224 Responses to OPEN THREAD

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  1. noggin says:
    April 5, 2013 at 7:20 pm

    wonderful demo in sooo many ways 😀
    hey! why isn t peter tatchel around

       4 likes

  2. Aerfen says:
    April 5, 2013 at 8:30 pm

    “Wimmin” are trumped by not only Mohammedans but every other victim group!

    The Order of Trumps (IMHO)
    Blacks
    Mohammedans
    All other VEMS (Visible ethnic minorities – the darker the better)
    All other ethnic minorities (the poorer the better so Poles trump Germans)
    Homosexuals and every kind of sexual deviant (trannies are a current obsession)
    Disabled
    Wimmin (unless ethnic minority in which case take the appropriate ladder up)

    There was a discussion yesterday about GM Police now starting to treat victimisation of ‘cult’ groups as ‘hate crime’ (following campaign by mother of murdered Goth girl Sophie Lancaster). The BBC do not much like it! The presenter (I think it was Rachel Burden) suggested there was a risk it might ‘dilute’ legislation to protect victims of ‘race crime and crimes against ethnic minorities’. I specificically noted the concern was ONLY on the Number One obsession race and tellingly added ‘because this affects social cohesion’!

    How disgraceful! If you support the existence of ‘hate crime’ the ONLY excuse is based on the belief that some ‘victims’ need special protection because they are more vulnerable, but this was an admission that its politcal that its all about protecting the status quo, about maintaining the mass immigration project, not about protecting helpless victims at all!

    I fail to see in any case, how a six foot black youth who goes to the gym every day, needs more protection than a frail elderly ethnic British man who is attacked on his way home from collecting his pension.

       11 likes

    • thoughtful says:
      April 5, 2013 at 10:30 pm

      It’s called the heirarchy of isms, but you should be aware that the lefties don’t actually mean what they say. It’s great to drone on & on like the Judean peoples front or to use these isms to beat over the heads of the political groups they don’t like, but when it comes to actually doing something, well that’s a different story.

      The reality is that most of the lefties hate the people who make up the minority groups they champion. They love the ideas of the groups dislke the people in them.

      So we see things like the employment tribunals which anyone would think finds for a lot of claimants but the reality is that even for cases of race discrimination only 2% of cases heard succeed. The EU told Liebour the UK had ‘no effective anti discrimination legislation’ BLiars response was to write to tribunal chairs to ask them to find for more claimants, needless to say they didn’t and nothing has changed.

         5 likes

      • thoughtful says:
        April 5, 2013 at 11:11 pm

        BTW I don’t believe Blacks are at the top, my belief is that Pakistani Muslim Men are at the top, they certainly seem to trump any kind of black guy, and this also fits in with the theory of left wing fascism!
        Bangladeshi Muslim Men come a close second.

        Pakistani Christian Men come quite a way down, probably lower than Muslim women, but still above black people.

           6 likes

        • stewart says:
          April 5, 2013 at 11:15 pm

          They are certainly excused the vilest of crimes by the bourgeois left and their mouthpiece the BBC.

             11 likes

  3. George R says:
    April 5, 2013 at 8:31 pm

    “BBC Panorama producer resigns after developer’s ‘bribery’ allegation.

    “Harlequin says it will to go to the police over claim attempt was made to bribe security consultant to disclose information.”

    http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2013/apr/05/bbc-panorama-harlequin?

       5 likes

    • David Preiser (USA) says:
      April 5, 2013 at 8:45 pm

      “one of their most experienced producers/directors”, and an award winner. All of sudden he thought he might pull this? Never happened before, eh? A fun project would be for someone to contact the subjects of his other reports and ask them what they think of this.

         5 likes

    • George R says:
      April 6, 2013 at 9:58 am

      Supplementary.

      “BBC accepts resignation of ‘Panorama’ producer at centre of bribery allegation.”

      By IAN BURRELL.

      http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/bbc-accepts-resignation-of-panorama-producer-at-centre-of-bribery-allegation-8562476.html

         2 likes

      • Guest Who says:
        April 6, 2013 at 10:58 am

        Seems, in this case at least, the ‘BBC has learned’ that ‘it’ has been got bang to rights.
        And of course it will now be time to ‘move on’, sharpish.

           4 likes

      • David Preiser (USA) says:
        April 6, 2013 at 6:01 pm

        Brilliant! No way in hell did this Beeboid suggest that the BBC may be able to send some work in that guy’s direction without having done it before, or without thinking it’s no big deal, even common practice. Somebody should seriously be contacting that care home Panorama exposed last year. I blame the management structure, of course, for corrupting these agni innocenti.

        My favorite part of the story, though, is this:

        Some colleagues were angry yesterday that he had been “forced out” over the incident when senior executives in the BBC had not lost their jobs over mistakes made in relation to the Jimmy Savile scandal and editorial failures surrounding untrue allegations about Lord McAlpine.

        Oh, dear. The kholops are still restless. What will the dvoryane say now?

        The development coincided with comments by the head of the BBC newsroom Mary Hockaday, who claimed that trust levels in BBC journalism were back to levels it enjoyed before the Savile crisis.

        Oh. YCMIU. Good thing Lord Hall is installing new top management and has reshuffled the Cabinet. I expect there will be new trust training courses on the menu.

           3 likes

  4. George R says:
    April 5, 2013 at 8:41 pm

    “Provocative BBC Good Friday programme – further reflections.”

    http://www.christianconcern.com/our-concerns/social/provocative-bbc-good-friday-programme-further-reflections?

       2 likes

  5. Sir Arthur Strebe-Grebling says:
    April 5, 2013 at 9:15 pm

    How quickly can they get rid of the news that S&P have reaffirmed the UK’s AAA credit rating?
    And where is the ‘but Labour says …’ bit of the report?

       9 likes

  6. David Preiser (USA) says:
    April 5, 2013 at 9:26 pm

    When does the BBC find a gun enthusiast they think you should listen to on the issue of gun control? When it’s a Democrat Jew who is in favor of universal background checks and the cryptically phrased notion of controlling “how these guns operate in society” (translation: capacity limits and limits on ammo, and possibly limits on customization). The former writer for the literary version of NPR says that the NRA represents only the most “extreme” minority of gun owners in the US, and he knows about 96 million more who do something along the lines of the President’s extreme gun control policies. As if an organization like the NRA represents the opinions of no one except those who pay membership dues, and nobody else even remotely agrees with any of their positions.

    The guy actually gives a fair accounting of why people enjoy gun ownership, fortunately stopping short of the testosterone-laden, knuckle-dragging, violent stereo-type reasons we usually hear about. But the message is clear: most United Statesians want something like the strictest gun control possible without banning it completely.

    Keep dreaming, BBC.

       6 likes

  7. thoughtful says:
    April 5, 2013 at 9:47 pm

    This is where do gooding gets you, trying to live a life which you have no idea about but think you do.

    Worked at students union & associated mag.

    http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-tyne-22042626

       2 likes

  8. tommy atkins says:
    April 6, 2013 at 12:17 am

    Obama phones California Attorney General to applogise for sexists remarks that he made about her looks;
    http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/post-politics/wp/2013/04/05/obama-called-kamala-harris-to-apologize-for-best-looking-attorney-general-remark/?hpid=z3
    odd how this has gone unreported here. Lies and tractor stats.

       5 likes

    • Reed says:
      April 6, 2013 at 12:43 am

      OMG! Obama’s War On Women! Oh, the misogyny.

         7 likes

      • Reed says:
        April 6, 2013 at 12:46 am

        First comment…

        stratman1
        It was inevitable. Those of his ilk – those who worship at the altar of political correctness – defined the idiocy that condemns even compliments as the one he made. Now he can rest in the bed he helped construct, LOL.

           6 likes

    • Rufus McDufus says:
      April 6, 2013 at 2:36 pm

      Actually the BBC have been reporting this one quite heavily. The spin is that it was such a minor mistake that His opponents would jump on anything to gain political capital, and even someone of His calibre is prone to the odd blunder.
      Of course they didn’t bother to report any of his much larger & more important errors.

         4 likes

      • David Preiser (USA) says:
        April 6, 2013 at 6:43 pm

        Curiously, Katty Kay made no frowning tweet about it. Didn’t even RT anyone else’s criticism, even though there are three tweets in her feed from friends about Women In Work. Katty is usually very on top of feminism and women’s rights issues. It’s very strange that she missed out this one or has no opinion worth sharing.

           2 likes

        • Reed says:
          April 6, 2013 at 11:01 pm

          “Even women at the top STILL judged by their appearance”

          This would have been the title of the article, had it not been an Obama gaffe.

             0 likes

  9. George R says:
    April 6, 2013 at 9:34 am

    “The Great Welfare Myth:
    The chattering classes are peddling a poisonous myth – that the poor cannot survive without the soul- deadening embrace of welfarism.”
    By BRENDAN O’NEILL.

    Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-2304776/The-Great-Welfare-Myth-The-chattering-classes-peddling-poisonous-myth–poor-survive-soul–deadening-embrace-welfarism.html#ixzz2PfcNy2SE
    Follow us: @MailOnline on Twitter | DailyMail on Facebook

       2 likes

  10. T Smith says:
    April 6, 2013 at 9:37 am

    I have just tuned in to the bbc news 24 channel to (as usual) be given the opportunity to hear Ed Balls give his opinion on the latest welfare reforms instigated by the coalition. I noticed that the interviewer made absolutely no attempt to question or challenge what he was saying even when he was unable to offer any policy from the labour party. There was no aggressive name calling (as per Boris Johnson), no mention of the recent speeding fine, just a quiet acceptance of what he wanted to say. Don’t forget that Balls was Browns absolutely fully signed up right hand lieutenant of Gordon Brown who was singularly responsible for losing most of this country’s wealth. WHY can’t we just have a fair and independent news media?

       14 likes

    • johnnythefish says:
      April 6, 2013 at 10:07 am

      Simultaneous posts here, I think (see below). I’m normally one of Davis’s biggest critics but on this occasion I thought he was very good. He was quietly dismissive of Balls when he tried to keep on talking and the fact he got him genuinely agitated showed he’d done his job properly.

         3 likes

  11. johnnythefish says:
    April 6, 2013 at 10:04 am

    Congratulations to Evan Davis this morning on his interview with Ed Balls. Not the cosy chat we’ve previously come to expect when Labour ministers come on the programme, but far more challenging – specifically on the timing of Labour’s introduction of the 50p tax rate and their lack of credible policies on welfare. As a result, the nation learned that Labour will ‘create’ a job in the public sector for anybody who’s been unemployed for 2 years, paid for by a bankers bonus tax – the gift that keeps on giving (and remember ‘bankers’ are paying of the order of 60% tax on them already). It also learned that put under the slightest pressure, Balls gets flustered and indignant (his excuses for not bringing in the 50p rate earlier were woeful) unlike Osborne who, love him or hate him, keeps his cool when given the kind of aggressive, scornful grillings reserved for Tory ministers we have come to expect of theToday presenters.

    Only if this kind of balance is manintained will people get a fair view of what all the political parties stand for, how competent and trustworthy the politicians are and what they have got to offer.

       7 likes

    • uncle bup says:
      April 6, 2013 at 5:36 pm

      I’m certainly not going to congratulate a droid for doing his job with at least a semblance of competence for once.

         2 likes

    • David Preiser (USA) says:
      April 6, 2013 at 5:50 pm

      Challenging? Not very, and certainly not when it counted. Davis did do a couple interruptions, but it wasn’t half of what he does to non-Labourites. Just because Balls protested at one point about not being able to get a word in (I’m getting the impression that politicians now come to Today prepared to drop that line at any opportunity), it doesn’t mean Davis was as unfair as he can be to others.

      He let Balls tell an outrageous lie and didn’t even try to call him out on it. Balls said Osborne is wrong, “reckless”, for dropping the 50p rate, but then said he’s a low-tax guy, but he’d keep the tax and maybe raise it because of the “fair share” BS. So he is a higher-tax guy because of his ideology, and it’s a lie to say he isn’t. Davis let it slide, because he had another goal for the interview and missed the opportunity. It’s a disservice to the audience for Davis to ignore that simply because he already had other plans for a line of questioning. He usually has no problem trying to put words in his guest’s mouth: “In other words, you’re saying X.” They all do it from time to time. But here he didn’t even try. If the only reason to have the 50p rate is “fairness”, then why is it “reckless” and damaging to the recovery by dropping it? Davis wasn’t interested, which is a shame, because it’s the whole foundation of Balls’ and Labour’s position. Surely that’s worth discussing rather than moving on to other ideas.

      Most of Davis’ interruptions were more him talking over Balls with those patented asides to the audience (what OBR stands for, giving more details about what Balls was referring to, etc.). That’s not really interrupting at all. It’s still rude and gets in the way of the discussion. And I’m sure it does make the guest feel like he can’t get a word in. Balls can’t even handle it in other interviews and gets agitated when he’s flailing and someone like Stage Performer Maitlis – a diehard supporter – is desperately trying to guide him back to clarity, but that doesn’t excuse Davis. Does the Today audience really need that much help following the conversation? I’m not sure what Davis does in these situations is at all helpful. He does it all the time.

      He also, from what I could tell, tried to catch Balls in a gotcha moment by asking leading questions on why he thought Osborne did introduce the 50p tax rate. It seems like he was trying to get Balls to say something about Osborne’s plan which he could then say “Gotcha, you’d do the same thing.” It didn’t work, and Balls didn’t really get where the conversation was going. So he kept trying to get back to the usual negative stuff and talking out of both sides of his mouth. Maybe I misread what Davis was trying to do, but he certainly achieved nothing with the questions about why Osborne did what he did.

      Davis blew this big time. Sure, one golden rule of interviewing is to let a foolish guest talk nonsense and make a fool out themselves, give them enough rope, so to speak, which is sort of what happened here. But that depends on which side of the issue one is already on. And if Davis can shut up for two seconds so we can hear his guest’s answer. No Labour supporter or undecided person is going to come away thinking the public sector jobs scheme would be a problem, or that there’s anything unhelpful about continuing to soak the evil rich make the wealthy pay their fair share.

      At best, Davis made the point that the 50p rate raised “only” 100 million, so wasn’t worth it. That’s not going to convince anyone that Balls is wrong, because not only did Davis fail to equally explain any damage it might have caused to consumer spending and investment, but Balls was allowed to dismiss it entirely, and Davis even made it sound like he agreed with him. Fail.

      Davis is always trying to nail something and often ignores what the guest gives him in pursuit of his goal.

         2 likes

    • chrisH says:
      April 6, 2013 at 6:42 pm

      Will have a listen.
      Certainly the cut and paste soundbites on the 9am news bulletin seemed to have been truncated and plenty of Evan being about to start a sentence with Balls still getting his message in.
      So sounds hopeful to me..will listen!

         0 likes

  12. Anders Thomasson says:
    April 6, 2013 at 10:47 am

    Was that Have I Got News For You last night or a Party Political for the Labour party?

       8 likes

    • AsISeeIt says:
      April 6, 2013 at 4:54 pm

      Both, I’m guessing. Gave up on HIGNFY ages ago.
      Paul Merton: ‘The Royal Family – they’re funny aren’t they?’
      Ian Hislop: ‘I hate the Tories, love the Lib Dems and take an occasional limp side swipe at Labour. But I do really really love my BBC pay cheque. What? Do I still edit that satirical anti-establishment magazine… who me?’

         5 likes

  13. George R says:
    April 6, 2013 at 10:53 am

    INBBC resorts to deceptive use of word ‘Islamist’, as here:-

    “Bangladesh Islamists march against bloggers”

    http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-22049408

    ‘Jihadwatch’s analysis on misuse of word ‘Islamist’-

    “Under pressure from Hamas-linked CAIR, AP revises meaning of term ‘Islamist'”

    http://www.jihadwatch.org/2013/04/under-pressure-from-hamas-linked-cair-ap-revises-meaning-of-term-islamist.html

       2 likes

  14. George R says:
    April 6, 2013 at 1:29 pm

    “BBC Sport have had their top man, sports editor David Bond, working on an investigation at home and abroad for more than three months.
    “Camera crews and production staff involved have had to sign agreements not to disclose any information about the secret project. Licence-fee payers will want the eventual programming to be worth all that time and money.”

    (Scroll down to final paragraph.)

    Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/article-2304763/Tony-Fernandes-QPR-owner-leads-search-new-Grand-National-sponsor–Charles-Sale.html#ixzz2PgZ3UrC1
    Follow us: @MailOnline on Twitter | DailyMail on Facebook

       0 likes

  15. George R says:
    April 6, 2013 at 1:51 pm

    Recycling?

    Will BBC-NUJ revise its website so as not to mislead licence payers (and their children)?

    1.) BBC-NUJ:-

    http://www.bbc.co.uk/learningzone/clips/recycling-and-the-incineration-of-waste/1577.html

    2.) ‘Daily Mail’:-

    “The great recycling con trick: How 12million tons of your carefully sorted waste is being dumped in foreign landfill sites.
    “Government vows to tighten inspections at ports to curb the problem.
    “Environment Agency orders councils to check on their contractors.
    “Waste sent to countries including China, Indonesia and India”
    By STEVE DOUGHTY.

    Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2304773/The-great-recycling-trick-How-carefully-sorted-waste-dumped-abroad.html#ixzz2PgeghIZu

       3 likes

    • uncle bup says:
      April 6, 2013 at 5:32 pm

      The EC’s ‘cradle to grave’ regulations on household recycling go all the way from your back garden to the pavement. Once your empty tins have been picked up off the pavement they are deemed to have been ‘recycled’. If they go straight to the local tip or onto a container ship and thence an Indonesian beach, as far as ‘targets’ are concerned they have been recycled.

      Yer just can’t get enough Europe can yer.

         5 likes

  16. stewart says:
    April 6, 2013 at 5:59 pm

    Lead story 6 o’clock news
    Nissan Maindealer is out of hospital
    What a relief

       2 likes

  17. Guest Who says:
    April 6, 2013 at 6:05 pm

    Given much of the BBC’s output is on the haves vs. the have nots, I am always interested in breakdowns of how the market rates that make BBC staff so uniquely worth it are arrived at.
    http://tradingaswdr.blogspot.co.uk/2013/04/gestation-period.html?
    £2500 for a daily gig is, I am sure, only fair for the calibre of what is asked, or left unsaid. To some.
    So far, so ‘but he’s worth it’. But what piqued my interest was this: ‘not sure at what stage he renounced his BBC staff status’
    What was involved? Epaulettes & buttons ripped off? What? And like twitter, there’s another unique ‘in the BBC but not of the BBC’ aspect to all this that really sounds dubious. I’m sure most presume he’s BBC through and through, when in fact there seems yet more degrees of separation, created for what reason one can only wonder.

       1 likes

  18. David Preiser (USA) says:
    April 6, 2013 at 6:12 pm

    5 points for Danny Alexander for the great dig at Ed Balls’ “fake outrage” and for pointing out that the Coalition – “led by” the Lib-Dems, lol – saw the wealthy paying more than under Labour. Sarah Montague did not like that one little bit. She couldn’t get him on anything, and her frustration was pretty obvious.

       3 likes

  19. David Preiser (USA) says:
    April 6, 2013 at 6:15 pm

    Last comment on Today: Montague claimed that the three people on disability benefits the BBC spoke to earlier in the show were proof that the Government had been using such heated rhetoric that real disabled people were living in fear and felt that the nasty Government had lumped them in with benefit fraudsters.

    No, BBC, you do that all on your own. Viz, the three people you had on earlier in the show. What a joke. Set up and create the fear, then blame the Government for these people being afraid. This is the exact same thing Alan was pointing out yesterday about Osbourne’s comments on Philpott. Once again the Narrative spread across the spectrum of BBC broadcasting. It’s not because of a conspiracy or directive from the top, either: they all think the same way, so it happens naturally. Restructuring the management system won’t fix this.

       2 likes

    • Guest Who says:
      April 6, 2013 at 6:28 pm

      ‘Montague claimed that the three people on disability benefits the BBC spoke to earlier’
      What the BBC projects based on what it has made up earlier, Blue Peter-style, shows how corrupted they have become.
      They really do not appear to have grasped that the BBC citing people the BBC have selected to confirm the BBC narrative is about as pure, if venal, a form of propaganda as it is possible to delude people with.
      And as been shown from QT to Today, even when they rig a vox-pop they can’t do it without being shown up as snake oil salesmen with a ringer in the crowd.
      And this is how Lord Hall Hall thinks ‘trust’ is regained?

         1 likes

      • David Preiser (USA) says:
        April 6, 2013 at 6:38 pm

        I didn’t listen to that earlier part of the show, and haven’t bothered to check if those poor dears really are disabled and not more validation of Rule #1.

        Lord Hall, like the rest of them, know that trust is already there and just needs a little reassurance from time to time when things look a bit wobbly. Making a public display about changing the management structure, putting in new training courses and adding a couple more compliance boxes to tick will be just the thing to re-establish it. Same as it ever was…..same as it ever was….same as it ever was…..

           0 likes

  20. Sir Arthur Strebe-Grebling says:
    April 6, 2013 at 7:24 pm

    Today’s news from the Nationalised Death Service, that England’s former deputy chief medical officer says that NHS bosses should be held accountable for the Stafford Hospital scandal, is hidden away on the bBBC’s website in the ‘local news’ for the area, with no mention on the national news or the health or politics pages.
    http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-stoke-staffordshire-22051258
    Move along now, nothing to see, only 1200 people killed in one hospital by the NHS.

       3 likes

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