Monthly Archives: June 2012

The BBC’s favourite ‘turbulent priest’ Giles Fraser has said something that might be construed as islamophobic in the corridors of the BBC…
“A week before the Occupy thing started I preached at St. Paul’s about violence,” said Fraser. “I’m very exercised, and always have been, by the way the Church justifies violence to itself.
That sermon is really about [the French anthropologist] René Girard. He argues that religions are sublimated forms of violence—and religion is a bad word for him. Scapegoating the one who’s different unites the community, and it’s the priest who sanctifies this, who launders society’s violence. For Girard, Jesus is the supremely anti-religious figure, because he sees the violent secret that binds people together. Above all he sees the role that religious professionals play in concealing and reinforcing it and that is why they hate him. Jesus is saying, in effect, ‘Those ones you’re telling to go home, those ones you’re pushing around, those ones you kill—they are me. That old person who natters on, the gay boy, the foreigner. The one who’s different.’ ”

From that you could take it that ‘Christianity’, the religion of Jesus Christ, is a religion of Peace, turning the other cheek and the meek inheriting the earth and all that good stuff.

Islam of course may well be the religion that is a classic example of sacredly endorsed violence sanctified by the supposed Revelations of a ‘merciful and forgiving’ God…..

Could any Muslim argue with that description? It seems they are unlikely to, in fact some revel in the violent nature of Islam…..

‘We are not a pacifist religion. We don’t turn the other cheek. We hit back.’
Dr. Kalim Siddiqui, director of the Muslim Institute in London

Surely the BBC will not be happy that their latest anti-Establishment poster boy has been so Islamophobic?

The Today programme yesterday wished Enoch Powell, on the occasion of the 100th anniversary of his birth, a happy birthday.

Well, nearly.

Justin Webb says…‘We’re going to wish him, well, a qualified happy birthday.’

…because you know what a racist hate monger he was….

Justin Webb was very insistent that Powell was a racist.

No he wasn’t….Powell made the clear and powerful point that ‘multi-culturalism’ doesn’t work….not because he had antipathy or hatred of any other race but because it is an inevitable consequence of human nature that people of similar background, culture and race will look to group together…and then seek to further their own group interests, and that cannot be denied.

It is fact and anyone who states that fact should not be labelled ‘racist’ ….. Webb has so easily taken on the language of the race ‘hustlers’ probably because that suits his own outlook on life rather than rigorously asserting the evident correctness of Powell’s argument.

Immigration is about race, culture and identity but in the main it is about numbers and the affect mass immigration has on the native population…who have not been given the opportunity to say whether this is what they want…and now post-effect…they are still denied a voice, being branded ‘racist’ by the likes of Webb for raising legitimate concerns.

Over the course of the Leveson Inquiry we have been gravely informed of the deleterious effect of the Murdoch’s malign influence on, and easy access to, politicians.

What the BBC seems reluctant to admit is that all media outlets have access, and demand that access, to the Government in order to lobby in their own interests.

Here is just one (I’m sure there must be many, many more) example of that:

‘Former Beeb boss Greg Dyke says the BBC never curried favour from politicians. ‘I took a decision to stay as far away from them as possible,’ he declared on Question Time. Funny that, as I recall his office begging for a meeting with then Tory leader William Hague during a rough patch for him at the BBC, which was reluctantly agreed to. At the end, the DG asked me if there was a back door he could use to avoid being spotted. What a roaring hypocrite.’

We are also informed that it is the power of the ‘Press’, ie the Newspapers, ie Murdoch, that has had such a detrimental effect on the relationship between politicians and the media…and therefore what the Public get to hear and read.

However Martin Ivens in the Sunday Times begs to differ offering a different perspective…one that the BBC has noted but failed to associate with its own actions…that of the damaging influence of 24 hour rolling news on political coverage and analysis.

Ivens says:  ‘After Margaret Thatcher was ousted, her Conservative and Labour successors became obsessed with the 24-hour cycle of rolling news, to the detriment of a wider strategic vision.  it is important to keep the newspapers on side, but a sense of proportion is required.  The politicians have got the power.’

That last point is important….because both Brown and Major claimed they were at the mercy of Murdoch and his battalions….a question that needs asking….is that really true?  The BBC won’t be delving too far down that path as the answer will not suit its narrative of an over powerful Murdoch Press that now needs to be reined in and perhaps an Empire broken up.

So it would seem that it is not just the newspapers but in fact 24 hour news services such as the BBC’s that put the pressure on politicians to always have ‘something to say’ and therefore encouraging them to make ever more either utterly inane and anodyne statements or to make some outrageous claim that will be swallowed by a media desperate to fill the time and generating artificial controversies that can be endlessly picked over.

Much like the Leveson Inquiry itself which despite the huge distate about the hacking of Milliy Dowler’s phone is of little interest or concern to the Great British Public who would have happily gone on buying the News of the World had it survived.

Leveson is merely the cumulation of Labour’s, the BBC’s and the Guardian’s ideological and commercial ‘War’ on Murdoch.

Gordon Brown may have been lying through his teeth, along with many others, but he seems to have triumphed….like another Scotsman, Lord Lovat, chief of the Frasers in the 18th century, he has imposed his malign influence upon events and has indeed triumphed because his account has been upheld and broadcast worldwide without challenge or question by the BBC, giving him the credibilty and gravitas that he does not merit…Brown has been lent a ‘Grandeur to his villainy’ by a BBC intent on destroying Murdoch and his media organisation.

Time for a new Open Thread, slightly early as the last one is bulging at the seams.

Good hunting!

The BBC presents  a fairly unsophisticated picture of this country’s economic state and the debate surrounding it.  It allows them of course to control the debate and what is said more easily….at a basic level it can invite on speakers who it knows may not be very good at getting their views across (probably a Tory)…or someone who is rather good at ‘soundbite’ debating (usually a Labour person).

AA Gill in The Sunday Times a few weeks back said this about the BBC’s TV approach to debate (and I think it is a fair comment on the Today programme):

‘[This raises] a bigger question about how we treat politics and current affairs on television. It is almost always confrontational and rabidly partisan, a four-minute, invigilated slanging match that is  intellectually bankrupt and obtuse. Television’s way of exploring issues is always more about the desire for lively television than illuminating arguments. The cast list of pugilists, hack and thwarted politicians who will turn up at any studio, anywhere, in the early evening has become the constitutional version of Mexican wrestling: shouty and phoney. Question Time, in particular, needs to be seriously reimagined. None of this is about involving the viewers in political debate or thought. It’s thuggish and dispiriting and adds to the general disgust with the whole political caste.’

Even the grand Paxman himself agrees the BBC has dumbed down:

We all remember Paxman telling us all about it in 2007:

“In this press of events there often isn’t time to get out and find things out: you rely upon second-hand information-quotes from powerful vested interests, assessments from organisations which do the work we don’t have time for, even, god help us, press releases from public relations agencies. The consequence is that what follows isn’t analysis. It’s simply comment, because analysis takes time, and comment is free.”

The biggest and most important debate right now is whether the Coalition is making ‘savage’ cuts that are bringing the economy to a grinding halt and whether Labour’s plan to spend more are the only way forward….in other words does ‘Austerity’ work….This suggests it does…but you won’t hear it on the BBC.

Which is why the most important questions are just how much is the Coalition cutting and how much are they borrowing? This is the heart of the matter…the crucial difference between Balls and Osborne, but….

…they are two questions that the BBC singularly fails to ask never mind answer.  To do so would cut the rug from under Balls completely when the Public realise debt is rising now even with ‘cuts’…so imagine how much bigger the debts burden would be under Labour’s profligate ways. 

John Redwood, Tory MP, has been consistently trying to get his point across that there are no real cuts in government overall spending at the moment….the NHS for example is having more money spent on it…but that money is being reallocated within the NHS…so some sectors are losing money others are gaining..but overall the NHS spend is going up.

The fact is debt is going up, just at a slower rate. 

Look at this from the Spectator’s Fraser Nelson who talks about how the truth is being hidden (and Osborne gets some of the blame himself to be fair)

 ‘Like Brown, Osborne’s reaction to economic trouble is to borrow more. He may well be right to do so, but he ought to be honest about it. This matters, because it’s not his money. Every penny of money his government borrows has to be repaid by ordinary people.’

He goes on to suggest we are being badly served by the BBC who fail to make the debate  understandable and wide ranging enough:

 ‘Osborne ought to be shocked at the opinion polls showing that only about a tenth of the public understand that he’s massively increasing the debt, and that most people think he’s reducing it.’

‘The BBC ought to be the custodians of this, with its role as a public service broadcaster. But the BBC has adopted a Balls-lite narrative of harsh, radical cuts – and won’t back down from it.’

In the comments ‘#88′  links us to this which reveals the effect on manufacturing  employment that Labour’s massive Public Sector ‘national service’ scheme had: 

‘The Keynes vs Hayek debate is at its sharpest on the issue of employment. Can government create jobs (as Balls says)? Or does large public sector employment simply displace economic activity that would happen elsewhere (as Osborne says)? A fascinating study has been released today by the Spatial Economics Research Centre at the LSE showing the damage done by public sector employment to the real economy. Drawing on a huge amount of local-level data over an eight-year period, it’s a serious piece of research that is worth looking into and deserves to impact our economic debate.

1. First, what is seen. In the short term, hiring someone to work for the government means another worker, who in turn spends. As the report puts it, ‘additional jobs may be generated as a result of increased demand for locally produced goods and services’. That is what is seen. In the short term — 2003-07 is the time period looked at — the study finds that for every 100 extra public sector jobs you get 50 additional jobs in the service and construction industries.

2. Next, what is unseen. Namely, the effect on other industries. For every 100 extra public sector jobs, the study finds 40 fewer jobs in manufacturing, because local businesses find it harder to hire people. This essentially cancels out the benefit in the service industry. As the study says, ‘Public sector employment has little effect on total private sector employment in the short run’. Over that four year period, expanding the public sector didn’t crowd out the private sector, but it didn’t help it grow either.

3. In the long-term, the public sector crowds out the private sector. Crucially, over a longer period (1999-2007) the study finds that enlarging the public sector causes even greater pain to manufacturing with no gain in the services industry. In fact, adding 100 extra public sector jobs leads to 100 fewer private sector ones, and leaves the overall employment level unchanged.

What the study does not say, but is blindingly obvious, is that manufacturing jobs are a whole lot more beneficial to the economy than public sector pen-pushers. So the net effect of all this is to make government bigger, but everyone poorer.’

If the BBC are not discussing this study that Nelson has summed up for you above then you have to seriously question the BBC’s professionalism and impartiality and its ability to inform and educate the public about the  most serious and important issues in the public domain.

Today’s interview by Evan Davis of Ed Balls did neither of them any credit. Davis failed to get Balls to reveal what his actual plans are for the economy and how much they will cost in borrowing, and Balls ignored all the questions and ploughed on battering us over the head with his ‘Plan B’……or ‘Going For Broke’ as you might like to call it.

Nick Robinson ‏@bbcnickrobinson
Think it’s time someone arranged for a re-match in which @edballsmp interviews @EvanHD. One for Children in Need if not @BBCr4?!

Davis became so frustrated that he almost lost his temper at one stage…though he did get a small ‘Grrrgh!’ out of Balls when Davis stated the obvious…that Balls’ plans for more borrowing would merely burden future generations with debt….so why not try monetary policy first?

David Smith ‏@dsmitheconomics
‘I think Ed Balls might be advised to steer clear of Evan Davis for future Today interviews. And Ed needs to brush up on the 1930s’

Balls of course would have none of it…..he had his story and he was sticking to it….the Coalition’s ‘fiscal crunch’ had choked off the economy and growth, monetary policy and liquidity weren’t the answer……because they didn’t answer the fundamental problem…which is…lack of confidence in the future economy by the public and businesses.

Lack of confidence might be a problem…along with lack of cash….but you could ask who caused the confidence shortfall in the first place?

Apart from the BBC itself contributing to the atmosphere of doom and gloom (see also the recent survey on the NHS which bore little relation to the real state of the Service and claimed everyone was deeply worried about it….likely due to the BBC’s relentless doom mongering about the NHS) could it be one E. Balls Esq who likes to shout from the roof tops that we are ‘doomed, all doomed’……

“These are the darkest, most dangerous times for the global economy in my lifetime. Our country – the whole of the world – is facing a threat that most of us only have ever read about in the history books – a lost decade of economic stagnation.”
He said: “This is not a crisis of debt as the government claims, which can be solved country by country, by austerity, cuts and retrenchment, but truly a global growth crisis which is deepening and becoming more dangerous by the day.”

or this….
Ed Balls: ‘Lost decade’ for economy looms if George Osborne fails to act
Shadow chancellor warns of Japanese-style stagnation without plan for jobs and growth.
The British economy risks being plunged into a lost decade of Japanese-style stagnation unless the government tempers its austerity drive with a plan for jobs and growth, Ed Balls warns today.

Iain ‏@Iain_31
Ed Balls really needs to stop smirking with saying the country is in recession

As well as using Japan as a ‘gold standard’ example of why austerity doesn’t work he harks back to the 1930’s to claim we spent our way out of the Depression.

Firstly Japan spent billions to try and dig its way out of recession and famously failed. Secondly Britain implemented far more swingeing ‘cuts’ in the 1930’s  than we have now at present…and only began tax cuts when the economy was on a firmer footing.

‘Myths about the 1930s abound and not just among Labour politicians. Ed Miliband and Ed Balls join many historians, filmmakers, and novelists in wrongly painting Thirties Britain as a
universally hopeless, destitute place, rendered poor and miserable by a heartless, Conservative-dominated National Government. The mood was depressing indeed in 1931, but the economic data is decisive: by the middle of the decade, recovery had come and in much of the country an unrivalled boom was underway.’

‘The cuts of autumn 1931, which were far more immediately fierce than anything put through by the Coalition today. They were felt particularly harshly by ratings in the Royal Navy, some of whom were told they would receive pay cuts of 25%. A few days after the Budget, the North Atlantic Fleet anchored at Invergordon refused to muster.’

‘[The policies] enabled the Bank of England, the commercial banks and building societies to embark on a “cheap money” policy which would henceforth underpin the economic recovery.’

Some lessons from the 30’s…..
First, to stabilize the public finances.
Second, to ensure cheap money was available for
investment by households and businesses to underpin a
recovery.
Third, to reduce taxes, especially on those with low incomes
and families, once it was safe to do so.

‘This was a sort of proto-Thatcherism, ahead of its time.’

So first…Austerity and balancing the books, then cheap money….today Osborne announced just that, then when economy is recovering some tax cuts.

So pretty much as is occurring.

Now Evan Davis, and nearly all in the BBC who comment on finance also claim Japan was a ‘victim’ of Austerity…not only that but here you can hear Davis going along with Balls and his description of the 1930’s policy…..only trick they missed was to mention the USA and the ‘New Deal’…..but Americas massive spending programme didn’t work in reality…the war saved the US.

Both Balls and the BBC experts, such as Stephanie Flanders, like to say that Britain is not a safe haven, that we would not lose the valued triple A credit rating that allows us to borrow money cheaply if we decided to kick over the traces and start borrowing massively in the style of Gordon Brown again…..not so says….‘Senior German and EU officials [who] have expressed concern that the Socialist policies will bring market turbulence to France and increase French borrowing costs, threatening the country’s long-term credit rating.
“France needs its AAA or else the euro cannot bear the debt burden. Germany cannot do it alone,” said a eurozone official.’

And: John Cridland, the CBI director general, said: “Labour has form spending money it does not really have.”

Just how much is Balls really against the Coalition cuts?

“No matter how much we dislike particular Tory sending cuts or tax rises we cannot make promises now to reverse them.” He added: “I won’t do that and neither will any of my shadow cabinet colleagues.”

Perhaps his attitude informs the Public when they come to assess his character as a ‘untrustworthy opportunist’

or indeed what the Boss of Biased BBC says about Balls:

David Vance ‏@DVATW
Ed Balls praising Eurozone growth and damning UK economy. He has no shame and demonstrates why Labour are unfit to EVER govern our country

And it would seem that even inside the Labour Party ‘machine’ austerity is order of the day:

From: Iain_McNicol
Subject: *Confidential: Message from General Secretary
Date: 14 June 2012 14:17:58 GMT+01:00
To: All_Staff
14th June 2012

In November, I announced a new structure designed to modernise our organisation and address the issues raised through the review. Each of the Executive Directors reporting to me has been asked to work on plans to optimise our organisation, in order to make us more efficient, refocus and re-energise our work in critical areas and to strengthen and professionalise our operations.
All of this must, however, be achieved against a backdrop of the financial challenge we are all familiar with.

The objective of all of us is that the Party should be a “one term opposition”.
To achieve this we need to make changes which are sometimes painful but necessary like those I’ve described above. I know this is not easy, but if we are to show people we are serious about cutting the debts of the country then we must also cut the debts of The Labour Party.

However Balls does have at least one fan….

@ElliottClarkson ‏@ElliottClarkson
Ed Balls is right. Throwing money at banks doesn’t work. I stood outside Natwest throwing 2p coins at the window and now I have an ASBO.

But what to make of this?…..

‘A female contemporary of Mr Balls at Keble said: ‘Eddie was always very ambitious, and he was hardly a sex magnet so I can’t remember him having any interesting girlfriends.‘

Ouch…bit rough on poor old Steph Flanders!

Shame the BBC can’t find the time or inclination to ‘fisk’ Balls properly…however as Guido says of their Leveson coverage….‘If you have been watching BBC news or reading the Guardian you would think that Brown’s testimony was proven and Rupert Murdoch had made up the whole claim about Brown “declaring war”.’   They clearly have their own little agenda which doesn’t include a Coalition Government lasting any longer than necessary.

A fresh open thread for Friday….let ’em know you’re watching and holding them to account!

Neil Turner in the comments has a campaign up and running:

His ePetition is now up:

 “Do you want to keep BBC’s Licence Fee ? Yes or No “ 

The Telegraph is thinking along similar lines.

Isn’t it time for a shareholder revolt at the BBC?

‘Isn’t it time that shareholders in the BBC – that means all of us – took a similar stand? Blissfully unaffected by the economic turmoil out there in the real world, it pockets a fixed annual income of £3.6 billion. It doesn’t have to struggle to make money, only to spend it. And it loves to splash it around. While it is notoriously difficult to get any hard info out of the Beeb on the salaries it pays – commercial sensitivity and all that – there’s enough in the public domain to have the hard-pressed licence fee payer reaching for their pitchforks. Last year the Corporation revealed it was paying £22 million to just 19 of its “stars”, all of them earning more than half a million a year. That included a reported £2 million for Graham Norton and Gary Lineker (why?) and £1.4 million to Alan Hansen (an even bigger why?). Is Anne Robinson worth £1 million a year and Jeremy Paxman £800,000? Most licence fee payers will have a view, but unlike shareholders in a company they have no way of expressing it. Surely it’s time they did.’