. Last week the mother and sister of Private Gordon Gentle, a 19 year British soldier who was sadly killed in Iraq on the day that the Iraqi interim government took control, walked out of a meeting with John Prescott. Here is an excerpt from Minette Marrin’s Sunday Times column* yesterday on the BBC Today programme’s coverage of their trip to London: Mother and daughter went to Downing Street where … Continue reading →

but not much. A BBC Online visitor unfamiliar with B-BBC and the blogoshere could (with the exception of precious few big media outlets) be forgiven for thinking this controversy is breaking news. The NY Times (registration required) has just done a hit piece on the Swift Boat Vets. (Will the Beeb follow?) The BBC has been forced, at least, to acknowledge that Swift Boat Vets who fought alongside Kerry, but … Continue reading →

this picture on the BBC site (or on The World’s Rudest Home Videos). But I wonder if this is what the Beeb meant by ‘standing ovation’ for John Kerry? Here’s the accompanying caption: War veterans Jere Hill, middle, from Warham, Mass., and Robert Gibson, right, from Lexington, Ky., stand with their backs turned during Democratic presidential nominee John Kerry (news – web sites)’s speech at the 105th Veterans of Foreign … Continue reading →

with a scathing denunciation of the way Jo Brand of course made political jokes about Bush and Howard but not about Kerry or Blair in The World’s Rudest Home Videos. Then I realised (a) it would involve admitting that I had watched The World’s Rudest Home Videos and (b) it’s on ITV. Drat. I shall retire for a week to consider my wicked ways. Click through to read and contribute … Continue reading →

: Yesterday, there was a remarkable example of biased BBC reporting relating to the Hugo Chavez referendum. BBC World Service’s radio program on August 15th reported correctly that Chavez had likely won the referendum. They followed with commentary about how this result would undoubtedly not please Washington. To educate their audience about why Chavez might be unpopular with the Bush administration, did they turn to a member of the administration … Continue reading →

Some Have Remarked on this piece of trash masquerading as a feature on BBConline. Little surprise then that the centrepiece of that article is very jaded indeed. I found the gist of it described at this site, posted on July 1st. Oh, and Fayetteville, N.C., is a town with five cinemas, and 60,000 inhabitants. Only one of the cinemas showed Fahrenheit 9/11. Click through to read and contribute comments on … Continue reading →

Even a journalist as decidedly left-of-centre as Nick Cohen can write matter-of-factly of the BBC’s liberal bias: The liberal media treat al-Qaradawi’s views with tact and circumspection. BBC News Online barely mentions them, and instead describes al-Qaradawi as an “articulate preacher and a good communicator”. Click through to read and contribute comments on this post.

“I remember Christmas of 1968 sitting on a gunboat in Cambodia. I remember what it was like to be shot at by the Vietnamese and Khmer Rouge and Cambodians, and have the president of the United States telling the American people that I was not there; the troops were not in Cambodia. I have that memory which is seared–seared–in me.” But he doesn’t say it any more. This official retraction, … Continue reading →

Yup. Scott Burgess’s title pretty well states the case. I do not subscribe to the argument that the BBC should resemble the nation as a whole. The nation as a whole is too varied, fickle, inconsistent and unclassifiable for that to work. The two issues he picks as examples of “broad liberalism”, support for the death penalty and support for not persecuting homosexuals, are, in their very different degrees of … Continue reading →

Just another day at BBC radio. Click through to read and contribute comments on this post.