You would need a heart of stone not to smile at the BBC’s desperation to cloak the news that the UK economy is indisputably on the mend. It’s not so many months since Miliband, Balls and Cooper were never off the State Broadcaster imploring the Coalition to abandon current strategy and adopt “PlanB” – the Labour recipe for success. Now, as it becomes crushingly clear Labour got it so badly wrong, the BBC allow the quiet shelving of “Plan B” and instead all we get is the “cost of living” swerve, also gratefully taken up by the BBC as the new and preferred attack route on the Coalition.

Oh my, it’s so tricky for the BBC. Yesterday we heard David Blunkett warn of riots on our streets as Roma queue up to bring us their multicultural riches and now today Jack Straw reveals that Labour got it badly wrong with their (deliberate) embrace of Open Borders. I am sure the BBC will give both these mea culpas from their political wing every due prominence. Now, back to the Philippines…

Here we go – middle of the week and time for a new Open Thread.

Problems with the site earlier prevented me posting this but I thought I would share anyway. I was listening to the TODAY programme this morning, just before 7am, and they were doing all they can to push the notion that the Typhoon that has caused so much destruction in the Philippines was “somehow” linked to global warming.  They had political hustler Justin Forsyth from Save the Children on asserting that whilst he had no proof global warming had caused this particular event people “knew” there was a connection. A bit like people “know” there is a connection between earning £163,000 and being CEO of Save the Children? As ever the BBC never miss an opportunity to advance their dismal global warming meme….

 The Spectator asks:

Why can’t we admit we’re scared of Islamism?

The article reveals that an art exhibition examining freedom of expression had to be moved to a different location due to ‘threats’ towards the gallery….

‘Enemies of the exhibition’ had made threats, and it was worried about a ‘potential terrorist attack’

The article continues:

There was no secret about its decision. But not one of the arts correspondents for the broadsheets or BBC covered the threat to an international exhibition featuring the work of dozens of artists. I have argued many times that censorship is at its most effective when no one admits it exists. The first step to freeing yourself from oppressive power is to find the courage to admit that you are afraid. The more people confess to being afraid, the less reason there is to fear and the easier it is to isolate repressive forces.

Such threats to relatively small events are the tip of the iceberg…the massive drive by Muslim nations to silence any criticism at all of Islam is extraordinarily sinister and should be resisted at all costs.

Of course people have to know what is going on.

But they don’t.

There is already seems to be a self imposed silence on this reinvention of the Spanish Inquisition:

The OIC Secretary General appears to be laying the diplomatic groundwork to persuade non-elected bureaucrats at EU headquarters to enact hate-speech legislation that would limit by fiat what 500-million European citizens — including democratically elected politicians — can and cannot say about Islam

The Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC), an influential bloc of 57 Muslim countries, has officially inaugurated a Permanent Observer Mission to the European Union (EU). The primary objective of the OIC, headquartered in Saudi Arabia and funded by Islamic countries around the world, has long been to pressure Europe and the United States into passing laws that would ban “negative stereotyping of Islam.”

I can’t find any references on the BBC to the OIC’s drive to impose Islam upon the World…..as you can see from the Spectator’s article there is already a willingness from Judges in Europe to silence any critic of Islam by labelling such criticism as ‘racist’….

a criminal record for condemning honour killings and clerical misogyny — proving yet again that the interests of women always come last.

Of course the law of untended consequences could come into play.

If criticism of any religion is to be banned then the Koran would have to be banned, and Islam along with it……the hate that spews out of the Koran for non-Muslims must surely raise a few Judicial eyebrows:

‘The unbelievers among the People of the Book and the pagans shall burn for ever in the fire of Hell. They are the vilest of creatures.’  98:6

Believers take neither Jews nor Christians for your friend.  5:51

‘Fight against such of those to whom the scriptures were given as believe in neither God nor the Last Day, who do not forbid what God and His Apostle have forbidden, and do not embrace the true faith, even if they are People of the Book, until they pay tribute out of hand and are utterly subdued.’  9:29

‘Make war on them until idolatry shall cease and God’s religion shall reign supreme.’  8:39

Front page news:

Broadcaster David Dimbleby gets first tattoo aged 75

Not front page news, in fact not news at all on the BBC:

Roma migrants could cause riots in cities, warns Blunkett

British cities could face race riots as an influx of Roma migrants creates “frictions” with local people, David Blunkett warns

The BBC though, does find time and space for more Hacking tales:

Hacking jury hears David Blunkett voicemails

The reliability and predictability of the licence fee has been a huge reason for the News Division’s success.
  MarkDamazer ex R4 Controller

Andrew Marr, BBC journalist recently voted top political reporter by Press Gazette describes “we have become too powerful, too much the interpreters, using our talents as communicators to crowd them (politicians) out. On paper we mock them more than ever before and report them less than ever before. On television and radio, we commentators are edging them out ever more carelessly”.

John Lloyd “you have to ask the question: is it the purpose of the news media to make an impact or to report the news?”.

As our most powerful cultural institution, the BBC is increasingly drawn into fierce debates about politics and morality, as well as its growing dominance of Britain’s media.

The BBC has become a victim of its own incredible success. It has emerged as a hugely powerful player over the last 10 years across national and – increasingly – international media. During this time it has raced to increase its number of TV and radio stations and has managed to establish a dominant position in online news.

Emma Duncan, deputy editor of the Economist, highlighted the specific threat that the BBC’s online news service poses to newspapers: “The Corporation has a fantastic website. That’s hardly surprising since it spends £145m a year of licence-fee payers’ money on it. Britain’s national newspapers put together spend around £100m on their online efforts. If the BBC is allowed to go on dominating online news it will undermine other news providers’ ability to survive on the internet, and thus threaten the diversity of news sources that is crucial to a democracy.

As Emily Bell, Guardian News & Media’s director of digital content, noted last year…[The BBC is] on a path which could … squish dozens of other media businesses, from magazines to daily newspapers, to local radio stations, to rival terrestrial broadcasters. The ecology of some parts of the UK media is now so uncertain and fragile that it can be depleted by a single blow from the end of the BBC’s tail as it rolls over in its sleep.”

As respect for other national institutions (politics, church, traditional family hierarchies) recedes, the BBC has assumed more cultural influence. It has become the place where national debates about moral, political and ethical disputes are increasingly being aired.

So not just the ‘usual suspects’ complaining about the BBC…even the Guardian, and the Economist, recognise the danger of its dominance.

The other media groups realised the growing dominance of the BBC and complained vociferously about the licence fee funded monster:

Media groups unite against BBC

News International, Associated Newspapers and the Telegraph Group have taken the rare step of joining forces to demand that the government curtail the BBC’s “digital empire-building”.

Commercial media groups are worried about the BBC’s digital ambitions, outlined recently in its Creative Future policy.

The submission on the BBC white paper, draft royal charter and agreement is also signed by David Elstein, the chairman of the Commercial Radio Companies Association and David Newell, the director of the Newspaper Society. The group said it had a grave concern about “the extent to which the BBC is being given a public policy directive to build a digital empire”.

Mark Thompson admitted  ‘there’s a big shock coming’...

Delivering the Royal Television Society’s Fleming Memorial Lecture this evening BBC Director-General Mark Thompson will say: “There’s a big shock coming…….The second wave of digital will be far more disruptive than the first and the foundations of traditional media will be swept away, taking us beyond broadcasting. “
“The BBC should no longer think of itself as a broadcaster of TV and radio and some new media on the side. We should aim to deliver public service content to our audiences in whatever media and on whatever device makes sense for them, whether they are at home or on the move. ”

Journalism
A new pan-platform journalism strategy, including mobile devices, is already underway, putting 24/7 news on the web, broadband, TV and radio at its heart for unfolding stories as well as analysis.
Current affairs will be reshaped and BBC News will work with the education sector to get BBC journalism into secondary schools across the country through initiatives like Schools Question Time.

So the BBC wants to spread its journalism into schools…why?

‘…unless the BBC worked harder to reach younger audiences and those that felt increasingly distant more effectively, the BBC could lose a generation forever.’

I guess they just want to keep their stranglehold on what people think…get ’em young and keep ’em.

Which might be one of the reasons why we get headlines like this today:

BBC website is ‘destroying’ local newspapers and harming democracy, warns Home Secretary Theresa May

The BBC is ‘destroying’ local newspapers by using its taxpayer-funded dominance to squeeze out competition, Theresa May has warned.
The Home Secretary condemned the BBC for using the licence fee to fund websites in direct competition with regional and national newspapers.
And she warned that as papers close, fewer sources of news will become ‘dangerous to the health of democratic politics’.

Though nothing new there….from 2006:

Tories attack BBC’s web dominance

The Conservative party will today launch an attack on the BBC, saying the corporation must be stopped from “abusing its privileged position and huge resources to crowd out smaller players” on the internet.

George Osborne saying:

“As new forms of media develop, I believe that the BBC must be very careful about not abusing its privileged position and huge resources to crowd out smaller players.

“I am concerned that in too many of its non-core activities, particularly on the internet, it is stifling the growth of innovative new companies that simply can’t compete with BBC budgets,” he will say, giving video downloading as an example.

“Another example is the BBC’s plan to launch programming for local communities – what it calls ‘ultra local television’. This might sound like a reasonable idea, but it could have a ruinous effect on local newspapers and local radio stations.

“This isn’t in the interests of the British public – who are denied new products and services, and ultimately, it isn’t in the interests of the BBC who need the competition.”

So I suppose the question is ‘Will the government have the bottle to do anything about it?’

Probably not.

unless the BBC worked harder to reach younger audiences and those that felt increasingly distant more effectively, the BBC could lose a generation forever.

The 181,880 people prosecuted last year for not paying for a TV licence, presumably some of the poorest in the country, will be delighted that if they had paid up their money would have gone into Labour Party coffers, or representatives of, and would undoubtedly be put to good use campaigning for the poor and needy:

BBC pays seven times more to Labour MPs, figures show

The corporation paid more than £32,000 in fees to Labour MPs whilst only shelling out £4,650 to their Tory counterparts in the past year

Alan Johnson, the former home secretary, was the biggest earner and was given £15,800 for 51 hours work contributing to radio and television broadcasts.

It means the former postman, who already picks up a £65,000 salary, is earning almost £310 per hour.

That’s £310 per hour.  Basically more than many earn in a week….living standards crisis?

Not in Alan Johnson’s house.

Here you to, let’s start the week with a new Open Thread to populate! Off you go…

Who wants to be a Slumdog waif and stray?…well it seems quite a lot of Indians don’t mind so much despite the best intentions of those who know what is good for them…and you and me.

The BBC has given Miliband a free ride over his ‘Living standard’s crisis‘, pretty much allowing him to get away with murder whilst making headline grabbing claims for policies that even the most ardent fan would admit don’t hold water and are solely intended to grab those headlines and make Miliband look like he is driving the narrative and is a really good, caring guy….come the election and a possible Labour win and they will all be quietly shelved.

Money and higher spending are always the road to happiness….unless the BBC is in a contrary mood and is lecturing us about ‘consumerism’ and wanting too much.

Having to pull in your belt for a bit, spend less on fags and beer, and your lifestyle has been shockingly curtailed by an uncaring Tory government.

Call the UN. Call the special rapporteurs to investigate this breach in your human rights!

Thankfully not everyone has yet fallen for that line of thinking…..the BBC leapt to the defence of India when critics attacked it for spending a billion pounds on its space programme….and in doing so revealed an amusing tale of rebellion and independence from the depths of the Indian slums in From Our Own Correspondent:(about 11:40)

For India, its mission to Mars is an opportunity to come out top of a new Asian space race. Justin Rowlatt examines the question: couldn’t the cash instead have been used to lift many Indians out of poverty?

The ‘Slumdogs’ weren’t interested in the charities’ charity so much….claiming,  literally from  the gutter, that ‘Life’s not that hard’.

The charities couldn’t persuade the children and youths to come off the streets and into their care …they wanted their freedom.

I guess there’s some things money can’t buy.

Strange that the BBC continually gives so much credence to the claims in this country that families on anything up to £70,000 a year benefits are in poverty and are therefore unhappy.