NEWSQUIZ


I had the misfortune earlier today to listen to what the BBC allege is a “topical panel quiz show”. I refer, of course, to the News Quiz. The panelists were Jeremy Hardy, Paul Sinha, Imran Yusuf and Fred Macaulay. We all know Hardy for the hard left parasite he is, feeding off the largesse extended his way by the BBC. Palestinian loving Mecca visiting Imran Yusuf  lived down to expectations and Paul Sinha (“Openly gay” according to his biog) proved to be particularly vicious in his leftist stream of hate. Macaulay got to spout about how wonderful  Scotland is under SNP rule. What a lousy programme this has become – stripped of any value other than offering lefties a chance to spew out their trash “humour”.

MOST TRUST?

Here, Richard Black sets out to mount what he sees as a balanced discussion of the much-mulled-over disagreement between Eric Steig and Ryan O’Donnell about the Antarctic climate record. He fails miserably, first by firmly nailing his colours to the mast of the warmist approach of Mr Steig, and secondly for his sneering, patronising assertion that he – unlike bloggers – bases his observations and reporting on “peer-reviewed” papers. Putting aside the rather major point that the central issue of the Steig-O’Donnell spat was that Mr Steig was a so-called peer reviewer who sought to block the publication of Mr O’Donnell’s paper (thus highlighting yet again what a warmist-rigged snakepit the whole peer-review system is), it also shows that Mr Black’s stance is based at core on smug, holier-than-thou hectoring. He is clearly having a swipe at those he perceives as his hated, inferior, right-wing enemies, such as the redoubtable James Delingpole – who published this searing analysis of the O’Donnell saga. Who would you trust most?

We Are All Freedom Fighters Now.

The BBC views the eruptions throughout the Arab World as one homogeneous, righteous, peoples’ call for democracy. To them ‘democracy’ can only mean ‘Western Style’ democracy. Legitimate doubts about that are brushed aside because journalists are too busy identifying with the protesters.

If the Egyptian protesters ever get their fair and free elections, it’s predicted that the Muslim Brotherhood will play a prominent role. No doubt the BBC would collectively shrug and say that’s democracy. If a Hamas style regime is elected, they’d insist the people must have what they want, even if it means kissing goodbye to freedom and cuddling up to Iran.

Daniel Greenfield expresses an alternative view, one which many people share, and one which others might like to hear about.

“Few of the gullible Western supporters who follow the revolution by Twitter, understand just how much the ordinary Egyptian taking part in the protests hates them. Behind all the English language signs produced for the foreign press and the articulate bloggers cultivated by the US and EU governments, is the angry mob who believes that Mubarak was a puppet of the CIA and the Mossad. “

Even if the BBC disagrees, it has an obligation to acknowledge that these views exist.
The way the BBC views the serious sexual attack on CBS reporter Lara Logan is not quite the same as his. Katie Connolly’s article and Daniel Greenfield’s are quite different. The BBC explains that reporting has become increasingly dangerous, even more so for women who face violent sexual assaults and rapes.

“BBC world news editor Jon Williams, noting the horror of Ms Logan’s ordeal, says that managing the risks of conflict reporting is a complex challenge.”

That’s conflict reporting in general. But Lara Logan was in Tahrir Square, amongst protesters who were calling for democracy, and she was on their side. Surely, they were righteous protesters who wanted western style freedom, were they not?

“The only popular cause in the Muslim world is fought against the Americans– even when the Americans are on their side”

says Daniel Greenfield

“Sexual violence is also a routine part of Egyptian mob scenes. In 2006, a crowd celebrating Eid Al-Fitr began assaulting every woman in sight. In 2009 alone, the UK foreign office reported handling nearly 30 cases of sexual assault against British nationals. Under Islamic mores, non-Muslim women are treated as whores. That may be why according to a 2008 study, only 68 percent of Egyptian women complained of being harassed on a daily basis, while 98 percent of foreign women did. When a group of jubilant enthusiasts of democracy found themselves near a Western female reporter without police supervision, what followed was absolutely horrible and terribly inevitable. It is what 98 percent of foreign women in Egypt risk encountering every day.”

Over in BBC land, it’s a different story.

“In many places women are treated far better than men,” Mr Williams says, recalling that BBC world affairs editor John Simpson became one of the first foreign reporters to enter Afghanistan in 2001 after crossing the border disguised as a woman.”

And very fetching he must have looked too. In his burkha.
Daniel Greenfield again:

“The cries of “Yahood, Yahood” or “Jew, Jew” reportedly shouted at CBS’s Logan while she was being sexually assaulted, reflect two things. Yahood is a common insult in the Middle East.[..]The negative depiction of Jews is rooted in the Koran, making it ubiquitous through the Muslim world.”

“The other aspect of it however is the prevalence of conspiracy theories throughout the Arab Muslim world. In Egypt, Nazi propaganda merged with traditional Islamic beliefs to give rise to Islamofascist organizations such as the Muslim Brotherhood. While Mein Kampf and the Protocols of the Elders of Zion are given little credibility in civilized nations– they are still highly popular in the Muslim world.”

The BBC isn’t bothering about all that antisemitic nonsense. Keep sending women to conflict areas, they advise. As long as they put on a burkha, carry a rape whistle, and stick a chair in front of the door, and if that fails:

“urinate, vomit or defecate on yourself”

– preferably not while reporting live on the telly.

"MONOCHROME BAND OF PEOPLE"

James Naughtie, discussing internships and work experience on this morning’s Today programme:

“You’ve raised the point about companies getting people to work for them for nothing. That’s one side of it. The other side is you get an army of people who are given an opening, an entrée, into the, y’know, professions or quite well paid jobs by being able to work for nothing because their families can afford it and perhaps if the family has got a connection whether it’s a business connection or a friendship, what you end up with is an absolutely almost monochrome band of people who are gonna end up in the best jobs because they’ve got the experience and they all come from sort of middle class professional backgrounds.”

And where did James Naughtie’s son do his work experience? Newsnight.

(Naughtie JR’s twitter accountSarah Palin appears to be a favourite topic. Almost monochrome band of people – politically, yes.)

PATTEN "TO BE CONFIRMED" IN BBC ROLE

The Daily Mail claims today that culture secretary Jeremy Hunt has recommended that Lord Patten should become the next chairman of the BBC, and that this is now almost certain to happen. It’s a horrific prospect, and it beggars belief that the Tories should appoint this euro-bigot to the role. Any idea that this is in any way a eurosceptic administration – already highly questionable after the handling of the Irish bailout and the daylight-robbery increase in the EU budget of 2.9% – is shot down in flames. Mark Thompson finally begrudgingly accepted (after cacophonies of protest stretching back years) in December that there had been bias in BBC reporting of the EU. With the appointment of Patten, the whole topic is now off the agenda and the euro-bigots who run the BBC will be smirking all the way to their White City eyries.

One of those will be the insufferable Andrew Marr, a europhile-in-chief. It’s been revealed that he is paid £600,000 a year of our money so that he can present BBC shows in which he rams his prejudices down our throats. How much more of this profligacy can be tolerated?

UPDATE: BBC Changes The Story From Wisconsin, But Censors Even More

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.

QUESTION TIME AXE?

I agree with Mr Littlejohn that it’s time for the chop, though a replacement for Question Time would undoubtedly be much worse. BBC producers are so obsessed by their own lefty agendas that they are no longer capable of understanding, let alone marshalling, balanced debate. Many years ago, when Robin Day ruled the roost and it was broadcast almost every week from the Greenwood Theatre, I used to do the PR for the programme. It had its problems then, of course, but the current gimmicks had not even been thought about…it’s been a slow, painful and garish slide into today’s deliberately-rigged gang-bang confrontation in the name of viewer appeal. What say you?

Mr Littlejohn’s piece has been prompted, of course, by the news that the BBC’s madhouse social engineering – in decanting thousands of staff outside London – means that in future that the production office of QT will be in Glasgow, but production meetings will be held in London because David Dimbleby refuses to travel to Glasgow. This will push the programme’s carbon footprint and hotel bills into the stratosphere. It’s madness on a massive scale that goes against the BBC’s moral zealotry; clear evidence that they never let their so-called principles block their own plans, and are always keen to find new profligate ways of spending the licence fee.

BBC Bias Favors Unions, Even In The US, And Censors News Of Violent Rhetoric

For the last couple of days, there have been major events in Wisconsin involving state government legislation intended to curtail public sector union entitlements in order to save money. Like several other states, Wisconsin faces a deep economic crisis and needs to save money and cut spending any way it can.

The newly installed Republican Governor, Scott Walker, has said that anyone who didn’t see this huge budget crunch coming must have been in a “coma”. He’s recently set forth a new budget plan with big spending cuts, including what gets spent on public sector unions. Needless to say, the unions are livid, and have taken to the streets.

The BBC reports it this way:

Wisconsin public workers protest over anti-union bill

Wisconsin public employees have crowded into the state capitol to protest the government’s plan to curtail their right to collective bargaining.

Teachers, prison guards and others say a Republican-sponsored bill would severely cut into their incomes.

In case anyone might get suspicious about the obvious trade union talking point here – ‘cut into their incomes’ – all doubts are dispelled immediately:

‘Scariest thing ever’

In Madison, the capital city of the mid-western state, the Republican-led legislature on Thursday was set to pass a bill pushed by Republican Governor Scott Walker that has been described by commentators as the most aggressive anti-union law in the nation.

The bill would eliminate most public workers’ collective bargaining rights and dramatically increase the amount they must contribute to their pensions and health insurance coverage.

“This is the scariest thing I’ve ever seen,” physics teacher Betsy Barnard told the Wisconsin State Journal newspaper of Mr Walker’s bill. “This is going to change Wisconsin forever.”

“Dramatically increase”? Here’s what the BBC doesn’t want you to know about that:

Currently most state employees pay nothing toward their pensions and only a modest amount for their insurance.

Yeah, I suppose having to pay a little something when you’ve been paying zero might seem “dramatic”. But that’s the union perspective the BBC is presenting, and not an objective fact. The use of emotional language here is advocacy behavior and not journalism. And what about the claim that the bill will “eliminate most” bargaining rights?

It’s also a bit of BS:

Walker, remember, is not removing unions’ fundamental power to bargain for wages. He is demanding that state workers put 5.8% of their wages toward retirement and that they cover 12.6% of their health care premiums, which would still have them paying more than $100 less a month than the average schmoe. He is also proposing that elected officials determine the shape of employee benefits without having to bargain them, and this as much as the added cost has unions crying “unfair.”

More reality can be found here:

Unions still could represent workers, but could not seek pay increases above those pegged to the Consumer Price Index unless approved by a public referendum. Unions also could not force employees to pay dues and would have to hold annual votes to stay organized.

In exchange for bearing more costs and losing bargaining leverage, public employees were promised no furloughs or layoffs. Walker has threatened to order layoffs of up to 6,000 state workers if the measure does not pass.

Instead of reporting (or, hell, even copying and pasting from the wire service) objectively, the BBC uses the emotional language of union talking propaganda, quite dramatically misrepresenting reality.

Next the BBC reports on the actual protests:

With teachers – and some students – massing in Madison to protest, dozens of schools were shut on Wednesday and Thursday.

Hundreds of protesters spent Wednesday night in the rotunda of the state capitol building.

Police officers stood guard outside Mr Walker’s office as angry protesters stood outside shouting for his recall from office.

How did the students get there? Aren’t they supposed to be in school? Well, no, because the teachers’ union closed schools for the day and bused the students in for the cause (video proof here).

How angry were the protesters, BBC?

Angry workers also surrounded Mr Walker’s family home this week, the New York Times reported.

How did they find out his address? Simple: the unions gave it out and sent their workers to harass the man’s family. They also went to the home of the Republican Speaker of the House in Wisconsin. Yet the BBC wouldn’t dream of frowning at this behavior in the way they did at the Tea Party protests. Quite a contrast. No suggestion of violence or dark forces behind it all.

Police in Madison, Wisconsin, estimated that 20,000 people rallied at the capital on Wednesday.

And that’s it from the BBC. Here’s a video of these heroic people. Guess to whom they’re comparing the Governor of Wisconsin?

In case that’s not enough, there’s this:

How about it, BBC? Any thoughts? You guys were oh, so critical when the odd Tea Party protester had a similar poster about The Obamessiah. What do you say now? Nothing, of course. Moving on…..

But Republicans, who were handed election victories in November in Wisconsin, say they have a mandate to cut government spending.

They say that despite the protests, voters approve of the cuts, which the Republicans say are needed to balance the state budget and avoid job losses.

Oh, those nasty Republicans, eh? Here’s what else the BBC doesn’t want you to know about what’s going in Wisconsin: a bunch of Democrat State Senators have gone AWOL because they don’t want to vote for it. If they voted against it, they’d show up. But they’re trying to boycott the vote instead. BBC: ZZzzzzzzzz

In sum: Biased in favor of the unions, use of emotional language which favors one side, censoring or misrepresenting of facts which harms the unions’ position. Don’t trust the BBC on US issues, or issues involving unions.

Question Time LiveBlog 17th February 2011


Tonights Question Time comes from Barking and on the panel we have Michael Heseltine, the ex-St Vince Cable, Yvette Balls (nee Cooper), Nigel Farage and a book publisher called Victoria Barnsley.

The LiveBlog will also cover the surreal This Week, with Andrew Neil and Michael Portillo.

David Vance, TheEye and David Mosque will be moderating the abuse here from 10:30pm, so we look forward to seeing you!