Sky's Adam Boulton is hyperventilating on our behalf in The Sunday Times today.
Number 10 is trying to control the media, and everyone in our democracy out to be afraid gasps the headline.
The piece then launches into a wheezy defence of the MSM, which he fears is being dangerously "downgraded".
He partly blames the BBC for bringing this situation about, accusing the corporation of having "connived for their own selfish advantage" with this process of degradation.
He's not wrong about the BBC's imperial swagger and occasional bloodlust towards its media rivals, but the example he gives of the BBC letting the side down is the corporation's refusal to play ball with its fellow broadcasters during the election by preferring their "shouty" Question Time format for election debates.
Hmm, weren't those BBC debates (such as the Johnson/Corbyn one hosted by Nick Robinson) actually the best ones?
At least it's confined to The Sunday Times. There was a time when Boulton, the Sky News Editor at Large, I think he's called, was running a campaign for televised debates between politicians during election campaigns. He must have wanted to seize the initiative / grab some of the action from the big beast BBC.
ReplyDeleteThis went on relentlessly for months when you couldn't turn on Sky News without seeing a banner across the bottom of the screen with some kind of a counter showing the numbers of people supporting it. I found it insupportable.
The main pleasure in watching Boulton is to see how he manfully struggles to control his burping. I always imagine him tucking into a double Full English breakfast before he makes his way to the studio. There then ensues the battle to control the gaseous emanations from deep in his digestive system while making the case for the EU, for the Democrats and for Labour.
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