Our hearts go out to the family and friends of BBC cameraman Simon Cumbers who was murdered by terrorists in Riyadh as he and correspondent Frank Gardner filmed a report. Many questions remain as to whether Saudi Arabia will descend into further instability, but there is no question that anyone can become a target in this war on terror. I recently posted on Frank Gardner (and the BBC’s) questioning stance … Continue reading →

of the D-Day commemorations yesterday was good and the news coverage of the death of Ronald Reagan, if not affectionate, at least respectful. There. I’ve said it. Click through to read and contribute comments on this post.

John Hensley comments: I would appreciate it if this could be mentioned in the blog. Junichiro Koizumi made a trip to N. Korea recently to negotiate permission for the children of Japanese kidnap victims to join their parents in Japan. A side story, written by Sarah Buckley, was about US soldier Charles Jenkins, who married a kidnap victim and is still in N. Korea: link. In the article is this … Continue reading →

Nigel writes: ‘Shooting D-Day through a lens’ is an interesting story about US photographer Marty Lederhandler and how some of his photos ended up being published by the Germans. (It’s to do with knackered carrier pigeons. No, this is not part of an ‘Allo ‘Allo script.) Anyhow, the interview wanders onto the subject of Iraq. Wouldn’t you know it, the BBC even create one of their little highlight boxes for … Continue reading →

Nick Cohen writing in the New Statesman reports that the BBC editors would not publish stories about the takeover of the leadership of the anti-war movement by the Socialist Workers Party, nor about the at first sight rather suprising alliance between the SWP and the Muslim Association of Britain. Two interesting points: – the story was leaked to Nick Cohen by disgruntled BBC reporters. – Harry’s Place, a left-wing pro-Iraq-liberation … Continue reading →

Hugh Hewitt, LA-based blogger, professor of law and former NPR broadcaster, has just ‘endured’ two weeks of the Beeb. I am just returned from two weeks in Europe, which meant having to watch CNN International, with its wall-to-wall anti-Bush anchoring, reading the International Herald Tribune –a New York Times lite– and of course enduring the BBC. I don’t know if the world hates us, but American and British media reporting … Continue reading →

Normblog points to an article in Ha’aretz about Malcolm Balen, the man the BBC has appointed to oversee its coverage of Israel. Click through to read and contribute comments on this post.

I don’t have any special knowledge of medical matters myself, but would like to pass on these comments from a reader writes: I am an medical equipment engineer and installer, my wife is a mid-wife, so we both for different reasons take a keen interest in medical stories, ESPECIALLY at teatime, when we eat and watch the evening news. So tonight 28/5 we were both intestested in in a news … Continue reading →

the last couple of weeks I have had much less time for the internet and blogging. Belatedly, from Jim Miller, here is an example of BBC bias from a couple of weeks back. I missed it then, but the issue is still current. I think the B-BBC posters have between them the full range of possible opinions about gay marriage (my own view is the standard libertarian one, and Jim … Continue reading →

Frank Gardner, so-called ‘BBC security correspondent’ provides an ‘analysis‘ asking Is US winning its war on terror? [emphasis added] Much has happened in the past 12 months. Some of al-Qaeda’s leading lights have been caught and interrogated. Saddam Hussein is no longer in power in Baghdad. Numerous plots and attacks have been thwarted. And yet, depressingly, the so-called war on terror is still with us. [emphasis added] If we were … Continue reading →