Martin says:

      China does what it likes because it is the Country buying up most of our and the US’s debt and we need them to continue to do so as no one else wants it. Another legacy of the one eyed twat.

         0 likes

  9. Millie Tant says:

    One of the things I hate about BBC News is the flying fruit bowls nonsense of the opening sequence. Now I see a flying fruit bowl has landed on the Biased BBC blog site.

    Oh, dear, did they have to target us in this way? Better a plague of locusts than a Beeboid Flying Fruit Bowl.

       0 likes

  10. David Preiser (USA) says:

    Did you guys know that today marks the end of the First 100 Days of the new Coalition Government?  I had no idea until I read it in the Spectator.  Other than Sopel mentioning it in passing just now, I certainly have heard nothing about this in the last few days on the BBC.

    For The Obamessiah, the BBC had the notorious Obama Diary: The First 100 Days, staffed by no fewer than eight BBC employees making frequent entries.  That’s for the leader of a foreign country, all at your expense.

    For the UK Government you get this:

    100 days of government in 100 seconds

    And it’s not like the BBC didn’t spend a huge amount of time reporting on US issues the whole time as well.  I bet the British Public hear more about ObamaCare when all that was going down than about any domestic UK policy at the time.

       0 likes

    • David Preiser (USA) says:

      Okay, so now the News Channel is mentioning the 100 Days.  It certainly wasn’t the case for the first hour I had the news on.  But now it’s time to rubbish the Tories for the first 100 days of each policy.  Right now some guy is on tearing into Gove’s education policy.  It’s not a coalition policy, he says, it’s a Conservative policy.  All bad news, with the female newsreader asking him leading questions only when he runs out of steam on his own.  It’s like he came in with a list of all the criticisms various Labour figures have had over the last couple months and is reading it out.  Did they do that with the US President’s policies? I forget.

         0 likes

  11. Millie Tant says:

    And they certainly weren’t keeping us informed about healthcare and other policies and developments in the dozens of other countries in Europe either. I could go on: Russia and loads of other places too. What do we know of them from the BBC?

       0 likes

  12. Grant says:

    Many Chinese have died in “mudslides” in S. China.  Are the BBC appealing for charity donations ?  If not , why not ?

       0 likes

  13. Anonymous says:

    The BBC are out to smear Rupert Murdoch again:
    http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-11014504

    No mention of the fact that Fox has historically given more to the Democrats than the Republicans:
    http://newsbusters.org/blogs/tim-graham/2010/08/18/wapo-highlights-dem-outrage-fox-donations-gop-downplays-reality-50-50-co

    Have the BBC ever mentioned the huge funding Barry receives from the lefties at MSNBC/General Electric? :
    http://www.opensecrets.org/orgs/all_recips.php?id=D000000125&type=C&filter=&stfed=F&nid=1084

       0 likes

    • David Preiser (USA) says:

      It’s very silly, considering how the vast majority of the rest of the media gives their money to Democrats and The Obamessiah, not to mention their professional support.  Murdoch’s money is a drop in the bucket by comparison.  But that doesn’t fit the BBC Narrative.

         0 likes

    • Anonymous says:

      Quite a sly paragraph here:

      “The donation from News America Inc, the parent company of Fox News, helped the RGA more than double its fundraising in the second quarter of 2010.”

      A casual reader may think the donation doubled fundraising from $1m to $2m when the quarterly amount raised was $19m.

      Also, the BBC are very quiet about their own soft loan facilities  received from the EU European Investment Bank. That facility is worth millions, perhaps tens of millions of Euros. So, if the BBC think Murdoch giving $1m to the Republicans is newsworthy and may skew news output why do they accept financing from the European Union?!

         0 likes

      • David Preiser (USA) says:

        It’s also pretty lame for Mark Mardell to compare the bosses’ donations only, when it’s all the journalists who donate their money and time to the Democrats are the ones doing the actual biased reporting.

        Not to mention that Jeffery Immelt, the boss of NBC, scolded his employees for being too critical of The Obamessiah.  Mardell forgot to mention that, of course.

        I like how Mardell thinks that it’s surprising that Fox News showed “without interruption” that speech and Q&A session the President had earlier.  It’s the same one the BBC was showing on the News Channel earlier, instead of wasting time on silly things like UK politicians and policies on the 100th Day of the new Government. Which organization is supposed to be blatantly biased again?

           0 likes

  14. Scrappydoo says:

    BBC TV has become unwatchable.  I made the mistake of watching a program about benefit cheats.   A serious subject ?   Not for the desperate BBC.  Every program now has to have stupid irrelevant sound effects and the requirement to shamelessly repeat sections  over and over to pad out the program (or to remind viewers with a very short attention span).  I expect this type of format in a light hearted entertainment show such as “You Have Been Framed“, where viewers send in their comic home movies, but the BBC now has to make all programs jokey and matey. The  BBC demonstrates little respect for viewers. The only explanation is that that BBC TV program makers are on drugs.     How long before BBC radio goes the same way?

       0 likes

    • Martin says:

      BBC TV for the most part is just utter shit.

         0 likes

    • It's all too much says:

      Don’t forget that most of the BBC is either an exercise in social(ist) engineering deramed up by Gramscites (East Enders) or written by people who have an utter contempt for their viewers

         0 likes

    • Millie Tant says:

      Yes, almost any programme you watch on the BBC turns out to be unwatchable. I can’t stand all that accompanying sound. It’s just annoying noise, noise, noise all the way. Do they seriously imagine that no one can sit down and enjoy viewing and listening without noise being added? It’s the same whether it’s the news headlines, a Newsnight report, a documentary or a light entertainment programme. And the jokey matiness is just so out of place and so juvenile.

         0 likes

      • John Anderson says:

        I tried to listen to the first two episodes of The Normans – listen, not watch.  Almost impossible because of the background music non-stop.

        Now HERE is some TV worth watching – blog-TV – where an 80-year old black scholar (and gentleman) takes Obama apart :

        http://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2010/08/026982.php

        No music, no visuals – just a very sensible man answering questions about the state of the US.

           0 likes

        • Grant says:

          John ,

          That is a fantastic link.  I would urge everyone, if they have the
          time ,to look at that interview.  The sort of thing which would never, ever, appear on the dumbed-down , crap, BBC.

             0 likes

    • 1327 says:

      The endless recapping what has just happened 5 minutes ago irritates me but really really annoys Mrs 1327 who has a habit of yelling at the TV then turning it off in disgust when this happens. It seems to have started in American programs who would recap after the ad breaks and then spread to Channel 4 made programs. Now the Beeb do it and they don’t have adverts !

      The assumption appears to be that the viewer has the mental capacity of a retarded goldfish.

         0 likes

    • Grant says:

      Scrappydoo,
      Quite right.  The endless, mindless, ” music ” for no purpose drives me nuts. Not to mention the idiotic self-advertisements between programmes. How much do they cost ?

         0 likes

  15. spooky says:

    Had the day off on Tuesday and my girlfriend had the Jeremy Vine show on radio 2 on (female standin for Mr Vine). Subject was if Tony Blair was right or wrong to donate his royalties to the RBL. In the one corner (by phone) was Blair’s biographer John Rentoul and  in the studio was a rent-a-quote zombie from the the “Stop the War against terrorists” Coalition. He introduced himself as a member of a “broad based coalition which has the support of the majority of the British public.” BBC naturally made no challenge and it was left to Rentoul to point out STWC are a front for the SWP.
    Nor was the point raised that STWC, along with fellow “pacifists” CND , and supporters like Galloway and Benn have made a nice profit from wriring and broadcasting about Iraq. Will they be giving any of their money to the British Legion. Why do these “peace” groups resolutely refuse to condemn Islamic terrorism? Indeed as STWC supports the “insurgents” who are murdering British troops why were these scum asked on the radio at all?

       0 likes

    • Martin says:

      They are invited on as they are the sort of people your average beeboid meets, bet it at a Coke party in Islington or sharing around a rent boy or two.

         0 likes

      • Grant says:

        At a BBC party is “pass the rent boy” the equivalent of “pass the parcel” ?

           0 likes

    • hippiepooter says:

      Fantastic post Spooky.  The BBC is not shy about reporting the racist and BNP antecedents of the EDL, but with the “Stop the War against Terrorists” Coalition (as you so excellently phrase it) they’re hand in glove with the trots who run it in covering up where they’re coming from.  Why indeed do these people get on.  Its because the BBC is riven with subversives like them and needs to be purged.

         0 likes

    • Grant says:

      Well said, Spooky.  But I am concerned that you listen to the BBC on your day off. The only BBC I listen to on a day off is ” Test Match Special “. In fact that is often why I take a day off !

         0 likes

  16. Will says:

    When the Mail came up with this story
    A man of 21 with learning disabilities has been granted taxpayers’ money to fly to Amsterdam and have sex with a prostitute.

    His social worker says sex is a ‘human right’ for the unnamed individual – described as a frustrated virgin.

    http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1303273/Councils-pay-disabled-visit-prostitutes-lap-dancing-clubs.htmlthe BBC were fully in support of visits to prostitutes, conjuring up the sappy idea that all whores have hearts of gold & would therefore have the patience & sensitivity to take the cherry of disabled folk in a mutually mind blowing coupling.Oh dear today the BBC have to let us know that surprisingly prostitution has a seamy side, with concerns over people traffiicing being expressed by BBC types at a Feminist charity & AI. Perhaps it should not be encouraged with taxpayer support
    http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-11012084

       0 likes

    • Millie Tant says:

      This is more earnest State nannying. There are loads of people who can’t manage to have sex with anyone for a myriad of reasons: because they are too shy, too odd, too unappealing, too inept and don’t know how to chat up someone or how to approach or complete the deed or they have silly ideas about themselves or sex or whatever.
       
      But the State doesn’t take charge of their sex lives. The State doesn’t bother about them at all. Nobody is bleating about their human rights or doling out taxpayers’ money to them to go and buy it, thereby exploiting some girl or woman maybe forced into prostitution, from a poor country most likely, or hooked on drugs. Those who cannot manage their own sex lives are not in any special category, protected by law from discrimination, and neither are those girls or women, it seems, so the ever-so-caring Nanny State does not care.

         0 likes

  17. Pounce says:

    Contining from my post on the Israel thread here are a couple of snippets the bBC hasn’t bothererd airing:

    (Helmend) A Taliban gulag has been uncovered in Afghanistan.NATO-led troops discovered the ramshackle jail near Musa Qaleh in Helmand province, in the southern region of the country, NATO’s International Security Assistance Force said on Wednesday.”Multiple intelligence sources and tips from Afghan citizens led to a combined Afghan and coalition force operation,” the ISAF said in a statement.Soldiers discovered 27 Afghan men in the prison, who were found shackled and showed signs of having been tortured. Five additional prisoners were killed during the firefight.

    Six policemen were poisoned and then killed on Monday afternoon in turbulent Kandahar province by the Taliban, provincial officials said

    Taliban militants killed an Afghan government official and his wife in southern Afghanistan, a government spokesman said Wednesday.

    But the bBC does report this story;
    Two ex-employees of a security company owned by the US firm formerly known as Blackwater have pleaded not guilty to charges of killing two Afghans in 2009.

    Strange how anything which puts the Taliban in a negative light isn’t published, yet anything that do likewise with the Brits or Yanks is on faster than you can say Happy Ramadan at the bBC.

       0 likes

  18. Betty Swollocks says:

    Am I wrong or has it been Alistair Darling/Ed Balls free day on the BBC today ?? 

       0 likes

  19. George R says:

    BBC’s Mardell, the Obama worshipper, tries some ‘irony’ against BBC’s enemy, ‘Fox News’, unwittingly not realising that his words can be turned against the BBC:

    “Somewhat tongue-in-cheek, the organisation’s self promotion constantly repeats the phrase ‘fair and balanced’.”

    http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/thereporters/markmardell/2010/08/does_a_donation_to_republicans.html

       0 likes

    • Martin says:

      What the fat git Mardell forgets is ‘WE’ are forced to pay a mandatory donation to BBC/Liebour every year called theTV tax. The fat twat might like to remember that.

         0 likes

    • Craig says:

      I had to laugh at Mardell’s complimentary use of a JournOLista, John B Judis, in an article about media bias!:

      In an excellent article, John B Judas argues that populism is a deep current in American politics and that it need not only be a tool of the right

      (The mispelling of Judis’s name is Mardell’s own!!)

         0 likes

      • David Preiser (USA) says:

        I totally missed that!  Nice catch, Craig.  It’s getting comical now.

        I suppose since Mardell was Europe editor at the time, he would be unaware that the entire Obamessiah election campaign rode a wave of populism.  All that banker bashing and “the rich need to pay their fair share” stuff the President was constantly barking about last year is Populism 101.  Mardell missed that as well, apparently.  Still learning his patch, I guess.

           0 likes

      • Grant says:

        And of course all “populism” is bad !

           0 likes

    • ap-w says:

      On the Radio 4 6pm news the newsreader explained that although donations by broadcasters were common in the USA, “this one has raised eyebrows, as Mark Mardell reports”. Whose eyebrows? What sort of journalism is that? The report as others have commented on was just the usual sneering BBC anti-Fox News bile. What it boiled down to was that the main crime of Fox News was to donate more money to the Republicans than any other broadcaster has to the Democrats. It’s a wonder my car radio survived Mardell’s smug reminder that there is no obligation for broadcasters to be imparital in the USA.

         0 likes

  20. Craig says:

    Mark Easton is back on drugs again:

    Drugs policy: The ‘British system’
    http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/thereporters/markeaston/2010/08/drugs_policy_the_british_system.html

    The liberalisation of drugs policy is one of the recurring themes of his very left-wing blog, and it’s never hard to work out where his sympathies lie.

    Other examples from this year are:

    Tension at heart of drug classification
    http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/thereporters/markeaston/2010/07/tension_at_heart_of_drug_classification.html

    Critical public interest
    http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/thereporters/markeaston/2010/06/foi_home_office.html

    Hard drugs and weak evidence
    http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/thereporters/markeaston/2010/04/hard_drugs_and_weak_evidence.html

    When the drug laws don’t work
    http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/thereporters/markeaston/2010/03/when_the_drug_laws_dont_work.html

    One of the very few times in the months leading up to the general election when Easton took a break from Tory-bashing and actually criticised a Labour minister was over this very issue. It wasn’t much of an attack on Labour admittedly, being mainly directed at civil servants (for supressing a report that might be helpful to those campaigning for a liberal drugs policy, specially the pro-legalisation group Transform):

    Democracy only works if you have well-informed public debate. So why did senior civil servants (and a Labour minister) believe it was legitimate to consider withholding official information simply because it might be used to criticise government policy?

    Still, for Easton to criticise a Labour minister at all in the first half of this year was a real rarity. Drugs liberalisation must be a subject very close to his heart.

       0 likes

    • Craig says:

      In a purely disinterested way, of course. That goes without saying.

         0 likes

    • Martin says:

      I strongly suspect now the Tories are in power we won’t see Sheena parroting Government spin as facts like we used to get from Sheena in the ‘good old days’

      I’m expecting him to start banging on about knife crime going up soon.

         0 likes

  21. Craig says:

    Main headline on the BBC website tonight?  
     
    Benefits review ‘shocking betrayal’ says Labour  
    http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-11017908
     
     
    Attacks by Labour, in the form of David Miliband and Yvette Cooper, and Dot Gibson, general secretary of the National Pensioners Convention, dominate the article.    
     
    For a sense of how far-Left Dot Gibson is (not that the BBC itself would tell you this):  
     
    Dot Gibson (Nat Pensioners Convention and tUSP) described the massive social problems in Britain today and the need for a socialist response.  She announced the Demo to Defend the Welfare State on April10th. 
    http://www.cnwp.org.uk/news.77.htm

       0 likes

  22. Martin says:

    God Newsnight, ‘splits’ again and Michael Prick looking an utter tool hectoring Clegg, what a mong.

       0 likes

    • David Preiser (USA) says:

      Yes, there’s a rift between IDS and Cameron, between Fox and somebody or other, between Clegg and whatever.  Everybody fighting, Cameron going off without consulting ministers, etc.

      Seems like a perfect opportunity to have David Miliband on to explain his Labour leadership position on the issue of benefit reform.  Wark helpfully guiding him along, telling him openly she wants to hear his stance as a leadership candidate.  And she’s not even listening to him now, doesn’t want to hear it if he’s not following the script.  He went off the prepared script and she didn’t notice, and he had to correct her.  Why is this 100th Day of the new Government an appropriate time for a Labour leadership challenge interlude?  Seems a bit forced.

      The panel discussion features:  Fraser Nelson (Conservative), Tony Blair’s old policy strategist to attack the Tories, and a LibDem woman whose first statement of the evening is that David Miliband is a “great thinker”.  So this is supposed to be two against one (one each of the governing parties versus one for the opposition) ends up being one against three, including Kirsty, who is openly trying to establish that a properly led Labour Party will get it right whereas the Coalition has it wrong.

         0 likes

      • davejanfitz says:

        i agree the beeb are in attack mode,notice that the liebore person always sits on the left of the presenter,newsnight,Question time,to name just two.When they have a close up of the presenter the liebore bod is always the last in shot…..

           0 likes

  23. David Preiser (USA) says:

    Hey, Allen Little:  When you’re done in that Bosnian town criticizing Catholic Croats for Newsnight, why don’t you come down to my neighborhood in Manhattan and wring your hands over people flying a different national flag than that of the country in which they live?  The only time I ever saw the Stars and Stripes proudly displayed on my block was on Sept. 12, 2001.  Otherwise it’s all Dominican flags.

    While you’re at it, you can laugh at the crazy religious beliefs of the locals?  Oh, wait, they’re Hispanic not Europeans so never mind.

    Idiot.  He’s only doing this because the BBC likes to laugh at believing Christians, and especially because these Croats are doing it in a majority Muslim area.

       0 likes

  24. Will says:

    France is to begin deporting Roma (Gypsies) as part of a crackdown on illegal camps in the country.
    The BBC Radio reports are summed up (in typical BBC syle) much as follows
    The BBC’s Christian Fraser in Paris says that with the president’s poll rating sagging, there are some who accuse him of using the recent unrest to boost his own popularity
    Why is it regarded as sinister that a democratically elected politician acts in accordance with the will of the voters?
    http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-11020429

       0 likes

    • Roland Deschain says:

      That would be a bit like Obama using the oil spill to boost His sagging popularity, then.  How reprehensible.

         0 likes

    • Grant says:

      Notice Sarkozy’s poll rating is “sagging”  , but not Obama’s.

         0 likes

  25. Roland Deschain says:

    Oh goody.  I can’t wait for this programme.

       0 likes

    • Grant says:

      Make sure you have your sick bag by the radio, Roland !

         0 likes

    • Buggy says:

      “….to Moazzam almost joining the British army…..”

      Jeez-Louise, this is going to be a thinnnnnn programme if they’re reduced to including things our peaceable chum has almost done.

      NEWSFLASH:

      I’ve just flapped my arms and jumped two feet in the air, ergo I’ve almost managed to fly to the moon under my own power !! So where’s my prog, BBC ? Eh? Eh?

         0 likes

  26. Guest Who says:

    Bit of fun tx to the favourite breakfast show of er.. ‘many’.

    The only tweet I have encountered today:

    BBCBreakfast   Awww, thanks! RT @Fadstar: I love BBC Breakfastabout 3 hours 

    But can’t help but notice this fan’s bio (she is appropriately, from another planet, and hence their perfect demographic):

    Im Fad. I Tweet cause sometimes I get bored.

    Works on many levels. Bless. Guessing she is one of the gazillion A* grads they are trotting out who didn’t get their first choice at Uni…. and it’s nothing to do with the last 13 years at all, as Mr. Miliband was allowed to reassure us on via Newsnight yesterday.

       0 likes

  27. Bupendra Bhakta says:

    OnThe Toady Show this a.m there camethe quote;

    ‘… students who had done less well than they had expected in their A levels’.

    So why the grammatically clumsy/incorrect ‘done less well’?

    I suppose the first draft by someone ill-versed in the ways of the BBC had (correctly) used the word ‘worse’ rather than ‘done less well’.  But the news editor when they had scraped her off the floor and applied water of Cologne to her temples, altered the ‘worse’ to ‘done less well’.  ‘Worse’, you see is clearly pejorative, and in the soft liberal left hopey changey world of the BBC all must succeed. 

    The poor originator of the story will have been sent to the icy wastes of Salford for re-education.

    As ever when it comes to honesty, transparency, intelligence and partiality the BBC are proving a complete and utter deferred success

       0 likes

  28. John Anderson says:

    Last night the BBC World Service had yet another programme extolling the virtues of the Koran, how beautifully it is chanted (cue awful drone),  how it is the word and only word of God, how it does not matter that young children in Britain are forced to spend hour after hour trying to learn it in Arabic,  yada yada yada.

    What the hell is the BRITISH World Service doing promoting an alien religion to the skies ?  Has the Wordl Service been taken over by Islam ?

       0 likes

  29. Umbongo says:

    Who in the real world actually believes that the “improving” grades achieved by those taking “A” levels have any meaning?  Aside from the educational establishment (which sold the pass on education 50+ years ago), the BBC and politicians from all the major parties, nobody is fooled.  Anecdotal I know, but not one – and I mean not one – of my friends or acquaintances in business or socially, with or without children going through the system, has any doubt that the state education system is effectively broken and that our children (and the country) are being badly let down by the kidology of the examinations results celebrated here http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-11012369 by the BBC. 

    On Today this morning, for instance, although one contributor said that she employs non-graduates, the theme was that more graduates inevitably translates into better educated 22 year olds and better jobs.  This is self-evident crap because many (probably a majority) of the degree issuing institutions are crap, delivering inappropriate and crap qualifications to the poor noodles who are fooled by the culprits named above that this is the way to “success”.

    Maybe the coalition should be really revolutionary and, for once in two generations, be honest with our children.  Maybe the coalition should tell them that they have been badly let down and the level of attainment on the basics at primary and secondary education is a disgrace; that most of those going into tertiary education will be wasting three years and the £20,000+ it will cost them.  Maybe they should be informed that lining up for mind-numbing possibly dead-end jobs at 22 weighed down with a load of debt is worse than going into the same job at 16 and getting some experience which would enable them to support themselves and a family just when their contemporaries are graduating from the Unversity of Central Nowhere.  Maybe someone will add that much of their debt has been created by paying academic parasites who purvey the useless qualifications and who are no better than conmen.

       0 likes

    • David Preiser (USA) says:

      Why am I getting the impression that each segment of the relentless BBC coverage of this issue begins under the aegis of equal opportunity but ends up being a plea for equality of outcome?

         0 likes

  30. Will says:

    Professor Robert Bartlett was right on message to conclude his 3 part programme on the Normans. We had a what the Muslims have done for us (mainly having preserved pre-Muslim texts – but Muslim featured larger than Greek/Byzantine) and a final hymn of praise to the glorious multi-cultural society existing under Norman Mediterranean rule.

       0 likes

    • Roland Deschain says:

      I lost count of the number of times he said “multi-cultural”.  I assumed he had a quota to reach in terms of his contract.

      It was a shame, because it’s been a generally interesting series, but the multi-cultural bit seemed to have been shoehorned into the last episode.

         0 likes

    • Millie Tant says:

      I didn’t actually sit down and listen to this throughout but it was on and I flitted in and out hearing bits of it. Lots of battles…cutting off hands and feet – and heads, dear God…annoying accompanying music… Crusaders… Italy…Popes….Sicily…Jerusalem… art, culture…Islam this and Islam that. And then at the end, I heard it: mulitculti. Aha!
      It reminded me of hearing him saying in the first programme that Scotland was a multi-ethnic society when the Normans arrived.  Bleugh!

         0 likes

  31. John Anderson says:

    All this multi-culti rubbish – how about Barbarossa’s terrorism of Aegean islands,  how about the massacres of Christians such as at Otranto in southern Italy,  the long brutal history of the Barbary Pirates and their slave trade (when will the BBC do a full programme on them, I wonder.)

    On Sicily, a major Norman conquest,  there is a wealth of fine Norman architecture.  Plus some of the finest Greek temples and amphitheatres in the Med,  plus fine Roman remains such as the largest remaining sets of mosaics.

    Of  the Moors – nothing of any significance.  So where is the “culti” ?

    …………………

    I rather like the Sardininian flag – denoting the four times they repulsed Moorish invaders.  I had to buy the Tshirt! :

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flag_of_Sardinia

       0 likes

    • dave s says:

      I fell asleep in the end. What could have been an interesting subject ended up like most of the BBC’s offerings.- strictly according to the manual of cultural correctness. If he is a professor then  God help his students.

         0 likes

  32. PDC says:

    Here’s a story that I don’t think the BBC has covered. Wonder why.
    http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/pakistan/7952496/British-cabinet-ministers-airlifted-to-safety-after-Pakistan-aid-convoy-attack.html
    If anyone doubts how undeserving Pakistan is of our aid then read that.
    Islamic fundamentalism is so rife in Pakistan, people would starve or die of disease than take aid from infidels.

       0 likes

    • Roland Deschain says:

      I have no problem with that.  Darwinism at its finest.

         0 likes

      • Martin says:

        Yep let the bastards stave.

           0 likes

        • Cassandra King says:

          I hope the floods wash the whole cesspit into the sea to be quite frank, the Pakistanis have caused so much trouble and strife and produced so many rabid islamist savages that I cannot spare even the minimal level of human compassion to them and their nation.
          Who in their fight mind would give a penny to ‘people’ who want us dead?

             0 likes

  33. Pounce says:

    The bBC, reporting on an MP caught driving without insurance and quite a few missing snippets of information.  
    Bolton MP Qureshi banned from driving  
    Bolton South East MP Yasmin Qureshi has been banned from driving for six months after admitting using her mobile phone while behind the wheel.  
     
    So according to the bBC this MP (anybody know what party as the bBC kind of left (there’s a clue) that out) was banned for getting caught using a dog and bone whilst at the wheel. But hang on what’s this much further down the article;  
      

    “She also pleaded guilty to driving without insurance, saying she thought the policy had been renewed. “
     
    And here is how the Guardian reports that story;  
    MP loses licence for driving without insurance while using mobile phone  
    Howard Sloane, prosecuting, said the MP already had nine points on her licence when she was stopped shortly before 3pm on 10 May by police who spotted her speaking into her mobile phone while driving her silver Vauxhall Astra along Wigan Road, Bolton.She had committed a previous offence of using her mobile phone while driving, in 2008, and two speeding offences, one in 2007 and the other last year.    

       

    Instead of reporting the news, the bBC waxes lyrical about how how this women is the second female asian (read muslim) MP in the UK.    

       0 likes

    • John Anderson says:

      But I thought failure to have motor insurance – IMHO a really serious offence – hardly ever occurred among immigrant communities.

         0 likes

    • Martin says:

      Hmm I haven’t heard this story on the BBc radio news, although they did tell me over and over that some footerist called Joey Cole got banned for speeding. He must be a Tory then and she a Socialist.

         0 likes

  34. deegee says:

    Weapons of Mass Distraction. BBC and Guardian

       0 likes

  35. David Preiser (USA) says:

    Well that was the most cheeseball collection of platitudes I’ve heard in some time.  “Good neighbors” with Pakistan?  I need an insulin shot. Gordon Brown is the most compassionate man ever, isn’t he?  I’m glad the BBC found time to give him a little platform for the cause (of rehabilitating his image).

       0 likes

  36. Pounce says:

    Here’s a perfect example of how the bBC promotes their version of a story on which to send a different  mesage.  
    US pledges Pakistan full support in flood crisis  
    The US has pledged its full support for flood-hit Pakistan, ahead of an emergency session of the UN intended to boost the international response….He said much-needed helicopters had been diverted from the war in Afghanistan to deliver aid and rescue stranded people in north-west Pakistan, where the flooding began.  
     
     
    And what the bbC doesn’t tell you. The US sent 4 CH47 Chinooks and 2 UH60 (Blackhawks) weeks ago. These have been replaced by  15 utility kites carried by theUSS Peleliu curently stationed off Pakistan with 15 more kites on their way.  
     
     
    So on that note, from watching the bBC how many people here knew the US has had helicopters aiding the relief effort for the past fortnight?  
    Strange as always out of the top ten aid givers only one country is Islamic. (But have another look at its status of Aid
    So much for that Muslim Brotherhood and during Ramadan as well.

       0 likes

  37. TrueToo says:

    It’s endless mushy sob stories on Pakistan on the World Service with virtually nothing reported on the aid programme. The brain-damaged lefty “editors” must have made a conscious decision to keep hammering away at the “human interest” angle at the expense of everything else in order to drum up support for more aid.

    Hell, if people start to get the idea that the crisis, large as it is, was hugely exaggerated, they will obviously be less inclined to donate. I expect the BBC to remain especially silent about receding floodwaters and American hands-on aid to the hungry and homeless.

       0 likes

  38. Craig says:

    If there was a JournOLista working at the BBC at the time of the 2008 US election, Max Deveson (then working for their online Washington team) remains the likeliest candidate by some margin.

    All the circumstantial evidence for that can be found on this old Open Thread (pages 11-12):
    http://biasedbbc.tv/2010/07/open-thread_22.html#comments

    A new twist in the story from the Daily Caller (which has been breaking the JournOList story) may, if it’s true, put Max even more in the frame:

    Was J-list in the service of J-Street?
    http://dailycaller.com/2010/08/03/was-j-list-in-the-service-of-j-street-2

    It highlights the links between many JournOListas and an organization called J Street, which “is a relatively new leftist lobby, PAC and educational foundation that calls itself “Obama’s blocking back” and takes positions critical or outrightly opposed to Israeli defense policy, the Netanyahu-led government, the Cast Lead operation, sanctions against Iran, and the interdiction of the Turkish IHH flotilla en route to Gaza.” 

    One of the BBC articles by Max Deveson that I didn’t mention on that Open Thread was this article from April 2008:

    US Jewish lobby gains new voice
    http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/7349371.stm

    Deveson begins:

    Are liberal Jewish voices in America being drowned out by powerful conservative lobbyists? A group of prominent left-leaning Jewish-Americans thinks so. They have launched a new lobbying organisation, called J Street, which they hope will redress this perceived imbalance.

    His article goes on to present a sympathetic portrait of the organisation.

    If Max Deveson wasn’t a JournOLista, he should have been!

       0 likes

    • Craig says:

      Checking the links on the Dally Caller article reveals that the JournOListas co-ordinated their initial plugs for J Street for April 15th 2008:

      Matt Yglesias, Apr 15 2008
      http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2008/04/j-street/44373

      Spencer Ackerman, Apr 15 2008
      http://washingtonindependent.com/1656/reframing-the-israel-debate

      Kevin Drum (quoting Laura Rozen), Apr 15 2008
      http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2008_04/013524.php

      Ezra Klein, April 15, 2008
      http://www.prospect.org/csnc/blogs/ezraklein_archive?month=04&year=2008&base_name=j_street_1

      And when was Deveson’s article published on the BBC News website?:

      Page last updated at 11:21 GMT, Wednesday, 16 April 2008 12:21 UK
      http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/7349371.stm

         0 likes

      • Craig says:

        Deveson doesn’t quote any known JournOListas in that article, but the ‘independent expert’ he quotes, University of Florida political scientist Ken Wald, says things a JournOLista would say.

        Here’s what Wald says elsewhere about the Tea Party:

        “It’s the kind of movement that attracted McCarthyites in the 1950s,” he said. “It is an open door for all kinds of extremists; all kinds of people will hop onto this movement. You see a lot of hostility to bankers that may be code text that will worry the Jews. It’s ironic, because this new kind of populism came along just as Jews were starting to penetrate the Republican Party organizationally.”
         
        Wald said the GOP faces some difficult choices as it tries to absorb major elements of the Tea Party movement without getting tarnished by its reputation for extremism and, in some cases, nuttiness — choices that will affect the party’s prospects with Jewish voters and donors alike.  
        http://www.thejewishweek.com/news/national/rand_paul_victory_poses_risks_jewish_republicans_tea_party_movement_surges

        And on Sarah Palin:

        Among Florida Jewish voters, according to University of Florida political scientist Ken Wald, “there’s a great deal of resistance to her for a couple of reasons. First, on the issues, she’s simply wrong. Jews as a group are pro-choice, anti-gun, and generally associated with liberal values on social and economic issues. Even many orthodox Jews, who are somewhat more traditionalist, are hardly raging social conservatives. The fact that her church hosted a Jews for Jesus speaker–at a service she attended and applauded–adds insult to injury. (Many in the Jewish community consider Jews for Jesus as a group that seeks the continuation of the Holocaust by peaceful means.)”
         
        In addition, Wald told the Huffington Post, “among middle-class Jewish career women in particular, there’s a resentment bordering on rage that somebody so obviously unqualified was appointed on the assumption that she would appeal to women. As women of accomplishment, they deeply resent the pandering and take it quite personally.”
        http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/10/18/the-palin-plunge-voters-s_n_135857.html

        Sounds suspiciously like a JournOLista to me!

           0 likes

      • John Anderson says:

        Obviously just an innocent coincidence !

           0 likes

    • David Preiser (USA) says:

      I remember that J Street piece.  Suddenly the BBC approves of the Jewish Lobby.  Tools.

      If nothing else, it’s more proof of  where the BBC takes its lead on reporting US issues.

         0 likes

      • John Anderson says:

        That is the biggest criticism of BBC reporting from the US.  It is just recycling of what JournoListas write.

        As such stuff is available on the Internet – why do we have to pay for a big team in Washington ?  They could just employ a subeditor in London to do the cribbing.

           0 likes

  39. Julio says:

    File under ‘degenerate BBC employee behaviour’

    BBC presenter who claimed he killed gay lover prosecuted for wasting police time

    Ray Gosling, the BBC presenter, will be prosecuted for wasting police time after claiming that he had killed a gay lover.

    The 70-year-old presenter apparently confessed to smothering his lover as he lay in hospital dying of Aids during a programme broadcast in February.

    He was arrested and questioned for 30 hours about the claim.
    Gosling initially refused to disclose the identity of the man he said he had killed saying he had made a pact with him.
    He had told a BBC Inside Out documentary that he had smothered the man with a pillow as he lay in a hospital bed in “terrible, terrible pain”.

    Gosling later admitted that he had disclosed the name of the man whose life he said he hand ended under police questioning.

    But a Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) spokeswoman said there is now “sufficient evidence” to prove he was lying.
    Helen Allen of the CPS said Nottinghamshire Police have been informed Gosling should be prosecuted for wasting police time.

    http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/law-and-order/7955584/BBC-presenter-who-claimed-he-killed-gay-lover-prosecuted-for-wasting-police-time.html

       0 likes