Tuesday 24 December 2019

Beginning of Winter Open Thread



As the last thread of Autumn filled up so quickly, here's a new pre-Christmas, Winter solstice open thread. 

Thank you for all your comments. They are much appreciated. 

35 comments:

  1. The days will soon be getting longer, and the lies on the BBC will be getting bigger.

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    1. Bring on more sunlight to banish the shadows of BBC lies.

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    2. MB - I have almost as little doubt about the latter as I do about the former.

      But you know what?

      I don't care any more.

      The BBC have thrown everything at the last 3 and a half years, including every dirty trick in the book and they still lost.

      Not just lost...they were routed.

      There's still some who trust their impartiality of course, but the EU elections in which we should never had to participate gave a clue, and the general election proved it comprehensively, that a significant enough constituency in the country have rumbled them.

      They're a busted flush.

      That's not to say that Craig and Sue won't continue to provide a vital service in revealing their bias, and we can not be complacent, but instead of being enraged by their pitiful bias, we can take delight in all of the above and either smirk, or better, laugh out loud at the futility of their efforts.

      For at least 5 years, they are at best on the back foot, at worst in danger of falling into irrelevance or even obsolescence.

      Enjoy it.

      Speaking of which, have you seen Dom Frisby's updated '17 Million'? Glorious.

      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f2zJ8vaB5jo

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    3. Rob, I've been thinking much the same.

      The BBC has chucked every kitchen sink it could find at it for the last six weeks, and the three and a half years before that, and got absolutely nowhere. And huge numbers of people now see how hard they tried and how badly they failed and have now lost trust in the BBC.

      Mr Frisby's song should be the UK's Christmas No.1.

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    4. I salute our common sense in rejecting Corbynism and deciding to see through Brexit against 3.5 years of relentless propaganda from our public broadcaster. However, I am a longer term pessimist. Boris and Cummings have bought us some time that is all.

      The reality is that in 2017 4 in 10 voted for Labour. Less than 1 of those 4 gave up supporting Labour in 2019. Just over 4 in 10 voted Conservative in 2017 and that proportion hardly changed at all - Boris attracted just 1.2% more of the total vote.

      In the 18-40 age range Labour attracted 46-56% of the vote - despite the anti-semitism, the pro-terrorism, the crazy funding proposals and the Marxist totalitarian approach of the leadership. We've no idea whether this youth vote is going to stick with Labour as the voters get older. If they do, and I think there is reason to believe they generally will, that would be a political disaster for the UK.

      We also know that 29% of UK babies are currently being born to mothers born abroad.
      According to the Runnymede Trust, in 2017 "Labour remained the most popular party among ethnic minority voters in both 2017 and 2015, receiving 77% of ethnic minority votes in 2017". Whilst "mothers born abroad" does not translate directly to "ethnic minority" or General Election voter there is ultimately a strong correlation.

      There does appear to be a strong drift to Labour caused by mass immigration and mass immigration shows no signs of reducing.

      I think the Marxist extremists in Labour are correct in thinking that if they hang on long enough with their policy agenda, they will eventually win out. (Of course if they lose Scotland, their chances of regaining power will be delayed for perhaps another 5-10 years.)

      But of course that is based on some assumptions: that the BBC in particular will continue to act as conduit for much of the Far Left agenda - political correctness, further restrictions on free speech, group identity politics, public expenditure propaganda, equality of outcome not opportunity, anti-capitalist rhetoric, and using climate change as a vehicle for introducing Marxist measures.

      If we can remove the BBC from the picture or even better reform it so it becomes an arena for impartial debate of democratic ideas, then the outlook for Marxist Labour is far less rosy.

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  2. The Guardian reports tonight that the BBC is considering restricting its journalists’ use of Twitter. It says that Fran Unsworth, the director of news and current affairs, is believed to be keen to persuade journalists to end the practice of frequently posting on politics and current affairs.

    I’m not sure whether this is good or bad. On one hand I’d definitely prefer to see impartial journalism at the BBC.

    On the other hand, I quite like to see their political preference, values and bias which is always revealed in full naked glory by their tweets and retweets.

    My concern is that banning social media will not change the behaviour of Sopel, Marr, Zurcher, Bowen and the rest. It just drives it undercover.

    It is helpful that social media shines a light on their prejudices.

    https://www.theguardian.com/media/2019/dec/21/bbc-could-restrict-journalists-twitter

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    1. Yep. It's a cover up - no genuine contrition. They realise that we know John Simpson, Sopel and co are pumping out rabid Remainer and anti-Trump propaganda on Twitter while turning up for work and pretending to be impartial.

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    2. I know what you mean Charlie. Their tweets are an absolute gift to us at times.

      But this is fascinating. First Channel 4, then Robbie Gibb's wish list, now this, all on the same day. The big broadcasters seem to be getting the jitters over their reporters' opinionated mouthing-off on Twitter.

      That said, we've had senior BBC figures talking of crackdowns on non-impartial BBC twitterings before (Helen Boaden, Mark Hockaday) but it's never stopped, or even abated. And, over the past few years, it's spiralled out of control.

      I really can't see some of the BBC's veterans and whippersnappers adhering to any fresh calls for greater care over impartiality and that they'll be revealing their political preferences, in all their full naked glory, for some time yet. They've become too used to venting their views. On they'll go.

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  3. The BBC should never have stated "the science is settled" regarding climate change. It isn't. But by saying that, they really give a licence to their staff to distort and misrepresent what is happening and to create, well, a climate of hysteria where more heat than light is being generated.

    Take a look at this corrective about temperatures experienced in Australia in the past 100 years (view from 1:50 if you want to skip the intro and get to the meat):

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rxJTZvRl13Q

    Wouldn't it be a lot better if people could discuss and debate these things openly?

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  4. Anthony Zurcher (BBC US correspondent and registered Democrat) getting even more Berserker since his Labour mates got smashed on 12 December in the UK. This is his tweet:

    "Last Thursday night in London I listened to voters bemoan Labour's stinging defeat. This Thursday I watched US Democratic presidential hopefuls debate choices that could avoid - or seal - the kind of bleak fate their trans-Atlantic counterparts now face."

    So he's says "I listened to voters bemoan..." - couldn't you find any voters celebrating Labour's defeat or are they just not the sort of people you talk to, Anthony? There are other "voters" you know apart from Labour ones.

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  5. On the Telegraph website tonight;

    The BBC director-general has rejected all claims of bias in its election coverage, insisting that the corporation has the public’s trust.

    Lord Hall of Birkenhead said that provoking the ire of both the Conservative and Labour parties proved that the BBC is impartial.

    In his first public riposte to accusations of political bias, Lord Hall said the BBC remains “the envy of the world”.


    No surprise there. They are in denial and going to carry on as normal. This will not end well.

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    1. Lord Hall fails to mention Brexit - the issue that caused the General Election. He would find it harder to claim the BBC were even-handed over that.

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    2. CBS - Complaints from Both Sides...the standard defence won't do any more...it's like one of those basic defences in chess that a Grand Master can pull it apart in a couple of moves.

      The BBC is dominated by lib-left groupthink. The vast majority of its staff, notably its presenters and reporters, support the non-Corbynista wing of the Labour Party, some support the Lib Dems, Greens or SNP/PC and a very small number support left wing Conservativism of the Clarkeian brand.

      That's why they get CBS - from everyone to the right of Ken Clarke and everyone to the left of Yvette Cooper - because they support the soft Left and are biased against everyone else.

      But of course that's just party politics.

      That's just the tip of the iceberg.

      Lurking below we have the pro-Remain bias, the pro-EU bias, the anti-Israel bias, the anti-American bias, the pro-ultrafeminism bias, the anti-male bias, the pro-Islam bias, the anti-India bias, the pro-abortion bias, the anti-Christian bias, the pro-climate alarmism bias...and many. many other biases where only a very narrow range of voices is legitimised.

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    3. 'anti-American bias' itself has some subtle shades. Oscars/Hollywood, Motown, US 20th C culture, Celeb Lifestyle, and now NFL have BBC approval. It is the 'populist' bias - the Republican/Trump following associated with a history of slave ownership that the BBC have weaponised.

      Another 'falsehood' to be added to the BBC fifty falsehoods: That wealthy Democrats were slave owners as well as wealthy Republicans.

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    4. Another 'falsehood' to be added to the BBC fifty falsehoods: That only wealthy Republicans were slave owners, when in fact so were wealthy Democrats.

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    5. The Democrats were once the party of the segregated South, on the pale side of the politics. The Democratic Party supported all the Jim Crow legislation designed to oppress African-Americans. When they were allowed to vote in the South, Black people voted Republican up until the 1960s.

      The BBC rarely reference this history.

      This is part of Biden's problem - he's old enough to be identified with the pro-segregation Democrats of a previous era.

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  6. Emma Barnett seems to think we have left the EU already and that Brexit has caused a shortage of "pigs in blankets". She also believes the cr*p from the Remainiac food industry that no machine can put together pigs in blankets. I call BS on that. What they mean is "We are fearful that if we individually invest in automation we will lose market share and reduce our profits."

    They never learn do they? Look at the idiotic relish on Emma Barnett's face as she seizes on this supposedly anti-Brexit story.

    https://twitter.com/haveigotnews/status/1208059151924047873

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    1. ...and the "Brexit" shortage had been resolved three days before the Egregious Emma recorded her party piece for HIGNFY.

      https://www.cityam.com/wetherspoons-resolves-pigs-in-blankets-shortage-in-time-for-christmas/

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  7. Being discussed on Sky Press Preview with Brendan O'Neill and Yasmin Alibhai Brown. She says she's convinced the BBC is biased against remainers. But to give her her due she did say she disagrees with the DG's 'both sides... therefore we can't be biased' dismissal, saying there should be an independent inquiry to establish whether there's been bias or not on Brexit or during the election.

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    1. Brendan O'Neill doing well to keep his cool while the YABberwocky tries to shout him down. Interesting that YAB name-drops, intimating she is close friends with Lord Hall. Who would be really surprised if she was?

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  8. Article about the Acorn organisation in today's G :

    https://www.theguardian.com/society/2019/dec/22/community-union-acorn-reports-glut-of-applications

    That rings a bell, I thought.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Association_of_Community_Organizations_for_Reform_Now

    Indeed, James O'Keefe did a piece on the original U.S version a few years ago.

    But now all polished up and exported to Europe. Coming to a BBC station near you any day now.

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  9. Noel Gallagher in the Sunday Times declares that he, like many in 2019, didn't vote Labour for the first time because "The British people aren't Communists. It's as simple as that." He also made a good defence of individualism...he didn't want the Corbynistas to tell him what he could and couldn't write and perform.

    He rather spoilt it by indicating he might be a Green Party supporter now...their policies are scarcely different from Corbynism.

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    1. We hear all the time on the BBC from people who, like Ash Sarkar are "literally" Communists. But we don't hear from people like Noel Gallagher who thinks people like Corbyn are literally Communists and wanted to turn the UK into a Communist state. Why?

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  10. H/T to MarkyMark -

    https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/world-us-canada-50831653/trump-impeachment-inquiry-sung-by-a-christmas-choir

    Is this supposed to be...amusing? Still good to know what BBC News staff get up to when not watching CNN 24/7.

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    1. Altogether now...'Twelve biased tweets an hour by Anthony Zurcher, eleven footballers spouting their political views on Football Focus, News at Ten with I-only-watched-the-first-bit-and-didn't-see-the-union-logo Huw Edwards, a lot more than nine repetitions of 'For ten years you’ve done nothing about it' by Andy Marr to Boris, eight times as many interruption for Boris than for Shami by Andy Marr, seven BBC editors saying 'we got it about right' on Newswatch, six Remainers on 'Question Time', FIVE GOLD RINGS ON JUST ONE OF THE FINGERS EMILY USES TO POINT IN AN ACCUSA-TORY WAY, four lefties agreeing with each other on 'Dateline', three women reviewing the papers on 'The Andrew Marr Show' (NOT like 'Loose Women' at all), two pro-immigration bishops on 'Sunday', and Lord Hall sitting complacently atop the whole bloody thing'.

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    2. I enjoyed that, Craig.
      You must have been listening to the new Bishop or Archbishop of York last week. They get worse all the time - the first thing that he comes out with is about black'n'asian minorities. I never thought anybody could be as bad as Rowan Williams but Welby is proving me wrong.

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    3. Accusa-Tory! I liked that!!

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  11. Interesting views from Matthew Goodwin:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3kf1YKeq7lA

    Re the debate on what to call the "Soft Left" Blairite wing of the Labour Party...I note Goodwin uses the term "hyperliberalism" to describe how runaway out-of-control liberalism became a kind of authoritarian parody of liberalism...But I still don't think "hyperliberal" quite captures the belief system of people like Blair, Campbell, Cooper, Harman and Adonis.

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    1. Another one here agreeing. Hyperliberalism sounds like extreme freedom rather than the coercive and doctrinaire authoritarianism of Blair, Campbell and Adonis, none of whom can bear other people having a contrary say, opinion, power or influence.

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    2. More on the nature of the illiberal 'liberals' in a piece by Dominic Sandbrook in the Mail, and the over-importance of the twitter bubble - take note, BBC. This blog has been telling Fran for ages to do something about the BBC's rogue tweeters but apparently she's only now thinking about it because Channel 4 has taken steps.

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  12. Don't know why but the phrase "Game for a laugh" came to mind when I decided to have a peek at the Guardian Opinion page...oh dear, they're not happy with Boris running rings round them on the "Islamophobia" inquiry!...Apparently his behaviour is "shameful". You always know you are on the right track when they wheel out the "sh" word.

    https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/dec/23/boris-johnson-reneged-inquiry-islamophobia-british-muslims

    Who else is writing for the Far Left anti-free speech Guardian these days? Well what a surprise - Dominic Grieve:

    https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/dec/23/tory-boris-johnson-labour

    And yes it's another "Boris didn't really win the election, you know..." article.

    Well that's enough Press Review.

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    1. Harry Cole, deputy editor of the Mail on Sunday, also reviewed that M. Dominic de Grieve piece:

      "What a grubby little piece... delusion levels remain off the chart, and what a charmer, not to mention that he got thumped by a candidate in the mirror image of his sourness - the lovely Joy Morrissey. Sounds like a joyeux noel over in the Grieve household."

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  13. MB - I have not left... yet... a bit like YAB. I can only imagine am Xmas dinner table with the likes of 'friends' Hall and Toynbee in its number.

    I'd be knocking back the brandy butter Aldi VSOP well before they lobbed up.

    And speaking of Aldi, if there was not shortage of anything there earlier, it was pigs in blankets, so Emma may like to stray beyond Attendezrose in future.

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  14. Apart from its egregious leftwingbias, one of the most insufferable aspects of Al Beeb is its self-love. We see it in its assumption that its journalists are the best of the best teaching the up and coming generation of journalists how to be the best of the best. Yet it tolerates such shoddy reporting as this:
    "Who is Ghislaine Maxwell?
    Ms Maxwell is the daughter of late British media mogul Robert Maxwell and a former girlfriend of Epstein."
    https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-50927651
    ("A former girlfriend of Epstein?" Who knew Elisabeth Maxwell had such strange taste?!)

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