Morning folks, it’s mid week and so it is time for a brand new shiny Olympic legacy approved Open Thread! Enjoy!
WEDNESDAY OPEN THREAD…
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Hi, a comment for contributors/administrators: can we have FEWER posts? I know there’s a lot going on but I like to read and post comments but very often find I come back next day and am left behind a trail of 4 or 5 or more posts daily. Hard to get a ‘conversation’ going. I know the BBC has multitude possibilities to be highlighting as bias but one or two a day is enough. Maybe have a contributors ‘multi-post’ where several examples of bias are in a single blog post?
You make a good point. The sheer volume of posts these days has, in my view, fractured the flow of comments so that any comment made is quite likely to suddenly find itself marooned in a post that’s well down the page and no longer “active”. Sometimes more is less.
The irony is that I can remember the “purple” days when one was lucky to see a new post once a week!
At the risk of incurring the wrath of Dez for replying to myself, I should perhaps clarify what I was getting at, as the post was made hurriedly at the end of a coffee break.
I was not implying that there was necessarily anything wrong in the number of posts; rather that it has had the unfortunate side effect on the ability to maintain a flow when commenting. Perhaps there is some way in which multiple posts can go to the same comment thread where there is some underlying subject in common?
I agree, if a subject does not demonstrate or imply BBC bias, then it should not be submitted.
All fair points, but as a free, private site, I’d have thought it up to the owners/administrators to do what they fancy, even if minded to share recipes.
Maybe on occasion there has been a temptation by some to stray into areas that don’t strictly cover impartial, market rate standard BBC coverage, but the consequences of that is for them to bear and others to engage with… or not.. by choice.
I just have a nasty tingle when I see the notion of what is, to all intents and purposes, an ‘off topic’ bar being set (of the thread authors ironically), which reminds me a tad too much of the BBC blog network’s main excuse for shutting down anything it didn’t fancy dealing with on this basis. Before he ‘went twitter’, Richard Black’s blog was notorious for this, with ‘club members’ deciding what was in keeping and who needed booting out for upsetting the cosy flow.
I can’t see how contributors would get regulated anyway on a free, open and independent blog, given even the trolliest cherry vulture can spam away without censure thanks to the censorship/moderation dilemma.
If it’s all too much, or not to taste, is it not possible to simply not get involved? Why the need to limit what is felt worthy of sharing. What to include? What not? How many times has the BBC been accused of oddly failing to cover an issue. As a precedent, I doubt few here would be impressed if they excused such a thing by claiming ‘viewers/readers’ were getting a bit overwhelmed so they only pay heed to the bits that really ‘matter’ (begging the question, on what basis, to whom).
Market forces and/or consumer preferences will soon shape whether what is done works or is having an adverse effect. There are now more ‘official’ contributors, so there will be more volume, especially as each has a ‘beat’. Maybe hence treat them as one would a correspondent at an MSM title. The Telegraph’s Geoff Lean or Richard Black are hence joke threads hardly worth bothering with save for a laugh. Others, even if you may often disagree, are still worth the follow and engagement.
‘..if a subject does not demonstrate or imply BBC bias, then it should not be submitted.’
At the very least, if this is adopted, I’d hope it would include inaccuracy, unprofessionalism, etc (which can of course be bias driven, but not always).
It’s just that in my dealings with BBC CECUTT, if a complaint is under bias they can laugh all the way to the Trust before blowing it out as subjective.
Meatier, factual fare is much harder for them to sideline.
I consider that many of us who post comments are like minded people and therefore the odd item can easily be borne and either agreed/disagreed with. These ‘off topics’ often bring us information that the £3billion BBC refuses to do. However I do like to keep the ‘Open Thread’ in sight and if it drops too low down the running order I presume nothing of note has recently been added. So whilst I wouldn’t mind one or two less posts and just say to all the authors, “thanks and keep up the good work.”
To be honest I think the guys do a wonderful job, seeing as they are all volunteers/employed/businessmen with families etc., etc. I especially enjoy the more political posts that not only dissect BBC Left-wing bias but explore the wider social, political and cultural factors, all of which contribute to the environment in which the likes of the BBC flourish. I think wider political debate, in addition to outright BC bias, is wholly worthy of in-depth discussion.
As a teacher who is currently studying for my Masters in education, this site has inspired me to think about setting up my own blog, which I hope, will focus on the ramifications of Left-wing ideology on our education system. Will keep you posted!
I think a hats off are due to DV, Alan and all of the other contributors that makes this such an engaging and accessible site. 🙂
Well said, mate!
You get going with that blog brother! Shine a light on it!
I agree with all that as well, I am not complaining about the site OR the content! 😯
The 1st paragraph of Roland’s first comment above is exactly what I was on about: sometimes ‘less is more’. I get the feeling that if there isn’t several new posts every day the administrators think the site isn’t active, the number of comments should tell them what is active and by having 5 or 6 on some days hardly any comments are made as by the time you get to comment everyone else has (had to) move on up the page.
All this ‘they do a great job’ blah blah blah is detracting from the point I was trying to make. I KNOW that “the guys do a wonderful job, seeing as they are all volunteers/ employed/ businessmen with families etc., etc.”
P.S. good luck with the blog 😉
P.P.S. If you need any help just ask 😎
Be very careful Alex, the teaching ‘profession’ is rampant with leftist zealots that will target you if you expose their shenanigans, lots of Howard Kirks out there, watch your back and good luck.
Personally I think it is about right with three or four posts a day. On the other hand just one or two open threads a week is perhaps not enough. One a day would give us all the opportunity to highlight something new and topical whilst it is still fresh off of the relentless BBC propaganda conveyor belt.
As for the “conversation” aspect it seems to me they can soon degenerate into name calling and off topic arguments over minutia from the left hand side of the pitch and of course from the Bias Deniers, who have taken their 30 pieces of silver from the corporate corporation at some time or another. They only bring down a red mist (on me at least) which detracts from THE BIAS.
But, please this is not a complaint, I enjoy this blog immensely. My only frustration is when the blog goes down after I have written (what I think is) a pithy Shakespearian comment but by the time the blog is up again the comment is out of time, has lost its edge, was too wordy anyway and is dumped in the re-cycle bin.
So Mark Thompson has moved seamlessly from the BBC to its ideological twin the NY Times. I wonder how Punch Sulzberger and his stable of journalists will relish being moved to the Ozarks.
He would have moved to the Guardian but Rusbridger is still in post and, frankly, the NYT pays better. Not only that, Thompson will cease suffering any cognitive dissonance by pretending to be “impartial” while publishing “all the (lefty) news that’s fit to print” which, when you think about it, is exactly what the BBC does.
One thing is for certain: Thompson will certainly keep the pro-CAGW propaganda-fest going at the NYT . Coming from the BBC, I suppose he’s seen a very safe ‘on-message’ choice for the cosy, delusional, hypocritical, left-wing warmist clique at the NYT.
There. That’s better. ; )
It will be interesting to see how he copes in an environment without a guaranteed cash flow from taxes.
New York Times Co. Posts $88 Million Loss, Citing About.com Write-Down
One can only hope Mr Thompson’s impact on the NYT will be the same as the impact Piers Morgan has had at CNN.
BBC Radio 5 this morning :
‘It’s been a bad week for (rail) passengers’.
No real balance, no real analysis. Simply a raw paintive cry along the lines of – we want cheap fares, we want shiny new trains and we want a Government that can – apparently – pull such miracles out of a hat.
No wonder the Beeboids loved Gordon Brown.
BBC Leftward, ever leftward.
‘No real balance, no real analysis.’
To be fair, this pervades across the MSM.
And this is an open goal for a bit of gov-bashing (though oddly the basis of accepting the bid seemed a bit different to the last tranche of critiques, so it was always going to be a damned all ways scenario), be it on tribal political grounds or simply winding-up ratings.
SKY was gunning on the latter. And Justine Rabbit-in-headlines delivered in spades. Felt a bit sorry for her as I suspected she was hampered by certain ethical and maybe even legal constraints that allowed Eammon Holmes to try and pull a Paxman.
But what got me was the now inevitable ‘here’s what our viewers say’ slot, leaving the silly woman mute in face of some carefully selected anger and protest.
No excuse for not being prepared for such, and legitimate challenge, but pre-selecting three hostile vox-pops as representative of anything other than stirring the pot was risible.
I can only imagine who the BBC has wheeled or will wheel out less for light and purely to generate heat.
I’m guessing few objective analysts and a lot of Prescott & Penny, who I think once used a train but seem more taxi and Virgin Airlines Upper Class regulars.
One reason I love the internet is that you can pretty soon get a fair spread of insights… for free.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/transport/9476519/Richard-Branson-attacks-Government-insanity-after-Virgin-Trains-loses-West-Coast-rail-contract.html#disqus_thread
What’s noteworthy is, as here, that I tend to breeze past the editorial (still free, but often tribal) to the comments, which can be highly informed.
Ironic the best often comes from those who not only don’t charge but often are not paid.
Unlike a unique few.
The Internet is the biggest single disaster for the Left since the fall of the Berlin Wall.
The left are not all stupid. Some will be able to see that their grip on information can be bypassed on the net. it’s going to be an ongoing battle as they seek to control the proles access to information.
Just wait and see what Leveson comes up with, and how it will try to hamstring the various blogs that people rely on.
Tweeters have been jailed, having given the prosecutors some racist element to seize upon. And for anyone who thinks that wont ever affect you i draw your attention to:
” first they came for the Jews, but I am not a Jew so I said nothing…………”
think about it.
Just saying .
Needless to say, no one at Al-Beebia thinks to ask any of the representatives of the supposed grass roots organisations claiming to represent commuters why they’re only now protesting about a deal that was put in place in 2002. Has something changed since then?
Just like the UK Border Agency, I have already lost count of the number of Olympic asylum asbsconders.
The BBC are not too fussed.
“Just part of the Olympic backstory” (Gordon Farqhar, BBC)
Fortunately the Mail (evil bigoted rag) can still do the sums
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2188496/Fears-asylum-claims-Olympic-athletes-missing-meant-home.html?ito=feeds-newsxml
“Fears over asylum claims as six more Olympic athletes go missing when they are meant to go home
Three Guinea athletes and three from Ivory Coast latest to ‘disappear’
Total number of athletes and delegates to have vanished from Games camps now at 21”
“Immigration officials fear that up to 2 per cent of the Olympic visitors from some continents may claim refuge in the UK in the months after the Games, potentially hundreds of individuals.”
The Guardian has a Olympic asylum absconder story – so we know the Beeboids will know all about it
http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2012/aug/15/eritrea-runner-seeks-asylum-uk?newsfeed=true
“Eritrea’s flag-carrying runner seeks asylum in UK to flee repressive regime”
(I guess the irony contained in that headline passed by the writers in the humourless Gruan).
So, Virgin lose in a competitive bid situation – Richard Branson has a hissy-fit tantrum, tries to back-passage the government into accepting less money for taxpayers whilst filling Virgin’s coffers, then threatens, as he has done in the past, to walk away from possible contracts for rail services, whilst bleating on about FirstRail being just like another company who once beat his bid and also walked away. What a hypocrite.
And the BBC’s response is…. rejoice, the taxpayer could well have won on this one, and if the rail-users get a better service to boot, high-fives all round.
And pigs trotters are a low-hanging aeriel hazard to humans.
The BBC’s real response is to shuffle around, interviewing anyone supporting their mate, Branson, and to give excess free air time to one Bob Crowe, (RMT) to freely promulgate his anti-business, anti-taxpayer, socialist utopia (in which of course, he would retain his current position as one of the ‘more-equal -than-others’ porcines.)
Plus ca change…..
I like this site, it provides the balance that is shamefully absent from what we are fed by our state broadcaster. I think with one or two exceptions we, all of us, are of like minds.
But this is one post I don’t agree with (putting aside the Bob Crow bit, which I’ll come back to later).
I know that Beardy Branson isn’t everyone’s cup of tea, but as a reguar user of Virgin Trains, Virgin have performed a near miracle in rescuing a basket case railway, getting people off planes and on to their Pendelinos, they have built a brand, unique in the railways and with it brand loyalty – this is what the vision of privatisation was all about. BR could never have done this and never have paid for it – the nationalised railways remains just a romantic figment of the imagination in Owen Jones and Bob Crow’s mind. And why shouldn’t Branson make a profit ? and at the same time share this with the Government – which he does
Branson has good cause to be upset. First’s bid is unsustainable and, as it happens as an occasional user of FGW services, their product is significantly inferior to that of Virgin. Twice Virgin have bid to bring the same transformation to other franchises and have been rejected in favour of bids which turned to be unsustainable – and in the end cost the tax payer a fortune. Our incompetent Civil Servants in the Dept. for Transport will never learn.
As for Crow? Crow defending a free market, privatising entrepreneur? This is just windbaggery. That the BBC gives him a voice doesn’t change things. This is a very bad decision.
Hmm but he is in a competitive market and he lost out I have no problem with that ! so what does he want just to be handed the contract like he would if his mates in the Labour puppetry were still in power if for a minute he stops loving himself and gets out of that huge smug cloud he lives in then he may see that he isn’t the saviour of Earth that’s flash Gordons job !
Don’t you mean Flush Gordon? After all the whole country went down the pan when he was PM.
” his mates in the Labour puppetry were still in power if for a minute ”
If he had those “mates” when the national lottery was up for bid, what hapened to his money making schemes?
One hopes that this franchise was decided upon by factors other than the price. Normally on high cost franchise, any company bidding a £1 billion pounds more than their nearest competitor, and more than £2 billion to the next nearest, must surely have had a lot of questions to answer concerning the viability of its business plans. There again the record of the civil service and different governments on high cost contracts is pretty awful. The BBC of course doesn’t want to mention the billions of overspend on the many failed government inspired contracts in the last 15 years or so. Can’t think why.
Agree totally. Hopefully our democracy holds those taking these decisions to account if this goes belly up. I don’t only mean the politcian here but also include those highly paid civil servants that the Minister claims to have rigorously tested this bid by First.
Too many times we see senior civil servants making recommendations and politicians implementing very expensive projects to find they fail or go horribly over budget. The NHS digitization is a good example.
Government ministers and senior civil servants being held accountable?
You are being ironic aren’t you?
They’re in the accounts BOOKS of outfits like Virgin, more like.
Dan Hannan in the Telegraph
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/tvandradio/bbc/9475479/Heres-how-we-counter-the-BBCs-liberal-bias.html#disqus_thread
Thanks for feedback. To be honest, we will post when the mood inspires. If you don’t like the post, move to another one. Blogging is, be definition, opportunistic.
Thanks David, however it seems everyone has misunderstood my comment. I have no problem whatsoever with any of the content.
Just found this patronizing, infantile and tergiversated BBC article attempting to ‘explain’ why race shouldn’t be linked to grooming… but then, surely we already knew that race has no part… right? I mean, how could it?
The BBC surely insults our intelligence with this ridiculous ‘race’ smokescreen. A whole race can’t be genetically hardwired into child abuse but what we do know is that a certain religion and its cultural attitudes to females can be a significant factor; extremist religious brainwashing, as we know, can drive people to blow themselves up, fly planes through buildings and stone females to death; furthermore, when one considers that Islam’s main prophet married a nine-year-old, doesn’t that give us some clues as to some of the cultural mindsets that pervade fundamentalist sects of Islam?
Moreover, in this useless, politically correct report the BBC, like social work and children’s services up and down the land, have conspicuously chosen to ignore what the judge said when he stated that the causes resulted from “the fact that they were not part of your community or religion”, to which the BBC evasively responds in the following sentence: “But to what extent, if any, is race an issue in such cases? And are these crimes indicative of a wider problem?”
Could grooming, in fact, be so prominent in Pakistan because of its zealous adherence to a medieval form of Islamic scripture? The BBC certainly don’t want you to think so… The closest the BBC gets in facing facts in this worthless and gutless article is when it mentions Mohammed Shafiq and the Ramadhan Foundation’s aims of forging ‘better understanding between Muslims and non-Muslims’. PATHETIC!
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-18004153
The BBC can’t admit that it’s cultural without, in their view, damning lots of people with brown skin. The idiot Thompson said a while back that the BBC handled Islam with kid gloves because most Mohammedans have darker skin than he does, and thus it becomes a de facto racial issue. Idiotic, poor logic, I know. But that’s the intellectual failure at the BBC for you. Maybe he knows it’s BS and it’s just an excuse to throw out there when needed, but it’s still an intellectual failure.
“……tergiversated ”
Interesting – hadn’t ever seen this word anywhere before today. Word of the year 2011, apparently. There you go, my thing learned for today. Thank you.
News headlines – Beeboids quick to spin the good news:
UK unemployment falls to 2.56m – UK unemployment figures will be published later, amid warnings that young people are finding it increasingly difficult to find work.
Read the story, and count the number od ways the Beeboid finds negatives to undermine the Govt.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-19259913
The BBC love to find someway of discrediting any good news. (it’s only because of the olympics! etc)
It would be refreshing if improved jobless figures also lead “some analysts” to believe that the government’s deficit reduction strategy is working?
If trying to tell bad news, they always rely on “analysts” as they are independent experts and can’t possibly be challenged. If there is any good news out there (like jobs, or borrowing down etc) they leave it for the Tory MP’s to announce themselves. Knowing full well those views and statistics will be not believed and happily challenged by a Labour MP afterwards (as well as BBC commentator)
The BBC love to find someway of discrediting any good news.
Only the years 1979-1997 and 2010-2015* For all other years good news is to be firmly attributed to the Government and there isn’t any bad news except to of course to the opposition party.
*subject to change
BBC-NUJ comes close to saying:
‘Unemployent down under Coalition Government:
Olympics to blame.”
Just as an experiment I switched between Classic FM news and BBC radio 5 this lunchtime.
Classic Fm covered the West Coast Mainline Change of operator. We heard from a representative of the new operator who gave a positive view of their plans for the future. Then there was a report about the fall in unemployment and a clip of Ian Duncan Smith commenting positively saying that government policy was staring to work.
Now for BBC R5 . The West Coat Mainline story was accompanied by moaning, doom and gloom from a labour MP. The fall in unemployment story started in a sneering way saying that the “government said” (we know what there up to here, they give the impression that the government is in a minority and no one agrees with them) . The story continued accompanied not by a clip from IDS but from Liam Byrne saying that we must concentrate our anger on youth unemployment and ignore any good news. No interviews with the coalition on either story just labour labour labour .
Well done BBC.
Yes, I’ve done something similar before… I will sometimes, out of sheer boredom, despair or drunkenness, skip back and forth from the BBC to Sky, and am always amazed at how synched the two programs are… their scheduling of the exact same news items are seemingly simultaneous… even their weather reports are on at exactly the same times… and they are, needless to state, both highly Left-wing in their output… makes me wonder about the extent, to which, the MSM is controlled in this country.
Don’t forget it was sky that picked up and ran with the “bigoted woman” recording that showed Flush Gordon for the knob that he is. Without sky the INBBC would ahve wiped the recording swiftly and rewritten history. Thankfully they were STUFFED and so was he.
Defenders of the indefensible will probably point out that, according to your account, the Classic FM segment was just as biased as how you describe the BBC’s. Only they appear to be approaching it from opposite sides, which nevertheless seems to prove BBC bias. Not to mention that Classic FM isn’t bound by the same Charter, not funded by force, etc.
If one side is on the Right, and the BBC approaches from the opposite side, they must be biased from the Left.
David Preiser (USA) yes you are right of course, lefty supporters of the BBC will see it differently. The fact is that labour are the oposition and are supposed not to be in power yet the BBC is always ready with a microphone to pick up any comment from labour. Remember what a rare sight on the BBC a conservative was during the labour years . Things have not changed much since then.
You won’t find many of the headlines on this UK Enrichment News site, on the BBC:
http://warband.wordpress.com/
You’d think the Beeb would love that site, it being not exactly hideously white. . .
God, this is a very depressing site, it goes on and on, all these evil foreign filth here, makes me want to volunteer to execute the lot of the scum, shall not be looking at this again for a while, but thanks for the info, warband eh?
Stick your head in the sand if you wish mate. Go read some more upbeat reports that will leave out the bits that irk you. After all, no-one wants you to be depressed by reading this stuff. But heads in sand will not make anything better !
just saying.
“I have no doubt Mr. Obama’s preference for avoiding widespread conflict (Iran/Syria/Israel) is heartfelt, but it is tactical as well” says Mark Mardell.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-19262897
There is another view not often aired on the BBC and usually discredited by their reporters. President Obama is not sympathetic to Israel’s cause. His view of the Jewish state is one of deep dislike. He has confronted, even insulted Israel’s Prime Minister, undermined her security by leaking sensitive information and while making warm fuzzy statements about “Israel’s right to exist” (he needs Jewish votes for re-election) he has held back from practical help. Why? Evidence this interview with Dinesh D’Souza who I think has the correct perspective on Mr. Obama’s motivation.
http://video.foxbusiness.com/v/952722593001/dinesh-dsouza-on-obamas-views-of-israel/
There are two issues here:
1. Mardell always gives Obama a pass. He and the BBC’s American newsroom appear to be fully signed up to Obama’s re-election. That’s because they (as lefties) are at home with Democratic rhetoric. They do not (in their gut) understand, or want to understand, the Republican party. One can understand this – after all, British journalists have been brought up asking the question, “What are THEY (the government) going to do about it?”
To understand the American right one has to dig a little deeper and discover the country away from the Manhattan and Washington elites. I know reporters parachute into trailer park now and again but that’s not enough to really get it. I’m amazed by the genuine curiosity friends and family in the UK have about America and how much they do not know.
2. The BBC editorial policy is anti-Israel. It’s been proved again and again on this site by people like Sue, DB, Natalie, Preiser and many others.
Once again I do want to hear what Mardell has to say, even thought I think he is deeply unfair. I want more skepticism – a little like the old days of poor old George W Bush when the Beeboids really had their fangs out!
Guess that’s too much to ask when you’re in love.
I think the Beeboids do believe they properly understand Republicans: backwards-looking, racist, selfish, unenlightened, Christianist. They view themselves as superior to these people in every way, and that comes out in their reporting rather often.
In this case, though, I have to say Mardell is correct in his assessment that a major Iran/Israel war would be inconvenient before November. But I bet we disagree as to why that would be. Or maybe Mardell just doesn’t want to admit that He just might show too much of His anti-Israel attitude at an inopportune moment.
After all, one thing Mardell will not be admitting here – and his testament that his beloved Obamessiah is really a Man of Peace sweeps this under the rug very nicely – is that the President does not believe Jerusalem is or should be the capital of Israel and would prefer to go with the EU preference of a divided city. Which worked so well with Berlin, right? Decided equally by the Jews and Palestinians, naturally. I wonder why the BBC won’t say it openly?
I’ve always found the BBC ‘The Editors’ thread a rich seam.
Not just for what the market rates at the top come out with in a near inability to be anything bar self-congratulatory, but the often hilarious lack of irony in the way one of the few so-called interactive threads on editorial gets.. ‘managed’ when the public fails to cooperate.
The latest is a hoot, which I missed by a hair before a near inevitable early closing after some initial ra-ras’s evidently attracted a comment that was not to taste and got the plug within two days.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/theeditors/2012/08/lawrence_of_asia.html
Propaganda backed by censorship. I guess that is what is meant these days by ‘techniques at the core of contemporary BBC journalism today’?
On Skynews just now live coverage of the David Dibell memorial service.
On our national broadcaster: nothing.
Shouldn’t the BBC be impartially reporting the circumstances in Syria. Wouldn’t it be refreshing to see reports like the following on the BBC’s news features…
http://www.ansamed.info/ansamed/en/news/sections/generalnews/2012/08/13/Syria-rebels-accused-atrocities-reporter-killed_7339933.html
Their buffoonish approach was highlighted the other day when I posted here about an incident where it was obvious to any listener with ears,that Hugh Sykes’ translator was translating the word ‘sharia’ used by some little boys, as ‘freedom’ but the Beeboid didn’t even notice – or perhaps he agreed with the equivalence!
For INBBC:
“‘Crimes Committed By All Sides’ In Syria Conflict”
http://news.sky.com/story/972681/crimes-committed-by-all-sides-in-syria-conflict
Check out Guido – some good beeboid bashing going on, with the classic beeboid ‘its not a story’ attempt at deflection !
‘with the classic beeboid ‘its not a story’ attempt at deflection !’
So long as it keeps the main point in the frame, good luck to ’em.
Seems there has been an overnight briefing by the BBC PR machine number-crunchers, and if critical folk are getting their numbers awry it is legitimate to correct these.
But what seems to have passed Aunty’s minions by in insisting on full angel pin-top correctives is the bigger picture, and that is … to use a phrase usually reserved for the Beeboid fraternity for their own purposes… the disproportionate aspects. Then they appear to suddenly have an edit to attend.
But David P also rightly highlighted that without further detail on actual internal usage/readership little can be really inferred, so it is more a fun bit of stirring which such as Mr. Bakhurst and others are kindly maintaining by getting all huffy and showing how much they care by saying how much they… and others don’t (there is a lot of it about).
I found this comment, citing a Guardian URL, worthy of note..
Damon Shinnie says:
August 15, 2012 at 6:24 pm
The fact that he counts The Times as a right wing newspaper suggests that he has left wing tendencies – a graphic in The Guardian http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/datablog/2010/may/04/general-election-newspaper-support# shows that The Times is the most politically neutral mainstream newspaper.
Sadly, I think it may be only a Pyrrhic exchange, as the net result will most likely be the licence fee payer simply gets dumped with a huge bill in future for purchase of a bunch of titles that will be delivered and immediately recycled unread.. to cover up this ‘perception problem’ lest it get repeated year on year. What’s bought doesn’t tell you who or how many read them.
Good link, and you’re right… however they see the Times as MURDOCH so a newspaper of the Devil’s own spawn
Of interest…two climate change ‘sceptical’ websites are having problems……GWPF and Jo Nova.
New website blues I guess.
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/08/14/the-gwpf-and-jo-nova-web-sites-down/#more-69219
At the time I thought it was… brave… of a BBC senior market rate to weigh in with a ‘no one cares’ challenge, and lo, the popcorn purchase was not wasted…
http://order-order.com/2012/08/15/bbc-news-boss-non-story-turns-out-to-be-story/
He’d do well as a cherry vulture.
Interesting the comments so far in defence, making equivalences that don’t stack up.
And all the while keeping the thing bubbling.
I may just have to pop out to the foyer for a slurpee, too.:)
BBC News boss Bakhurst is claiming that the real truth lies in the total number of papers bought along ideological lines. He lumps the Times in with the Telegraph/Sun/Mail because it’s a Murdoch, rag, although it’s hardly as ideological, I don’t think.
Still, that doesn’t excuse the sheer volume of Guardian readers way out of proportion with the public. One other key piece of data missing from all this – the one that really matters, IMHO – is which Beeboids are buying them. If all the IT, tech, and accountants are buying the non-Left papers, and the vast majority of the News staff, and producers, editors, and on-air talent across the spectrum are the ones buying the Guardian, etc., then we’ll know. Without this the numbers aren’t much use.
On the subject of truths vs. real truths, I found this interesting, not least because of the source.. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-19269571
Saying vs. doing springs to mind, but as a step in a better direction, the overall sentiment is to be applauded.
Gets better..
roger harrabin @RogerHarrabin
NASA tell me “unprecedented” ice melt means a very rare event in 30 years. I ask which dictionary they are using for their definition.
The thoughts of most of the Western world MSM enviro reporters will be interesting to hear, on matters of precedent, terminology, and unprecedented terminology by reporters.
Adding a 5l Root Beer Float now.
Harrabin is a dick: the Magnetic Pole is moving (always has) and is currently moving away from Canada towards Siberia; therefore more ice in some places and less ice in others (where there was more before).
The tendency towards hyperbole may stem from the sense of despair among some scientists at the way climate change has disappeared from much of public discourse since the double whammy of Copenhagen and Climategate. They feel that they still have a vital story to tell about the experiment we’re conducting on the planet and they’re desperate for someone to listen.
They also often feel they are in a street fight with one hand behind their back; Benny Peiser’s artfully lurid headlines for the Global Warming Policy Foundation, for instance, can distort the often worthy articles they advertise.
Journalists are trained to reach for the sexiest headline available. But if scientific organisations are to retain credibility, even their media relations need to remain studiously detached.
This is a bit rich coming from Harrabin, co-founder of the Cambridge Media and Environment Programme, which pushes reporting only the “consensus”, funded by both the Government and the WWF.
Seeing as how the BBC rushes to report very single incident of gun violence that can be even speculatively linked to political ideology, I’m sure we’ll be seeing a BBC report on this incident any minute now:
FBI probing shooting of guard at Family Research Council HQ
A gunman posing as an intern shot a security guard at the Family Research Council’s headquarters in Washington, D.C. after expressing disagreement with the conservative group’s policy positions, Fox News has learned.
What? I thought it was only Right-wingnuts who loved their shootin’ irons who killed people in cold blood over ideology.
The suspect “made statements regarding their policies, and then opened fire with a gun striking a security guard,” a source told Fox News. WJLA-TV7 reported the suspect was also shot.
Authorities were treating the attack as a case of domestic terrorism.
The FRC, of course, is a Christian organization which, among other things, opposes homosexual marriage and is labeled a “hate group” by the Left.
CNN and MSNBC have been silent on this incident so far, and the story is not currently splashed across the front page of either the HuffPo or Politico, so maybe the Beeboids either won’t know about it or don’t think it’s newsworthy yet.
But this goes against the Narrative, so we’ll see if the BBC censors some or all of it or dares to report it accurately.
The shooter Floyd Corkins turns out to be a gay activist. He was carry a Chick Fil A bag. From the Huff Post
“A man suspected of shooting and wounding a security guard in the lobby of a Christian lobbying group had been volunteering at a community center for gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people.”
Will the BBC describe this man as a ‘left wing’ extremist or a ‘gay supremacist’.
However the Obama administration are refusing to describe this as an act of terrorism or a hate crime.
As predicted, now that the mainstream US media whose lead the BBC follows are reporting it, the BBC is too (h/t Louis R in the Mason/Ryan thread). Also as predicted, they censor that bit out, no labels for the gentleman at all. All for legal reasons, can’t say anything until after the trial, right? Even though we got plenty of background info about the mass murderer at that Sikh temple. Except it’s BS.
We do know his motive. We do know what he was thinking, he said it openly, and even the law enforcement officials who are giving the boilerplate say he was carrying the fast food bag. The Washington Post reports both those facts and the boilerplate “We don’t know yet”. Yet, just like how the BBC pretended not to notice what the Ft. Hood killer and that kid who tried to grab the torch were yelling, they’re currently pretending not to have read the eyewitness account here and are instead going with only the “Can’t say yet” game.
I guess I should say that it’s nice to see the BBC finally becoming more responsible about refraining from baseless speculation about motives. Of course, next time it might be back to normal, depending on the politics of the incident.
Nobody died, so this story has been pushed out of eyesight already, and we probably won’t hear about it ever again.
UPDATE: The story has “evolved”, and the BBC is now reporting those facts they’ve been withholding. This news brief mentions both motive and the branded bag. It was a hate crime after all.
No mention, though that the shooter was a volunteer worker at a local homosexual community center. That would be too much to bear, I guess.
Congratulations for stepping up to the plate, BBC. In my face then, eh? What took you so long? Didn’t read the Washington Post quickly enough to learn that it was okay to report it? Can’t wait for the obligatory moaning about keeping guns out of the hands of people like this.
Now is this me or does this smack of the BBC meddling directly in US politics:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-19271594
I’m not sure I’ve ever seen anything like this before, on the BBC.
Here we have a story on what can at best be described as controversial policy in that it and it’s timing has been widely commented on to be a ploy by the Obama team to improve his chances of reelection this November.
It’s one thing to report on it and there’s nothing wrong with that. But look in this body of text:
he Obama administration detailed on Tuesday what documents illegal immigrants need to qualify for the programme.
The paperwork for the programme can be downloaded from the US Citizenship and Immigration Services website.
Here we have the BBC putting a direct link to the download page for the forms.
Now I know the BBC put links within their reports and they often place links to news sites and blogs that underscore perfectly where their narrative comes from, especially in the US. My question is why would they need to link to the download page to the forms. It’s not background material. It’s not a reference source to provide context to the report. It’s a link that might as well yell “roll up roll up Obama needs you in 2012”.
I don’t think I ‘ve seen that before and I think it’s highly questionable.
One bit did make me smile though. When I saw this section of the report:
Applicants must pay a $465 (£300) fee and provide proof of identity and eligibility.
This could include a passport or birth certificate, school transcripts, medical and financial records, military service records and, in some cases, multiple sworn affidavits
Given the material required, Obama couldn’t prove his eligibility under his own policy.
It’s over-egged enthusiasm. Another genius move by a very, very young person, paid very, very low wages, who just hasn’t received the proper BBC training yet. Right, Helen?
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-19193146
Richard Black. ‘Nuff said.
Totalitarian dreams on display at the end, there.
Its late and over a cup of tea I am reading the news. Most interested in the revelation from the Ecuador Embassy over how the British have aid they are willing to break down the door in which to arrest Assange.
Now I can’t be asked with posting links as I am 5 secs from my bed. But if you have the time cross check the bBC version with the Guardian version of this story and tell me if I am in saying that the bBC version leaves out salient parts of the story.
I know I’m late to this debate but please don’t reduce the number of threads.
One of the most interesting parts of this site and one of the reasons I have been coming back for years is the freshness of the discussion.
Every minute of everyday auntie pumps out blatantly biased shite which in any other forum might be missed but here someone somewhere in the bloggosphere picks it up in some massive positive crowdsource.
Whats fascinating to me is the pluralism of thought on this site. It is not a monolith of foam flecked irate Mail readers or EDL types but reflects a huge swathe of the population from the centre of British politics to out there right wing.
All of us have different view points, all of us have observations to share and it is done in a polite informative way where discussions are expanded on and challenged/reinforced.
This site helps meld all the varied points of view, galvanising them and making the stronger. I truelly believe sites like this serve a massive purpose holding normally unaccountable bodies to account.
Case in point here is that Guido reads this blog, the beeboids have to read Guido as a major political blogger and thus by osmosis our opinions are heard.
Please don’t restrict the topics. They allow readers to find points that interest them and join in the conversation. Ok sometimes it may mean discussions end early as new topics arrive but the open thread serves as a good ‘sticky ‘ forum where longer debates can occur.
Well done Mr Vance ET al. You may be a bowler hatted sash wearer but I respect your views and thank you and your colleagues for producing a site which allows those of us who see the emperor is wearing no clothes to vent our spleen and share our frustrations at the way our country is being managed by an undemocratic unrepresentative propaganda machine.
” foam flecked irate Mail readers or EDL types”
Would you care to add a definition? or is a generalisation or generic term ok?
Paddytoplad was, I think, merely using the words that others might use when attacking those who comment here.
Roland you are right. I was using the phraseology of the Guardianista to illustrate that the contributors here didnt fit their junior common room revolutionary stereotype.
To the Graun and the beeb there are not Tories there are only Tory Toffs
To the Graun and the beeb there are not normal people proud of their heritage and worried about it being swamped into some multi culti stew their are only tattooed NF racists.
To the axis of liberal evil there are not benign business owners who value their staff and their customers there are only cheats and exploiters.
To the axis of liberal evil there are not people defending their children from random rocket attack and terrorist infiltration there are only nasty Zionist jooze.
The islington canapé set that infest the beeb see this site as being full of ‘angry of tunbridge wells’ types with their farah slacks and rotary club ties or Bovver boys and in reality we cover a wide spectrum of normal balanced rational folk who just want a fair BBC
Point well made and properly accepted now I see it in context. Thank you paddytoplad.
Pob hwyl!
You might be forgiven for thinking “tax dodgers” were all bankers and media stars. Interestingly the Revenue have put up mugshots of their most wanted tax dodgers, all of whom have done a runner. The names, faces and nationalities may come as a surprise to BBC and Guardian readers:
Well done LC; no real surprises about the origins of most of these individuals. The caucasian variety have names that remind us very much of possible criminal links with other areas of our planet.
It just shows that HMRC is institutionally racist.
This is another classic example of BBC bias. Their story about these tax-criminals is categorised under ‘business’ while that of itv.com is under ‘crime’.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-19269662
http://www.itv.com/news/2012-08-16/most-wanted-tax-dodgers-list-published-by-hmrc/
And BBC just shows the faces, without giving any information about the crimes committed by Gordon Arthur, Hussain Asad Chohan, Zafar Baidar Chisthi, Cesare Selvini, Nasser Ahmed, Olutayo Owolabi, Malcolm McGregor McGowan, Leigang Liang, Mohamed Sami Kaak, Yehuda Cohen, John Nugent, Vladimir Jeriomin, Wayne Joseph Hardy, Dimitri Gaskov, Adam Umerji aka Shafiq Patel, Darsim Abdullah, Timur Mehmet, Emma Elizabeth Tazey, Sahil Jain and Rory McGann.
Ah but they are not tax dodgers.
I was coming to post about this story too, but for a different reason.
The BBC have it as “Gallery of tax fugitives revealed”
and then the lead reads ‘Tax officials have published a gallery of photographs of the people they consider to be the most wanted UK tax fugitives.’
From this it implies a BBC glee at locking up nasty bankers who refuse to pay their taxes.
But when you look at those involved it is nothing to do with people refusing to pay their taxes.
In fact:
Yehuda Cohen: VAT fraud
Timur Mehmet: VAT fraud
Emma Elizabeth Tazey: VAT fraud
Sahil Jain: VAT fraud
Rory McGann: VAT fraud
Olutayo Owolabi: tax credits, money laundering (i.e. he’s a benefits cheat)
Malcolm McGowan: smuggling cigarettes
Leigang Liang: Smuggling cigarettes
Mohammed Sami Kaak: smuggling cigarettes
John Nugent: VAT fraud
Vladdimir Jeriomin: claiming income tax repayments for tax that was never paid
Wayne Hardy: smuggling cigarettes
Dimitri Gaskov: smuggling cigarettes
Hussain Chohan: smuggling cigarettes
Zafar Chisthi: VAT fraud
Cesare Selvini: smuggling platinum
Gordon Arthur: smuggling cigarettes
Nasser Ahmed: VAT fraud
Adam Umerji/Shafiq Patel: VAT fraud
Darsim Abdullah: organised crime
So in other words, not a single one of these people fits the BBC headline of tax evaders.
Smugglers, fraudsters yes.
Never mind, the BBC want us to believe
“The publication is part of a government campaign aimed at tackling tax evasion and gathering taxes at a time of austerity.”
Er what?
VAT fraud, which constitutes the bulk of the money – hundreds of millions of pounds in the case of those above – involves reclaiming from the government VAT that was never paid in the first place. Aka, fraud, theft.
It is nothing whatsoever to do with tax evasion in any normal sense of the word.
That doesn’t matter to the BBC – they are happy to publish a fraudulent story/headline because it suits their own prejudices, rather than in fact telling the truth – namely that a bunch of mostly foreign criminals steal money from HMRC thanks to the VAT system and the EU which facilitates it.
Disgusting, the BBC make me sick.
From this it implies a BBC glee at locking up nasty bankers who refuse to pay their taxes.
It implies no such thing. You may have inferred that but nothing in the article implies it.
happy to publish a fraudulent story/headline because it suits their own prejudices
What have they said that is fraudulent? If you smuggle in fags then you are avoiding paying tax — that makes you a tax evader (as in the head). If you defraud HMRC then you are a fraudster (as in the headline).
Head: “Tax evaders and fraudsters gallery is published by HMRC”
Par 2: “The gallery, published for the first time online, details 20 people who HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC) believe are responsible for £765m of tax evasion and fraud.”
Par 6: “The individuals include people who have been found guilty in their absence of crimes such as fraud, money laundering and smuggling.”
suits their own prejudices
Well somebody’s prejudices are on display here; and it isn’t the BBC.
> It implies no such thing. You may have inferred that but nothing in the article implies it.
The mini-headline (from most read articles) is ‘tax fugitives’. This is the one most people will read first.
Normal use of the word ‘tax fugitive’ would be to describe someone is fleeing paying their taxes. Most of these people never paid any – they are simply fraudsters.
The more accurate usage would be ‘tax fraudsters’.
> What have they said that is fraudulent? If you smuggle in fags then you are avoiding paying tax — that makes you a tax evader (as in the head). If you defraud HMRC then you are a fraudster (as in the headline).
No, people who smuggle cigarettes are callled (wait for it)
…. drum roll …
smugglers.
‘Tax evasion’ nearly always refers to people not paying corporate or personal taxes that are rightfully due. Why then use it to refer to ‘smugglers’ when smugglers is unambiguous and coveys more information?
BBC sub editors are not stupid.
They write headlines every day.
They know full well that smugglers is shorter and catchier than ‘tax evaders’. So why refer to ‘tax evaders’, if not to mislead people that this about anything other than plain old crime?
> Par 2: “The gallery, published for the first time online, details 20 people who HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC) believe are responsible for £765m of tax evasion and fraud.”
I don’t really see why you are using this as a defence. This sentence says that HMRC are chasing £765m and implies that
(a) most of this £765m is down to ‘tax evasion’ and
(b) that the ‘fraud’ is secondary to this tax evasion (since it is listed second).
In fact, the vast bulk of the money is simply ‘fraud’. The ‘tax evasion’ by any normal person not trying to mislead would be referred to as ‘smuggling’ or ‘unpaid tobacco duty’.
Why does ‘tax evasion’ appear so many times in this article?
> “The individuals include people who have been found guilty in their absence of crimes such as fraud, money laundering and smuggling.”
Again, this doesn’t really help the BBC case. The crimes listed are not obviously tax crimes, are they? So the implication is that not only are these naughty ‘tax evaders’ not paying their fare share, but they are also guilty of other things.
Following on from that, how do you explain this?
“The publication is part of a government campaign aimed at tackling tax evasion and gathering taxes at a time of austerity.”
Again, “tax evasion” is used. As I’ve explained “tax evasion” is a word generally used to describe individuals or corporations not paying tax on taxable income.
And the second part of the sentence is designed to reinforce that impression, since it says “gathering taxes at a time of austerity”
The implication is VERY clear
* all these nasty rich people have been let off paying their taxes (to fund the schools ‘n’ hospitals and other worthy causes) for a long time
* but now they are finally going to pay ‘their share’.
This is simply fraudulent.
This is NOTHING to do with gathering taxes at a time of austerity. None of these people in fact had taxes to pay. The cigarette smugglers did so because they thought they could get away without paying it (and it seems that they have). The VAT fraudsters (who make up the vast bulk of the total, which the BBC doesn’t tell us because obviously they want to create the impression that nasty tax evaders are costing us hundreds of millions) is again NOT a matter of collecting taxes, it is about stopping a fraud that uses the EU (yes, the EU) to reclaim non-existent VAT.
There are no extra taxes to be gathered here. The fact is the UK is is the number one victim of the EU-wide VAT fraud problem. We lose billions per year to this scam, and as those who don’t rely on the BBC for their news might notice, most of the perpetrators are foreign. This is the real story – that we are apparently powerless to stop this EU-driven VAT scam – not subtle propaganda about ‘tax evaders’.
Let’s not pretend that the BBC choose their words carelessly. They don’t. Their words reflect their prejudices, which are blatant – painting a collection of mostly foreign fraudsters as ‘tax evaders’.
Absurd and ridiculous.
So the BBC is misleading people about the true nature of this because it is pro-EU?
In which case why do both the Telegraph and Mail, which I don’t think anyone will claim are pro-EU, use the phrase “tax fugitive” in their heads?
Telegraph
HMRC publishes mugshots of 20 most wanted tax fugitives for first time
Daily Mail
Most wanted: The 20 tax fugitives who have conned the government out of £765million
This is NOTHING to do with gathering taxes at a time of austerity
Then why did the government (which the BBC supposedly hates and is always trying to run down according to this site) say it was exactly that? And why would the BBC quote a government minister saying that?
The implication is VERY clear
To you perhaps. I am not sure many others see it in quite the same way as you do — and that would include the Daily Mail and Daily Telegraph.
You can hardly compare the Daily Mail article, which includes a full description of all the crimes, mugshots, etc., with that of the BBC.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2188991/Most-wanted-The-20-tax-fugitives-conned-government-765million.html
The Telegraph article does the same thing
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/personalfinance/consumertips/tax/9478101/HMRC-publishes-mugshots-of-20-most-wanted-tax-fugitives.html
“To HELL with Anyone who Does Not Accept Islamic Rule,” MEMRI Aug 11 … will the bbc be erm “surprised” by this too?
MEMRI
as it was “surprised” by Mursi dismissing his opposition?
as Yolande Knell wistfully “remembers Tahir square” . bbc eh … and muses “the challenges ahead” . bbc
by the way is there still a “carnival atmosphere” it slipped my mind, what with all those journalist rapes/sexual assaults n stuff
link
http://www.memri.org/clip/en/0/0/0/0/0/0/3533.htm
and looks like any future opposition better be very careful!
http://www.memri.org/clip/en/0/0/0/0/0/0/3535.htm
what could go wrong 😀
Apparently ‘people’ has joined ‘Asian’ as a synonym for the religion regarding which the BBC dare not speak its name. From the Today programme running order page 16h Aug:
8.36 “Norman Benotman, president of the Quilliam Foundation, shares his views on the growing number of British people going to Syria to take up arms against the regime there. ”
Of course when the piece wen out he M word had to be used frequently but it was interesting that Benotman wanted o big up the problem from hundreds of would-be jihadis to thousands hanging around in neighbouring countries waiting for a chance to join in. I suppose as he de-radicalisation specialist at the Quillian Foundation he would want to make his job seem even more important- personally I would have though the safety of the ordinary British citizen would be best served if we loaned Assad a dozen Apache gunships for the duration.
The BBC refers to Muslims as “Muslims” when they get killed, but when they’re doing the killing, they transform into “militants”, “men”, or “people”.
Fancy that?
The BBC is full of people who when it comes to Islam are spineless cowards, hypocrites, and arse lickers.
One day very soon reality will destroy the Left-wing bubble they live in.
Mark thompson has gone on public record admitting thats exactly what they do.
Treacherous scum the lot of them.
Honest Reporting caught this before me. The BBC is using a dubious blogger as a source without any collaborating evidence. Surely there is something in the BBC ethical journalism rules against that?
According to HR: The BBC report says he claims he was given a top-secret memo about Israeli plans to stop Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons. Silverstein’s critics claim his real source was an Israeli online forum in Hebrew called Fresh.co.il. Silverstein says he and Fresh received the same leaked documents.
More on this How the BBC got Duped by Anti-Zionist Blogger Richard Silverstein
More on Richard Silverstein from CiF Watch suggests that this particular blogger is a very dubious source.
This should have been in the previous post Leaked Israel memo: propaganda or Iran war plan? Essentially the article says we don’t know if it’s true and have no way of verifying it but we are running with it anyway.
‘we don’t know if it’s true and have no way of verifying it but we are running with it anyway.’
Ain’t selective watertight oversight just grand?
Well, only if you control the pre-pro and edit suite, of course.
‘using a dubious blogger as a source’
Ah, I can help here, following my exchanges with CECUTT on use of sources.
It’s all OK. Really. Peston. Robinson. Bowen. Black.. you name ’em (well not the… sources… obviously), they can say what they like and blame… attribute… another, un-named person. It’s an ‘experienced professional’ thing. Apparently. Trust ’em, they’re the BBC.
And with the move to new media and mobile, everyone in the land knows that when the BBC uses the term ‘sources’ in quoting what they say, the general public nowadays knows they are probably dubious, so space constraints mean it’s fine to drop the bit about being ‘very dubious’.
Mind you, to say that the last time I got a Trust ruling it took ’em about 6 pages and a lot of cut ‘n pasting of BBC Editorial Justific… er.. ‘Guidelines’ to do so, that seemed basically to say that ‘If the BBC does it, the BBC thinks that’s pretty much good enough for anyone to take as A-OK’ .
Silverstein pleads ‘transparency’ but of course he’s purely shit-stirring. He’s masquerading as a do gooder. Pretending to be acting for mankind because the Israelis are so reckless that they’ve neglected to prepare for the consequences of their preemptive strike. He’s trying to convince us that he’s saving the world from being drawn into ‘another of Israel’s wars’, a narrative he knows the BBC will fall for.
“My view is that I’m providing a service by exposing this document and by calling for a debate on the thinking behind the document and calling for it to be criticised and analysed and probed for its weaknesses, because if Netanyahu and Barak will not consider the weaknesses of an Israeli attack and the repercussions of one then we have to do what we can to make that debate happen.” Says Silverstein on the BBC Worldservice.
The BBC article here confused me. Jonathan Marcus states:
“The text supplied to the BBC is just that – text.
There is no document as such and thus it is impossible to verify if it is indeed an Israeli cabinet paper of some kind. But its purpose for Mr Silverstein is clear.”
However, he seems to have forgotten that immediately, because he refers to it as ‘the document’ thereafter. It isn’t quite clear whether the rest of the article is what Jonathan Marcus believes, or what Richard Silverstein believes, but either way it seems to contain a good deal of speculation.
The part that particularly struck me was when the interviewer asked Silverstein the utmost, paramount, most desperately begged question:
“ But you’re now part of the debate. I mean do you not fear that you are being used by those opposed to the attack in disseminating a document which may or may not reflect the thinking of politicians at the moment?”
Not because I was surprised that a BBC employee virtually accused Silverstein of being a useful idiot. Yes, that did surprise me, but what I noticed most of all was that it didn’t occur to him at all to ask himself the same question.
I’ve read that article and was intrigued by the bBCs synopsis of the Israeli submarines. I did like how the bBC inserted the bit about if those Sub launched cruise missiles had been acquired from the US.
After years of political character assassination from the left (Including the bBC) We now have reached a state of mind where the US is guilty of anything it is accused of:
Making medal winners pay tax
Hating Blacks
Hating Muslims
Killing people
Spending too much money on:
Space research
Defence
Getting Assange to seek refuge in an embassy.
So the nasty Americans may have sold SLCM to Israel. The fact of the matter is, the US refused to sell cruise missiles to Israel, so as it has with a vast majority of its kit, it made its own, the Cruise missiles used by Israel are based on their air launched Popeye missile, it has a range of 1500 miles and can carry a 200kg warhead.
Now I know the Israelis are good are making weapons, but have they really perfected a 200Kg nuke. and if they have how much damage could a cruise missile have on a hardened target such as those found in Iran, designed to survive nuclear attack. Now maybe if a much larger warhead was used combined with the ground penetrating capabilities of missiles designed to dig into the ground, However I think you will find that cruise missiles don’t have the speed or the mass to have that capability.
Now I know all of this, as It is my job to know these things, yet I am surprised that the so called experts used by the bBC don’t. “Frank -don’t shoot I am a muslim-Gardner an expert.” Don’t make me bloody laugh.
Idea for new BBC show:
Nicky Cambell visits the homes of the terminally ill and severely crippled to discuss with carers just how much fuss and bother it is to care for these ‘people’. Marcus Brigstocke provides the comic relief while celebrity doctor Harold Shipman administers the fatal dose.
Waiting with my feet up to see how the BBC spins the police shooting at the mine is SA as somehow being the fault of The White Man…
INBBC: UK Muslims & Jihadists in Syria.
INBBC tiptoes around well-known fact, filtering it via Muslim Labour MP:-
Muslims, partly based in UK, fight Islamic jihad in Syria, Afghanistan, etc.
INBBC (and UK political class) do not discuss ways of stopping this and arresting jihad criminals; neither do they make the obvoius link that continuing mass immigration from Islamic countries into the UK inevitably will bring in more such jihadists.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-19280966
It’s hard to see why the shooting dead of 18 black miners by police has been relegated to such a low place on BBC SPIN24. It has all the ingredients for the BBC to go on and on about it: oppressed miners, unequal society, police brutality. Of course in the liberal narrative South Africa is a wonderful progressive rainbow nation so anything that contradicts that is verboten.
I’ve been watching News24 since 7pm (it is now almost half past) and it has only received a cursory mention as opposed to the very lengthy “indepth” (ie being spun the liberal way) coverage of Assange, right-to-die stories. Even Prince Phillip’s bladder complaint has received longer coverage.
Update: just about to post this and a report has appeared…at 28 minutes past! “Scenes reminiscent of Apartheid” is the line taken.
You’re absolutely right. It must have been a good day to bury bad news because this horrific case barely gets a mention.
Imagine the Beeb’s response had the perpetrators of this dreadful crime been white!
reminicent of apartheid … bloody nerve!
i wonder if the over 2000 murders of south african white farm families … yes usually the older ones, (easier to hack to death), is even worth a mention?
the talk is unbelievably, that Terrablanche was spot on, in a tribal society, the boer “tribe”, should just have had the orange free state, set it up
and protected it, the farmers have had to go back to defence/weapons training, the police have no interest, the long worked productive land is being erm “repatriated” by government, when this means the rainbow nation
can no longer feed itself, i suppose the int hand outs will have to start.
a country thrown away/
At the BBC, people’s lives are valued according to who kills them.
‘Scenes reminiscent of apartheid’. They just can’t leave it alone, can they? Why can’t they just make a straightforward report of the event without drawing their own parallels which, in this example, serve to deflect attention away from yet another once-prosperous African country being turned into a chaotic, corrupt basket-case.
Because they are denied proper information thro’ only watching the INBBC the liberals were yesterday straight onto twitter spouting about how nothing changes in RSA, it’s bloody apartheid all over again.
Having seen ITV news showing film of the incident it was clearly NOT like apartheid at all, and the foolish strikers (or rentamob, whoever) actually charged at heavily armed police with machetes!
Oh the folly, and when o when can we send OUR POLICE to RSA for some bloody good training in what to do during a riot.
“Scenes reminiscent of Apartheid”
This does seem an extraordinary line to be taking.
But, to be fair, it is across the MSM, and I just caught SKY trotting it out over my morning coffee.
I simply make that ‘two wrongs make a bigger wrong’ before Drs. Sceznadymanus from Oslo get all validated.
Reminds me of some recent Olympics memes, where it’s almost like a memo went out on how to refer such such events to suit a narrative.
But more likely lazy journalism and/or inner London groupthink at play.
From what I have seen it’s hard to imagine what else police confronted with an advancing hoard intent on slicing and dicing are meant to do, so when confronted with yet another prioritising dilemma (police, racial composition, rainbow nation, proportionate responses, black on black harm), the default comfort setting seems to have been to go into a trance and reach back in history to when it could be framed ‘properly’.
Just amazed these rioting miners were not accused of ‘storming’, but that term seems reserved for a) Things that haven’t happened, b) may not even have been likely, c) claimed at all, or the sole preserve of three white chicks entering a church to sing a ditty.
Perhaps the latest word to enter into the MSM ‘folk we like’/’folk we don’t’ descriptive lexicon, along with ‘audacious’ or ‘daring’ (when leaving a bomb in a market square to kill kids) vs. ‘extreme (for blokes from certain less favoured political parties saying stuff that doesn’t suit).
EX-D.G THOMPSON as CEO of ‘New York Times’.
‘Slate’ has:-
“Why Is the BBC’s Mark Thompson Now CEO of the New York Times? ”
‘Slate’ hints that a somewhat financially desperate ‘NYT’ may want Thompson to try to somehow replicate the special kind of massive public sector financed privilege which BBC still has, but in a ‘NYT’ milieu.
Special pleading stuff.
http://www.slate.com/blogs/breakingviews/2012/08/15/bbc_s_mark_thompson_is_an_odd_choice_for_ny_times_ceo_.html?
BBC breakfast at 07:30 this morning, Charlie and Loiuse reading out the plaque outside a US icecream parlour where Barry Obama and Michelle shared their first kiss. Dewey eyed Charlie in awe of the words of dedication written thereon, paying tribute to that first wonderful kiss.
said Charlie ” Oh the things you have to reveal when you’re president of the United states”.
My thoughts were: well how about starting with your birth certificate mate! the real one?
How long before they discover where Barry performed his first miracle?