Just adding to what David has already posted about Marr’s programme and the BBC’s coverage of the ‘Living Wage’.
All in all today on the BBC seemed like one extended Labour Party Political Broadcast. We had Victoria Derbyshire giving an unopposed voice to the Fire Brigade Union who have a poster out now about The Cuts saying…. ‘They cut, You burn’. Didn’t hear any voice to naysay their propaganda.
Then we get onto Ed Miliband’s latest wheeze…the Living Wage….a policy that seems in direct opposition to everything that Labour was meant to stand for….that the rich pay more and that money is redistributed to the less well off….in effect Big Business and the wealthy subsidise small business and the poorest. The Living Wage, as said before, seems designed to end this relationship…..with Small Business being forced to pay wages they can’t afford.
It may come as a surprise but we already have a living wage…it’s what you earn topped up by tax credits or any other allowances you might get .…..paid for by taxing the better off and big business….not to mention the NHS, schooling, the emergency services and any other service provided by the State…..pay for that lot yourself and the living wage would be have to be a bit higher than £7.45.
It was telling who the BBC brought on to prop up their propaganda on one show…..A Labour spokeswoman, Rachel Reeves, a TUC spokesman and the BBC’s own accountants, KPMG, who love the living wage.
As David has said not one critical voice was heard until ‘The World at One‘…Today did seem like a BBC show case for Labour’s exciting new policy.
Still no answer as to where the money comes from to pay for all this.
The BBC told us that ‘The Living Wage Foundation’ has announced that the Living Wage will rise across the nation…..you might have got the impression that this was a government body of some sort…rather than what it is…a campaigning pressure group for leftwing utopian dreams.
This, if anything, is a classic example of the power of the media….a pressure group working in tandem with a friendly media to push its own ideology…..and because the most powerful of the media give it their backing the politicians who might normally have doubts about it all run scared and ‘sign up’ to it in the hope that the BBC et al won’t then make them look ‘nasty’ just because they ask a few questions such as ’where does the money come from and how many jobs will this cost?’…the BBC are happy to complacently assure us that the living wage would be ‘Lifting the poor out of poverty’ but refused to divulge who pays.
Andrew Marr’s show, ironically linked to the BBC’s ‘Free Thinking Festival’, was pure propaganda touching on just about every BBC sacred cause….Israel, immigration, climate change and a new world order…..and no ‘voices of dissent’ to challenge any of the BBC’s cherished sympathies.
The overall narrative was about how to change the political makeup of the West…they were talking about the lack of democracy in the West, carrying on the BBC’s seeming long term project to challenge the legitimacy of Western democracy…..they spoke of the need for ‘consensus politics‘….but what that boils down to is a one party state where all Parties follow the same policies and the public don’t have a real choice…a dictatorship in essence….and because the main, most powerful media also are in on the ‘consensus’ there is absolutely no ‘opposition’….in other words the situation we have in Britain today where politicians force immigration, Europe, Islam and wind farms upon the people without allowing them a say.
This is of course an idea advanced by the BBC’s pet Marxist (aside from Mason), Martin Jacques, as posted about earlier…making the case for ‘benign’ dictatorship.
We are told by Marr and Co that everything is polarised now in the US…..political parties don’t have the same policies as each other and that is terrible…. that’s a bad thing….I always thought that was kinda the way a democracy worked.
The problem is that America is too democratic….even Richard Black saw this as a problem……
THE US POLITICAL SYSTEM
Just about every other country involved in the UN talks has a single chain of command; when the president or prime minister speaks, he or she is able to make commitments for the entire government.
Not so the US. The president is not able to pledge anything that Congress will not support, and his inability to step up the US offer in Copenhagen was probably the single biggest impediment to other parties improving theirs.
Viewed internationally, the US effectively has two governments, each with power of veto over the other.
Doubtless the founding fathers had their reasons. But it makes the US a nation apart in these processes, often unable to state what its position is or to move that position – a nightmare for other countries’ negotiators.
Yes, Democracy is a bit of a nightmare unlike lovable old Chinese Communism.
Not only do we have polarisation of politics but we also have a polarisation of the media.…which is also dangerous….Fox News anyone? Not the BBC or the Guardian of course.……we need to have a common reference that provides a common link to all…a Public Broadcasting Service that talks to everyone…..we absolutely need the BBC.
Unfortunately that is precisely what the BBC doesn’t do…and is the reason for this blog’s existence…the BBC speaks only for itself and its fellow travellers on the Left. It not only refuses to allow discussion of the ‘Right’s’ issues but actively works to discredit anyone who dares to attempt to publish or broadcast such ideas and thoughts.
We were also told that we have no neighbourliness anymore….no doubt one of the evils of the consumer/capitalist/freethinking society…helping each other out is a new phenomenon….I’m not sure what planet they are living on but certainly where I live people are always swinging into action in the interests of that funny old thing called a ‘community’.
Here’s a thought though….should there be a lack of such communal empathy might that be a result of people having all responsibility for their own lives being taken over by the State?
We are also informed that we must have someone in charge who knows what it is to be poor or from an ethnic minority……how childish and simplistic….and merely parroting Miliband’s pathetic and discriminatory posturing……isn’t Miliband himself a ‘millionaire’? Is Miliband black, or a woman, or gay, or Muslim or a Welsh hill farmer? No? then how can he speak for such people? Surely he is ‘out of touch’. A ridiculous notion and one the BBC should not be championing.
Then we had ‘Climate change‘…to tackle this we need a ‘Common Purpose’…we need to change course….that is, close down industry and build lots and lots of wind farms or else we will be inundated with 200m climate refugees by 2050….and storms like ‘Sandy’ which we all know was caused by man made global warming…..er except it wasn’t.
Then we had….The Palestinians have a right to the land of Israel…presumably the Sikhs and Hindus kicked out of ‘Pakistan’ can have their lands back then? No? Oh and the current Israeli government is wrong and dangerous…..it does not want a two state solution and that’s very worrying…the only Palestinians who don’t want it are fanatics and extremists.
No mention that Palestinians want to wipe the Jews off the face of the earth….and have been trying to do so for at least 60 years…..with the help of their Muslim neighbours.
But at least we now know….only a government that has policies the BBC agrees with is valid and acceptable.
Marr is well named….’Marring’ …to spoil or impair….a suitable description of what he does to the reputation of the once great BBC now brought so low.
again the BBC Trust is not fit for purpose
That must be because the BBC Trust is hideously white. Although just last week they have dragged in a token foreigner.
Now, now, let’s not insult the wife of the BBC’s technology correspondent…..
That’s Diana Coyle, Vice Chairman of the Trust: she does actually mention it on her trustee page.
The new trustee is West Indian Sonita Alleyne.
The Labour Party is the Parliamentary wing of the BBC.
The latest strategy for ending British society:-
The political Left’s (and BBC-NUJ’s) push for £7.45-£8.55 a hour living wage for all the world’s immigrants to be available by the U.K. open door for unlimited numbers of immigrants.
Why stop there? Why not £10 an hour minimum? After all, this is still much, much less than Miliband gets.
And that would be so simple to achieve as an election promise, censoring out the inflationary and uncompetitive consequences for the British economy, of course.
And how much tax does the government take?
8:55 an hour, 37.5 hour week
4070.62 a year.
http://www.listentotaxman.com/index.php if you want to calculate it yourself.
Hmmm, methinks that its a distraction. We have to talk about nasty employers who make work for people, rather than talk about how we are screwing the poor.
Epic narrative sweep Alan: living wage through China to anti-semiticism. Do you have a computer programme to generate your articles?
And on the living wage, two words: Boris Johnson. Not a left wing policy.
Jim, are you on some BBC rota? Is there some “mastermind” at the BBC who sees some item on here that he doesn’t like, so he presses a button and one of you Beeboids stirs into action to refute it?
I can just imagine it – a console with all your names by buttons – Jim Dandy; Dezzie; Prole; Scottie (currently in for lengthy repairs due to blowing a few fuses too many). Some mad, red faced, champagne swigging Beeboid-Controller who is manically typing in your responses and pressing your goto button. Suddenly the light goes on behind your eyes and your fingers start frantically typing the replies supplied by the controller. After two or three days of activity, you are withdrawn so your batteries can be recharged and your fuses replaced.
It doesn’t matter which Beebotron does the typing, your answers are indistinguishable from one another. Although just recently some new, less effective models have been created including the “Chloe mk. 1”. The “Prole mk. 1” is still semi-malfuntioning but its responses are getting more into line with the older models like the “Jim Dandy” prototype.
“two words: Boris Johnson. Not a left wing policy”
Those who suggest Boris Johnson is a socialist because of his support for this are being somewhat ridiculous, I would concede. Behind his bumbling persona, Boris is a smart guy and he must know it is unworkable. So clearly he’s picking and choosing his fights. Perhaps Alan’s paragraph above explains it:
“..and because the most powerful of the media give it their backing the politicians who might normally have doubts about it all run scared and ‘sign up’ to it in the hope that the BBC et al won’t then make them look ‘nasty’ just because they ask a few questions such as ’where does the money come from and how many jobs will this cost?’”
I reckon he sees no point in being made to look nasty on this one. It won’t happen. The sums don’t add up. So why not support it and throw your opponents off balance. But given it’s basic mathematics it’s surprising the BBC found it so difficult to find critics.
Jim – you have not refuted Alan’s accusation that the BBC presentation of the living wage issue was unbalanced.
Unless you have proof to the the contrary, we’ll assume you at least agree with that part of his argument (which supports the raison d’ etre of this site).
And by the way, I think Boris’s argument for it is to address the particular problems faced in London.
‘the BBC’s ‘Free Thinking Festival’’
Well, tell it often enough, backed by £4Bpa, and they may get away with it.
A further irony is the free thought the BBC generates by selective editorial appears to cost £142.50pa.
Having heard Mary Robinson and Michael Ignatieff give their spiels as contributions to the Freethinking Festival, I think it ought to be renamed he ‘pious platitudes from the bien pensants’ festival,.
I had thought that a living wage was obtained by either getting more per hour for your work ie self improvement , OR, working longer hours even if that meant finding another part time job. Most people I know work well over 45 hours a week. Perhaps if some of those looking for the hand outs did the same they would a living wage .
The fire brigade has become another branch of the social engineering project. It could easily make cuts without any loss of service simply by sacking all its frontline female employees. That women are employed as ‘firefighters’ paid the same as men but NOT required to do any dangerous work is a scandal which the BBC would not touch in a month of Sundays. This would require true free thinking (ie not cultural Marxism).
That the watering down (no pun intended) of the fire service has led already to unnecessary deaths, I doubt will ever be mentioned by the BBC nor will we ever get a campaign from the fire brigade Union with pictures of an overweight 5 ft tall women sitting on fire engines with the slogan They work, You Burn.
If firemen are not going to do their job because of cuts then they need sacking and a new lot trained to do it, for less if necessary. No fireman who considers his pay packet before his duty is worthy of the service.
An article here in the Telegraph which exposes the myth that cuts to the fire service put more people in danger.
The real reason the FBU kick off whenever manpower reductions are mooted is it leaves their members fewer hours to do their second job, as anyone who knows a fireman will be aware. Of course, not even the Telegraph dare say that.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/9655935/Our-firefighters-are-inflaming-public-fears.html
We seem to be getting a fair few grumpy Beeb supporters these days, so well done David and Alan.
They are deliberately obtuse, you know…I compare the gung-ho unequivocal support for the AV system, Regional Assemblies and the congestion charges…all beloved of the BBC, Liberals, Labour and Guardian…with the BBCs continual nay saying and griping about the upcoming Police Commissioner elections.
Though the BBC loved an election-unless its one that Labour didn`t impose on us or is not of their timing. We all know that they like Referendums as long as they suit Europe of the regions, and do NOT threaten the EU “project” for a liquidated England.
Montagues carping about the coming elections for P.C clearly shows that this is the “wrong election”, and is not her cup of tea…even though “Lord” Prescott has thrown his bulimic blubber into the ring.
She rather whizzed over the Labour candidate who thinks that they`ll be HER police to push around…oh, if only she`d been a Tory. She wants no badger culling, and fears that the police might catch criminals and not badger butchers is she doesn`t rein the fuzz in.
Subtle, nuanced and so clever in disguising their own agenda…that`s our Beeb!