The doors of Morecambe's Midland Hotel swing open to welcome you to another Open Thread. Please come inside and partake of another cocktail (or whatever takes your fancy, at a price) in the rotunda.
6.35p.m. News - Rohingya. A few things to ponder: Why are the refugees struggling along a muddy trail in flip-flops when it runs parallel to a metalled road? Why is everybody so clean - how can they be wearing snowy white, apparently freshly-laundered, robes or shorts? How can the children, grinning mischievously for the camera, be so happy & unaffected by the burning of their villages? Perhaps it's because they've been told they are on their way to a better life in Europe.
As the Brexit process lumbers along, we should be seeing from the BBC and MSM a construct of what post-Brexit Britain should look like. In all the negative and doom-laden reporting about the process, the pessimism of the BBC has prevented us from seeing a vision of a good Brexit - we have only been given the nightmare version.
The Brexit process is already a quarter way through. Please BBC, get out and about. Let's see some of the positive stories of expanding global business and cultural opportunities, such as Dyson's - see 'Accentuate the Negative' from a few days ago. Good headline by the way Craig. London is only a tiny part of the UK (with a big head though) and the UK definitely is much more than just London.
The Remainiac Wreckers don't want us even to imagine such a future. Their mind-bending is all about planting the idea that it shouldn't happen because it will be a disaster. You wouldn't think we were experiencing a UK manufacturing export boom would you? - well not if you got your news from the BBC only.
Because so much of the business and cultural wealth of the UK is held in London, it must be easy for the BBC and MSM when considering the identity of the UK after Brexit just to forget about the other 60 million or so of us who don't live and work there. London is not the be all and end all of wealth creation - though an outside observer would be hard pressed to discern that fact from the BBC.
I should have added .... Because so much of the business and cultural wealth of the UK is held on behalf of the nation in London... though not created there, ... it must be easy for the BBC and MSM when considering the identity of the UK after Brexit just to forget about the other 60 million or so of us who don't live and work there.
By the way, I don't count the odd jolly down to Brighton as 'getting out and about'.
London is essentially a huge money laundering operation...recycling ill-gotten gains from oligarchs around the globe and also a huge welfare sponge, sucking wealth out of the rest of the country. The BBC likes to promote the idea that the rest of the country is utterly dependent on London.
To most people in the UK, London is a foreign country, but to the Westminster MSM BBC elite, London is the greatest city in the world, and doesn't need the rest of the UK dragging them down like a millstone around their necks.
When the majority of the UK voted Leave the EU in the 2016 Referendum, the reality dawned, bringing with it a severe depressive effect. Ever since, and even now, the BBC and possibly a good many the Westminster MPs are trying to set the clock back to the position before the vote when the elite thought that their position was impregnable.
The Leave vote contained a message from the majority of voters who wanted a shake-up of the London elite, bringing some measure of accountability back to the licence payers and constituents. What we are seeing is a continuing defiance of the electorate.
I was shocked by something I heard on Woman's Hour this morning. During a trivial and trite item on advice-giving two women laughed over the time one of them hit a baby's head against a table because she'd had too much wine...really, on the BBC...women being encouraged to laugh about something like that. I think one of them said "At least you didn't drop it..." The BBC really don't care who gets hurt in the name of female "empowerment". Can you imagine them broadcasting a piece where two mean shared a similar confession.
We can just about accept the BBC being in our faces over certain issues such as racial discrimination, LBGT rights, inclusivity, disabled people's rights and so on. But, the two most serious items on the news agenda, which are: Islamic terrorism and the wider threat from Islam to the stability of our way of life, and Brexit and what future we should be working towards having left the EU. These are matters that the BBC refuses to face up to. They can only peddle their own wish-list, which does not find much sympathy from the UK electorate at large. It's time for a new wave of forward thinkers to take over from the tired lot such as MM.
It is revealing of an arrogant, self-serving elite that the two issues that the BBC most ignores are the same ones that the Government also wishes us to ignore (viz. the risks of Islam and the opportunities after Brexit).
It is to be hoped that Theresa May does not go down in history as the British Prime Minister who fouled up Brexit and left us with the worst instead of the best of both worlds and also, who turned a blind eye towards the risks of Islamic attrition towards the UK.
If this is the mindset of these senior execs in the BBC and MSM, can we hold out any realistic hope that anti Brexit biased reporting will stop any time soon? - it looks doubtful and the answer is probably No!
It's inevitable when the top rungs of the BBC career ladder are occupied by ageing left-wing incumbents, that any younger aspiring career broadcaster would bite his/her tongue rather than being seen to step out of line - especially in public, and in an alien uncontrolled environment.
That 'not one hand went up' is more a sign of the stranglehold that the BBC hold over their staff, with their insistence that they all stick to the narrative, than anything else. Even the cleverest statistician could not wangle 100% opposition to Brexit in this group.
Petition to scrap TV licence hits 235,000 supporters as BBC airs comment linking Farage to Polish man’s death. https://you.38degrees.org.uk/petitions/end-the-bbc-licence-fee
Two items of note, totally biased report on this mornings Today on Radio 4; gushing about the universal popularity of "Mutti" (merkel) in the German elections, dismissing any opposition to her as "extreme right", but then I suppose a foreign election doesn't count. Also suspicious near silence on events in Catalonia, arrests of regional politicians, seizures of documents, all by one of our liberal EU friends and allies (and probably the rightful guardians of our downtrodden colony of Gibraltar).
From BBBC: https://biasedbbc.org/blog/2017/09/21/mo-or-less-2/
We are told that Mohammad including its variant spellings is now the most popular boy's name in the UK. Was this reported on the BBC News website? - No!
What was reported was a reference to the now unpopular name of Nigel, and the use of that 'news' to take a swipe at Nigel Farage by subtly mocking his name.
This is the equivalent of featuring the .0001% and ignoring the 99.9999%. (I made up the %ages by the way).
All we can do is to keep logging the BBC narrative day by day just to show how pitiful their reporting standards are, and how political opinion is pedalled under the guise of news.
Indeed - for the same reason they haven't given much publicity to a huge rise in VAT receipts, a reduction in borrowing requirement and a big surge in manufacturing exports...because the narrrative is that Brexit is a disaster.
Had the misfortune to listen to a large chunk of Today on the radio this morning presided over by the deadly duo of Mishal Husain and Stephanie Flanders (back on the BBC payroll???).
The levels of pro-EU, pro-German, pro-Merkel, pro-migration, anti-populism bias were ludicrously off the scale. Who do they get to give us the low down on St Angela - why, our very own Neil Macgregor, who is being paid shed loads of money by Mrs Merkel to create a rival to the British Museum.
According to Macgregor the wonderful Mama Merkel epitomises stability for all Germans.
The reality is that Merkel's party is supported by perhaps one in four at most German voters (her party is scoring about 36% out of those who are likely to vote). 75% do not support her. Listening to Today you would imagine her open borders abberation bringing in a million migrants had been a great success, not that 95% of the "refugees" have not found meaningful employment and 90% want to bring over more "dependents" of various kinds. Or that the total annual net bill to the state is well over £10 billion (and growing) by now.
They were all at it. The business correspondent was cooing about Germany's marvellous economy...well as someone once said, the EU is a German racket, as the French have found to their cost. It would be odd if their economy wasn't doing well out of the rigged exchange rates and domination of its banking system.
Stephanie was quite clearly biased against populism. Populism has a long and respectable history in politics - certainly more respectable than socialism, capitalism, sectarianism, nationalism and liberalism. It has nothing to do with fascism or other totalitarian systems of government. But she was talking about it "stalking" Europe like Marx's Communist "spectre" haunting Europe. Populism means governing in the interests of the whole of the populace, not a narrow section of the population. It is firmly committed to democracy, because that is the only mechanism available for delivering the views of the whole populace and reaching a consensus.
The populist response in Europe is a natural consequence of the globalist-PC policies being pursued by the elite. It can only be defeated by undemocratic means - and people like Flanders and Husain fully approve of that attempt to defeat it.
Populism doesn't say the people are always right but it does say the people always have a right to be heard.
It was Stephanie Flanders who said openly that London is a world class city being held back by a second rate country. With Paul Mason on QT and Stephanie on Today, it would seem that reinforcements are being brought in to shore up the BBC's narrative.
I like the analogy - the BBC are throwing every division, every unit into the battle! lol "Everyone of you can do your bit...whether you are an Archers scriptwriter, a football match presenter, a science editor, someone claiming to do impartial Reality Checks...however big or small your role, you must do your duty for Remain...one more push and we will have the enemy on the run." I am imagining Tony Hall as Douglas Haig, oblivious to the damage being done to the men and women under his command, as they lie, lie and lie again to keep us in the EU.
Again today as per usual - Theresa May photographed with a black background is used on this piece:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-41355642
It's a not so subtle subliminal message to show that TM is isolated, in danger of falling into a black hole etc etc.
This exercise will be some Beeboid's claim to fame: " I was the person who never showed our Prime Minister in anything but a bad light". Promotion is probably guaranteed.
Yes - noticeable how the lying Remainiac poster is neatly on display in strong sunlight...and not hint of the spittle-foaming protestor who is probably tasked with holding it. No vote? All expats had a vote as long as they had not lived outside the UK for more than 15 years. Many of those who had lived outside the UK for more than 15 years believe in the UK e.g. ex RAF personnel in Cyprus and would have voted to leave.
I had hoped that Theresa May's speech today would give some confidence to the Leave voters that their majority decision to leave the EU would be respected. We now have the remainder of the two-year article 50 period, followed by an transitional period during which we continue to abide by the rules of the EU.
Who is Theresa the Appeaser trying to cosy up to? Is it her own backbenchers? Is it the BBC and the MSM?, or, Is it the EU who in truth she wishes we weren't leaving?
I think is mostly being done to appease the business community - part of the wider globalist elite decision makers - who will have to make an ajdustment. Personally I can live with two years. Two years is nothing in the life of a nation. But what happens after the transition period? That is the issue. No way can we pay more than Norway or Switzerland (pro rata) for privileged access to the EU. No way can we hand over our fisheries to the EU. No way can we accept free movement or anything like it.
I think I am now understanding the latest BBC tack on Brexit...as we get closer to the inevitable agreement with the EU (which previously the BBC liked to suggest was very doubtful). LK and others are now parrotting the line that it will be "Same Difference". So despite it being very likely that we will see an end to unrestricted free movement of people, the BBC will now be telling us that it will be "just the same - except you won't now have any influence over EU decisions".
Nick Robinson was pushing a similar line too (on Twitter): "So, Brexit now means - paying what we pay now, abiding by same EU rules & allowing in as many EU migrants for 2 years after we Leave in '19?"
Consider the outcome for the UK if Jeremy Corbyn was to become PM. He said at the weekend that he would need two parliamentary terms to carry out his changes.
1. The UK would have to leave the UK and the single market if his plans for nationalisation were to be carried out. - Brexit achieved
2. In light of the TfL decision over the Uber operating licence, under Labour the high tech freedoms of London envied by the world would be curtailed in favour of Union control of key sectors of the economy. This is the reason that so many economic migrants head for London - for the freedom to work and live without state control.
Here is a paradox. If you want to cut immigration of economic migrants, and ensure a full Brexit - Vote Labour.
Compare this, where the defendant has been found guilty - with all the coverage of the 'Neo-Nazi arrests: Serving British soldiers held over terror offences as alleged members of National Action' story recently, which hasn't even come to trial yet.
I should have said - the headline to the story is: 'Stoke imam guilty of supporting Islamic State group'. I wonder which of the 70 or so proscribed banned groups he belongs to. The BBC doesn't say.
The BBC make use of the equivalent of 'a golden hour' during these criminal proceedings against terror suspects. If the story fits their narrative, such as 'Neo-Nazi arrests: Serving British soldiers held over terror offences as alleged members of National Action', then they beat their drum incessantly.
If the story doesn't fit, such as 'Stoke imam guilty of supporting Islamic State group', then they maintain a 'radio silence' hoping not to draw too much attention to the story. After the 'golden hour' when criminal proceedings are underway, they seem to lose interest entirely.
It is basic good journalism practice to follow up a headline, especially if it has been such a big story, to let the readers know the outcome - not at the BBC it isn't!
Jeremy Corbyn has a dilemma. A good many of his party backbenchers want the UK to continue to be in the single market, but now he realises that such a tie-in might prevent him from pushing his left-wing agenda, which was to include nationalisation. He needs the UK to be outside the EU in order to have any chance of succeeding. Let's face it, the Labour party is as split as the Conservatives over Brexit and or future relationship with the EU.
Why aren't the BBC exposing this rift in all its grim reality as they do incessantly with the Conservatives' position on the EU? What we'll see is a throwback to the good old days of 'conference' where they discuss the matter ad nauseam, leaving the outcome as clear as mud.
Let's face it, the 2017 General Election was called over the question of Brexit, so that TM would, as she thought, have the country behind her. The Brexit question was swept under the carpet in favour of the traditional two-party slanging match.
MPs from all sides carried out a deceit upon their constituents, the majority of whom wanted to leave the EU. We can see now what these duplicitous MPs are really about. From both sides, the message is the same - let's find a way to stall the process - a 'transition period' is a good start. I suspect senior Conservatives of wanting to Remain, but paradoxically, I suspect senior Labour MPs need Brexit to happen before they can bring in their left-wing policies.
Corbyn has known for a long time that the EU has prevented the nationalisation agenda, which is why I would put money on him having voted to leave.
I see Moody's have downgraded the UK in part because of loosening the fiscal purse strings. Goodness only knows what it would do if Labour got in. Massive debt, interest rates on the rise and a poor credit rating. Either the country would go down the pan, or more likely the planned spending wouldn't happen and lots of Corbyn supporters would be very disappointed. No wonder he's stopped answering questions.
BBC News R4 last night noted that the AfD is first time the far-right has been in German parliament since the WW2. Good grief.
This morning Today R4 has been along the same theme, AfD continually referred to as far-right. Descendents of Nazis being interviewed to express their horror.
To me it almost seems as long ago as WW2 that the BBC was an impartial news organisation. What has happened in Germany, and elsewhere, is that the established parties became globalists which welcomed mass immigration. A radical position which new parties have to be created in order to oppose.
You got it in one Ozfan. Anyone who opposes the insane globalist policies has necessarily to be described as "far right" whereas in fact they are simply putting forward policies that would have bene entirely uncontroversial even three or four decades ago. Yes there are some real totalitarian Far Righties who exploit this situation but the vast majority of voters are simply voting against gobble-you-up globalism. Apparently it's now illegal to not want to be gobbled up.
Incidentally the Free Democrats were a notorious post war home for far right totalitarians (Narzees) as they had been banned from the SDP and Christian Democrats...so they've definitely been represented in the Bundestag, albeit under a false flag of liberalism.
Caught the end of Today's Labour Love-In....Mishal Husain I think it was, but might be wrong, leading a conversation which was basically "How can we get Labour elected and Brexit stopped?" all conducted in a positive and constructive manner.
Then onto Start the Week...had to laugh hearing Matthew Taylor telling us we were wrong to have considered globalisation as inevitable and we would be wrong to consider technological change as inevitable. What had he sprinkled on his cornflakes I wondered...this is the man who has told us countless times that mass immigration is inevitable and good for us.
The onto Fergal Keane...the poet sometimes mistaken for a journalist. Smiling again as he told us about his fantasist father who seemed to suffer from a bad case of the Blarney who "told a version of the truth"...ah, like father like son, I thought to myself. To be fair though, he is a good writer and story-teller so I quite enjoyed it, and he is certainly right to identify the famine as the key factor in the tragic fracture of the relationship between Ireland and Britain.
On to Woman's Hour. Why is there such a programme in these enlightened times which the BBC is supposed to embrace fully? Why isn't it called Woman and Transgender Hour? Or why isn't there a separate Lesbian, Gay and Intersex Hour?
Oh well, on to a bit of heroine worship as they discussed the sainted Angela. Some criticism though, as she was insufficiently feminist, insufficiently pro-gay marriage, reminded people a bit of Thatcher and might have made a tactical error in letting in one million undocumented migrants...but overall it was very positive in a completely impartial way of course. I don't think Cologne New Year's Eve got a mention. It rarely does and if it does it is never explained in detail. Also had me smiling as I thought of how Trump is often accused by his detractors (ie in the BBC's case every single member of staff without exception)of reacting to TV pictures. We heard Mama Merkel was moved to let in the one million largely unemployable pro-Sharia migrants, some of whom would be IS operatives, because of what she saw on TV as regards events in Budapest.
A feminist mentioned Cologne on Women's Hour several months ago. Nothing about what actually happened, rather she lambasted the 'right wing Islamophobic' reaction to the mass sexual assaults. Amazing, the proverbial Nelsonian eye....
May polls 42% of the vote & takes 2-3 weeks forming a coalition & the BBC says it's a catastrophe; Merkel gets 33-34% of the vote and will need 3 MONTHS to form a coalition & the BBC thinks that's fine. And the difference is...?
Clearly you haven't been on the BBC Common Purpose "Multiculturalism in the Modern World" course...please report to admin and book yourself in. :) Then you will understand this is entirely consistent.
You're quite right MB - I've already denounced myself to the Ministry of Truth & have performed a quick autolobotomy with my Black&Decker, to avoid disrupting their busy schedule.
"It's 7 o'clock on 26th September and this is the Today programme...here are the BBC Meme: Labour are getting ready for government..."
Yep...there are soft interviews and then there is the blancmange the BBC serve up when covering a Labour Conference.
The repeated message is, Labour are now a credible alternative government ready to take over the reins of power and you shouldn't be worried about having a Maoist and a Marxist as your Chancellor and PM for five years (assuming they ever allow another election after 5 years).
And then there was an interview with Naomi Klein (credentials for pontification? - er none except the BBC like her)and a real Corbyn love-in...again one could be forgiven for thinking he had actually won the 2017 election.
The only sunbeam in all this is that it is amusing to reflect on how the Soggy Left BBC types have virtually abandoned their Blair Plus Project and are now having to kowtow to the Labour Hard Left...Do they really think the Hard Left will leave them alone? Of course not - once in power they will be introducing Hard Left values into the BBC.
I don't know if it was my imagination playing tricks, but I could have sworn that Huw Edwards was choking slightly with emotion as he read out the first headline item on the BBC one 10 o'clock news last night - Labour plan to 'take back' PFI schemes. He certainly put on his deepest Welsh Kinnock-esque voice of the valleys, the traditional Labour heartland.
I agree with MB here that since the 2017 GE, the Beeboids believe that election a Labour Government with Corbyn at the helm is possibile if they can all get together and give things a good push.
Yes, there is now definitely a BBC push on. There preferred initial option was to junk Jeremy and get someone like Chuka or Starmer in to defeat Brexit. When that didn't happen they did their best to boost the Lib Dems. The aim was to secure a Labour-Lib Dem coalition the price of which would be a second referendum. When Tiny Tim was clearly not getting traction and Corbyn's Labour started to rise in the polls, it was only then that the BBC really switched to giving them the big up as the least of two evils. Ever since then they have been trying their damnedest to make Labour look electable while at the same time trying to get Labour to switch to an anti-Brexit position. The more Labour has become Brexit-sceptical, the more the BBC has boosted them.
I think however, they would still like to see Corbyn and Co. out. The BBC - certainly its decision makers - aren't really hard left, they are social radicals, soggy left globalists, champagne socialists, elitists. They don't want to see their easily acquired wealth taxed out of existence or comprehensive types with one GCSE being brought into the BBC presenter roles on a quota basis.
Agreed MB, but I think that is where the strategy has come unravelled. Corbyn and Mcdonnell with the wind in their sails need Brexit to happen to carry out their plans.
When John Mcdonnell speaks euphemistically about 'taking back' PFI schemes, he is talking about nothing short of part-nationalisation of the property market. Alarm bells should be sounding - nationalisation of land and property has been a long-held dream of the far-left of the Labour party for as long as I can remember. In the 1970s it was spoken of openly outside as well as within the political establishment.
Equally, to nationalise the railway network even in part would destroy investor confidence and send shock-waves throughout the economy. In which case, London's days as a world-leading financial centre would be numbered. The London loved apparently by the world would quickly become an unmanageable hulk, as its life-blood, investor confidence, drained away.
I'm not sure renationalising the rail network would do that alone. But once Corbyn and Co were in power, the (correct) impression that they were seeking to create a kind of 1950s People's Republic would certainly engender panic among investors who use the City. It's ironic isn't it since the BBC has done nothing but talk up the (largely non-existent) threat to the City from Brexit while appearing to suggest there is absolutely no threat to the City from the election of a Labour government led by a Marxist and a Maoist. Incidentally, I have long believed McDonnell is by far the more dangerous of the two, because of his plausible manner, the clever way he dresses up his extremism as moderation and his lack of interest in the modern PC branding of Labour.
The twist here is that London under a Labour Government without investors and entrepreneurs that have made it a world-leading financial centre would be genuinely dystopian - overcrowded, over-regulated, etc. Brexit and a halt to immigration would have been achieved but at what price?
The immigration of City workers might end but there would be no end to mass immigration under Labour. There would be far more of it as all effective controls were removed. Remember - even the soft Left Labour MPs want to allow in all asylum seekers from France.
I agree - that's just where the dystopian nightmare lies. Since my first post on this, John Mcdonnell has been 'war-gaming' seeking strategies for the time when investors' confidence is damaged, and there is a run on the £. He is already portraying the Labour leadership as the victim, not the aggressor.
Harriet Harman was playing down Laura Kuenssberg’s need for a bodyguard at the Labour Party Conference this morning on Radio 4. Apparently it’s a cross party problem.
Perhaps Laura was about to say that the Labour Party are split from top to bottom over Brexit - just like the Conservatives. 'Better to keep quiet Laura' will have been the thinly veiled threat.
There seems to be some doubt as to whether Kuenssberg has a bodyguard at all.
I am sure all the judicious-minded sceptics on this site won't jump to any conclusions until the assertion of the single, anonymous source cited in The Sun is corroborated by an official source or on any kind of tangible evidentiary basis.
If there is some doubt that Kuenssberg has a bodyguard is does not appeared to be shared by John Mcdonnell, Harriet Harman, The Guardian Newspaper and a considerable number of people at the Labour Party Conference. There certainly is no doubt that she has be subjected to a totally unacceptable amount of harassment from supporters of that “nice” Jeremy Corbyn.
BBC presenters on Today seem to have lost their ability to suggest quotation marks through vocal inflection and their sense of irony (well at least in some cases...when not quoting Trump or Farage for instance). Mishal (why do her colleagues pronounce her name as though it were Michelle BTW?) declared flatly that Labour was the party of working people. It might more accurately be described as the party of students, the unemployed, and single parents. But working people it was... Then John declared the EU was going to become a reformed and far more efficient United States of Europe that the UK would be eager to become part of...again no irony or quote marks in his voice, despite it being a summation of Macron's speech. That said, for the BBC herd, Macron has yet to recover his halo since indulging in that cosy love-in meeting with Trump so his speech was met with a certain scepticism, as is applied to all Trumpophiles.
'Labour is in fact ahead amongst those in work: 4 points ahead amongst those working part time and 6 points ahead amongst those working full time, illustrating how the Conservatives are increasingly relying on the grey retired vote.'
But Labour do NOT have a preponderance of the votes of working people - they have a minority. Other parties combined have the majority. To describe the Conservatives as "the party of the retired" would be defensible on a factual basis as it would be to call Labour "the party of the students". But even then it would unwise I think for an allegedly impartial broadcaster to describe them so at the microphone in flat, matter of fact tones. Would Mishal Husain describe Labour as the "party of Muslims" because a majority of Muslims vote Labour? I think we know the answer to that one don't we...? :)
Time to get into the prediction business. I think AMD Waters is going to win the UK leadership. But I also think the BBC will (a) be gunning full time to lever her out (so expect exposes by John Sweeney or similar and manufactured rows with her enemies within the party) and (b) preventing her from speaking on the BBC's airwaves despite being leader.
6.35p.m. News - Rohingya. A few things to ponder: Why are the refugees struggling along a muddy trail in flip-flops when it runs parallel to a metalled road? Why is everybody so clean - how can they be wearing snowy white, apparently freshly-laundered, robes or shorts? How can the children, grinning mischievously for the camera, be so happy & unaffected by the burning of their villages?
ReplyDeletePerhaps it's because they've been told they are on their way to a better life in Europe.
Shirts, not shorts!
ReplyDeleteAll their men-folk are in Europe already.
ReplyDeleteAs the Brexit process lumbers along, we should be seeing from the BBC and MSM a construct of what post-Brexit Britain should look like. In all the negative and doom-laden reporting about the process, the pessimism of the BBC has prevented us from seeing a vision of a good Brexit - we have only been given the nightmare version.
ReplyDeleteThe Brexit process is already a quarter way through. Please BBC, get out and about. Let's see some of the positive stories of expanding global business and cultural opportunities, such as Dyson's - see 'Accentuate the Negative' from a few days ago. Good headline by the way Craig. London is only a tiny part of the UK (with a big head though) and the UK definitely is much more than just London.
The Remainiac Wreckers don't want us even to imagine such a future. Their mind-bending is all about planting the idea that it shouldn't happen because it will be a disaster. You wouldn't think we were experiencing a UK manufacturing export boom would you? - well not if you got your news from the BBC only.
Deletehttp://www.telegraph.co.uk/business/2017/09/04/construction-industry-dips-one-year-low-new-orders-dry/
Because so much of the business and cultural wealth of the UK is held in London, it must be easy for the BBC and MSM when considering the identity of the UK after Brexit just to forget about the other 60 million or so of us who don't live and work there. London is not the be all and end all of wealth creation - though an outside observer would be hard pressed to discern that fact from the BBC.
ReplyDeleteI should have added .... Because so much of the business and cultural wealth of the UK is held on behalf of the nation in London... though not created there, ... it must be easy for the BBC and MSM when considering the identity of the UK after Brexit just to forget about the other 60 million or so of us who don't live and work there.
DeleteBy the way, I don't count the odd jolly down to Brighton as 'getting out and about'.
London is essentially a huge money laundering operation...recycling ill-gotten gains from oligarchs around the globe and also a huge welfare sponge, sucking wealth out of the rest of the country. The BBC likes to promote the idea that the rest of the country is utterly dependent on London.
DeleteTo most people in the UK, London is a foreign country, but to the Westminster MSM BBC elite, London is the greatest city in the world, and doesn't need the rest of the UK dragging them down like a millstone around their necks.
DeleteWhen the majority of the UK voted Leave the EU in the 2016 Referendum, the reality dawned, bringing with it a severe depressive effect. Ever since, and even now, the BBC and possibly a good many the Westminster MPs are trying to set the clock back to the position before the vote when the elite thought that their position was impregnable.
The Leave vote contained a message from the majority of voters who wanted a shake-up of the London elite, bringing some measure of accountability back to the licence payers and constituents. What we are seeing is a continuing defiance of the electorate.
I was shocked by something I heard on Woman's Hour this morning. During a trivial and trite item on advice-giving two women laughed over the time one of them hit a baby's head against a table because she'd had too much wine...really, on the BBC...women being encouraged to laugh about something like that. I think one of them said "At least you didn't drop it..." The BBC really don't care who gets hurt in the name of female "empowerment". Can you imagine them broadcasting a piece where two mean shared a similar confession.
ReplyDeletemean = men
DeleteWe can just about accept the BBC being in our faces over certain issues such as racial discrimination, LBGT rights, inclusivity, disabled people's rights and so on. But, the two most serious items on the news agenda, which are: Islamic terrorism and the wider threat from Islam to the stability of our way of life, and Brexit and what future we should be working towards having left the EU. These are matters that the BBC refuses to face up to. They can only peddle their own wish-list, which does not find much sympathy from the UK electorate at large. It's time for a new wave of forward thinkers to take over from the tired lot such as MM.
ReplyDeleteIt is revealing of an arrogant, self-serving elite that the two issues that the BBC most ignores are the same ones that the Government also wishes us to ignore (viz. the risks of Islam and the opportunities after Brexit).
DeleteIt is to be hoped that Theresa May does not go down in history as the British Prime Minister who fouled up Brexit and left us with the worst instead of the best of both worlds and also, who turned a blind eye towards the risks of Islamic attrition towards the UK.
DeleteWho supports Bexit? - not one hand went up!
ReplyDeletehttp://news-watch.co.uk/new-bbc-drive-for-onscreen-diversity-swamps-need-for-brexit-impartiality/
If this is the mindset of these senior execs in the BBC and MSM, can we hold out any realistic hope that anti Brexit biased reporting will stop any time soon? - it looks doubtful and the answer is probably No!
Seems OFCOM is the BBC, and the BBC is OFCOM. Cosy.
DeleteIt's inevitable when the top rungs of the BBC career ladder are occupied by ageing left-wing incumbents, that any younger aspiring career broadcaster would bite his/her tongue rather than being seen to step out of line - especially in public, and in an alien uncontrolled environment.
DeleteThat 'not one hand went up' is more a sign of the stranglehold that the BBC hold over their staff, with their insistence that they all stick to the narrative, than anything else. Even the cleverest statistician could not wangle 100% opposition to Brexit in this group.
Petition to scrap TV licence hits 235,000 supporters as BBC airs comment linking Farage to Polish man’s death.
ReplyDeletehttps://you.38degrees.org.uk/petitions/end-the-bbc-licence-fee
Two items of note, totally biased report on this mornings Today on Radio 4; gushing about the universal popularity of "Mutti" (merkel) in the German elections, dismissing any opposition to her as "extreme right", but then I suppose a foreign election doesn't count.
ReplyDeleteAlso suspicious near silence on events in Catalonia, arrests of regional politicians, seizures of documents, all by one of our liberal EU friends and allies (and probably the rightful guardians of our downtrodden colony of Gibraltar).
Oh wait Newsnight seems to be covering it...
From BBBC: https://biasedbbc.org/blog/2017/09/21/mo-or-less-2/
ReplyDeleteWe are told that Mohammad including its variant spellings is now the most popular boy's name in the UK. Was this reported on the BBC News website? - No!
What was reported was a reference to the now unpopular name of Nigel, and the use of that 'news' to take a swipe at Nigel Farage by subtly mocking his name.
This is the equivalent of featuring the .0001% and ignoring the 99.9999%. (I made up the %ages by the way).
All we can do is to keep logging the BBC narrative day by day just to show how pitiful their reporting standards are, and how political opinion is pedalled under the guise of news.
Perhaps viewers reacted to 'racist', 'xenophobic' Monty Don's naming of his dog Nigel?
DeleteHere's a little gem tucked away on the Business part of the BBC News website:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-41330813
Retail sales up?
Q. Why isn't this given much publicity?
A. Because it doesn't suit the BBC narrative!
Indeed - for the same reason they haven't given much publicity to a huge rise in VAT receipts, a reduction in borrowing requirement and a big surge in manufacturing exports...because the narrrative is that Brexit is a disaster.
DeleteHad the misfortune to listen to a large chunk of Today on the radio this morning presided over by the deadly duo of Mishal Husain and Stephanie Flanders (back on the BBC payroll???).
ReplyDeleteThe levels of pro-EU, pro-German, pro-Merkel, pro-migration, anti-populism bias were ludicrously off the scale. Who do they get to give us the low down on St Angela - why, our very own Neil Macgregor, who is being paid shed loads of money by Mrs Merkel to create a rival to the British Museum.
According to Macgregor the wonderful Mama Merkel epitomises stability for all Germans.
The reality is that Merkel's party is supported by perhaps one in four at most German voters (her party is scoring about 36% out of those who are likely to vote). 75% do not support her. Listening to Today you would imagine her open borders abberation bringing in a million migrants had been a great success, not that 95% of the "refugees" have not found meaningful employment and 90% want to bring over more "dependents" of various kinds. Or that the total annual net bill to the state is well over £10 billion (and growing) by now.
They were all at it. The business correspondent was cooing about Germany's marvellous economy...well as someone once said, the EU is a German racket, as the French have found to their cost. It would be odd if their economy wasn't doing well out of the rigged exchange rates and domination of its banking system.
Stephanie was quite clearly biased against populism. Populism has a long and respectable history in politics - certainly more respectable than socialism, capitalism, sectarianism, nationalism and liberalism. It has nothing to do with fascism or other totalitarian systems of government. But she was talking about it "stalking" Europe like Marx's Communist "spectre" haunting Europe. Populism means governing in the interests of the whole of the populace, not a narrow section of the population. It is firmly committed to democracy, because that is the only mechanism available for delivering the views of the whole populace and reaching a consensus.
The populist response in Europe is a natural consequence of the globalist-PC policies being pursued by the elite. It can only be defeated by undemocratic means - and people like Flanders and Husain fully approve of that attempt to defeat it.
Populism doesn't say the people are always right but it does say the people always have a right to be heard.
It was Stephanie Flanders who said openly that London is a world class city being held back by a second rate country. With Paul Mason on QT and Stephanie on Today, it would seem that reinforcements are being brought in to shore up the BBC's narrative.
ReplyDeleteI like the analogy - the BBC are throwing every division, every unit into the battle! lol "Everyone of you can do your bit...whether you are an Archers scriptwriter, a football match presenter, a science editor, someone claiming to do impartial Reality Checks...however big or small your role, you must do your duty for Remain...one more push and we will have the enemy on the run." I am imagining Tony Hall as Douglas Haig, oblivious to the damage being done to the men and women under his command, as they lie, lie and lie again to keep us in the EU.
DeleteAgain today as per usual - Theresa May photographed with a black background is used on this piece:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-41355642
It's a not so subtle subliminal message to show that TM is isolated, in danger of falling into a black hole etc etc.
This exercise will be some Beeboid's claim to fame: " I was the person who never showed our Prime Minister in anything but a bad light". Promotion is probably guaranteed.
Yes - noticeable how the lying Remainiac poster is neatly on display in strong sunlight...and not hint of the spittle-foaming protestor who is probably tasked with holding it. No vote? All expats had a vote as long as they had not lived outside the UK for more than 15 years. Many of those who had lived outside the UK for more than 15 years believe in the UK e.g. ex RAF personnel in Cyprus and would have voted to leave.
DeleteI had hoped that Theresa May's speech today would give some confidence to the Leave voters that their majority decision to leave the EU would be respected. We now have the remainder of the two-year article 50 period, followed by an transitional period during which we continue to abide by the rules of the EU.
ReplyDeleteWho is Theresa the Appeaser trying to cosy up to? Is it her own backbenchers? Is it the BBC and the MSM?, or, Is it the EU who in truth she wishes we weren't leaving?
I think is mostly being done to appease the business community - part of the wider globalist elite decision makers - who will have to make an ajdustment. Personally I can live with two years. Two years is nothing in the life of a nation. But what happens after the transition period? That is the issue. No way can we pay more than Norway or Switzerland (pro rata) for privileged access to the EU. No way can we hand over our fisheries to the EU. No way can we accept free movement or anything like it.
DeleteThe 'appeasement' is crucial unless the economy is to be completely destroyed.
DeleteI think I am now understanding the latest BBC tack on Brexit...as we get closer to the inevitable agreement with the EU (which previously the BBC liked to suggest was very doubtful). LK and others are now parrotting the line that it will be "Same Difference". So despite it being very likely that we will see an end to unrestricted free movement of people, the BBC will now be telling us that it will be "just the same - except you won't now have any influence over EU decisions".
ReplyDeleteNick Robinson was pushing a similar line too (on Twitter): "So, Brexit now means - paying what we pay now, abiding by same EU rules & allowing in as many EU migrants for 2 years after we Leave in '19?"
DeleteWe might see Nick Robinson's true colours. Shouldn't he be ecstatic because the Brexit process can, with a few more tweaks, be put on permanent hold?
DeleteOr, is the real prize the downfall of Theresa May and the Conservative Government - to be replaced by Corbyn and his far-left supporters?
Time will tell.
Consider the outcome for the UK if Jeremy Corbyn was to become PM. He said at the weekend that he would need two parliamentary terms to carry out his changes.
Delete1. The UK would have to leave the UK and the single market if his plans for nationalisation were to be carried out. - Brexit achieved
2. In light of the TfL decision over the Uber operating licence, under Labour the high tech freedoms of London envied by the world would be curtailed in favour of Union control of key sectors of the economy. This is the reason that so many economic migrants head for London - for the freedom to work and live without state control.
Here is a paradox. If you want to cut immigration of economic migrants, and ensure a full Brexit - Vote Labour.
1. ...The UK would have to leave the EU...
DeleteAnother story tucked well away from the front pages of the BBC News website:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-stoke-staffordshire-41366446
Compare this, where the defendant has been found guilty - with all the coverage of the 'Neo-Nazi arrests: Serving British soldiers held over terror offences as alleged members of National Action' story recently, which hasn't even come to trial yet.
I should have said - the headline to the story is: 'Stoke imam guilty of supporting Islamic State group'. I wonder which of the 70 or so proscribed banned groups he belongs to. The BBC doesn't say.
DeleteThe BBC make use of the equivalent of 'a golden hour' during these criminal proceedings against terror suspects. If the story fits their narrative, such as 'Neo-Nazi arrests: Serving British soldiers held over terror offences as alleged members of National Action', then they beat their drum incessantly.
DeleteIf the story doesn't fit, such as 'Stoke imam guilty of supporting Islamic State group', then they maintain a 'radio silence' hoping not to draw too much attention to the story. After the 'golden hour' when criminal proceedings are underway, they seem to lose interest entirely.
It is basic good journalism practice to follow up a headline, especially if it has been such a big story, to let the readers know the outcome - not at the BBC it isn't!
Jeremy Corbyn has a dilemma. A good many of his party backbenchers want the UK to continue to be in the single market, but now he realises that such a tie-in might prevent him from pushing his left-wing agenda, which was to include nationalisation. He needs the UK to be outside the EU in order to have any chance of succeeding. Let's face it, the Labour party is as split as the Conservatives over Brexit and or future relationship with the EU.
ReplyDeleteWhy aren't the BBC exposing this rift in all its grim reality as they do incessantly with the Conservatives' position on the EU? What we'll see is a throwback to the good old days of 'conference' where they discuss the matter ad nauseam, leaving the outcome as clear as mud.
Let's face it, the 2017 General Election was called over the question of Brexit, so that TM would, as she thought, have the country behind her. The Brexit question was swept under the carpet in favour of the traditional two-party slanging match.
MPs from all sides carried out a deceit upon their constituents, the majority of whom wanted to leave the EU. We can see now what these duplicitous MPs are really about. From both sides, the message is the same - let's find a way to stall the process - a 'transition period' is a good start. I suspect senior Conservatives of wanting to Remain, but paradoxically, I suspect senior Labour MPs need Brexit to happen before they can bring in their left-wing policies.
From Guido - Labour to Officially Ignore Brexit at Conference
DeleteThe BBC has for over 30 years loved to talk about "torysplitzovereurope" rather than the details of the evolving EEC/EC/EU undemocratic superstate.
DeleteCorbyn has known for a long time that the EU has prevented the nationalisation agenda, which is why I would put money on him having voted to leave.
DeleteI see Moody's have downgraded the UK in part because of loosening the fiscal purse strings. Goodness only knows what it would do if Labour got in. Massive debt, interest rates on the rise and a poor credit rating. Either the country would go down the pan, or more likely the planned spending wouldn't happen and lots of Corbyn supporters would be very disappointed. No wonder he's stopped answering questions.
BBC News R4 last night noted that the AfD is first time the far-right has been in German parliament since the WW2. Good grief.
ReplyDeleteThis morning Today R4 has been along the same theme, AfD continually referred to as far-right. Descendents of Nazis being interviewed to express their horror.
To me it almost seems as long ago as WW2 that the BBC was an impartial news organisation. What has happened in Germany, and elsewhere, is that the established parties became globalists which welcomed mass immigration. A radical position which new parties have to be created in order to oppose.
You got it in one Ozfan. Anyone who opposes the insane globalist policies has necessarily to be described as "far right" whereas in fact they are simply putting forward policies that would have bene entirely uncontroversial even three or four decades ago. Yes there are some real totalitarian Far Righties who exploit this situation but the vast majority of voters are simply voting against gobble-you-up globalism. Apparently it's now illegal to not want to be gobbled up.
DeleteIncidentally the Free Democrats were a notorious post war home for far right totalitarians (Narzees) as they had been banned from the SDP and Christian Democrats...so they've definitely been represented in the Bundestag, albeit under a false flag of liberalism.
My Radio 4 listening today...
ReplyDeleteCaught the end of Today's Labour Love-In....Mishal Husain I think it was, but might be wrong, leading a conversation which was basically "How can we get Labour elected and Brexit stopped?" all conducted in a positive and constructive manner.
Then onto Start the Week...had to laugh hearing Matthew Taylor telling us we were wrong to have considered globalisation as inevitable and we would be wrong to consider technological change as inevitable. What had he sprinkled on his cornflakes I wondered...this is the man who has told us countless times that mass immigration is inevitable and good for us.
The onto Fergal Keane...the poet sometimes mistaken for a journalist. Smiling again as he told us about his fantasist father who seemed to suffer from a bad case of the Blarney who "told a version of the truth"...ah, like father like son, I thought to myself. To be fair though, he is a good writer and story-teller so I quite enjoyed it, and he is certainly right to identify the famine as the key factor in the tragic fracture of the relationship between Ireland and Britain.
On to Woman's Hour. Why is there such a programme in these enlightened times which the BBC is supposed to embrace fully? Why isn't it called Woman and Transgender Hour? Or why isn't there a separate Lesbian, Gay and Intersex Hour?
Oh well, on to a bit of heroine worship as they discussed the sainted Angela. Some criticism though, as she was insufficiently feminist, insufficiently pro-gay marriage, reminded people a bit of Thatcher and might have made a tactical error in letting in one million undocumented migrants...but overall it was very positive in a completely impartial way of course. I don't think Cologne New Year's Eve got a mention. It rarely does and if it does it is never explained in detail. Also had me smiling as I thought of how Trump is often accused by his detractors (ie in the BBC's case every single member of staff without exception)of reacting to TV pictures. We heard Mama Merkel was moved to let in the one million largely unemployable pro-Sharia migrants, some of whom would be IS operatives, because of what she saw on TV as regards events in Budapest.
A feminist mentioned Cologne on Women's Hour several months ago. Nothing about what actually happened, rather she lambasted the 'right wing Islamophobic' reaction to the mass sexual assaults. Amazing, the proverbial Nelsonian eye....
DeleteMay polls 42% of the vote & takes 2-3 weeks forming a coalition & the BBC says it's a catastrophe; Merkel gets 33-34% of the vote and will need 3 MONTHS to form a coalition & the BBC thinks that's fine. And the difference is...?
ReplyDeleteClearly you haven't been on the BBC Common Purpose "Multiculturalism in the Modern World" course...please report to admin and book yourself in. :) Then you will understand this is entirely consistent.
DeleteYou're quite right MB - I've already denounced myself to the Ministry of Truth & have performed a quick autolobotomy with my Black&Decker, to avoid disrupting their busy schedule.
DeleteGood, you can now apply for a job on BBC Breakfast Time or any of their regional news programmes.
DeleteThanks to Biased BBC for highlighting this...
ReplyDeletehttps://twitter.com/NeilGarratt/status/912213970794270722/photo/1
Looks like some of our intellectuals might at last be waking up to the terrible assault on free speech and culture that is taking place in the UK.
There are no examples of an assault on free speech in that article.
DeleteMany is the debate these days when a speaker is stripped naked, flayed alive, eye gouged and burned. Apparently.
Delete"It's 7 o'clock on 26th September and this is the Today programme...here are the BBC Meme: Labour are getting ready for government..."
ReplyDeleteYep...there are soft interviews and then there is the blancmange the BBC serve up when covering a Labour Conference.
The repeated message is, Labour are now a credible alternative government ready to take over the reins of power and you shouldn't be worried about having a Maoist and a Marxist as your Chancellor and PM for five years (assuming they ever allow another election after 5 years).
And then there was an interview with Naomi Klein (credentials for pontification? - er none except the BBC like her)and a real Corbyn love-in...again one could be forgiven for thinking he had actually won the 2017 election.
The only sunbeam in all this is that it is amusing to reflect on how the Soggy Left BBC types have virtually abandoned their Blair Plus Project and are now having to kowtow to the Labour Hard Left...Do they really think the Hard Left will leave them alone? Of course not - once in power they will be introducing Hard Left values into the BBC.
I don't know if it was my imagination playing tricks, but I could have sworn that Huw Edwards was choking slightly with emotion as he read out the first headline item on the BBC one 10 o'clock news last night - Labour plan to 'take back' PFI schemes. He certainly put on his deepest Welsh Kinnock-esque voice of the valleys, the traditional Labour heartland.
DeleteI agree with MB here that since the 2017 GE, the Beeboids believe that election a Labour Government with Corbyn at the helm is possibile if they can all get together and give things a good push.
Yes, there is now definitely a BBC push on. There preferred initial option was to junk Jeremy and get someone like Chuka or Starmer in to defeat Brexit. When that didn't happen they did their best to boost the Lib Dems. The aim was to secure a Labour-Lib Dem coalition the price of which would be a second referendum. When Tiny Tim was clearly not getting traction and Corbyn's Labour started to rise in the polls, it was only then that the BBC really switched to giving them the big up as the least of two evils. Ever since then they have been trying their damnedest to make Labour look electable while at the same time trying to get Labour to switch to an anti-Brexit position. The more Labour has become Brexit-sceptical, the more the BBC has boosted them.
DeleteI think however, they would still like to see Corbyn and Co. out. The BBC - certainly its decision makers - aren't really hard left, they are social radicals, soggy left globalists, champagne socialists, elitists. They don't want to see their easily acquired wealth taxed out of existence or comprehensive types with one GCSE being brought into the BBC presenter roles on a quota basis.
Agreed MB, but I think that is where the strategy has come unravelled. Corbyn and Mcdonnell with the wind in their sails need Brexit to happen to carry out their plans.
DeleteWhen John Mcdonnell speaks euphemistically about 'taking back' PFI schemes, he is talking about nothing short of part-nationalisation of the property market. Alarm bells should be sounding - nationalisation of land and property has been a long-held dream of the far-left of the Labour party for as long as I can remember. In the 1970s it was spoken of openly outside as well as within the political establishment.
ReplyDeleteEqually, to nationalise the railway network even in part would destroy investor confidence and send shock-waves throughout the economy. In which case, London's days as a world-leading financial centre would be numbered. The London loved apparently by the world would quickly become an unmanageable hulk, as its life-blood, investor confidence, drained away.
I'm not sure renationalising the rail network would do that alone. But once Corbyn and Co were in power, the (correct) impression that they were seeking to create a kind of 1950s People's Republic would certainly engender panic among investors who use the City. It's ironic isn't it since the BBC has done nothing but talk up the (largely non-existent) threat to the City from Brexit while appearing to suggest there is absolutely no threat to the City from the election of a Labour government led by a Marxist and a Maoist. Incidentally, I have long believed McDonnell is by far the more dangerous of the two, because of his plausible manner, the clever way he dresses up his extremism as moderation and his lack of interest in the modern PC branding of Labour.
DeleteThe twist here is that London under a Labour Government without investors and entrepreneurs that have made it a world-leading financial centre would be genuinely dystopian - overcrowded, over-regulated, etc. Brexit and a halt to immigration would have been achieved but at what price?
DeleteThe immigration of City workers might end but there would be no end to mass immigration under Labour. There would be far more of it as all effective controls were removed. Remember - even the soft Left Labour MPs want to allow in all asylum seekers from France.
DeleteI agree - that's just where the dystopian nightmare lies. Since my first post on this, John Mcdonnell has been 'war-gaming' seeking strategies for the time when investors' confidence is damaged, and there is a run on the £. He is already portraying the Labour leadership as the victim, not the aggressor.
DeleteHarriet Harman was playing down Laura Kuenssberg’s need for a bodyguard at the Labour Party Conference this morning on Radio 4. Apparently it’s a cross party problem.
ReplyDeletePerhaps Laura was about to say that the Labour Party are split from top to bottom over Brexit - just like the Conservatives. 'Better to keep quiet Laura' will have been the thinly veiled threat.
DeleteGentle tap of the forearm and whisper in the shell-like per QT, or more a 'Duck, Sniper! was Hillary's imagination love. It may not always be'?
DeleteThere seems to be some doubt as to whether Kuenssberg has a bodyguard at all.
ReplyDeleteI am sure all the judicious-minded sceptics on this site won't jump to any conclusions until the assertion of the single, anonymous source cited in The Sun is corroborated by an official source or on any kind of tangible evidentiary basis.
If there is some doubt that Kuenssberg has a bodyguard is does not appeared to be shared by John Mcdonnell, Harriet Harman, The Guardian Newspaper and a considerable number of people at the Labour Party Conference. There certainly is no doubt that she has be subjected to a totally unacceptable amount of harassment from supporters of that “nice” Jeremy Corbyn.
DeleteBBC presenters on Today seem to have lost their ability to suggest quotation marks through vocal inflection and their sense of irony (well at least in some cases...when not quoting Trump or Farage for instance). Mishal (why do her colleagues pronounce her name as though it were Michelle BTW?) declared flatly that Labour was the party of working people. It might more accurately be described as the party of students, the unemployed, and single parents. But working people it was... Then John declared the EU was going to become a reformed and far more efficient United States of Europe that the UK would be eager to become part of...again no irony or quote marks in his voice, despite it being a summation of Macron's speech. That said, for the BBC herd, Macron has yet to recover his halo since indulging in that cosy love-in meeting with Trump so his speech was met with a certain scepticism, as is applied to all Trumpophiles.
ReplyDeleteOne could just as easily and lazily say that the Tories are the party of the retired.
Deletehttps://yougov.co.uk/news/2017/06/13/how-britain-voted-2017-general-election/
Delete2017 election by employment stats:
'Labour is in fact ahead amongst those in work: 4 points ahead amongst those working part time and 6 points ahead amongst those working full time, illustrating how the Conservatives are increasingly relying on the grey retired vote.'
But Labour do NOT have a preponderance of the votes of working people - they have a minority. Other parties combined have the majority. To describe the Conservatives as "the party of the retired" would be defensible on a factual basis as it would be to call Labour "the party of the students". But even then it would unwise I think for an allegedly impartial broadcaster to describe them so at the microphone in flat, matter of fact tones. Would Mishal Husain describe Labour as the "party of Muslims" because a majority of Muslims vote Labour? I think we know the answer to that one don't we...? :)
DeleteYes, I forgot the important point you were making about tone of voice.
DeleteFull marks for bringing it round to Muslims, though.
Time to get into the prediction business. I think AMD Waters is going to win the UK leadership. But I also think the BBC will (a) be gunning full time to lever her out (so expect exposes by John Sweeney or similar and manufactured rows with her enemies within the party) and (b) preventing her from speaking on the BBC's airwaves despite being leader.
ReplyDeleteIs this the Labour Party website?
ReplyDeletehttp://www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/uk-politics-41385169
It might as well be. Let's remember this and compare and contrast with the equivalent page for May's speech when it comes.