Author Archives: David Vance

BIG QUESTIONS FOR A SUNDAY…

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Nicky Campbell’s Big Question programme looks to be a rich treat this morning; Up for discussion “Is it time to squeeze the rich?” (Does that include BBC presenters, Nicky?) Lots of clerics on to attack the banks.
Then, “Should creationism ever be taught in schools” (There’s a Church of England cleric who thinks it is akin to child abuse to do so and a Muslim who home-schools to be able to teach creationism, nice bit of BBC positioning there) Finally “Should you only tick the box about religion if you go to church” in the Census?

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MARCHING AGAINST REALITY…

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I know that you are talking about this on the Open Thread but I spent a few minutes suffering the BBC coverage of the Denialists parade through our Capital city. Talks about bias! The BBC is openly doing everything possible to hype this up, whoring themselves to the comrades in the Trade Unions. Perhaps you might like to post your thoughts on the rolling coverage here? The BBC reporters appear ENTHUSED as they facilitate the Tory-bashing assembled leftist masses. Heard Ed Balls been given unfettered time to attack the Conservatives and re-write Labour’s central role in helping bring about the deficit that these assembled fools deny.

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INDIFFERENCE?

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As regards the slaughter of the Fogel family by Palestinian savages ( and I chose that word very carefully), I commend this piece to you. It doesn’t single out the BBC in particular, but then again, it doesn’t have to. Sue covers Louise Bagshaw’s article below. The one bit in Bagshaw’s article that surprised me was this….

“Like many of us, I consider the BBC to be a national treasure. I am not a BBC basher; I have never before complained. I do not support nor do I condone the Israeli settlement building…..”

You are spectacularly uninformed, Louise.

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A LA RECHERCHE DU TEMPS PERDU

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Have to laugh at the BBC’s unremittingly bleak coverage of the Budget. The sneering tone ran across all their media formats. I caught Osborne being interviewed on Today (8.10am) and I thought he did rather well. He was quick to correct Naughie when he tried to mischaracterise what had been clearly said. And rightly so. Somehow, when Osborne said GROWTH, A MILLION JOBS – the BBC heard GLOOM, MISERY. You can see the BBC wincing that it is not Brown and Darling coming forth to talk their drivel each year at this time.

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WHAT THEY DON’T REPORT…

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Anyone spotted this on the BBC yet? It’s over on Harry’s Place but the State Broadcaster with it’s multi-billion resources seems to have overlooked it;

‘Press Release: British Muslims for Israel condemns Jerusalem Bomb Plot

British Muslims for Israel condemns the terrorist attack in Jerusalem today.Such acts of indiscriminate violence are never justified, hurt the cause ofPalestinians and harden public opinion in Israel. Hasan Afzal, a spokesperson for British Muslims for Israel says “Today’sattacks seem to be of a piece with the extreme violence perpetrated againstIsraelis in the last few weeks. First we had the Itamar massacre, then abarrage of rocket attacks from Palestine into Israel and now the attack inJerusalem. These attacks hurt all sides, and help no one.”

Afzal added “Recent events have shown that groups such as Hamas and the Al-AqsaMartyrs’ Brigade are determined to kill indiscriminately and use ordinaryPalestinians as hostages to their cause. We urge all British Muslims to condemnthese senseless attacks which block any attempts for peace and ruin the livesof both Israelis and Palestinians”.

For further information, please call (+44) 7590 67 66 91 or email BritishMuslimsForIsrael@gmail.com‘

Meanwhile….


There is a web report of the killing of 6 people by Syrian security forcesoutside a mosque….but not on the Radio….but the bomb in Jerusalem bypersons unknown does make it in….the BBC manage to avoid mentioning thesecurity wall that has stopped nearly all such attacks so far….the BBCphrases things so that we are lead to believe the lack of bombs is down toPalestinian goodwill and peaceful intent….’Jerusalem suffered a spate of busbombings between 2000 and 2004 but attacks had stopped in recent years.’

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NO INTEREST IN HIGH INTEREST

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It’s odd the things that Stephanie Flanders overlooks; A B-BBC reader observes;
“Distinct lack of interest from the BBC economic reporters on the record borrowing for February. This gives the lie to Labour’s, and Balls’ claim of ‘cutting too far too fast’.

Shame the BBC cannot bring itself to delve into the figures and shed some light on Balls’ claims…though John Humphrys let slip a non-Party line this morning in a reaction to the debt figures…’Presumably we’ve got to do something about that pretty sharply!’ …presumably not too sharply nor too soon.

If we had record borrowing in February at a time when, as John Humphrys categorises them, we are having ‘enormous cuts’ I imagine if we weren’t cutting we would be borrowing even more.

Remarkably uncommented on by the BBC.

Remarkable as the interest payments on the present debt is nearly £50bn…more than spent on defense or education….borrow more and that interest payment would go up even more…too fast and too far?

Every household pays £1900 per year just to pay off that interest, the full debt burden on every single person in the UK is £14,814 each.

Thanks Gordon, thanks Ed Balls, thanks Ed Miliband….all with their fingerprints on Labours ‘Golden Years’.

Apparently Balls is riding high in the opinion polls….he must have a very good PR team.”

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BUYING THE BBC TO SAVE MONEY

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Interesting to read how the private sector could help us all by running parts of the BBC; I am advised;

“As the BBC comesunder increased pressure from tightened budgets, the executives of theBirmingham-based commercial radio station brmb have come up with a solution tomaintain localness and save money. There is serious debate about limiting BBC local radio stations to one or twolocally produced shows a day with BBC Five Live filling the rest of the time.In light of this the management of brmb has offered to run BBC WM at asignificantly reduced budget with a saving to the BBC and the licence payer.

The senior team behind brmb, Phil Riley and David Lloyd, have a track record ofmajor achievements in the radio industry. Between them, they have experience ofmajor roles in broadcasting in the UK from regulation to content creation andbusiness management. They successfully rebuilt London talk station LBC,re-establishing the image of the station and its audience. The team alsoapplied in 2003 for an OFCOM licence to run a commercial talk station inBirmingham ‘WBC’. Chief Executive of Orion Media (parent company of brmb) Phil Riley believesthat it is unthinkable that the UK’s second city should not have a fullyoperational news talk service: “The suggestion is outrageous. This city creates a mass of news and sportstories everyday. It is unacceptable that the BBC should be cutting back on itsservice to the city. We already have an accomplished and credible news andsports team based at brmb ready and willing to provide the service. 

“Great talk radio is about not just news, but local presenters, interesting guestsand listeners who want to participate and reflect the richness of the areawhere they live.” The financing of the service is not an issue, Mr Riley says:“From our understanding of the costs of running BBC WM, we believe we couldachieve a fifty percent saving. This would be great news for the listeners andthe people of Birmingham and the country at large. Isn’t this the ‘Big Society’in operation – a commercial business offering to provide a public service at afraction of the cost?”

Have to agree with this….just think, a 50% saving simply by getting the BBC bureaucracy out of the way…

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