Don’t the audience know the script?

I got this one from the comments to the post below. Many, including me, were surprised to note that the audience of Radio 4’s tranzi flagship Today apparently contains a goodly proportion of believers in the right to armed home defence. Laban Tall writes about the way the BBC dealt with this distasteful result. Click through to read and contribute comments on this post.

I’ve been away

, visiting family and letting my poor nerves recover from the stress of Beeb-watching. But I did scribble this one down specially for B-BBC. On 31st Dec, the Ceefax news index on page 102 said “122- Israeli troops shoot protestors.” Sounds bad, said I, thinking about the deaths or injuries implied by the word “shoot”, and grimly set the remote to page 122. It turned out that the only things … Continue reading

Best worst:

Denis Boyles does a best /worst of the year list. The Beeb makes the cut in both! The BBC is the worst in this best of all possible media planets. The Beeb’s grotesque old-Labour bias and blatant anti-Americanism continues apace, despite the mismanagement of the Corporation by Greg Dyke and his sidekicks, all of whom rested the credibility of the BBC on the quality of Andrew Gilligan’s slipshod reporting, captured … Continue reading

What it takes for the BBC to admit they got it wrong

This just in: Caroline Thomson, the BBC’s director of policy and legal affairs, said the Today programme report that led to Lord Hutton’s judicial investigation fell short of the “truth and accuracy” that are the “gold standard of the BBC”. She said the concessions made by the BBC during the inquiry had been “spectacular”… Ms Thomson conceded that the BBC’s regulatory structure, in which the organisation’s editorial impartiality is upheld … Continue reading

Sorry for the hiatus

. Christmas is a busy time for personal life and a quiet time for news, or rather, news bias. What’s the point in the BBC launching an offensive against their bettes noire or an extensive cover-up of ‘bad news’ when the punters are flat out with surfeit of this or that mind altering substance (even if it’s just the old post-prandial-orgy-chasm their minds have fallen into)? There’ll probably be another … Continue reading

Handling ‘Dictators’

‘Tony Hall, the U.S. ambassador to the food program… asked one of Mugabe’s top aides: “Why do I get the impression that I have to beg you to feed your people?” ‘ -Michael Grunwald, Washington Post Staff writer, Jan 03 Funny how in this article about famine in Zimbabwe, a certain man’s name is missing. On top of that, they’ve chosen just about the most tendentious ‘fact’ possible with which … Continue reading

Egyptian Foreign Minister attacked by angry Palestinians at Jerusalem’s Al-Asqua Mosque

and it’s an embarrassment for Israel, says the BBC: …the BBC’s Jill McGivering, in Jerusalem, says the incident is sure to cause some embarrassment for the Israelis. Huh? Why Israel? Are the Egyptians likely to berate the Israelis for not having a bunch of non-Muslim security goons crawling over one of Islam’s most holy shrines? Are the Egyptians likely to demand that Israel make its control over Jerusalem more strongly … Continue reading

BBC Analyst: Muammar must’ve outsmarted W.

Hello? Even the NY Times credits Bush with success. To admit that Bush has had success on any level (whether hunting down Saddam, a strengthening economy or scaring Col Gaddafi into cooperation) must be harder for the Beeb to swallow than cod liver oil. Hardliners in Beebland must shudder to read Bush-loathing Washington Post reporter Dana Milbank own up to Bush success. It has been a week of sweet vindication … Continue reading

The BBC Betrays Britain, and Iraq: 2

. Hazhir Teimourian has serious worries about BBC World Affairs Editor John Simpson’s recent book, ‘The Wars Against Saddam: Taking The Hard Road To Baghdad’, which the Kurdish commentator on Middle Eastern affairs reviewed for the Literary Review (offline at the moment) this month. Having blamed Simpson’s account for giving Saddam an easy ride, and accused him of blaming the UK and US far too much over deaths caused by … Continue reading