Word salad.

We’ve had a lot to say about Fiyaz Mughal over the years, not always in complimentary terms. We saw his role as chief of “Tell Mama” as almost laughable. But, a bit like Trevor Phillips, he seems to have redeemed himself. Have they both turned over a new leaf or did we get it wrong all along?

For Fiyaz Mughal put his name to that letter to the Guardian, explaining why he and the other 23 signatories could no longer vote Labour. Not under Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership, anyway. 

“if Corbyn comes to power, my time working with any Labour minister will come to an end.
I cannot work to prop up or deliver any work under his leadership. This is particularly depressing since I am a social liberal – values that should naturally resonate with any Labour administration.
So why did I sign the letter openly voicing the fact that Corbyn would be a disaster for our country?
Firstly, Corbyn has been a lightning rod to attract people to Labour whose world view strongly hinges on the Israel and Palestine conflict. That is not a problem, but it has become a problem since some of these activists are openly antisemitic and see all Jews as being "the other"; as the cover-all term, many of these activists liberally use the term ‘Zionists’ to smear British Jews who simply disagree with them.”

*****

The other day a Corbynite economist appeared on Politics Live. Not your average millennial, but a mature lady called Ann Pettifor. No fool like an old fool. 

She defended the Labour Party’s policy on taxation by likening it to the Scandinavian model. Now, our Danish friends, middle-class rather than wealthy, have been long complaining about the huge amount of tax they have to pay for the socialist utopia. This dates back several years, long before the Islamic invasion. Goodness knows how the situation has unfolded, tax-wise. 

I was gratified to hear Ms Pettifor making this particular comparison, even though she viewed it as a positive, and was using it as a defence against assorted comparisons with Venezuela. I was surprised no-one on the panel took it up.

******

Can someone enlighten me as to the difference between poetry and ‘word-artistry’? Rapper, innit?

There’s a trailer featurin’  George the Poet that I find so grating that it’s even more “off-switch” than the Archers' signature tune. 

I don’t know what exactly I’m allergic to - the absence of scansion and the self-indulgent approach to rhyme, but I do wonder if George the Poet is to ‘poet’ like Rupert the bear is to ‘bear’.

******

I haven’t commented on the BBC’s continuous bias against Israel for a while, but I haven’t forgotten it. It’s piling up - the stuff I’ve read on EoZ and BBC Watch is enough to make one weep. 

Of course, the fact that this country (Britain) is being Islamified at a rate of knots explains the media’s refusal to link the Palestinians’ religious fuelled anti-Jewish principles with their determination to eradicate the ‘Jewishness’ of Israel. 

The widely held theory that Mike Pompeo’s statement about the legality of settlements is another obstacle to peace is entirely mistaken. It’s the opposite. The sooner the non-Islamic world stops encouraging a belief system based in hatred the better. They are only perpetuating the conflict for the sake of an ill-conceived sense of righteousness. 

Not that Boris Johnson’s Tories are any better than the BBC on that score, but at least Matt Hancock once attended a presentation by PMW. (Not that he was particularly impressed)

Tell Mama

.@KirstyWark questions @TRobinsonNewEra about his tweets following the conviction of Finsbury Park killer Darren Osborne #newsnight pic.twitter.com/LWoZSUC9vA

— BBC Newsnight (@BBCNewsnight) February 1, 2018

The squawk is far from dulcet, and the consonants all but subsumed by the nasal vowels. Oh Kirsty, how you deserve your nick-name.

Well done! Well done to the BBC for airing that disastrous interview, for it wasn’t live, and you could have binned it to save your shame. 

Kirsty, you’ve out Newman-ed Cathy!

The whole of Newsnight was, well, car-crash to the point of pile-up. And to think, I was about to switch over to wait for Question Time. But I didn’t. 

Tommy Robinson has come a long way. Not so long ago, if one had the temerity to even think of mentioning his name, one had to take the precaution of apologising first, like when one is toying with the thought of saying “Geert Wilders!” or “Melanie Phillips!” Trigger!  Trigger warning!  

Now that he’s learned how to articulate his thoughts, Tommy’s formidable. 

Is the BBC running scared? Note how they used an ancient clip of Tommy from the EDL days. Get over it, BBC. He’s moved on.  Come of age. Tommy has blossomed. You can’t smear him quite so easily these days.

The nub of the argument seems to be that the BBC, inspired  by Daniel Sandford no doubt, has taken the view that if only the BBC and the media in general could keep quiet about Muslim terrorism, extremism, and all that divisive “world within a world” stuff, it would all go away. That seems to be the plan. 

The biggest and best, most trusted broadcasting corporation in the world had decided to shield us from it all, for our own good. Then along comes Tommy Robinson to spill the beans, and hey presto! Darren Osborne is unleashed. Geronimo!

No, BBC! All wrong! The terrorism can’t be hidden. You can’t protect us from it by pretending it’s not really happening. You can  play it down, which you do, but you can’t conceal it. Nor should you.

If you are going to blame the messenger, the at least take responsibility for your own message, which you even sugar-coated, with your Maxine Peake playing the heroine. Weren’t we supposed to identify with brave Maxine? Thought so.

Darren Osborne explicitly claimed that he was - let’s call it ‘radicalised ‘ - by your very own emotive drama-documentary, based on a true tale, dramatised and neatly packaged for our gratification. That’s from the horse’s mouth. He wrote it on a piece of paper! 

Yet the BBC has ignored the the fact that its picturesque production, designed to touch our heart strings, played a part in this so-called ‘radicalisation’. On top of that, they even managed to sideline the spate of explosions, car-rammings and stabbings, all explicitly carried out in the name of Allah, and shamelessly, they chose to put the blame on - - Tommy Robinson.

What about that Imam? The one featured in the Darren Osborne report. The Imam who had suddenly noticed the potential of the ‘vehicular’ mode of sending one’s martyr to paradisio. “It could catch on,”  said he, with a fearful expression. What? Hadn’t he noticed Islam’s own weaponisation of the automobile right up until the moment Darren Osborne tried it out? Good grief. Where had that Imam been for the last few years? Praying?

What was it Cdr. Dean Haydon from the Metropolitan Police said to the BBC as he was being filmed  standing in front of those gleaming letters that spell out  “New Scotland Yard”. Oh yes, he called the al-Quds march ‘obscure” . Silly me; I thought there was a debate the other day. You know, in parliament. Hezbollah flags, anyone? That obscure.

Back to Kirsty. One of the issues that hit the headlines yesterday was the rise in antisemitism. What did Newsnight decide to go with? Islamophobia. They wheeled out Tell Mama’s very own grievance monger Fiyaz Mughal, and oh, did the tone change. Leaning forward and smiling, a benevolent  Kirsty encouraged Fiyaz to tell Mama Kirsty all about it. He duly delivered some impassioned Tommy-bashing on Kirsty’s behalf. 

Not to mention her interview with Amanda Spielman. Though slightly subdued, Kirsty still managed to conduct a hostile interview with the woman who recklessly dares to recognise Muslim radicalisation when she sees it.