UPDATE to my post yesterday about the union protests in Wisconsin. The BBC has dramatically changed the news brief since I wrote the post. They’ve clearly updated it to reflect the Dems going AWOL. I think that part of the story deserves its own report, but never mind. Unfortunately, NewsSniffer has no trace of this report at all, so no hard proof other than the quotes I pulled yesterday.
Changes made: Headline and lead, as they updated it following story developments. This meant the removal of that emotionally charged language from the intro, which is a good thing. They even give quotes from both the Dems and the Governor, providing actual balance for a change. In addition, the sub-editor inserted the following qualifier into the line I highlighted about the misrepresentation of the bill and bargaining rights: “except for matter of salary”. Not perfect, but definitely an improvement, slightly more of a reflection of the reality I provided. At least the union talking points have been mitigated. That was a main component of my complaint.
Unfortunately, the BBC decided to censor the part about the unions going to the Governor’s home and harassing his family. This is not good. It’s the BBC sanitizing the protesters and hiding the truth about behavior from the Left. They also continue to censor the news of the teachers busing in students, the Hitler/Nazi stuff, and the other violent rhetoric. If this had been a Tea Party protest, the only photos provided by the BBC would be of some idiot with a Hitler poster. That double standard is still entrenched in BBC editorial policy.
One step forward, two steps backwards, I guess.
UPDATE to the UPDATE: Click here to see the BBC’s slideshow of the protests in Wisconsin. Not a swastika in sight. Compare and contrast this to their coverage of protests they don’t like, e.g. Tea Party ones. Where’s the BBC mewling about the “anger” here? Instead, it’s all presented as perfectly justifiable concern. All we ever heard from Mark Mardell and his colleagues about the Tea Party was how angry we were, and how we never liked the President anyway. No mention here of how Democrat unions never liked the Republican Governor anyway. Did any Tea Partiers ever try to storm a government building? How many arrests have been made at Tea Party protests across the country? I forget.
UPDATE II: Now the Wisconsin Education Association Council has published the home addresses of state legislators (link to pdf file is directly below the big red Stop sign). Amusingly, the union supporters in the comments on that page are calling the Republicans “fascists”. Hey, BBC: Did any Tea Party protests harass people and their families in their own homes? Was this ever encouraged by any Tea Party groups, BBC? Who’s angry and dangerous, then? What happened to the President’s wonderful words in Tucson about togetherness? He’s not being very bi-partisan or helping cool down the rhetoric now, is He? BBC Narrative failure.
FOX NEWS, Glenn Beck (Feb 17, 2 min video clip)
An alternative to BBC-NUJ propaganda on this can be found at link below:
“Apocalypse Now: Wisconsin vs. Big Labor; Plus: More out-of-state union recruiting & another teacher speaks up for Walker”By Michelle Malkin http://michellemalkin.com/2011/02/18/apocalypse-now-wisconsin-vs-big-labor/
Malkin rocks! Wish we had someone feisty like her and Ann Coulter over here to counteract the leftwing mainstream media. The US is much better organised in this regard. How we desperately need some activist centre-right radio stations to offset the corrosive effect of the BBC.
We used to have Talk Sport (or as it was called in the days when it had several fiesty right wing presenters, Talk Radio). Now its talk output varies from extreme left, George Galloway, through to centre. The right of centre “shock jocks” have all been fired.
Only LBC remains with at least some output right of centre, but it’s very PC an uncontroversial.
I suppose one reason for the demise of free speach on the radio must be that any utterances deemed too right wing these days almost certainly breech some broadcasting guidline or even some law as racist, as a hate crime, as incitement to violence, or as offensive.
I remember Talk Sport were forced to sack several of their presenters following complaints to the broadcasting watchdog. James Whale and Jon Gaunt are two that come to mind. They were replaced by lefties.
Yes, I know Talksport, but ever since they binned Charlie Wolf some years ago, there has not been anyone of the centre-right persuasion with sufficient intellectual capacity to speak clearly with authority on current affairs. Of those on board now, there’s only Ian Collins who flirts with it, but he’s a lightweight. Neither Whale blew nor Gaunty were smart enough to anticipate the bullets that would be aimed their way.
In any case, Malkin is streets ahead of anything on UK radio, as is Coulter. I wrote to Melanie Phillips a few years ago on this subject, and she said that to set up a station such as FOX in the UK would be illegal!
I couldn’t agree more. Michelle Malkin is excellent.
Before any defenders of the indefensible reach for some low-hanging fruit, let me point out that the BBC’s reporting that there were students there is NOT the same thing as saying that the teachers’ union bused them in. As it stands, the reader is free to infer that the students were there of their own volition to support their teachers, which twists the interpretation of events. I provided proof that students were brought there as political pawns of the union in my previous post.
David, good stuff again…however, mark my words: the BBC will find a way to publish the Hitler and or similar stuff but in a story about Fox/Glenn Beck and their coverage (first couple of comments above) re rhetoric of the right etc.
Didn’t Wisconsin pioneer a welfare-to-work programme some years back? The Beeboid Corporation doesn’t like politicians who do that sort of thing and maybe has a lingering resentment and bias as a result – well, if it has a memory going back that far.
This is purely about nasty Republicans attacking lovely unions and the beautiful public sector.
Brilliant post David.
I see the trick is presentation, the art of subtle manipulation of the facts and language. From the first word you can clearly detect where the BBCs sympathies lay.
UPDATE: The Washington Post is now reporting that the President of the US has sent His own political operatives to Wisconsin to put pressure on the Governor and support the unions.
This is a violation of States’ Rights, and an overreach of the power of the Presidency.
The BBC has updated their article even more, and actually mention that the President has publicly criticized the bill. This is the second time He’s attacked a state governor over policy. An abuse of power. The BBC is censoring the information that He sent His minions to attack locally.
Shame. If it was Bush, etc.
BBC-NUJ wastes British licencepayers’ money by going to Wisconsin to support Democrat propaganda on councils.
But, BBC-NUJ refuses to do an investigative job, for its own vested political reasons, on the waste inherited from Labour councils in Britain:
“Revealed: Labour’s crazy town hall ‘non-jobs’, including the walking co-ordinator on £32,000-a-year and the roller disco coach”
Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1358144/Labours-3m-town-hall-jobs-bonanza-employed-deliver-frontline-services.html#ixzz1EM8wzhUl
And, of course, it’s not BBC-NUJ which investigates these (BBC top brass like) council salaries:
‘Telegraph’ –
The council ‘fat cat’ earning £570,000
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/politics/8334915/The-council-fat-cat-earning-570000.html#
Excellent work on this David.
The double-standard over the use of violent imagery/Hitler analogies by the Left and the BBC’s failure to either point it out or wax indignant about it is an unanswerable point. The BBC would pounce on any sign/mention/hint of such things by opponents of Obama. There are so many examples of this, such as this and this and this and this and this and this and this. (All the usual suspects are in there – Frei, Mardell, Katie Connolly, Paul Adams etc). Yes nothing in their articles/slide show about Wisconsin.
Here are some more images from Wisconsin that the BBC is silent about:
Part of me wonders if the dirty tactics are growing. I went to Michelle Malkin’s site to find some other details. Her related posts sidebar to pointed me to another site. Once I clicked on it, a virus started downloading.
Left me wondering if it had been deliberately hacked.