Author Archives: DB

A FORCE FOR GOOD

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BBC World Service journalist Piers Scholfield asks a question about Super PACs:


What’s “a force for good” in the eyes of a BBC World Service journalist? The link takes you to this article about a Vermont-based Super PAC called “Americans For a Better Tomorrow, Today”. Here’s what they stand for:

The group wants to highlight the issues and values brought into focus by the Occupy movement, including progressive tax policies, clean energy development, the protection of collective bargaining rights and a system that doesn’t routinely graduate college students with $100,000 of student loan debt.

Lefty values = force for good. The BBC’s coverage of this year’s presidential election is going to be a doozy, isn’t it?

(Previously – Piers Scholfield, Green Party supporter)

Oh btw, remember Jude “I love him” Machin? She’s still got it bad:

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SMART-ARSE SLAPPED

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Here’s Conservative MP Graham Stuart responding to a cheap shot from Nicky Campbell on Radio Five Live’s Breakfast show this morning.

GRAHAM STUART/NICKY CAMPBELL (mp3)

Nicky Campbell: For the first time MPs on the Education Select Committee want you to provide the questions when they go head-to head with Michael Gove next Tuesday. They’re asking for suggestions via Twitter. LOL. And it’s going to be with the hashtag “AskGove”. The Conservative MP Graham Stuart is the chair of the Education Committee. Good morning.

Graham Stuart: Good morning, Nicky.

Nicky Campbell: Tell us a little bit more about this, getting other people to do your hard work for you. Great idea – you can go and have lunch in your subsidised canteen. [Smug chortle]

Graham Stuart: Thanks for that low remark. You of course struggle by on a fraction of what MPs are paid Nicky so it’s nice to have someone like you standing up for low earners…

Nicky Campbell: Absolutely, well said!

Graham Stuart: … and the unsubsidised while working for the BBC, but never mind – we won’t worry about your hypocrisy.

After that put-down Campbell steered clear of the wisecracks and concentrated on the topic at hand.

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UNEMPLOYED MAN STRUGGLING TO FIND WORK

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In today’s Independent on Sunday:

It’s just after breakfast time and Giles Fraser is smoking his third fag of the day. Clad in faded black jeans and a baggy black T-shirt, he flicks haphazardly into a full ashtray on the floor and scrolls down the Twitter feed on his computer. As a morning ritual it is pretty familiar to scores of the jobless. Then again, the Reverend Dr Giles Fraser, to give him his full honorific, is unemployed…

Tomorrow he starts working shifts on the leader desk at The Guardian, which he plans to do for the remainder of his notice period. He also has a documentary planned with the BBC and will continue to do his regular slot on BBC Radio 4’s Thought for the Day.

In the past month on the BBC:

19/12/11 Start The Week with guest Giles Fraser.
23/12/11 Thought For The Day with Giles Fraser.
24/12/11 Saturday Review with guest Giles Fraser.
25/12/11 Constantine – the man who invented Christmas presented by Giles Fraser
1/1/12 Sunday with guest Giles Fraser.
5/1/12 Newsnight with guest Giles Fraser.
6/1/12 Thought For The Day with Giles Fraser
13/1/12 Thought For The Day with Giles Fraser

During his recent appearance on Newsnight one of the programme’s producers – Sara Afshar – tweeted “Giles Fraser is great” and “I actually cheered at one point“. With his adoring lefty fans at the Guardian/BBC, one thing the Reverend Dr need never worry about is being unemployed.

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BBC NEWS PRODUCER WARNS READERS ABOUT "RIGHTWING" MIGRATION WATCH

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Lefty BBC London news producer Jane Bradley has been doing her lefty thing on Twitter again:


Migration Watch responded:


Her reply:


Except BBC journalists don’t issue warnings on Twitter about left-leaning lobbyists, do they? I shouldn’t have to point this out, but as it’s increasingly clear that Ms Bradley lacks basic common sense and can’t keep her politics to herself, I feel I have to spell it out for her in terms even she might understand. Impartial BBC. “Warning… rightwing.” Duh!

This tweet about Migration Watch once again sheds light on conventional opinion within BBC newsrooms. If there are people out there who really think that the BBC’s impartiality guidelines safeguard its journalism against the political views of its overwhelmingly left-wing staff then, well, they’re even bigger idiots than Jane Bradley clearly is.

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RICHARD BLACK ’97: 1 METRE SEA LEVEL RISE IN 30 YEARS

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Richard Black 1997:

The best models we have predict a range of effects on climate as the Earth warms up. The biggest global effect will be a rise in sea level – warmer water simply takes up more room, and some of the world’s ice will melt.
The seas could rise by up to a metre in 30 or 40 years’ time. That might not sound much but it could lead to whole nations disappearing beneath the waves.

It’s 2012 and we’re half way there. I guess those “best models” must have indicated that the next 15 years are the really bad ones.

UPDATE 5.15PM. He’s still banging on about it. This tweet appeared yesterday: That link takes you here:

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change predicts a sea-level rise of up to 59 centimetres over the next century, a level that would inundate most of the Maldives’ inhabited atolls. Low-lying Pacific island nations, such as Kirabati and Tuvalu, would also face being flooded.

Yeah, whatever. “Wolf!”

As Tim Blair points out, the Maldives has more pressing concerns. And boy does it know how to play gullible fools such as Richard Black – when the president isn’t blubbing about climate refugees he’s breaking ground for new airport terminals.

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NICE AND COSY

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Evan Davis really gave Chuka Umunna a tough going-over on this morning’s Today programme, if by tough going-over one imagines being soothed with the soft gentle strokes of giant cotton wool balls for ten minutes. Davis’s line was basically, “You get on with it and I’ll chip in every now and again to concur with everything you’re saying and help clarify the message.” When they’d finished agreeing about executive pay, Davis then asked Umunna (adviser: Diane Coyle, vice chair BBC Trust, wife of BBC tech correspondent Rory Cellan-Jones) why poor Ed Miliband is getting such a tough time when it seems clear that he’s actually pretty awesome:

Just before we finish I do want to ask you about the leadership. It’s sort of been in the news this week, this feeling that it’s been a difficult week for Ed Miliband – he’s given an interview in The Guardian this morning. Why do you think it is, because he’s given a fairly clear analysis of the country very much along the lines of the one you’ve talked about – about irresponsible capitalism that needs dealing with – why do you think it is that question marks have been raised about him given the clarity of his message?

Amazing as it seems, poor Chuka somehow managed to survive that blistering line of attack.

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DON’T MENTION THE "D" WORD

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Yesterday’s edition of the Today programme managed the impressive feat of reporting the jailing of Rod Blagojevich without mentioning that he’s a Democrat. This morning’s edition reported on MF Global boss Jon Corzine’s appearance before a congressional committee and, while pointing out that he’s a former senator, once again there was no reference to the fact that he too is a Democrat. And what of Corzine’s role as a major fundraiser for Obama 2012? It’s as if any reference has been banned from on high.

When a Republican is involved in a scandal the BBC makes the party affiliation the story’s hook. When Democrats are involved in scandals the BBC whistles, shuffles its feet and looks the other way.

How many times do you think we’d have seen and heard these clips on the BBC if, all other things being equal, the main characters were Republicans?

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SHOCKER: BBC JOURNO PRAISES U.S. CHRISTIANS

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Actually, not so shocking. They were the “correct” sort of Christians.

During a question and answer session at a conservative Christian college in Iowa on Monday Republican presidential hopeful Rick Santorum faced some opposition on social issues (health care and gay marriage) from a couple of Democrat students. BBC America’s Kate Dailey couldn’t contain her joy:


It’s not too great a leap to conclude that Dailey doesn’t feel quite the same way about conservative Christians.

(The tweet links to this article about the event by a CNN journalist whose own leanings are not difficult to discern).

Dailey also recently revealed what a big fan she is of Obama’s eldest daughter:


Time and again we see BBC journalists expressing their dislike of Republicans and conservative causes while cheerleading all things Obama and “progressive”. It seems the entire BBC America staff is on the same page politically, so it’s really no surprise that the BBC’s coverage from the U.S. is so completely biased.

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