Nothing has changed….UKIP during the 2009 Euro elections was being smeared as racist:

Dear Mr. Thomas,

Complaint UKIP broadcast on the Today programme at 7.32am on May 30, 2009

The interview, by the standards of others broadcast during the European Parliamentary elections, as unfairly and relentlessly negative towards the party and gave undue prominence to claims that its policies were racist.

John Humphrys suggested that they would “scrap with the BNP” for votes, a direct insinuation that the party had racist policies. This was exactly in line with what UKIP’s opponents wanted to project about the party. Mr Humphrys could have asked tough questions about immigration without pushing into the territory of racism at all.

This morning Today had a little chat about UKIP (08:21) and what should be done to avoid giving them ‘victim status’ (and the subsequent voter appeal) and the impression that they are being bullied by the big political parties and media….asking why the Public still supports them despite the ordure heaped upon them….the conclusion…it is because the Establishment is seen as out to get them….and this interview doesn’t dispel that.

UKIP supporters are dismissed as ‘believers’ by Evan Davis….so not reasoned, thoughtful people…but merely driven by a sort of blind religious fanaticism?

The conclusion was don’t concentrate on what UKIP actually stands for, limiting EU power and immigration, but denounce them for their apparently incompetent economic policies….as opposed to the competent policies of….?

The Spectator’s Isabel Hardman typified the deceitful approach to talking about immigration that is now adopted by politicians and the media….‘OK yah it’s good to talk about immigration, absolutely essential…….but aren’t UKIP, and anyone who does talk about immigration, racist?’

Hardman came up with a classic of hat ilk this morning (08:21)….we mustn’t say talking about immigration is racist but….UKIP’s posters were so mean spirited and xenophobic.

…that was despite in the same sentence saying Labour MP Mike Gabe’s declaration that the posters were racist was daft…..70% the Public didn’t think the posters were racist she said….so his party must have been dismayed to hear him say that they were…..Not an ideal strategy  to say the public are racist if you want to appeal to them…..politicians aren’t engaging with the public’s concerns and have insulted voters  (by calling them racist) for many years.

And yet Hardman states those views are ‘mean spiritied and xenophobic’ herself.

Just another Today programme UKIP smear about the UKIP ‘problem’ as they see it dressed up as reasoned debate.

Hardman is hardly someone who is a natural UKIP supporter:

Here’s another example of the stupidity and double dealing of the chatterati:

Nick Cohen in the Guardain says:

Instead of tearing into the preposterous Ukip leader, Britain’s famously aggressive media have made him a celebrity

Cohen then goes on to do that very thing…tear into UKIP……

[Farage] says he represents “ordinary people”. But he is a public school-educated former banker, whose policies will help him and his kind. He claims he is the voice of “common sense”, while allying with every variety of gay-hater, conspiracy crackpot, racist, chauvinist and pillock. The only sense he and his followers have in common is a fear of anyone who is not like them.  [Yes…so afraid of foreigners that Farage married a German…and UKIP  does employ many foreign staff]

When considering Ukip…… For all the bombast, they would think that, underneath, these must be civilised men with an ironic sensibility who might have been educated at Winchester………..”Actually, they’re a bunch of thugs.”

The same should be said of Ukip.

So Cohen says attacking UKIP is a bad idea…and yet Cohen couldn’t resist, just as Hardman couldn’t stop her superior moralising inner nanny coming to the surface.

Cohen finishes up with this complaint that the media created the bland politician and now complain about that blandness, but Cohen says that it is ‘sinister of [broadcasters] to promote fanaticism as a cure for the boredom it generates.’

So UKIP are ‘fanatics’ ….because they have views Cohen doesn’t agree with….isn’t he once again doing exactly what he complains of…..he hates that ‘difference’ that UKIP represents and attacks them as sinister and fanatical because of it….doing exactly what the media did to politicians, attacking their convictions and turning them all into bland copies of each other…the BBC’s effect on Cameron the most notable….always labelling the Tories the ‘nasty party’ and hence Cameron’s appeasement of them and the evisceration of his own party and its policies.

Mark Bolland ran the Press Complaints Commission from 1992 to 1996.  He has some damning views on Leveson, that celebrity led witch hunt backed by the BBC:

Politicians destroyed the PCC to take revenge on the media, says the man who helped to create it

Today we are all supposed to be “Leveson compliant”. I am not sure why, when large chunks of what The Economist rightly condemned as a “shoddy” report following a dodgy inquiry have been torn apart or discredited – but let me ensure I am suitably transparent, with a declaration of interest. I was the first director of the Press Complaints Commission, appointed by its first chairman, the Liberal Democrat peer Lord McGregor. My partner, Guy Black, was its second director and is now chairman of its funding body. So every reader will know where I am coming from.

What began with the Calcutt inquiry ended with the monstrosity of the Leveson inquiry. I have no doubt that its proposal – swiftly and rightly rejected by the Prime Minister – to introduce press controls underpinned by statute was pre-determined from day one. That was why assessors like Sir David Bell who, as chairman of the Media Standards Trust, had conducted a long campaign against the popular press, were chosen to sit alongside Leveson. That is why he packed the first few months of his show trial with the so-called “victims” – a celebrity circus in which bile against the media was assiduously reported by the BBC and others day in day out.

It was a fix from the very start, and it certainly didn’t need £6 million of our money.

It is remarkable that a document, Meeting the needs of Muslim pupils in state schools (save to open), written by someone now central to the claims about a ‘Muslim Trojan Horse’ plot to Islamise schools is now ignored by the BBC….the document proves that this person had the intent to Islamise schools….and yet the BBC instead prefers to suggest another document professing the same Islamising agenda is fake in an attempt to undermine the credibility of the reports.

To report on the 2007 document would just confirm the Trojan Horse allegations are true and that a so-called moderate body, the MCB,  that represents the Muslim community in the UK, and a frequent guest on the BBC, was at the heart of that operation.

That might suggest that the MCB is not so ‘moderate’ nor to be trusted….. and it might then be difficult for the BBC to pass off Islam as a ‘moderate religion’ if schools adopting  its basic practices are dubbed victims of an extremist, Islamist plot.

Best not to report it then…..as ‘Is the BBC biased’ says….the BBC’s coverage of the same story can appear to come from somewhere unique to the BBC. Somewhere strange.

We had a look at this earlier:

Trojan Horse, Spartan Facts

Now Andrew Gilligan in the Telegraph has a look at the 2007 MCB document:

Guide to school Islamisation, by ‘ringleader’ of Trojan Horse plot

School governor who is alleged ringleader of the Trojan Horse plot in Birmingham wrote 72-page document on manipulating teachers and curriculum

Just a reminder of what a small world it is, a very incestuous world where Politics and the Media mix and are increasingly hard to tell apart.

Sue Inglish is the BBC’s  Head of Political Programmes, Analysis and Research

This is from BBC journo Nick Jones who is keen to see the licence fee retained and ‘to explore the factors that led executives to detach themselves from the ethos of a public service financed by a compulsory licence fee,‘ but has some other interesting thoughts on the BBC:

How did the BBC end up being controlled by so many selfish and incompetent executives? For me the starting point has to be the challenge the Corporation faced in adjusting to the rapid expansion of radio and TV services during Margaret Thatcher’s premiership. Opening up the airwaves to competition and loosening the stranglehold of the BBC-ITV duopoly were steps which helped to create and then sustain the vitality of the vibrant broadcasting industry we have today. But the well-ordered structures of Auntie could not always cope with the repercussions of a Thatcherite free-for-all; new services came and went as ratings and market forces eroded the hitherto certainties of the BBC and a commercial TV monopoly that had originally been dubbed a “licence to print money”.

Rather than proclaim openly and publicly what the BBC required from licence fee negotiations, Birt and his acolytes preferred to deal directly but privately with the government of the day, adviser to adviser, strategist to strategist – a process that accelerated once Tony Blair was elected prime minister and their appointees became part of a revolving and self-perpetuating web of advisers, lobbyists and the like.

Perhaps a final word should go to Margaret Hodge, chair of the House of Commons Public Accounts Committee, who has urged Hall and Lord Patten, chairman of the BBC Trust, to redouble their efforts to establish clearer lines of accountability. She had her own explanation for the National Audit Office’s calculation that in the three years to 2012 the BBC gave severance payments to 150 senior members totalling £25m, half the budget of Radio 4:

“They failed to understand they were dealing with licence fee payers’ money. There was a culture at the top where people had known each other for years and years. They probably came in together as graduate trainees and it seemed right they should look after each other when they lost their jobs, giving out lots of public money in unacceptably high pay offs”

A perspective on Israeli military action that you won’t hear from Al Beeb (From Tom Gross):

Video dispatch 21: Al-Jazeera: Why can’t Arab armies be more humane like Israel’s?

“Why don’t they learn from the Israeli army which tries, through great efforts, to avoid shelling areas populated by civilians in Lebanon and Palestine?

I attach a remarkable new video from Al-Jazeera (the Arabic version of al-Jazeera) in which the presenter, Faisal Al-Qaseem, asks his audience why Arab armies (and in particular the Iranian proxy organization Hizbullah) can’t act in a more humane way to civilians, like the Israeli and French militaries do. The discussion took place on one of the channel’s flagship live discussion shows, The Opposite Direction. (The guest in the video on the right, Mr Muhammed, also agrees with him.)

Among the questions posed on air:

“Why don’t they learn from the Israeli army which tries, through great efforts, to avoid shelling areas populated by civilians in Lebanon and Palestine? Didn’t Hezbollah take shelter in areas populated by civilians because it knows that Israeli air force doesn’t bomb those areas? Why doesn’t the Syrian army respect premises of universities, schools or inhabited neighborhoods? Why does it shell even the areas of its supporters? …

“I will also give you the example of France. All Syrians remember that the French forces, when they occupied Syria tried to avoid, when rebels entered mosques or schools, they stopped. The people would prefer that France come back! For god’s sake, if a referendum were to be held… if people were to be asked, who would you prefer the current regime or the French, I swear by God they would have preferred the French.”

“The Israeli army, if it wanted to break up a demonstration, would have used water cannons or rubber bullets, not rockets or explosive barrels as happens in Aleppo today.

“You mustn’t compare the Syrian army with French or Israeli… The Israeli army didn’t shell Aleppo University and students there. They didn’t shell the university with rockets killing dozens of students… The Israelis or the French didn’t kill their people. Please tell me how many of their people did the French army kill?”

***

You can watch the video below. One wonders when Western news outlets, such as The Guardian and BBC, which day after day single out Israel for denigration, will be as honest as this al-Jazeera anchor and studio guest?

You might have thought it strange that the independent BBC is a member of the CBI….but it was, still is in fact for now:

Thanks to #88 who draw my attention to the snakelike Andy Burnham….who lives by the motto that in every disaster there is opportunity.

Burnham, he who ducks and dives when questioned about Stafford Hospital, has suddenly found the time to be ‘outraged’ about something…the altering of the Hillsborough Wikipedia page….and the BBC are happy to give him plenty of …er…rope you might call it……..

In fact the BBC joins in with his mad conspiracy theories about this as he suggests it goes all the way to the top.

The BBC presenter asks ‘Given the location of the computer just how damaging do you think this is?’

Talk about a leading question….how damaging to whom exactly?  The present government? Why is this damaging to government at all…it’s just some herbert with time on his hand and a grievance…..it’s not MI5.

Burnham tells us that this is coming from ‘the heart of government….who’d have thought the authorities could stoop so low in their treatment of Hillsborough victims and survivors…sickening and appalling that someone within government could aim this type of abuse at them….and it shows what I have been up against from government and the Establishment…it may have been a rogue individual but perhaps it is more than that….but it shows just how high up those attitudes went!’

The man is barking…the same man who blocked a public inquiry into Stafford Hospital now complains about the ‘Establishment’ conspiring to silence him.

Here’s the BBC giving credence to his madness:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D1zQwak1_5Y

The BBC is employing that old trick of hyping and hyping a very dubious allegation and making loose associations with whomsoever it is targeting, in this case the present government, knowing that mud sticks whatever the final outcome….perhaps it was merely a cleaner in a government office but the BBC, and Burnham, would no doubt be happy if David Cameron is dragged into this in whatever capacity and have his name suddenly mentioned alongside such allegations smearing him however tenuous the link.

Today the BBC announced that a report that someone, from 2009 to 2012, using a government computer, had altered the Hillsborough tragedy’s Wikipedia page  adding insults to it, was the BBC’s lead story.

Indeed it did seem to be so with a not inconsiderable amount of coverage for what might seem a small story in the scale of things…though naturally distressing to the families….. though the abuse was removed almost immediately from the page when posted.

The Liverpool Echo broke the story:

Exclusive: Shocking Hillsborough insults added on Wikipedia from Government computers

A series of sickening revisions to the site began on the 20th anniversary of the 1989 tragedy, when “Blame Liverpool fans” was anonymously added to the Hillsborough section of the encyclopedia site.

Computers on Whitehall’s secure intranet were used again in 2012 to change the phrase “You’ll never walk alone” to “You’ll never walk again” and later “You’ll never w*** alone.”

The words “nothing for the victims of the Heysel stadium disaster” were also added to a description of the Hillsborough memorial at the Reds’ stadium.

The BBC, as said, has been highlighting this all day.  This is its web page:

Hillsborough Wikipedia posts: Government pledges ‘urgent inquiries’

I have heard only a single mention of Heysel…in a text message read out on 5 Live suggesting we don’t forget it….that suggestion didn’t spark any interest in the presenter and was indeed instantly forgotten.  It was rare to hear a mention at all during the BBC’s coverage of Hillsborough recently.

Hillsborough seems to have caught the BBC’s imagination….no doubt who was in government at the time, the police mistakes and coverup, and Murdoch Sun’s infamous frontpage all contributing to it being so keen to keep this one running.

No headlines or lead story from the BBC about this…not hard to find the culprit…or which ‘government office’ seems to find it OK:

Or how about the BBC’s own involvement in a ‘disrespectful’ insult….remember ‘Ding Dong The Witch Is dead’ chart manipulation after Mrs Thatcher’s death?……..

“The BBC finds this campaign distasteful, but does not believe the record should be banned.

BBC director general Tony Hall said: “I understand the concerns about this campaign. I personally believe it is distasteful and inappropriate.

“However, I do believe it would be wrong to ban the song outright as free speech is an important principle and a ban would only give it more publicity.”

However even the Guardian thinks it may have gone too far in some of its coverage of Hillsborough:

Mix and Match of the Day turns tragedy to cliche

Adam Curtis did a brilliant piece on Charlie Brooker’s Newswipe on BBC4 last week about “Oh Dearism”, the trend for television news to show shocking events about which we can do nothing but feel helpless and sad, and to which the only possible reaction is “Oh dear”.

I wonder if anybody in BBC Sport saw it. I only ask because Saturday’s Football Focus and Match Of The Day used the 20th anniversary of the Hillsborough disaster to indulge in the kind of crass grief tourism that has become a media staple since Princess Diana’s death.

Had the coverage dealt with this issue, there might have been some point to it, but interviews with the parents of two teenage girls who died on the terraces were there merely to fill our eyes with pointless tears. It is a kind of pornography. Anybody who knows anybody who has lost a child to sudden death or can imagine what it might be like to lose one’s own knows how unspeakably sad it must be. But what can you do, other than say, “Oh dear?”

At Heysel in Belgium in 1985 (May 29) Liverpool fans caused 39 deaths and around 600 injuries…so just a reminder to put things in perspective:

Just a few days earlier on May 11 Bradford City’s stadium burst into flames…in the 5 minutes one stand took to burn to the ground 56 people died and 250 were injured despite the best efforts of police officers to rescue many stricken fans putting themselves at great risk to do so.

Bradford fire: forgotten tragedy of the Eighties

“All of a sudden, a sheet of flame went up to the roof and along the entire length of the stand. Within five minutes of it starting, the whole stand was burnt down. In fact, I think it was timed at 4min 35sec. The strong wind was fanning it from the end where the blaze had started.

“It didn’t receive much comment at the time, but the roof was bitumen, with slats, and as the flames ran along the top of the stand the bitumen started melting and falling on the people below. People were coming out of there with their hair and clothes singed and big drops of bitumen all over them.

The tragedy lacked both the global reach of Heysel – a European Cup final, between Liverpool and Juventus – and the outrage and sense of injustice that came with the Hillsborough disaster. Bradford was commonly regarded as a product of widespread ignorance about general safety at football grounds, and the lethal combustibility of wooden seats (there was an echo here, in wider society, with the King’s Cross fire -itself blamed on the presence of wooden escalators on the London Underground).

With Bradford there was no stampede by drunk and belligerent fans (Heysel), and no policing or stewarding issues of the sort that keeps the Hillsborough Campaign in sad and grinding motion to this day. Put the three calamities side by side and you wonder how football ever emerged from the Eighties. With so many dead in four short years, our national game had become a killing field. The Popplewell and Taylor reports into Bradford and Hillsborough, respectively, were among the most important social documents of our times.

My thanks to David Keighley and Andrew Jubb for this most interesting report on BBC bias over at Civitas. Make sure you read it….