A couple of days ago Michael Rosen was on the BBC with this:

Journalese

Why are thugs always vile, market towns always bustling, blondes bubbly and tirades foul mouthed? With the help of ex Editor Eve Pollard, journalist Robert Hutton and Professor John Mullan, Michael Rosen takes a look at the language and the cliches of news journalism

Rather ironic considering his ill-considered, cliché ridden left wing rant in the Guardian (another cliché!) causing a minor stir …

Craig at ‘Is the BBC biased’ spotted this extraordinary letter from an impartial BBC employee to our new culture secretary:

Dear Mr Javid,

We’ve never met, but that’s because I work in “culture” and you have spent most of your adult life so far in banking.

It’s very difficult to see from your Wikipedia entry or from the kind of information put before us by Huffington Post how you are qualified to do this new job as culture minister.

You’re an ex-banker who made millions during the fatal bubble of the early 21st century; you were at a bank that has been fined for rate-fixing. You know all about this kind of money. The fact that people like you got up to all sorts of greedy lending and fiddling is why we’re in the crisis.

And yet the party you belong to keeps telling us that the reason we’re in the crisis is because “we” spent too much money on health, education, social services, benefits and – yes – culture. Anything that was paid for out of taxation seems to have caused the crisis, according to your party. Lies, all lies, but that’s the sort of “culture” we have to put up with from your party.

…..you are someone who benefited from the false boom, the very same boom that caused the crash, and to continue the chain, which is what has given your party the excuse to slash public services and cut waged and unwaged people’s standard of living, and further enrich the mega-rich.

Oh…bit of a slip there…..’ the false boom, the very same boom that caused the crash‘?

So that’ll be the the false boom, the very same boom that caused the crash under Labour’s regime of light regulation….you know…the ‘golden age’ announced by Gordon Brown.

None so blind as those who will not see….and a BBC journo, of  a sort, to boot.

And what of this?……‘the party you belong to keeps telling us that the reason we’re in the crisis is because “we” spent too much money on health, education, social services, benefits and – yes – culture.’

No, the party he belongs to tells us the reason we’re in the crisis is because Labour spent too much money that we didn’t have…not that we spent too much on health etc…a subtle difference that I’m sure a sophisticated and intelligent, cultured man like Rosen would appreciate.

Rosen continues:

No matter you are of working-class origin and your cultural background is a million miles from the Etonian toffs, you are now part of the class (yes) that runs the ludicrous world of the mega-rich gamblers who have caused millions of people across the world to lose their jobs and welfare.

So I’m not holding out any hopes.

Yours,

Michael Rosen

Ah…the old them and us class warfare.

Of course Rosen (Oxford Uni educated) can detach himself from the pampered, self indulgent, holier than thou crowd that inhabits the BBC…can’t he?

Rosen wasn’t so ‘Marxist’ when it came to accepting the position as the ‘Children’s Laureate’ from the Establishment…nor numerous other honorary positions and awards.

Rosen failed the vetting process at the BBC in the 1970’s and was dumped from its employ.

Shame the BBC doesn’t have such high standards now…impartiality being in its DNA apparently.

A reminder for forgetful little old Michael:

Gordon Brown in June 2005 giving the Chancellor’s annual speech to the City at the Mansion House. Addressing the bow-tied ranks of money-changers, he paid lavish homage to ‘your unique innovative skills, your courage and steadfastness’. They had his personal thanks ‘for the outstanding, the invaluable contribution you make to the prosperity of Britain’. 

‘As the world has changed, as industrialisation spread from Britain round the whole world, you have changed too – adapted and innovated, so that you prosper still – indeed as never before. With London today …..host to a greater number of foreign bank branches and subsidiaries than any other city, the City of London continues to lead the world.’

Having hosed them with adulation every time he visited the City, Gordon Brown surpassed himself when he returned in 2007 to deliver his final Mansion House speech as Chancellor before he moved into Number 10. ‘A new world order has been created,’ he proclaimed. Britain was ‘a new world leader’ thanks to ‘your efforts, ingenuity and creativity’. He congratulated himself for ‘resisting pressure’ to toughen up regulation of their activities. Everyone needed to follow the City’s ‘great example’, emulate this ‘high value-added, talent-driven industry’. ‘Britain needs more of the vigour, ingenuity and aspiration that you already demonstrate.’ Thanks to their ‘remarkable achievements’, we had the huge privilege to live in ‘an era that history will record as the beginning of a new Golden Age’.

or a ‘false boom’ as Michael prefers to call it….whilst blaming the Tories.

Ed Miliband has been visiting Israel.

Does Nick Robinson ask Miliband any difficult questions or any about his attitude towards ‘Israel’?

No.  What Robinson does do is give Miliband an open platform to say what he likes without challenge, in other words a cosy little ‘fireside’ chat revealing to us just how wonderful Ed really is…not just wonderful but wise and thoughtful, statesmanlike….in essence a bit of free pro-Miliband publicity in the run up to an election…..ala Desert Island Discs style when he was again allowed to ‘polish’ his, and his father’s,  public image courtesy of the BBC.

Robinson blows smoke up Miliband’s backside as he ends by raising the ridiculous comparison that Miliband is the new Thatcher:

NR: “You know what I am asking you. Are you going to be Labour’s Margaret Thatcher?”

EM: “Well no you don’t make those comparisons. I want big change in the country, people yearn for big change.”

NR: “If a commentator called you Labour’s Margaret Thatcher then you wouldn’t much mind?”

EM: “Well you can call me a radical. That’s what I want to be. That is the kind of prime minister that I want to be.”

Radical?  An opportunist coward springs to mind. The man who backed Unite’s little election rigging scam until it was made public at which time Miliband decided he had to reform Labour’s Union connections….a ‘brave move’ trumpeted loudly…which  er….made the unions more powerful…..and Syria?  He ran for cover when he thought he would lose the vote having previously backed the threat of military action.

As for the Thatcher comparison…is that an ex-Young Conservative mocking Miliband or a now BBC reporter gone native trying to make a favourable comparison and make Miliband look more acceptable to some who like a bit of ‘conviction politician’ in these days when they all look and sound alike?

What does Miliband think about Israel?…….Robinson doesn’t delve too far but tells us that…..

Ed Miliband now talks often of his Jewish heritage (though not faith because he is an atheist) but he has never been a cheer leader for Israel.

He’s reluctant to call himself a Zionist.

‘Never been a cheerleader for Israel’?

Curious…the Independent has a far more explicit and revealing write up of his views:

“We want to encourage the two-state solution that we in the Labour party believe in.”

“I come here conscious of my family history and with a deep sense of gratitude to Israel for what it did for my grandmother, who spent 30 years living here. Israel was sanctuary for her from the most indescribable grief.”

Mr Miliband told the students his family history “makes me aware of the challenges Israel faces, the dangers of anti-Semitism and of people who question its right to exist”.

“I don’t think boycotts are the solution to the complex problems Israeli and Palestinian people grapple with.”

A year ago, Mr Miliband was asked at an event of British Jewish leaders whether he was a Zionist, or Jewish nationalist. He replied: ‘’Yes, I am a supporter of Israel.’’

Or from the Jewish Chronicle:

Israel is the Jewish Homeland

Mr Miliband described Israel as “the homeland for the Jewish people” during a meeting with Hebrew University of Jerusalem students on Thursday.

“No one should be under any illusions about the Iranian regime, and we are not. Everybody is absolutely clear and understands the deep concern there is in Israel about what the Iranian government has said about Israel and about its intentions. It isn’t just Israel’s concern; it isn’t just a regional concern; it’s a very significant global concern.”

Yep…guess Robinson is right…Milband does not support Israel at all.

So…two state solution, Iran a threat to Israel, no boycotts, the right to exist, increasing anti-Semitism and Israel as the Jewish homeland….a sanctuary.

All ‘controversial’ and  rather difficult for the BBC.  Best not to mention it.

But do mention   ‘Just how broken the Middle East is, Mr Miliband saw on the top of a hill just above the Gaza Strip.’

So that’ll be Israel’s fault then that the Middle East is ‘broken’?

Why no mention of this part of Cameron’s Easter Message on the BBC?:

As we celebrate Easter, let’s also think of those who are unable to do so, the Christians around the world who are ostracised, abused — even murdered — simply for the faith they follow. Religious freedom is an absolute, fundamental human right.

Britain is committed to protecting and promoting that right, by standing up for Christians and other minorities, at home and abroad.

The BBC’s take on Cameron’s views on religion…..

David Cameron has spoken of the “peace” and “guidance” he finds in his Christian faith.

In a rare comment on his religious beliefs, the prime minister stressed the importance of teaching children about the religious aspects of Easter.

The BBC quotes Bloomberg:

According to reports on the Bloomberg news service, the prime minister made no reference to gay marriage, a policy overseen by Mrs Miller but which threatened to damage his government’s relationship with the Church of England, in his comments.

But not all Bloomberg…..only the very selective chunks…..

The BBC deciding to report that Cameron made no reference to gay marriage….but strangely managing to miss Bloomberg’s mangled reference to what Cameron actually did say about the persecution of Christians despite Bloomberg’s big headline:

Persecuted Religion

He committed his government to fighting persecution of Christians abroad.

“It is the case that Christians are now the most persecuted religion around the world,” Cameron said. “We should stand up against persecution of Christians and other faith groups wherever and whenever we can.”

Because we all know it’s Muslims who are the most persecuted don’t we….’we’ being the BBC.

And for the BBC the easter Message is just a cynical political stunt:

It’s a message from an instinctively “county Tory”, a Conservative from a rural background, that will appeal to the party heartlands; where some feel bruised by what they see as liberal, metropolitan concerns such as gay marriage.

The BBC give Labour a free pass as they propagate their ‘research’:

School places: Labour warns of primary school ‘crisis’ in England

One in four councils believe there is a “real crisis in primary school places” looming for this September in England, according to Labour’s shadow education secretary.

But why is there this ‘crisis’?

Could it be that it is Labour who created it by flinging open the borders and generously offering the world a free education?

Yes I think it might be…but not because the BBC mentions that….didn’t mention it in 2013 either when Labour again were allowed to get away with dodging the blame…..they mentioned this:

The demand for places has been driven by the birth rate rising more quickly than at any time since the 1950s.

….but not why the birthrate has shot up….or that immigrants bring in their children as well….though there is this clue:

London has the greatest need, accounting for 37% of the extra primary places required, according to the NAO.

London, with a massive inflow of immigrants.

The Telegraph tells the truth:

Competition has been intensified by a rise in the birth rate combined with an influx of migrants.

The BBC is quick to mention immigration in regard to education when it suits their pro-immigration agenda:

Immigration rhetoric putting off overseas students – peers

Not getting a school place for your child is not the only cost of mass immigration……another being the actual financial cost of this huge swamping/exploitation of the education system…

Highest ever number of school staff

The number of teachers and support staff working in England’s state schools has risen to a record level of 1.3 million people.

These annual census figures show there are about 220,000 more full-time-equivalent teaching and assistant posts in schools compared with 2005.

Essentially the cost of all those new recruits on the public payroll is the result of immigration.

Say £10,000 a year each, a very conservative estimate….that’s £2 billion every year just on the wages….never mind new classrooms or schools, free school meals, books, interpreters and so on.

But the BBC continues to give us a onesided narrative that immigration is hugely beneficial to us.

Having a mooch through the Feedback site I see Roger Bolton has a few thoughts on the internal workings of the BBC such as this about Woman’s Hour:

As you well know BBC programmes are supposed to be impartial but I’m not sure if that can be said of Woman’s Hour, at least when it comes to feminism. Woman’s Hour is in fact a powerful advocate for women’s empowerment.

Then there was this:

Feedback: Presenters’ views about the BBC

Bolton’s comments on this must have made him popular with his colleagues:

Presenters like John Humphrys are now on the staff. Should they be silent?

I will try and say something controversial on the issue.

It is this…..

Don’t take too much notice of what presenters say because most don’t know much about the issues involved.

I speak as someone who has been on both sides of the fence, a former BBC executive (dispensed with in politically sensitive times) as well as a presenter.

The latter are primarily performers, preoccupied with the content of the programmes they are presenting. If they have a strong journalistic background they probably think most management is a waste of time and see its representatives as roadblocks to be driven around.

Many know little, and care less, about budgets, training and other issues. So don’t pay too much attention to them, or me.

BBC executives are, of course, self-interested when discussing the future of the organisation that feeds and clothes them, but many do care passionately about the BBC and public service broadcasting. Some presenters are just self-centred.

Wonder if Bolton got any ‘feedback’ on that.

Just heard the BBC’s David Jordan, Director of Editorial Policy and Standards, (getting around a lot these days) telling Feedback on R4 that the BBC is ‘eternally grateful’ for audience feedback and complaints…it helps them make better programmes.

Away you go!

Also on Feedback complaints about the smutty or downright obscene nature of a comedy programme, Down the line, broadcast at 18:30

Apparently mentions of gay sex, slags and tarts, prostitutes, masturbation and so on, shocked a few listeners….

‘….is the 6.30pm comedy slot really the place for jokes about group sex on Hampstead Heath, brothels and sex workers?’

The BBC’s response…..well, audiences should realise it’s cutting edge comedy and there may be some explicit content.

Which makes you wonder what they were thinking here:

The BBC has been accused of being too “embarrassed” and “Victorian” to cover public health issues properly, after it emerged that an interview about breastfeeding was edited to avoid mentioning nipples.

 

Earlier this year the current affairs programme BBC Breakfast covered a story about tongue-tie – a serious congenital condition that affects up to 10 per cent of babies.

The condition makes it difficult for the child to attach properly to its mother’s breast, and sore or damaged nipples are the number one symptom used by medical practitioners to diagnose the problem.

BBC Breakfast covered the story throughout the morning on 18 February, but when an interviewee mentioned that nipples could become damaged and bleeding they were asked to redo their answer because the content was too “graphic”.

Suzanne Barber, a midwife and chair of the Association of Tongue-tie Practitioners, told The Independent that the incident was an example of the BBC’s “Victorian attitude” to matters of public health.

“The BBC’s embarrassment means the breast remains the preserve of sex and titillation, rather than child rearing or public health,” she said.

Ms Barber said that while it was good to see the issue of tongue-tie covered at all, the “very generalised” discussion undermined the BBC’s role as a public service broadcaster.

“It didn’t really give a full picture of the enormity of the problems women face, so many of the concerns were played down or outright dismissed.”

 

 

 

That is a minor example of the BBC attitude…..quietly avoiding topics that it thinks would upset the status quo or common decency.

Here it possibly results in mothers or even doctors not diagnosing a problem because the connection between a damaged nipple and a babies medical problem is not made.

In other cases such as Europe, immigration or Islam there are far more serious and wide ranging problems which could result from the BBC’s reluctance to examine  issues fully due to its ‘fear of adding to a ‘right wing’ narrative’ and making immigrants feel unwelcome etc…whatever that is.

 

The BBC says:

“We always think very carefully about the language and images we use and the BBC has guidelines we follow depending on the context of a story and when and where it is being aired.”

 

 

 

 

‘ …a sobering and disturbing tale, and a reminder that intelligence and a lifelong devotion to “truth” is no protection whatever against believing that the most brutal, stupid, dangerous and unethical ideology is the greatest achievement of mankind.’  Philosophy’s shameful love

Three examples of where the BBC reports something in a different way depending on what ‘narrative’ it is trying to push…..

Firstly….

The BBC’s Matt McGrath was quick to try an exploit a report from the GWPF and turn it to his advantage….despite, when you read it, there being little in its contents that bare much resemblance to claims made in McGrath’s imaginative report.

McGrath preferring to massage the truth in favour of his own ideological prejudices has by comparison completely ignored another report by the GWPF and Michael Gove’s response.

The Daily Mail does report events:

Heads are breaking the law if they preach eco agenda, warns Gove: Education Secretary’s ‘concern’ at report that accuses ‘activist’ teachers

Plans to curb wind turbines onshore will push up electricity bills

Secondly:

When energy firms put up their prices they made a claim that the green levy was a major consideration and burden on them…this was of course pooh pooed by those with vested interests in maintaining the momentum of the green agenda by making fossil fuels more expensive, artificially loading them with extra taxes to make renewables seem cheap….but of course they have to hide the amount of subsidy the renewables get to make that possible.

Helpfully the BBC has long ignored or downplayed the enormous subsidies going to windfarms and other green renewable energy generators.  More often than not fossil fuel or nuclear are pictured as vastly more expensive, not to mention dangerous.

How strange then that the BBC, in the shape of Matt McGrath, is now very concerned about the effect that restricting the building of windfarms will have on energy prices….

Plans to restrict wind farms to seas around Britain will need much larger subsidies from consumers, experts say.

So….not interested in the vast costs of directly funding windfarms when they are being built but suddenly is interested when windfarms aren’t being built…then, oddly, not subsidising them is going to cost us more.

Harrabin joins in the chorus of propaganda for onshore:

Journalism or green lobbying?

Roger Harrabin has a theory...and it is only a theory because he offers no proof (who needs proof when you are on a crusade?)…..Pickles has banned windfarms because of the right wing press…..

Communities Secretary Eric Pickles has staged a minor coup over coalition energy policy.

Conservative newspapers have been demanding a cap on onshore wind farms, but the Lib Dems have refused to agree…..the Liberal Democrats, accused him of playing politics….

However even McGrath doesn’t come up with that fantasy (and the BBC itself has frequently blamed ‘rightwing Tory backbenchers’ for this policy change)……

Newspaper reports suggest that the Conservative Party will include a pledge to limit onshore turbines in next year’s election manifesto.

Long unpopular among some Conservative MPs from rural constituencies, onshore wind turbines appear to have incurred the wrath of the Prime Minister as well.

Which paper does McGrath link to there?…er…the right wing Guardian….

And what does the Guardian say?:

The south-west is home to a large number of onshore windfarms and marginal Tory-Lib Dem seats.

 Asked by the Western Morning News whether plans to curb wind farms would feature in his party’s manifesto, Shapps said: “The wind is moving in a clear direction here.”

Ah…so marginal Tory seats….in other words Tory MPs working the maths out for themsleves unaided by a rabid right wing Press….ban windfarms and get more votes.

Presumably the Western Morning News is not an example of that rabid right wing Press…and yet it is asking questions about a ‘cap’.

Just another example of Harrabin confusing his personal prejudice with news and journalism.

Here Harrabin is more interested in the politics than the facts:

A third example of the BBC’s hypocrisy and the tortured manipulation of the facts to fit their agenda….

China has long been held up as the poster child of the green renewables initiative, despite building a coal power station every week.

China is the new Go-Green Model

We have been told that such developing nations must be allowed to generate massive amounts of CO2 in order that they can industrialise…it’s only fair that they be allowed to catch up with the West.

What’s odd about that is of course that we are frequently told that we have ‘x’ number of months to save the planet…cut CO2 or we will fry.

100 months to save the world

How does that work….a desperate and dangerous time when belching out CO2 is destroying the planet…..and yet China et al are to be allowed to pump out …CO2.

Here’s the latest from the IPCC….

[The IPCC] warns that governments are set to crash through the global CO2 safety threshold by 2030. Humans have tripled CO2 emissions since 1970, it says – and emissions have been accelerating rather than slowing.

Sounds apocalyptic doesn’t it?  And yet…China is the Green’s poster boy for renewables…

…why?  Because to justify allowing China to generate all that CO2 the apologists have to find something to excuse that ‘polluting’ of the planet…..and it is polluting apparently….Harrabin is quite firm in that belief:

[Harrabin should really stop Tweeting]

But back in the UK or the West, the fingers point at, for example, our vehicle use and how polluting that is…….when people suggest China has vastly more vehicles the point is made that that’s OK because when you look at it as cars per head of population China has far fewer cars than Western countries…not more ‘in absolute terms’….so that’s OK.

or is it?

The report, seen by BBC News, warns that transport will become the biggest source of CO2 emissions unless politicians act firmly.

Act firmly…but let China et al have what they want.

Contrast the approach when a climate change advocate is trying to extol the virtues and the capacity of wind energy in China….suddenly the relatively tiny wind generated energy shouldn’t be compared ‘per head’ so to speak, but in absolute terms…and then it is permissible to  compare it to Europe’s own generation capacity…which of course is allegedly smaller…so good for China…….

A more fundamental question is the likely contribution of wind power to China’s insatiable demand for energy.

The most recent figures, for 2012, show that wind only generated 2% of the country’s electricity. Coal, the largest contributor, generated 75%.

However, since China’s total generation is more than that of all European Union countries combined, wind’s percentage is large in absolute terms.

So…hurray…China is leading the world in green renewable energy…er…in absolute terms…not in comparison to the polluting, dirty, filthy fossil fuel energy it actually produces…but never mind ignore that when convenient.

And then maybe not even in ‘absolute terms’….. in the comments to the BBC report someone begs to differ and suggests China is not as productive as the BBC claims:

84.

Roberto Lacal
9th January 2014 – 20:59

Well, hasn’t the BBC been swooning at the visits by Sinn Fein leader Martin McGuinness to a few events with Her Majesty this past week? And the BBC now even comes out with the line that McGuinness WAS indeed  a “former IRA commander”. The curious bit is this; these world class journalists NEVER think to ask just what did he command when he was in a senior position with this terror group. How odd. Almost as if….

It’s not that long ago since Comrade Ed Miliband was pushing the Co-Op bank as the template for all banks. Naturally time has proven him to be disastrously wrong and this morning comes the news that the Co-op Bank has lost £1.3 billion. It has also paid its CEO £2.9m pay package and £1.2m bonus.  And yet, had you tuned into the TODAY programme on BBC Radio 4 this morning just after 7am. you would have heard a surreal attempt to play this catastrophic state of affairs down. Evan Davies (I think) repeated the idea that this scale of loss “had been pretty much as expected” and that the CEO’s massive payout can’t be attacked because he was not in charge when the losses were made. It was an incredible sanitisation of Miliband’s preferred banking model which contrasts so strongly with how the BBC deal with banks such as Barclays. Bias? You can bank on it.

Good Morning everyone. Friday arrives and with it this new OPEN THREAD for your use. Detail the bias here please!