was limited to gems such as Fawlty Towers and Are You being Served?”–so Gerard Baker concludes. As a Yank, I must agree. To much fanfare, and a fair amount of predictable gushing from its liberal admirers in the US, the British Broadcasting Corporation, the state-owned bureaucracy that bestrides the UK cultural and political landscape like a colossus, launched a 24 hour news channel in America last week. Billboards in Manhattan … Continue reading →

(too lazy to pick up the phone to Kenneth Clarke, that is), BBC Views Online’s weekly Magazine Monitor: Ten Things column lapped up and repeated the story that: 5. The croquet set John Prescott so memorably used at Dorneywood was presented to the grace-and-favour house by previous resident Kenneth Clarke. Except of course he didn’t, as anyone who saw Kenneth Clarke being interviewed on Sky News in the middle of … Continue reading →

BBC Views Online presents In pictures: Remembering Khomeini: On the 17th anniversary of the death of Ayatollah Khomenei, Iranian photographer Mohsen Shandiz (centre) presents his memories of the return of the spiritual leader of the Islamic revolution to Iran in 1979. Coming soon to BBC Views Online’s In Pctures series: Remembering Hitler, Remembering Stalin, Remembering Pol Pot, Remembering Saddam, ad nauseam. For an alternative selection of Khomeini pictures, many snapshots, … Continue reading →

that took place in this troubled world on Friday night/ Saturday morning concerned crimes and alleged crimes by US soldiers in Iraq, according to Ceefax. For those unfamiliar with Ceefax, the BBC’s teletext system displays about twenty-five pages of news stories each day, starting with the news summary on page 101. Pages 125 has four sub pages on the alleged massacre at Ishaqi. When you get to the fourth page, … Continue reading →

Please use this thread, and this thread alone, for off-topic comments, preferably BBC related. Please keep comments on other threads on the topic of that particular post. N.B. this is not an invitation for off-topic comments – the idea is to maintain order and clarity. Thank you. This post will remain at or near the top of the blog. Please scroll down to find new topic-specific posts. Click through to … Continue reading →

“the_camp_commandant” writes: This BBC news article (link) appears to have swallowed completely the line the government is pushing about “giving more rights to cohabitees”. There has been a suggestion from liberal lawyers that cohabiting couples should have the same “rights” on separation as divorcing couples. The BBC article buys completely the canard that this proposed interference in people’s lives is somehow in pursuit of giving them rights. It completely fails … Continue reading →

Joe Joseph of the Times reviews the latest edition of the BBC’s series of speculative mini-dramas set in the future, “If… the Oil Runs Out.” Ten years may have gone by, Western civilisation may be grinding to a halt, but the BBC hasn’t changed. Interviews with oil analysts were interwoven with a mini-drama spun around an abrasive, career-minded American geologist who thinks she has located oil in a wildlife haven … Continue reading →

Please use this thread, and this thread alone, for off-topic comments, preferably BBC related. Please keep comments on other threads on the topic of that particular post. N.B. this is not an invitation for off-topic comments – the idea is to maintain order and clarity. Thank you. Click through to read and contribute comments on this post.

Did you see all those BBC headlines about desertions from the army? More than 1,000 members of the British military have deserted the armed forces since the start of the 2003 Iraq war, the BBC has discovered. “Since” is such a useful word. It implies causation without actually stating it. The BBC are very fond of sincing. When USS Neverdock had finished chewing up, grinding down and spitting out the … Continue reading →

I was just decanting the milk-sodden leavings at the bottom of my offspring’s breakfast bowl onto Thursday’s Times prior to putting them in the bin when I noticed this: Bush to get Mashed By Adam Sherwin THE BBC has persuaded the creator of the 1970s television series M*A*S*H to turn his fire on the Bush Administration. “The BBC has persuaded … to turn his fire on the Bush Administration” It … Continue reading →