The BBC reports:

Ed Miliband to call for banking competition inquiry

A Labour government would tell regulators to investigate whether there is adequate competition between High Street banks, the BBC understands.

Ed Miliband is due to say on Friday that the authorities should look into whether breaking up banks would benefit customers.

The question ‘What should the Treasury do?’ actually refers to bank bonuses and not competition despite the way it looks in the headlines there:

Should the Treasury approve big banker bonuses?

Funny really…Miliband wants to know what the ‘authorities’ think about capping retail bank’s market share….and the Treasury provides the answer…Miliband is a fool basically…and the BBC ignores it…

From the Telegraph:

Mark Carney rejects Ed Miliband’s bank shake-up plan

Labour’s proposals to limit market share were also rejected by Lord Lawson, former Chancellor and member of the Parliamentary Commission on Banking Standards, who said: “I think there are probably enough domestic banks for there to be competition.”

‘A blow to Miliband’s plan’…..why would the BBC ignore that?

Also frontpage in the FT (£):

Carney deals blow to Labour bank plan

Where oh where is the BBC report?…the BBC being the biggest news provider in the UK if not the world.

Competition?

The BBC gives us this list of banks implying a miniscule market:

On Friday, Mr Miliband is expected to say that forcing the major High Street banks to sell off branches would promote the growth of new firms able to challenge the dominance of the “big five” – RBS, HSBC, Lloyds, Barclays, and Santander.

“We’ve got to give customers more choice,”

The big five?

What about the Halifax, or the Co-op, or Tescos, or Sainsburys, or Standard Chartered, or Clydesdale? The Post Office has a basic banking service as well….amongst numerous other smaller banks.

As with the energy companies which despite there being a ‘big six’ numerous smaller companies provide an alternative supply…as Miliband knows because he switched to one of them himself, the banks also provide more than enough competition.

Anything else?…from the FT:

The Post Office is one of several “challenger” banks vying to break up the UK’s highly concentrated banking sector by offering a current account, considered the cornerstone of a bank’s relationship with customers.

These providers have stepped up their plans to launch accounts following the introduction of a new switching service, which enables customers to move their current accounts within seven working days.

Tesco declared at the end of last year that it would start providing current accounts in the first half of 2014. The retailer plans to offer rewards to banking customers, using its existing Clubcard points system.

Virgin Money, which took over parts of Northern Rock, also aims to launch current accounts early this year, starting with a basic account aimed at people who do not have a bank account.

Another bit of tilting at windmills to generate headlines by Miliband and his spinners.

And oh yes:

In 2009, the Labour government attempted to create a new “people’s bank” through the Post Office, but the plans were scrapped a year later after they were deemed too expensive.

Shame the BBC regurgitates it all without question once again.

Just listening to 5Live Sport (still on air now) talking to Lord Herman Ouseley, Chair of Kick It Out about Anelka and what is an anti-Semitic salute.

The FA has been taking a long time to come up with a verdict…the BBC presenter, Mark Pougatch probably, said that ‘cultural differences would have to be considered’ when Lord Ouseley said that a lot of information was coming back from France on the background to this.

‘Cultural differences’?  Really?  In which culture is it acceptable to give an anti-Semitic salute…and why should that then be acceptable here if it was a ‘cultural thing’?

As the BBC has already reported this:

The French government’s Sports Minister, Valerie Fourneyron, described the gesture as “anti-semitic”.

…you might think it was cut and dried as to the meaning of the ‘salute’….in France, or anywhere.

The BBC loathed the EDL which campaigned against an ideology that incites homophobia, misogyny, apartheid, death to apostates and anti-Semitism.

But the BBC praises those who chase Neo-Nazis out of town:

The North Dakota town that thwarted a neo-Nazi takeover

[The Neo-Nazi’s ] plans for Leith were exposed in August last year by the Southern Poverty Law Center, an Alabama-based civil rights organisation.

The Southern Poverty Law Center counted 1,007 groups as active hate groups in the United States in 2012….of that…only 3 are Muslim….a religion of peace indeed.

Has the BBC published a map of Muslim ‘hate groups’ in the UK?  Surely there must be some of concern?

Imagine the outcry if non-Muslims in Tower Hamlets were to ‘thwart a fundamentalist Muslim takeover’….too late for that anyway.

Lutfur Rahman can be described as ‘extremist-backed,’ rules Press Complaints Commission (but we will publish his denials)

Since April Lutfur Rahman, the extremist-backed mayor of Tower Hamlets, has been pursuing a PCC campaign against the Telegraph. He has over the last eight months made four complaints, all of which were finally resolved to our satisfaction last week.

It is notable the joyous glee that the BBC hunts down White people who express extremist views….or tries desperately to blame them for something they hope wasn’t done by a Muslim…the Boston bombs for instance…..curious that the BBC avoided tackling politics in Tower Hamlets or indeed the so-called ‘Muslim patrols’ as they hit the headlines everywhere else.

There’s hardly a day goes by without a sneer or a derogatory remark about the Daily Mail from a BBC presenter.

Now that Murdoch has been somewhat neutered the Mail is the next in the firing line for the relentless barrage of criticism that is intended to close it down….either literally or by making life so difficult for the owners that they backdown and give in to what amounts to control by the Left as to what is ‘acceptable’ content.

Scary huh? A Free Press anyone?

The assault has begun already in the New Statesman:

Paul Dacre of the Daily Mail: The man who hates liberal Britain

He’s the most successful and most feared newspaperman of his generation. But after a bad year in which he was forced to defend his methods, how much longer can Dacre survive as editor-in-chief of the Daily Mail?

Politicians no longer fear Murdoch as they once did. They still fear Dacre.

But Murdoch’s decline leaves the Mail under more scrutiny than ever. Is Dacre at last running out of road?

Rumours circulate in the national newspaper industry that members of the Rothermere family, owners of the Daily Mail, are increasingly nervous of the controversy that Dacre stirs up.

Dacre attracts visceral loathing. His enemies see the Mail, to quote the Huffington Post writer and NS columnist Mehdi Hasan (who was duly monstered in the Mail’s pages), as “immigrant-bashing, woman-hating, Muslim-smearing, NHS-undermining, gay-baiting”.

Curiously the New Statesman doesn’t give us the full facts here:

Nor that Hasan has admitted that…As a Muslim, I struggle with the idea of homosexuality… because of his religion…which by the way is also misogynistic, never mind the calls to kill the unbeliever or gay people…..or apostates as illustrated by the atheist Afghan given asylum here in fear of his life.

The NS continues:

In Dacre’s mind, the country is run, in effect, by affluent metropolitan liberals who dominate Whitehall, the leadership of the main political parties, the universities, the BBC and most public-sector professions. As he once said, “. . . no day is too busy or too short not to find time to tweak the noses of the liberal­ocracy”.

The Mail, in his view, speaks for ordinary people, working hard and struggling with their bills, conventional in their views, ambitious for their children, loyal to their country, proud of owning their home, determined to stand on their own feet. These people, Dacre believes, are not given a fair hearing in the national media and the Mail alone fights for them. It is incomprehensible to him – a gross category error – that critics should be obsessed by the Mail’s power and influence when the BBC, funded by a compulsory poll tax, dominates the news market. It uses this position, he argues, to push a dogmatically liberal agenda, hidden behind supposed neutrality.

[The Mail’s ] trick is to make the world seem more threatening than it is: crime is rising, migrants flooding the country, benefit scroungers swindling the taxpayer, standards of education falling, wind turbines taking over the countryside.

While his views are mostly right-wing, he is not a reliable ally for the Conservative Party, or for anyone else. This aspect of his way of working is little understood. More than most editors, it can be said of him that he is in nobody’s pocket, not even his proprietor’s.

Today, it is resolutely – some would say hysterically – Euro­sceptic and a far higher proportion of its readership is from Scotland and the English north and midlands. [No wonder the cosmopolitan media luvvies hate it]

The New Statesman’s main complaint, or should I say charge, against the Daily Mail is:

To its critics, however, the Mail is as biased as it’s possible to be, and none too fussy about the facts.

[Next week the New Statesman looks at the BBC…and then itself]

The NS gives numerous examples of the Mail being ‘none too fussy about the facts‘, the Mehdi Hasan one above for instance…but like that just how many of the NS’s claims are really true?

This for example…In the past ten years, the Mail has reported that the dean of RAF College Cranwell [Joel Hayward…a Muslim] showed undue favouritism to Muslim students (false)

Indeed the Mail published this story for which they had to pay damages:

‘Ayatollah of the RAF’

The main source for the Mail‘s witch-hunt is a letter headed “The Air Force Ayatollah”, which was sent to the paper by anonymous RAF officers. Apparently students at Cranwell “are in fear” of expressing anti-Muslim sentiments in front of Hayward. Worst of all: “Anyone who fails to follow the line that Islam is a peace-loving religion is hauled into his office for re-education”….The sole “Islamist” connection that the Mail can come up with is the fact that Hayward wrote a paper for the Cordoba Foundation, “described by David Cameron as a front for the Islamist group, the Muslim Brotherhood”.

But when you look at the man they were reporting on perhaps the RAF should have asked some questions:

“Hayward’s thesis is that the Nazis did not attempt the systematic extermination of Jews during the Second World War. In particular, he finds the evidence that gas chambers were built and used for this purpose unconvincing.”

An Islamic website says this about his thoughts on Libya:

To the dismay of defence chiefs, he has cast doubt on the widely held belief that the Nato actions averted the mass killing of civilians in Benghazi. He also warned against the RAF becoming ‘the air corps of a rebel army’….I worry that the rush to intervene again in a Muslim land without a well-reasoned strategy, even ostensibly to stop a bad man from misbehaving, may yet convince observers that there is more going on behind the scenes than at first there appears.

Dr Hayward has previously expressed remorse after appearing to claim that far fewer Jews were killed by the Nazis than generally thought and that the gas chambers of the Holocaust were British propaganda.

Hayward describes himself as “a moderate and politically liberal revert who chose to embrace the faith of Islam because of its powerful spiritual truths, its emphasis on peace and justice, its racial and ethnic inclusiveness and its charitable spirit towards the poor and needy.”

The usual people that use the term ‘revert’ are fundamentalist Muslims…the term is essentially an insult to all non-Muslims…people who use it mean that all people are born Muslims and if they take up the faith they don’t convert, they revert back to their original state as a Muslim.

Hayward compares Muhammed to Churchill:

On 4 June 1940 Churchill gave a magnificent speech to inspire the British people to continue their struggle against the undoubted evils of Nazism, even though the German armed forces then seemed stronger and better in battle. His speech includes the fabulous warlike lines:

We shall fight on the seas and oceans
We shall fight with growing confidence and growing strength in the air, we shall defend our Island, whatever the cost may be
We shall fight on the beaches
We shall fight on the landing grounds
We shall fight in the fields and in the streets
We shall fight in the hills
We shall never surrender.

No-one would dream of calling Churchill warmongering, much less murderous.

Well actually the Left call Churchill a murderous warmonger all the time….the Labour Party and the Daily Mirror leading the charge:

The Conservative leader, Winston Churchill, has wound up his election campaign with a hard-hitting speech in which he vigorously denied accusations of warmongering.

Labour has concentrated its attack on Mr Churchill and the Conseratives saying their return to government would make a third world war more likely.

“Whose finger on the trigger?” has become the slogan for this campaign after the Daily Mirror coined the phrase for a front-page headline.

Trouble is of course Churchill didn’t produce a book that goes onto to call for the death of all Germans or non-Britons etc etc

Jihad Watch has published the Mail’s story...it seems pretty harmless…Hayward has been given the right of reply in it….’Last night Dr Hayward said he did not ‘recognise’ the allegations’……and the Mail is only reporting what it has been told by other RAF officers.

The Mail was forced to withdraw the article and pay damages to Hayward:

Libel damages for RAF professor branded Ayatollah by Associated Newspapers

Remember when the New Statesman had to apologise for its anti-Semitic front cover?:

Dacre and the Daily Mail are now enemy Number One…no doubt we can expect far more of this from the usual suspects.

Free Press anyone?

And to finish…some fine words from Joel Hayward……

Eminent scholar Robert Pape demonstrates that most terrorist attacks by Muslims (and almost all suicide attacks, by whoever) are motivated by perceived grievances that relate to foreign occupation or exploitation. These include Palestinian attacks and most of those in Iraq and Afghanistan. Even many bombings in Pakistan relate to the government’s actions in support of the West’s counter-insurgency war in Afghanistan.

It is also clear that western and other nations can increase their own security by leaving Muslim lands to carve out their own futures. Bin Laden may be gone, but some of the claimed grievances that he railed against—albeit through evil action—still fuel tremendous resentment.

Oh…and Murdoch may be part of a pro-Israel conspiracy:

The scandals linked to NoTW raise questions pertaining to truth, objectivity and bias.

[Robert] Fisk believes that at least one international media organisation with excessive influence throughout the western world is steering opinion towards Israel.

 I do not know if Fisk is correct but let’s say, for the sake of argument, that he is.

I am not a conspiracy theorist and rather than attributing this observation to the influence of any malevolent individuals or groups, I tend to attribute the apparent bias and absence of balance mainly to the legacy of Orientalism and a widespread lack of knowledge about Islam.

So Fisk may not be right but……

SamCam’s father nets £350,000 a year from subsidised wind farm

The BBC and their pet scientists frequently lament the fact that so many people are sceptical about global warming and the attendant political policies forced upon them.

Why oh why they ask in despair does no one believe them?

Could it be for instance the inconvenient revelations in the CRU emails?  Could it be the rigged ‘inquiries’ into those emails? Could it be that both scientists and the BBC are not keen to let the public see the data or who is saying what in their secret seminars? Could it be the lack of any real ‘science’ that proves CO2 is the actual driver of climate change?

Could it be as mentioned in the last post that in the quest for a carbon free energy policy it seems that all morality and common sense has gone out of the window as illustrated by Lord Smith’s desire to deny cheap energy to the masses and impose hugely expensive renewable energy upon them instead…

Coal on the global market is so cheap that it threatens government attempts to tackle climate change, the chairman of the Environment Agency has warned.

“The government must ensure it doesn’t continue.”

Or could it be something like this example, Via Bishop Hill, of the arrogant desire to hide yet more inconvenient and very awkward truths about wind turbines….that they are wearing out much faster than claimed…and thereby also losing efficiency as well…and costing us even more?

The Government’s scientific advisor, Prof. Mackay is in full denial mode:

Readers will no doubt recall the study by Gordon Hughes, which suggested that wind farms are wearing out much more quickly than previously thought. This was the subject of a bit of to and fro at BH the other day, when Prof David Mackay, the chief scientist at DECC, appeared in the comments to dispute the findings.

Renewable Energy Foundation published some background, explaining that the two sides had in fact been discussing the issue since the original Hughes paper appeared in 2012. Hughes had apparently met with Mackay and had at that time apparently persuaded him that the model was in fact identifiable. Mackay had then shifted position somewhat, claiming only that the decline in performance was overstated (he suggested 2% per annum compared to Hughes’ 5%). However, by May Mackay had apparently reverted to his earlier position, namely that Hughes’ model was non-identifiable.

The REF’s summary of the story to date ended with this strikingly robust statement:

Professor Mackay has made considerable efforts, first to persuade us to withdraw Professor Hughes’ paper, and now publicly, and on dubious grounds, to discredit work which is obviously original and draws attention to a previously undiscussed phenomenon, the decline in load factor over time, that was not acknowledged, for example, in the Department of Energy and Climate Change’s own levelised cost estimates for wind power. This is extraordinary behaviour for a Chief Scientific Advisor to government. Rather than shooting the messenger, Professor Mackay might more fruitfully be advising government on how best to ensure that consumer gets better value for their subsidy, and that we present a more economically compelling example of the low carbon economy to the developing world. 

 

Ensuring the consumer gets better value for their subsidy?

Pull the other one…never happen…not as long as Cameron’s father-in-law, and his ilk, are raking in the dosh from the windfarms.

Wonder just how many investments the good Tim Yeo, Chair of the DECC, has?

Is the BBC investigating any of this?  Is it heck as like!

As Christopher Booker says:

The BBC,  now has a “narrative” shaping its coverage in only one direction on almost every issue, from global warming and wind farms to the EU and the activities of what they call our “brave” social workers. And the most telling giveaway of anyone who has passed into the grip of a “narrative” is how they instantly fall back on denigration of anyone who questions it, dismissing them as “flat-earthers”, “idiots”, “cranks”, “Right-wingers”, “creationists”, “in the pay of Big Oil”, and so on.

Also, more detail on the wind turbines from Roger Helme:

A paper  by distinguished environmental economist Professor Gordon Hughes of Edinburgh University shows that in the UK, on-shore wind farm relative output (actual output as a percent of rated maximum) declined from an average 24% at the outset to 15% after ten years and 11% after fifteen years.  Danish offshore wind farms declined even more catastrophically, from 39% initially to 15% at age ten.  The output of larger turbines (now favoured by the industry) declined more rapidly than that of smaller turbines.

This decline may be attributable to wear and tear on the mechanical parts and bearings, plus degradation of the aerodynamic surfaces of the blades (I daresay those clots of eagles’ blood and feathers don’t help).  Degradation of the blades can create instability and vibration, in turn leading to mechanical wear, damage and failure.  And offshore, the strong winds and harsh conditions constitute an extraordinarily challenging environment for wind turbines.

These findings have important implications for policy towards wind generation in the UK. First, they suggest that the subsidy regime is extremely generous if investment in new wind farms is profitable despite the decline in performance due to age and over time. Second, meeting the UK Government’s targets for wind generation will require a much higher level of wind capacity – and, thus, capital investment – than current projections imply. Third, the structure of contracts offered to wind generators under the proposed reform of the electricity market should be modified since few wind farms will operate for more than 12–15 years.

The BBC’s Ethical Man laments the ineffectiveness of wind turbines  (cheap energy is only possible at the moment thanks to fossil fuels):

Professor David MacKay, the new chief scientist at the Department for Energy and Climate Change, has done the maths on this. Instead of kW, he calculates power in kWh, and he estimates that if we put wind turbines across the windiest 10% of the country, we would generate only 20 kWh per day per person in Britain.

According to MacKay, it takes 40 kWh to drive the average car 50km.

Add in offshore turbines covering a third of the available shallow water locations (44,000 turbines) and installing deep water turbines in a 9km-wide strip all round the entire British coast and you get an additional 48kWh day per person.

That’s a lot of power, but even on quite conservative estimates the average UK resident uses 125 kWh day.

It leads to a dispiriting conclusion. Wind is, at best, only a very partial solution to the problem of how to generate low-carbon energy.

Some prices to consider:

China is still massively hooked on coal.

Roger Harrabin has been reporting the ‘excuses’ for China’s use of coal and telling us how wonderful the Chinese are at tackling environmental issues for a long time.

There are always two threads he likes to emphasise….firstly that China must continue to develop economically, it’s only fair, and that the West is responsible for China’s emissions as they buy Chinese products.

Harrabin never questions those ‘orthodoxies’.

Despite being told the Planet is about to burn unless we immediately reduce all carbon emissions China et al can continue to pump out massive quantities of the stuff…so kind of gives the lie to how urgent the environmental issue is….so is it all just ‘political’…a leftwing conspiracy to close down Western industry?

“A massive campaign must be launched to de-develop the
United States. De-development means bringing our
economic system into line with the realities of
ecology and the world resource situation.”
– Paul Ehrlich,
Professor of Population Studies

Here is a Harrabin  report from 2011….

It is virtually impossible for the world to keep within the CO2 limits defined as safe for the climate, according to the chief economist of the International Energy Agency think tank.

Dr Fatih Birol told an audience in London that key nations were not prepared to take the steps necessary to cut carbon growth.

Dr Birol said the unsayable – that peaking emissions by 2020 was virtually impossible, and that in those circumstances we could “kiss goodbye” to the 2C target.

“We would need to double decarbonisation efforts, then double them again to keep emissions (of CO2 and equivalent gases) within 450 parts per million,” he said. “The bulk of the effort needs to take place in countries where climate change is not high on the policy agenda. We have to be realistic.”

Dr Birol referred to the debate in Europe as to whether the EU would cut emissions by 20% or 30% by 2020 against 1990 levels. The difference between these two targets, he said, was equivalent to just two weeks of China’s emissions.

He said the West could not blame China because per capita emissions and car ownership there were still comparatively very low and he urged the UK and EU continue with “climate leadership”.

Did you note that sentence?

“The bulk of the effort needs to take place in countries where climate change is not high on the policy agenda. We have to be realistic.”

In other words countries like China must make the most effort to reduce emissions.

Still, can’t blame China.

and one from 2007

China is now building about two power stations every week, the top climate change official at the UK Foreign Office, John Ashton, has said.

He said there was no point blaming China for rising global CO2 emissions.

Rich nations had to set an example of low-carbon development for China to follow, Mr Ashton told the BBC. 

There is  a moral case.  Most of the greenhouse gases in the atmosphere have been put there by developed countries without the constraint of having to worry about the climate. That means we should bear the leading edge of responsibility.

Rivers of Gold

So the ‘West’ has to pay twice….we’re already pumping massive amounts of money into China’s economy..in infrastructure and manufacturing investment and then by buying the products yet more goes in…and now we’re also supposed to provide compensation for making China rich?

But what does China do with all that money?

‘Provincial governments and state-owned enterprises often see more political and financial advantage in diverting the river of investment money flowing into China towards polluting heavy industries.’

Here from 2009 we see that China thinks its emissions will peak, that’s right peak, between 20 and 30 years from now….

‘a modelling exercise published recently by three respected organisations – the Energy Research Institute (ERI), Qinghua University, and the State Council Development Research Centre – concludes that emissions could peak between 2030 and 2040.’

Harrabin of course can’t lavish enough praise on the Chinese and thinks they are the saviours of the planet……

‘It is almost impossible to tell industrial policy and environment policy apart.’

The blog ‘Not a lot of people know that’ tells a different tale where China is combating pollution in the cities…by moving it out into the countryside:

A Look at China’s Current and Proposed Coal Use

With its rapid economic development in recent years, China has been expanding coal power generation capacity at an astonishing speed for the past decade (see graph below). It is worth noting that this period of rapid expansion followed a period of relatively slow growth in new coal-fired capacity. The action plan marks the first time the Chinese government has introduced a ban on new coal-fired plants.

However most of China’s coal development is moving westwards to less developed regions. The graphs below show that current coal consumption is strong in northern provinces (left), and the geographic distribution of proposed coal power projects (right) indicates a further growth of coal consumption in the northwestern provinces. Most of these regions are not covered by the action plan, and more than 80 percent of the proposed projects in the 2012 pipeline are currently exempt from the ban and special standards.

So China is still building coal fired power stations at the rate of one a week…and emissions will continue to rise until maybe 2040.

Yep……no problem there then if you believe in CO2 powered Global Warming, Climate Change or is it Global Weirding?

And by the by this gives the lie to just how much politicians and the great and the good really care about energy prices…..from last year……

Cheap coal ‘threatens UK pollution targets’

Coal on the global market is so cheap that it threatens government attempts to tackle climate change, the chairman of the Environment Agency has warned.

Lord Smith says the UK’s share of electricity generated by coal is up to 40% – the highest since 1996.

Unless this trend is curbed, he says, the UK will miss its targets on curbing climate change and sulphur pollution.

The price of coal has been driven down by the dash for shale gas in the US.

Lord Smith told the BBC: “There’s lots of talk about a dash for gas but in effect we’re in a dash for coal that’s completely unsustainable.

The government must ensure it doesn’t continue.”

Yes…can’t have cheap energy can we? Instead we must meet some emissions targets driven by scientists who have allowed themselves to be trapped in their own hubris and desire for the massive research grants to continue and by a political set that are also caught in their rhetoric on the subject and in many cases by a desire to use climate change as a vehicle for change socially, industrially and politically.

About a decade ago, Qaradawi issued a fatwa on the gradual conquest of the entire continent of Europe via Islamic exhortation (dawah) and the demographic factor, leading to the fulfillment of Muhammad’s prophecy on the conquest of the cities of Constantinople (Istanbul), Jerusalem, and Romiyyah (Rome) as a condition for the emergence of the Mahdi, the Muslim messiah.

Welcome to the dawah of political Islam. With its high octane blend of politics and religion as potent as any of history’s grand ideas.   John Ware, Panorama

Funny thing…the BBC spent a lot of time and effort to counter ‘myths’ about Muslim demographics….the Muslim birthrate…

Disproving the Muslim Demographics sums

&

Debunking a YouTube hit

Even producing their own little YouTube counterblast:

Strange now though how quiet the BBC is about the frontpage story in the Times which tells us that 10% of child births are ‘Muslim’.

Of course talking about Islam is not the done thing….criticising Islam is ‘polluting’ polite society as Sarah Montague reminds us:

‘It’s one thing to say these are extremist groups on the fringes [The EDL]…but it’s the extent to which they pollute the rest of the population I suppose in terms of how you deal with it is the concern and how much pollution do you think has gone on?’

The BBC only refers to it in ‘What the papers say’ and links to that on Twitter.

Could it be that the BBC is hiding certain news that it thinks will cause a bit of a stir…..‘‘the one-in-ten birthrate statistic could “generate alarmism”.’

And alarmism there might be…or is that genuine concern?……

Matthew Goodwin, a leftwing academic has made it his job to study the ‘far Right’ and the ‘Counter Jihad movement’……from his work we can see that 50% of his poll agree that there will be a ‘clash of civilisations’ between white Britons and Muslims…36% disagree.  Further more 52% of Conservatives, 33% of Labour, 18% of UKIP and 24% ‘other’, and only 5% of the BNP agree with the EDL (as was).

So probably a good thing to talk about such concerns and not brush them under the carpet as the BBC does.

The BBC weren’t so quiet when it came to a Christian birthrate:

A Womb is a Weapon

Across the world, and increasingly in Europe and the UK, a unique Christian evangelical movement is growing.

For some, encouraging larger Christian families is part of a project to outbreed other religions, particularly Islam, winning back the world for Christ one baby at a time.

The BBC’s Giles Fraser, in his alternate gig at the Guardian said this:

“Why do you have so many children?” I asked [a Palestinian in Gaza]. Perhaps it was a rude question. But I didn’t get how in so poor a place as Gaza it made sense to have a dozen kids. “It’s political,” the man said – going on to explain that Yasser Arafat had told to them that their victory was to be found in “the Palestinian womb“. I was shocked. But in a place whose very existence is threatened, having children is all about national survival.

So no doubt there then that demographics is important.

The Guardian does its own bit of counter ‘alarmism’  trying a similar tactic to the BBC to reassure everyone that there really isn’t a problem:

Is it true there is a ‘startling’ rise in the birthrate of British Muslims?

The figures do not calculate birthrate as such, but show that almost a tenth of babies and toddlers (under-fives) in England and Wales are Muslim.

But are these figures anything new? No.  [Well…that’s OK then]

The story points out that fewer than one in 200 over-85s are Muslim. [Of course it’s the over 85’s that are likely to become fundamentalists aren’t they?] 

What about the focus on Muslims?……the one-in-10 birthrate statistic could “generate alarmism”.   [So best to hide it eh?…Never mind why it might generate alarmism]

The Spectator takes it’s own look at the story:

I suppose that The Times should be congratulated for reporting at all a fact which most of our media  refuse to touch.  The majority still go along with an ‘expert’ quoted in the Times story who warns that ‘the one-in-ten birthrate statistic could “generate alarmism”.’  [See Guardian for proof of that statement]

There are certainly a lot of people who go along with that line of thinking. Something big may be happening, and people can see it is happening, but best not to mention it in case people are ‘alarmed’. Elsewhere in the piece there is an account from Batley in West Yorkshire of how the growing young Muslim population there has led to ‘pubs, hospitals, houses and public buildings’ being turned into ‘Muslim private schools, madrassas, mosques and a Sharia court to satisfy rising demand from families.’

All of which nicely demonstrates part of the pickle this country is in. Even the papers that will report on one of the biggest underlying stories of our time, and one which demonstrates an unprecedented change in the make-up of our country, must on all accounts be turned into a good news story. And since expressing any worries about the fact is undoubtedly terribly bigoted and nasty, we’ll all just have to nod our heads, keep our fingers crossed, mouth the same platitudes and all put our collective future in the hopes of Sheikh Mogra.

Sheikh Ibrahim Mogra, the assistant secretary-general of the Muslim Council of Britain. He doesn’t seem to see the large increase in the Muslim population of the UK as posing any particular challenges and is quoted saying: ‘I just wouldn’t want our fellow citizens to be alarmed by an increase in number… This generation is very much British. They feel very much this is their home.’

Others might agree, but are more honest about the eventual intended ending….

Dawa is prescribed in the Quran as an obligation of all Muslims.

In the 1990s, Shaykh Yusuf al-Qaradawi, the prominent spiritual leader of the Muslim Brotherhood, dramatically re-envisioned the strategy of the worldwide Islamist revivalist movement, and in the process, offered a bold new vision for Islamic dawa in Western countries.

For Qaradawi, Muslim settlement in the West isn’t simply religiously permissible. It is, he argues, a religious necessity and an obligation for the worldwide Islamic revival movement. The Muslim presence in the West is necessary because it enables the conduct of dawa, which in Qaradawi’s view serves multiple purposes—from proselytization to Europeans, to creating Islamic enclaves and an Islamic environment for Muslim immigrants and European converts, to influencing the social and political climate towards Islam and the Muslim Nation (umma) within Western societies.
Qaradawi ultimately believes that Islam will be established as the dominant religious and political force in Europe through dawa. As he has written, “Islam will return to Europe as a conqueror and victor after being expelled from it twice … the conquest this time will not be by the sword but by preaching and ideology….Muslims must start acting in order to conquer this world.”

Most people who praise Qaradawi’s liberalism do not recognize that he defines Muslims in Europe not as European Muslims but as “expatriates” who live under special conditions of weakness and hardship. The rules he developed for Europe should not, therefore, be understood as a liberalization of Islam in general, nor as an attempt to develop an independent European Islamic law with permanent validity.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vdsQGhiBkSI

‘We do not disassociate Islam from war.  On the contrary, disassociating Islam from war is the reason for our defeat.  We are fighting in the name of Islam.  Religion must lead to war.  This is the only way we can win.’
Said by the moderate and respected Sheikh Yusuf Qaradawi, February 2006

The BBC did once venture down this road:

Panorama with John Ware in 2006….  The Muslim Brotherhood movement already dominates many Islamic groups here. Islam Expo was a further attempt by the movement to position itself as mainstream. Its followers are foot soldiers to the most influential dawah missionary of political Islam today, Sheikh Yusuf Qaradawi. But it is only to Middle East audiences that the Brotherhood’s spiritual leader, the Sheikh of the Mujahideen, unveils his prophetic dream. Europe, as he sees it, Islam’s next frontier. 

YUSUF QARADAWI: So Constantinople has been conquered and now the second part of the prophecy remains, which is the conquest of Rome. This means that Islam will return to Europe once again.

Perhaps the next conquest will be the conquest of dawah and ideas. There’s no need for conquest to be with the sword. We might conquer these countries without armies. We want armies of dawah preachers and teachers. WARE: Islam is undergoing a huge revival, here and everywhere, and it is the Muslim Brotherhood who are leading it. Welcome to the dawah of political Islam. With its high octane blend of politics and religion as potent as any of history’s grand ideas. You can comment on tonight’s programme or find out more by visiting our website.

There’s the Truth, and there’s the Truth as reported by the BBC…as Rod Liddle points out…

In Sweden there are riots…almost all the people doing the rioting were, to adapt Nick Robinson’s phrase, people of non-Swedish orign.  These were…are..race riots.

It was not the ordinary Swedes rising up against the oppressive Swedish state; it was immigrants.  Come on James – why not tell us the truth?’

Mein Kampf becomes an ebook bestseller

Digital editions of Adolf Hitler’s fascist screed, in less public format, attract surge in readers

The Today programme (08:24) reports, with a shudder, that interest in Hilter’s Mein Kampf has risen…it is number one bestseller in its Amazon category.

We are told….It’s an important book because it influenced millions of people…and post war it still does…on the Far Right.

We are told it can come with a health warning for readers…..

Mein Kampf is an evil book but it is important to read it…for all who care to safeguard democracy.

We were told it’s had a following all over the world…including India and the Middle East.

Mishal Husain asks…‘Why India?’

Why  the interest in just India from Mishal Husain you might ask….because it isn’t Indians chasing Jews from Europe once again….surely relevant to the topic under discussion.

It is certain fundamentalists who read an equally disturbing book that is perfectly legal to buy, indeed praised and admired by many…possibly those who haven’t actually read it.

A book that Churchill compared to Mein Kampf:

“All was there—the programme of German resurrection, the technique of party propaganda; the plan for combating Marxism; the concept of a National-Socialist State; the rightful position of Germany at the summit of the world.  Here was the new Koran of faith and war: turgid, verbose, shapeless, but pregnant with its message.”

Or another British Prime Minister, William Gladstone, who called the Koran an “accursed book” and once held it up during a session of Parliament, declaring: “So long as there is this book there will be no peace in the world.”

When the BBC starts to examine the contents of the Koran in as rigorously challenging and uncompromising  manner as it looks at Mein Kampf, and indeed the Christian Bible,  we might get some genuine, if inconvenient, truths.

Watched Sherlock last night…His Last Vow.

Who was the evil mastermind, Sherlock’s new nemesis?  Rupert Murdoch…the Australian newspaper owner.

No sorry, it was in fact someone called Charles Augustus Magnussen, a newspaper proprietor…and as the BBC call him…‘The King of Blackmail’….using his newspapers and information gathering power to influence government policy…allegedly….not meant to be anyone we know at all.

The show opened with him up before a Leveson style panel where you get the idea of exactly what the subtext is underlying the show….over powerful media owners using that power to blackmail people using very unsavoury methods.

Here’s some of the opening lines:

‘Mr Magnussen how would you describe your influence over the Prime Minister?’

‘I notice you’ve had 7 meetings at Downing Street this year…why?’

‘Do you think it right that  a newspaper proprietor, a private individual, and in fact a foreign national, should have such regular access to our Prime Minister?’

At which point a caption flashes up on screen indicating Magnussen’s thoughts about the questioner’s weak points that he can exploit later….this one…his ‘disabled daughter‘…nasty eh?  Boo Hiss the evil rightwing, foreign, newspaper owner.

‘Mr Magnussen, can you recall if at any point your remarks could have influenced government policy or the Prime Minister’s thinking in any way?’

We also had a drug addled character prepared to use a knife called ‘Bill Wiggins’…’Wiggins’ was a ‘Baker Street Irregular’….only known as ‘Wiggins’ originally…though may have been called ‘Sam Wiggins’.  Why change his first name?

Bill Wiggins is a Tory MP….pure coincidence I’m sure….though Joan Collins was squired by another Bill Wiggins who was a cocaine addict… Bungalow Bill as he was known…because he had nothing going on upstairs.    The character in the show later turns out to be a cut rate ‘Sherlock’ and becomes part of the team.

Later we have a a security guard at Magnussen’s office who is attacked and may be dead.

Sherlock’s response…on seeing he has some sort of tattoo…‘He’s been in prison..and is a white supremacist…so who cares’.

Bet he wouldn’t have said that about a Muslim extremist….nice to associate Murdoch with such things though..never miss a chance to put the boot in.

Magnussen……when asked how he proves his claims about people …..‘Proof…I don’t need proof…I’m in news…I just have to print it.’

Ah..those terrible, untrustworthy rags.

The writer is Steven Moffat…….well known for his support of the Labour Party and previous insertions of leftwing propaganda into BBC shows…such as Dr Who.

‘Sherlock’ of course has form:

BBC’s Sherlock attacks Boris Johnson as ‘dithering’ and ‘self-interested’

A fake newspaper shown during BBC One drama Sherlock included an article mocking the Mayor of London’s ‘hair-brained’ plans

In another episode (Hound of the Baskervilles) from an earlier series we had a martinet, ‘rigthwing’ army officer running a secret research base producing chemical weapons…on his book shelf in his office….books about Maggie Thatcher….someone in props having a laugh I expect.

No doubt there are vast numbers of such little lefty jokes placed through out the programmes.

The Game is afoot….with more comebacks from the dead than Lazarus and Jesus combined.

LOL

James Delingpole under threat:

@JamesDelingpole Hey scumbag, just remember they hanged Lord Haw Haw. #Haiyan

This post is just something to suck on and give you pause for thought before I look at the BBC’s recent bit of climate propaganda…Is there a Green Hush?

The BBC has maintained a constant narrative that climate scientists are ‘under attack’ from sceptics and therefore such pressure explains the scientist’s refusal to explain their actions or indeed their ‘science’.

The trouble is it is in fact the sceptics who are under the worse attacks, led it might be said by the mainstream media…such as the BBC and the Guardian.

Harrabin admitted he was a climate change campaigner:

I have spent much of the last two decades of my journalistic life warning about the potential dangers of climate change.

Roger Harrabin complaining about the sceptics:

In the absence of any formal inquiry, trial by internet will continue. For better or for worse.

The BBC has been at the forefront of attacks on climate sceptics….and is still at it.  Roger Harrabin is the BBC’s environmental correspondent who has helped orchestrate those attacks.

Here is a Harrabin email  organising the troops, trying to develop a party line on how to react to, how to report, Al Gore’s setback:

In any future reporting of Gore we should be careful not to suggest that the High Court says Gore was wrong on climate…….

We might say something like: “Al Gore whose film was judged by the High Court to have used some debatable science” or “Al Gore whose film was judged in the High Court to be controversial in parts”.
The key is to avoid suggesting that the judge disagreed with the main climate change thesis.

Please pass to presenters because this issue about Gore will arise again.

…and it must be squashed!

Delingpole again is under threat…from the BBC’s very best:

“I’m not sure whether I should shake your hand. I want to punch you.” He sounded jolly cross indeed – and ranted that I was utterly irresponsible and had disseminated lots of lies – though he later apologized to me saying he was jet-lagged and had confused me with Christopher Booker.

Phew..that’s OK then!

Here Harrabin lays the groundwork for what follows:

Over two decades I’ve spoken to mainstream scientists who are sick of hearing their work attacked and their motives questioned. In this world, climate science extends beyond arguments about trend-smoothing to become a matter of life and death for millions of people, according to the mainstream projections on temperatures.

Can there be much doubt that such sentiments lead to this type of thinking from the Green Lobby?:

With high probability GW will cause hundreds of millions of deaths. For this reason I propose that the death penalty is appropriate for influential GW deniers.

Below is a selection of voices articulating what measures should be taken to silence or punish climate sceptics….if you think calls for death might be a little extreme you might ask why the BBC’s favourite ‘caring’ activist, Richard Curtis, also ‘jokingly’ implies that might not be a bad idea in his climate video for the 10:10 campaign.

‘Execute’ Skeptics! Shock Call To Action: ‘At what point do we jail or execute global warming deniers’ — ‘Shouldn’t we start punishing them now?’

NASA’s James Hansen has called for trials of climate skeptics in 2008 for “high crimes against humanity.” Environmentalist Robert F. Kennedy Jr. lashed out at skeptics in 2007, declaring “This is treason. And we need to start treating them as traitors” In 2009, RFK, Jr. also called coal companies “criminal enterprises” and declared CEO’s ‘should be in jail… for all of eternity.”

In June 2009, former Clinton Administration official Joe Romm defended a comment on his Climate Progress website warning skeptics would be strangled in their beds. “An entire generation will soon be ready to strangle you and your kind while you sleep in your beds,” stated the remarks, which Romm defended by calling them “not a threat, but a prediction.”

This video highlights the Green’s campaign of vilification against climate sceptics…by terrorizing children…as someone put it, an ‘eco-snuff movie’.

And…all lovingly written by the man who is is allowed by the BBC to use its massive broadcasting platform to pump out ‘poverty porn’ and when he’s not doing that filling the airwaves with Green hype and misinformation..Richard Curtis:

The Guardian, of course:

There will be blood – watch exclusive of 10:10 campaign’s ‘No Pressure’ film

Here’s a highly explosive short film, written by Richard Curtis, from our friends at the 10:10 climate change campaign

“Clearly we don’t really think they should be blown up, that’s just a joke for the mini-movie, but maybe a little amputating would be a good place to start?” jokes 10:10 founder and Age of Stupid film maker Franny Armstrong.

Why take such a risk of upsetting or alienating people, I ask her: “Because we have got about four years to stabilise global emissions and we are not anywhere near doing that. All our lives are at threat and if that’s not worth jumping up and down about, I don’t know what is.”

“We ‘killed’ five people to make No Pressure – a mere blip compared to the 300,000 real people who now die each year from climate change,” she adds.

Jamie Glover, the child-actor who plays the part of Philip and gets blown up, has similarly few qualms: “I was very happy to get blown up to save the world.”

Here the ‘Tallbloke’ reveals the thoughts of another eco-fascist who wants to punish sceptics by killing them, though he thinks freedom of thought is a ‘very valuable thing’!:
The opinions of everyday GW deniers are evidently being driven by influential GW deniers who have a lot to lose if GW is taken seriously, such as executives in transnational oil corporations.
I have always been opposed to the death penalty in all cases, and I have always supported the clear and consistent stand of Amnesty International on this issue. The death penalty is barbaric, racist, expensive, and is often applied by mistake.

Even mass murderers should not be executed, in my opinion.….[but]…….GW deniers fall into a completely different category. They are already causing the deaths of hundreds of millions of future people. We could be speaking of billions, but I am making a conservative estimate.
With high probability GW will cause hundreds of millions of deaths.

For this reason I propose that the death penalty is appropriate for influential GW deniers. More generally, I propose that we limit the death penalty to people whose actions will with a high probability cause millions of future deaths

Does that make me crazy? I don’t think so. I am certainly far less crazy than those people today who are in favor of the death penalty for everyday cases of murder, in my opinion. And like them I have freedom of speech, which is a very valuable thing.

Climate sceptics need ‘treatment:

You must understand climate scepticism isn’t a result of intelligent thought or informed debate, it’s because climate sceptic’s brains are wired wrong:

Psychology provides insight into why people doubt climate change

The authors drew on dozens of studies into people’s reactions to news about climate change, some of which suggest that certain types of people are more likely to find the evidence for human-induced climate change less convincing than others.

More in a similar vein:
David Roberts is a blogger over at the green website Gristmill.   On September 19, 2006, evidently fed up with climate change deniers, Roberts made an interesting suggestion for how to resolve scientific issues. To wit: “When we’ve finally gotten serious about global warming, when the impacts are really hitting us and we’re in a full worldwide scramble to minimize the damage, we should have war crimes trials for these bastards—some sort of climate Nuremberg.” Roberts is far from alone. As Brendan O’Neill over at spiked points out, “climate change deniers” are now being likened by some activists to Holocaust deniers or even Nazis themselves. Apparently, it is no longer acceptable to question in polite company the hypothesis that humanity is causing catastrophic climate change.

Global warming: the chilling effect on free speech
The demonisation of ‘climate change denial’ is an affront to open and rational debate.
‘David Irving is under arrest in Austria for Holocaust denial’, she wrote. ‘Perhaps there is a case for making climate change denial an offence. It is a crime against humanity, after all.’
The message is clear: climate change deniers are scum. Their words are so wicked and dangerous that they must be silenced, or criminalised, or forced beyond the pale alongside those other crackpots who claim there was no Nazi Holocaust against the Jews. Perhaps climate change deniers should even be killed off, hanged like those evil men who were tried Nuremberg-style the first time around.

Of course the BBC is at the forefront of the attacks on climate sceptics, orchestrated by Roger Harrabin who runs the Green’s ‘Black Ops’ misinformation campaign…CMEP.

When the CRU emails were released into the world, after a months silence from the BBC, we finally got a response from Harrabin and Co…a response that was obviously an organised one being exactly the same from several BBC journalists and some of their allies:

Harrabin…The UEA’s CRU is one of the most respected centres in the world and its data set is like others around the world.  Hackers stole private emails that climate sceptics say manipulated the data…if it were true it would be extremely serious but scientists behind it absolutely reject the allegation…I have spoken to a lot of scientists and they are very confident that the science behind the CRU data will be upheld.
Obviously this was a bid to sabotage Copenhagen…millions of dollars are spent by American business trying to discredit AGW and this is the background as to why researchers have behaved in a defensive way.

Some of the e-mails reveal the frustration and annoyance among mainstream climate researchers about the probings they face from critics who relentlessly question their methodology.

But speaking to my source at the CRU, it is also clear that the unit has been dragged down by what it considers to be nit-picking and unreasonable demands for data – and that there is personal animus against their intellectual rivals.

Now this sort of hostility is nothing new in academia – but the revelations come at a sensitive time as the world’s nations gather for the climate meeting in Copenhagen.

In the absence of any formal inquiry, trial by internet will continue. For better or for worse.
Tom Feilden….this shows how difficult it can be to remain objective when scientists are subjected to concerted attacks by those who will do or say anything to win a wider political argument.
The CRU emails are taken out of context….are they the result of  exasperation by someone who has been subjected to constant harassment by an orchestrated group of campaigners?

 
Seems that BBC correspondents and climate alarmists are ‘orchestrating’ a campaign…..the themes are all consistently the same….out of context, stolen, scientists under attack and being forced to be defensive, climate sceptics orchestrate.
Curiously climate misinformation campaigner, Bob Wade from the Grantham Institute at the LSE, uses the same excuses…political motivated theft  and harassed scientists.

In 2008 Harrabin was involved in a controversy after he altered a BBC Online report on climate forecasting report following complaints by an environmentalist and the World Meteorological Organisation. Conservative critics accused Harrabin of caving into pressure.

Blog bully crows over BBC climate victory

Harrabin denies it:

However:

Abbess: “Several networks exist that question whether global warming has peaked, but they contain very few actual scientists, and the scientists that they do contain are not climate scientists so have no expertise in this area.”
Harrabin: “No correction is needed. If the secy-gen of the WMO tells me that global temperatures will decrease, that’s what we will report”
Abbess: “Personally, I think it is highly irresponsible to play into the hands of the sceptics/skeptics who continually promote the idea that ‘global warming finished in 1998′, when that is so patently not true.
“Please do not do a disservice to your readership by leaving the door open to doubt about that.”
Harrabin: “We can’t ignore the fact that sceptics have jumped on the lack of increase since 1998. It is appearing reguarly now in general media. Best to tackle this – and explain it, which is what we have done.”
(still no mention of the WMO…)
Abbess: “When you are on the Tube in London, I expect that occasionally you glance a headline as sometime turns the page, and you thinkg [sic] ‘Really?’ or ‘Wow !’ You don’t read the whole article, you just get the headline.
“It would be better if you did not quote the sceptics. Their voice is heard everywhere, on every channel. [Even the BBC? – astonished ed] They are deliberately obstructing the emergence of the truth. I would ask : please reserve the main BBC Online channel for emerging truth.”
“A lot of people will read the first few paragraphs of what you say, and not read the rest, and (a) Dismiss your writing as it seems you have been manipulated by the sceptics or (b) Jump on it with glee and email their mates and say “See! Global Warming has stopped !”
“I am about to send your comments to others for their contribution, unless you request I do not. They are likely to want to post your comments on forums/fora, so please indicate if you do not want this to happen. You may appear in an unfavourable light because it could be said that you have had your head turned by the sceptics.”
Harrabin: “Have a look in 10 minutes and tell me you are happier. We have changed headline and more.”

Harrabin has a little job on the side, using his BBC job as a platform to launch his lucrative public speaking career:

The  Gordon Poole Agency:   He gets 5k to 10k for talks on environment etc

Many of today’s environment/equity themes became issues of public
            concern following Roger’s reports on Radio 4’s “Today” programme.
            They include climate change, biodiversity, carbon footprints,
            population, over-fishing, green taxation, road pricing, global
            inter-connectedness, 3rd World debt, and many more. He was years
            ahead of the pack in showing how the environment links to energy,
            transport, farming, government aid, foreign policy, planning