151 Responses to OPEN THREAD

  1. fred bloggs says:

    As a Sherlock Holmes fan, I often think of some lessons to be learn’t from those stories.  I have always like the idea of ‘The curious incident of the dog in the night-time’.  It reminds me of Thursday when Balls was giving his first major economics speech.  It was highlighted on ‘Today’ with something special by toenails.  Then on every news session until the speech and then the speech itself was shown ad nausaem.  Balls has a very bad CV, on it is Harvard, Financial Times, special advisor to Brown.  Why is it bad? because the only practical economics he has done is going to take the UK 40 years to repair. I read the Fraser Nelson article in the Spectator where he shows the flaws in Balls speech, which is why I then thought of the ‘the dog’; or Flanders to be specific as I could not find any detailed critique by her on Balls speech.

    The curious incident of the dog was that it did not bark in the night, the curious incident of Flanders (BBC economics editor) is that Balls makes his first big speech and barely a peep from Flanders: just like the dog.

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    • Jane Tracy says:

      Actually Stephanie “floundering” Flanders did make a reference to Ed. Balls’s speech.

      “The figures were released on the same day that shadow chancellor Ed Balls called for a temporary emergency decrease in VAT to revive the economy”

      The figures were weak retail sales figures which gave Steph the chance to try to make an ex look good…

      For most it just reminds them that Ed Balls doesn’t do deficits

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      • fred bloggs says:

        Jane, I did find that reference and that is what got me so curious.  I could see no reason why she had virtually ignored the speech, that is balls first big speech as shadow chancellor,  when Fraser nelson had written reams, taking it to pieces.  I can only profer the idea that she found it so lame, that rather then give it the derision it desrves, she wimped out and said nothing.

        Bias by ommission again!

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  2. TheGeneral says:

    I see the BBC are ignoring Balls losing his court case against his former landlord who was suing him for damage to the property and rent arrears.
    If this had been George Osbourne we would have been bombarded with the news at every news broadcast.

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  3. ltwf1964 says:

    that prick Gavin Esler on Newsnight last night

    “the image of the tories is the “nasty party”

    can’t recall him referring to liebore as “the incompetent wasters party”

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    • Millie Tant says:

      Emily Maitlis has used it gratuitously on Newsnight as well. They apparently don’t realise they are being nasty by opportunistically invoking this ancient stick with which to beat the evil Tories.

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  4. Biodegradable says:

    Please sign this petition, and others there:

    BBC Coverage of the Middle East conflict

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  5. deegee says:

    New BBC Q&A Palestinian statehood  bid at the UN
    Just Journalism responds

    Some of my own comments
    Have you noticed that the BBC generally leads with a picture of heroic Palestinian ‘resistance’? Has it ever led with a picture of fraternal homicide, Palestinian against Palestinian? Or the results of Palestinain violence against Jews?

     The Palestinians and their supporters are also looking at ways to press for UN General Assembly resolution 181 of 1947 to be enforced. Surely it is vital information to note thgat all the Arab states voted against in 1947, refused to accept the result and went to war to stop the Jews forming their state?

    The problem for the Palestinians is that Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu does not agree with the premise. Subtlely laying the blame on one ‘bad’ man without acknowledging he represents a substantial section and probably majority of Israelis on the issue.

    The Palestinians argue that recognition of a Palestinian state would strengthen their hands in peace talks with Israel. They say these would have to resume, in order to resolve other issues such as security, water, refugees and arrangements for sharing Jerusalem, which both sides claim as their capital. A more honest appraisal would be that the Fatah Palestinians have minimum, non-negotiable demands on all these issues. even leaders of the Islamic militant organisation, Hamas, acknowledged there was a broad consensus on the establishment of a Palestinian state within 1967 borders, though they formally still refuse to recognise Israel and their Charter is committed to its destruction

    even leaders of the Islamic militant organisation, Hamas, acknowledged there was a broad consensus on the establishment of a Palestinian state within 1967 borders, though they formally still refuse to recognise Israel and their Charter is committed to its destruction I repeat even leaders of the Islamic militant organisation, Hamas, acknowledged there was a broad consensus on the establishment of a Palestinian state within 1967 borders, though they formally still refuse to recognise Israel and their Charter is committed to its destruction.

    The main opposition comes from Israel. DUH!

    Missing in the Q&A is the distinct liklihood I would call it probability that a successful GA campaign would be seen by HAMAS and the more militant members of Fatah as a sign that the nations of the world will back them or at least refuse to aid Israel’ sdefence when they start a war. Egypt might back them under the legitimate contention they are backing a UN resolution and Hizbullah is likely to attack from the North (they don’t actually need an excuse).

    War rather than peace.  

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  6. Biodegradable says:

    The BBC’s top choice for today’s news from Israel:
    Jerusalem rabbis ‘condemn dog to death by stoning’

    They do include a link to the story in Israel’s Ynet news with a selected quote:

    But a court manager told Israeli daily Yediot Aharonot the stoning had been ordered as “as an appropriate way to ‘get back at’ the spirit which entered the poor dog”, according to Ynet.

    Along with the entirely gratuitous BBC comment, “Dogs are considered impure animals in traditional Judaism.”

    However if one reads the original Ynet report (who does?) one sees the statement from the head of the court, not only the “court manager”:

    http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-4082843,00.html

    The head of the court, Rabbi Avraham Dov Levin, denied that the judges had called for the dog’s stoning. But one of the court’s managers confirmed the report to Yedioth Ahronoth.


    “It was ordered by the rabbis because of the grief he had caused the court,” he said. “They didn’t issue an official ruling, but ordered the children outside to throw stones at him in order to drive him away. They didn’t think of it as cruelty to animals, but as an appropriate way to ‘get back at’ the spirit which entered the poor dog.”

    When was the last time the BBC reported on people actually being stoned to death in Iran and elsewhere in the Arab world?

    The BBC; never missing a chance to damn Israel!

    And on a similar note, yesterday the BBC reported an explosion in Israel:

    Explosion at flats in Israeli city leaves three dead

    In reality FOUR died, but the BBC didn’t bother to report this either:

    Palestinian Arabs celebrate even when Jews die in accidents

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    • Biodegradable says:

      Stealth Edit Alert!

      Somebody in Beeboid Land must be reading my comments here O:-)

      The Israeli dog story now has the addition of “One of the judges at the court in the city’s ultra-Orthodox Mea Shearim neighbourhood had reportedly asked local children to carry out the sentence.”

      And “Dogs are considered impure animals in traditional Judaism” has been changed to Dogs are often considered impure animals in traditional Judaism.”

      Still sticking with the version that the dog was senetenced to death whereas the idea was only to chase the dog away.

      The BBC have now stealth edited that article about the explosion to update the death toll to four, but the time and date stamps on both articles are still the same.

      Dishonest cowards!

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    • Biodegradable says:

      Here’s an update on that story from Harry’s Place:

      The Dog That Didn’t Die

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  7. james1070 says:

    A BBC spokesman discussed his plans for the future of the corporation.

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  8. George R says:

    Colonisation of Britain, from within and from  without, by BBC-Patten.

     BBC-Hindi, safe, BBC Urdu, safe; BBC Hausa, safe;

     BBC 4 not so much.

    If any naive British licencepayers thought that BBC-NUJ was here to provide a broadcasting service for British people in return for the tax they pay, think again.

    “Hindi will survive funding cuts, says BBC”

    [Extract, Patten’s diktat]:

    “According to Patten, the Hindi service was at ‘the core of what the BBC is doing’, and said he would discuss future funding of the Hindi Service with Foreign Secretary William Hague.”

    No doubt, this will please some Hindi speakers in India who will get a free broadcasting service, but paid for, by British licencepayers, without their permission.

    Close down BBC World Service empire now.

    “Hindi will survive funding cuts, says BBC”

    http://www.business-standard.com/india/news/hindi-will-survive-funding-cuts-says-bbc/439576/

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  9. Biodegradable says:

    The BBC pimps for Al-Queda!

    Meet the new boss

    Al-Qaeda’s freshly promoted chief executive finds a busy in-tray

    Journalist and analyst, Rahimullah Yusufzai, who has met Zawahiri twice, describes him as a “well-read, knowledgeable” man who has delved into politics, was a prisoner, worked as a medical aid worker, became a guerrilla fighter, organised funding, recruitment and deployment of al-Qaeda fighters, emerged as a propagandist and ideologue, and finally became a militant leader.

    Paragraph sub-heading:

    Breath of fresh air?

    Mr Yusufzai says Zawahiri does not match Bin Laden’s stature and charisma as a “princely” warrior who brought personal wealth to his cause and could command respect of all Islamist groups, whether within the al-Qaeda fold or beyond it.

    In from the cold?

    Secondly, he would like to find ways to make al-Qaeda more relevant to ongoing popular insurgencies in the Arab world, few of which draw their inspiration from militant Islam.

    And, if luck were on his side, he would like to launch a spectacular attack somewhere in the West on the pattern of 9/11 or 7/7.

    “Luck”?!

    His challenge would be to knit these groups into a unified force that can destabilise Pakistan, an ally of the “Crusaders and Jews”.

    Ah yes, those damned “Crusaders and Jews”.
    Ayman al-Zawahiri Born in Cairo, Egypt, in 1951 Trained as an eye surgeon

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    • My Site (click to edit) says:

      And, if luck were on his side, he would like to launch a spectacular attack somewhere in the West on the pattern of 9/11 or 7/7. ‘

      Well, it is a variation on ‘Ayman would like to travel the World and kill people’ as Eric Morely announces the winner of AQ apprentice, in reverse order.

      I really, really would like a BBC senior bod, or apologist here, to explain away that ‘luck’ too.

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    • cjhartnett says:

      I hope that this is a whimsical, satirical flight of fancy  Mr B!
      “Busy in-tray”…”with any luck?”
      I only hope that this is biting satire!

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  10. George R says:

    “How to Get a Job at the BBC”http://www.newenglishreview.org/blog_display.cfm/blog_id/35899

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    • james1070 says:

      LOL, it’s funny because it’s true.

      Best bit

      Any Palestinian under the age of 24 is a child.

      Any Palestinian under the age of 12 is a baby.

      Any Palestinian over the age of 33 is a grandfather/grandmother.

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  11. David Preiser (USA) says:

    Oh, dear.  More news about the President the BBC will have to censor:


    Senior White House aide: 1996 Obama gay marriage questionnaire is a fake, even though Obama signed it

    Must be something about Him signing a petition against gay marriage, right?  After all, we know He stated during the election that He felt that marriage should be between a man and a woman, although He supported civil partner laws for homosexuals.   Of course, he eventually started waffling on that, after feeling lots of pressure from the homosexual lobby because they all voted for Him, hoping He’d do something.

    But wait, no, it’s not about that at all.  It’s a petition supporting gay marriage.

    Some paper sent out a quesitonnaire to people running for the state legislature in Illinois.  The Obamessiah’s responses and signature can be seen either via the link above or directly here.


    “I favor legalizing same-sex marriages,and would fight efforts to prohibit such marriages,” Obama wrote in the typed, signed, statement.

    Now He says it’s not Him.  Breitbart hacked his left hand, I suppose?  Why would He be trying to dodge this now?  Because He can’t and/or won’t do anything about gay marriage?   Has He been lying about His beliefs the whole time?  Again?

    BBC:  ZZzzzzzzzzz

    Note: This is actually old news from 2009.  Nobody cared then because it was still full-on Obamessiah Hope time.

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  12. 1327 says:

    Last (Friday) night I ended up watching a BBC 4 documentary on music festivals. I really should have known better as within 15 minutes I was being told how “Fatcha” destroyed the hopes of the British youth during the 80’s thus forcing many of them into a nomadic existance as new age travellers. Next we were told that these travellers became such a threat to the establishment that they had to be destroyed by the Fascist bully boy police. The programme quoted as fact that many of the “Police” during the Battle of the Beanfield riot were in fact Special Forces !! The SAS must have a special unit devoted to giving stinking lefty hippies a kicking.

    Those interviewed included the band The Levellers and that old friend of B-BBC Billy Bragg himself so as you can imagine all fair and balanced.

    The latter end of the programme covered the Raves of the late 80’s and early 90’s. We were told that these Raves were highly popular with the youth of time who used them to forget the unemployment “Fatcha” had forced on them. Oddly I was a teenager then and I don’t remember anyone attending one of these either at my school or later my FE college. Its very odd to see my own youth becoming distorted history.

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    • cjhartnett says:

      I watched some of this!
      To see the gnomic Mr Eavis having to deal with some vicious crusties with pit bulls on ropes, but demanding the right to leech of his farm seemed to sum up the Beebs air of entitlement-even with naive old hippies like Michael Eavis!
      What a progamme!…yet more bile and lavender oil poured down the cracks of their once-great country.
      Have any of the class warriors had an invite to Billy Braggs gaff down in Burton Bradstock-shouldn`t be easy to miss?
      Let`s stick it to the maan!…we mean it!

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    • Biodegradable says:

      I confess I was actually a hippy in the 1970s, when Labour were in power, and one could even live quite well, if modestly on Unemployment Benefit.

      How does the BBC explain away the fact that it was precisely in that period pre-Thatcher that there were many more music festivals (the first Glastonbury?) and indeed many more musicians worth listening to?

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    • matthew rowe says:

      The Levellers? that bunch I remember having the very dubious pleasure of seeing  that bunch of gits when they did J.B.s in Dudley before they got er well know for 5 minutes! they played 3 songs and then all started fighting with each other over the bass rift  berks mind it did improve the music as they put a killing joke album on to cover the laughing of the audience !
      and 5 years later they were telling their fans not to buy from the guys outside as they were ripping the band off ! funny as they used to tout crap at others bands  gigs !!!

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  13. Umbongo says:

    Interesting apercu on Today this morning concerning the “education” academics in general and “Professor” Bernard Barker of Leicester University in particular.  The (frankly, rather tedious) discussion between Barker and Trevor Averre Beeson ended with a rant by Barker about private sector looting of our “education” system whereby, unfortunately from the education establishment’s view, private sector companies brought in to state schools apparently provide pupils with an education which the state system left to itself fails to do.  Evidently in Barker’s world as long as no-one makes a profit, the wide-spread illiteracy and innumeracy of the products of the state system are fine with him.  Well of course, since it’s Barker and his colleagues whose work over the last couple of generations has produced (quite deliberately I suspect) the shambles Gove is feebly trying to correct.

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    • cjhartnett says:

      Funnily enough Umbongo I saw it all from the other end of the telescope.
      I found it refreshing to have an unreconstituted socialist like Barker shouting “what`s your cut Trevor” as our smoothie-chops consultancy wallah from Lilac Springs(no product placement here eh?) blathered on about quality and diversity and the like in delivering the caring excellence needed for our chillzones-sorry children!
      Barker no doubt doing the Union rounds along the south coast,now that the students are delivering pizzas after a few years of class war-in every sense!
      Still I prefer Barker to the phoney Tonys that have infested education from pillow to mattress!

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      • Umbongo says:

        cjh

        I must say that both contributors were unattractive.  However, the purpose of Barker’s work is – I suppose – to provide evidence-based theories (and practical recommendations) to improve the education of our children: by “education” I mean, at least, an ability to read, write and do sums competently and to be able, on leaving school, to mount and understand a reasonable argument on a variety of subjects.  Manifestly, policies designed by and/or supported by Barker and his colleagues over the years have left us with the intellectual dross produced by the state sector.  In a civilised society Barker would have become the unskilled labourer his intellect is most suited for.  That way he would at least contribute to society rather than be a life-long parasite on hard-working taxpayers.

        I have as little time for Trevor but he is only exploiting an opportunity created by the crap policies adopted from the Bernard Barker Little Book of How to Destroy Education and applied by the Ministry of education since the mid-60s.  There should be no need in an educational system for either the Trevors of this world (who is, I’m sure, quite capable of earing a living elsewhere) nor the Barkers the product of whose life-work we see all around us.

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        • cjhartnett says:

          Agree 100%
          The likes of Barker have sold enough Socialist Workers and the like-but it is rare to see education mentioned in them!
          As far as they`re concerned it`s not worth discussing what schools are actually for-they`re the mind factories for the kids of the proles, and as long as the State lets them in and keeps them there-then fine. A socialist state preferably.
          No problem either with heads parachuted out of the schools to sell something back to the bullheaded ciphers of state diktat in one form or another.
          Humphrys did a day “as a teacher” some time back-so you`d have thought that he had learned something about the hellholes that Labour left us with( of course with the ground set by both parties previously!). Silly me.

          In the BBC-they don`t have kids, or else they send them to private schools( if they can`t blag a faith school place, or one in a better Islington suburb).
          Hence the whole scandal is left to handwringing with union harpies…it clearly is of no interest to them!

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  14. George R says:

    <!– googleon: all –>“BBC hires beauty experts for HD switch”

     [Extract: emphasis added]:

    “The shifts begin at 5am for BBC Breakfast and Arabic News, and incorporates rolling news coverage on News 24, the BBC One evening news programmes and Newsnight, until 10.30pm.
    “The beauty experts are not only required to provide make-up and hair styling, but must also ‘possess good interpersonal skills and have the ability to build a rapport with make-up subjects’ who will also include guests on news programmes from ‘a variety of backgrounds’.
    “They must also be ‘comfortable working in a potentially pressurised environment’ without compromising their services.
    “Those working for the Arabic and Persian services should ‘ideally demonstrate a practical understanding of the complexities and sensitivities involved’.

    http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/tvandradio/bbc/8583568/BBC-hires-beauty-experts-for-HD-switch.html


    It all goes on the British licencepayers’ tab, including Islamophic INBBC Arabic TV service for the Muslims of the Middle east and elsewhere in HIGH DEFINTION!!!!!

    Close down INBBC World Service empire NOW!

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    • David Preiser (USA) says:

      Think of all the money the BBC would save if they just obeyed Islam and put all the women in burqas.  No wrinkles or blemishes to cover up, and it might even allow older women to stay employed longer.

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    • deegee says:

      Apparently Arabic televison is a BBC cash cow. We should never forget that the BBC is a news agency and Arabs pay top dollar for the highest priced packages (essentially everything including commentary done for them).

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    • George R says:

      “Is it the last chequered flag for Formula One on BBC? TV chiefs set to axe motor racing to save digital channels”

      Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2005473/BBC-chiefs-set-axe-motor-racing-save-digital-channels.html#ixzz1PiGdXL8m

      It could be that INBBC is scrapping F1 so that the British  licencepayers’ money is switched to paying for INBBC’s global Islamophilic output on World Service empire,  such as INBBC 24/7 news propaganda Arabic TV service, BBC Hausa, BBC Urdu, etc.,etc.
      Patten is using our money to relegate British national sovereignty, via both his beloved bureaeucratic empire of the E.U., and via INBBC World Service.

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  15. cjhartnett says:

    Have I got this right then?
    1. Ed Balls is successfully prosecuted for trying to rip off the landlord of his constituency office-but that`s not news the BBC wants to tell us about.
    2. Muslim sex-slave chains are abusing white girls in care up north-that`s not news either really.
    3 Asian and African cases of TB have made the UK the highest number of TB cases in the E.U(40% of the 9000 cases are London)-no, that`s not news either!

    Anyone able to tell me what the rules are?-I`d have thought pandemics, vulnerable girls beign exploited by paedophiles and a salacious court case involving a Oxbridge type who likes dressing up as a Nazi would have been meat and drink( nut roast and saspirilla!) to our BBC chums!
    Shows just how little I know-but if the BBC won`t tell us, then NONE of us will evr know…it`s my BBC isn`t it?

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  16. ltwf1964 says:

    meanwhile,the Andrew Marr show this morning,and right on cue the demonisation of US Republican presidential hopeful Michelle Bachmann begins……

    David Aaronovitch calls her “bonkers” because she referred to satan somewhere

    and a few minutes later,Aaronvitch confesses that he “was” a communist (IE STILL IS) and points to Marr and says “and you were a Trot”

    and not much of a denial to be heard from Mr Superinjunction

    Ms Bachmann can expect more crap to be thrown at her but from the lefties because she espouses old fashioned moral values for the US

    quelle surprise

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    • Craig says:

      Typical Marr paper review panel: A Labour MP called Yasmin Qureshi; David Aaronovitch, a journalist who is openly a member of the Labour Party; and Michael Portillo, a Conservative In Name Only (as his contributions largely confirmed).

      Yasmin Qureshi began by attacking the government for being unsympathetic to the public sector. Michael Portillo also attacked the government for its handling of the matter, agreeing that it has been “inflamatory”. “Yeah”, agreed Marr, it was an unexperienced minister “maybe sounding a little bit too tough.” Marr then invited Aaronovitch to talk about “real cuts in real institutions”, namely hospitals. Later Yasmin attacked the government over payments to parents with disabled children. After Aaronovitch’s attack on Michelle Bachman (“stark staring bonkers”) was greeted with laughter – and one assenting comment – from the others, Portillo waxed very lukewarm about David Cameron’s call to “stigmatize” AWOL fathers.

      Then came the “I was a communist. You were a Trot, weren’t you?” exchange. Marr said he was “certainly not a communist. I was in the Labour Party. I was not a Trot. I was not a Trot.”

      So, there you have it: A Labour MP, a Labour-supporting journalist, a CINO and an interviewer who used to be in the Labour Party, but wasn’t a Trot, wasn’t a Trot.

      That’s the Andrew Marr Show‘s idea of a balanced panel.

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      • Craig says:

        And for the sofa bit at the end of the show it was Labour-supporting journalist David Aaronovitch and Labour MP Ed Balls left to discuss David Cameron’s call to “stigmatize” AWOL dads. Balls went strongly on the attack (surprise, surprise!).

        Where was Lord Strathclyde (on earlier to discuss a subject nobody cares about, Lords reform)? Why wasn’t he on the sofa instead of Aaronovitch to provide a bit of balance if politically controversial subjects were going to be raised by Marr?

        Again, that’s a very odd idea of balance.

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        • My Site (click to edit) says:

          Considering the week he’s had, one one have thought Mr. Balls wouldn’t have wanted to be anywhere near a TV studio… bar any under the roof of one broadcaster.

          Ta-da! He gets to attack others.

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  17. cjhartnett says:

    Thanks Craig!
    I was stuck listening to the awful Broadcasting House on Radio 4, presented by some weekend rebel type who`d like to be Jon Snow when he grows up I think!
    One of the paper reviewers was Michael Rosen-we got Camerons hypocrisy over his moaning about dads not sticking around. This while school playing fields and play area staff were likely to lose money-and worse, jobs! Or so Michael says!
    We also got from Rosen the tale of kids getting soaked in an Islington school recently whenever it rained. He`s been to thousands of schools as Paddy reminded him to tell us too..so there Mr Gove!
    Don`t we ger enough of Rosens moanings on his licence funded platform of a show on Radio 4. We KNOW what his views will be on anything newsworthy in the eyes of the MSM/BBC…and that is why HIS jobs are safe whilst those of us out here have jobs that aren`t!
    So to feed this into yours Craig-Commies/Trots/Crusties or whaever…these are the safety in numbers types hogging all the BBCs sofas as one cosy sit-in prior to the union lads taking it to the streets( one can pray to Dawkins for that at least!)
    Aoronovich/Reid/Mandelson/Marr/Darling…as FBT sang-“the lunatics are taking over the asylum”.
    DFS fire sale of BBC sofas and rolling bandwagons(no wheels) due for this lot before they do a runner up to Salford and make us clean the self satisfaction from the upholstery!
    Wonder where Marr went for Fathers day today-at least he had an excuse to get out of (one of his) house/s! Aaronovich should have had rye and borscht in bed instead of creaming the proletariat on Pravda this morning!

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  18. Craig says:

    CJ, did you notice the different way Paddy introduced Michael Rosen and Richard D. North?:

    “With the papers we welcome the author Michael Rosen, surgeon Helen Fernandez and free-marketeer Richard D. North.”

    I’d have announced it like this:

    “With the papers we welcome the author Richard D. North, surgeon Helen Fernandez and communist Michael Rosen.”

    Also, Paddy O’Connell is so dripping with BBC right-on sensitivities he even picked up on Richard North’s use of the phrase “old geezers”. He interrupted Richard in mid flight to say, “We’re calling them pensioners this morning.” He sounded deadly serious. When Rosen said he calls himself an “old geezer”, Paddy took a sharp intake of breath and firmly changed the subject. I really don’t think he was joking.

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    • Craig says:

      Another sop to right-on sensitivities came when Paddy read out an e-mail from a listener that reminded us that Ancient Greek democracy was a sham because it didn’t allow women to vote.

      Paddy doesn’t read out many e-mails but when he does they are almost always politically right-on (when they aren’t just silly). The next one had a minor go at “posh” people.

      Elsewhere, we got the latest installment of BH’s Derry Diary, where (at last) culture was theme and Antony Gormley (of Angel of the North fame) was interviewed about how one of his 1980s artworks in the city was destroyed by Protestant youths.

      Then we got one of those occasional audio talks from a non-BBC guest. The remarkable thing is that they always seem to be someone on the political Left. Today we got an NHS consultant called Simon Marsh who complained “over the last thirty years the NHS has become beholden to a new master – money. And with it targets and efficiency” (both words said as if they were bad things.) 

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  19. George R says:

    In case commenters/readers here haven’t seen yet, Melanie Phillips’ blog has now shifted from ‘Spectator’ to here:
    http://melaniephillips.com/

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    • David Preiser (USA) says:

      I guess her post suggesting that all Palestinians are terrorists finally broke the camel’s back.

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  20. George R says:

    BBC-Patten to expand INBBC  World Service, especially Arabic TV sericew from East Wing, Broadcasting House, at expense of services to British licencepayers.

    “The plan is that some World Service journalists will take over BBC News jobs. BBC News employs about 3,000 staff in London and overseas and a further 3,000 around the UK providing coverage in the nations and regions. The World Service employs an additional 2,000.”

    http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2011/jun/10/bbc-news-world-service-jobs

    -The scale of the BBC-Patten-Thompson global propaganda empire we have to finance is enormous, and politically unrepresentrative of British licencepayers.

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  21. David Preiser (USA) says:

    The Beeboids will be devastated:

    Palestinian Fatah-Hamas reconciliation talks ‘on hold’

    Tuesday’s talks in Cairo had been aimed at reaching consensus over a new reconciliation government. But continued disagreements meant the talks had been postponed indefinitely, said Fatah officials in Ramallah.

    The delay has cast doubts on last month’s unity deal between Hamas and Fatah aimed at ending a four-year rift. It has left the Palestinians with rival governments in the West Bank and Gaza Strip.

    It’s only “Breaking News” at the moment, just a quick copy and paste from a wire service.  But you can be sure this will be “developing”, and I bet News Sniffer will provide a few laughs at how the News Online kids go through contortions to get the Narrative right.

    Jeremy Bowen told me that this Palestinian unity was a response to the Palestinian people, and only Israel was the obstacle to peace.  Of course, I shouldn’t really trust anyone who tells me that, while the Hamas Charter calls for the destruction of Israel, it’s not a problem anymore because “some” Hamas leaders want a “long truce”.  Bowen thought we’re too stupid to know that “hudna” means “long truce”, and so told a little white lie.

    I suppose the BBC will find a way to spin this latest Palestinian Split as being Israel’s fault.

       0 likes

    • deegee says:

      A Hudna is traditionally considered to last 10 years. It can be broken, especially if made with infidels, if conditions change in favour of the Muslims.

         0 likes

  22. Grant says:

    Does the brilliant cartoonist Matt of “The Telegraph” read this website ?
    He has a husband saying to his wife this week :-

    ” The BBC has sent us a bill for our TV licence and a leaflet on assisted suicide “.

       0 likes

  23. David Preiser (USA) says:

    I’m finding the lack of concern about the President doing an end run around the Office of Legal Counsel and listening only to lawyers who tell Him what He wants to hear.  When it was George Bush doing this about waterboarding, we never heard the end of it from the Left or the BBC.  We mustn’t use torture, we must maintain the moral high ground, Dick Cheney and John Yoo are war criminals, etc.  In fact, that Narrative is so ingrained at the BBC that John Humphrys made a gratuitous cheap shot about it just the other day.

    Maybe it’s just me, but I kind of think using the military to blow our enemies into tiny bits is a little bit worse than waterboarding a handful of people.  Or is killing hundreds if not thousands of people somehow not as bad as making three or four people uncomfortable for a while, depending on who’s doing it?

    Ignoring legal advice about whether or not waterboarding constitutes torture doesn’t seem to be as major as ignoring legal advice about whether or not the President can use the US military to blow people up at His discretion, indefinitely, without the consent of Congress.  But perhaps I value human life differently than they do at the BBC.

    Note that in the one BBC article (so far) about this, the BBC says that it’s “rare” for a President to blow off the Office of Legal Counsel, they don’t remind you who was the last one to do it.  Of course, that would mean admitting that their beloved Obamessiah has YET AGAIN done a George Bush when it comes to warmongering.  So the BBC keeps shtum.

       0 likes

  24. Craig says:

    There were some familiar BBC themes on Radio 4’s Sunday with Ed Stourton today.

    The programme returned to the subject of sexual abuse by Catholic priests – a subject it last examined a week ago. No one can complain that the BBC hasn’t given this subject the fullest possible airing. A liberal type from the Observer (and Independent on Sunday) then gave his view.

    A liberal Anglican bishop and a liberal rabbi then gave their view on the need to keep religious appointments to the House of Lords, both seeing the need to expand this to include imams (but not pagans). They were entirely in agreement with each other, and said as much.

    We also heard from Symon Hill, who “is walking from Birmingham to London as a public act of repentance for his youthful homophobia.” This is the same guy the BBC website was plugging the other day. He is a director of the BBC’s preferred Christian think tank Ekklesia and is doing it because it “wants to highlight repressive attitudes towards gay men and women in some Christian groups”.

    Still, there was Lord Sacks on religion and science and Phillip Pullman to represent the atheist corner. No muslims though.

       0 likes

  25. Craig says:

    A bit ominous this. Paddy O’Connell (on ‘Broadcasting House’) was asking for a children’s choir to sing a song about the River Jordan for a forthcoming piece for the show by freshman BBC Middle East correspondent Kevin Connolly. Connolly’s record so far is not one to be proud of:
    http://biasedbbc.tv/2011/06/kevin-connollys-lazy-narrative.html

       0 likes

  26. John Anderson says:

    News headlines on Radio 4 include the death of the guy who trashed Parliament Square with his campsite.  Naturally they say his passing is mourned by some MPs – with a soundbite quote from extreme leftie Jeremy Corbyn.

    How about the many MPs who thought the guy was a disgrace to London?

       0 likes

    • Craig says:

      Amazingly the BBC News website considers this the third most important story in the world at the moment, quoting Corbyn and two other approving Labour MPs.

         0 likes

    • David Preiser (USA) says:

      Two things caught my eye.  Interesting that he was seeking treatment in Germany, when I thought the NHS was the envy of all.  More interesting is that the man saw no parallels between the killing fields of Cambodia and what Sadaam was doing to his own people for years.  I bet this guy never gave a damn about Iraqi children until 2003.

         0 likes

      • cjhartnett says:

        Good point.
        A traitor to the NHS surely, so only three minutes silence instead of the usual four for fallen heroes of the Revolution in the case of Brother Brian!
        Still-hope being too close to too many BBC microphones and arclights-as well as the fetid stench from Westminster itself-is not linked to cancer in any way!
        As a precaution, I`d suggest closing down the place and not allowing the BBC to interview anyone until they have passed safety standards as set by the EU!
        It`s what Brian would have wanted!

           0 likes

      • Grant says:

        Half-page obituary in the “Telegraph” , of all places, reveals he really didn’t do much with his sad life.
        Doesn’t say who paid for his treatment in Germany or who is paying for his ex-wife and their 7 children. 

           0 likes

        • As I See It says:

          I’m not sure exactly where Brian stood vis a vis Stop the War Coalition – buts its one coalition the BBC seem quite keen on. Presented with a platform care of BBC Radio London this morning their spokesbloke started ranting about the Tories abolishing the NHS. Due credit to Paul Ross stepping in to try to calm this SWP accented idiot. He qualified his statement to suggest that Cameron is completely privatising the NHS. Stop the war over there, start the class war here!

             0 likes

  27. Craig says:

    BBC favourite Mehdi Hasan of the New Statesman was on today’s Politics Show. He was also the paper reviewer on yesterday’s Breakfast. Given the number of invitations the BBC sends him, how on earth does Mehdi have time to edit the New Statesman?

       0 likes

    • cjhartnett says:

      By the look of it, he gets Rowan to do it!
      That once-organised rag ofagitprop is now phoned in by the likes of Laura Penny or whatever that OMG Socialist is called!
      I do wonder if Medhi is one of Boris` moles subverting socialism from within…Geoffrey Robinson, Peter Mandelson…keep `em coming!

         0 likes

  28. David Preiser (USA) says:

    Great post by Delingpole in which he both calls out Richard Black for being a propagandist and gets in a little dig at The Obamessiah for being a Warmist tool.

    Greenpeace and the IPCC: time, surely, for a Climate Masada?

    An official IPCC report bigging up renewable energy as the power source of the future turns out to have been lead-authored by an activist from Greenpeace and based not on solid science but a wish-fulfilment fantasy scenario devised by, you guessed it, Greenpeace.

    Key bits:


    This was uncritically reported by its amen corner in the MSM, led of course by the BBC’s Richard Black and the Guardian. But others more diligent smelt a rat – among them the mighty Steve McIntyre whose magisterially contemptuous blogpost on the subject has been keeping climate sceptics such as Bishop Hill, WUWT, Rex Murphy, Ronald Bailey and Mark Lynas busy all week.

    Mark Lynas? Not the same eco activist Mark Lynas who once threw a custard pie in Bjorn Lomborg’s face and was responsible for advising the Maldives cabinet to pose for that nauseatingly disingenuous publicity shot where they’re all under water (because, like, the Maldives are being drowned due to global warming: except, of course they’re not)? Yep, that one. But on this occasion, at least, even as committed an eco zealot as he has been forced to concede that IPCC has done its reputation as the “gold standard” (copyright: B Obama) of international climate science few favours:


    The IPCC must urgently review its policies for hiring lead authors – and I would have thought that not only should biased ‘grey literature’ be rejected, but campaigners from NGOs should not be allowed to join the lead author group and thereby review their own work. There is even a commercial conflict of interest here given that the renewables industry stands to be the main beneficiary of any change in government policies based on the IPCC report’s conclusions. Had it been an oil industry intervention which led the IPCC to a particular conclusion, Greenpeace et al would have course have been screaming blue murder.

        Additionally, the Greenpeace/renewables industry report is so flawed that it should not have been considered by the IPCC at all. Whilst the journal-published version looks like proper science, the propaganda version on the Greenpeace website has all the hallmarks of a piece of work which started with some conclusions and then set about justifying them. There is a whole section dedicated to ‘dirty, dangerous nuclear power’, and the scenario includes a complete phase-out of new nuclear globally, with no stations built after 2008.

    Personally, I’d say the parts I’ve put in bold should be reproduced elsewhere, only substituting “BBC” for “IPCC”.

    And I like the Masada metaphor, although I see how it could be twisted to equate the moral positions of the Israelites with that of the Warmists.

       0 likes

  29. Craig says:

    As so often, today’s The Big Questions generated a huge amount of heat and very little light as a few pro-Israeli guests were screamed at and talked over every time they tried to speak by a hysterical pro-Palestinian contingent in the audience.  
     
    The ‘big question’ was phrased in a loaded fashion.  
     
    At the beginning of the show, Nicky Cambell put it like this:  
     
     
    “As a U.N. report shows a tripling of abject poverty in Gaza since Israel imposed its blockade five years ago, and five years ago this week in fact, our next big question: “Is it time to free Palestine?” This Palestinian says conditions in Gaza are now unbearable and will only be alleviated under a free state.”  
     
    (The Palestinian in question turned out to be a pro-Hamas activist who sailed on the Flotilla of Sweetness and Light last year. He was very disruptive.)  
     
    When the topic came under discussion in the second half of the programme, Nicky re-phrased it like this:  
     
     
    “In September the United Nations will vote on whether Palestine should be recognised as an independent state within the borders that existed before the 1967 Six Day War. Now with the peace talks at an impasse and conditions within Gaza fast deteriorating, the U.N. Relief and Works Agency for Palestinian Refugees said this week ‘It’s hard to understand the logic of a man-made policy which deliberately impoverishes so many and condemn hundreds of thousands of potentially productive people to a live of destitution.’ We ask this morning, is it time to free Palestine?”  
     
    Thankfully Nicky’s later questions were a fairer mix, asking a decent number of questions for example about Hamas and its charter, but the hysteria generated made the programme intolerable, as did the poor quality of many of the guests – including the emotional Margo MacDonald MSP, a  very woolly reverend from the Church of Scotland, a ranting ‘comedienne’ (not funny), a ranting Hamas supporter who tried to shout down anyone who supported Israel and another ranting Palestinian nut who got all huffy and self-righteous.  
     
    Thus ended another series of The Big ****ing Stupid Questions.

       0 likes

    • deegee says:

      It’s hard to understand the logic of a man-made policy which deliberately impoverishes so many and condemn hundreds of thousands of potentially productive people to a live of destitution.

      I also find it hard to understand HAMAS.

         0 likes

    • John Horne Tooke says:

      “As a U.N. report shows a tripling of abject poverty in Gaza since Israel imposed its blockade five years ago, and five years ago this week in fact, our next big question: “Is it time to free Palestine?” This Palestinian says conditions in Gaza are now unbearable and will only be alleviated under a free state.”    
       
      So is this like the poverty in the UK? Or something else? What is their definition of poverty? 
      http://www.faithfreedom.org/features/news/starved-palestinians-in-gaza-city-open-new-shopping-mall/&nbsp;
       
      http://www.jpost.com/MiddleEast/Article.aspx?id=221934&nbsp;
       
      Do you ever see scenes like this in Gaza? 

       
      Real poverty should be at the forefront of the BBC not some “relative poverty” in Gaza. 
       
      Children in Gaza are forced into hatred by their parents and “tribal leaders”, whipped up to a frenzy to hate Jews. 

       
      All this is not even reported by the BBC. If children are suffering in Gaza it is from their political leaders. 
       
      “Is it time to free Palestine?” – The BBC asking naive questions as usual.They don’t even know who is doing the blockading. 
       
      “2007–ongoing Combined land and sea blockade of the Gaza Strip by Israel and Egypt, beginning in June.” 
      http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_historical_blockades

         0 likes

      • deegee says:

        Why is the real poverty of much of Africa and South America ignored in favour of the relative poverty of Gaza? Why in view of the lovefest for the Arab Spring isn’t worse poverty in Egypt or Jordan even discussed?

           0 likes

        • Biodegradable says:

          Do you ever see scenes like this in Gaza?

          Forget Gaza and even Africa. Search google images and youtube for “madrid chabolas”

          That’s Madrid, Spain, Europe!

             0 likes

  30. deegee says:

    A significant event will take place at the end of the month and appears to have slipped the BBC’s attention. UNWRA’s mandate is up for ratification.

    UNWRA has always been part of the problem not the solution. Nevertheless I can’t expect the mandate not to be renewed. Too many jobs and too much budget depends on it. Still all is not lost. An additional clause stating the crtieria for ending Palestinian refugee status (as exists in UNHCR) would be revolutionary.

    Another issue worth discussing. If the Palestinians are granted statehood in September (I believe it’s odds on they will) does that mean Palestinian refugee status will expire? What if Syria, Jordan or Lebanon expels the PAlestinian refugees to the newly minted State of Palestine?

       0 likes

    • John Anderson says:

      deegee

      with respect, I do not thing the “Palestinian State” motion will pass.  Even slippery Obama’s USA vote will be against.

      Also, the talks between Hamas and the PLA have for the moment broken down.

      ……………………………

      Sensible Egyptians, Syrians, Jordanians know that the Israeli military would whip their ass if war broke out,   Juast like the 6-day war – air supereoirity is the decider (Come in Pounce on this assertion)

      The Israeli air force – and Israeli air defence systems – are a match for anything thrown at them.

      And the Israili tank forces,  IF they have air cover,  will wipe the opposing tanks out.

      Sadly,  I believe there will be a war soon   To satisfy the stupid “Arab street”.    But it will be disaster for the Arabs – again.

      ………………………………

      The US Defence Secretary has just declared NATO to be a busted flush,  a waste of resources,   a set of “allies” that mostly don’t  add up to a row of beans.  And therefore the US commitment of “blood and treasure” is hardly worth continuing. 

      I believe a Repub candidate in 2012 will latch on to this – “We should stop funding NATO – and we should quit m,uch of the funding of the UN”     (Hopefully with theIPCC and all the “human rights” crap

      Hopefully,  an incoming

         0 likes

      • matthew rowe says:

        Israel’s training and democratic tendency’s have given it one of the most flex-able and proactive  military systems in the world and man for man it is something even with their  up-to-date equipment and greater numbers  their enemy’s are singly unable to defeat ! as even an f-15 is useless if the enemy is sitting  over your airfield!.  
        And  as the Arab states  cannot combine their forces as they all hate each other any military solution would be a disaster for the Arab goverments and they know it !!

           0 likes

      • deegee says:

        I hope you are correct but you make some questionable assumptions.
        1) The Palestinians don’t make use of the “Uniting for Peace” provisions to counter Obama’s veto (if it happens).
        2) The attack against Israel will be made by conventional armies where Israel has a huge advantage. In all likelihood the war will start with artillery (rocket) bombardments from heavily dug-in forces using civilian structures as human shields. The Hizbullah experience is if Israel doesn’t enter and destroy each fortification from the ground, they will survive, win a propaganda victory and declare victory.
        3) The enlightened European nations will not stop Israel resupplying from their ports and over their territory using the UN provisions as legal justification.

           0 likes

  31. As I See It says:

    Jeremy Bowen looking happier than he has for months. Top of the BBC1 10 O’clock News and a NATO airstrike gone astray – Jeremy’s loving it. Right back on form!

       0 likes

  32. John Anderson says:

    David Preiser

    It is very, very early yet in the approach to who will be 2012 candidates,

    The BBC seems to assume that Obama will be the Dem candidate.  Never has the BBC speculated about who else might run. Never have they considered how bloody hopeless his record has been,  and why the US electorate are likely to dismiss him as the fraud he always was.

    But on the Repub side – the BBC carries on its bias.  Palin is a nutter,  no-one else is worth reporting on.  They were reporting Palin in a slime way- but not Mitt Romney or any of the candidates who had declared they are running.  Nor have they properly reported on the tussles inside Congress – except with an Obama bias.

    Out of left-side comes Michelle Bachmann.  She played a blinder in the New Hampshire debate between various Republicans.  SHE IS NOW IN THE BULLSEYE FOR BBC ATTACKS. 
    She looks maybe replacing Sarah Palin as the candidate of the “right”,  and the Tea Party who combine middle ground with the right.  Independents as well as repubs – people who want the expansion of Government spending stopped.

    I do not know where it will go.  But I know damn well that anyone who emerges on the Repub will be vilified by the BBC.  They have ignored Romney so far – but they have afeady started with snide remarks about  Michelle Bachmann

    Make up your own minds.  In the new-media age, NOT available on US network sites,  the only place I have found where you or  I can see the whole debate is Breitbart.com.  Yes, the site the Dems call fascist.

      There will be more debates,  let’s form our own views.

    http://www.breitbart.tv/gop-hopefuls-duke-it-out-in-new-hampshire/

    All the stuff that BBC Amedrica denies us.  We pay,  they suppress.

    (I gather Bachmann has made a new tough claim – that Obama actually wants US Medicare to collapse, so it all gets folded into ObamaCare)

       0 likes

    • David Preiser (USA) says:

      The incumbent President is always the presumed candidate unless, like Lyndon Johnson, he says explicitly that he won’t run for a second term.  It’s almost unheard of for someone within the Party to challenge a sitting President.  No way in hell will the current President stand aside.  I doubt His ego would ever permit it, but leave open the extreme possibility that He’d do it in the hopes that forcing out the first black President would be enough to villify His enemies for a generation.  I think there would be far more racial strife if He stepped down (and made a vindictive statement about it, which would be par for the course for Him) than if He were defeated in an election.  Even then, I’m not looking forward to the anger from the race-oriented crowd about how White America wouldn’t let a black man succeed.

      In any case, Romney hasn’t been ignored by the BBC as much as he’s been dismissed.  Mardell already opined that Romney just wasn’t exciting enough to defeat the world’s greatest speechifier, and the “seven dwarves” didn’t get any respect either.

      But I agree with you that whoever the eventual Republican candidate is, he or she will not get fair treatment from the BBC.  Although I expect that the Beeboids will reserve their greatest venom for the same people at which they spewed it in 2008:  the American public.  If we don’t elect Him a second time, it will be because Republican intransigence prevented Him from fixing the economy that Bush destroyed, and we didn’t give Him a fair chance.  Mardell and others have already begun to lay the groundwork for that Narrative.  Also, we’re still racists at heart, so couldn’t stomach another four years of a black man in charge.

      Aside from all that, I think Bachmann is giving the President too much credit.  I don’t think He and His minions have enough of a clue to deliberately sabotage Medicare.  They are just like Stephanie ‘Two Eds’ Flanders, and believe that throwing more money at something is always the answer.  Yet, I have to admit, if the President really did want to destroy the economy and take the country down into hell, it’s hard to imagine what He’d be doing differently now.

         0 likes

      • hippiepooter says:

        The Republican Party is easily the most inclusive party in the world.  We have Andrew Breitbart, a guy on the Advisory Board of GOProud, the Republican ‘homocon’ group that caused a stir at this year’s CPAC, urging Cain/West, two black conservative Christians, as the Republican ticket for 2012.

        The American Right coming ‘atcha, giving meaning to the meaningless rhetoric of the left.

           0 likes

  33. Grant says:

    BBC having a field day with the NATO air strike. Lots of interesting uses of inverted commas on the website and, of course , the opposition are still “rebels”. What do they have to do to be upgraded to “militants” ?
    I am beginning to find the BBC’s bias, generally, just pathetic. It would be a self-parody, if it wasn’t so dangerous and viewed as the truth by so many.

       0 likes

  34. Biodegradable says:

    An excellent reminder of what a real “human rights activist” is:

    Yelena Bonner: A True Human Rights Giant

    She was a heavyweight who could criticize the human rights community’s silence on Gilad Shalit. Speaking at the Oslo Freedom Forum, Bonner pointedly asked:

    Why doesn’t the fate of the Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit trouble you in the same way as the fate of the Guantanamo prisoners?

    You fought for and won the opportunity for the International Committee of the Red Cross, journalists, and lawyers to visit Guantanamo. You know prison conditions, the prisoners’ everyday routine, their food. You have met with prisoners subjected to torture . . .

    Returning to my question of why human rights activists are silent, I can find no answer except that Shalit is an Israeli soldier, Shalit is a Jew. So again, it is conscious or unconscious anti-Semitism. Again, it is fascism.”

       0 likes

    • cjhartnett says:

      Thanks for reminding us of Yelena Bonner.
      Sakharov, Solzhenitsyn and the marvellous Natan Sharansky too-yet Brian Haw would be sneaked onto the plinth in Trafalgar Square ahead of these true heroes.
      THe BBC likes its toadies warm and its rebels cold…safe.
      Haw was no threat to them-but a Sharansky or a Bonner will always be!

         0 likes

      • Grant says:

        BBC Website’s news report of Haw’s death is about 4 times the length of the report of Bonner’s death.
        Can I deduce from this that Haw was left-wing and not Jewish ?  

           0 likes

        • cjhartnett says:

          Assuredly so Grant.
          Think I can guess who will be hogging the Last Words spot later on in the week.
          Bonner may get something phoned in and cobbled together if we`re lucky. Haw will get Skinners trousers at half mast, and little mention of what our rebel was doing in Germany when Barts might have been nearer for him.

             0 likes

  35. 1327 says:

    This morning while waiting for a meeting to start I caught a fair chunkof President Assads speech in Syria being shown in real time on BBC news with a translation. What was obvious was that he isn’t going to back down and is in this to the bitter end. The other thing I learned from watching the speech is that he or the culture he operates in is totally barking !! He waffled and issued threats but most of the time rambled on and on about different conspiracies and the like.

    I came out of the meeting and caught a news round up on the BBC new channels and then have looked at their website where I find that Assad has taken a “hard line” with various quotes from his speech but no mention at all of the insane bits. Why is this aspect of his personality (and probably his culture) being edited out by the Beeb ?

    Answers on a postcard please !

       0 likes

    • Grant says:

      1327,
      I think the only Arab dictator the BBC hasn’t supported is Mubarak. Funny that. 

         0 likes

    • NotaSheep says:

      Assad ‘stands up to Israel’ – that was the BBC line as to why Syria would not experience any revolts. Now there are revolts, it is used to justify Assad staying in power. The BBC seem to see the whole Middle East through a pro/anti Israel filter.

         0 likes

  36. My Site (click to edit) says:

    On the plus side, the next few years’ worth of Breakfast paper reviewers, Newsnight guests, Marr sofa-sitters and R4 co-presenters is pretty much sorted…

    http://conservativehome.blogs.com/leftwatch/2011/06/the-crowd-pleasing-left.html

    That said, it looks on reflection little different to the last few years as well.

       0 likes

  37. George R says:

    Censored by Islam Not BBC (INBBC):

    – Child sex grooming in Britain.


    ‘Times’ headline, Page 1, today (paywall):

    “2,000 victims but child sex grooming is ‘hidden issue’.

    ‘Hidden issue’ with INBBC? You can say that again.

    In the ‘Times’ report, the words ‘Islam’ and ‘Muslim’ are carefully avoided.

    From ‘Times’ report:

    “The results of the five-month investigation show that 20 per cent of those identified” {as child sex grooming perpetrators} “are of Asian origin. Although it concludes that child grooming cannot be associated with a particular ethnic group, meetings have been held with civil servants from the Department for Education about how to ‘present’ publication in the media.”


       0 likes

  38. My Site (click to edit) says:

    So much worth contributing… so little time:

    http://www.bbc.co.uk/journalism/blog/2011/06/what-a-documentary-director-do.shtml

       0 likes

  39. cjhartnett says:

    BBC Haiku!

    Pay them more
    Make more laws
    Train them again
    In what Nanny had meant
    But do save your rants
    For the end of the grants

    …Think John Cooper Clarke is at my door with a pizza!

       0 likes

    • Craig says:

      Though I’m not sure I entirely share your analysis, that’s a clear case of bias you’ve found on the part of Nicky Campbell. Well worth a read.
      And Nicky Campbell of all people Hippiepooter!! πŸ™‚

         0 likes

  40. George R says:

    “Immigrants take 9 out of 10 jobs in UK: Frank Field”

    -NOT reported by open-door BBC, but picked up in Kerala!

    http://www.newkerala.com/news/2011/worldnews-10963.html

       0 likes

  41. Roland Deschain says:

    Oh look, it’s worse than previously expected.

    Change the fu**ing record, Mr Black.

       0 likes

    • My Site (click to edit) says:

      Another ‘broadcast only’ with Editors’ Picks call out, one notices.

      What governs when he actually dares to test his writing to a responsive audience?

      I may have given it a sympathetic hearing, but with no opportunity for folk who may actually know what constitutes an expert panel of scientists’ i fear the default presumption is just more faxed-in PR BS from the ‘in-crowd’.

         0 likes

    • John Horne Tooke says:

      Black cannot change the record because he makes lots of money from his ludicrous propaganda. Goebbels could never in his wildest dreams surpass the BBC :

      “If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it. The lie can be maintained only for such time as the State can shield the people from the political, economic and/or military consequences of the lie. It thus becomes vitally important for the State to use all of its powers to repress dissent, for the truth is the mortal enemy of the lie, and thus by extension, the truth is the greatest enemy of the State.”

      The time will come when “the state” no longer support this drivel, and then the idiotic Black may get his cumuppence.

         0 likes

    • John Horne Tooke says:

      If you want to support IPSO you have to contact this person

      Mirella von Lindenfels

      http://www.stateoftheocean.org/support.cfm

      Who is also head of this money making company.

      http://communicationsinc.co.uk/index.cfm

      Or

      Dr Alex Rogers who is a zoologist from here

      http://www.zsl.org/

      A panel of unknown people who call themselves scientists proves nothing. I agree with John Droz (http://windpowerfacts.info/) when he says:

      “The reality is that genuine science is apolitical, and consists of
      a) comprehensive,
      b) independent,
      c) transparent, and
      d) empirical assessment of claims.

      Put another way, there can be a profound difference between “reports by scientists” and “scientific reports.”

      http://wattsupwiththat.com/2011/06/07/science-is-not-being-corrupted-%E2%80%94-scientists-are/

         0 likes

      • John Horne Tooke says:

        This bit is brilliant

        “We’ve sat in one forum and spoken to each other about what we’re seeing, and we’ve ended up with a picture showing that almost right across the board we’re seeing changes that are happening faster than we’d thought, or in ways that we didn’t expect to see for hundreds of years.”

        Its children telling ghost stories, it is not science.

           0 likes

  42. David Preiser (USA) says:

    The BBC News is ridiculously partisan, both politically and economically.  They’ve got Nigel Farage on a little while ago to talk about how Greece should not get bailed out again and you’re only pouring good money after bad.

    After Farage made the same case he’s been making for years about how bailing out Greece would never work and would only drag the euro down further, Stage Performer Maitlis replied that “the problem is” that most people watching right now would merely think, “Well, he would say that, wouldn’t he?”

    What a @#$$ing joke.  That’s why they brought him on the show today: to say exactly that.  For Maitlis to dismiss his position like that shows that the BBC News producers looked at this as a set-up, a chance to use Farage as a kind of straw man argument against their partisan position that we must continue to prop up the Greek tragedy.  And it got worse.

    Maitlis then said that, if the whole euro collapsed, Farage wouldn’t be bothered at all because that’s what he wants to happen.  This is playing the man and not the ball.  Maitlis just did the usual far-Left scare tactics of “Ooh, it will get worse if we don’t give them money, You’re horrible!”, and did not even attempt to engage with Farage’s points.

    Maitlis (or a producer in her ear) tried to make a Lehman Bros. parallel with Greece, as if Greece defaulting would bring down the whole house of cards in the way that Lehman’s collapse did.  It didn’t, really, and Greece defaulting now sure as hell wouldn’t be as bad as giving them another 10 billion and then defaulting (which they will, because there won’t be enough internal changes to prevent it).  But Greece defaulting won’t make the euro collapse just like that.  Here’s how the Stage Performer tried to make her case:

    “The grown-up response would be to divorce those two right now”, would cause a major “Lehman-like” collapse.  Scare tactics. Farage allowed that yes, austerity measures taken now would hurt in the short term, but they must do it instead of sucking more money from the teat.  “There’s a lot of people in Greece who wouldn’t agree with that.”  No sh!t, Emily.  That’s the problem.

    This is also revealing of the ideological position at the BBC that the euro is a good thing and must keep going.  Why?  Maitlis was clearly taking the position that we must maintain the euro, as this is the only reason she could come up with for pouring more money down the Greek toilet.  At no time did she even attempt to explain what would work, only that we must do it or else.

    It was pure contradiction, no discussion, with Farage essentially being dismissed out of hand because he has an ideological position that the euro is a mess and we shouldn’t be bailing out Greece a second time.  Yet, Maitlis and the BBC are guilty here of acting out of ideology themselves.

    They don’t explain how bailing out Greece will work, just that not doing it will make them feel bad.  A pathetic, biased segment.

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    • John Horne Tooke says:

      Yes its very sly bringing on an anti-eu politician. I know what Farage would say before he opened his mouth. It would have been more honest to ask an economist.
      http://www.cebr.com/?p=148

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      • David Preiser (USA) says:

        That’s why it’s BS journalism.  Stage Performer Maitlis didn’t debate his ideas, she demonized him as an ideologue instead, as if that was a substitute for debating the issue.

        It’s an old tactic: try to discredit a position by associating it with an outlier rather than explaining why it’s wrong.  If you don’t want to bail out Greece again (and unconditionally, FFS), it’s only because you’re a heartless isolationist deologue like this Farage bastard.

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        • Grant says:

          Now that I have gone digital  ( πŸ˜€ ),  I am able to watch lots of channels , so will be spending even less time with the BBC.
          I watched SKY News at 7 today which had a long section on Greece, the Euro and the EU. Several “independent” experts (none of whom I had ever seen on the BBC ) and an interview with the economic spokesman of the Greek opposition party.
          Now, it was true that the Sky presenter was overly aggressive, but pretty much with everyone. However, I was struck by how balanced the programme was. The possibility of Greece , Portugal , and Ireland leaving the Euro, and even the EU, was discussed as a real possibility in terms of pros and cons for the countries themselves as well as the EU as a whole, without the  BBC slant that the very idea is sheer madness.
          Early days for me with Sky, so far, but it seems very different from the BBC.

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          • cjhartnett says:

            It`s usually much better that tonights Grant!
            Jeff Randall is excellent-his pew warmer tonight(Joel Hills) seemed to have decided to be Humphrys circa 1992 or something.
            When Joel dared to talk to the Greek politician about how the Greeks were feeling about the “bail out”, I saw a future BBC hack in the making.
            The Greek bloke was patience itself-presumably it`s worse in Omonia Square at the moment….and all done in English.
            Sky/Al Jazeera/R.T…all are better balanced than the BBC!

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            • Grant says:

              cj,
              I was sorry to miss Jeff. But funny, I thought that Joel Hills was angling for a job at the BBC.  He wasn’t really listening to what the Greek chappie was saying. The Greek must have been thinking “The problem with the British is that they are over-excitable ”  !

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        • Lloyd says:

          and it’s a tactic which they do over and over and over.

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          • As I See It says:

            Peston turned up on the BBC1 Six O’Clock News last night to give what I take to be the party line. The exaggerated lip curling Huw Welshman-Edwards (Given the newscaster has to be Welsh I’d rather listen Tom Jones) interviewed the great Beeboid sage and so long as you could bear to listen between the odd pauses and long drawn out drawl we get:

            1. Yes the EU will give another bail out – they have to do that because otherwise well, lets not go there.

            2. In time the Greeks need to have their debt reduced. Basically the EU tax payer will have to let them off.

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  43. George R says:

    Inevitable: the further deep Islamization of Islam Not BBC (INBBC)-

    Life of Mohammed on INBBC2; – 3 part series, from Muslim, ex-INBBC,  now at INBBC’s chum network, Al Jazeera and RAGEH OMAAR again!!! -featuring such apologists for Islam as T. Ramadan and J.Esposito.

    No sign of any critic of Islam presenting a 3 part series on INBBC, such as ROBERT SPENCER, who has written books such as:

    http://www.jihadwatch.org/recommended-books-to-understand-jihad-dhimmitude.html



    From the dhimmi INBBC Press Office:

    http://www.bbc.co.uk/pressoffice/pressreleases/stories/2011/06_june/20/muhammad.shtml

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    • George R says:

      INBBC’s big spending on TV religion goes on pro-ISLAM propaganda.


      1.) In 2009, Muslim RAGEH OMAAR, ex-INBBC, now Al Jazeera English was commissioned by INBBC to make the expensive Islamic propaganda TV series (3 parts) that was:
       ‘An Islamic History of Europe’;

      2.) INBBC appointed Aaqil Ahmed as Head of Religious Programming in 2009;

      http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/northern_ireland/8047537.stm

      3.) In 2011, Muslim RAGEH OMAAR to present another expensive pro-Islam TV  3-part series, financed by British people; trips to Mecca aplenty. (This Mecca?:’The Siege of Mecca’):

      http://www.amazon.com/Siege-Mecca-Forgotten-Uprising-al-Qaeda/dp/0385519257#reader_0385519257

      4.) INBBC-Patten-Thompson will ensure that the British people are forced to continue to finance e.g. INBBC’s ARABIC TV service to the Muslims of the Middle East, as part of INBBC ‘core’ activities, even if cuts are enforced on domestic broadcasting services to British people!





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  44. My Site (click to edit) says:

    Tweetness and light…

    caitlinmoran Caitlin Moran  by BBCNewsnightNow all I have to do is try not to actually burst into tears on Newsnight tonight, and I am done.
    The audience hears you love… we hear you.

    And ok, it’s old, but still gold…

    StinkyJrnlsm: BBC to Apologize for Documentary, May Have Contained Fake Footage http://bit.ly/jT0GzD

    Hmn, possibly, eh? But does, for sure, always contain nuts.

       0 likes

  45. David Preiser (USA) says:

    A viewpoint which will not be allowed on the BBC:


    Obama Wins Nobel War Prize

    As the July 2011 deadline for Afghan troop withdrawal nears, President Barack Obama is gearing up for another significant milestone, the Nobel War Prize awards ceremony, which will be held in Oslo next month.

    Satire, yes.  But this bit isn’t so funny:

    Among Obama’s list of war accomplishments, the committee highlighted Obama’s decision to double the number of troops and expand the number of private contractors in Afghanistan, as well as his dramatic escalation of drone strikes and targeted assassinations in Yemen and Pakistan. According to one committee member, “Two years ago, we worried that President Obama would rollback Bush administration policies and pursue a peace agenda, but in fact he’s expanded the militaristic Bush approach to counterterrorism. He’s managed to get the U.S. involved in three wars in the Middle East, keep Guantanamo open, and dramatically expand the use of covert CIA capture/kill operations across the globe. We could not think of a more worthy candidate for this award.”

    News this week
    that the CIA is building a secret military base in the Middle East had the committee buzzing with excitement. One judge noted, “We applaud Obama for presiding over 865 military bases abroad at a cost of over $102 billion annually. At a time when the country is faltering from the economic crisis, Obama’s decision to approve the construction of more bases deserves praise.”

    Where’s the anit-war crowd now, BBC?  How’s that Nobel Peace Prize working out?

       0 likes

    • deegee says:

      I’ve said it before. Awarding the Nobel Peace Prize to a man who had done literally nothing towards peace reflects badly on the Nobel Prize Committee. Actually accepting the prize reflects badly on the recipient.

         0 likes

  46. joseph sanderson says:

    Watch out for a new ‘tricky dicky’ Black article tomorrow on the BBC website, in which I predict he will be attempting to sell Mann’s latest try at prooving his ‘hockey stick’ mirage!.

    And if you are given a chance to post on Blacks blog, ask his how Mann has managed to achieve his stick (hint He got his acceleration via adjustment to *actual* sea levels to account for land based water reservoirs while ignoring ground water pumping to the surface).

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  47. George R says:

    BANGLADESH.

    What British INBBC licencepayers will have to pay for:

    http://www.thedailystar.net/newDesign/news-details.php?nid=190873

       0 likes

  48. London Calling says:

    I dunno, you wait hours for a green lie to come from the BBC, then four come along at once.

    A compendium of dodgy advocacy-driven grant hungry tosh served up with a good helping of “we are all doomed” plus the “call to arms” beloved by scaremongers across the ages, “only ten years” (or any time you like) to save the planet/Ocean/ cute animals, whatever.

    BBC shock headlines:

    ‘Shocking’ decline seen in oceans
    The oceans are in a worse state than previously suspected, with mass extinction of marine species looming, according to a panel of scientists.
    Acid oceans turn ‘Nemo’ fish deaf Coral reefs heading into crisis 2010 sets new temperature records ‘Ten years’ to solve nature loss

    All of this recent tosh has been roundly demolished in the intelligent blogsphere but its served up by the £3bn BBC as shock horror “fact”. Why tell one lie when you can tell four?

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  49. Grant says:

    PS.  On the “bastard Farage” issue, there are many economists who believe the UK would be better off out of the EU, but I don’t seem to see the on the BBC.
    By the way, for all you cricket fans out there, Nigel was the lunchtime guest on saturday’s  TMS. He made a couple of anti-EU noises with a few  background “hear hears ” to be heard in the commentary box, but didn’t make the obvious point that the main reason the UK should leave the EU is that the Europeans don’t play cricket !

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    • John Horne Tooke says:

      “Europeans don’t play cricket !” Come on Grant – you really shouldn’t come out with sweeping statements, its soo BBC.
      http://www.cricket.de/

      πŸ™‚

         0 likes

      • Grant says:

        JHT,
        “sweeping”. Very droll.
        Looks like I bowled a wide, as I forgot about the Dutch who have a pretty decent team.

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