Gavin Esler’s Dateline continues to regularly serve up panels where all four guests come from the Left. Today’s cast list was:
– Abdel Bari Atwan, ‘al-Quds al-Arabi’ (the programme’s most regular guest)
– Agnes Poirier, of the left-wing french magazine ‘Marianne’ (and a very regular columnist for the ‘Guardian’, which Esler opted not to mention)
– Yasmin Alibhai Brown, the ‘Independent’
– Dr Vincent Magombe, Africa Inform International
As a result, viewers got a one-sided set of views, some of which were very, very silly:
1. THE RESIGNATION OF DR FOX
Dr Magombe thought it boded ill for the government and complained about “the extreme antiques of the Conservatives”, especially the “outrageous things” they are saying about immigration. “The tone that the Conservatives always use in this debate really just shows normal people that they are extreme in their beliefs,” he said. YAB attacked Fox. Agnes said “I’m not going to cry over Dr Fox’s departure. It a good thing for Europe because he was one of the really staunch Europhobic ones in cabinet”. ‘Bari’ talked Tory “sleaze”, recalling the last Conservative government (but forgetting who was in power from 1997-2010, and all their sleaze.) That was pretty much it!
2. THE ‘ARAB SPRING’
As ever it was straight to ‘Bari’ for some ‘impartial words of wisdom’ on Syria. Atwan talked nonsense about Syria’s “neighbours” being about to arm the rebels, talked up “outsiders” and attacked the United States. YAB also attacked the “outside forces” for wanting to “keep the Middle East as it was” and named names, attacking specific neo-cons and “Zionists” in some semi-demented rant based around Dr Fox. (Someone, and it sounded like Gavin Esler, said “Yes” in response.) Dr Magombe then blamed American “manoeuvring” for putting the military into power in Egypt & later blamed the Americans for keeping Museveni in power in Uganda.
3. THE U.K. GOVERNMENT’S STRATEGY ON OBESITY
This began with YAB saying “they don’t care about obesity because rich people are generally thin and they care about the rich, not the poor. All they’re interested in is feeding profits to the food industry.” (A few hums of agreement heard from the other guests!) Agnes Poirier wanted to be “authoritarian” and ban McDonalds. Esler sucked up to Atwan about the Arabs having the best food in the world & Atwan got to plug his book on Arab food, and attacked our fry-ups. At least Dr Magombe disagreed with the rest on this issue.
What a ridiculous, biased programme Dateline is.