“Instead of balanced coverage you’ve got somebody, a commentator, finding a way to reaffirm the beliefs of their viewers.”
That’s Foster Kamer of the Village Voice in his dire paint-by-numbers attack on Fox News and the American Right for the BBC’s Culture Show (h/t Oliver via David Preiser).
Kamer’s item is so clichéd, so typical of lazy left-wing conventional wisdom that I wouldn’t be surprised to hear that the BBC College of Journalism is already using it as an example of best practice.
It wouldn’t have occurred to the editor of the Culture Show to commission a conservative commentator (Klavan, Breitbart, Gutfeld?) to give a different perspective on the US media for once. No, that would risk alienating the target audience – pretentious Guardian-reading dickwads. Far better to play it safe and get a reliably on-message left-wing hack to serve up the usual BBC smug prejudiced toss about the US.
How do you suppose Kamer responded to NPR’s sacking of Juan Williams? By championing open debate and free speech? No, like this:
A nasty little left-wing bigot. Not unlike the Culture Show supremo Janet Lee, in fact, as the editor of GQ Dylan Jones can testify:
Last summer, even I was subjected to a volley of abuse from a BBC executive. Janet Lee, the editor of the BBC’s flagship arts programme, The Culture Show (and who I have known for over 25 years), came up to me at a party on the Thames and, after calling me a ‘Tory ****’ proceeded to disparage the Tory leader, using ‘Etonian’ as though it were the very worst word in her lexicon of obscenities. You could tell she couldn’t work out what was worse: becoming a Tory, or admitting it.
Impartiality is in their genes.
Update Oct 25. Janet Lee’s predecessor as Culture Show editor was Eddie Morgan:
After a spell working in strategy for Granada Media, Eddie joined the BBC to work as an output editor on Newsnight.
In 2002 he took time out from TV to work as Assistant General Secretary of the Labour Party and then went to the communications firm Brunswick before returning to the BBC to help set up The Culture Show in 2004.
I wolud think that, to Biased-BBC readers, the interesting facet of the Juan Williams story is the growing chorus of calls to defund the NPR. NPR gets some of their funding via the corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB) which is the closest you get in the US to the BBC.
There’s a lot of rumbling that if the Republicans won’t pull the plug on that sort of public funding, then they’ll never go after ObamaCare, so it is becoming a bit of a litmus test.
Here’s some links:
House GOP could force vote on defunding NPR
The Real Case for Defunding NPR
Calls increase for Congress to investigate, defund NPR
Sarah Palin calls for Congress to defund NPR over Juan Williams’ firing
or is it a distraction?
One costs peanuts, the other tens or hundreds of billions. Not taking action against NPR isnt going to change anything, nor potentially mean anything either.
Mailman
NPR is like the wet half of Radio 4 in the evenings. The only thing worth a damn is Car Talk, which would do quite well on any commercial outlet if they wanted to.
DB – or David Vance
The comments by the BBC’s Janet Lee really deserves a separate post.
The whole bias thing is so blatant, “Impartiality is in our genes ” !
……………………
David Vance
Are you still writing the book on all this stuff ?
I intend to.
Foster Kamer was on the JournoList. No surprise there.
The BBC needs to be disinfected with a flame thrower.
And, of course BBC-NUJ is still onside with billionaire George Soros’ political and financial campaign against Murdoch-Fox News:
“George Soros’ war against Fox News”
http://www.investors.com/NewsAndAnalysis/Article.aspx?id=551438&p=2
I watched the begining of that Sunday programme with Susanna Reid yesterday because I caught a glimpse of Douglas Murray’s shining face, looking about ten years old.
Lo and behold, comical old lefty has-been Derek Hatton was sitting there, brought in specially to attack The Cuts.
His line of attack was:
“Tory Toffs, Tory Toffs, whadda they know, Tory Toffs?
Eton, Eton, they all went to Eton.
Tory Toffs, Tory Toffs, Whadda they know, Tory Toffs.?”
Good lyrics. Then I turned the TV off.
There was a time when even the Labour Party were embarrassed by his level of left-wing extremism, it is amazing that the BBC still dig him up to voice their partizan prejudices.
Well look what the BBC did to Kilroy when he mentioned members of the Religion of Peace, fired, contact over. Yet when Stephen Fry insults Catholic Poles nothing happens, especially since so many Poles fought on our side in the Battle of Britain.
Stephen Fry-the so called “national Treasure”
well,you know what they used to do with treasure,don’t you?
kept it hidden…..usually under the ground
See Fry’s plugging his book on the Beeb. Payback for his support for the licence fee.
He’s one of the most unpleasant people I’ve ever met. And one of the least funny.
More irony. In the August 3rd edition of Aeriel, Janet Lee recommends
Barbara Demick’s book, Nothing To Envy, an account of six defectors from North Korea. I expect Janet cannot see any similarities to North Korea in her contempt for any political oppostion and in the daily left wing output of the BBC.
Bias at the BBC? Never! So the Radio 5 12 O’clock news led off with ….. David Cameron’s speech? Er no, it started with Red Ed’s ATTACK on the Government.
Now perhaps I missed it but I can’t EVER remmeber the BBC giving top billing to Cameron when the one eyed mong was PM.
Was this the show about Glenn Beck?
This was Beeboid crap at its worst and I only lasted about 10 minutes. The bias simply dripped from every word and edit. To the point where one simply could not make sense of it, even in the programme’s own terms – ie explaining why the “right” is so popular in America today.
Impartiality in its genes. Like hell.
Richard Bacon will be discussing the US election and “where it’s gone from for Obama”
Expect a luv fest for Barry and more George Bush hate
The libbies inabilty to comprehend any other viewpoint other than their own is the weak point.
It means they always underestimate the people and the arguments.
It is like an officer class of an army never considering the enemy’s strength.
Long may the blinkers stay on.
Richard Bacon, Bacon verbally masturbating over Barry (plays clips of Barry in Chicago, “people in tears”) woman from Tea Party (on phone) keeps getting cut across by Bacon and cut off, appears to be a discussion with three liberals, Stryker Maguire, Richard Bacon and some Democrat who works for Barry.
Bacon also doesn’t understand healthcare continually going on about the poor being left to die in the streets (not something I ever noticed)
Emails read out all supporting Obama of course (oh and blaming Tories)
The BBC lied about ObamaCare from the start, doing little more than regurgitate White House talking points. All the poor people in my neighborhood get free health care at the top-flight hospital up the street – all paid for by my taxes via Medicaid or Medicare, both of which have existed for decades.
What ObamaCare did do was introduce a fine to any of those people who don’t purchase private health care from a government-authorized provider if they ever earn just enough money so they can’t get Medicare. How is that helping the working classes? It penalizes them even further.
I guess this is the second-most important election in human history, if it’s worth all this BBC effort across the spectrum of broadcasting.
Notice that with every Government policy the BBC get in the “critics say” before the BBC actually explains what the policy is. When Liebour were in power this never happened as often the BBC would have no then opposition Tory to give a view at all.
DB, are you calling Foster Kamer, “A nasty little left-wing bigot” just because he called Juan Williams a dick, or for some other unspecified reason? Because it looks a little bit strained next to you description of “pretentious Guardian-reading dickwads”!
Funnily enough, BBC Radio 4 also broadcast a programme about Glenn Beck this week. It was broadly sympathetic. Strange no-one here has mentioned it…
Hey guys the beebles just put a programe on about Glen Beck and it was broadly sympathetic ! as a pretentious Guardian-reading dickwad i am outraged at this whole 14 mins being given to this free thinking man who does not use my// sorry your taxes to tell you how the think!
I am writing to Janet [smack in the mouthable] Lee just as soon as i can put my copy of the mirror down!!
The thing I love about Beck is that he gets under the skin of lefties and rarks them up no end 🙂
He also reminds me of the kind of person who used to get hidings at school all the time because of his dry geeky sense of humour 🙂
Mailman