It’s been one year since an unhinged Arizonan killed several people in cold blood while attempting to assassinate Rep. Gabrielle Giffords. The BBC is silent on that matter today, which is slightly curious considering the big deal it was at the time, and what larger meaning they and their fellow travelers in the Left-wing US media tried to force onto it. They tried to blame Sarah Palin for inciting this act of mass murder. She had previously published a map with a cross-hairs on it, calling for supporters to “target” various Democrat opponents. Ignoring all common sense and the fact that this was a common rhetorical gesture, nothing to do with a call for violence, the BBC pushed the idea that Palin was to blame. But now…silence.
(UPDATE: See the bottom of this post.)
The easy “journalistic” defense is that the BBC has only such much time and only so much room to do stories, and the Republican race, the economy, and foreign policy developments take up the bulk of their time. The rest of the 55 Beeboids employed to cover the US are dedicated to producing more lightweight, magazine-style pieces and celebrity gossip, so hard news is outside their bailiwick.
Call it a straw man if you will, but then please give me an alternative reason for the BBC’s silence. My bet is that the agenda the BBC tried to push at the time has proved to be false, so they’ve ignored the story since there’s no special issue mileage to be gained. Also, if they bring it up again, they have to be careful not to remind you of their behavior at the time.
Let’s recall how the BBC, following the lead of their like-thinking brethren in the US media, tried to tell you that this act of mass murder was partially Sarah Palin’s fault. Let’s also recall how they pimped the President’s ill-advised attempt to use this tragedy to push His anti-gun agenda.
DB busted several Beeboids for their disgusting behavior at the time. BBC tv news editor Rachel Kennedy blamed Palin when tweeting:
The tweet has since been deleted. Down the memory hole, like so many other unfortunate tweets by BBC employees after they’re caught out.
As DB noted at the time, Katie Connolly (who later left the BBC to work for a Democrat strategy group) tried to smear the Tea Party movement with this by tweeting that the entire movement was Giffords’ enemy. Gavin Esler and a stalwart of the BBC College of Journalism were just two of the other BBC employees who joined in the fun.
The BBC’s top man in the US, Mark Mardell, also tried to smear Palin and the “rhetoric” of the Right for this tragedy. Sure, he opened with the “we don’t know the motives” disclaimer, but his entire post is dedicated to pointing the finger of blame. As I said in a post following the incident, this was drastically different from his behavior when Maj. Nadal murdered several people in the name of Islamic jihad.
Mardell further pushed his Narrative that Republicans engage in dangerous behavior in a later post, in which he promoted a speech by the President. The President also ran with the sick Narrative that Right-wing political rhetoric was to blame for the incident, and did a “we must all work together” speech.
It became apparent almost immediately to those who looked somewhere other than the BBC and the Huffington Post for their news on US issues that the mass murderer was mentally ill, and that partisan politics had precious little to do with his actions. The BBC took days to admit this, and not a single Beeboid apologized for their biased, inaccurate, slanderous statements.
Today, the BBC is silent. If they do whip up a news brief about it for tomorrow morning, they won’t be reminding you of their disgusting behavior at the time, won’t be reminding you of how their fellow travelers got it horribly wrong, won’t want you to recall how this tragic act was used to advance a political agenda.
UPDATE: The news brief is up. As predicted, no mention at all of the media hysteria, hoping you won’t remember the BBC’s disgusting behavior. One would have thought this would be a good moment to think about the dangers of divisive rhetoric, but then it’s only the Left doing it on this issue, so the BBC won’t touch it.
David, good on you for reminding us of their ignominious behaviour. far from self-correcting and improving on their reportage, the bbc is actually getting more blatent in its prejudices. It fails to see that it is actually all the things that it rails against. Isn’t the phrase : through a glass darkly, apposite as far as they are concerned?
they are an absolute affront to decency,journalism and plain old fashioned good taste
you could devote an entire evening’s tv to covering the sbile that this left wing scum spew out on twitter on a daily basis
laugh?I nearly paid the licence tax
Tweets can be deleted. So can friendships. I took my old friend Jim Hawkins (Radio Shropshire) to task as a result of his tweet on Palin’s guilt being posted by B-BBC. I was polite and pointed out the evidence that the whole thing was trumped up by HuffPo, MSNBC, media matters and other Soros entities. I haven’t heard a word from him since. Ah, well.
I am now waiting for the BBC to have a go at Santorum and what he and his wife did when a baby lived only 2 hours. Just as Sarah Palin and her disabled son were attacked – liberal journalists in the US have been attacking Santorum’s behaviour on that sad occasion. The journalists involved have apologised – sort of – but I expect some BBC creep will revert to it.
I never thought I would be referring to BBC staff as “creeps”. But so many of them behave that way, no sense of proper journalism.
…………………………….
By the way – has anyone seen the rumour that Richard Black is possibly on the shortlist for BBC Scence Editor – as is that other enviro-creep, David Shukman :
http://tradingaswdr.blogspot.com/2012/01/inside-collider.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+TradingAsWdr+%28tradingaswdr%29
here’s another post from the WDR site – run by an ex-employee of the BBC :
http://tradingaswdr.blogspot.com/2012/01/all-change.html
The posts at his site are mostly BBC gossipy stuff
I’m sure Richard Bacon will be laughing at Santorum’s family tragedy sometime in the near future.
If Black gets the post of science editor, it will be a very sad day for science journalism. He’s a single-issue drone, and the BBC really shouldn’t promote the climate issue over all other areas of science. If they give him the top job, it will be proof of their agenda that this trumps all other science issues.
‘If Black gets the post of science editor..’
…it will be an interesting insight into what passes for an appreciation of science, or editorial at market rate level in the BBC, as he has neither qualifications or integrity in either role.
But then Mr. Bowen is Middle East Editor and Helen Boaden is Head of ‘News’, so it fits.
In some ways I hope he gets it. Like Miliband and Abbott being the faces of their party, by further words and deeds they drag what’s left of the whole shamble’s cred into the abyss.
But I will also hark to a level of reporting and presentation that was world class and worth watching. No wonder my sons can not name a single BBC programme they would seek out in the week to watch, bar a few nature docos.
Notice how the BBC attacks the Migration Watch report on jobs and immigration. The BBC tell us that Migration Watch are a nasty bunch who want to stop immigration.
funny that when it’s a Labour party affiliated group doing a survey the BBC never bother to tell us it’s a left wing organisation.
Also, in the BBC reports they appear to spend more time attacking Migration Watch than what their report reveals.
Does the BBC really think that if we had less immigration we wouldn’t have lower unemployment?
I seem to remember under Liebore Gordon Brown saying “British jobs for British workers”
Do you have a link Martin? If, as you say they are attacking MW then it is absolute bias, plus MW figures and reports are rock solid.
The web article on this, at a cursory glance, seems reasonable. It even refers to “the left-leaning IPPR think tank”.
It is may be worse than that. If a leftie think-tank (or Green faux-charity) brings a report out, it is seldom described as leftie – and the Today programme floats its story without any real questioning or rebuttal.
The Today programme had a short piece on the MigrationWatch story It described MW as a “pressure group” – and it had brought in some bod from Royal Commonwealth Society who had been previously at the IPPR to try to contradict Sir Andrew Green. And of course the IPPR was not described as leftie.
Double standards or what ?
‘The tweet has since been deleted. Down the memory hole, like so many other unfortunate tweets by BBC employees after they’re caught out’
It’s not a stealth edit; it’s a BBC stealth ed…it’s an ‘evolution of the story’. Apparently.
Unique.
I remember the lefties knee-jerking into blaming Palin and all the other right wing gun nuts, or Patriotic American believers in the constitution, as I call them, for that shooting.
Small things like the tiniest shred of evidence where not required, or course.
When it turned out to be an extremist left wing former Marxist-turned-conspiracy nut who pulled the trigger, NONE of the lefties in politics or the media apologised for their mindless, delusional and wholly incorrect hate filled rants.
Open thread topic really.
But sometimes it is therapeutic to get something posted a.s.a.p.
I am absolutely stunned by this.
Speechless.
Talk about the banality of evil.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-16443556
It offers an insight into the barbarism endemic to an Islamic society which is presented in style of some gossipy, light weight traveler#s tale.
It isn’t satire, is it.? Am I missing the irony?
This is about murder and persecution sanitised with jokey asides.
What about Asia Bibi? What about the effort to enfranchise and grant crhistians basic human rights. What about a murderer feted by his Muslim community?
Unbelievable.
Don’t know what you mean RGH: clearly this murderer is just another misunderstood loveable rogue?
And then there’s this guy:
http://tinyurl.com/2c49my4
Curiously enough, a clear statement by the felon that the rhetoric of a former Vice-President inspired him to commit his crime didn’t strike anyone at the BBC as raising any questions about the American left.
I do recall at the time of the Gifford shooting a rather extended HYS debate where numerous comments went overboard calling Palin an acessory to attempted homice. Many of these comments crossed the line and were not removed. It was quite a hate moment, even by BBC standards.
The US is a profoundly Christian country, yet the Beeb only only ever associate Christianity with the Right, we never hear of “The Christian Left”.
So who voted for Obama, then?
Jedi? Druids?
Simple: Black and Hispanics are the good kind of Christians, because of the color of their skin.
“One would have thought this would be a good moment to think about the dangers of divisive rhetoric, but then it’s only the Left doing it on this issue, so the BBC won’t touch it.”
Exactly.