Nelson Mandela has died…but don’t worry…he has apparently been reincarnated as Gordon Brown.
That was certainly the impression I got when Brown turned up on Victoria Derbyshire’s show (10:20) telling us how grateful he was to Nelson Mandela for helping him to save the world.
Incredible how the BBC can unearth the shy and retiring Gordon Brown when it wants to….it seems remarkably reluctant to seek him out and ask him about those 13 years of cooking the books.
The BBC has of course taken to carpet bombing us with reminiscences about Mandela…even Sheila Fogarty cracked and got caught up in the euphoria…saying our best hope is that some of Mandela’s character and values will rub off on us.
Most embarrassing was Evan Davis who gushed, giggled and fawned his way through Today.
I did laugh when he told us that politics was very tribal and that Mandela’s forgiveness and reconciliation should be a lesson for us all (08:36) …..Davis said he wondered why people find it so difficult to learn that lesson or follow the example of Nelson Mandela…it’s not difficult he informed us.
This from an organisation that takes every chance it can to spread hatred for Margaret Thatcher…even today the opportunity is not missed.
Vicotria Derbyshire asked Brown ‘Did Britain get it right in the 80’s?‘…meaning of course was Thatcher’s policy towards South Africa the right one. No guesses what Brown said. But why just the 80’s? Apartheid didn’t just blossom in 1979 with the election of Thatcher….though I’m certain BBC history will say it did….Apartheid was operating for as long as whites were in South Africa in different forms….and it was probably operated by the Zulus before them…if you weren’t a Zulu perhaps you got a spear through you…they didn’t build an empire by being cuddly and forgiving…and the Zulus of course co-operated with the S.A regime in suppressing the ANC.
In the early hours we heard from a priest in Glasgow (05:20)….which Mandela visited in 1991….he asked Mandela what he thought of Mrs Thatcher…I was hoping, the priest said, to be told she was a terrible woman…but Mandela didn’t say that at all.
A curious paradox…….the BBC always supports negotiations rather than force or sanctions against a nation…see Iran for the latest example……and the BBC has spent the day praising Mandela’s ‘forgiving nature’ and his ability to build reconciliation……but was Thatcher not applying those very principles to South Africa…engaging positively with the regime and working to end Apartheid through diplomacy and negotiation? The BBC does not see it that way at all for some reason.
Norman Tebbit who lived through those times in close up says:
The policy of the Thatcher government was a success.
‘The result was an overwhelmingly peaceful transition of power in which the final initiative for the handover came not from foreigners but from native South Africans – and Afrikaner South Africans, at that.’
Even the Guardian had to accept Thatcher played an important role in ending Apartheid:
Thatcher played a pivotal role in southern Africa. As Britain’s new prime minister in 1979 she was persuaded by Commonwealth leaders at their meeting in Lusaka, where she famously danced with President Kenneth Kaunda, to try to end the war in Rhodesia – now Zimbabwe. That led to the Lancaster House conference and an election in Rhodesia/Zimbabwe which was won overwhelmingly by someone she despised – Robert Mugabe.From that she was persuaded to try to deal with apartheid in South Africa.
I [Journalist Richard Dowden] was briefed off-the-record by her foreign affairs adviser on several occasions, but when he told me that she had called on the then president, PW Botha, to release Nelson Mandela, I found it difficult to believe. I did not report it as I could not source it. But it was true. In a letter to Botha in October 1985 she wrote: “I continue to believe, as I have said to you before, that the release of Nelson Mandela would have more impact than almost any single action you could undertake.”
When Botha stepped down after a stroke in 1989, he was replaced by FW de Klerk, who met Thatcher at Downing Street in June. I was among a group of journalists waiting outside No 10 with the promise that he would give a press conference straight after. We watched him leave then ran up Whitehall to the South African embassy where he had promised to speak. He did not turn up. We were told later that he had been too shocked by Thatcher’s vehemence.
Mandela was released on 11 February 1990.
When he came to London, the ANC central committee insisted – against his wishes – that he did not meet Thatcher. After he did finally meet her later that year he thanked her for helping to end apartheid and announced this at a press conference soon after. Senior ANC officials spluttered with rage.
Margaret Thatcher’s vital role in ending apartheid
Desmond Tutu said Mandela was a gift from God.
And for the BBC it does seem that Mandela is now a religion…..as even Boris Johnson said today…it was a kind of ‘Magic’.
The spell is as powerful as ever.
Gordon Brown. Worst PM ever
He was even more of a thief and liar than any other PM has ever been. He made L George look an honest man. He should be stripped of his pension and at least then he would be in the same boat as millions of those from whom he stole their pensions.
Edward Heath runs him close given his euro-treachery and capitulation to the unions.
My best memory was when our University’s student union (a collection of 20-something arts grads who couldn’t get jobs elsewhere, who subsequently diverted funds earmarked for students to supporting folk who make things go boom overseas, and got thrown out as a consequence when the legal, medical and engineering undergrads took a hit on coursework marking by missing lectures to vote during the day when the parasite classes rigged elections) renamed the ‘Multi-purpose Hall’, the ‘Nelson Mandela Hall’.
No one really had a problem with the change as the original did lack a certain pizazz, but some felt it might have been nice to have been asked, as we’d have gunned for maybe slightly more worthy, actual alumni. Folk like Florence Nightingale, or if the mood was in favour of a living soul, maybe Desmond Tutu.
The student body was left in no doubt that what was done, was done, and could not be undone.
So we decided, so be it, and started renaming other aspects of the college to honour equally iconic folk of the era nothing to do with it, but dear to the hearts of the body politic.
Must say the howls emanating from them at the christening of the Scargill septic block and Livingstone broom cupboard were quite satisfying.
Sounds great – did you have a Tony Benn toilet block? 🙂
Actually, I think the medics named the chimney to the facility burning off medical waste after him.
Did Derbyshire take the opportunity to ask the imbecile why he brought the country to its knees? Or was she simply lopping free Tory hits in his direction?
BTW; I was awake in the wee small hours having taken a call from overseas. At 4am I think it was, someone from the Commonwealth who after Gleneagles had helped bring about the end of apartheid told a small Mandela anecdote.
It’s a quiet time on Five Live, so she was given lots of space, until that is she mentioned that at a reception in London for the released Mandela, the event was gate-crashed by one Robert Maxwell (he of the Labour Party / Mirror / pension thieving (which goes with the socialist territory – ask Brown). The interviewer shut her up and she was off-air before you could say Jack Robinson.
No doubt she will not be invited back
Count up Obama’s achievements on the world stage then compare them with Thatcher’s.
There, that didn’t take long, did it?
And tell me again – which one was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize?
Maybe I’m seeing bias where none exists, but I’ve noticed that when you put ‘bbc news’ into a well known global search engine, you get a lovely picture of a smiling and waving Obamessiah alongside Bill Clinton. Have a look….now is that supposed to be subliminal?
It seems Clinton did not know Mandela very well but he did once ask Winnie for a blow job.
Bill would look good wearing one of Winnie’s ‘necklaces’.
He might have been reincarnated as Gordon Brown, but Obama has managed to make a similar comparison. Pictured in the man’s prison cell.
http://weaselzippers.us/2013/12/05/barack-obama-honors-nelson-mandelas-death-with-a-picture-of-barack-obama/
Yes…and it’s a ‘reincarnated photo’…as lefty John Pilger noted in july:
I wonder what he would make of the recent “pilgrimage” to his cell on Robben Island by Barack Obama, the unrelenting jailer of Guantanamo.
Pilger notes that old ‘1984’ effect….when those in charge suddenly give up on the revolution and all the promises and look to make a profit instead:
From Apartheid to Neoliberalism in South Africa
Mandela’s Tarnished Legacy
Do the White House apparatchiks not realize just how much these photos of the President reacting to historic moments resemble the propaganda imagery of Stalin, Tito, Chavez, and Mao? They’re probably just entranced by the emotional pull.
Most of the Rightosphere tends to moan about these things as narcissistic, making all the moments about Him rather than about the event or the figure being referenced, much like they sometimes count the number of times He says “I” and references Himself in a speech. I see it more as part of the Cult of Personality built up around Him.
I notice there’s never a snarky tweet from a Beeboid about it, though. But when somebody does a story about Sarah Palin, she gets criticized for somehow inserting herself into the news, or a speech is described as “so self-serving and transparent”.
It’s all about him.
https://twitter.com/NerdyWonka/status/403879274056151040/photo/1
The short answer is no they don’t. They genuinely think everybody the world round is just dying to see him story-telling on tv again. And with such self-degrading adulation that the media heaps upon him why should he think anything else?
“Bent the arc of the moral universe”?
Give me strength.
Just like Blair his speeches seem to be written with more than half an eye to ‘The Book Of Great Political Anthologies’, and with the same clunking “look: lots of impressive sounding sentences but you’ll look in vain for any substance here” template.
This one is clumsier than most, though: if Mandela was using his hands to “take history [in them]”, then with what was he “bending the arc of the moral universe” ? A prehensile tail ?
Watch for a hero-worshipping circus not unlike the Ayatollah, where followers literally went into such a frenzy that they knocked his carcass out of the casket!
Bent the arc of the moral arm towards justice did we?
And not a howl of Orwellian scorn ensued?
Eek!
The White House honors everything with a picture of Him. It’s a regular feature.
They gave the queen an iPod with his speeches on it. Yeah.
I think that’s a myth. It was loaded with show tunes and footage of her visit to the US. Maybe that included one of His speeches on the occasion.
The Queen gave the President a framed picture of herself and the Prince. So?
I don’t suppose for one minute that it would enter the BBC’s collective head that many people find giving airtime to the likes of the discredited Brown, Huhne, Pryce and Campbell quite offensive.
He had a good innings and died of natural causes, unlike lots of white farmers in the hands of murderous gangs. What with the BBC and London’s ES nine page blub-fest, I am sick to the back teeth of the exaggerated sentiment -“an outpouring of love” No, not here. He’s turned into a dusky Princess Diana.
1000000s of people have turned up at Nelson Mandela house to pay their last respects to a well known black terrorist
Del Boy and Rodney have told them all to fuck off.
And it starts:
Simon Amstell apologises for Mandela comment on Radio 1
Simon Amstell has apologised for a comment he made in reference to Nelson Mandela on Radio 1’s Breakfast Show.
The comedian suggested there was racial segregation between Radio 1 and sister station BBC Radio 1Xtra.
He said: “Mandela would not approve of the situation at the BBC.” Amstell tweeted an apology after the show.
The comments on Friday morning came less than 24 hours after it was announced that the former South African president had died.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/newsbeat/25256315
Nick Grimshaw you are a left wing ****.
I have to admit to never seeing the people who work at Radio 1 and 1Xtra so the joke is still flying over my head (I don’t listen to either stations). What did Amstell mean? Are most staff at Radio 1 white and in 1Xtra they are mostly black?
The only thing that surprises me there (if it’s true) is that any part of the BBC is allowed to have many white people working there. If it’s full of black people or Asians then that would be fine under BBC law.
Anyway Amstell has fallen foul of the rule that says no jokes about racism at the BBC. Whether postmodern or not.
Anti Semitic BBC…Amstell is Jewish!
Looks like Obama and his wife are off to South Africa next week to pay respects to Nelson Mandela. More air miles,think of all that fuel and $ cost, what’s wrong with a video link? Wonder if he can squeeze in a fund raiser or two?
To be fair, Mandela’s not croaking on schedule back in the summer with The One in journo-bedecked attendance summer was a very poor show indeed. Now He’s got to make an extra trip.
I wonder how many of Michelle’s relatives will be enjoying some welcome winter sun on this particular jaunt ?
Extra “summer” in the first para: ignore, please.
I can’t stand the thought of all those obituaries, anecdotes and quotes going on and on for weeks and perhaps even months about Nelson Mandela, his life and times, what he did and didn’t do and which people had what opinions about him…and that’s just on the Biased BBC website.
Perhaps they will do a documentary on what happened to his first wife and children that he abandoned to go off with that evil bitch Winnie.
fed up with being told how we all feel. I bare him no malice but to be told how i’m feeling by a news broadcaster gets me rattled.
I was sad when my father died and inconsoleable for weeks when my mother died but i did not project my feelings onto others. I did not know my family members personal feelings or grievances (if any) about my parents. It’s a personal thing.
Perhaps because they claim Nelson as their (and by default our) personal father,saviour,saint,answer to life or whatever, it means we should to. They realy are trying to dictate the thought process simply by bombardment of the correct views.
One galling memory for me about Mandela is when he went to the prison in Glasgow a few years ago and pleaded for an appeal on behalf of the Lockerbie bomber. Also urging that he be allowed to serve out his sentence in a Muslim country:
“Megrahi is all alone,” Mr Mandela told a packed press conference in the prison’s visitors’ room. “He has nobody he can talk to. It is a psychological persecution that a man must stay for the length of his long sentence all alone.”
Mr Mandela added: “It would be fair if he transferred to a Muslim country – and there are Muslim countries which are trusted by the West. “It will make it easier for his family to visit him if he is in a place like the Kingdom of Morocco, Tunisia or Egypt.”
Mr Mandela said he also hoped to meet Prime Minister Tony Blair and US President George Bush to discuss the case.
The former president, who himself spent more than 20 years as a prisoner, said Megrahi was being “harassed” by other inmates at Barlinnie. “He says he is being treated well by the officials but when he takes exercise he has been harassed by a number of prisoners,” said Mr Mandela. “He cannot identify them because they shout at him from their cells through the windows and sometimes it is difficult even for the officials to know from which quarter the shouting occurs.”
Let’s just remind ourselves that Megrahi was convicted of killing 270 people as a result of his blowing up Pan Am flight 103 over Lockerbie. Did he really give a thought about all those who had lost loved ones because of this murderer might be feeling?
Mandela lived to 95, a fair old age. No doubt he did many good things in his life for what he believed. I don’t however see him as a saint, as do the BBC.
This morning around 08:30 on Radio 4 there appeared to be nothing else going on in the world except tributes following his death. Contrast this with ‘Ding Dong the witch is dead’ that the BBC ran quite a few times following Thatcher’s death. One might have thought that the worst tidal surges and high winds that hit the country yesterday might have received some attention too.
But for the BBC – it’s their agenda and interest first – sod the licence fee payer.
*
Rod Liddle at the Spectator has noticed this overdone ‘reverence’ from the BBC about Mandela, and has commented on it. Needless to say his criticism brought on all the lefties to slag him off, which has also been picked up by other media sources.
I agree with him.
Quote:
Nelson Mandela dies, aged 95
alex salmond must have been so proud seeing all them scottish flags waving when Megrahi arrived back home in his muslim shit hole
David Kay wrote:
alex salmond must have been so proud seeing all them scottish flags waving when Megrahi arrived back home in his muslim shit hole
You mean Glasgow?
Now then, now then…Was VD attempting to resurrect Gordon Brown’s reputation as a political giant by allowing him to bathe in Nelson Mandela’s reflected glory?
OR…do we all need to offer VD an apology, juxtaposing as she did, a remarkable man with a political pygmy, a dishonest, shifty, lowlife, incompetent scumbag and bully (and now, to use his own words, ex-politician).
Of course Brown and the rest of the left have been lapping it up…but they have no sense of irony. They hang on to the death shroud of someone who by common consent was something they will never be. While Mandela eventually sought reconciliation, Brown, Miliband, Jones, Toynbee and the lot of them are incapable of such feats or such humility.
Irony upon irony. No-one hates, no one loathes as much as a lefty.
I thought I would never see a more adulating media after Clinton left office but the world seems to at least know they are being spied on by the U.S. and the Nobel Peace Prize for drone strikes president. I don’t know what prevents them from really being mad. Must be Stockholm Syndrome. The way the world press is treating Mandela now you would think he is going to rise from the grave!
Monty Python’s ‘Life of Nelson’ NM: ‘You don’t have to follow me, you’re all individuals.’ BBC in unison: ‘Yes, we ARE ALL INDIVIDUALS’ Rod Liddle: ‘I’M not’.
Nelson Mandela had been on death’s doorstep for months, rumoured to be on life support with speculation about rifts within the family regarding burial site.
Forgive me if I am wrong but it seems to me that the death of Nelson Mandela has be choreographed and the timing opportune to say the least.
Mandela’s death announced in London at the Royal premiere of Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom.
Funeral arranged for 15th December, day before Public Holiday in South Africa marking Day of Reconciliation.
Many trades and factories close for their summer holidays on or around end of 2nd week of December, mourning would not interfere with factory production, unlike the strikes earlier in the year.
Is it possible that bBC could have had prior knowledge?
They were hoping to keep him alive until Easter, but that spot had already been taken.
Found on the web:
http://avcom.co.za/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=124454&sid=77168c0aeabf2c3f770%207571293133a36&start=150#p1363884 –
WRITTEN ON 4th December….
“On 22 November, Zuma went to inspect the improvements and repairs in the greater Mthata area and tried to gain as much political mileage as possible from it. Basically all the political elite went to see if the place looked good, and they were apparently quite impressed with the way it displayed.
Not all readers may realize that Mthata is only 31.3km from Qunu, the Eastern Cape home village of Nelson Mandela and the place where his funeral will take place. All the developments in the greater Mthata area also included Qunu and it is only a 30 minute drive on the lovely new roads to get to Qunu from Mthata.
Then on Wednesday 27 November the SAAF command cancelled the bi-annual Wheels and Wings show at the AFB Ysterplaat unilaterally and without any good and valid reason. Many people are seriously hacked off because a lot of time, effort and money has already been sunk into the event that was due to take place on 7&8 December. The unexplained cancellation of the show is busy creating a lot of PR fallout.
On Thursday 28 November the head of the SANDF cancelled all leave of all military personnel for the December period. No reason has been given.
Team ALARM also became aware of large military convoys that will be moving from Pretoria and Bloemfontein to the Qunu area shortly. We have however not been able to verify this information yet.
Should it happen that Mandela’s death is announced officially, the timing could not have been more perfect for the ANC. Mandela’s funeral would attract more interest than the soccer world cup, and everybody from Obama to the Pope would probably attend his funeral. Such a spectacle would go a long way in getting pressure off the ANC generated by the Nkandla scandal and the pending split of COSATU.
Additionally it would be very, very beneficial to hold his funeral on 16 December that is already known as “Day of Reconciliation” which happens to be on a Monday this year. That means there is a very handy reconciliation long weekend appearing on the calendar in 16 days that can be used to absolute maximum benefit.
The fact that Nelson Mandela the movie also appeared this last week, handily provides the cherry for the cake. The opportunity is just too good to pass up and we wonder if the Government will really let it slide by without making use of it?
Will we see an official announcement of Nelson Mandela’s death in the next few days? It certainly looks like we are heading that way. We will only be sure when we hear the official announcement, but will not be surprised at all when we do.”
Added to that: I have heard that recently the streets of Johannesburg have been spruced up and the pavements cleared of informal traders. Could this possibly have been in anticipation of an army of foreign dignitaries visiting.
The trouble with the BBC is that they can never achieve balance – always their own prejudices shine through. On Thursday night it would have been sufficient to say that Nelson Mandela has died at the age of 95 (perhaps with a 3 minute resume of his life) and then to have said ‘There will be a special programme aired tomorrow night which will give a fuller picture of the man’…or something and then on the day of the funeral we could have had a few scenes of the ‘great and the good(?) if we really had to.
Was it coincidence that last night Fiona Bruce was dressed in black? A pity a black tie couldn’t have been worn when the Queen Mother died (some of us have long memories).
This morning every time I switched on to the Today programme there was Justin Webb saying ‘Now to go back to Nelson Mandela….’ (have to add with what sounded a spring in his step and joy in his voice…not at all the voice of mourning that Fiona Bruce said we were all in a collective state of). Still I enjoyed a silent breakfast (apart from Mr D’s crunch of the cornflakes).
Your first line says it all, Deborah. And ‘their prejudices’ will continue to ensure that they will never achieve balance. Not only has the BBC awarded itself the remit to continually foist its own ‘narrative’ on news events, but look at the ‘pool’ from which it recruits. Far from dignifying the death of a world statesman, their OTT, competitive ‘mourning’, has turned many people off – as usual, it’s all really about the BBC, & how they feel.
As for Fiona ‘Get out of my way I’m fabulous’ Bruce, well, she’s a frustrated actress/celebrity. Witness the deepening of her voice, the raising of an eyebrow, the signals that say ‘This is important, plebs, take note!’ Big salary, even bigger ego.
As for Huw Edwards & his quavering, lachrymose performance; it was unprofessional & indulgent. He should have been whisked off to Harley Street, to the Clinic of Tears, where the redoubtable Dr Hyperbole, the world-renowned expert on ‘narcissistic altruism’, could have dried his leaky mince pies & given Huwey Edwards & The News a bumper shot of reality serum. Then he might understand how those people outside the beeboid bubble do ‘balance’.
Friday was the biggest day for news our region has seen for some time, thanks to Thursday’s extraordinary weather. The Yorkshire coast had the worst storm surge for sixty years, with Whitby and Scarborough inundated. In Leeds the high winds lifted a woman off her feet and put her in hospital. In Auckley the roof was blown off Hayfield School. There were countless power cuts (we were off for five hours here in Braithwell), a man on a mobility scooter was killed by a falling tree, a large building collapsed in Hull, there were floods all over the place, and transport links were badly disrupted.
I put the BBC’s ‘Look North’ on expecting to see a full roundup of the day’s local news, but to my astonishment the programme devoted almost fifteen of its 27 minutes to Nelson Mandela, with the Yorkshire news, sport, and weather squeezed into the remaining twelve minutes.
This was a crucial day for regional news. Local stories were of immediate interest and importance to so many of us. It was the sort of day when local TV news should come into its own; yet on that day ‘Look North’ failed lamentably to live up to its mission statement: to bring us ‘the latest news from around Yorkshire’. The BBC national news covered Mr Mandela’s death at great length and in more than adequate detail. We didn’t want or need yet more of it from ‘Look North’, even with the flimsy pretext that it was ‘the Yorkshire Mandela story’.
Luckily I’d recorded ‘Calendar’ on ITV, and was pleased to see a good comprehensive set of reports about the storm’s aftermath, with a bit of other news as well, and with only three minutes out of 29 devoted to Mr Mandela.
I’ve thought for some time now that Look North suffers from unbalanced editorial judgement, but this edition, with its total overkill on the Mandela story at the expense of vital local information, was the limit. I shan’t bother with the programme anymore. My ‘series link’ has been deleted.
“In Leeds the high winds lifted a woman off her feet and put her in hospital.”
Well, it saves on getting an ambulance and is a novel way of beating the traffic.
BBC News is not interested in reporting “news” it is interested in promoting it’s own political agenda. They have found they can get away with it – no-one in their organisation will say Boo! The Prime Minister himself is scared shitless. The opposite, they will be rewarded with preferment.
Dr Who is not at risk, its the metro-lefty establishment that can not survive privatisation. There are only so many punters wanting to buy the Guardian / Independent point of view. May be the Guardian establishment would club together to buy the privatised BBC, pay for the op-ed they have until now had for free.