How will the world cope with BBC journalists on strike? Radio 4 was a Today free zone this morning and my blood pressure the better for it! Are you enjoying the silence?

Just watched end of “The MidWife” on BBC1. Did you see it? This is pure Statist propaganda — ended up telling is how wonderful free NHS contraception is.

Who says these tend to arrive late? Here is the Monday open thread a little early for you as I see the previous one is bulging at the seams!

Interesting treatment here by the BBC of two of the candidates in the forthcoming Eastleigh by-election.

On the one hand, we have Tory hopeful Maria Hutchings “provoking a backlash after suggesting her son would need private schooling to be a surgeon.”  Meanwhile, comments in a 1998 book by Labour candidate John O’Farrell have surfaced, in which he said he was “disappointed” that Mrs Thatcher had not been murdered by the IRA.

Not quite sure that challenging the merits of state schools quite equates to wishing the savage murder of a British Prime Minister. I also notice the BBC got a quote from Miliband condemning Hutchings but when it comes to HIS candidate wishing to see a British Prime Minister brutally murdered…erm..silence.

Still, how DARE Hutchings attack our wonderful State education system …..

Thatcher’s the best!

New poll names ex-Tory leader as greatest prime minister

A new poll by ComRes for the Independent on Sunday and the Daily Mirror shows that Margaret Thatcher the most respected leader of the past five decades

A new poll by ComRes for the Independent on Sunday and Sunday Mirror newspapers has revealed that the former Tory leader, Margaret Thatcher, is still the nation’s best leader since 1964, according to the public.

The poll gives the former prime minister, now Lady Thatcher, a whopping 23 point leader over the current Tory leader David Cameron, and a 13 point lead over the second top choice, Harold Wilson.

The poll asked members of the British public: “In your opinion, is David Cameron a better or worse Prime Minister than —?” and named each of the prime ministers since Harold Wilson.

Embarrassingly, though not unpredictably, the last Labour leader, Gordon Brown, scored -17 points, coming last behind John Major and James Callaghan. The full list after polling breaks down as follows:

1 Margaret Thatcher +23

The BBC refused at first to report the ‘Muslim Patrols’ in London…but were quick to head off to Israel to report on Jews being racist.

The BBC are quick to report Sadiq Khan explaining Labour’s next great plan for the economy.

Not so quick to report death threats from Muslims to the very same Sadiq Khan because he voted in favour of gay marriage….apparently he is ‘selling out his religion’.

Mufti Muhammed Aslam Naqshbandi Bandhalevi, who is the head imam of the Jamia Islamia Rizvia mosque in Bradford, has issued a fatwa, or ruling, declaring Mr Khan an ‘apostate’ from Islam and said he should ‘repent before Allah’.

“We are socialists ….”

“We are socialists, we are enemies of today’s capitalistic economic system for the exploitation of the economically weak, with its unfair salaries, with its unseemly evaluation of a human being according to wealth and property instead of responsibility and performance, and we are all determined to destroy this system under all conditions.” —Adolf Hitler

It is now clear beyond all reasonable doubt that Hitler and his associates believed they were socialists, and that others, including democratic socialists, thought so too.

The title of National Socialism was not hypocritical.

His differences with the communists, he explained, were less ideological than tactical. German communists he had known before he took power, he told Rauschning, thought politics meant talking and writing. They were mere pamphleteers, whereas “I have put into practice what these peddlers and pen pushers have timidly begun”, adding revealingly that “the whole of National Socialism” was based on Marx.

Dr Rachel Frosh has been removed the Conservative Party candidates list and forced to resign as the Deputy Police and Crime Comissioner in Hertfordshire because she retweeted a message that linked Nazis to Socialism….incurring the inevitable ‘outrage’.

Blackshirted Fascist, Labour’s Oswald Mosley, wanted policies in 1930 that seem uncannily like Labour’s now:

The memorandum called for high tariffs to protect British industries from international finance, for state nationalisation of main industries and a programme of public worksto solve unemployment.Thirty years later, in 1961, R. H. S. Crossman described the memorandum: “… this brilliant memorandum was a whole generation ahead of Labour thinking.”

 

The Nazis were quite clearly Socialists….You have to wonder what the professionally outraged would have made of a tweet that linked Socialism to Communists…you know those people who murdered millions upon millions of people…far more than the National Socialists ever did.

Never mind that the Left have now joined forces with the Islamists.

Will the people of the East End defend the Jews against the ‘fascists’ now?

It is remarkable what people can be sacked for saying…and what they say but don’t get sacked for…..

Labour comedian John O’Farrell probably has his own parking space at the BBC employed as he is by them so often.

I wonder what it is that they like about him so much?

‘Upon hearing of the Brighton hotel bombing in 1984 he was described as having a ‘surge of excitement’ and wrote how he was ‘disapointed’ the bomb did not kill Margaret Thatcher. He wrote of this event in his book ‘Things Can Only Get Better’ where he said: ‘In October 1984, when the Brighton bomb went off, I felt a surge of excitement at the nearness of her demise and yet disappointment that such a chance had been missed. ‘This was me…..wishing that they had got her. “Why did she have to leave the bathroom two minutes earlier?” I asked myself over and over again.’ ‘

Death to Jewish settlers, says anti-Zionist poet

…Tom Paulin….who frequently worked for the BBC….and was of course a Labour man.

 

Of course they are prepared to keep on their books the likes of Jeremy Hardy who said all BNP members should be shot in the back of the neck…and Tom Paulin who described Israelis as Nazis who should be shot.

Just what do you have to do to be banned from the BBC?

Oh yes…say a tennis player looks like a Golly.

What’s the US military doing in a remote corner of the Philippines? Kate McGeown’s gone to find out.(12mins 30 secs)

International terrorism brought the US troops to the islands….to advise and assist…‘and its clearly paying off’.

And  look, the Filipino Jollibee restaurant chain is opening up franchises….

‘The place is a bit safer now but also a bit more American too.’

Do I detect a bit of regret about that?

Gotta celebrate that diversity and cosmopolitan atmosphere generated by all those ‘foreign’ food restauraunts as in the UK where having Chinese, Indian, Thai, Pizza and US burger chains all add to the wonderful multi-cultural mix that is the UK.

Seems a little bit of doubt about that applying to American food chains in non Western countries perhaps?

Much as Western influences were polluting the pure and noble savages of Qatar where the BBC’s Razia Iqbal suggests:  ‘ ‘importing’ Western culture such as orchestras will dilute what it is to be Qatari’……only to be rebuffed with a dose of reality:  ‘No, we have opportunities now beyond our wildest dreams in education and business and in daily life.’

The Qatar Philharmonic was established in 2008, the first western symphony orchestra in a Gulf state, and just one of a number of institutions intended to demonstrate the country’s cultural ambitions.

Razia Iqbal visits Katar, the official cultural village of Doha, and talks to members of the orchestra, many of whom have been imported from Europe. And she interviews the country’s ‘culture queen’, Sheikha Mayassa Al-Thani, daughter of the Emir of Qatar.

No such concerns about diluting British culture and what it is to be British from the BBC.

The Guardinianista’s are up in arms about the Sun’s frontpage:

But not too bothered about the Star:

The Guardian’s Paul Harris though is most upset to see similar frontpages in New York and says:

‘But after having read about the scandal in the UK, what I was not expecting to see as I walked to work in New York was the same offence repeated in New York’s daily newspapers – and, apparently, not a word of anger about it.’

Possibly the lack of interest in the Star’s frontpage and the American’s lack of outrage is connected…neither are related to Murdoch or News International….that is purely a BBC, Guardian and Fellow Traveller’s bête noire…no one else is really interested.

The Guardian itself seems entirely unconcerned about the Hard Left Mirror’s frontpage which seesm even more in bad taste….almost celebrating guns, being titled ‘BladeGunner’:

At least someone else noticed:

Andrew Bloch ‏@AndrewBloch

Blimey! Daily Mirror front page… “Blade Gunner” pic.twitter.com/fQmieHuE

The BBC itself is happy to use a not too dissimilar in style photo in their write up:

‘There is no living musician who has been more influential than Bob Dylan.’

So he must have something worthwhile to say….

“I realized at the time that the press, the media, they’re not the judge – God’s the judge,” says Dylan. “The only person you have to think about lying twice to is either yourself or to God. The press isn’t either of them. And I just figured they’re irrelevant.”

Yeah.

Kind of puts Billy Bragg in perspective….

Speaking of whom….The Picket Line Poet strikes again…As DV noticed, Billy Bragg has been putting in another appearance on R4.…anymore and he might as well be put on the payroll.

Now…there’s an idea…the BBC want an authentic working class tinge to their output….who better than Billy boy?   Make sure there’s somewhere for his whippet and pigeons  in the studio,  a spittoon, and nurse on standby…these working class heroes have had such a hard life they might just keel over from the stress at any moment. Gor blimey guvn’r.

Isn’t it an incongruous paradox that it is a lefty boot boy who is the über middle class R4’s favourite pet….do they have him like some form of performing monkey wheeling him in for a bit of amusement…..ever seen Trading Places?  Are they all laughing at him really whilst at the same time somehow horrified?

Looking for ‘bias’ on R4 on a Saturday morning is like shooting fish in a barrel…almost too easy to be worth the effort….but this morning had such a rich vein of worthy codswallop you’ve just gotta have a go….the Reverend Cole, Billy Bragg, Peter Oborne and FOOC…deep joy.

Bragg  is just beyond parody, more Bob Hope than Bob Dylan….a living cartoon stereotype of a corny old act dragged in from the 70’s and 80’s.  The simple trite leftwing tripe that he spouts, the soundbite slogans, the thoughtless makebelieve signifying nothing that trips off his tongue…..all no doubt just the right size to fit on a student placard….ironically it’s probably those very middle class students that he despises so much who paid Bragg’s mortgage.

Bragg thinks you shouldn’t be allowed to succeed however good you are, however popular…if you’re not working class…..ironic for this man who espouses equality he wants success handed on a plate to those from the council estate….hardly ‘authentic’.

Just wonder how many of these artists, groups and bands are from the 6percenters?  Not  many I’ll bet.

I don’t suppose Bob Dylan is working class, certainly not in attitude, and he went to university…..would Bragg allow him to be a success?…has he earned the right?

‘There is no living musician who has been more influential than Bob Dylan.’

I heard that said on the BBC recently as well…so it must be true.

What does Bob think about ‘authenticity’ and ‘roots’?……

“You’re born, you know, the wrong names, wrong parents. I mean, that happens. You call yourself what you want to call yourself. This is the land of the free.”

Ah….so no matter what your ‘birth’ you’ve still got a right to have a go?

So what made Dylan different? What pushed him out there?

“I listened to the radio a lot. I hung out in the record stores. And I slam-banged around on the guitar and played the piano and learned songs from a world which didn’t exist around me,” says Dylan.

He says that he knew even then that he was destined to become a music legend. “I was heading for the fantastic lights,” he writes. “Destiny was looking right at me and nobody else.”

So hard work and self belief and a bit of luck no doubt.  The secret of success….not a Billy Bragg quota system.

What really amused me was Braggs assertion that what you get when you have ‘Markets’ is ‘horsemeat’.  When you have ‘Bragg’ you get ‘hogwash’.

Horsemeat?  Tell that to the Chinese, they‘d have killed for some horse meat…they know what State controlled enterprise really means…..and it didn’t mean a land of bread and honey…it meant being treated like horses, workhorses….and having to eat grass to survive…before turning to cannibalism,  finally succumbing to starvation…just like the millions in the Socialist haven of Soviet Russia…never mind the marvels of the Socialist Republic of North Korea.

Yes, State control.  Stuff that nightmares are made of.  Never mind Billy you keep sweating away banging out the tunes for the Brothers and Sisters oppressed by Capitalism.  I’m sure you’re making a difference.  Meanwhile they’re off to Magaluf on  cheap RyanAir flights, knocking back the booze and dancing to the beat of those middleclass minstrels you so love to hate.  Stuff their grandparents could only dream of in austere, rationed 1950’s Britain before Capitalism was spread to the masses.

Hilariously Labour’s Frank Dobson turned up on ‘Week in Westminster’  interviewed by Peter Oborne (22 mins 30 sec) chatting about ‘Capitalism in Crisis’…no not banking…but horsemeat in your burger following on from Bragg.

Strange how this bloke who also spoke of the whistleblowers in the NHS and boasted here of having put in legislation to allow ‘whilstleblowing’ didn’t seem too keen to boast about Labour’s record running the Stafford Hospital.

If a few traces of horse meat in a burger is a crisis in capitalism…what’s a few thousand deaths in state run hospitals Franky baby?

I can’t understand why you don’t want to talk about it…not want to blow the whistle Frank old son?

The BBC have made no effort at all to take to task the Labour politicians at the heart of that genuine crisis….they do however seem keen to lay some blame at the Tory led Coalition’s feet…despite them coming to power long after these events.

Oborne interviewing Dobson raises the subject of politicians dodging the Stafford scandal but allows Dobson to sidestep it as he put the blame on the Media and then told a joke about the horsemeat scandal.

Ironic that when given the chance to tackle Dobson, a former Labour Health Secretary, Oborne ducks out of the fight as he seems pretty keen to nail them in this Telegraph column:

‘At any given moment, there exists at least one delicate subject that all mainstream political parties would much rather not discuss.
Now the subject which nobody wants to talk about is the National Health Service. It is just over a week since the publication of the Francis report into Stafford hospital, where some 1,200 patients died in appalling circumstances. Had any other institution been involved in a scandal on this scale, the consequences would have been momentous: sackings, arrests and prosecutions.‘

Guess Dobson might be right…the Media seem to lack the will or the backbone to target the real culprits…the politicians who like to take the credit but dodge the blame when things go wrong on their watch….and it’s not as if Oborne doesn’t know that Dobson was dodging the bullet and diverting attention with his joke as he finished his article with this:

‘Psychologists would call the events of the last week “transference”. And if British politicians (of all parties) carry on changing the subject, the more certain it is that there will be fresh Staffords to come.’

Pretty clear and damning…and yet….

NHS boss Gary Walker was ‘gagged’ by the NHS from talking about the circumstances of his dismissal from his job….but the BBC are on the trail of the Department of Health and the responsible Minister as they may have known about the ‘gagging order’ in 2010.

The BBC are not bothered about the mass deaths of patients under Labour…but are about the horrible unfairness of a man paid £500,000 to keep schtumm….

Walker made this statement:
“I don’t think it’s simply about the Lincolnshire Trust,” he added, calling for Mr Hunt to investigate the “chain of command” that led to the gagging, which he said included the Department of Health, the East Midlands Strategic Health Authority (SHA) and the Lincolnshire Trust.
“I don’t think Mr Hunt can investigate his own department so I think he should be looking for someone exceptionally independent from all of this.”

And the BBC have latched on to the part about investigating the Department of Health….as  you listened during the day that part of the story was highlighted increasingly by the BBC.  It is certain to be  a major line in any interviews to come…much like the new line that is growing like topsy about horsemeat in burgers….that it is yet another attack on the poorest in society by an uncaring Capitalism.  Another soundbite that Labour politicians and their fellow travellers are increasingly splashing vigorously around like Holy Water on a vampire.

So how ironic…BBC gear up for attack on Tories for a supposed ‘cover up’ after the event but fail entirely to tackle the real villains…Labour who for years ignored the scandalous and deadly lack of care.

BBC Bias…maybe I should write a song about that!