Who better to get you in a festive Christmassy mood than Nabila Ramdani on Sky Press Review? - that smoking volcano of suppressed anger and contempt (about what?, for whom? you ask - don't ask for whom the bell tolls!!!)...She's straight in undermining the British Army but with a bit more "on the one hand, on the other" (has she been on a course? - she didn't used to try that Fake Impartiality Balance - FIB for short).
Having not seen her for several months, I was worried she had dropped off the radar. She may have had a wobbly over Syria...the MSM narrative would not be hers I imagine and perhaps she was sent to sit on the naughty step... Anyway she's back and I like to watch her, pondering what passions rage within her...the equivalent of staring at the Sun, imagining the broiling hot gases churning, spiralling to the surface...
She's off on the Nazamin story in Iran (or hostage story as I would describe it)...How can I put this?...not a great deal of empathy on display, and quite a bit of emphasis on the Iranian government's charges against their hostage, something the UK media generally avoids focussing on too much for obvious reasons. The pleasant Dia Chakrabarty showed her how empathy is done when it came to her turn. Perhaps Nabila needs to go on an empathy course?
I saw that Sky press preview last night and was baffled as to who she was and where they had got her. She had her head down while speaking and seemed to have a problem with speaking English.
You should see her when she's really angry! - a sight to behold.
Perhaps she was raised by wolves? Might explain the lack of eye contact and language development - and the sense she's sizing up for supper all those around her.
Nothing on the BBC website about the PA gun attack on Police in the USA at multiple locations - now confirmed as a terror attack. The Egyptian migrant got in via chain migration, no doubt on some bogus pretext.
The BBC is determined to "boil the frog"...important to do it in imperceptible stages, lest the critter leap free...
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-42329014
Looks like the BBC is gearing up for a nice Fake News New Year. From the article:
"The murder rate in most countries has fallen significantly in the past 15 years. That's the reality, but most people don't believe it - fewer than one in 10 thinks there are fewer murders"
Most people are probably thinking "murderous attacks" by gun, acid, knife or arson. The truth is that even in poor countries people now survive murderous attacks if they can be got to a hospital quick enough.
"Deaths from terrorist attacks around the world were lower in the past 15 years than in the previous 15 - but only a fifth of us think that's the case"
Well whoopee-doopee. If you are looking worldwide what is being included? Most Brits will be answering this from the viewpoint of the UK and will feel there has been a huge rise in terrorist plots.
Ask the question the way you want them answered and you will get the answers you desire. :)
Incidentally...let's not forget the BBC is doing its bit to raise the level of deaths from gun and knife crime by publicising grime music with overtly violent and threatening lyrics (on Radio 1 Extra especially). Ironically the BBC - the ultimate "safe space" - is making our public spaces less safe, especially for young men from certain backgrounds.
The BBC love to cover news from the USA in even more detail than some parts of the UK. So I was more than a little surprised to discover that this had passed them by...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IfSFLCOeU3c
It appears that the Sainted Hillary (unlike all other former Secretaries of State) refused to be interviewed by the Freedom of Information Inspector General.
Surely the BBC should cover this if only to debunk it as Fake News and to reassure the snowflakes that Hillary's Halo is intact?
Heard some of WATO today. A very confused item on Jo Johnson "free speech" speech, not helped that it was overseen by "Joke Journalist" Jonny Diamond (the guy who turned news reporting into a comedy gig, albeit not a very good one, when he literally made stuff up about Trump and put it out on BBC News - not a problem apparently because it was, allegedly, "funny").
Diamond's liberal use of the C word as in "controversial" completely muddied the waters. We know for the BBC that patriotism, opposition to mass immigration, and and the belief that gender differences are grounded in biology and evolution, are "controversial" despite them being what most people in the country favour.
So having peppered his questions with controversial when he asking about banning of a pro-Israel speaker one naturally assumed that he was putting being in favour of the continued existence of Israel in the "controversial" category.
BTW, Christmas seems to be a time when it allows itself a bit of nostalgic belief in fundamental gender differences. There was MacIntyre on his prog which included Bill Bailey, and that was followed by Lee Mack in Not Going Out. The comedy (not their best I have to say but passable) was very strongly based in the idea of fundamental differences between male and female perceptions of the world. The audiences seemed to respond warmly to the jokes based on those perceived differences. But, by New Year, I am sure the BBC will have its po face back on. I can just here Jenni Murray's beguiling introduction: "Now - did you have a lovely traditional Christmas with the family sat on the sofa gathered around the warm glow of the TV watching some much loved comedy, as in the good old days of the sixties and seventies?...OR - were you secretly groaning inside...feeling more than a little bilious at the very sexist nature of the comedy on offer over what should be the fesitve season? Joining me today is Uma Less, professor of TV Comedy at the University of Righton...
Indeed! You know the Lesses? There is a third - Ruth - Professor of Combined Feminist, Transgender, Media, and Privilege Studies at the Qatari and Chinese funded "Emir Farzi - Mao Ze Dong" International Friendship Research Unit at the University of London. She is publisher of the seminal work "Melanin Deficient Men Must Die, But Slowly and Painfully".
A huge family. Penny appears regularly on Woman's Hour bemoaning the many degrees of inequality (if you haven't heard today's 'issue', just force yourself to listen to a bit of it, it's a treat. White men are a real problem according to Garvey, even though a lot of them contribute to her overblown wage). Penny and Relent have their claws out for the patriarchy. Speech rarely makes an appearance, alas. Whereas Guile features with alarming frequency on QT.
Spirit, Frivo and Spine have formed a sexual / political / philosophical intersectional ska group. Spine plays the drums, Spirit sings in that modern mumble I so love, and Frivo has haircuts, does whatever he feels like and taps a tambourine. They aren't very good.
I did not have any BBC on Christmas Day. It's my favourite day of the year, so didn't want to risk spoiling it.
However doing some tidying up this morning I turned on R4 and ... it was Moaners Hour being introduced by Jane Garvey ... "Well, you've survived this far" moaned Jane about Christmas before describing a line-up of divisive anti-family, feminist moaning with the promise of special Christmas transgender racial moaning to finish the program.
I switched-off and haven't had any more BBC all day.
But as yet, not space for the YouGov poll showing a huge lead for leaving the EU among voters.
Given YouGov is a BBC Favourite and were six points wrong in Remain's favour on their eve of referendum poll, I think we can say that is a pretty clear result.
But though they are a BBC favourite, so far no mention...perhaps those somnolescent BBC journos we see in front of their computer screens have yet to recover from a surfeit of nut cutlet at Christmas?
You mean in 2010? Yes,he campaigned for a simple "in-out" referendum (probably through craven fear of UKIP's impact in Sheffield would be my guess). He seemed to think it was simple enough then. But you're right the BBC never ask him any hard questions about that.
On a day when Lewis Hamilton is forced to apologise for being somewhat nonplussed at the sight of his nephew in a princess dress, I turned on the radio to hear Jenni Murray informing us, in her unpleasantly prurient social worker voice, that masculinity has to change. Frankly, I’m not even sure what that means, other than just another part of life that the PC left want to control. A simplification it may be, but basically militant feminists want to be men (when it suits them), but they don’t want men to be men.
I’m still looking for a term that accurately describes the PC left, who despite their own description of themselves, are neither progressive nor liberal.
JM is a complete hypocrite. I've read stuff by her* defending her sons' rugby playing and the fact she went to matches to support them playing. You couldn't get much more masculine than male rugby, or an activity more needlessly damaging of young male bodies in fact, (apart from war). And what did Jenni think they did after the matches? Quilt making?
There the BBC makes the following demonstrably Fake Claim:
"Opinion - BBC News itself is impartial and does not offer opinions but we do sometimes publish expressions of personal views by outside experts, advocating ideas and drawing conclusions based on the author's interpretation of facts and data"
These could be shown to be false by any number of examples but this one will do:
If the BBC really can't see this is an opinion piece entered under the "News" section, then that equally shows its bias through its (left-liberal slanted inability to distinguish fact from opinion.
'Bishop of Liverpool criticises Christian Trump supporters'
Needless to say, the report comes via a Guardian interview with Paul Bayes, the Bishop of Liverpool. It is unusual for the BBC to report on matters of the Anglican Church, but in this case, the anti Trump angle wins out, pushing up into headline position.
There must be some 'empathy' between the C of E, the BBC and the Guardian on this - what a surprise! Naturally, the empathy isn't with the upholding of Christianity against the impending growth of Islam in the UK, but with US party politics - a subject the the BBC cannot leave alone, and for which they would use any ammunition available to them.
I saw the following in the BBC article you just referenced:
"A travel ban currently prevents nationals of Chad, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Syria and Yemen from entering the US."
This is simply untrue. It would be true to say that entry from those countries is now subject to very strict vetting. However, on a case by case basis American consuls can approve entry to the USA for individuals.
I decided this fits MB's festive fifty, No. 50 Bias by Absorption. Here the BBC swallow hook line and sinker a Guardian interview with Paul Bayes, the Bishop of Liverpool, without question, allowing fermentation of anti Trump sentiment from within to amplify a second-hand borrowed story.
Talking of things festive, I've just chortled my way through my annual stocking-filler treat of unpublished letters to the Daily Telegraph, this year called, 'Did Anyone Else See That Coming...? To give you just two examples, there's this: "SIR- 'On the BBC (viewers) will often hear people they disagree with saying things they do not like,' says Nick Robinson, quite reasonably. However, if they support UKIP, Israel, Brexit, grammar schools etc. They will rarely, if ever, hear people they agree with saying things they like.'...and things like this,
'SIR - The blame lies with the BBC for feeding Laura Kuenssberg on live wasps, the last of which she has not finished chewing as she goes on air. When she is to question anyone in Cabinet, they throw in a hornet.' "
So come on fellow ITBBCB? bloggers, own up! - which of you has been writing to the Telegraph under the pseudonyms of 'B.T.WALL & G.P.Brown?
Given the BBC News website treats us to all sorts of Trumpophobic minutitiae on its US/Canada page, and given the huge number of correspondents it has covering the US, it's odd isn't it they can't find space for this important story:
The Anthony Weiner-Huma Abedin-Hillary Clinton link is being made apparent and I think it is also shedding light on Comey's odd behaviour during the campaign...it is probably the NYPD investigation that forced him into CYA mode.
These documents were released mid Friday afternoon. Still the BBC has failed to follow up this huge story on its US-Canada page. I think one can only conclude they are in full Clinton Protection Mode...of course they are always in full Clinton Protection Mode (!) but here they are prepared to put their own reputation as a news agency on the line in service of that CPM requirement.
Like the BBC I am becoming a bit US-obsessed at the moment!
Not since the American Presidential election have I visited so many "far right", "conspiracist" and "Fake News" sites...back in 2016 that was how I knew not to trust the BBC's take on the American election: I realised thanks to those sites that (a) the polls were effectively rigged (b) the media was covering for Hillary and (c) there was a huge groundswell of support for Trump...which was why I thought Trump had a good chance of winning, as he did.
The reason for my renewed interest is that I am getting the same vibe...there is a huge amount of interesting stuff happening at the moment in the USA and there is virtually NO reporting of it here in the UK on the BBC or MSM more generally - and that is despite their obsession with all things American, in particular all things Trump.
Among the things being ignored:
1. FOI e mails obtained showing Huma Abedin passing Clinton e mails containing classified material to her (Huma's) husband, disgraced Weiner.
2. Recent Exec Order by Trump on seizure of human trafficker assets. Apparently this is what lies behind the sudden and unexplained resignation of Eric Schmidt, Google CEO.
3. Mueller investigation falling apart as e mails and other info show half the investigation team are pro-Clinton, anti-Trump partisans.
4. "Q Anon" - a source on Reddit has been making accurate predictions and hints about major developments including Pope's comments on Lord's Prayer and number of other high profile issues, including terrorist incidents.
5. Growing evidence that Comey has been involved in obstruction of justice on a grand scale. (Newt Gingrich has been on national TV and said this, by the way. Not my interpretation.)
6. A web of corruption around the Clintons and Podestas.
It is all v. fascinating and backed up by real evidence.
Are the BBC at all interested? Er - no. What does that tell you about the continued Fake News operation at the BBC? They really are not a serious news organisation. They a serious political propaganda machine, that is all.
The BBC News website is proving true to form this morning. When I looked earlier there were New Year messages from Theresa May and Jeremy Corbyn side by side given equal prominence. An hour later, the Prime Minister's message has disappeared leaving Jeremy's piece in place with its photo showing clearly the Labour 2017 election slogan. I guess that will stay there for most of the day now.
Theresa May's message is back again now - noticeably given less prominence to that of Corbyn.
Her message 'Britons will feel pride in 2018, says Theresa May' must be less important to the BBC than 'Labour 'staking out centre ground', says Jeremy Corbyn'
Yes, Sky News in contrast has one headline story covering them all ('Leaders pitch to voters in New Year messages') while ITV News has equally-sized pieces with equally-sized photos placed next to each other from TM and JC. As you say, Jeremy Corbyn still had a main article with photo on the BBC News website with Mrs May still relegated to a small side-story.
Yes, this is a subtle form of bias because if ever they were questioned, the Beeboids would say that of course both Leaders' messages were given equal prominence. The question is though: how long did this equal prominence last? Answer - Not for long!
They've both disappeared altogether now. As it is the week-end and New Year's Eve, a quiet time in the BBC newsroom - with all senior folk away at their Cornish bolt-holes, perhaps there is a back-room battle going on between junior editors each keen to make their mark and endear themselves to their absent masters.
I just saw the Trump New Year message online...thought I would see how the BBC were treating it...nowhere to be seen! lol Surely they have got to be interested in it because they obsess about Trump all the time. I really don't think the BBC can be defined as a "news" organisation. They are an "Organised Information Distortion Service". Maybe when they've decided how they are going to treat the Trump message (mock? misdirect? ignore?) they will decide to what extent they will report it and how.
It's 17 mins after midnight - just searched on Trump New Year Message. No results! lol Maybe they have a kind of standing committee of Trump Interpretation and they have to go through that before they report it.
Just an observation. The BBC is a multi-billion pound organisation, employs well over 1000 of its own journalists and is hugely obsessed with all news relating to Trump...
So why when you go on its US-Canada page do you find three prominent article from its "experts"(Anthony Zuchner, Katty Kay and Jon Sopel) dated: 12,13 and 17 December - in order words articles that are already 2-3 weeks out of date.
I don't think this is even half way acceptable. Fox New, a much smaller news outfit, manages to provide up to date news and analysis.
If you look at the Zuchner article, dealing with the Mueller investigation, it is clearly written before the huge number of recent developments: congressional hearings, FOI e mail releases, Comey tweet etc etc.
The BBC isn't just biased, it's also pretty useless.
I would put this down to smug complacency. In the mind's eye of the average BBC Journalist, it is the reaction that his/her reporting will receive from their peers at the BBC, the MSM and Westminster that matters most to them. They are playing to an audience of group-thinking cloned Beeboids all eager to amplify a fine-tuned mantra - reaction of the licence-payer must be well down their list of concerns.
Yes, I think you are right. Jon Sopel is much more concerned that his riposte to the President plays well with his peers in the elite news squad than it should actually be convincing. Looking at Sky tonight, I got a sense that perhaps the media are feeling things slipping out of their grasp. It's great to see Trump setting the agenda in so many areas e.g. Pakistan, whose duplicitous foreign policy has been an absolute scandal for decades. I got a strong feeling the elite media are giving him a kind of grudging respect now. We certainly don't hear those old "chaos in the White House" tropes so beloved of journos like ITV's Robert Moore - though Craig noted Naughtie is still predicting something along those lines (but then Naughtie is very old and stupid).
Anonymous, the reaction of the license fee payer is NOT low down on their list of concerns - it's simply NOT on the list at all! Why should it be? License fee rolls in whatever they say to joe public. Much more important for their careers to keep the boss and his/her peers happy. This is one of the reasons why Groupthink is so strong at the BBC. It's actually reinforced by the license fee system.
Not sure I agree with the fair rises, however this actually suggests it’s about spot on;
Robin Keenan, from Waltham Abbey in Essex, said he has been priced out of his London-based job due to ticket costs. "I'm starting a new job tomorrow that's a lot closer to home - so no more trains," he told BBC News. "I've taken a £2,000 hit in my wages but I'll be saving that amount due to a short bike journey.
Rail fare rises: Commuters 'priced off' UK trains, union says http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-42536159
I’ll leave it to others to decide whether this is actually just based on labour statements and not actually news.
Really, you would think Trump faces only troubles and no opportunities! You wouldn't think the American economy is growing at 3% per annum or that the Dow has gone through the roof.
The reference to the Mueller investigation is pathetic. Anyone who follows American politics will know the investigation is in deep trouble because so many of its staff are now proven (via e mails, donations and so on) to be pro-Clinton anti-Trump partisans. But the photo-caption gives us the Fake News claim that "Mueller is oout of the headlines - for now". This is nonsense - there have been Congressional hearings over Christmas that have focussed on Mueller and been reported in by all the main news agencies. But - surprise, surprise - the BBC has created this Fake News impression that nothing has been happening re the Mueller investigation. This article is proof that this is just another BBC Fake News op. They couldn't get away with it in the USA. But in the UK they can project an entirely false image of what has been happening - "nothing" according to their Fake News.
It's the first week of a new year...so, step forward Mark Easton, still obsessed with his cazy, kamikaze, single-minded mission to concrete over the whole of Britain, by getting us to believe that only 0.1% of the landscape is built on.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-42554635
"The illusion of a concrete Britain" by Mark "Sharp-Suited Stalin" Easton.
Now, please note this article appears as "News" under the UK News section on the NEWS page of the BBC Website. News? Really???
And this is how this "news" article ends:
"But it is hard to have an informed and rational debate about housing policy, airport expansion or, for that matter, intensive agricultural methods when the country is so mistaken about the basics. We must open our eyes and our minds to the true geography of the United Kingdom."
This is not news, this is opinion, and p*ss-poor opinion at that based on a dodgy survey in turn based on the dodgy proposition that individuals can make their own meaningful estimate based on a statistical methodology briefly explained to them by non-experts (the pollsters). It's a bit like telling people what the cosmological constant is and then asking them to estimate the amount of dark matter in the cosmos.
Easton seems to be under the mistaken impression that it is for him to tell the British people what is and isn't important in their lives. In particular he wants them to study statistical geography more assiduously than has hiterto been the case. One can almost here the collective raspberry that is the response of the British people to this arrogant, teacherly demand.
What most people understand by "built up", "countryside" and "natural" is as much subjective as objective. It's a lot to do with noise levels, freshness of the air, population density, the amount of greenery on view, whether you can see roads, traffic, railways and pylons.
According to Easton the 40 million people squeezed into the southern parts of England should not feel they are living in built up areas. They are suffering from a delusion, owing to poor statistical understanding.
Easton's arrogance is the very definition of all that is wrong with the BBC.
I read this news from Mark Easton, and I noticed a recurrence of a theme bearing a strange similarity to the piece of his highlighted recently: namely his concern with the Industrial Revolution of the 19th C.
From this latest news story 'The illusion of a concrete Britain':
.... The story of Britain's treasured green landscapes being gobbled up by greedy industrialists and developers is part of national folklore....
....It has its origins in the trauma of the Industrial Revolution, when rural life was rocked by the arrival of big cities, vast metropolises squatting unsteadily on the countryside and changing everything.....
And then the piece written on 24th June 2016, the day after the EU Referendum: 'A less than United Kingdom':
.... In the century after 1750, Manchester was transformed from a market town of 18,000 inhabitants to a teeming metropolis of 300,000. It was a similar story in Bristol, Birmingham, Liverpool, Leeds and Newcastle....
....Those sucked into the gravitational pull of the new manufacturing centres were forced to adapt to urban dominance, but such was the resentment that it lives on to this day....
.... For the poor agricultural labourers marched from farm to factory, and for the rich landowners supplanted by ambitious industrialists, the new age of international trade was as horrifying as some regard the globalisation of today.....
By comparing these two stories, which deal with dissimilar issues, the implication is that land should be made available for unlimited expansion of city-style cosmopolitan life.
CountryFile epitomises the BBC's distorted view of the UK outside the city limits, where local farmers, (whose employees and relatives can't afford to buy themselves a house because of over-inflated prices), craftsmen and artisans are encouraged to put on a show as entertainment.
Easton is one of those "Bears of Little Brain" - Emma Barnett is another one - who you often find on the BBC and who seem to think they are a lot cleverer than they are (and consequently they feel justified in the erroneous belief that they are cleverer than the average Brit)...in his case, he probably read a couple of books of social history, probably The Making of the English Working Class by EP Thompson being one of them and he thinks he understands everything there is to know about our society and its history.
As you say, he appears to think our green an pleasant land should be made available for unlimited expansion of his favoured city-style cosmopolitan life.
Since Easton is so keen on stats and thinks statistical geography is the beginning of wisdom, perhaps he should reflect that our UK cities actually have a very low population density compared with cities around the world like Calcutta, Hong Kong, Tokyo, Shanghai, Cairo, Rio de Janeiro - or even Paris. So, why isn't he arguing that our cities need to catch up with the world average in terms of population density - rather than arguing that our countryside should be despoiled and our agricultural sector decimated?
Hmmm...because, although, he poses as someone dedicated to the things that unite us, he actually hates half the country - the half that voted Brexit, the half that have a sentimental attachment to the notion of a green and pleasant land, the half that value our culture and don't want to see it obliterated by mass immigration.
The above gives further credence to the BBC 'London is the UK and the UK is Loondon*' misapprehension, and that investment in national infrastructure should serve London first .
Take for instance Crossrail, a magnificent engineering achievement of which the country can be proud. But, at £15bn, who stands to benefit? My guess is that over 99% of the UK population will never make use of it. The cynic in me says that it's for the wealthy elite, barristers included, who live in the leafy suburbs of West London to get to work in Canary Wharf, and in reciprocal movement, cleaners and baristas travel out from their below par east London accommodation to work.
I think you just coined a new word - Loondon...where the people vote consistently for more mass immigration to make sure they can't ever afford to live in anything bigger than a multi-occupied shoe box. :)
Crossrail is probably more justifiable than HS2 in terms of economic gain but I am sure you are right it will deliver most benefit to the Riverside Riche and further fuel mass immigration. Until the early 80s London's population was reducing and there had been a huge increase in the quality of life compared with how things had been in the 1950s. It's noticeable now in London how many young families are living in cramped apartments.
In Mark Easton's recent reference to the Industrial Revolution, he cites Manchester as an example of the rapid expansion of a small town into a city caused by movement of the working population to support the cotton industry. The point he misses is that there were sound economic reasons for Manchester as a location - proximity to Liverpool for the import of raw cotton and the canal system, later to be replaced by the Manchester Ship Canal, the reliably wet weather due to its proximity to the Pennines, and a plentiful supply of water. Civic pride and regional identity followed.
The same is true of many other industries, which were founded in various locations due to local resources. In his assertion that there is plenty of green space to build, Easton is dismissing as an argument the regional sensibilities that are essential to the formation of a coherent and fully functioning social enterprise.
Easton's argument seems to be that as London is the UK and the UK is London, the simple concept of expanding the London culture of economic development into the rest of the UK will work. Well, it won't. Within the London model, there is an element of a return to feudalism, where the rich become richer and the poor become poorer. Immigrant workers poor into London expecting a better way of life economically (which relatively they may well achieve), only to take up their position within this new-feudalism of the London City-State.
The vote to leave the EU was in part a reaction to the London model, and a search for the civic pride and fulfilled skilled employment of old - as it was and still is in Manchester.
The search for regional identity is a concept beyond the understanding of the BBC because it doesn't fit comfortably with their own concept of inclusivity. As a result, Leave voters who didn't wish to be 'included' into the London model are automatically labelled as racist xenophobic misogynist etc.
In Mark Easton's claim that there is plenty of green space available for building, he fails to take account of regional variations of building style, something that gives rise to civic pride eg Cotswold Stone or Cornish granite or Welsh slate. The Prescott inspired estate building where high density developments are located on the margins of towns and villages take no account of regional identities - an example of a one-size-fits-all approach to the housing shortages.
This approach to house building has a number of inherent failings. Firstly, until there is a healthy profit available to the house-builder, the site will stay dormant despite PP having been given. Secondly, developments do not create places - they rely mostly on car use to connect residents to centres of amenity, culture, healthcare etc. Rapid expansion of urbanity during the Industrial Revolution resulted eventually in the creation of great towns and cities. It's hard to imagine how this London model can ever achieve anything comparable.
Any chance of "Another Beauty" being in the running. That would be so funny if they were. But true to his "America First" mantra, I think he may focus on US Fake News.
I wonder how many remainers have made the connection between the migrant crisis and the result of the referendum. Angela Merkel’s actions in 2015 may well have tipped the balance and actually precipitated Brexit. A sobering thought for Junkers and all those traumatised Europeans.
Yes, I think it was definitely what prevented old smoothy chops Cameron from achieving his objective. Although the British people were constantly lied to about the nature of the migration wave (being fed pictures of and reports about distressed families rather than armies of young men) they saw enough to make them feel very uncomfortable...if a million people could be let in on the whim of one German Chancellor what did that say about the nature of the EU? The migration wave set the scene for Brexit. The next tipping point I think was the President of the USA being invited in to lecture us about how we should vote in our own Referendum. Thought the polls were rigged against Leave, they showed movement away from Remain after that. Obama's intervention combined with the negative nature of the relentless and increasingly absurd "project fear" (which I think provoked a certain bloody-minded reaction from Brits, as seen in Sunderland) then delivered a Brexit majority. It was an amazing victory given the huge scale of the pro-Remain propaganda seen on BBC, Sky and ITV.
The BBC's Fake News Reality Check team seem to have overdone it at Christmas and are now suffering a semi-psychotic episode in the New Year...at least judging by their latest "analysis"...
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-41165076
The subject this time...? "Queen Bee syndrome"...yes, me neither.
Still, surely the Reality Check Team - who probably cost the BBC several million pounds a year in salaries, office space and pension commitments - must have come up with a clear, trenchant and informative conclusion explaining what the "reality" is with respect to the issue of the moment, the famous or is it infamous "Queen Bee Syndrome"...
Well here you go:
"Queen bee syndrome is a controversial subject.
The theory seeks to establish a cause and effect relationship between perceived female behaviour traits and the lack of representation at the top of management.
In doing so it makes sweeping generalisations about the way all women behave.
This is a very difficult link to prove. It also ignores the role that men may play.
The very existence of the term is perhaps one of many examples of sexism at work.
As Sheryl Sandberg, Facebook's chief operating officer, observed last year: "Women aren't any meaner to women than men are to one another. Women are just expected to be nicer".
Most research suggests that since the concept first gained traction in the 1970s, queen bee syndrome has lost its sting."
There you go! Feel "englightened" now?
What a crock of BS!!!
Even from the information given about the claimed "syndrome" you can see that their conclusion that "In doing so it makes sweeping generalisations about the way all women behave." is Fake, False, Fictitious. It is quite clear the idea of the syndrome was created to explain how SOME women behave most definitely not ALL women as claimed in the conclusion.
It's really quite incredible that valuable licence fee resources are being spent on this rubbish, or that the BBC touts their Reality Check as proof of their commitment to countering Fake News and ensuring the public receive accurate information.
A new Bias ploy? Highlight only those Viewsnights from Newsnight that you want to highlight - like this one from David "Blair Babe" Aaronovitch about the Brexit generation that is dying out...
For me paying for the BBC is like broadband and telephone line rental, it’s something from a bygone age that you just pay for so that you can use something else....and I’m sure that’s true for an increasingly large number of others, who feel trapped by the deliberately confusing rules.
Your site seems to have never mentioned Prof Ivor Gaber, whose speciality is producing reports saying that the BBC shows bias to right. An extraordinary claim with no extraordinary evidence. I would say malicious cos his trick was to pick episodes of Marr where there was a big interview of a lefty politician, but Gaber would say "look at the press panel has 1 Lab, 1 Tory and a Sun journalist ..Right Bias, righty Bias ..well of course there aren't going to have another Labour MP on when the first half of the prog has been Corbyn, McDonnel, Abbott etc. His Facebook page is all postings about Lefty and Anti-Brexit petitions to sign. I did a few posts on B-BBC - Quik list on articles and bio
No, and I can't think why we've not mentioned him - especially as his name is very familiar to me.
Worse, he's even published research papers titled 'Is the BBC biased?'
The one thing I particularly remember for him for is for producing a report called 'The Corporation and the coverage of the 2006 Israeli—Hezbollah war', which dismissed concerns about anti-Israeli bias and said that the BBC "covered the conflict more or less impartially".
Like the Cardiff Uni crowd, Prof Gaber is obviously one of these left-wing professors who the BBC can rely on to boost their 'complaints from both sides' fallacy whilst, simultaneously, reinforcing their their 'the BBC is impartial' fallacy.
Ah in a comment to someone citing Gaber as truthful David Keighley threw down a challenge "If you can provide research-based evidence in line with with what Ivor Gaber contends, I will be very happy to publish it on the News-watch website." Obviously this was not forthoming
It was published yesterday but I didn't spot it anywhere on the main page. I suspect it was 'buried' in the World Section - an example of both Bias by News Prioritising and Bias by Burying.
Scanning TV Eyes for any mention of the story on the BBC News Channel I drew a blank. It looks as if it wasn't reported at all on BBC TV.
The one exception was just now on 'Dateline' when Michael Goldfarb brought it up: "But what is interesting to me is the way the Republicans have dealt with this so far. Their initial response was to demand the Justice Department look into the Clinton foundation. They are backing their man."
The story is also filed under "Russia-Trump inquiry" despite it having absolutely nothing to do with the Russia-Trump inquiry! - a classic bit of news management from the BBC:
See http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-42587028 with its photo of Donald Trump with a completely black background. This trick has been used for months now on the BBC News website mainly on Theresa May's image, and now seemingly on Trump when they want us to perceive the subject as isolated and without support - from the BBC that is.
When was the last time we saw one of the favoured individuals such ad JC with a wholly black background? Some dept or other at the BBC must be hard at work with their photoshop kit to produce these images. The images have been tampered with and artificially created.
You have mentioned this before LC and I’ve been sceptical about your claim but I just tested this on google images and typed three different searches bbc Trump, bbc Theresa May and bbc Corbyn. You are absolutely right , mostly of Mays and Trumps have black backgrounds in the first 20 images whereas Corbyn has none. Not scientific research I know but I think you are on to something. Also just tried bbc Clegg and guess what no black backgrounds. Subliminal and sinister.
Psychological malfunctioning of world leaders can have consequences for the planet.
He has been described as a narcissist, an overgrown baby - vain and careful about his appearance. There is no doubt about his debilitating recurring bouts of mental illness, deep depressions and periods of manic activity, suggesting a bipolar diagnosis which would compromise rational decision making. His unnatural love of war and conflict has been much criticised as has his seeking out grand gestures and "quick fixes" to solve complex problems. Looking at his relationship with his father and mother one can see the many unresolved issues that were to influence his psychology. This can perhaps be seen in some of his disparaging and sexist remarks about women. To top it all he is grossly dependent on alcohol.
All in all, Winston Churchill was a thoroughly dangerous influence on the world stage. A shame the BBC didn't "speak truth to power" back in the 1940s as they do so bravely now while plotting with CNN to bring down Trump through the 25th Amendment process.
The BBC should be ashamed of its wartime record as regards that warmonger Winston Churchill and for being so judgemental about Adolf Hitler. Lord Hall must be aghast.
Bessie Braddock MP: “Winston, you are drunk, and what’s more you are disgustingly drunk.”
WSC: “Bessie, my dear, you are ugly, and what’s more, you are disgustingly ugly. But tomorrow I shall be sober and you will still be disgustingly ugly.”
I know some people can't stand BBC World Service, feeling it falls short in the blowing the British trumpet department. However, I find it far less biased than Radio 4 or BBC TV. A good example recently was a piece by Adam Easton about Poland that I heard today - which began with a frank admission that the right wing government was very popular and then dealt pretty fairly I felt with why that might be. It shows that being balanced is not difficult to pull off. But had it been a Newsnight piece it would have been wrapped in a load of Guardian-guff about the rise of Trump, fascism, Brexit and hate crime, framed by a couple of experts or commentators who despise the current Polish government, focussed on a very EU-sympathetic analysis and presented on the assumption that Merkel-Macron style leadership is the very acme of good governance.
TWTW on Radio 4 today - devoted entirely to knee-yife crime innit? Subjects carefully avoided included lone parenting and poor parenting, incentives to lone parenting, poor school discipline, minority community differentials and message sent by repeat offending let-offs.
But for me there was an even bigger glaring omission. Various wiseacres told us that young people were influenced to carry knives by "fashion". No mention of music probably the biggest influence through grime with its violent references, threats, and glorification of guns and knives. And where is such music to be found? BBC Radio 1 and Radio 1 Xtra.
The hypocrisy of the BBC - one moment mourning the death of young people and on the other glorifying youth violence via music is quite sickening.
I heard that too. Your point about the BBC's hypocrisy has given me pause for thought. Non-PC tweets are beyond the pale for them; violence-promoting songs are fine.
The BBC must look at this site - the picture of Mrs May as she appeared on Marr is not shrouded in black:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-42597563
But what is there, but isolated in the report of her interview is:
...'She insisted the NHS was delivering care to more people than ever before'....
This sentence is itself a detached paragraph with no background or context. It is the BBC way of disassociating itself from the comment.
The meaning is clear. The NHS is having to 'deliver care to more people than ever before', and yet is unable to reduce waiting times. What possibly could be the reason?
It's a funny old word, "insisted". My ears always prick up when I hear it. The BBC could just say "said" instead. "Insisted" always makes me think of Hamlet's "The lady doth protest too much, methinks."
Where someone says something that is undoubtedly and verifiably true - eg that the NHS is delivering care to more people than ever before - surely "noted" is the more appropriate neutral verb.
Unsurprisingly, there has been a subtle change in the wording of this story:
.. 'PM Theresa May defends record ahead of cabinet reshuffle'..
The single sentence paragraph has been removed in favour of:
.... Mr Marr disputed the idea that urgent care was being delivered in time, raising the case of Leah Butler-Smith and her mother, who, having suffered a stroke, waited an hour in an ambulance and a further four in A&E before seeing a doctor.
"If I'd been waiting for five hours before I'd seen a doctor after my stroke I would not be here talking to you," he said.
"This is about life and death, and up and down the country people are having horrendous experiences of the NHS."
The prime minister said she had not heard of the specific case and so could not comment, and insisted that the NHS was delivering more than ever before...
So, Mrs May is still 'insisting', but now the emphasis has been changed to make it sound as if TM is mounting a feeble defence against the BBC Labour perennial accusation of 'NHS cuts'.
The subtle change is in the exclusion of a key part of Mrs May's reply - Version 1:
...'She insisted the NHS was delivering care to more people than ever before'....
Version 2:
... 'insisted that the NHS was delivering more than ever before'...
Although these two versions don't seem to be much different, the second version shifts emphasis away from total numbers receiving NHS care in favour of exposing a system that can't cope because of a Government whose handling of the NHS cannot be trusted - the default position of Labour BBC.
I agree the two are not the same. Version 1 is a statement of fact whereas Version 2 is a political claim. According to the Mail she said:
"If we look at what is happening across the NHS what we see is that actually the NHS is delivering for more people, it is treating more people and more people are being seen within the four hours every day than has been in the – a few years ago."
The BBC could have quoted her but you may have noticed they don't like to quote Conservative politicians directly. They much prefer the Norman Smith "dodgy paraphrase" method. :)
At 37 minutes into the Andrew Marr Show, Theresa May says 'The NHS is treating more people...'
This has been reported on the BBC News website as version 2 - probably the archived version: ... 'insisted that the NHS was delivering more than ever before'...
Is this a deliberate misrepresentation by the BBC of what the PM said?
Your Complaint Location England First half of UK Postcode LE16 Type of complaint BBC News (TV, Radio and website) Which news service is it about BBC News website URL http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-42597563 Complaint category Standards of interviewing/presenting Contacted us before No Complaint title Misrepresentation of what was said in an interview Complaint description By a series of editorial content changes, the BBC News website misrepresented what was being said by the Prime Minister on the Andrew Marr Show on Sunday 8th January 2018. At 37 minutes into the Andrew Marr Show, Theresa May says 'The NHS is treating more people...' However, this statement was reported on the BBC News website differently. Firstly in version 1: ...'She [Mrs May] insisted the NHS was delivering care to more people than ever before'.... And later on in the day, version 2: ... [Mrs May] 'insisted that the NHS was delivering more than ever before'... It is version 2, which will most-likely be the archived version, what the Prime Minister said has been misrepresented. By removing ...'The NHS is treating more people...' and replacing it with ... 'insisted that the NHS was delivering more than ever before'... the PM's assertion that the NHS were treating more people has been lost altogether. If waiting times are not being reduced as a result of increased numbers being treated, then good journalistic practice might have led Marr to ask what the reasons for that might be. My complaint is that the Prime Minister's words were deliberately misconstrued in order to convey a politically damaging message about the Conservative Governments handling of the NHS.
I don't need to tell you of the hoops you will be put through, but as this is on matters of fact in editorialising the onus is on them to prove otherwise, which if incontrovertible means they will try all sorts of 'belief' or 'practice' weasels to avoid addressing that.
Persevere, but the long haul awaits you.
I do one day intend to place my exchanges up on a blog one day to show where I went wrong, went right, and where the BBC tried, succeeded, failed or cheated to keep complaints anywhere but transparent.
Enough of us do, the BBC will have serious problems on its hand as their sister print medium is fond of telling us all: 'facts are sacred'.
And once the edit is outside their domain, raw data and full transcripts are mirrors up to which they can be fairly held.
Awaiting updates with interest. These can take time too.
As do FoI replies. I have a few nearing deadline.
One BBC quirk is to cite their own wasting of time or glacial consumption rates as reason to close the process down.
Craig I know you monitor those fake claims that the BBC is biased to the left. They seem to have ramped up the PR see this thread https://twitter.com/RickBlaine123/status/926600347296165888
I'm trying to figure out their claim that Amol Rajan supported the Conservatives in the 2015 election ..I'm wondering if that means he supported the Libs going into coalition ?
"Independent editor Amol Rajan has said he regrets not doing more to counter suggestions that the paper’s election leader backing the coalition was voicing support for the Conservatives. " https://www.theguardian.com/media/2015/oct/08/independent-editor-tories-amol-rajan
"Amol Rajan wangled a nice radio programme which involved him seeing his old mates at his cricket club in London, being treated as a revered guest at Lord's, visiting India where presumably there are quite a few relatives he could meet up with, being ushered into the equivalent of Long Room at Lord's at one of India's ancient grounds and finally getting plenty of air time to pontificate about the future of cricket, despite being only a very average club player." is also Fake News.
He's a celeb-lover, an Emma Watson botherer, a virtue signaller, and a fully paid up Trumpophobe - but is he a journalist?
He tells us Oprah Winfrey delivered a "powerful" speech and tweeted with all his might to promote her. Well there's another view, Jimmy boy - that it was a breath-takingly hypocritical speech given her close relationship with Harvey Weinstein and her failure to issue any kind of warning to the young female British actress who was reassured by Oprah's presence but then become a victim of a serious assault by HW. Did Oprah really not know about Harvey's MO at the time? A journalist would ask that question, rather than sycophantically promoting her as the next Democrat Presidential nominee.
Anyone heard anything from Kim Ghattas on BBC in recent months? I last saw her covering Hillary Clinton's campaign. I think she was then described as US State Department Correspondent...
People may remember Ghattas was a complete Hillary Clinton teeny-bopper fan, who talked up her campaign and wrote an admiring book about her. The BBC thought this qualified her to report objectively on the Clinton campaign.
I haven't seen anything from her in ages...is she being paid by the BBC as one of their staffers? Because she seems to do a lot of work on the side if that is the case!
Looking at her official website she does claim to be a BBC journalist and that is the suggestion from her Twitter account as well.
Incidentally you can see from the Twitter account that she is not shy in expressing her anti-Israeli sentiments.
I think there is a scandal here about how much some of these BBC staffers are getting paid for such little work. It would be nice if someone with the resources did a bit of digging. The work rate of Sky and ITV reporters seems much higher and they don't have a plethora of overlapping titles. In the USA it appears there is an International Editor covering the USA, a US State Department correspondent, a North American Correspondent (Cook), a North America reporter (Zurcher), and a BBC America presenter. That's just for starters as several other journos visit there on a regular basis: Simpson, Naughtie, Maitlis come to mind.
How much does the BBC spend on this endless stream of anti-American, anti-Trump invective? Must be tens of millions a year I reckon. And the irony is you have several American stations who would be only too happy to provide English language coverage at a tenth of the price. They could use CNN and you wouldn't notice much difference.
I need to vent about the expression “Stale, Male and Pale” how is it acceptable for the BBC to use this? They wouldn’t dare use it about any other demographic.
I agree. The use of this description is unacceptable. Surely, Jeremy Corbyn and John McDonnell are equally deserving of the same description, but we won't hear any such statement about them fom the BBC.
BBC have another orgasm, this time over banning of Mail sale by Virgin Trains. Totalled biased report on 10 O'Clock News...firstly it claimed that the Mail used headlines about migration and related subjects to generate sales, as though that were their only operation. Then the reporter ended on a question about whether it was right to ban sales of a newspaper that "we" disagree with, implicitly acknowledging that she was anti-Mail. Of course we know she is, but she's not supposed to admit to it as (laughably) impartial BBC reporter.
I am looking forward to the Trump Fake News awards. Surely he can find some space for an overseas award to go to the BBC? Would be great if he chose James Cook as well with his indefensibly opinionated article (rather than the more circumspect Sopel).
... State Broadcaster "questions" the banning of the free press. ..
I think ... "questions" the banning of the free press... gives a misleading indication that the BBC might be questioning the veracity of VT's actions. ... State Broadcaster "heralds" the banning of the free press... might be a better description.
Yes I think "heralds" is a much better description. They often give a blast of the trumpet to usher in developments they like while putting on a veneer of faux impartiality. We see the same with the misnamed "Stop Funding Hate", transgender politics (how many people in the UK would even think it was an issue if they were choosing the news agenda? - I'd say about 0.01% max), BDS boycott of Israel, and promotion of racialised politics.
Did anyone here catch the programme "The Dawn of Brtish Jihad" by Mobeen Azhar, he of the gelled quiff and ostensibly "Islamo-lite" ideas...
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b09l06nt
What struck me was the absence of any WTF element...it seemed almost to be celebrating, or at least treating in almost jocular fashion, the fact that back in the 90s the part-time Jihadis were tolerated, or even encouraged in the context of the Cold War - there was no suggestion that this (facilitation of Islamic Jihad in South Asia) was one of the biggest strategic mistakes ever made by the USA and its allies.
What I heard of the programme seemed to view everything from an Islamic/South Asian perspective. Can we expect more of the same as producers and presenters from that background increasingly take over BBC content?
I think MA was behind Muslims Like Us which you may recall allowed a couple of full-on Salafists to give vent to their views without challenge.
More skewed reporting is to be found on the BBC News website Homepage. In a small side-panel without any photograph is the story: 'UK manufacturing output at its highest for 10 years'.
Taking priority over this good news story, with a more prominent position and with a photograph is another story: 'Coconut controversy: Shoppers query use of plastic wrapping'.
To my mind, this demonstrates to the BBC tactic of deflecting attention away from important good news that might show the Government in a good light towards a light-hearted item.
On the Business section, the manufacturing story does receive priority over the coconuts. Both have photos.
As if by magic, a photograph has appeared and the manufacturing story has received promotion on the BBC News website Homepage. At 3.00 pm the manufacturing story with photo was to the right (ie less important) of the coconuts, but by 3.25 pm they swapped places, so manufacturing now has more prominence. Someone at the BBC must read this site and respond!
For me the way the BBC treat manufacturing and financial services is generally biased because they assume they are of equal economic benefit in principle. That's not my view at all, and plenty of economists agree with me. Manufacturing spreads wealth all around the country rather than concentrating it in the capital. A manufacturing boom doesn't translate into increased housing costs, accelerated mass immigration and consequent pressure on public services in the way that a boom in financial services does. Increase manufacturing doesn't make us more vulnerable in a financial crash, in the way an increase in the finance sector does. I am ecstatic that our Brexit vote has reduced the value of our over-inflated currency and made possible this impressive manufacturing boom. Let's now build on this going forward.
... Manufacturing spreads wealth all around the country rather than concentrating it in the capital.... I quite agree with you MB.
From House of Commons Library BRIEFING PAPER Number 01942, 2 January 2017:
...There is considerable regional variation in manufacturing employment.... .... As a proportion of all jobs, manufacturing is highest in the East Midlands, where it accounts for 12%. By contrast, only 2% of jobs in London are related to manufacturing....
The explanation as to why the BBC do not enthuse about good news in the manufacturing sector is because it doesn't fit the London Model. The manufacture of successful products provides a sense of belonging and worth, which in turn enhances regional identity away from the capital. This sense of belonging is what the majority of the UK aspired to when they voted to Leave the EU.
Loondon - yes, it's not just a globalist economic bias in BBC reporting...it's a cultural thing...the Loondoners who dominate the BBC want the whole of the UK to be recast in London's image. The last thing Mark Easton wants is to see the development of strong manufacturing centres in the regions which will impede the all conquering advance of PC multiculturalism into the regions.
There is also an issue in the way the BBC reports the issue of the Brexit negotiations in relation to financial services. Admittedly, they are reflecting the government's position, but they do address the matter as though it would be a national tragedy if financial services were excluded from the final trade agreement with the EU. That is an opinion, not a fact. If you think, as I do, that the finance sector is way too dominating over our whole economy already, then really there is nothing to fear from losing a few tens of thousands of finance jobs to the EU and a few billions of tax revenue. If, as a result, we could add another 1% to our manufacturing growth, as I think we could, then that would be a huge win for the UK. Most of the finance jobs that will be lost to the EU aren't held by UK citizens and a limited departure of finance jobs will relieve pressure on London housing costs, which currently is just pauperising a large section of the capital's hard working labour force.
I've noted elsewhere the huge number of BBC staff devoted to reporting on the USA...to which I can add Owen Amos (a "Features Writer" for the BBC based in Washington DC, is the way he describes his "Take Down Trump" role). And here he is full Trumpophobic flow about the upcoming Presidential medical (clearly intended to feed into the BBC-CNN 25th Amendment plot to remove the elected President from office and thus secure the global triumph of PC multiculturalism):
With tongue firmly in cheek, we should congratulate the BBC for not falling for the fake news story on the front page of The Telegraph - 'Scourge of the Seas - Crisp Packet washed up after 21 Years'. This is just the type of quirky story that they normally adopt willingly.
To all right-minded people it is unimaginable that a crisp packet could survive in tact with printing legible after being at sea for this period of time. More likely, is that the packet was at the back of Grannie's cupboard, forgotten about for all this time before being brought to a beach ready to be found by some enthusiastic eco crusader.
The footnote might be that as the story indirectly implicates one of their own due to his advertising commitments with the crisp maker, the BBC might not run the story for fear of negative publicity - or upsetting their 'star'.
Funnily enough - the BBC do sort of endorse the story with a paragraph below in their 'Newspaper headlines: NHS funding plea and a plastic 'scourge'.
....The Daily Telegraph leads on claims Mrs May is free to rethink tuition fees now that ministers opposed to fee cuts have quit the government. It also pictures a 21-year-old crisp packet found washed up on a UK beach....
What business is it of theirs? Why is our licence money being used in this partisan (and absurd) way?
And it is completely pointless, because there is absolutely no chance of Winfrey standing or being elected. There are more skeletons rattling in her closet than it's possible to imagine. But of course the BBC would never even hint at such skeletons.
Tonight's BBC One 'News at Six' had Steven Spielberg on telling Will Gompertz that "President Trump is using the same tactics as Richard Nixon used during his presidency to 'try to silence the press.'"
I didn't know Richard Nixon organised Fake News awards! :) I am so looking forward to Trump's awards ceremony. There is going to be a lot of Trump Derangement Syndrome in evidence.
Oh yeah, then there's Nick Bryant, apparently the BBC's "New York correspondent". Does the BBC really have to have a correspondent dedicated to just one city in the USA. An important city, yes, but not a lot of "news" of relevance to us comes out of it, apart from the financial markets. But this being the BBC, you can bet someone else is covering the financial markets.
Our intrepid BBC New York correspondent Nick Bryant appears to take regular sunshine breaks in Southern California where he composes stream of consciousness lefty bollox/cod American history:
This is as always opinion, masquerading as news in the news section of the BBC website.
Much of it is demonstrably Fake. For instance he paints a picture of a contemporary America drowning in gun violence compared with the last "golden age" of Reagan (yes, he appears to have forgotten all the BBC hate directed at the Cowboy Reagan at the time. The reality is that deaths from guns have declined something like 50% or more since the 1980s. Of course, being a sneaky BBC type he of course provides cover for himself by trying to confuse the issue with references to gun massacres.
Another bit of fakery, he tries to make out that the USA was "less welcoming" after 9-11 when in fact legal immigration climbed to an all time high! And, let's not forget in 2008 American voters elected a President with a Muslim name, only to re-elect him four years later. What more do they need to do?
And it is beyond Bryant to admit that the USA's current economic growth rate and jobs growth rate is phenomenal for a highly developed country - GDP is rising at well over 3%.
Normally journalists try and answer questions they ask. But not the lacklustre BBC. Nope - they just "ask the questions"...even though they know the answer to both questions is a big fat NO. So why do they ask questions they know the answer to but choose not to answer?
I think we know why. The BBC is a full on Remainiac Propaganda Unit.
The ‘question as a headline’ technique to push a view they need some separation from is becoming epidemic.
I liken it to the A5 brochures I get sent by gizmo retailers before Christmas, with every page littered by ‘Is this the most amazing cat neutering spatula ever designed?’
I have noticed recently how the BBC News website shows photos of the newspaper headlines with which they agree i preference to those with which they disagree.
In today's display are the Guardian (there's a surprise) and the Mirror which both have pro EU headlines. ...'Hopes Raised for Second Referendum'... from the Guardian and ... 'Farage: I Want Second Referendum'... from the Mirror.
There are ten newspapers featured altogether of which seven do not feature the Farage story.
There are also ‘quotes’ or “quotes” they like, which often seem to suffice with little actual journalistic challenge on substantiation.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-42572116? Patients 'dying in hospital corridors'
Nick seems happy with the claims of ‘doctors’ (with mounting evidence of many be politically active and motivated) and the ever-vague ‘reports’ the bbc then in turn.... ‘reports’.
Yes they have another quote up: Trump 'in crude Oval Office outburst about migrants'...odd thing is, when you read the article the quote doesn't appear anywhere I can see. It's a 'made up' quote. In fact Trump did not comment about migrants but the countries from which they came, describing the countries as "sh*thole" places...but isn't that exactly what the human rights migration lobby are saying themselves - the countries from which people are fleeing (no jobs, rampant corruption, oppression of minorities, violence and war) are sh*tholes which people have every right to try and escape from...they don't claim the same right for people from countries that are tolerant and prosperous.
I have popped a few more concerns over to the BBC about BBC use of 'quotes' and unverified claims.
My first on opinions as headlines already has two 'apologies for the delay' as they miss their deadlines (woe betide any missing one back) on trying a less idiotic blow off attempt; I rather suspect the 'line to take' and template is proving less than they'd hoped.
Today's BBC 'Reality Check' examines Theresa May's claim that NHS funding is worse in Wales. Only the BBC could report that Wales spends £64 per capita more than England and neglect to mention that much of that goes on free prescriptions for all - which is why they have fewer doctors than England & much longer waiting lists for hip replacements.
The bbc has a rather restricted version of ‘reality’, and often fights hard to preserve it when other issues are in play, like default political support:
We all know Reality Check was set up to help combat the wave of populism passing over the Western world. That is its only purpose. In pursuit of that objective their so called "Reality Checks" frequently offer up Fake Facts, fail to answer the questions they ask themselves in the articles, and leave glaring omissions. The Checks are nearly all biased towards exposing what they see as misinformation from the populist movement, though much more to the right than left.
Had to smile when I heard a bit of Ed Stourton's book "Auntie's War, Eyewitness Reports" on Book of the Week (no conflict of interest with that plug for a staffer's book, then!). Recording what Richard Dimbelby said about his feelings of "exhilaration" at seeing the carpet bombing of Berlin, Stourton commented about there being no attempt at impartiality back then (I paraphrase).
Calls to mind Craig's comment about how the BBC would now have reported WW2...
but also, one has to smile since of course we can quote any number of examples where the BBC's "exhilaration" shines through...remember the welcome for unlawful migrants to Germany given by a highly excited and jubilant Jenny Hill (ironically, in Berlin)? Remember the fall of the Berlin Wall, again in Berlin? Remember the reports of the Fake "Arab Spring"? Remember the release of the Birmingham Six? Remember the Good Friday agreement? Hardly any attempt at dispassionate judgement by most BBC reporters and a lot of exhiliration on display. I am not saying that is wrong and in some of those cases exhiliration seems reasonable enough. I am rather satirising Stourton sourpuss insistence that the modern day BBC would be right to be entirely unexhilirated about Britain's role in WW2.
On another subject - we had good further example last night of Dimbleby's "Bias by Obfuscation" as, in a great display of pretended even handedness, he explained laboriously that Toby Young was not a Nazi (pace the comments of the egregious non "comedian" on the panel) and also that John McDonnell was only quoting someone calling for the lynching of Esther McVey and not making the comments himself. See - a nice bit of BBC balance. I was pleased to observe Dominic Raab was having none of this fake balance (noting that McDonnell had been laughing and joking about the quote) and refused to accept Dimbleby's obfuscatory interjection as valid. Raab seems to have a bit of mettle in him.
'Impartiality' would be two paces to the right of where the BBC has been for the last 40 years or so. Remember the Falklands war, when the BBC was actively willing the task force to fail? Remember the dismay on Peter Snow's face when a senior general explained to him that there was now (after Goose Green) no possibility whatever of an Argentine counter attack? How could it be that the BBC preferred a fascist dictator to their own armed forces, who were fighting in defence of democracy? Clearly during WW2 there was a strong sense of unity - of 'us' versus the common enemy; perhaps living through the blitz explains how Richard Dimbleby could feel exhilarated by the bombing of Berlin instead of succumbing to a nasty attack of 'impartiality.' The answer is perhaps that the modern BBC employs large numbers of misfits with chips on their shoulders and a deep-rooted hatred of their own country - a country which unreasonably forces them to lead a pampered, privileged and over-paid existence at the expense of the license fee payers.
Yes, am I old enough to remember the BBC's approach to the Falklands War...the BBC's references to "the British" were jarring - as though they were pretending they themselves weren't British (what does the first B in BBC stand for?). It was probably the first time a lot of people began to have serious doubts about the BBC's modus operandi. No one was expecting WW2 Pathe-style propaganda but a recognition that they were our troops and a recognition of the importance of not speculating about where our troops might land.
I don't Stourton recognised the public uneasiness.
Thank you for reminding me of the correct spelling of "exhilarated" BTW!
Returning to the theme of the BBC's Fake News Reality Checks...here's the latest, focussing on - surprise, surprise a Trump statement (not a Corbyn, McDonnell, Abbott or Lady Nugent one):
At the outset the article quotes Trump's tweet as follows:
"Reason I canceled my trip to London is that I am not a big fan of the Obama Administration having sold perhaps the best located and finest embassy in London for “peanuts”. "
It is captioned as "Tweet by President Trump". You can see it ends with a full stop after "peanuts".
The article then puts the "claim" as follows:
"The Obama administration sold the US embassy in London for "peanuts"."
But this is all Fake News because the actual Trump tweet was in full as follows:
"Reason I canceled my trip to London is that I am not a big fan of the Obama Administration having sold perhaps the best located and finest embassy in London for “peanuts”, only to build a new one in an off location for 1.2 billion dollars.Bad deal. Wanted me to cut ribbon-NO!"
You will see there was no full stop after "peanuts" and therefore it is clear that this was not the nub of his criticism.
As you can see, the Reality Benders have deliberately excised the words "...only to build a new one in an off location for 1.2 billion dollars.Bad deal." Clearly the thrust of Trump's comment was that the Obama administration ended up selling the old Embassy for a not very good price and then forking out a huge amount of money on the new Embassy (at a less prestigious location). On the BBC's only figures the deal could have cost the USA something like £600-700 million...that is a lot of money in anyone's estimation.
It would be easier if the Reality Check team just put up a permanent notice saying "We Hate Trump". That would at least be true and accurate and fully part of reality.
It highlights the muddled thinking of that newspaper and of the BBC when they can't quite decide how to make everything about the put out about Donald Trump so one-sided and biased.
In the opening paragraph Wainwright writes:
... 'Raised on a hill, surrounded by a moat and bristling with all the anti-terrorist measures known to man, the new US embassy in Nine Elms, south-west London, should be exactly the kind of building that Donald Trump would be only too keen to open. Covered in a prickly translucent plastic skin, which looks cheap, foggy and is already stained, the $1bn cube is in many ways the perfect metaphor for his administration....
But in the last paragraph he writes:
.... 'The building is environmentally friendly, as open and welcoming as could be hoped, and it hides its security features in the landscape more subtly than expected. In short, it’s a progressive beacon of the Obama administration, so perhaps it’s for the best that it won’t be tainted by a Trump visit'.....
So, the building ....'should be exactly the kind of building that Donald Trump would be only too keen to open. Covered in a prickly translucent plastic skin, which looks cheap, foggy and is already stained'....
AND ... ' it’s a progressive beacon of the Obama administration'....
This is bigotry in its pure form - Wainwright trips over himself in a predictable bid to insult Donald Trump and to praise Barack Obama. His opinions, clearly shared by the BBC, are cringeworthy. What they haven't realised yet is that Donald Trump thrives on this childish banter and becomes stronger as a result. Probably, we shall go through the whole period of DT's Presidency without the BBC being granted access to any real news - he'll make sure of that. As far as he's concerned they're whistling in the wind.
I think you have that nailed! lol It couldn't be a clearer expression of the black is white or white is black (which one do we require on this occasion) thinking that is now the mark of the modern day progressive (and I speak as someone who is still happy to describe himself as a progressive, just not happy with all these people who CLAIM to be progressives but are actually regressives).
Also, I would like to offer Trump a get out of jail free card on the "sh*thole countries" comment...it seems clear to me in the light of his denial that he was merely enquiring why people were trying to enter the USA from all these "Sahel" countries. Others in the room may have misheard him. :)
Reasons why the BBC is so insulting towards Trump? I think it's because he treats them as a massive irrelevance; whereas the likes of May and Cameron go in fear and trembling at the idea of being judged and found wanting by the BBC, sitting in its self-appointed rôle as Supreme Court of Political Correctness, Trump doesn't give a damn what the Beeb, CNN or the Huffington Post think; he can afford to taunt them because Twitter allows him to communicate directly with his public. In short, the BBC detests Trump because he is a threat to their power: just imagine what might happen if the Tories took a leaf out of Trump's book, learned to use the social media and replaced their current grovelling invertebrate with a leader of conviction!
Yes, the reason for the BBC's ill-mannered approach to politicians with whom they disagree is usually 'the accountability' interview. This excuse is lacking when it comes to their dealings with Donald Trump, it is purely personal.
Who better to get you in a festive Christmassy mood than Nabila Ramdani on Sky Press Review? - that smoking volcano of suppressed anger and contempt (about what?, for whom? you ask - don't ask for whom the bell tolls!!!)...She's straight in undermining the British Army but with a bit more "on the one hand, on the other" (has she been on a course? - she didn't used to try that Fake Impartiality Balance - FIB for short).
ReplyDeleteHaving not seen her for several months, I was worried she had dropped off the radar. She may have had a wobbly over Syria...the MSM narrative would not be hers I imagine and perhaps she was sent to sit on the naughty step... Anyway she's back and I like to watch her, pondering what passions rage within her...the equivalent of staring at the Sun, imagining the broiling hot gases churning, spiralling to the surface...
She's off on the Nazamin story in Iran (or hostage story as I would describe it)...How can I put this?...not a great deal of empathy on display, and quite a bit of emphasis on the Iranian government's charges against their hostage, something the UK media generally avoids focussing on too much for obvious reasons. The pleasant Dia Chakrabarty showed her how empathy is done when it came to her turn. Perhaps Nabila needs to go on an empathy course?
I saw that Sky press preview last night and was baffled as to who she was and where they had got her. She had her head down while speaking and seemed to have a problem with speaking English.
ReplyDeleteYou should see her when she's really angry! - a sight to behold.
DeletePerhaps she was raised by wolves? Might explain the lack of eye contact and language development - and the sense she's sizing up for supper all those around her.
Nothing on the BBC website about the PA gun attack on Police in the USA at multiple locations - now confirmed as a terror attack. The Egyptian migrant got in via chain migration, no doubt on some bogus pretext.
ReplyDeletehttps://www.jihadwatch.org/2017/12/pennsylvania-muslim-who-shot-police-officer-arrived-in-us-via-chain-migration
The BBC is determined to "boil the frog"...important to do it in imperceptible stages, lest the critter leap free...
ReplyDeletehttp://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-42329014
Looks like the BBC is gearing up for a nice Fake News New Year. From the article:
"The murder rate in most countries has fallen significantly in the past 15 years. That's the reality, but most people don't believe it - fewer than one in 10 thinks there are fewer murders"
Most people are probably thinking "murderous attacks" by gun, acid, knife or arson. The truth is that even in poor countries people now survive murderous attacks if they can be got to a hospital quick enough.
"Deaths from terrorist attacks around the world were lower in the past 15 years than in the previous 15 - but only a fifth of us think that's the case"
Well whoopee-doopee. If you are looking worldwide what is being included? Most Brits will be answering this from the viewpoint of the UK and will feel there has been a huge rise in terrorist plots.
Ask the question the way you want them answered and you will get the answers you desire. :)
Incidentally...let's not forget the BBC is doing its bit to raise the level of deaths from gun and knife crime by publicising grime music with overtly violent and threatening lyrics (on Radio 1 Extra especially). Ironically the BBC - the ultimate "safe space" - is making our public spaces less safe, especially for young men from certain backgrounds.
The BBC love to cover news from the USA in even more detail than some parts of the UK. So I was more than a little surprised to discover that this had passed them by...
ReplyDeletehttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IfSFLCOeU3c
It appears that the Sainted Hillary (unlike all other former Secretaries of State) refused to be interviewed by the Freedom of Information Inspector General.
Surely the BBC should cover this if only to debunk it as Fake News and to reassure the snowflakes that Hillary's Halo is intact?
Heard some of WATO today. A very confused item on Jo Johnson "free speech" speech, not helped that it was overseen by "Joke Journalist" Jonny Diamond (the guy who turned news reporting into a comedy gig, albeit not a very good one, when he literally made stuff up about Trump and put it out on BBC News - not a problem apparently because it was, allegedly, "funny").
ReplyDeleteDiamond's liberal use of the C word as in "controversial" completely muddied the waters. We know for the BBC that patriotism, opposition to mass immigration, and and the belief that gender differences are grounded in biology and evolution, are "controversial" despite them being what most people in the country favour.
So having peppered his questions with controversial when he asking about banning of a pro-Israel speaker one naturally assumed that he was putting being in favour of the continued existence of Israel in the "controversial" category.
BTW, Christmas seems to be a time when it allows itself a bit of nostalgic belief in fundamental gender differences. There was MacIntyre on his prog which included Bill Bailey, and that was followed by Lee Mack in Not Going Out. The comedy (not their best I have to say but passable) was very strongly based in the idea of fundamental differences between male and female perceptions of the world. The audiences seemed to respond warmly to the jokes based on those perceived differences. But, by New Year, I am sure the BBC will have its po face back on. I can just here Jenni Murray's beguiling introduction: "Now - did you have a lovely traditional Christmas with the family sat on the sofa gathered around the warm glow of the TV watching some much loved comedy, as in the good old days of the sixties and seventies?...OR - were you secretly groaning inside...feeling more than a little bilious at the very sexist nature of the comedy on offer over what should be the fesitve season? Joining me today is Uma Less, professor of TV Comedy at the University of Righton...
Isn't Uma's sister Joy a professor of Radio Comedy at Middlesex University, London (the UK's first gender-fluid university)?
DeleteIndeed! You know the Lesses? There is a third - Ruth - Professor of Combined Feminist, Transgender, Media, and Privilege Studies at the Qatari and Chinese funded "Emir Farzi - Mao Ze Dong" International Friendship Research Unit at the University of London. She is publisher of the seminal work "Melanin Deficient Men Must Die, But Slowly and Painfully".
DeleteA huge family. Penny appears regularly on Woman's Hour bemoaning the many degrees of inequality (if you haven't heard today's 'issue', just force yourself to listen to a bit of it, it's a treat. White men are a real problem according to Garvey, even though a lot of them contribute to her overblown wage).
DeletePenny and Relent have their claws out for the patriarchy.
Speech rarely makes an appearance, alas. Whereas Guile features with alarming frequency on QT.
Spirit, Frivo and Spine have formed a sexual / political / philosophical intersectional ska group. Spine plays the drums, Spirit sings in that modern mumble I so love, and Frivo has haircuts, does whatever he feels like and taps a tambourine. They aren't very good.
Whatever else I'm sure the sainted Murray knows the difference between 'sat' and 'sitting', (I can hear Sir Terry spinning as I write!).
ReplyDeleteI did not have any BBC on Christmas Day. It's my favourite day of the year, so didn't want to risk spoiling it.
ReplyDeleteHowever doing some tidying up this morning I turned on R4 and ... it was Moaners Hour being introduced by Jane Garvey ... "Well, you've survived this far" moaned Jane about Christmas before describing a line-up of divisive anti-family, feminist moaning with the promise of special Christmas transgender racial moaning to finish the program.
I switched-off and haven't had any more BBC all day.
Merry Christmas all at ITBB!
The bbc is, for us, not an option. Not one missed.
DeleteHowever, we have added Netflix to our repertoire, which has expanded considerably.
And all at a price considerably less than the licence fee.
News - real news - you won't hear on "another beauty" BBC.
ReplyDeletehttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d37JmU8laTo
The BBC finds space for hundreds of anti-Brexit, pro Second Referendum stories on its Brexit page.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.bbc.co.uk/news/politics/uk_leaves_the_eu
But as yet, not space for the YouGov poll showing a huge lead for leaving the EU among voters.
Given YouGov is a BBC Favourite and were six points wrong in Remain's favour on their eve of referendum poll, I think we can say that is a pretty clear result.
But though they are a BBC favourite, so far no mention...perhaps those somnolescent BBC journos we see in front of their computer screens have yet to recover from a surfeit of nut cutlet at Christmas?
Via Twitter I just now learned that Nick Clegg campaigned for the Referendum that gave the country Brexit.
DeleteI wonder if the bbc will ‘analyse’ that?
You mean in 2010? Yes,he campaigned for a simple "in-out" referendum (probably through craven fear of UKIP's impact in Sheffield would be my guess). He seemed to think it was simple enough then. But you're right the BBC never ask him any hard questions about that.
DeleteOn a day when Lewis Hamilton is forced to apologise for being somewhat nonplussed at the sight of his nephew in a princess dress, I turned on the radio to hear Jenni Murray informing us, in her unpleasantly prurient social worker voice, that masculinity has to change. Frankly, I’m not even sure what that means, other than just another part of life that the PC left want to control. A simplification it may be, but basically militant feminists want to be men (when it suits them), but they don’t want men to be men.
ReplyDeleteI’m still looking for a term that accurately describes the PC left, who despite their own description of themselves, are neither progressive nor liberal.
JM is a complete hypocrite. I've read stuff by her* defending her sons' rugby playing and the fact she went to matches to support them playing. You couldn't get much more masculine than male rugby, or an activity more needlessly damaging of young male bodies in fact, (apart from war). And what did Jenni think they did after the matches? Quilt making?
ReplyDelete*time I can never get back
Spotted over at Biased BBC:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-42197006
There the BBC makes the following demonstrably Fake Claim:
"Opinion - BBC News itself is impartial and does not offer opinions but we do sometimes publish expressions of personal views by outside experts, advocating ideas and drawing conclusions based on the author's interpretation of facts and data"
These could be shown to be false by any number of examples but this one will do:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-42197006
If the BBC really can't see this is an opinion piece entered under the "News" section, then that equally shows its bias through its (left-liberal slanted inability to distinguish fact from opinion.
The BBC have lapped up this anti Trump snippet:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-42499266
'Bishop of Liverpool criticises Christian Trump supporters'
Needless to say, the report comes via a Guardian interview with Paul Bayes, the Bishop of Liverpool. It is unusual for the BBC to report on matters of the Anglican Church, but in this case, the anti Trump angle wins out, pushing up into headline position.
There must be some 'empathy' between the C of E, the BBC and the Guardian on this - what a surprise! Naturally, the empathy isn't with the upholding of Christianity against the impending growth of Islam in the UK, but with US party politics - a subject the the BBC cannot leave alone, and for which they would use any ammunition available to them.
I saw the following in the BBC article you just referenced:
Delete"A travel ban currently prevents nationals of Chad, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Syria and Yemen from entering the US."
This is simply untrue. It would be true to say that entry from those countries is now subject to very strict vetting. However, on a case by case basis American consuls can approve entry to the USA for individuals.
I decided this fits MB's festive fifty, No. 50 Bias by Absorption. Here the BBC swallow hook line and sinker a Guardian interview with Paul Bayes, the Bishop of Liverpool, without question, allowing fermentation of anti Trump sentiment from within to amplify a second-hand borrowed story.
ReplyDeleteTalking of things festive, I've just chortled my way through my annual stocking-filler treat of unpublished letters to the Daily Telegraph, this year called, 'Did Anyone Else See That Coming...? To give you just two examples, there's
ReplyDeletethis:
"SIR- 'On the BBC (viewers) will often hear people they disagree with saying things they do not like,' says Nick Robinson, quite reasonably.
However, if they support UKIP, Israel, Brexit, grammar schools etc. They will rarely, if ever, hear people they agree with saying things they like.'...and things like this,
'SIR - The blame lies with the BBC for feeding Laura Kuenssberg on live wasps, the last of which she has not finished chewing as she goes on air. When she is to question anyone in Cabinet, they throw in a hornet.' "
So come on fellow ITBBCB? bloggers, own up! - which of you has been writing to the Telegraph under the pseudonyms of 'B.T.WALL & G.P.Brown?
Not guilty! But enjoyed those. :)
DeleteGiven the BBC News website treats us to all sorts of Trumpophobic minutitiae on its US/Canada page, and given the huge number of correspondents it has covering the US, it's odd isn't it they can't find space for this important story:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-5219125/State-Dept-release-Abedin-documents-Weiner-laptop.html
The Anthony Weiner-Huma Abedin-Hillary Clinton link is being made apparent and I think it is also shedding light on Comey's odd behaviour during the campaign...it is probably the NYPD investigation that forced him into CYA mode.
These documents were released mid Friday afternoon. Still the BBC has failed to follow up this huge story on its US-Canada page. I think one can only conclude they are in full Clinton Protection Mode...of course they are always in full Clinton Protection Mode (!) but here they are prepared to put their own reputation as a news agency on the line in service of that CPM requirement.
DeleteThanks Craig and Sue for all your hard work during 2017. Looking forward to 2018!
ReplyDeleteSeconded.
DeleteLike the BBC I am becoming a bit US-obsessed at the moment!
ReplyDeleteNot since the American Presidential election have I visited so many "far right", "conspiracist" and "Fake News" sites...back in 2016 that was how I knew not to trust the BBC's take on the American election: I realised thanks to those sites that (a) the polls were effectively rigged (b) the media was covering for Hillary and (c) there was a huge groundswell of support for Trump...which was why I thought Trump had a good chance of winning, as he did.
The reason for my renewed interest is that I am getting the same vibe...there is a huge amount of interesting stuff happening at the moment in the USA and there is virtually NO reporting of it here in the UK on the BBC or MSM more generally - and that is despite their obsession with all things American, in particular all things Trump.
Among the things being ignored:
1. FOI e mails obtained showing Huma Abedin passing Clinton e mails containing classified material to her (Huma's) husband, disgraced Weiner.
2. Recent Exec Order by Trump on seizure of human trafficker assets. Apparently this is what lies behind the sudden and unexplained resignation of Eric Schmidt, Google CEO.
3. Mueller investigation falling apart as e mails and other info show half the investigation team are pro-Clinton, anti-Trump partisans.
4. "Q Anon" - a source on Reddit has been making accurate predictions and hints about major developments including Pope's comments on Lord's Prayer and number of other high profile issues, including terrorist incidents.
5. Growing evidence that Comey has been involved in obstruction of justice on a grand scale. (Newt Gingrich has been on national TV and said this, by the way. Not my interpretation.)
6. A web of corruption around the Clintons and Podestas.
It is all v. fascinating and backed up by real evidence.
Are the BBC at all interested? Er - no. What does that tell you about the continued Fake News operation at the BBC? They really are not a serious news organisation. They a serious political propaganda machine, that is all.
The BBC News website is proving true to form this morning. When I looked earlier there were New Year messages from Theresa May and Jeremy Corbyn side by side given equal prominence. An hour later, the Prime Minister's message has disappeared leaving Jeremy's piece in place with its photo showing clearly the Labour 2017 election slogan. I guess that will stay there for most of the day now.
ReplyDeleteTheresa May's message is back again now - noticeably given less prominence to that of Corbyn.
DeleteHer message 'Britons will feel pride in 2018, says Theresa May' must be less important to the BBC than 'Labour 'staking out centre ground', says Jeremy Corbyn'
Yes, Sky News in contrast has one headline story covering them all ('Leaders pitch to voters in New Year messages') while ITV News has equally-sized pieces with equally-sized photos placed next to each other from TM and JC. As you say, Jeremy Corbyn still had a main article with photo on the BBC News website with Mrs May still relegated to a small side-story.
DeleteYes, this is a subtle form of bias because if ever they were questioned, the Beeboids would say that of course both Leaders' messages were given equal prominence. The question is though: how long did this equal prominence last? Answer - Not for long!
DeleteIt's all changed again. Theresa May's message has disappeared altogether again - JC is still there as large as life.
DeleteNow May is being given more prominence than JC...think they're messing with our minds...and reading this blog! lol
DeleteThey've both disappeared altogether now. As it is the week-end and New Year's Eve, a quiet time in the BBC newsroom - with all senior folk away at their Cornish bolt-holes, perhaps there is a back-room battle going on between junior editors each keen to make their mark and endear themselves to their absent masters.
DeleteOh, they must be messing with our minds. They're both in the less important side-section now, and JC is now back above TM!
DeleteAnd finally - in the less important side-section the last message standing is that of JC - blatant bias.
DeleteMay back on top!...perhaps they've got sophisticated software that jiggles them around.
ReplyDeleteHappy New Year to Craig, Sue and all of you. :)
ReplyDeleteHappy New Year Monkey Brains!
DeleteI just saw the Trump New Year message online...thought I would see how the BBC were treating it...nowhere to be seen! lol Surely they have got to be interested in it because they obsess about Trump all the time. I really don't think the BBC can be defined as a "news" organisation. They are an "Organised Information Distortion Service". Maybe when they've decided how they are going to treat the Trump message (mock? misdirect? ignore?) they will decide to what extent they will report it and how.
ReplyDeleteIt's 17 mins after midnight - just searched on Trump New Year Message. No results! lol Maybe they have a kind of standing committee of Trump Interpretation and they have to go through that before they report it.
DeleteJust an observation. The BBC is a multi-billion pound organisation, employs well over 1000 of its own journalists and is hugely obsessed with all news relating to Trump...
ReplyDeleteSo why when you go on its US-Canada page do you find three prominent article from its "experts"(Anthony Zuchner, Katty Kay and Jon Sopel) dated: 12,13 and 17 December - in order words articles that are already 2-3 weeks out of date.
I don't think this is even half way acceptable. Fox New, a much smaller news outfit, manages to provide up to date news and analysis.
If you look at the Zuchner article, dealing with the Mueller investigation, it is clearly written before the huge number of recent developments: congressional hearings, FOI e mail releases, Comey tweet etc etc.
The BBC isn't just biased, it's also pretty useless.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world/us_and_canada
I would put this down to smug complacency. In the mind's eye of the average BBC Journalist, it is the reaction that his/her reporting will receive from their peers at the BBC, the MSM and Westminster that matters most to them. They are playing to an audience of group-thinking cloned Beeboids all eager to amplify a fine-tuned mantra - reaction of the licence-payer must be well down their list of concerns.
DeleteYes, I think you are right. Jon Sopel is much more concerned that his riposte to the President plays well with his peers in the elite news squad than it should actually be convincing. Looking at Sky tonight, I got a sense that perhaps the media are feeling things slipping out of their grasp. It's great to see Trump setting the agenda in so many areas e.g. Pakistan, whose duplicitous foreign policy has been an absolute scandal for decades. I got a strong feeling the elite media are giving him a kind of grudging respect now. We certainly don't hear those old "chaos in the White House" tropes so beloved of journos like ITV's Robert Moore - though Craig noted Naughtie is still predicting something along those lines (but then Naughtie is very old and stupid).
DeleteAnonymous, the reaction of the license fee payer is NOT low down on their list of concerns - it's simply NOT on the list at all! Why should it be? License fee rolls in whatever they say to joe public. Much more important for their careers to keep the boss and his/her peers happy. This is one of the reasons why Groupthink is so strong at the BBC. It's actually reinforced by the license fee system.
DeleteNot sure I agree with the fair rises, however this actually suggests it’s about spot on;
ReplyDeleteRobin Keenan, from Waltham Abbey in Essex, said he has been priced out of his London-based job due to ticket costs.
"I'm starting a new job tomorrow that's a lot closer to home - so no more trains," he told BBC News.
"I've taken a £2,000 hit in my wages but I'll be saving that amount due to a short bike journey.
Rail fare rises: Commuters 'priced off' UK trains, union says http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-42536159
I’ll leave it to others to decide whether this is actually just based on labour statements and not actually news.
Zurcher's piece on what faces Trump...
ReplyDeletehttp://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-42545855
Really, you would think Trump faces only troubles and no opportunities! You wouldn't think the American economy is growing at 3% per annum or that the Dow has gone through the roof.
The reference to the Mueller investigation is pathetic. Anyone who follows American politics will know the investigation is in deep trouble because so many of its staff are now proven (via e mails, donations and so on) to be pro-Clinton anti-Trump partisans. But the photo-caption gives us the Fake News claim that "Mueller is oout of the headlines - for now". This is nonsense - there have been Congressional hearings over Christmas that have focussed on Mueller and been reported in by all the main news agencies. But - surprise, surprise - the BBC has created this Fake News impression that nothing has been happening re the Mueller investigation. This article is proof that this is just another BBC Fake News op. They couldn't get away with it in the USA. But in the UK they can project an entirely false image of what has been happening - "nothing" according to their Fake News.
It's the first week of a new year...so, step forward Mark Easton, still obsessed with his cazy, kamikaze, single-minded mission to concrete over the whole of Britain, by getting us to believe that only 0.1% of the landscape is built on.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-42554635
"The illusion of a concrete Britain" by Mark "Sharp-Suited Stalin" Easton.
Now, please note this article appears as "News" under the UK News section on the NEWS page of the BBC Website. News? Really???
And this is how this "news" article ends:
"But it is hard to have an informed and rational debate about housing policy, airport expansion or, for that matter, intensive agricultural methods when the country is so mistaken about the basics. We must open our eyes and our minds to the true geography of the United Kingdom."
This is not news, this is opinion, and p*ss-poor opinion at that based on a dodgy survey in turn based on the dodgy proposition that individuals can make their own meaningful estimate based on a statistical methodology briefly explained to them by non-experts (the pollsters). It's a bit like telling people what the cosmological constant is and then asking them to estimate the amount of dark matter in the cosmos.
Easton seems to be under the mistaken impression that it is for him to tell the British people what is and isn't important in their lives. In particular he wants them to study statistical geography more assiduously than has hiterto been the case. One can almost here the collective raspberry that is the response of the British people to this arrogant, teacherly demand.
What most people understand by "built up", "countryside" and "natural" is as much subjective as objective. It's a lot to do with noise levels, freshness of the air, population density, the amount of greenery on view, whether you can see roads, traffic, railways and pylons.
According to Easton the 40 million people squeezed into the southern parts of England should not feel they are living in built up areas. They are suffering from a delusion, owing to poor statistical understanding.
Easton's arrogance is the very definition of all that is wrong with the BBC.
I read this news from Mark Easton, and I noticed a recurrence of a theme bearing a strange similarity to the piece of his highlighted recently: namely his concern with the Industrial Revolution of the 19th C.
DeleteFrom this latest news story 'The illusion of a concrete Britain':
.... The story of Britain's treasured green landscapes being gobbled up by greedy industrialists and developers is part of national folklore....
....It has its origins in the trauma of the Industrial Revolution, when rural life was rocked by the arrival of big cities, vast metropolises squatting unsteadily on the countryside and changing everything.....
And then the piece written on 24th June 2016, the day after the EU Referendum: 'A less than United Kingdom':
.... In the century after 1750, Manchester was transformed from a market town of 18,000 inhabitants to a teeming metropolis of 300,000. It was a similar story in Bristol, Birmingham, Liverpool, Leeds and Newcastle....
....Those sucked into the gravitational pull of the new manufacturing centres were forced to adapt to urban dominance, but such was the resentment that it lives on to this day....
.... For the poor agricultural labourers marched from farm to factory, and for the rich landowners supplanted by ambitious industrialists, the new age of international trade was as horrifying as some regard the globalisation of today.....
By comparing these two stories, which deal with dissimilar issues, the implication is that land should be made available for unlimited expansion of city-style cosmopolitan life.
CountryFile epitomises the BBC's distorted view of the UK outside the city limits, where local farmers, (whose employees and relatives can't afford to buy themselves a house because of over-inflated prices), craftsmen and artisans are encouraged to put on a show as entertainment.
Easton is one of those "Bears of Little Brain" - Emma Barnett is another one - who you often find on the BBC and who seem to think they are a lot cleverer than they are (and consequently they feel justified in the erroneous belief that they are cleverer than the average Brit)...in his case, he probably read a couple of books of social history, probably The Making of the English Working Class by EP Thompson being one of them and he thinks he understands everything there is to know about our society and its history.
DeleteAs you say, he appears to think our green an pleasant land should be made available for unlimited expansion of his favoured city-style cosmopolitan life.
Since Easton is so keen on stats and thinks statistical geography is the beginning of wisdom, perhaps he should reflect that our UK cities actually have a very low population density compared with cities around the world like Calcutta, Hong Kong, Tokyo, Shanghai, Cairo, Rio de Janeiro - or even Paris. So, why isn't he arguing that our cities need to catch up with the world average in terms of population density - rather than arguing that our countryside should be despoiled and our agricultural sector decimated?
Hmmm...because, although, he poses as someone dedicated to the things that unite us, he actually hates half the country - the half that voted Brexit, the half that have a sentimental attachment to the notion of a green and pleasant land, the half that value our culture and don't want to see it obliterated by mass immigration.
The above gives further credence to the BBC 'London is the UK and the UK is Loondon*' misapprehension, and that investment in national infrastructure should serve London first .
DeleteTake for instance Crossrail, a magnificent engineering achievement of which the country can be proud. But, at £15bn, who stands to benefit? My guess is that over 99% of the UK population will never make use of it. The cynic in me says that it's for the wealthy elite, barristers included, who live in the leafy suburbs of West London to get to work in Canary Wharf, and in reciprocal movement, cleaners and baristas travel out from their below par east London accommodation to work.
* Loondon - miskeyed, but it can stay.
I think you just coined a new word - Loondon...where the people vote consistently for more mass immigration to make sure they can't ever afford to live in anything bigger than a multi-occupied shoe box. :)
DeleteCrossrail is probably more justifiable than HS2 in terms of economic gain but I am sure you are right it will deliver most benefit to the Riverside Riche and further fuel mass immigration. Until the early 80s London's population was reducing and there had been a huge increase in the quality of life compared with how things had been in the 1950s. It's noticeable now in London how many young families are living in cramped apartments.
That's decided then. From now on, this particular Anonymous will be known as Loondon Calling.
DeleteIn Mark Easton's recent reference to the Industrial Revolution, he cites Manchester as an example of the rapid expansion of a small town into a city caused by movement of the working population to support the cotton industry. The point he misses is that there were sound economic reasons for Manchester as a location - proximity to Liverpool for the import of raw cotton and the canal system, later to be replaced by the Manchester Ship Canal, the reliably wet weather due to its proximity to the Pennines, and a plentiful supply of water. Civic pride and regional identity followed.
DeleteThe same is true of many other industries, which were founded in various locations due to local resources. In his assertion that there is plenty of green space to build, Easton is dismissing as an argument the regional sensibilities that are essential to the formation of a coherent and fully functioning social enterprise.
Easton's argument seems to be that as London is the UK and the UK is London, the simple concept of expanding the London culture of economic development into the rest of the UK will work. Well, it won't. Within the London model, there is an element of a return to feudalism, where the rich become richer and the poor become poorer. Immigrant workers poor into London expecting a better way of life economically (which relatively they may well achieve), only to take up their position within this new-feudalism of the London City-State.
The vote to leave the EU was in part a reaction to the London model, and a search for the civic pride and fulfilled skilled employment of old - as it was and still is in Manchester.
Slip of the keyboard again, 3rd para ... pour into London...
DeleteThe search for regional identity is a concept beyond the understanding of the BBC because it doesn't fit comfortably with their own concept of inclusivity. As a result, Leave voters who didn't wish to be 'included' into the London model are automatically labelled as racist xenophobic misogynist etc.
DeleteIn Mark Easton's claim that there is plenty of green space available for building, he fails to take account of regional variations of building style, something that gives rise to civic pride eg Cotswold Stone or Cornish granite or Welsh slate. The Prescott inspired estate building where high density developments are located on the margins of towns and villages take no account of regional identities - an example of a one-size-fits-all approach to the housing shortages.
This approach to house building has a number of inherent failings. Firstly, until there is a healthy profit available to the house-builder, the site will stay dormant despite PP having been given. Secondly, developments do not create places - they rely mostly on car use to connect residents to centres of amenity, culture, healthcare etc. Rapid expansion of urbanity during the Industrial Revolution resulted eventually in the creation of great towns and cities. It's hard to imagine how this London model can ever achieve anything comparable.
President Trump is going to dole out some Fake News awards...
ReplyDeletehttp://www.foxnews.com/politics/2018/01/02/trump-fights-fake-news-with-awards-for-most-dishonest-corrupt-media.html
Any chance of "Another Beauty" being in the running. That would be so funny if they were. But true to his "America First" mantra, I think he may focus on US Fake News.
BBC report links crime wave to migrants:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-42557828
If you made this point on "Have Your Say", the BBC would report you to your employer, your school or the police.
Free speech in the UK has become a rather unfunny joke.
I wonder how many remainers have made the connection between the migrant crisis and the result of the referendum. Angela Merkel’s actions in 2015 may well have tipped the balance and actually precipitated Brexit. A sobering thought for Junkers and all those traumatised Europeans.
DeleteYes, I think it was definitely what prevented old smoothy chops Cameron from achieving his objective. Although the British people were constantly lied to about the nature of the migration wave (being fed pictures of and reports about distressed families rather than armies of young men) they saw enough to make them feel very uncomfortable...if a million people could be let in on the whim of one German Chancellor what did that say about the nature of the EU? The migration wave set the scene for Brexit. The next tipping point I think was the President of the USA being invited in to lecture us about how we should vote in our own Referendum. Thought the polls were rigged against Leave, they showed movement away from Remain after that. Obama's intervention combined with the negative nature of the relentless and increasingly absurd "project fear" (which I think provoked a certain bloody-minded reaction from Brits, as seen in Sunderland) then delivered a Brexit majority. It was an amazing victory given the huge scale of the pro-Remain propaganda seen on BBC, Sky and ITV.
DeleteThe BBC's Fake News Reality Check team seem to have overdone it at Christmas and are now suffering a semi-psychotic episode in the New Year...at least judging by their latest "analysis"...
ReplyDeletehttp://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-41165076
The subject this time...? "Queen Bee syndrome"...yes, me neither.
Still, surely the Reality Check Team - who probably cost the BBC several million pounds a year in salaries, office space and pension commitments - must have come up with a clear, trenchant and informative conclusion explaining what the "reality" is with respect to the issue of the moment, the famous or is it infamous "Queen Bee Syndrome"...
Well here you go:
"Queen bee syndrome is a controversial subject.
The theory seeks to establish a cause and effect relationship between perceived female behaviour traits and the lack of representation at the top of management.
In doing so it makes sweeping generalisations about the way all women behave.
This is a very difficult link to prove. It also ignores the role that men may play.
The very existence of the term is perhaps one of many examples of sexism at work.
As Sheryl Sandberg, Facebook's chief operating officer, observed last year: "Women aren't any meaner to women than men are to one another. Women are just expected to be nicer".
Most research suggests that since the concept first gained traction in the 1970s, queen bee syndrome has lost its sting."
There you go! Feel "englightened" now?
What a crock of BS!!!
Even from the information given about the claimed "syndrome" you can see that their conclusion that "In doing so it makes sweeping generalisations about the way all women behave." is Fake, False, Fictitious. It is quite clear the idea of the syndrome was created to explain how SOME women behave most definitely not ALL women as claimed in the conclusion.
It's really quite incredible that valuable licence fee resources are being spent on this rubbish, or that the BBC touts their Reality Check as proof of their commitment to countering Fake News and ensuring the public receive accurate information.
The word 'Crikey!' springs to mind. And the phrase 'Good grief!'
DeleteI think you will find both phrases are unacceptable to a PC audience as they are christocentric. :(
DeleteAccording to the Sun from before Christmas, 3.5m people have declined to buy a TV Licence over the last four years in favour of streaming Netflix etc.
ReplyDeletehttps://www.thesun.co.uk/tvandshowbiz/5167904/licence-fee-amazon-prime-netflix-bbc/
We haven't heard about this on the BBC. Should we be worried that they are not worried - enough to even mention it?
A new Bias ploy? Highlight only those Viewsnights from Newsnight that you want to highlight - like this one from David "Blair Babe" Aaronovitch about the Brexit generation that is dying out...
ReplyDeletehttp://www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/uk-politics-42574540/viewsnight-the-brexit-generation-is-dying-out
Highlight it and plonk it under the politics section under "News" even though in the description you admit it's opinion, not news.
For me paying for the BBC is like broadband and telephone line rental, it’s something from a bygone age that you just pay for so that you can use something else....and I’m sure that’s true for an increasingly large number of others, who feel trapped by the deliberately confusing rules.
ReplyDeleteYour site seems to have never mentioned Prof Ivor Gaber, whose speciality is producing reports saying that the BBC shows bias to right. An extraordinary claim with no extraordinary evidence.
ReplyDeleteI would say malicious cos his trick was to pick episodes of Marr where there was a big interview of a lefty politician, but Gaber would say "look at the press panel has 1 Lab, 1 Tory and a Sun journalist ..Right Bias, righty Bias
..well of course there aren't going to have another Labour MP on when the first half of the prog has been Corbyn, McDonnel, Abbott etc.
His Facebook page is all postings about Lefty and Anti-Brexit petitions to sign.
I did a few posts on B-BBC
- Quik list on articles and bio
No, and I can't think why we've not mentioned him - especially as his name is very familiar to me.
DeleteWorse, he's even published research papers titled 'Is the BBC biased?'
The one thing I particularly remember for him for is for producing a report called 'The Corporation and the coverage of the 2006 Israeli—Hezbollah war', which dismissed concerns about anti-Israeli bias and said that the BBC "covered the conflict more or less impartially".
(http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/1464884908100603).
Like the Cardiff Uni crowd, Prof Gaber is obviously one of these left-wing professors who the BBC can rely on to boost their 'complaints from both sides' fallacy whilst, simultaneously, reinforcing their their 'the BBC is impartial' fallacy.
Nothing on NewsWatch or BBCwatch either
Delete(Strange that to post comments here, your site won't recognise my wordpress credentials)
Ah in a comment to someone citing Gaber as truthful
DeleteDavid Keighley threw down a challenge
"If you can provide research-based evidence in line with with what Ivor Gaber contends, I will be very happy to publish it on the News-watch website."
Obviously this was not forthoming
OK - having read all 1004 articles on the BBC News website concerning the Michael Wolff book on Trump I have a question:
ReplyDelete"Does the Lord Hall of Birkenhead pleasure himself in his pants with a sprig of holly of a morning?"
The only reason I ask is that one of his close confidantes told me he does.
Did you spot that the BBC has finally got round to reporting something about the investigations in to the Clintons?
Deletehttp://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-42579732
It was published yesterday but I didn't spot it anywhere on the main page. I suspect it was 'buried' in the World Section - an example of both Bias by News Prioritising and Bias by Burying.
Scanning TV Eyes for any mention of the story on the BBC News Channel I drew a blank. It looks as if it wasn't reported at all on BBC TV.
The one exception was just now on 'Dateline' when Michael Goldfarb brought it up: "But what is interesting to me is the way the Republicans have dealt with this so far. Their initial response was to demand the Justice Department look into the Clinton foundation. They are backing their man."
And the BBC are backing their woman!
The story is also filed under "Russia-Trump inquiry" despite it having absolutely nothing to do with the Russia-Trump inquiry! - a classic bit of news management from the BBC:
Deletehttp://www.bbc.co.uk/news/topics/ckgj73ppdk5t/russia-trump-inquiry
See http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-42587028 with its photo of Donald Trump with a completely black background. This trick has been used for months now on the BBC News website mainly on Theresa May's image, and now seemingly on Trump when they want us to perceive the subject as isolated and without support - from the BBC that is.
ReplyDeleteWhen was the last time we saw one of the favoured individuals such ad JC with a wholly black background? Some dept or other at the BBC must be hard at work with their photoshop kit to produce these images. The images have been tampered with and artificially created.
You have mentioned this before LC and I’ve been sceptical about your claim but I just tested this on google images and typed three different searches bbc Trump, bbc Theresa May and bbc Corbyn.
DeleteYou are absolutely right , mostly of Mays and Trumps have black backgrounds in the first 20 images whereas Corbyn has none. Not scientific research I know but I think you are on to something. Also just tried bbc Clegg and guess what no black backgrounds.
Subliminal and sinister.
Psychological malfunctioning of world leaders can have consequences for the planet.
ReplyDeleteHe has been described as a narcissist, an overgrown baby - vain and careful about his appearance. There is no doubt about his debilitating recurring bouts of mental illness, deep depressions and periods of manic activity, suggesting a bipolar diagnosis which would compromise rational decision making. His unnatural love of war and conflict has been much criticised as has his seeking out grand gestures and "quick fixes" to solve complex problems. Looking at his relationship with his father and mother one can see the many unresolved issues that were to influence his psychology. This can perhaps be seen in some of his disparaging and sexist remarks about women. To top it all he is grossly dependent on alcohol.
All in all, Winston Churchill was a thoroughly dangerous influence on the world stage. A shame the BBC didn't "speak truth to power" back in the 1940s as they do so bravely now while plotting with CNN to bring down Trump through the 25th Amendment process.
The BBC should be ashamed of its wartime record as regards that warmonger Winston Churchill and for being so judgemental about Adolf Hitler. Lord Hall must be aghast.
DeleteBessie Braddock MP: “Winston, you are drunk, and what’s more you are disgustingly drunk.”
DeleteWSC: “Bessie, my dear, you are ugly, and what’s more, you are disgustingly ugly. But tomorrow I shall be sober and you will still be disgustingly ugly.”
1946, and he probably wasn't even drunk.
I know some people can't stand BBC World Service, feeling it falls short in the blowing the British trumpet department. However, I find it far less biased than Radio 4 or BBC TV. A good example recently was a piece by Adam Easton about Poland that I heard today - which began with a frank admission that the right wing government was very popular and then dealt pretty fairly I felt with why that might be. It shows that being balanced is not difficult to pull off. But had it been a Newsnight piece it would have been wrapped in a load of Guardian-guff about the rise of Trump, fascism, Brexit and hate crime, framed by a couple of experts or commentators who despise the current Polish government, focussed on a very EU-sympathetic analysis and presented on the assumption that Merkel-Macron style leadership is the very acme of good governance.
ReplyDeleteTWTW on Radio 4 today - devoted entirely to knee-yife crime innit? Subjects carefully avoided included lone parenting and poor parenting, incentives to lone parenting, poor school discipline, minority community differentials and message sent by repeat offending let-offs.
ReplyDeleteBut for me there was an even bigger glaring omission. Various wiseacres told us that young people were influenced to carry knives by "fashion". No mention of music probably the biggest influence through grime with its violent references, threats, and glorification of guns and knives. And where is such music to be found? BBC Radio 1 and Radio 1 Xtra.
The hypocrisy of the BBC - one moment mourning the death of young people and on the other glorifying youth violence via music is quite sickening.
I heard that too. Your point about the BBC's hypocrisy has given me pause for thought. Non-PC tweets are beyond the pale for them; violence-promoting songs are fine.
DeleteThe BBC must look at this site - the picture of Mrs May as she appeared on Marr is not shrouded in black:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-42597563
But what is there, but isolated in the report of her interview is:
...'She insisted the NHS was delivering care to more people than ever before'....
This sentence is itself a detached paragraph with no background or context. It is the BBC way of disassociating itself from the comment.
The meaning is clear. The NHS is having to 'deliver care to more people than ever before', and yet is unable to reduce waiting times. What possibly could be the reason?
It's a funny old word, "insisted". My ears always prick up when I hear it. The BBC could just say "said" instead. "Insisted" always makes me think of Hamlet's "The lady doth protest too much, methinks."
DeleteWhere someone says something that is undoubtedly and verifiably true - eg that the NHS is delivering care to more people than ever before - surely "noted" is the more appropriate neutral verb.
DeleteYes, the impression given is that an assertion such as this blindingly obvious truth must be defended against the superior intellect that is Marr.
DeleteUnsurprisingly, there has been a subtle change in the wording of this story:
Delete.. 'PM Theresa May defends record ahead of cabinet reshuffle'..
The single sentence paragraph has been removed in favour of:
.... Mr Marr disputed the idea that urgent care was being delivered in time, raising the case of Leah Butler-Smith and her mother, who, having suffered a stroke, waited an hour in an ambulance and a further four in A&E before seeing a doctor.
"If I'd been waiting for five hours before I'd seen a doctor after my stroke I would not be here talking to you," he said.
"This is about life and death, and up and down the country people are having horrendous experiences of the NHS."
The prime minister said she had not heard of the specific case and so could not comment, and insisted that the NHS was delivering more than ever before...
So, Mrs May is still 'insisting', but now the emphasis has been changed to make it sound as if TM is mounting a feeble defence against the BBC Labour perennial accusation of 'NHS cuts'.
The subtle change is in the exclusion of a key part of Mrs May's reply - Version 1:
Delete...'She insisted the NHS was delivering care to more people than ever before'....
Version 2:
... 'insisted that the NHS was delivering more than ever before'...
Although these two versions don't seem to be much different, the second version shifts emphasis away from total numbers receiving NHS care in favour of exposing a system that can't cope because of a Government whose handling of the NHS cannot be trusted - the default position of Labour BBC.
I agree the two are not the same. Version 1 is a statement of fact whereas Version 2 is a political claim. According to the Mail she said:
Delete"If we look at what is happening across the NHS what we see is that actually the NHS is delivering for more people, it is treating more people and more people are being seen within the four hours every day than has been in the – a few years ago."
The BBC could have quoted her but you may have noticed they don't like to quote Conservative politicians directly. They much prefer the Norman Smith "dodgy paraphrase" method. :)
At 37 minutes into the Andrew Marr Show, Theresa May says 'The NHS is treating more people...'
DeleteThis has been reported on the BBC News website as version 2 - probably the archived version: ... 'insisted that the NHS was delivering more than ever before'...
Is this a deliberate misrepresentation by the BBC of what the PM said?
Ask the BBC. Remind them of a previous time they tried to use the NHS less than accurately...
Deletehttp://www.pressgazette.co.uk/trust-upholds-complaint-against-bbc-news-over-inaccurate-tweet/
OK, Iv'e done that. Here is my complaint:
DeleteYour Complaint
Location
England
First half of UK Postcode
LE16
Type of complaint
BBC News (TV, Radio and website)
Which news service is it about
BBC News website
URL
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-42597563
Complaint category
Standards of interviewing/presenting
Contacted us before
No
Complaint title
Misrepresentation of what was said in an interview
Complaint description
By a series of editorial content changes, the BBC News website misrepresented what was being said by the Prime Minister on the Andrew Marr Show on Sunday 8th January 2018. At 37 minutes into the Andrew Marr Show, Theresa May says 'The NHS is treating more people...' However, this statement was reported on the BBC News website differently. Firstly in version 1: ...'She [Mrs May] insisted the NHS was delivering care to more people than ever before'.... And later on in the day, version 2: ... [Mrs May] 'insisted that the NHS was delivering more than ever before'... It is version 2, which will most-likely be the archived version, what the Prime Minister said has been misrepresented. By removing ...'The NHS is treating more people...' and replacing it with ... 'insisted that the NHS was delivering more than ever before'... the PM's assertion that the NHS were treating more people has been lost altogether. If waiting times are not being reduced as a result of increased numbers being treated, then good journalistic practice might have led Marr to ask what the reasons for that might be. My complaint is that the Prime Minister's words were deliberately misconstrued in order to convey a politically damaging message about the Conservative Governments handling of the NHS.
Hard to argue with, but they will.
DeleteI don't need to tell you of the hoops you will be put through, but as this is on matters of fact in editorialising the onus is on them to prove otherwise, which if incontrovertible means they will try all sorts of 'belief' or 'practice' weasels to avoid addressing that.
Persevere, but the long haul awaits you.
I do one day intend to place my exchanges up on a blog one day to show where I went wrong, went right, and where the BBC tried, succeeded, failed or cheated to keep complaints anywhere but transparent.
Enough of us do, the BBC will have serious problems on its hand as their sister print medium is fond of telling us all: 'facts are sacred'.
And once the edit is outside their domain, raw data and full transcripts are mirrors up to which they can be fairly held.
Awaiting updates with interest. These can take time too.
As do FoI replies. I have a few nearing deadline.
One BBC quirk is to cite their own wasting of time or glacial consumption rates as reason to close the process down.
Craig I know you monitor those fake claims that the BBC is biased to the left.
ReplyDeleteThey seem to have ramped up the PR
see this thread
https://twitter.com/RickBlaine123/status/926600347296165888
I'm trying to figure out their claim that Amol Rajan supported the Conservatives in the 2015 election
..I'm wondering if that means he supported the Libs going into coalition ?
"Independent editor Amol Rajan has said he regrets not doing more to counter suggestions that the paper’s election leader backing the coalition was voicing support for the Conservatives. "
Deletehttps://www.theguardian.com/media/2015/oct/08/independent-editor-tories-amol-rajan
Yes, "Media Editor Amol Rajan. Campaigned for the Conservative Party at the 2015 General Election" is fake news.
Delete"Amol Rajan wangled a nice radio programme which involved him seeing his old mates at his cricket club in London, being treated as a revered guest at Lord's, visiting India where presumably there are quite a few relatives he could meet up with, being ushered into the equivalent of Long Room at Lord's at one of India's ancient grounds and finally getting plenty of air time to pontificate about the future of cricket, despite being only a very average club player." is also Fake News.
DeleteJames Cook in all his Twitter splendour.
ReplyDeletehttps://twitter.com/bbcjamescook?lang=en
He's a celeb-lover, an Emma Watson botherer, a virtue signaller, and a fully paid up Trumpophobe - but is he a journalist?
He tells us Oprah Winfrey delivered a "powerful" speech and tweeted with all his might to promote her. Well there's another view, Jimmy boy - that it was a breath-takingly hypocritical speech given her close relationship with Harvey Weinstein and her failure to issue any kind of warning to the young female British actress who was reassured by Oprah's presence but then become a victim of a serious assault by HW. Did Oprah really not know about Harvey's MO at the time? A journalist would ask that question, rather than sycophantically promoting her as the next Democrat Presidential nominee.
Anyone heard anything from Kim Ghattas on BBC in recent months? I last saw her covering Hillary Clinton's campaign. I think she was then described as US State Department Correspondent...
ReplyDeletePeople may remember Ghattas was a complete Hillary Clinton teeny-bopper fan, who talked up her campaign and wrote an admiring book about her. The BBC thought this qualified her to report objectively on the Clinton campaign.
I haven't seen anything from her in ages...is she being paid by the BBC as one of their staffers? Because she seems to do a lot of work on the side if that is the case!
Looking at her official website she does claim to be a BBC journalist and that is the suggestion from her Twitter account as well.
https://twitter.com/BBCKimGhattas?ref_src=twsrc%5Egoogle%7Ctwcamp%5Eserp%7Ctwgr%5Eauthor
Incidentally you can see from the Twitter account that she is not shy in expressing her anti-Israeli sentiments.
I think there is a scandal here about how much some of these BBC staffers are getting paid for such little work. It would be nice if someone with the resources did a bit of digging. The work rate of Sky and ITV reporters seems much higher and they don't have a plethora of overlapping titles. In the USA it appears there is an International Editor covering the USA, a US State Department correspondent, a North American Correspondent (Cook), a North America reporter (Zurcher), and a BBC America presenter. That's just for starters as several other journos visit there on a regular basis: Simpson, Naughtie, Maitlis come to mind.
How much does the BBC spend on this endless stream of anti-American, anti-Trump invective? Must be tens of millions a year I reckon. And the irony is you have several American stations who would be only too happy to provide English language coverage at a tenth of the price. They could use CNN and you wouldn't notice much difference.
She seems to be doing things for the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and writing for US publications like 'Foreign Policy'.
Deletehttp://carnegie-mec.org/2017/12/13/world-on-edge-what-to-expect-in-2018-event-5712
http://foreignpolicy.com/2017/12/22/palestine-is-a-victim-of-the-iranian-saudi-war/
Well, one moderating job and one piece of writing!
Thanks for pointing out her anti-Israel tweets. She certainly isn't shy about expressing them.
I need to vent about the expression “Stale, Male and Pale” how is it acceptable for the BBC to use this? They wouldn’t dare use it about any other demographic.
ReplyDeleteI agree. The use of this description is unacceptable. Surely, Jeremy Corbyn and John McDonnell are equally deserving of the same description, but we won't hear any such statement about them fom the BBC.
DeleteHmmm that might be why they changed it to “Male and pale” on the 6 o’clock news on radio 4 tonight. Strangely it’s that bit I find more offensive,
DeleteI’ll happily support anyone else’s right to call another person incompetent etc but it should never be based on their sex or colour.
Is any of the following acceptable? Blonde Bimbo? Muslim Terrorist? Black Gangster?
ReplyDeleteStrangely the only one that probably is to the PC crowd is Jewish Banker, which says more about them.
BBC have another orgasm, this time over banning of Mail sale by Virgin Trains. Totalled biased report on 10 O'Clock News...firstly it claimed that the Mail used headlines about migration and related subjects to generate sales, as though that were their only operation. Then the reporter ended on a question about whether it was right to ban sales of a newspaper that "we" disagree with, implicitly acknowledging that she was anti-Mail. Of course we know she is, but she's not supposed to admit to it as (laughably) impartial BBC reporter.
ReplyDeleteI am looking forward to the Trump Fake News awards. Surely he can find some space for an overseas award to go to the BBC? Would be great if he chose James Cook as well with his indefensibly opinionated article (rather than the more circumspect Sopel).
Increasingly alarming and quite sinister that our State Broadcaster "questions" the banning of the free press.
DeleteState Broadcaster has already set up it's "fake news" and "fact check" operations which take aim at incorrect thoughts in other outlets.
... State Broadcaster "questions" the banning of the free press. ..
DeleteI think ... "questions" the banning of the free press... gives a misleading indication that the BBC might be questioning the veracity of VT's actions. ... State Broadcaster "heralds" the banning of the free press... might be a better description.
Yes I think "heralds" is a much better description. They often give a blast of the trumpet to usher in developments they like while putting on a veneer of faux impartiality. We see the same with the misnamed "Stop Funding Hate", transgender politics (how many people in the UK would even think it was an issue if they were choosing the news agenda? - I'd say about 0.01% max), BDS boycott of Israel, and promotion of racialised politics.
DeleteDid anyone here catch the programme "The Dawn of Brtish Jihad" by Mobeen Azhar, he of the gelled quiff and ostensibly "Islamo-lite" ideas...
ReplyDeletehttp://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b09l06nt
What struck me was the absence of any WTF element...it seemed almost to be celebrating, or at least treating in almost jocular fashion, the fact that back in the 90s the part-time Jihadis were tolerated, or even encouraged in the context of the Cold War - there was no suggestion that this (facilitation of Islamic Jihad in South Asia) was one of the biggest strategic mistakes ever made by the USA and its allies.
What I heard of the programme seemed to view everything from an Islamic/South Asian perspective. Can we expect more of the same as producers and presenters from that background increasingly take over BBC content?
I think MA was behind Muslims Like Us which you may recall allowed a couple of full-on Salafists to give vent to their views without challenge.
More skewed reporting is to be found on the BBC News website Homepage. In a small side-panel without any photograph is the story: 'UK manufacturing output at its highest for 10 years'.
ReplyDeleteTaking priority over this good news story, with a more prominent position and with a photograph is another story: 'Coconut controversy: Shoppers query use of plastic wrapping'.
To my mind, this demonstrates to the BBC tactic of deflecting attention away from important good news that might show the Government in a good light towards a light-hearted item.
On the Business section, the manufacturing story does receive priority over the coconuts. Both have photos.
As if by magic, a photograph has appeared and the manufacturing story has received promotion on the BBC News website Homepage. At 3.00 pm the manufacturing story with photo was to the right (ie less important) of the coconuts, but by 3.25 pm they swapped places, so manufacturing now has more prominence. Someone at the BBC must read this site and respond!
DeleteFor me the way the BBC treat manufacturing and financial services is generally biased because they assume they are of equal economic benefit in principle. That's not my view at all, and plenty of economists agree with me. Manufacturing spreads wealth all around the country rather than concentrating it in the capital. A manufacturing boom doesn't translate into increased housing costs, accelerated mass immigration and consequent pressure on public services in the way that a boom in financial services does. Increase manufacturing doesn't make us more vulnerable in a financial crash, in the way an increase in the finance sector does. I am ecstatic that our Brexit vote has reduced the value of our over-inflated currency and made possible this impressive manufacturing boom. Let's now build on this going forward.
Delete... Manufacturing spreads wealth all around the country rather than concentrating it in the capital.... I quite agree with you MB.
DeleteFrom House of Commons Library BRIEFING PAPER
Number 01942, 2 January 2017:
...There is considerable regional variation in manufacturing employment....
.... As a proportion of all jobs, manufacturing is highest in the East
Midlands, where it accounts for 12%. By contrast, only 2% of jobs in
London are related to manufacturing....
The explanation as to why the BBC do not enthuse about good news in the manufacturing sector is because it doesn't fit the London Model. The manufacture of successful products provides a sense of belonging and worth, which in turn enhances regional identity away from the capital. This sense of belonging is what the majority of the UK aspired to when they voted to Leave the EU.
Loondon - yes, it's not just a globalist economic bias in BBC reporting...it's a cultural thing...the Loondoners who dominate the BBC want the whole of the UK to be recast in London's image. The last thing Mark Easton wants is to see the development of strong manufacturing centres in the regions which will impede the all conquering advance of PC multiculturalism into the regions.
DeleteThere is also an issue in the way the BBC reports the issue of the Brexit negotiations in relation to financial services. Admittedly, they are reflecting the government's position, but they do address the matter as though it would be a national tragedy if financial services were excluded from the final trade agreement with the EU. That is an opinion, not a fact. If you think, as I do, that the finance sector is way too dominating over our whole economy already, then really there is nothing to fear from losing a few tens of thousands of finance jobs to the EU and a few billions of tax revenue. If, as a result, we could add another 1% to our manufacturing growth, as I think we could, then that would be a huge win for the UK. Most of the finance jobs that will be lost to the EU aren't held by UK citizens and a limited departure of finance jobs will relieve pressure on London housing costs, which currently is just pauperising a large section of the capital's hard working labour force.
I've noted elsewhere the huge number of BBC staff devoted to reporting on the USA...to which I can add Owen Amos (a "Features Writer" for the BBC based in Washington DC, is the way he describes his "Take Down Trump" role). And here he is full Trumpophobic flow about the upcoming Presidential medical (clearly intended to feed into the BBC-CNN 25th Amendment plot to remove the elected President from office and thus secure the global triumph of PC multiculturalism):
ReplyDeletehttp://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-42614426
Judging from his Twitter account it's actually Owen who is brain dead:
https://twitter.com/owenamos?lang=en
With tongue firmly in cheek, we should congratulate the BBC for not falling for the fake news story on the front page of The Telegraph - 'Scourge of the Seas - Crisp Packet washed up after 21 Years'. This is just the type of quirky story that they normally adopt willingly.
ReplyDeleteTo all right-minded people it is unimaginable that a crisp packet could survive in tact with printing legible after being at sea for this period of time. More likely, is that the packet was at the back of Grannie's cupboard, forgotten about for all this time before being brought to a beach ready to be found by some enthusiastic eco crusader.
The footnote might be that as the story indirectly implicates one of their own due to his advertising commitments with the crisp maker, the BBC might not run the story for fear of negative publicity - or upsetting their 'star'.
Funnily enough - the BBC do sort of endorse the story with a paragraph below in their 'Newspaper headlines: NHS funding plea and a plastic 'scourge'.
Delete....The Daily Telegraph leads on claims Mrs May is free to rethink tuition fees now that ministers opposed to fee cuts have quit the government. It also pictures a 21-year-old crisp packet found washed up on a UK beach....
The pathetic BBC is still banging the drum for President Winfrey!
ReplyDeletehttp://www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/entertainment-arts-42655805/tom-hanks-oprah-is-one-of-a-kind
What business is it of theirs? Why is our licence money being used in this partisan (and absurd) way?
And it is completely pointless, because there is absolutely no chance of Winfrey standing or being elected. There are more skeletons rattling in her closet than it's possible to imagine. But of course the BBC would never even hint at such skeletons.
Tonight's BBC One 'News at Six' had Steven Spielberg on telling Will Gompertz that "President Trump is using the same tactics as Richard Nixon used during his presidency to 'try to silence the press.'"
DeleteI didn't know Richard Nixon organised Fake News awards! :) I am so looking forward to Trump's awards ceremony. There is going to be a lot of Trump Derangement Syndrome in evidence.
DeleteOh yeah, then there's Nick Bryant, apparently the BBC's "New York correspondent". Does the BBC really have to have a correspondent dedicated to just one city in the USA. An important city, yes, but not a lot of "news" of relevance to us comes out of it, apart from the financial markets. But this being the BBC, you can bet someone else is covering the financial markets.
ReplyDeleteOur intrepid BBC New York correspondent Nick Bryant appears to take regular sunshine breaks in Southern California where he composes stream of consciousness lefty bollox/cod American history:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-41826022
This is as always opinion, masquerading as news in the news section of the BBC website.
Much of it is demonstrably Fake. For instance he paints a picture of a contemporary America drowning in gun violence compared with the last "golden age" of Reagan (yes, he appears to have forgotten all the BBC hate directed at the Cowboy Reagan at the time. The reality is that deaths from guns have declined something like 50% or more since the 1980s. Of course, being a sneaky BBC type he of course provides cover for himself by trying to confuse the issue with references to gun massacres.
Another bit of fakery, he tries to make out that the USA was "less welcoming" after 9-11 when in fact legal immigration climbed to an all time high! And, let's not forget in 2008 American voters elected a President with a Muslim name, only to re-elect him four years later.
What more do they need to do?
And it is beyond Bryant to admit that the USA's current economic growth rate and jobs growth rate is phenomenal for a highly developed country - GDP is rising at well over 3%.
The BBC asks "Is Nigel Farage feeling Bregret?" and "Has Nigel Farage changed his mind on Brexit?"
ReplyDeletehttp://www.bbc.co.uk/news/video_and_audio/headlines/42654608/nigel-farage-warming-to-second-eu-referendum
Normally journalists try and answer questions they ask. But not the lacklustre BBC. Nope - they just "ask the questions"...even though they know the answer to both questions is a big fat NO. So why do they ask questions they know the answer to but choose not to answer?
I think we know why. The BBC is a full on Remainiac Propaganda Unit.
The ‘question as a headline’ technique to push a view they need some separation from is becoming epidemic.
DeleteI liken it to the A5 brochures I get sent by gizmo retailers before Christmas, with every page littered by ‘Is this the most amazing cat neutering spatula ever designed?’
I have noticed recently how the BBC News website shows photos of the newspaper headlines with which they agree i preference to those with which they disagree.
DeleteIn today's display are the Guardian (there's a surprise) and the Mirror which both have pro EU headlines. ...'Hopes Raised for Second Referendum'... from the Guardian and ... 'Farage: I Want Second Referendum'... from the Mirror.
There are ten newspapers featured altogether of which seven do not feature the Farage story.
There are also ‘quotes’ or “quotes” they like, which often seem to suffice with little actual journalistic challenge on substantiation.
Deletehttp://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-42572116?
Patients 'dying in hospital corridors'
Nick seems happy with the claims of ‘doctors’ (with mounting evidence of many be politically active and motivated) and the ever-vague ‘reports’ the bbc then in turn.... ‘reports’.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-42656433
DeleteYes they have another quote up: Trump 'in crude Oval Office outburst about migrants'...odd thing is, when you read the article the quote doesn't appear anywhere I can see. It's a 'made up' quote. In fact Trump did not comment about migrants but the countries from which they came, describing the countries as "sh*thole" places...but isn't that exactly what the human rights migration lobby are saying themselves - the countries from which people are fleeing (no jobs, rampant corruption, oppression of minorities, violence and war) are sh*tholes which people have every right to try and escape from...they don't claim the same right for people from countries that are tolerant and prosperous.
I have popped a few more concerns over to the BBC about BBC use of 'quotes' and unverified claims.
DeleteMy first on opinions as headlines already has two 'apologies for the delay' as they miss their deadlines (woe betide any missing one back) on trying a less idiotic blow off attempt; I rather suspect the 'line to take' and template is proving less than they'd hoped.
Today's BBC 'Reality Check' examines Theresa May's claim that NHS funding is worse in Wales. Only the BBC could report that Wales spends £64 per capita more than England and neglect to mention that much of that goes on free prescriptions for all - which is why they have fewer doctors than England & much longer waiting lists for hip replacements.
ReplyDeleteThe bbc has a rather restricted version of ‘reality’, and often fights hard to preserve it when other issues are in play, like default political support:
Deletehttp://www.pressgazette.co.uk/trust-upholds-complaint-against-bbc-news-over-inaccurate-tweet/
We all know Reality Check was set up to help combat the wave of populism passing over the Western world. That is its only purpose. In pursuit of that objective their so called "Reality Checks" frequently offer up Fake Facts, fail to answer the questions they ask themselves in the articles, and leave glaring omissions. The Checks are nearly all biased towards exposing what they see as misinformation from the populist movement, though much more to the right than left.
DeleteHad to smile when I heard a bit of Ed Stourton's book "Auntie's War, Eyewitness Reports" on Book of the Week (no conflict of interest with that plug for a staffer's book, then!). Recording what Richard Dimbelby said about his feelings of "exhilaration" at seeing the carpet bombing of Berlin, Stourton commented about there being no attempt at impartiality back then (I paraphrase).
ReplyDeleteCalls to mind Craig's comment about how the BBC would now have reported WW2...
but also, one has to smile since of course we can quote any number of examples where the BBC's "exhilaration" shines through...remember the welcome for unlawful migrants to Germany given by a highly excited and jubilant Jenny Hill (ironically, in Berlin)? Remember the fall of the Berlin Wall, again in Berlin? Remember the reports of the Fake "Arab Spring"? Remember the release of the Birmingham Six? Remember the Good Friday agreement? Hardly any attempt at dispassionate judgement by most BBC reporters and a lot of exhiliration on display. I am not saying that is wrong and in some of those cases exhiliration seems reasonable enough. I am rather satirising Stourton sourpuss insistence that the modern day BBC would be right to be entirely unexhilirated about Britain's role in WW2.
On another subject - we had good further example last night of Dimbleby's "Bias by Obfuscation" as, in a great display of pretended even handedness, he explained laboriously that Toby Young was not a Nazi (pace the comments of the egregious non "comedian" on the panel) and also that John McDonnell was only quoting someone calling for the lynching of Esther McVey and not making the comments himself. See - a nice bit of BBC balance. I was pleased to observe Dominic Raab was having none of this fake balance (noting that McDonnell had been laughing and joking about the quote) and refused to accept Dimbleby's obfuscatory interjection as valid. Raab seems to have a bit of mettle in him.
'Impartiality' would be two paces to the right of where the BBC has been for the last 40 years or so. Remember the Falklands war, when the BBC was actively willing the task force to fail? Remember the dismay on Peter Snow's face when a senior general explained to him that there was now (after Goose Green) no possibility whatever of an Argentine counter attack? How could it be that the BBC preferred a fascist dictator to their own armed forces, who were fighting in defence of democracy?
DeleteClearly during WW2 there was a strong sense of unity - of 'us' versus the common enemy; perhaps living through the blitz explains how Richard Dimbleby could feel exhilarated by the bombing of Berlin instead of succumbing to a nasty attack of 'impartiality.' The answer is perhaps that the modern BBC employs large numbers of misfits with chips on their shoulders and a deep-rooted hatred of their own country - a country which unreasonably forces them to lead a pampered, privileged and over-paid existence at the expense of the license fee payers.
Yes, am I old enough to remember the BBC's approach to the Falklands War...the BBC's references to "the British" were jarring - as though they were pretending they themselves weren't British (what does the first B in BBC stand for?). It was probably the first time a lot of people began to have serious doubts about the BBC's modus operandi. No one was expecting WW2 Pathe-style propaganda but a recognition that they were our troops and a recognition of the importance of not speculating about where our troops might land.
DeleteI don't Stourton recognised the public uneasiness.
Thank you for reminding me of the correct spelling of "exhilarated" BTW!
Returning to the theme of the BBC's Fake News Reality Checks...here's the latest, focussing on - surprise, surprise a Trump statement (not a Corbyn, McDonnell, Abbott or Lady Nugent one):
ReplyDeletehttp://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-42663977
At the outset the article quotes Trump's tweet as follows:
"Reason I canceled my trip to London is that I am not a big fan of the Obama Administration having sold perhaps the best located and finest embassy in London for “peanuts”. "
It is captioned as "Tweet by President Trump". You can see it ends with a full stop after "peanuts".
The article then puts the "claim" as follows:
"The Obama administration sold the US embassy in London for "peanuts"."
But this is all Fake News because the actual Trump tweet was in full as follows:
"Reason I canceled my trip to London is that I am not a big fan of the Obama Administration having sold perhaps the best located and finest embassy in London for “peanuts”, only to build a new one in an off location for 1.2 billion dollars.Bad deal. Wanted me to cut ribbon-NO!"
You will see there was no full stop after "peanuts" and therefore it is clear that this was not the nub of his criticism.
As you can see, the Reality Benders have deliberately
excised the words "...only to build a new one in an off location for 1.2 billion dollars.Bad deal." Clearly the thrust of Trump's comment was that the Obama administration ended up selling the old Embassy for a not very good price and then forking out a huge amount of money on the new Embassy (at a less prestigious location). On the BBC's only figures the deal could have cost the USA something like £600-700 million...that is a lot of money in anyone's estimation.
It would be easier if the Reality Check team just put up a permanent notice saying "We Hate Trump". That would at least be true and accurate and fully part of reality.
Looking for clues as to why the BBC should be so insulting to Donald Trump, I found the following article by Olive Wainwright in the Guardian:
Deletehttps://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/jan/12/new-us-embassy-fabulous-not-tainted-by-donald-trump-visit
It highlights the muddled thinking of that newspaper and of the BBC when they can't quite decide how to make everything about the put out about Donald Trump so one-sided and biased.
In the opening paragraph Wainwright writes:
... 'Raised on a hill, surrounded by a moat and bristling with all the anti-terrorist measures known to man, the new US embassy in Nine Elms, south-west London, should be exactly the kind of building that Donald Trump would be only too keen to open. Covered in a prickly translucent plastic skin, which looks cheap, foggy and is already stained, the $1bn cube is in many ways the perfect metaphor for his administration....
But in the last paragraph he writes:
.... 'The building is environmentally friendly, as open and welcoming as could be hoped, and it hides its security features in the landscape more subtly than expected. In short, it’s a progressive beacon of the Obama administration, so perhaps it’s for the best that it won’t be tainted by a Trump visit'.....
So, the building ....'should be exactly the kind of building that Donald Trump would be only too keen to open. Covered in a prickly translucent plastic skin, which looks cheap, foggy and is already stained'....
AND ... ' it’s a progressive beacon of the Obama administration'....
This is bigotry in its pure form - Wainwright trips over himself in a predictable bid to insult Donald Trump and to praise Barack Obama. His opinions, clearly shared by the BBC, are cringeworthy. What they haven't realised yet is that Donald Trump thrives on this childish banter and becomes stronger as a result. Probably, we shall go through the whole period of DT's Presidency without the BBC being granted access to any real news - he'll make sure of that. As far as he's concerned they're whistling in the wind.
I think you have that nailed! lol It couldn't be a clearer expression of the black is white or white is black (which one do we require on this occasion) thinking that is now the mark of the modern day progressive (and I speak as someone who is still happy to describe himself as a progressive, just not happy with all these people who CLAIM to be progressives but are actually regressives).
DeleteAlso, I would like to offer Trump a get out of jail free card on the "sh*thole countries" comment...it seems clear to me in the light of his denial that he was merely enquiring why people were trying to enter the USA from all these "Sahel" countries. Others in the room may have misheard him. :)
Reasons why the BBC is so insulting towards Trump? I think it's because he treats them as a massive irrelevance; whereas the likes of May and Cameron go in fear and trembling at the idea of being judged and found wanting by the BBC, sitting in its self-appointed rôle as Supreme Court of Political Correctness, Trump doesn't give a damn what the Beeb, CNN or the Huffington Post think; he can afford to taunt them because Twitter allows him to communicate directly with his public.
DeleteIn short, the BBC detests Trump because he is a threat to their power: just imagine what might happen if the Tories took a leaf out of Trump's book, learned to use the social media and replaced their current grovelling invertebrate with a leader of conviction!
Yes, the reason for the BBC's ill-mannered approach to politicians with whom they disagree is usually 'the accountability' interview. This excuse is lacking when it comes to their dealings with Donald Trump, it is purely personal.
DeleteRoger Harrabin's fake news on Radio 4 yesterday, headline news:
ReplyDelete“The world’s leading climate agencies have said for the first time that global warming caused by humans now dwarfs natural temperature changes”
Only one thing wrong with that - they didn't say that.
https://cliscep.com/2018/01/19/fake-news-from-the-bbc-harrabin-and-stott/