Monthly Archives: February 2012

The BBC Celebrates WikiHacks Again

By | | , ,
8 Comments

Check out how the BBC reflexively sides with WikiHacks and their publishing of stolen emails from Stratfor.  Stratfor is not a government agency, and has not been accused of any crime, yet the BBC opens the piece by describing WikiHacks as a “whistleblowing website”. Of course, anyone who is aware of boss Julian Assange’s open declaration that his intent is to harm US geopolitical goals will know what his real agenda is here.

In any case, in stark contrast to their treatment of the leaked CRU emails (there is still not a single scrap of evidence that they were stolen), the BBC sees nothing wrong – declines to editorialize against, really – with the fact that WikiHacks got the Stratfor emails from the hacker group, Anonymous, who admits to illegally obtaining the emails, along with credit card numbers and other data.

Notice also the accompanying photo of a gently beaming, serene St. Julian. Selecting photos is an editorial decision, one which can influence the readers’ interpretation of a story.

St. Julian is on record, we’re told, as stating that some of the far-left activist groups on which Stratfor was gathering information are “fighting for a just cause”. So it’s not so much whistleblowing as it is an attempt to undermine a political enemy. But never mind, he’s still a hero to the BBC for doing it. To further cast aspersions on Stratfor – the victim of a crime here – we even get a quote from Barron’s that the organization is a kind of “shadow CIA”. Just so you all know who the real bad guys are here, and to re-inforce the false description of WikiHacks as whistleblowers.

Then comes the outrageous bit:

Despite the new disclosures, Wikileaks is still facing difficulties on several fronts.

Despite? Despite releasing stolen information from an organization not of the Left, BBC?  In other words, the Beeboid who wrote this – and an approving editor – believe that releasing stolen emails from Stratfor should go a long way towards rehabilitating WikiHacks in the public eye. This is the BBC taking sides against Stratfor and in favor of WikiHacks.

Click through to read and contribute comments on this post.

CASTLES IN THE AIR…

By | |
13 Comments

One of the big problems with the BBC is the bias by omission that singularly characterises much of the daily output. Consider this analysis put together by B-BBC contributor Alan; 


“Whilst the BBC isconcerned about the deleterious effects on the democratic process that is beingTrumped by wads of Yankee greenbacks corrupting the smooth progress andundoubtedly fair Scottish government’s imposition of windfarms upon theScottish people it is less concerned about economies being destroyed byenvironmental policies that raise massive green taxes and make energy a costthat is ruinous to industry….as the Germans are finding out but which seemsto have escaped the BBC’s notice…and it surely is a big story, one of greatimportance for every country….consider Britain has targets to reduce CO2 by80% by 2050…..more than any other country in the world…..

‘Government pledges to cut carbon emissions by 80% by 2050. New climate change secretary Ed Miliband sets new goal.’ Thursday 16 October2008

Miliband told MPs that the tough economic conditions were not an excuse to”row back” on the commitment to tackle global warming.’ “To meet it will require determined action from Gordon Brown and every one ofhis successors for the next four decades. Hard choices will be made that willtouch every Briton, but it can and must be done.”

Four decades of green austerity then….on top of years of austerity to battlerecession. Of course if you think perhaps the Tories are against this think again:

‘Greg Clark, the shadow climate change secretary, also welcomed theannouncements. He said: “The choice between aggressive and ambitiousaction on carbon reduction and a successful, powerful economy is, in fact, nota choice at all – they are one and the same.” He welcomed the acceptance of the 80% target, saying: “We have always saidthat we should be guided by the science on that matter.” ‘

So all round delusions.And this is what a Biased BBC commenter has drawn attention to:

‘….a Cabinet Minister indicated – in effect, and with scarcely-concealedregret – that the party line set by David Cameron in response to variousopinion polls, focus groups and other such artifices for identifying andfollowing a consensus rather than setting a lead, and not the objectivescientific and economic truth, was likely to remain the basis of UK climatepolicy.’

So UK policy has nothing to do with either science or economics…..Cameron hasjust decided that is the consensus of opinion amongst fellow politicians andthe bien pensant and so has made his decision regardless of the harm to thenational economy. 

Here is what the reality is away from the cosy political clubs(except oneswhere Labour MP’s start a drunken punch up) and agreeable likemindedness of thepoliticians. Shouldn’t hold your breath for Black to report this…and it is surely a bigstory with implications not just for Germany….not even on his Twitter feedthat has infinite space for such links and which he uses in a highly selectiveway to control what you do and do not get to read and therefore think.

Click through to read and contribute comments on this post.

PRITI WORDS DON’T MEAN MUCH TO THE BBC…

By | | , ,
64 Comments

I don’t know about you but I’m with Conservative MP Priti Patel who has claimed the BBC is showing bias in favour of hard left activists as concerns the current “Workfare” issue;

She claimed BBC 2 Newsnight had ‘spent all week putting solitary Government Ministers up against panels made up of the hard Left’. Sources say David Cameron is ‘determined’ to rescue the scheme and is ‘livid’ at the BBC’s role. On Tuesday’s Newsnight, Tory MP Harriett Baldwin was put up against three critics who had experience of workfare schemes. Jeremy Paxman asked Baldwin four times: ‘Do you understand why people find the schemes offensive?’ And on Thursday, presenter Kirsty Wark said: ‘It’s just essentially cheap labour.’ On Friday morning’s Today programme, Evan Davis said: ‘The amount you are going to learn stacking shelves is not going to be very great – it’s been over-sold. What do you learn when you go and do work experience in supermarkets?’ 

Throw in some of Stephen Nolan’s comments and you have a full on jihad against Government policy which coincidentally echoes the campaign from the hard Marxist left…

The BBC has willingly taken on this agitprop role and this is but the latest manifestation. I have no sympathy for Cameron, he has consistently failed to confront the monster so he cannot be surprised when it bites.

Click through to read and contribute comments on this post.

WORSHIPPING AT THE ALTAR…

By | |
15 Comments

The BBC’s quest to find climate change hype knows no bounds. Here, in alleged news about the collapse of Mayan civilisation, the BBC reporter has constructed his story so that its focus is a warning that the cause was drought. He adds:

The reconstructed droughts are similar in extent to some predictions for the near future of the same region as a result of climate change.

“There are differences too, but the warning is clear – what seems like a minor reduction in water availability may lead to important, long-lasting problems,” Professor Martin Medina-Elizalde said.

Thus, the BBC foists its ruthless and relentless climate change beliefs on the reinterpretation of history and in the construction of warped futurology. This was a tactic pursued with equal fanaticism by Stalinist Russia. Many years ago, I read archaeology at one of our oldest universities, and I saw at first hand the back somersaults which were performed by the country’s Marxist antiquarians in order to meld its past into dialectical materialistic orthodoxy. The BBC’s copy tasters are performing exactly the same task, looking out like hawks in search of their prey any smidgeon of academic garbage that will support their crusade.

You don’t have to search far to find where their heroes in this quest are. Here the BBC warmist priest Mike Amos lauds without qualification the work of the EU’s European Research Council, which is in charge of frittering away billions of pounds worth of Politburo-style research effort. Mr Amos picks out from the Council for special attention Dr Nicole Boivin(speciality – ‘the relationship between human activity and environmental change’), and says:

She is investigating the initial steps to globalisation, with particular reference to the Indian Ocean where some of the first major cross-cultural interactions took place thousands of years ago. Her project employs some innovative approaches, pulling together expertise from a range of disciplines – not just standard archaeology, but fields such as historical linguistics, molecular biology and palaeo-environmental studies.

In other words, the fragrant Dr Boivin, one of the tens of thousands of publicly-funded climate change activists and leeches, is being paid to reinforce the EU – and BBC – globalisation agenda and to re-write history in that pursuit. And the BBC worships at her altar.

Click through to read and contribute comments on this post.

BLACK CALLS POT BLACK…

By | |
17 Comments

It’s not a good week if Richard Black does not gain the interest of our commentariat and so it is that B-BBC contributor Alan observes;

“Richard Black hassurfaced again having gone to ground to give himself thinking time in order towrack his brains to find a line of defence for the person who stole documentsfrom Heartland Institute.
(Should you want some real world science facts listen to this….21 minutes and39 seconds that speaks more common sense than Black has done in his entirecarrer…http://audioboo.fm/boos/679624-matt-ridley-on-why-the-cure-for-climate-change-may-be-worse-than-the-disease?playlist_direction=reversed)

Forced into writing something by the amount of criticism his non-reportinggenerated:

‘I don’t normally do requests, as they say – but I’ve a lot of messages viaemails, blog comments and Twitter asking for a follow-up post on the HeartlandInstitute, and am happy to oblige.’ (as ‘Watts up with That’ reports….UPDATE28: 11:40AM James Evans in commentsreports that “the BBC has finally weighed in, and it’s lame”. It only tookRichard Black 36 hours to be convinced by an onslaught of emails. Whatta guy!The article makeup leaves no question now that Black is biased beyond allhope.’)

This is the best he could do:

‘Firstly, what’s wrong with the Heartland Institute preparing curriculummaterial for use in schools, you’ve asked. “Green groups do it all thetime,” is the allegation.

As a parent and a citizen, if teachers use non-standard curriculum material,the main thing I would be worried about is accuracy.’ He had no such qualms about the fraudulently inaccurate ‘Inconvenient Truths’video peddled by Al Gore. An Al Gore who is making millions from the climatechange ‘business’.Presumably lying fora good cause, or one you have persuaded yourself is a good cause is acceptableto Black.

And of course with Black the problem may or may not be accuracy, his worst failureis to not print the facts if they are ‘inconvenient’….note well that in thislatest effort worthy of Pravda he has avoided completely mentioning that themain document was faked….possibly because he has a good idea who the fakeris….suspicions are all pointing in one direction.

I wonder what he makes of the below where artists and performers are beingorganised to collaborate with ‘on message’ scientists to manufacture thepublic’s consent to their lifestyles being destroyed along with their businessesand futures, energy prices ramped up to extortionate levels on order to pay forpolicies based on at best mistaken science at worst deliberate attempts to hidethe truth:

‘TippingPoint, in partnership with NIReS, will be holding a major national gatheringof those concerned with the interface between the arts and culture on one hand,and environmental issues, particularly climate change, on the other. Our aim is to continue and strengthen the vital process of giving the urgentchallenges of climate change and sustainability a cultural and artisticvoice…..collaborations with scientists, artists can play a vital role inexploring and pointing the way towards the cultural, societal and behaviouralshifts needed in a world subject to a rapidly changing climate.’
http://www.ncl.ac.uk/sustainability/initiatives/tippingpoint.htm

Should you be in any doubt that we are being deliberately mislead read this:
http://bishophill.squarespace.com/blog/2012/2/20/the-entrepreneur.html
Which describes the political, not scientific reasons behind biofuels beingadopted as a solution to climate change.

 Another one that Black ignores.

As I said at the start Black has gone on the offensive to defend his previousstance on Heartland….claiming the man who fraudulently obtained the documentsis the real victim of the affair…..

‘@BBCRBlack via Twitter
Fallout from Heartland may harm Peter Gleick and others, reports @suzyji@guardianeco http://t.co/G1ZaPUsn‘

A Guardian story of course.

However he does not link to the likes of this:
Heartland Memo Looking Faker by the Minute
Business Feb 17 2012, 12:14 PM ET 1080
http://www.theatlantic.com/megan-mcardle

Here are his full thoughts on the matter…they don’t need much comment as theyare clearly a man clutching at straws to defend the indefensible:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-17126699

‘As the old saying goes, “news is something that someone somewhere doesn’twant you to know”
and here was information about a significant player in climate politics that itcertainly didn’t want you to have.

I am very wary of drawing parallels between the so-called”ClimateGate” issue of 2009 and the so-called “DenierGate”issue of the Heartland Institute, because they are very different.
But one thing they do have in common is that each is really a combination oftwo stories: who lifted the documents, and what the documents tell us.

With the Heartland case, we knew last week that someone had obtained thedocuments by the back door – “stolen”, to use the institute’s word.
Now, we know who; and that’s as far as it goes.

Firstly, what’s wrong with the Heartland Institute preparing curriculummaterial for use in schools, you’ve asked. “Green groups do it all thetime,” is the allegation.

As a parent and a citizen, if teachers use non-standard curriculum material,the main thing I would be worried about is accuracy.

The proposed modules would, for example, state that “whether humans arechanging the climate is a major scientific controversy” and that”natural emissions [of CO2] are 20 times higher than humanemissions”. The first is just wrong. It may be a public debate; but within science, thequestion is how much, not whether. In the second case, natural absorption is not mentioned and it’s the differencebetween the two – net emissions – that is the crucial fact.

Nevertheless, the rationale behind the argument is clear. Heartlandacknowledges it ramps its climate work up and down depending on how much moneyit receives.’

Click through to read and contribute comments on this post.

A RISING TREND BEST OBSCURED

By | |
25 Comments

B-BBC contributor Alan notes; 


“The BBC are stillingtrying to spin immigration figures and downplay the extent of immigration tothis country despite Mark Thompson’s admission that they had not covered thesubject properly in years past. The Telegraph reports the figures from government based on the yearly periodJune to June….June 2010 they were 235,000, by June 2011 they were250,000….so definitely a rise when comparing years.

The BBC has decided to take a different starting point, September 2010…butstill finishes in June 2011. September, the total net immigration would havebeen 255,000 for the year sept 2009 to sept 2010. As the total for June 2011was 250,000 the BBC have claimed this means that essentially immigration issteady and has not risen.

You could interpret it as it actually is….that immigration rose in Sept 2010and has continued at that high level ever since. This is of course the exact opposite trick they play with temperatures whenreporting climate change….here they ignore the plateau of 14 or so years thattemperatures have remained unchanged and claim there is a trend of risingtemperature despite this levelling off. Using the same analogy as the BBC for temperature you would have to sayimmigration is showing a rising trend. (and net migration is a figure which hides a lot…because 500,000 nativeBritish might emigrate, 500,000 foreigners immigrate here and the net figurewould be zero….but in effect you would have a much larger immigrantpopulation percentage wise in the UK slipping under the radar.)”

Click through to read and contribute comments on this post.

THE RIGHT NOT TO WORK

By | |
18 Comments

Thanks to the BBC-lite version of the Today programme, I am unable to link you to the direct item on this morning’s programme but it appears at 8.10am and is between Evan Davies and Chris Grayling, the topic being the various government programmes to get the unemployed into some form of work experience. This interview concludes a very successful work for the BBC which has led a jihad against the notion that Job Seekers should be seeking job experience in exchange for their benefits. This, as the BBC and the Socialist Workers Party would tell us, is “slave labour.” I thought Grayling handled himself quite well, correcting several wild claims by Davies but the brutal truth is that several large UK retailers have been put in a difficult position, thanks to the publicity afforded Big Sloth by the BBC, and are rapidly distancing themselves from the work experience concept. I notice that the BBC chooses not to discuss it’s OWN unpaid work positions – a classic example of the churning hypocrisy in play here.

Click through to read and contribute comments on this post.

Question Time LiveBlog 23rd February 2012

By | | ,
7 Comments


Tonight Question Time comes from Tunbridge Wells.

David Dimbleby is joined on the panel by Minister for Culture Ed Vaizey, Shadow Attorney General Emily Thornberry, UKIPs Paul Nuttall MEP, journalist Cristina Odone and dreary lefty Simon Schama.

Your Moderators line-up consists of David Vance, David Mosque, TheEye and John Ward.

It’s a 10:30pm kick off and afterwards we bid a welcome return to the maddess that is This Week. Unfortunately there’s a return for the odious Jacqui Smith but you can’t have everything.

For those who enjoy the Blue Nun Bingo whilst watching This Week (and also for those who don’t understand it) David Mosque has created a website dedicated to the game here. Awesome effort and well worth a look.

See you here later!

Click through to read and contribute comments on this post.