129 Responses to Open Thread Thursday

  1. Guest Who says:

    The BBC seems to be quite excited about ‘waste’, and given the latest DMI findings it’s clearly a subject they know a fair bit about.
    Today they seem exercised about how much ‘may’ (checking or waiting for confirmation is so Non-BIJ, from another time) have gone South around Tamiflu.
    It is of course a concern, and a story, if borne out.
    Trouble is, on places like FaceBook, where I just read it, folk are pointing out it was such as the BBC screaming about insufficient stocks at the time of the last scare.
    Pointing out that they seem to be seeking to have it all ways.
    Shocked, I tell you. Shocked.
    In other news, the BBC is also asking if we have lost our trust in politicians.
    I guess they don’t do introspection. Or irony.

       42 likes

    • Hellwig says:

      ‘It is of course a concern, and a story, if borne out.’

      Makes the rest of your comment superfluous.

         6 likes

      • Guest Who says:

        Sadly my coffee breaks are self-funded, so you will probably prevail on attrition, but as the mug cools…
        ‘Makes the rest of your comment superfluous”
        If you say so.
        But it’s just possible that your opinion is in error.
        You appear to have missed the part about how the reasons behind the waste were in no small measure driven by such as the BBC, now trying to cynically capitalise on a ‘damned for not doing, damned having done too much’ basis.
        Thank you for the opportunity to reiterate this main point.

           28 likes

    • Ember2014 says:

      They seemed very concerned with Maria Miller’s waste of public money. Less interested in discussing the many millions lost on BBC IT projects that disappeared.

         38 likes

    • Ken says:

      And the BBC were not only complaining that there was insufficient stocks of tamiflu during that scare, but they also complained that thousands would die needlessly due to the Government cutting funding for public information films.

      Back then they were criticising for the government not wasting enough.

         27 likes

      • Guest Who says:

        A probably not superFLUous point that many (the BBC FB ‘news’ page is a hoot as they don’t appear to have the same modding and closing capacity compared to a HYS) seem to have appreciated.
        Bar, at current count, 4 (excluding selfies).

           7 likes

    • johnnythefish says:

      The BBC are keen to pin this on ‘the Government’, but conveniently fail to mention it was under Labour that most of it happened.

         25 likes

      • Sir Arthur Strebe-Grebling says:

        There’s more chance of finding someone alive in MH370 than of the bBBC mentioning who was in power 1997-2010.

           29 likes

  2. Thoughtful says:

    At Last !

    Fresh from the Tim Burton racially aggravated harassment trial, the British Police are working hard on their mission to stamp out any criticism of Muslims, after all according to Labour “Muslims must never be criticised no matter what they do” !

    This time there is a convicted fraudster in Croydon who has been door stepped by a Journalist from the local paper. The fraudster complained to the Police she was being harassed who took immediate action, sending three officers ten miles to deliver a ‘warning’ to the newspaper to stop it’s investigation.

    Unlike poor Tim Burton they did have the resources and access to the press association to make their story heard, and it has been – even on the BBC except that they missed out one tiny section. Bet you can’t guess what !

    http://www.croydonadvertiser.co.uk/Advertiser-responds-police-threaten-journalist/story-20904983-detail/story.html

       30 likes

    • JimS says:

      Well this story was ‘covered’ in The Media Show on Wednesday. Bit short on detail on the ‘stalked’ though.
      They did manage to cover our new SoS for Culture’s muslim background though. Islamic moderation in all things, as they now say!

         15 likes

  3. Thoughtful says:

    Last night I watched a film called ‘The Kingdom’ I can thoroughly recommend it to anyone who hasn’t already seen it.
    There’s not a chance in hell of this film appearing on the BBC though !

    Allah U Akbar !

       13 likes

  4. David Brims says:

    Peaches Trixie Bell Geldof was the lead story on the BBC news, her father Bob said she was ‘a beautiful wild child’ ( a euphemism for spoiled brat and drug addict ) The next item was Bruce Forsyth leaving Strictly Come Dancing !!

    On a lighter note, we’re on the brink of a Third World War starting up in either Ukraine or Iran and the BBC are leading with this garbage !!!

       49 likes

    • chrisH says:

      No-after Bacons fulsome tribute to Peaches as seen in that clip left up by a friend here at Biased BBC recently-poor Peaches is now referred to as “writer and broadcaster”!
      Typical BBC bottom sniffing now she`s dead, and Bob`s still around.
      I`d have thought that her being a “mother” would be the only description that matters-but that would upset Harriet, Jenni so won`t be getting used anytime soon.
      Family hating, gay crawling weirdos without families and kids-all Oxbridge, right surnames and hideously white reporters in “entertainment” do all the BBC pieces on her..no wonder her being a mum is so despised.
      Not when she gave up a good gig at cable TV…what a loss!
      Daily Mail proving to be despicable about her death IMHO-but don`t tell the BBC anybody will you?

         20 likes

      • David Brims says:

        I remember a time when parents called their children John and Mary, now the names are Tooth pick or Paper clip or Mohammad or Leroy.

           31 likes

        • Eric says:

          Yes. It reminds me of the old joke –

          “At Glastonbury last year there was Gonorrhoea, Trench Foot and Impetigo.

          In fact all the Beckham children were there”

             36 likes

      • NotaSheep says:

        The same Richard Bacon who when presenting the BBC’s Most Annoying Person list for 2010 said re Peaches Geldof – “No matter how much we might want Peaches to go away”

        That Richard Bacon? As I Said here Will there be tears for Peaches Geldof from Richard Bacon today? If there are then maybe you should watch this video…

           9 likes

    • Alex says:

      Well said, David! I too am sick of hearing about this crap and also the pantomime Pistorius trial, especially when events in Ukraine are on the verge of seriously kicking off!

         30 likes

      • therealguyfaux says:

        Somehow, “Oscar Pistorius” and “kicking off” in the same sentence calls to mind that classic simile about the gent who has his work cut out for him, i.e, the expression that ends, “…[I]n an arse-kicking contest,” only, in his case, twice the effort will be needed. And believe me, with that story of his, he DOES have his work cut out for him.

        But hey, it’s an OJ Simpson-type trial, twenty years on from the original. Many are too young to have followed that one. People like a good she-done-him-wrong-so-he-done-her-in story. People relate to that in a way that, e.g., watching people fighting for freedom and justice in their land, with geopolitical ramifications, fails to quite match. The television execs know what attracts eyeballs.

           12 likes

        • Alex says:

          Media lefties just love to gloat over others’ misery. They thrive on it like flies to a rotting carcass. But, as Marshall McLuhan predicted, media indoctrination will turn the populace into sheep-like entities ready to do their masters’ bidding at a drop of a hat.

             16 likes

        • Ken says:

          Couldn’t disagree more. The Pistorious case is a black and white, he shot her, she is dead, he is guilty, lock him up bore-fest stretched out to ridicululous lengths.

          The evidence against him is overwhelming and I am sick of hearing about him and his awful acting. Lock him up and throw away the key and let’s see some real news, y’know, for a change.

             20 likes

          • Robert Price says:

            It seems you have first hand information. Were you there at the time?

               1 likes

  5. David Brims says:

    Here’s a story you don’t see every day, an African gentleman permitted a hyena to eat his testicles because his local witch doctor told him it would make rich ! I don’t think this story will be headlining the BBC news.

    http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2593446/Man-allowed-HYENA-eat-genitals-witch-doctor-told-make-rich.html

       18 likes

    • Buggy says:

      Sneer all you like, but when he’s rolling in loot like Scrooge McDuck you’ll all be searching for hyenas or equivalent. Badgers ?

      Hope he makes enough to pay for some artificial replacement nads at any rate.

         10 likes

      • Downboy says:

        Did a Lion or some other critter eat his brains before the whole hyena/witchdoctor/gonads thing?

           6 likes

  6. chrisH says:

    As a Biased BBC fan, I get this sixth sense of endemic BBC bias.
    So it was when John Humphrys and Zeb Soames( Today 8a.m news and puffpiece 8.40am 10/4/14) tell me that “we”…”the Government” were duped by Big Pharma over Tamiflu…you just KNOW by the omission of “Coalition” at the front of that statement of theirs…”Government accused of wasting” etc…that this will be the last LABOUR Government that pissed yet more money up the hospital wall in the hope that they could be “seen to care”!
    So it turns out to be-2006-2010 with most of it wasted in 2009.
    So Browns Boys did this….but, of course ,it`s THIS Government that are implied to be the dupes by the BBC and its ploughboys like Humphrys and Soames.
    That sixth sense came in handy with the Co-Op stuff…Labour ex City Schmoozer Lord Paul Myners leaves the Co-Op Board mid-review…into Flowers , ex Chairmen leaving last month saying they`re ungovernable?
    Yet no mention of the fact that this is Labours piggy bank-the unions cash cow-subsidises many Labour MPs-donates to Labour, leaves berths for washed out Labour Lords and MPs. It is only in the shit now after 130 years of probity because Brown got them to hoover up crap assets and go large to show his grand vision of the Hollande Banque Ethicale-as well as stuff the board with the likes of Paul Flowers and other quango exotica.
    No-no mention of Milibands praises, Balls funding with this zombie bank post-Brown…the BBC would rather you pin it all on the posh boys and leave history to Tristram and Simon, Polly and Owen.

       51 likes

    • richard D says:

      You’re right, ChrisH – Bias By Concealment – yet another tactic to try to turn any story about Labour, which may not show them in the best possible light, into an attack on the current government, by any means possible.

      And as for the puff interview with Ms Cooper just before 8:00, well the interview went sort of like this…

      BBC : Immigration, always a topical topic. And here’s Yvette Cooper to tell us all about the wonderful plans she and her party have on this issue.

      YC : Thanks, BBC, and yes we have wonderful plans. Not like the current government…. (followed by an unchallenged tirade against the Conservative Party).

      BBC : But Labour policies were the basic cause of the problem during 13 years of government….

      YC : Well, not really, we must have well-educated immigrants, who have benefitted this country immeasurably in the pat few years, but let me just tell you about the current government’s crap plans, since we have clearly been getting the wrong sorts of immigrant since, oh, about 2010….(cue unchallenged anti-Tory tirade)

      BBC : Well, the current government is trying to get the numbers of immigrants down, so what what might an incoming Labour government actually do to achieve that ?

      YC : Well, I’ll tell you what we’re not going to do, we’re not going to have targets, because that leads to actually having to do something measurable. But let me tell you how the current government…..(cue usual tirade)

      BBC : So how are you going to be able to tell if you have achieved your goals…. (interrupted)

      YC: Look, we’re not going to have targets, after all the current government is losing us billions in income from foreign students by focusing on the numbers of fake students coming to the UK ….( and so on with tirade)

      BBC : OK – so we’ll give up on that line of questions, since you’re clearly very uncomfortable talking about measuring your performance, so what are you actually going to do ?

      YC. Well, there’s lots of things we’re going to do…(goes on to mention a few things that have already been started by the current government)…. and we’re going to clamp down really hard on fake students.

      BBC: Well, the thing is, that we may want the entrepreneurs and the businesses from all over the world to come here and invest, and what we really need to do is to keep out the unskilled workers – but they mainly come from Europe – and we can’t stop them – what are you going to do about that ?

      YC : Well, yes, but we, the Labour party, can make sure they don’t get any benefits or have benefits paid to kids back in their own countries. And remember… (cue usual tirade)

      BBC : (ignoring the fact that this is already being tackled by the current government) Well, thank you Yvette Cooper for telling us all about your wonderful plans…. can I kiss your feet now ? (OK, that last bit was probably not actually heard ‘on air’.)

      Absolute puff piece. BBC Objectives….. tick !

         47 likes

      • Geoff says:

        “Bias By Concealment”

        Much the same as this …

        http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/cricket/26920496

        It leads one to believe that a woman cricketer has been named ‘Cricketer Of The Year” the headline should read “Has Been Named As One Of The Cricketers of the Year”.

        When the story was broadcast on the BBC News Channel last night, it was the headline and only mentioning in passing that England’s Joe Root was also named the same.

           20 likes

        • uncle bup says:

          Wimmin’s cricket – the BBC flogging a dead horse.

          cf Wimmin’s football, AGW, Gameshow Nikki’s career etc etc

             5 likes

  7. noggin says:

    This I found interesting, it concerns Ayaan Hirsi Ali, due to be given an honorary degree at a US university, she is a fierce critic of oppression of woman in Islam, novelist, and is a political figure, ex member of the Dutch parliament …… As an ex-muslim, plus one who so critical of the hypocrisy surrounding Islam, she constantly receives death threats.

    http://www.foxnews.com/us/2014/04/09/brandeis-university-withdraws-planned-honorary-degree-for-islam-critic-ayaan/

    http://time.com/56111/ayaan-hirsi-ali-they-simply-wanted-me-to-be-silenced/

    Now would she even receive such an award, in a University in Britain today? …… would she even get into Britain today?
    If so how would national media (like the BBC) report it, and more importantly her?

       35 likes

    • noggin says:

      “Asking whether radical preachers ought to be allowed to operate is not hostile to the idea of civil liberties; it’s an attempt to save civil liberties. A nation like this one is based on civil liberties, and we shouldn’t allow any serious threat to them. So Muslim schools in the West, some of which are institutions of fascism that teach innocent children that Jews are pigs and monkeys—
      I would say in order to preserve civil liberties … don’t allow such schools.”

         25 likes

      • Hellwig says:

        You might have noticed the two clips you posted were from BBC programmes. Duhh.

           8 likes

        • noggin says:

          and ???? ………

          “to call the paucity of that remark stupid would be an insult to stupid people”

             16 likes

        • Stewart says:

          As examples of the BBC’s obfuscation ,hypocrisy and bias,on a site dedicated to exposing the BBC’s obfuscation, hypocrisy and bias .Duhh.

             10 likes

      • Dave s says:

        Ayan Hirsi Ali understands what Solzhenitsyn pointed out long ago. That Western societies founded on the rule of law are unable to defend themselves against those whose motivation does not include respect for that same rule of law. If our leaders would grasp this we might make it through the next decades. But so corrosive has liberalism been somehow I doubt it.
        Reality is so inconvenient to a liberal fanatasist.

           25 likes

        • Downboy says:

          The liberal elite in this country are the modern exemplars of Vladimir Lenin’s ‘useful fools’.

             12 likes

        • mo says:

          Well said Dave S on “Reality is so inconvenient to a liberal fanatasist.”

             4 likes

      • +james says:

        Never knew David Bowie’s wife is so outspoken.

           1 likes

    • Dysgwr_Cymraeg says:

      Dhimmi Dave would have her banned from entry.

         14 likes

    • Llareggub says:

      Unfortunately the BBC mindset applies to US universities. The degree offer has been withdrawn. Allah Akibar .

      http://www.foxnews.com/us/2014/04/09/brandeis-university-withdraws-planned-honorary-degree-for-islam-critic-ayaan/

         15 likes

      • noggin says:

        behind the scenes at BBC HQ as they hear the happy news

           7 likes

      • Guest Who says:

        The ‘process’ behind such PR disasters always intrigues me, given the reaction to a withdrawal on such a basis can only be equal to cover ups as worse than original SNAFU.
        Like the recent ‘let’s discuss censorship in a cradle of tolerance’ by BBC3 that worked out so well, it’s hard to imagine just what they were thinking at the start (though possibly female, diverse, courageous, iconic, cool name… tick) vs. the process subsequently that has brought them to this point.
        One is sure they feel it was well worth it.
        Certainly some topics often now tucked away have been brought front and centre into the limelight, so they really have managed to turn it into a mainstream issue, if perhaps inadvertently.
        I see AP was the basis of the Fox report, but as always what is and is not shared can intrigue:
        More than 85 of about 350 faculty members at Brandeis signed a letter asking for Ali to be removed from the list of honorary degree recipients.
        That being a ‘split’, at least in BBC terms, presumably? I wonder what the tipping point of a banning is?
        ‘an online petition created Monday by students at the school of 5,800 had gathered thousands of signatures’
        That last is suddenly a bit vague, isn’t it? The detail of actual number and composition of student body may be interesting.

           11 likes

      • chrisH says:

        Usual conundrum for the Left.
        Do you back the fearless victim of FGM and the woman who narrowly survived what poor Theo Van Gogh suffered in 2004?
        The bravest woman who has suffered terribly under Islam and continues to call the Left out on its craven acceptance of violence, of male supremacy and of FGM?
        Or do you hide behind the bean bags, sniff Allahs slippers and pass the Islamofascists the razor blades so they can finish the job?
        No question-the BBC and the Guardian wet the beds of our children, and invite Muslims to dry them off with a Sharia flag after they`ve been groomed and used in Allahs cause!
        That`s the liberal elite-let`s hope Allah deals wiuth them whilst we prepare the counter jihad to them.
        Good old Nick Cohen the only lefty I spare in this case-he`s been fearless too in supporting Ayaan…so credit him for that.

           16 likes

  8. Umbongo says:

    Further to the fourth Labour Party election broadcast this week on Today this morning, this time on “immigration”: it was noticeable that the “other immigration” – the permanent and ongoing one from the subcontinent and Africa accelerated and enabled by Labour and arguably the most damaging one to this country both economically and socially – has disappeared from media and political consideration. The task now, according to Labour (and the coalition as it happens) is to fillet out unproductive immigration from outside the EU. The problem of unproductive immigrants from outside the EU already settled here is not touched on by any of the major parties nor, of course, by the BBC.
    As I’ve commented before, the “little people” have been lied to for the last 70 years about the reasons for and effects of extensive non-European immigration: from the “shortage of labour” justification in the 50s to the “muli-culti” nirvana of the last 20 years: from the wonderful (although, unfortunately crime-ridden) “vibrancy” of the inner cities to the remarkable increase in GDP (not, though, in GDP per head). I have yet to see or hear on the BBC (or the other channels for that matter) a thorough-going analysis of the changes wrought by all parties of government since 1945 through, effectively, unrestriced third-world immigration. As usual, until the problem is identified and analysed, the solution will be elusive. Fiddling with a short delay in payments of child benefit or playing around with inchoate visa restrictions are not “solutions”; they’re political chicken feed on which the BBC focuses its (and our) attention but, with the BBC’s connivance, avoid the major issue – as they’re intended to.

       41 likes

  9. Alex says:

    The BBC were really getting the boot in to the Tories yesterday… they wheeled on that utterly miserable sod, John Mann, to lead the attack over the Miller expenses saga. It’s as if the BBC and Labour had forgotten about their own moments of shocking greed and deceit that have been so apparent over recent years. Also, maybe it was just me, but did anyone else get a sense of BBC black power fights back and lefty relief that no charge has been made regarding the PC Blakelock verdict?

       38 likes

  10. Phil Ford says:

    Kellingley and Thoresby deep mines to hit 1,300 jobs
    http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-26969266

    It’s a tragedy, but not for the same reason the BBC and its fellow-travellers would imagine. That’s the funny thing about the coal miners strike of the 80s that so many on the left seem to fixate upon; here we are 30 years later and I wonder if there would be anything like the tacit media sympathy for such a strike these days, given the prevailing dogma which sees coal as possibly the very worst of all the ‘evil’ fossil fuels, according to the climate czars of the EU and the UN?

    The real tragedy – the one the BBC will never tell you about – is that coal remains both cheap and staggeringly plentiful in the UK, not to mention an abundant home-grown (and thus secure) source of energy for decades to come. Sadly, because the bureaucrats of Brussels have declared war on cheap fossil fuels we are all doomed to pay exorbitant energy prices for years to come, so as to fund all those inefficient, wasteful ‘renewables’.

    Meanwhile, China and India can’t build traditional coal plants fast enough to meet the demands of their expanding economies. Funny old world…

       35 likes

    • Dave s says:

      You are right. We have huge coal reserves and they know it.
      What this is about is the core belief of the liberal elites. That humanity is the despoiler of the planet and must be curbed or even eliminated.
      This world is not for us to enjoy but would be better without us in it. In reality we do not exploit the world but this is not how the liberal Westerner sees it.
      It is an evil philosophy that will lead to the most dreadful horrors in the future.
      That is why the culture war is so important.
      At the heart of liberalism is hatred for humanity

         29 likes

    • johnnythefish says:

      Add Germany to India and China, once they realised that ‘renewables’ weren’t quite going to cut the mustard after closing down their nuclear plants in a politically-correct fit of Fukushima-induced panic.

      For those of you who remember the old ‘MAD’ comic, it used to feature a regular strip called ‘Scenes We’d Like to See’. The continual handwringing by the BBC over t’ miners’ strike juxtaposed with its daily doom-laden, Harrabin-scripted features about CO2 and global warming Armageddon conjures up one such ‘scene’: it would be an army of miners on a picket line outside Drax fighting an army of the great unworked and unwashed (environmental protestors) in a vain attempt to keep it coal-fired. BBC news correspondents would be seen imploding as they try to manage the ideological paradox, contradicting their own half-truths with random outbursts of twisted logic. Hell, Ken Loach could even make a film out of it.

         16 likes

  11. Doublethinker says:

    On the Daily Politics today an excellent discussion took place about how people react to choice and how the public sector attempts to provide choice. The conclusion was that unless public sector providers , eg hospitals or schools , were allowed to go bust and shut down, then choice within the public sector was a sham. But that the British people would get nervous if the market was allowed to work like this within the public sector. So we have to put up with the problems of complacency, poor service and waste that run through the British public sector.
    However, I don’t think that the British people would get nervous if market forces were allowed to act within the media. After all it would be technically very easy to make the BBC a subscription service and it wouldn’t be life threatening to anyone , except of course the current BBC employees , but who cares about them after what they have done to us.

       20 likes

    • bogtrott says:

      What did the BBC do for us ? Well reg what about the……..
      You can fill in the blanks if you can

         3 likes

  12. An English Gentleman says:

    So, where is the bbbc campaign to ensure Mrs. Blakelock becomes a Baroness just the same as Stephen Lawrence’s mother?

       51 likes

  13. Deborah says:

    Listening to the Today programme on Radio 4 (Thursday) only to find Mishal Hussein in Delhi which is where her family are originally from. But the entire piece was about Muslims in Delhi. Now I always thought that Muslims were the minority in India so wouldn’t it have been more sensible to have given us a piece about the majority? Mind I never hear about how the minority Christians in Syria or Egypt are faring – I wonder why?

       41 likes

    • Alex says:

      The BBC and all left-wingers worship Muslims because they are petrified of them. That’s why the religion with the most fascist and violent followers in the world can do and say no wrong. Let’s have a wee look at the list of Muslim groveling that pervades the infantile and hypocritical Left-wing mindset:

      i) Muslims hate gays and and say awful things about homosexuality but the BBC and Left ignore.

      ii) Muslims regularly preach hatred and violence towards the host nations who have to put up with it, but still, the Left ignore and rather focus on EDL and BNP who spray paint the odd obscenity on a Mosque wall.

      iii) Muslims commit appalling terrorist atrocities across the world on a daily basis but to say anything like Islam is a violent faith risks being ostracized.

      iV) Muslims have the worst record towards women’s rights in the world, but the bBC and the Left remain silent.

      V) Muslim paedo gangs are at epidemic levels but the Left are afraid to do or say anything and so they blame the Right for stirring up hatred.

      VI) Animal rights activists remain deafeningly silent on the revolting and barbaric halal slaughter that is spreading like cancer in our land.

      VII) Muslim supremacists in places like Tower Hamlets are targeting and beating up non-Muslims in a wave of violence similar to that seen in 1930’s Germany but the BBC never report this and instead portray all Muslims as the persecuted minority

      IX) Muslim Anti-Christian and Semitic violence around the world is all but ignored by the BBC on a regular basis

      Please feel free to add to this, no doubt, incomplete list 🙂

         50 likes

      • Dave s says:

        Ah reality. That inconvenient thing. You need re -education so that you will see that the liberal fantasy world of 2014 is ,in fact, the real world.
        2 plus 2 actually equals 5.
        I thought everybody knew that. The liberal elite/media do why not you?

           18 likes

      • johnnythefish says:

        Alex – Dez will be along any minute to refute every single one of your points.

        Or at least be getting his moral equivalence arguments lined up, which might be why he’s taking so long – Googlin’ an’ stuff.

        Dez, in the words of the great Lesley Crowther – COME ON DOWN! (when you’re ready, of course……… take your time now………)

           4 likes

    • Colonel Blimp says:

      Less than 12% of the Delhi population, slightly lower than the national average

      http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islam_in_India

         14 likes

    • Deborah says:

      And now on the 10pm news Mishal is on again telling us that the Muslims are the most neglected part of the Indian population and how they may affect the election result.

         7 likes

  14. #88 says:

    So while the BBC were giving the Tories and Cameron a good kicking over Maria Miller yesterday, offering their microphones to John Mann and others in the Labour Party so they could take a free kick (I didn’t hear them challenge Mann on the nature of his malicious complaint that kicked all of this off) – this was happening;

    http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/scottish-news/shamed-former-mp-jim-devine-3394119#.U0ZucydS_eo.twitter

    Jailed former LABOUR MP and expenses cheat, Jim Devine, was back in court, facing the music over his attempts to blame his office manager for his own criminality. Devine, according to the Judge, ‘not a credible or reliable witness’ was ordered to pay her £18,000 damages to the woman who’s reputation was ruined by Devine’s malicious allegations.

    With MPs expenses being a white-hot story yesterday, you’d have expected the ‘worlds most trusted broadcaster’ to have covered the case.

    But this is the BBC and of course, they didn’t. ‘The world’s most trusted broadcaster’ is again censoring the news by omission. Add it to the list of the important and topical stories that these bastards have refused to cover.

       35 likes

  15. #88 says:

    ‘Little Sir Echo’

    A post script to the resignation of Maria Miller was the appointment of her successor, Sajid Javed.

    Dan Hodges in the Telegraph gives his take on Labour’s pathetic response to Javid’s appointment as they piled in thrashing around, twisting and turning…’but he’s not a woman’…’there’s one woman less in the cabinet’…’the new minister for women isn’t a minister and will report to a man’…’she’s not a mother, there’s now no mother in the cabinet’.

    Of course it wasn’t long before the BBC were offering their own expert commentary and analysis on Javid’s appointment. Guess what? Toenails Robinson and friends were soon telling us, in their own words, ‘but he’s not a woman’…’there’s one woman less in the cabinet’…’the new minister for women isn’t a minister and will report to a man’…’she’s not a mother, there’s now no mother in the cabinet’.

    As Guido once suggested, why don’t Labour and the BBC share an office and save money?

    http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/danhodges/100267162/labours-response-to-maria-millers-resignation-is-an-embarrassing-incoherent-shambles/

       30 likes

    • Guest Who says:

      ‘Guess what? Toenails Robinson and friends were soon telling us, in their own words, ‘but he’s not a woman’…’
      Whodathunkit?
      ‘One is sure the first thing will be for Ed to line up as many (mainly white) women on his bench …
      With the BBC pulling a Danny Cohen and squawking on irrelevant box-ticking trivia to wind up the heat with zero light on competencies.’

      But then, it was a different time…

         14 likes

      • johnnythefish says:

        No matter how hard Labour try with their obviously very fair and meritocratic placement of women, how can they ever hope to match Hewitt, Smith and Harman? I remember Today used to be such a quiet and civilised programme when they were in cabinet, everyone seemed to get along so well….

           17 likes

        • #88 says:

          Ah Harman!

          Has Miliband sacked her yet? (perhaps he is giving her a chance to clear her name).
          Oh! And have the BBC pressed for her resignation?

             26 likes

          • Downboy says:

            If Javid had been resigning and Miller was being appointed in his place, the cry from Labour and the BBC would have been ‘Oh no, a Muslim has left the Cabinet.’ Heads they win, tails the Toreees lose.

               19 likes

    • uncle bup says:

      As Guido once suggested, why don’t Labour and the BBC share an office and save money
      ———————————————————————-

      Hey, hey, hey… the BBC doesn’t do ‘saving money’.

         5 likes

  16. Phil Ford says:

    Why in the name of all that’s good and holy is comrade Billy Bragg a panel member on tonight’s QT? What pearls of insightful political wisdom can we expect to hear from the BBC’s favourite ‘Dave Spart’?

    Is this what the BBC means by ‘impartiality’..?

       43 likes

    • Downboy says:

      Tony Benn is unavailable.

         23 likes

      • chrisH says:

        Bragg is replacing the Bennster as Roy Baileys Socialshit compadre in the coming Hay on Wye circuit of gigs(oh how edgy lads…Hay is the new Mogadishoo!).
        Duelling guitars and can`t wait to hear Bragg harmonising on “Fashists marchin dahn the High Stweet”…more like tweedy multimillionaires getting permission to tiptoe through the bluebells with rose pink crepe paper..private entry only”.
        Bragg of Burton Brigstocke…what catalysts THEY turned out to be?

           14 likes

  17. Geoff says:

    He’ll be insufferable in tandem with Harriet Pieman…..

       24 likes

  18. jeff says:

    I thought that Radio 4’s PM programme yesterday surpassed itself in standards of truly appalling journalism. Eddie Mair interviewed the defence lawyer in the PC Blakelock murder trial. Courtney Griffiths described the case as “a farce and a lynching party.” Considering the ghastly fate of PC Blakelock you would have thought he might have chosen his words a little more carefully. Eddie didn’t seem to notice and asked who Griffiths blamed for “the farce.” Was it the police or the prosecution? Never a mention of the local community who have been complicit in harbouring these murderers for nigh on thirty years. The intrepid reporter continued with his questioning. Did Mr Griffiths think there was any chance of bringing the culprits to justice? Sadly not. Apparently after the Duggan shooting “the community” are lacking any faith in the police. Eddie failed to mention that the Duggan shooting took place twenty seven years after PC Blakelock was hacked to death by a baying black mob, and in the interim “the community” haven’t exactly been beating the door down to help.

    Still it wasn’t all bad news yesterday; Radio 4’s Woman’s Hour named Doreen Lawrence as woman of the year.
    Do you reckon they’ll ever do that for Blakelock’s widow…

       35 likes

    • chrisH says:

      S`pose there`s no chance of Black Voice journalists or the Carribean Times daring to go undercover to find the racist black scum who killed a decent lad in the carrying out of his duties is there?
      Keith Blakelocks murderers are still around there-and a decent Panorama would have no problem getting them on camera or tape to give to the Met.
      You know-like the Daily Mail and the Met did for the murderers of Stephen Lawrence.
      Well Keith Blakelock is OUR equivalent…yet the likes of Linda Bellios, Courtney Griffiths, Imran Khan, Dianne Abbott or even Phil Shiner(who does like a controversial case!) don`t give a flying f*** about getting justice for Keith and his wife/kids.
      Not at all- “dem police got a good hiding” seems to be all that will go on the blue plaque on Broadwater Farm!
      One sick country…can`t see it standing long at the minute though….we shall be released an`all….

         31 likes

  19. #88 says:

    ‘Don’t Cap My Benefits’ is just rolling on BBC1….the titles have only just appeared…and already the TV is in peril. I’d better remove all lose objects.

       17 likes

    • CCE says:

      Just watched the Panorama special – it shows just how delusional and dysfunctional the BBC leftists are. It they really think that parade of shirkers and parasites taking over 700 quid a week is going to garner any sympathy – no matter how much sad manipulative music you play – then they are really mad.

      I was utterly incensed and enraged by the scale of the sponging, self pity and sense of entitlement on show. If you want to live in Brent get a F**kig job and pay for it!

      I think that programme could make an excellent party political broadcast for the tories – it really shows how the ‘benefits’ system ‘works’. So a massive own goal for the BBC – with that sort of thing I would be surprised if there weren’t massive protests demanding the cap be reduced substantially.

         18 likes

      • #88 says:

        I calculated that the woman with two kids was receiving the equivalent of a £44k wage.

        Another family had manged ‘7 children under 9 years of age’

        Clearly work was a discretionary thing for some – they might consider it, they might not…depending on the job and the money

        One would see their benefit drop by over £300 per week – just what WERE they getting?

           12 likes

      • johnnythefish says:

        As JFK said ‘Think not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country’.

        Didn’t see the programme but presume, as is par for the course with the BBC, that they didn’t go walkabout from the scroungers’ homes to see how far away the nearest hardworking Pole was.

           11 likes

      • Bodo says:

        I was going to write about the program, but you pretty much said it all. Astonishing wasn’t it?

        I’ll just add;
        BBC repeatedly stated that the cause of the housing problem was the government’s cap on benefits. It isn’t. The only cause is the massive increase in demand for housing due to record-breaking levels of immigration thanks to the last Labour government.
        Shortages of housing, and the massively increasing housing benefit bill are symptoms of labours disastrous time in office.

        Shame the BBC with its “mission to explain” decidednot to look at the reasons behind the current problems.

           8 likes

        • Eric says:

          And where there is a housing shortage it drives up rents and house prices. The gulf between the haves and the have not’s gets greater. But this is an inequality that the BBC and metropolitan lefties will not mention.

          Just another side effect for 13 years (no make that 40 years) of creeping socialism.

             4 likes

          • Stewart says:

            The demand driven rise in property prices has been further accelerated by ,until recently, by unlimited housing benefit.
            By artificially inflating rents and guaranteeing their payment ,unrestrained housing benefit has caused the boom in the buy to let market. What Guardianista wouldn’t secure their pension by buying ‘cheap’ property all the time the state is going to underwrite their return?
            The people most hurt by this are young people trying to get on the ladder .The Tories have tried to address this by capping housing benefit ( a process that should by gradual but continuous) But in their inevitable attack on them the BBC never once addressed this point, preferring instead to continue broadcasting that vile piece of property porn ‘homes under the hammer’ ( A genre that C4 abandoned long ago) on a daily basis.
            I notice that they have rightly, but barely, touched on the fact that the Tories scheme to help with deposits has simply poured fuel on the already raging fire ,but failed to mention ( and this is probably why they have not made more of it) that Gorden Browns shared ownership scheme did exactly he same thing
            They must know that house prices are this high because we have a true population of 75million and that no amount of house building ,either buy the state or private sector,will stop the rise to Japanese levels, all the time the sluice gates are wide open
            Once again ,no sacrifice (by others) is to great in the drive towards their (the BBC’s) multicultural utopia

               5 likes

    • Stewart says:

      Perhaps the BBC might consider a program called ‘don’t tax my wages’ well if if they payed tax (and NI) like the majority of us on PAYE , rather than being engaged on bogus self employed contracts for service (like Bulgarian lumpers Danny), they might

         7 likes

    • Dave666 says:

      Dave666 watched parts of this and recorded it for later dissection. The only comments Dave666 would make at this point in time was. Note that everyone they followed in detail had children. Did you play along with Dave666 in the spot the large screen TV and mobile phone game.
      “We can assure you of our commitment to impartial reporting”
      So where was the other view points in this hour long special? Not enough time?

         9 likes

  20. John Anderson says:

    As ever – Mark Steyn nails the Ayaan Hirsi Ali controversy :

    http://www.steynonline.com/6250/degrees-of-separation

    And to think Mark Steyn used to be a regular broadcaster on the BBC – commenting especially on the great musicals of theatre and film. The BBC is too damn scared to use him now !

       15 likes

    • chrisH says:

      Maybe we at Biased BBC…Media Sciences University of Albion…should issue her with our “stiff`kit” for being a brave and fearless opponent of Newsnight poptarts as offered to her…and having more balls than that craven jellybean of a Uni that folded at the first sniff of peroxide.
      America is going to hell with Cap`n O Barney isn`t it?

         9 likes

  21. chrisH says:

    Saw a bit in yesterdays Telegraph about the upcoming introduction of Jafaari Law in Iraq.
    This would legislate for the marriages of nine-year old girls…and further reduce any rights that women might have in that country we “liberated” in 2003…Mission Accomplished I believe Dubya said…alongside our Tone.
    Yet not a peep about Iraq putting the marriage of nine year old girls onto their statute book…it`s as if Harriet Harman, Jack Dromey and Margaret Hodge would rather it was not discussed,or reckon that informed choices can be made in such cases, as PIE might have advised in the early 70s.
    NO BBC interest-no Womans Hour…not even cBeebies…are the slightest bit concerned.
    Anybody else smell Saviles socks here…after a full marathon?

       19 likes

  22. John Anderson says:

    The Office for National Statistics has now admitted that its figures on immigration from Eastern Europe were grossly under-estimated – there were some 350,000 more than they had been “reporting”.

    http://www.breitbart.com/Breitbart-London/2014/04/10/Official-Report-Immigration-from-Eastern-Europe-Massively-Underestimated

    Oddly enough, although the BBC website carries the story – way down on the UK News page – but nowhere on the main News homepage – I have heard nothing broadcast by the BBC on these awful figures. Mark Easton on his hols, maybe ?,

       13 likes

    • John Anderson says:

      …and the BBC report headline describes the error as an underestimate – not the MASSIVE under-estimate it really is.

      So someone skimming the headline might think “Oh, just a slight error, nothing to bother about”.

      A third of a million extra UK jobless displaced from the labour market, – or huge extra welfare bills and pressure on schools, hospitals etc – “nothing to see here, please move along”.

         12 likes

      • Downboy says:

        Yeah but no pressure on services in Hampstead/Primrose Hill, plus one gets cheap plumbers and au pairs, not to mention a truly vibrant local restaurant scene.

           13 likes

    • #88 says:

      I understand that the non EU figure (official) was the same – 2.5 million, plus, it is estimated, 1million illegals.

      Our population increased by a minimum of 6 million (net immigrations) plus births.

      The left don’t like the word ‘swamped’. I wonder why?

         11 likes

    • JimS says:

      Radio 2 News were describing the error as being in the “tens of thousands” – doesn’t have quite the same impact as “a third of a million” or ” a city the size of Leicester”.
      Still, they could have said “thousands” and it wouldn’t be actually incorrect!

         8 likes

  23. noggin says:

    finally … sheeeeesh!
    BBC starts to catch up a tad … on the Ayaan Hirsi Ali story
    from earlier in the thread.
    http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/blogs-echochambers-26981135
    wait for it 😀 … ‘War on Islam’ advocate in college row ?
    looks like the BBC and CAIR/Muslim Students Assoc all sing from the same hymn sheet eh!

       6 likes

    • noggin says:

      and … better put the CAIR reaction too 😀

         7 likes

        • Guest Who says:

          A little intrigued at the claimed 6,800 ‘staff & student’ signatories in the subhead given it’s later stated the student body is 5,800 with 350 staff, of whom only 85 were for the withdrawal of honour.

             5 likes

          • Stewart says:

            Clearly ‘Tower Hamlets’ method system of voting being used

               7 likes

          • Danny Howard says:

            And an online petition created on Change.org Monday by students at the school of 5,800 had gathered thousands of signatures from inside and outside the university as of Tuesday afternoon.

            http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2600308/Brandeis-U-decides-against-honor-Islam-critic.html

               2 likes

            • Guest Who says:

              Mr. Howard, thank you.
              I’m liking this factual quote citing. At least you resisted adding more per usual on a personal basis.
              Let’s analyse further.
              ‘claimed 6,800 ‘staff & student’ signatories in the subhead
              That would be this subhead:
              ‘The award was cancelled yesterday after more than 6,800 staff and students signed an online petition against the decision’
              I said I was intrigued by it; not that I was unaware what was not adding up or why. I used the same numbers as you trot out as I too read them.
              But as a devotee of the BBC and accuracy won’t fit lead-ins, I can see why your focus was to ignore what was actually said and then head to para 73 is if that somehow atones for the bit at the top. It doesn’t.
              The funny.. funnier part is this is you defending the DM’s editorial skills whilst ignoring the actual point of the thread and story comment.
              It would be interesting to see what % of actual students (we know staff) were involved in the petition, as it goes to precedent of activist entities within organisations using externally-sourced ‘votes’ on ‘petitions’ to sway less than resolute governance bodies with essentially irrelevant data.
              So, hope the outing was worth it for you as it has offered me the opportunity to make that additional point?
              It has certainly improved my Friday this glorious morning.

                 2 likes

    • Guest Who says:

      ” a firestorm of criticism from conservative media outlets.”

      I’d be interested in what forms the basis of that assertion and indeed the terminology.
      It is my understanding that it is in fact religious conservatism from certain quarters that had the hissy fit to get this FUBAR to its current level.
      I’d also be surprised if a large chunk of the less dogmatic Graun CiF crowd were either of no opinion or baying for her head too.
      So maybe the BBC could put up where that little gem actually came from?

         5 likes

  24. tom0mason says:

    I find it strange that the bBC reports (and the Guardian in print) on the Tamiflu drug trials not being complete.
    The bBC asserts that because complete scientific assessment of the drugs efficacy could not be correctly made, as the complete drug studies were not released for review.

    Funny that, but AGW and ‘climate change’ demands no such thorough scientific data disclosure.

    I think the UK government has wasted many times the amount of money on AGW mitigation than stockpiling a poorly assessed flu drug.

       9 likes

    • ian rushlow says:

      The difference being that to the BBC some things are self evidently true and therefore not subject to factual analysis. You know the sort of things: global warming is real, multiculturalism is good, immigration is beneficial, diversity is wonderful. Zzzzz….

         4 likes

      • Dave s says:

        You forgot – Thatcher is responsible for every bad thing.
        Liberalism is exactly as you say. it is the pursuit of unreality at the expense of truth.

           2 likes

  25. Oldbob says:

    BBC UK weather 10:35

    “A major cyclone is about to hit northern Australia with winds expected to exceed 100 mph” .

    And just why exactly do we need to know this?……let me make a wild guess !

       11 likes

  26. Bof says:

    Has anyone managed to stand QT tonight with Bragg and
    HarPIE,
    I saw the inevitable first question on troughers go straight to Bragg and immediately turned off.
    I could not face the usual diatribe from that pair

       9 likes

    • Dave666 says:

      No sorry Dave666 couldn’t even face turning it on and watched some program about the CIA in Somalia on another channel instead.

         5 likes

  27. George R says:

    INBBC gives politically sympathetic coverage to Muslim relatives of Crawley Islamikaze ‘hero'(!) in Syria, BUT British security services report says this:

    “Syria-related attacks ‘main terror threat to UK'”
    http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-26957385

    Note: the Guardian-BBC-NUJ ‘hero’ Snowden, is castigated in the report.

    ‘Daily Mail’ adds:-
    “In a sharp rebuke to US traitor Edward Snowden and those who publish his stolen top secret files, the independent watchdog finds Britain’s intelligence services not guilty of illegal surveillance.

    “Disturbingly, however, he accuses the police of ‘institutional overuse’ of their powers, revealing that they monitored more than half a million private electronic communications last year.
    “Wouldn’t the liberal Left do better to focus on this real threat to civil liberties, instead of putting lives at risk by undermining our security services – the thin line between the citizens of this country and terrorist outrage.”

    Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-2601175/DAILY-MAIL-COMMENT-Good-emerge-sorry-affair.html#ixzz2yWV37APx
    Follow us: @MailOnline on Twitter | DailyMail on Facebook

       5 likes

  28. Ember2014 says:

    Newsnight: a man who gave testimony at the Nigel Evans court case says he feels “humiliated” and that parliament should change.

    That’s right BBC, fire another salvo at the evil Tory. Justice wasn’t done in your eyes and so you devote your first Newsnight story to this “miscarriage of justice.”

       7 likes

    • #88 says:

      It’s an echo of how the BBC gave a platform to the brother of Lee Rigby’s killer.

      The ‘too big for their boots BBC’, emboldened by their domination of media life in Britain, now want to muscle in on the justice system and get their way with that.

         8 likes

  29. noggin says:

    http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-26975845
    BBC – The Russian government withheld intelligence from the US on one of the Boston Marathon bomb suspects that may have led to further scrutiny before the attack?

    hmmm

    “an attempt to displace blame for the FBI’s dropping the ball on watching Tamerlan Tsarnaev before the Boston Marathon jihad bombing from the FBI to the Russians. The problem with this attempt, however, is that while the report says that the Russians refused to give the FBI further information, it acknowledges that they told the feds that Tamerlan Tsarnaev “was a follower of radical Islam and a strong believer” and that he “had changed drastically since 2010 as he prepared to leave the United States for travel to the country’s region to join unspecified underground groups.”

    http://www.jihadwatch.org/2014/04/russia-told-fbi-in-2011-that-tsarnaev-was-follower-of-radical-islam-and-a-strong-believer

    BBC – the world turned upside down

       6 likes

    • Alan Larocka says:

      Since the Ukraine/Gay Olympics recent situations, BBC has decided that Russia is now global bogeyman for everything.

         0 likes

  30. Geoff says:

    I wonder what expenses the BBC are paying Lord Billy Bragg to spend a night away from his Dorset mansion and lord it up in a five star West End hotel with included travel ?

    Oh the irony…

       14 likes

  31. George R says:

    Whose side are Beeboids, and the political left on?

       2 likes

    • Dave s says:

      Now now you are being provocative. The BBC is impartial. It is always telling me it is so it must be true.
      I think the sun has gone to my head.

         3 likes

  32. George R says:

    Will the fearless Islamic, Al Jazeera-supporting, BBC-NUJ report this?-

    “Nebraska: ‘Tri-Faith’ project has links to Muslim Brotherhood, media cowers in fear”

    http://www.jihadwatch.org/2014/04/nebraska-tri-faith-project-has-links-to-muslim-brotherhood-media-cowers-in-fear

       4 likes

    • George R says:

      When’s the BBC-NUJ’s next pro-Islamic Al Jazeera-Muslim Brotherhood demo to be held on BBC premises, on licencepayers’ time?

         6 likes

  33. George R says:

    EGYPT.

    INBBC’s politically biased reporting on trial of al Jazeera people continues today.

    It is, of course, written from INBBC’s political position of support for al Jazeera.

    Any INBBC reporting on Egypt is written from an Islamic al Jazeera position, and is therefore discredited as biased from the outset.

       6 likes

  34. George R says:

    Norway.

    Beeboids, not reporting, and reporting Norway.

    1.) Not reporting –

    “Norway’s capital to get first Muslim only school, to teach Arabic and Muslim values”

    http://www.thecommentator.com/article/4866/norway_s_capital_to_get_first_muslim_only_school_to_teach_arabic_and_muslim_values

    2.) Reporting-

    “Norway amnesiac: Czech couple say he is their son”

       3 likes

  35. +james says:

    Old news, but never seen it here. BBC hound poor old Keira Kinghtley. She hasn’t had a TV in Years, like a lot of young folk. No mention on the Beeb by the way.

    http://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-2582329/No-TV-Keira-hounded-pay-licence-Actress-reveals-collectors-demanded-money-despite-not-having-set-years.html

    At least they are Fairness-Nazis going after the rich as well as the poor.

       8 likes

  36. Merched Becca says:

    http://www.bbc.co.uk/bbctrust/who_we_are/trustees/

    So the trustees of the BBC are the people that monitor the standards of the organisation. Do they get a wage, or some sort of remuneration for the work that they do?
    Presumably they were selected or chosen for their intelligence and impartially.

    If so, they would be intelligent enough to seek the opinions of the public at large and get a ‘feel’ from the people of Great Britain on how the corporation is performing. Intelligent enough to ‘stumble’ upon this website to get some sort of feed back on the BBC ‘s performance.

    Or perhaps they just bury their heads in the sand and stay completely out of touch with the growing number of discontented TV licence payers?

    Are you reading this site Trustees of the BBC?

       5 likes

    • An English Gentleman says:

      No, they aren’t they don’t give a shit. They have been given their jobs by their friends and then they, in turn give their friends promotions………Lousy, corrupt and extremely unhealthy……..It’s a little bit like the MP’s who I believe, think that they are above the law………

         7 likes

    • Richard Pinder says:

      The BBC Trust selects candidates on the understanding that the candidate can be Trusted to keep a lid on the cesspit of science censorship, financial mismanagement, corruption and cover-up at the BBC, as well as protecting the BBC from whistleblowers and outside scrutiny, through the control of the complaints procedures.

      Signed by Richard Pinder, on behalf of Lord Patten

         6 likes