Let's go back to the old days.

This is a blog about the BBC, but as you probably know, I  do tend to wander off-topic. However, here’s something that definitely does concern the BBC.  It’s an op-ed by Peter Baum, published in Israel National News Arutz Sheva.

The BBC – Way past its sell by date

The BBC has a problem with the truth. The BBC has a problem with the Jewish State of Israel. Blacks do not matter to the BBC either. Op-ed.

This headline, if not the article itself - is a tad sensationalist, but never mind. It’s worth a read, but it’s also worth mentioning that on other occasions the author has come in for criticism from the Board of Deputies for making ‘unacceptable remarks’ 

While the Board (and its president Marie van Der Zyl) is inclined to be excessively cautious - some might say verging on obsequious and/or appeasing - one can almost understand the desire not to rock the boat at a time when antisemitism is on the rise and the dwindling number of British Jews in the UK feel uneasy.

It took Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership and those egregiously antisemitic shenanigans in the Labour Party to (finally) draw outright criticism from the Board, but arguably, that made their intervention a lot more significant than if they’d squandered their credibility by firing off accusations willy-nilly.

Now another bombshell has dropped, and I don’t really know what to make of it. Actually, it popped into our sidebar in the form of a new piece in the Guardian! 

Antisemitism issue used as ‘factional weapon’ in Labour, report finds.

Well I never! 

But if you read the actual article, the Guardian seems to give equal credence to the two opposing “factions”.  Correct me if I’m wrong because I haven’t got the stamina to digest it properly at the moment (Too hot) but my personal ‘first glance’ summary boils it down to:

"Faction A accuses faction B of antisemitism, while Faction B’s counter-accusation is that  - I don’t know - faction A is being mean and spiteful."

Possibly a little more nuanced than that, but this remark makes the whole thing look ridiculous:

“In simple terms, each faction believed the other had ‘started it’ ….”

 

Come on kiddies! Get a grip!

 

  In a similar vein, I ploughed through most of the Oldham Council meeting in which members of the council (plus Andy Burnham) were made to listen and to express regret and contrition over the way everyone mishandled the grooming gang scandal. 

I have to admit that shocking as this was to watch, there was a comical element to it. In fact there’s a massive politically incorrect comical element to all of this. The characters are outrageously lampoonable, as are all politicians, councillors, perpetrators  and even victims.

I wish we could go back to the olden days when we could get away with a really vicious “Spitting Image” ridiculing the whole lot of it. Could do with a laugh.

A very sad story

This is a very sad tale of multiple tragedies.  My intention here is primarily to focus on the BBC’s conduct, but also to recount a bit of a story. 

Michael Rosen is one of the BBC’s most treasured contributors, and as Craig reminded me, his radio programme ‘Word of Mouth' is interesting and exceedingly listenable. 

He has broadcast several first-hand accounts of his near-death experience due to Covid-19 - the bad one - and has expressed his sincere gratitude to the NHS and explained how well they treated him.

He experienced a devastating personal loss several years ago when his eighteen-year-old son died suddenly of meningitis. He wrote so movingly of it at the time that I very well remember feeling deeply sorry for him and his family.

However, he is also a keen Corbynista, and I do recall the below-the-line contributions he made to Harry’s Place, back in the days when that was an ideologically left-leaning, and if you’ll pardon the anomaly, a pro-Zionist website. He was, back in the day, a bit of a troll, as his comments were somewhat provocative and, well, troll-like. Agent provocateur is the phrase I’m a-lookin' for.

Another red flag was raised (for me) when I noticed that Rosen was a fan of the self-confessed antisemite Roald Dahl, whose own family had to issue a posthumous apology on his behalf, in order to shift more of his merchandise. (Most kids, including mine, like Dahl’s stories. I think the stories have a bitter and twisted subliminal agenda,  but I did read them aloud to my own children - metaphorically hanging my own personal antipathy to the author on a peg at the bedroom door.

If you’re interested, Rosen was in a spat with TCW’s Laura Perrins in 2016 on the Beeb’s Daily Politics hosted by Jo Coburn, when the left-wing Momentum movement was more of a thing.

That roughly sets out my feelings about Michael Rosen. However, there is another and even sadder part to this unfolding tale. It gets bizarre. 

Michael Rosen saw something on Twitter he didn’t like. It was the kind of thing people do online, poking fun at people like Jeremy Corbyn by way of some nifty photoshopping. 

Someone on Twitter had doctored a picture depicting the magic grandpa apparently reading to some schoolchildren, originally a photo-op created to demonstrate Corbyn’s cuddly ‘Grandpa-ness. 

 

The book in the Tweet had attracted Rosen’s attention because it was Rosen’s own popular Bear Hunt-themed children’s book - but with a twist. The book’s cover had been substituted for another image - The Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion - and, obviously to everyone but Rosen, intended as a dig at Corbyn’s antisemitism.

Rosen didn’t see the joke. He took umbrage, bigly. Not only that, but he somehow interpreted the Tweet itself, and therefore the tweeter, as being antisemitic. As to how he worked that out, nobody has so far offered a credible explanation. As far as I can tell, it was a massive inversion of the actualité and if anything, a combination of gaslighting and self-denial.

This is where the BBC comes in. Last May, the BBC put out an article on their website. 

Michael Rosen condemns Northumbria Uni lecturer's manipulated image tweet,  illustrated with a jokey pic of Rosen peering smilingly through two huge piles of his books.

The article is sparse. It doesn’t name Rosen’s accusé, but alludes to him as “Northumbria Uni lecturer.”

The content of the article implies that the Uni Lecturer is an antisemite and Rosen’s ridiculous accusation is reproduced in the form of a quote. 

The book's author, Michael Rosen, has condemned the tweet as "loathsome and anti-Semitic". The member of staff has been approached for comment

The BBC is careful to stress that Rosen is “not in favour of anyone being sacked over this”.

Whatever you make of this poorly constructed article, it certainly lacks logic and is so badly explained that it leaves an impression diametrically contra to the actuality.

Although Rosen was gratuitously magnanimous about the sacking, the University in question did what universities as employers do these days; they dealt with it with predictable unsupportiveness and wokeness typical of present-day academia. 

So now the University Lecturer is dead. We are not aware of what has happened but one can speculate. He was 38 years old for God’s sake.

Peter Newbon received hate mail and was bullied online in wake of tweet about Jeremy Corbyn

A coroner will investigate the sudden death of a Jewish academic “remorselessly bullied” on social media after he was accused of anti-Semitism by one of Britain’s best loved children’s authors. 

Peter Newbon, 38, a father of three young girls, died a week ago in the wake of a Twitter “pile on” that had left him feeling under pressure, according to friends. He was found dead last Saturday. 

His partner, Rachel Hewitt, said his death had left her “broken into a million unbearably painful pieces”. 

“Through his work as a senior lecturer in the humanities at Northumbria University, which he joined in 2012, Pete inspired students with his passion for Romantic and Victorian literature. 

"In his political campaigning, particularly against anti-Semitism in Labour, he showed bravery, integrity, and a fierce sense of right and wrong. His friends have told me they loved his gentleness, goodness and irrepressible humour.”  

The North Yorkshire and York coroner court is due to open an inquest at a later date.

I’m sure Michael Rosen feels pretty bad now. One hopes so. But the BBC hasn’t quite got round to reporting this tragedy yet, and one does wonder how they’ll pitch it, when and if they do.

Labour Party matters

Someone pointed out the other day that it takes first-hand experience of a given subject or incident to expose how distorted ‘news’ can be. Personal involvement in any story jolts you into that illuminating, lightbulb moment when you suddenly realise how partial, one-sided or misleading ‘the News’ often is.

I looked back at our archive and found “On a Loop.” It's a shame, but it’s as relevant now, at the tail end of 2020, as it was in 2012. Here’s the gist:

Most pro-Israel bloggers like myself would find life much simpler if there were no Palestinian civilian casualties, no settlements, no disputed borders, no ultra religious Jewish extremists making claims on behalf of God. But, proceeding further down that path, it would be easier for us if Israel stopped protecting its citizens as assiduously as it does so that we could produce heart-rending footage of injured Israelis. We could make our case more effectively if the ‘apartheid wall’ was dismantled and the suicide bombers provided us with some photogenic carnage. How much easier life would be for we Israel supporters if Israel was swept into the sea altogether and we could make the case for Israel all day long, unopposed. Then we’d be laughing. 

I’m not writing about the Middle East today. Not directly - but as usual the Middle East’s presence is felt in the shadowy form of a big fat elephant. It’s the very thing that hasn’t been properly scrutinised in the context of the crisis in the Labour Party.

The EHRC report has come down hard on Corbyn’s Antisemitic Party. Because of the obvious need to stick to ‘facts’ and not to be derailed by squabbling over subjectivity and ‘feelings’, the commission pared a litany of submitted grievances against Corbyn’s Labour Party right down to substantive issues only; straightforward matters of legality. You know, actual breaking of the law.

While this approach concentrates the mind, it also lets a whole lot of flotsam through the net to muddy the waters and clog up the works. It’s sad that the EHRCommission took (or had to take) the factual, ‘substantive only’ tack, sticking to indefensible, irrefutable, “Illegality-only” evidence - in order to convince their opponents of the validity of the report. Of necessity, the emotional stuff, the real, true racist stuff had to be sidelined, just because of the enormity of the opposition. As Paul T Horgan says: 

The EHRC report) takes no account of Corbyn supporters targeting a chant calling for Israel to be destroyed at Jewish demonstrators protesting against anti-Semitism. Verbal abuse against Jewish people at party meetings and conferences is not counted. The party members who hounded Jewish woman MPs such that they had to leave Labour is not included. The Labour members cheering Chris Williamson on when he complained that the party was ‘too apologetic’ over anti-Semitism are not part of Corbyn’s claimed statistic.

There are several aspects to this saga. Number one is Keir Starmer. He’s a politician, which I suppose is some sort of an excuse in itself. A 'par for the course' type of thing. 

So when he was exposed at the time of the last General Election, doing rather more than toeing the party line by explicitly assuring Andrew Marr that he’s 100% behind Jeremy, his current posturing (strong, decisive leadership - grovelling apologies to the Jewish community) starts to look decidedly 'realpolitikish', however much we might wish it were otherwise.

Like the lawyer he is Starmer followed the brief and stood by Corbyn’s side for years no matter what.

Today it’s a different brief but highlights the same thing - he doesn’t do what’s right, he does what’s politically convenient.

The public won’t forget he propped Corbyn up. pic.twitter.com/NKRNQtupHn

— CCHQ Press 🤲😷↔️ (@CCHQPress) October 29, 2020

Nevertheless, for now, let’s give the benefit of the doubt to Sir Keir, if you like. Just please don’t let him do any more kneeling.

All of a sudden everyone in the Labour Party not committed to the ultra-left is deserting the sinking ship. Even Jeremy Corbyn’s protégé Angela Rayner gave a brave account of herself on Newsnight, standing firm under Kirsty Wark’s mildly fierce searchlight. I mean, “how are you going to get yourself out of that?” is a question going begging. 

And Shami in your ermine robes, wherefore art thou? Oh yes, and Seaumas Milne. Why so shy? No-one holds him to account do they? Perhaps the BBC’s conspicuous lack of curiosity about Milne is related to his former associate editorship of the Guardian.

So now that the Corbyn supporting faction and the equivocators who were well on board with Jeremy Corbyn’s Antisemitic Party during the good times are jumping ship. It wasn’t me! they shout in unison. 

Which brings me back to the elephant in the room. Israel.

Melanie Phillips has: 

Much of the bigotry against Jews expressed by Labour members is tied up with the demonisation and delegitimisation of Israel.

However, there is general bafflement in Britain over the association of anti-Israel and anti-Jewish sentiment, with a widespread belief going way beyond the Labour Party that the claim of antisemitism is being used to stifle legitimate criticism of Israel.

I blame the media for the decades of partial reporting that thrust ammunition into the hands of the haters.  It allowed the very word ‘Zionism’ to stand for evil. Why, the word itself is almost an anagram of Nazi. If you could stomach listening to Chris Williamson screeching at Andrew Neil you’d know what I mean. 

The Balen report was suppressed by the BBC at the cost of several hundred thousand pounds (of my money.) If the Labour Party can be skewered by a forensic, facts-not-feelings inquiry, why cannot the BBC?

Could the EHRC investigate the BBC and examine the not-very-subtle “anti-Israel” agenda that all the usual BBC stalwarts and equivocators are now carefully distancing themselves from, as they turn to interrogate their Labour party counterparts?  All of a sudden Mishal ‘homemade contraptions’ Husain and company are getting all self-righteous on behalf of ‘the Jewish community’. 

Has the BBC taken the oath? Has it sworn to tell the truth the whole truth and nothing but the truth? Or will selected bits of it do?

Each time we spot another heartfelt “what about Israel’s ’treatment’ of the Palestinians!?” followed by another possibly well-meant but utterly misguided attack on Zionism (and therefore Jews) it originates from some agenda-driven, holy, high-up employee of the Associated Press or Reuters parachuting some agenda-driven hack into some godforsaken theatre of war to fulfil a tailored and tacitly preordained brief. That’s according to Matti Friedman. 

Should the media care to tell the whole truth it would expose the true nature of the Palestinian Cause. The very existence of Israel must not be accepted as justification for any of the disingenuous Palestinian grievance-mongering we’ve been force-fed by the media, yet ‘getting rid of Israel’ is the stated aim of Palestinian zealots, Hamas and its supporters, however unpalatable that truth might sound to virtue-signalling, Western, pro-Palestinian advocates and BDS activists. 

 Injustices and suffering, abuses of human rights, all the stuff that the Pro-Palestinian justice warriors are so virulently passionate about when they blame it on Israel, emanate in reality from the Palestinian leadership’s corruption and religion-based racism. The people are sacrificial lambs; expendable currency in the war against the Jews on behalf of Jeremy Corbyn’s friends, Hamas, the PA., Iran etc. 

The so-called Palestinian cause was seeded with hatred of Jews. It flourished in the West alongside Tony Blair’s legacy of mass immigration and it took hold in left-wing politics through Islam-friendly expediency. Now antisemitism disguised as Pro-Palestinianism is actually fundamental to the contemporary Labour Party’s remit. How are you going to untangle that, Sir Keir?

Questions and answers. The 'other' racism

The ‘other’ racism

Dawn French’s comedic response to an “are you or are you not” question was an emphatic “Not!” which was very funny. If the BBC were to be asked, under oath, if it is an ‘ideologically’ anti-racist organisation or not, I’m afraid the answer would also have to be ‘not’.

Can we take it that racism is generally considered to be bad’? That’s a very clumsy statement but it will do for now. If we can take it that anti-racism is ‘good’, do we believe that the BBC, as an institution, includes or excludes ‘hatred of Jews’ in its interpretation of racism? Jeremy Corbyn uses the phrase “antisemitism-and-all forms-of-racism” therefore, impliedly, he sees it as a separate and possibly lesser, ‘ism’. 

Since Islam is firmly established in multicultural-Britain as just one of a number of ‘diverse’ religions, and the racist element within it is studiously ignored,  I’m asking whether overt antisemitism (or antisemitism disguised as anti-Zionism) is acceptable or just an opinion and therefore sort of okay?

We are often told that being (ideologically) ‘anti-Israel’ is a legitimate position. What does that mean? A generous interpretation could be, say, stopping short of disputing Israel’s ‘right to exist’, yet critical of most retaliatory or self-defensive acts by Israel. (Because of support for the Palestinian cause)

Is anti-Israel activism a prejudice, though? Israel-bashers argue that hatred of Israel is a logical response to a nasty, totalitarian regime, and given the way it has been portrayed by the mainstream media for the last seven decades, incurious people are bound to see it that way. A circular self-propagating mash-up in which the snake eats its own tail.  

I don’t buy the idea that being ‘anti-Israel’ is “just an opinion” and a mere matter of ‘picking-your- side’ between two equally innocuous teams and where your choice might be random, traditional or you just like the colours of their strip. Why not?  Simply because when one takes an interest in proper, pre-1967 history, unlike the lazy and historically illiterate BBC, the opposing sides are neither equal nor innocuous.  Let’s simplify it and reduce it to choosing between goodies and baddies. 

If the BBC were truly ideologically opposed to ‘pure’ racism, would it really tolerate, let alone revere, so many fundamentally antisemitic (generally hard left) contributors and pundits?

Peter Oborne’s relationship with the BBC is a case in point.  There is a relationship because, for one thing, Oborne is a regular presenter of The Westminster Hour. A responsible position, I’d say, suited to someone respected by the Beeb. But Oborne makes little secret of his prejudice. We can easily bracket Oborne with a particular breed of ex-BBC staffer. The ones that morph into full-on anti-Israel campaigners the moment they’re unleashed from the constraints of impartiality under conditions in the BBC’s charter. People such as Tim Llewellyn and Alan Hart deceased. 

I’ve tried to apply due diligence in my exploration of the BBC’s indulgent blind-eyed approach to Peter Oborne’s racism as I don’t want to appear indolent, but I have to admit that I don’t start with a clean slate. I find him strange. His authoritative, self-assured manner somehow lends incongruity to his pro-Islam fixation, even though that particular brand of Arabist, anti-Jew sentiment typically sits comfortably with such characteristics. This cosy, mutually ego-massaging tete a tete with Owen Jones seems especially incongruous! Here the pair are defending Islam and calling Jeremy Corbyn a breath of fresh air.

A kind of debriefing, post-defeat interview with Jeremy Corbyn has featured on various websites recently, including the Campaign Against Antisemitism,

"Jeremy Corbyn says EHRC is just “part of the Government machine” in first interview since stepping down as Labour leader in latest attempt to undermine investigation into Party’s antisemitism 

It was conducted by a man named David Hearst with Oborne looking on and occasionally chipping in. Hearst is a man with whom Arabist / antisemitic credentials not only sit comfortably but invite themselves in, take their boots off and make themselves at home. The Corbyn interview can be seen on the anti-Israel ‘Middle East Eye’ website

“Jeremy Corbyn questions impartiality of EHRC antisemitism inquiry.
In first interview since stepping down, former Labour leader says allegations he tolerated antisemitism are 'wrong and extremely unfair'

The most informative critique of this bizarre interview is by Mark Gardner in the Jewish Chronicle:

“Out of office, Corbyn is creating an antisemitic myth to explain his defeat."

Hearst and Corbyn have more than Mr Milne in common. They were, for example, amongst the leading British cheerleaders for Sheikh Ra’ed Salah, who infamously preached a blood libel in Jerusalem. 

The themes of Mr Corbyn’s interview will repeat in far-left propaganda for years to come, from university academics in sociology departments throughout the country, to street demonstrations and the mad, sad and obsessive losers who pollute social media. 

The narrative is simple, yet dangerous. Mr Corbyn was a singularly good man who wanted to save people from the harm that is done to them. He wanted to tackle endemic poverty, end racism, stop wars and save the planet. Because of this, the establishment ganged up on him, bullying him with so much slander that his defeat was inevitable. The general public was hoodwinked by evil forces into rejecting their saviour and antisemitism was one of the primary lies wielded against him, which is why this is very dangerous for Jews.

Coincidentally, this topic has just appeared on Harry’s Place. Snap! 

The evolving pattern of Peter Oborne’s causes and crusades is chequered. Here he is in May 2019 in the Daily Mail, criticising Nigel Farage and praising the Beeb. Nigel Farage's blustering about BBC 'bias' exposed his gaping flaws.

In June the BBC gives him another ‘Week in Westminster’ slot.

In October 2019 he’s on Channel 4 talking to Krishnan Guru-Murthy about “Smears, Lies and Fake news.” (This time criticising the BBC.)

  

Back in 2009, however, he was praising the BBC and passionately defending certain reporters against accusations of bias. Naturally, Oborne would jump to the BBC’s defence as the subject was an accusation of antisemitism.  

“Some journalists we spoke to had been accused of antisemitism, and felt inevitably it had done some damage to their careers. Others, like the BBC’s Orla Guerin, against whom this very serious and damaging charge has repeatedly been made by the Israeli government, wouldn’t even talk to us off the record. It is easy enough to see why. Guerin is a brave, honest and compassionate reporter. Yet the Israeli government has repeatedly complained to the BBC that Guerin is “antisemitic” and showed “total identification with the goals and methods of Palestinian terror groups.”

He also leaps to the defence of Jeremy Bowen on the rare occasion that the BBC Trust upheld a complaint about “breaching their rules of accuracy and impartiality in an online piece, and their rules of accuracy in a radio piece.”

Read the full text to experience the bitter taste of Oborne’s account of the BBC’s 'pro-Israel' bias. I give you the concluding paragraphs:

“Not only has Bowen’s hard-won reputation been sullied, but the BBC’s international status as the best source of trustworthy news in the world has been gratuitously — if unintentionally — undermined.”               

 [...]The Trust’s ruling was met with dismay in BBC newsrooms. A former BBC News editor, Charlie Beckett, told us “the BBC investigated Jeremy Bowen because they were under such extraordinary pressure... it struck a chill through the actual BBC newsroom because it signaled to them that they were under assault.

No wonder Peter Oborne approved of Jeremy Corbyn’s “the EHRC is all part of the government machine” line of defence. Sadly, it’s impossible to make progress when faced with a brick wall of an argument. 

The most egregious example of an overtly racist anti-Israel polemic was a Channel 4’s  2009 Dispatches titled “Inside Britain’s Israel lobby. ” It was so badly produced and poorly researched that I suspect Oborne would be ashamed of its superficiality, should he be held to account for it now. But like Baroness Chakrabarti, he isn’t likely to admit that the work was shoddy, and retrospectively, something of an embarrassment.

If one were ever in a position to put the original question to the BBC, “Fess up! Are you an anti-racist organisation or not?” I’m afraid the honest answer would have to be a very firm ‘Not’.  

"Palestine" and other non-coronavirus musings for April fool’s day 2020

Part One: Jeremy Corbyn

“Under his dull, dismal leadership, Labour has become a byword for animus against Jews and every strain of conspiracy theory that proceeds therefrom.”

So says Stephen Daisley 

“Every Labour MP returned in December, every Labour activist who knocked on doors or delivered leaflets, knowingly tried to elect an antisemitic government out of sentimentality and tribalism.”

This taints the whole lot of them as far as I’m concerned. Including  Hilary Benn, Yvette Cooper, Liz Kendall, Uncle Tom Cobley and all.  Might as well throw in the contenders for the leadership and deputy leadership while I’m at it.

“Decorbynisation cannot be a trim job; the diseased roots must be hacked out. As well as reforming the complaints process along the lines proposed by Lisa Nandy, Labour will have to rid itself of the fallen redeemer and his sullen apostles. Expel him. Expel everyone who nominated him. Expel everyone who voted for him. Burn it down and salt the earth.”

I love that expression: ‘salt the earth’. It reminds me of “Quick! Get rid before it lays eggs” if you see what I mean.  Yup. Sanitise all the surfaces, wash your hands to two verses of The Red Flag and mind you don’t catch your keffiyeh in the door on the way out. 

Part Two: Sarah Champion.

I have a long memory. Certain things, such as my longstanding awareness of Jeremy Corbyn’s petty-rebellious antisemitic antics are etched in the hard-wired department of my brain.   

I well remember Corbyn, (alongside characters like Andy Slaughter, Paul Flynn, Grahame Morris and a clutch of Muslim Corbyistas like Zara Sultana lobbying furiously and viscerally against Israel and for “Palestine”, but I won’t be joining the anti-Corbyn brigade when they cite Sarah Champion as some kind of martyr for being demoted by the dear leader for (belatedly) naming and shaming the ‘Pakistani grooming gangs’ that had been operating in her constituency (Rotherham). 

 Some people regard the article in the Sun that got her into trouble with Corbyn as an ‘act of bravery’  - but it took her long enough to get round to writing about a crime that had been going on under her nose for some time and the true nature of the crime had already been pointed out by others as they expressed sympathy with the victims. 

I’m afraid I well remember Ms Champion sitting at the head of the table presiding over a 99.9 % Asian council committee meeting castigating Israel with great gusto at the time of Israel’s 2014 incursion into Gaza. Where Ms Champion is concerned, I believe a large dollop of opportunism is involved as articles on this blog can testify.

Part Three: Lovely Poem

Today Programme

On #R4Today some of the BBC's best known voices will offer their favourite poems of #comfortandhope.

Here @MishalHusain reads 'On Time' from The Prophet by Kahlil Gibran. https://t.co/tSSau3acnC pic.twitter.com/4NTeotibGW

— BBC Radio 4 Today (@BBCr4today) April 1, 2020

“That was lovely,” said Nick Robinson, choking back emotion.

Part Four: "Palestine"
There’s no sport, due to the lockdown, but sports commentators are still in full swing, so Rob Bonnet interviews 10-year-old skateboarding whizz, Roxanna Howlett, from Exeter. Roxanne is a versatile skateboarder and she has travelled widely through her sport.

RB

"Well, I hear that you travel a lot with your skateboard. Where’ve you been” (as if he didn’t know)

RH

"Palestine, Sweden, Berlin, Amsterdam, America

RB
"Goodness me, you’re the best, well-travelled ten-year-old I think I've ever met. That’s fantastic! What about Palestine? What was that like?

RH
It was amazing, actually. It’s quite a poor country.

RB
What did you do there?

RH

We met up with the State Pal, they’re a charity and they help children from all around the world

RB

How much equipment did they have in Palestine?

RH
They didn’t have very much it was quite bad to see but they had brilliant skate parks

Good to know Rob Bonnet has such a keen interest in …. “Palestine”.

Emergency measure

Opining on the way the government is handling this pandemic is above my paygrade. How do I know which experts are the stablest geniuses? 

We’re seeing a stream of contradictory and confusing advice. For example, I can’t drive a short distance to take my normal daily walk in a virtually deserted open space, despite the fact that it’s impossible to stick to the requisite social distancing if my allotted hour’s exercise must be taken in my immediate vicinity. Andrew Marr was on the case this morning, and it seems that the ‘logic’ for this rule is the possibility of having a driving accident which could divert essential resources from the virus.  

However, I assume we can drive to the supermarket. Which creates another contradiction. Can we confine our shopping to the ‘immediate needs’ principle, while going out shopping as infrequently as possible? Surely it’s one or t’other. It can’t really be both.

The Labour Party’s newfound cry for ‘unity’ seems absurd in the light of their recent electoral disaster. They behave as if their support for the government is some sort of altruistic act.  From such a position of weakness, it’s ludicrous for the Labour Party to pretend that supporting the government amounts to a concession on their part.

As for Jeremy Corbyn’s delusional assertion that Labour’s economic policies were right all along, well, the illogicality of that apples-and-pears comparison shows that his grasp on reality has departed. If it was ever there in the first place. It’s beyond satire. “Of course, I’m a human, (!) of course I make mistakes”. 

Some Labour MPs can’t put their destructive criticism and accusations of governmental negligence on the back-burner. Negativity shines through all those cries for unity and togetherness. 

The Doctor

Take Dr Rosena Allin-Khan, who is currently doing night-shifts in an NHS hospital. She couldn’t resist complaining to Sophy Ridge about the government’s failure to provide adequate PPE for ‘the front line’. Sure, that’s a genuine cause for concern, but wouldn’t it be more productive for the BBC  and the media in general to investigate the reason for any alleged delays rather than just endlessly disseminate criticism of the government. 

They could send Greg Wallace to visit-a-factory-in-a-hairnet to find out if something in particular is holding things up.  One of their investigative reporters could ferret out the source of blockages twixt manufacturer and recipient. Perhaps un-sequester John Sweeney for the task? 

The Sweeney

I’ve learnt a new word: Furlough: ‘leave of absence, especially that granted to a member of the services or a missionary’ Am I the only person who hadn’t heard of the word before this crisis, and might something similar be applied, in this emergency, to the BBC?

Happy Chanuka

I would like to wish happy #Hanukkah to Jewish people celebrating in Britain and across the world.#Chanukah pic.twitter.com/UfwHrEMNYK

— Jeremy Corbyn (@jeremycorbyn) December 22, 2019

Britain would not be Britain without its Jewish community. And we will stand with you and celebrate with you - at Chanukah and all year round. pic.twitter.com/S5ClRprCuL

— Boris Johnson (@BorisJohnson) December 22, 2019

Pheeww! (OPEN THREAD)

A few observations, but please make allowances for someone who only managed about four hours sleep. 

Thank you for a lively open thread.  (You may use this as a new one if you like)

The magic has deserted the grandpa. The full pronunciation of ‘Party’ has resumed; Jeremy's ’T’ has been restored to its rightful place. He probably deduced that pandering to glottal-stopping troops was a waste of time if they’re going to just turn on him and kick him when he’s down.

Although I wouldn’t class Lisa Nandy and Lucy Powell as particularly disloyal, or Corbynista troops -  not by a long chalk - but don’t forget, they would have stood by him if Labour hadn’t been thoroughly trounced.  

Both of them publicly turned on him this morning, albeit in measured tones.  Lucy Powell said he could have shown some contrition and taken responsibility for Labour’s failure. He didn’t. He was irritable and he doubled down on the weaknesses in his campaign with remarkably stubborn intransigence. Sulky and, what’s the opposite of magnanimous? Mean-spirited?

I was sorry that Caroline Flint lost her seat. She was magnanimous. That's the way to do it.

What will happen next?

Where will all the antisemitism go? It’s out of the bottle and it can’t go back.

Let’s see how the BBC will adjust. Will they pretend they weren't institutionally hostile to the Tories all along?

Look at "ex-BBC" Paul Mason! I think he's completely lost touch with reality. Yet the BBC once employed him as a BBC economics expert. Look at shifty Shami Chakrabarti. She's been interviewed by the BBC's finest a few times since 'the whitewash'. Yet she wasn't even challenged on the fiasco of a report that earned her a peerage.

 But, hey. Pheewwww!

Is Jeremy Corbyn a troll?

Hmm. Jeremy Corbyn has posted a video today (apparently, he's 100% right, but life's a bitch):

Our time will come. pic.twitter.com/VAr9rAdA0f

— Jeremy Corbyn (@jeremycorbyn) December 15, 2019

As you'll see from the caption heading his tweet, his message is "Our time will come". 

Now, as pugnazious at Biased BBC notes, "Our time will come", however innocuous it sounds, is actually a major Irish republican slogan, Tiocfaidh ár lá. 

Sinn Fein and the IRA repeatedly used it - and Sinn Fein still uses it - as a rallying cry.

So, the obvious questions is: would Jeremy Corbyn - or whoever wrote this Twitter comment (Seumas, maybe?) - be unaware of that Irish republican connection when writing "Our time will come", especially given JC's strong interest (shall we say, to put it mildly) in Irish republican affairs? 

I doubt it.

Wonder if any mainstream media outlets, such as the BBC, will seriously look at Jeremy Corbyn's "Our time will come" tweet in the light of all that pugnazious has drawn to our attention to?

Looking into this myself even further, I'd guess that Mr Corbyn's tweet (whoever actually wrote it) is a deliberate piece of post-election trolling by the pro-IRA elements in Mr Corbyn's office, possibly with the Labour leader's blessing. (I can't imagine him being bright enough to think of doing such a thing himself, no offence). 

If anyone spots any speculation about this on the BBC please let us know. 

And lead me not into temptation

Talking of Broadcasting House, the paper review today featured Richard Wilson. 

The famous Labour-supporting actor told the programme, with passion: 

What always upset me during the election was that Corbyn must have known how hated he was and yet he decided to carry on. That's what I can't forgive. 

Now, having posted that tardy scoop, I really need to just leave it there and not continue this post. I mustn't let Sue down, myself down or you down by giving in to base temptations. But it's so hard. Yet I must stop myself. I so, so, so desire to rewrite the above as:

What always upset me during the election was that Corbyn must have know how hated he was and yet he decided to carry on. I couldn't BELIEEEEEEEVE it! 

...but I really, really mustn't. It would be such an obvious thing to do. So I mustn't.

Doomsday

I’m sick of seeing Jeremy Corbyn brandishing sheaves of paper to ‘prove’ the nastiness of the Tories. A bundle from Russia-with-love to prove that Boris Johnson is about to sell off our NHS to “Trump”. The evidence appeared to consist of a wad of thick black lines, the content redacted, obliterated and unreadable. But no matter. When today is over we might not have to see it again.

A few days ago BBC News featured a Corbyn rally (in Bristol, perhaps?) Corbyn, again waving papers before an adoring mob. This time, the front page of the Mirror featuring four-year-old Jack being “treated for pneumonia on the floor because there were no beds in Boris Johnson’s hospital.” Behind the anointed one, a comedy bobble-hat rose up, very slowly from beneath the podium to reveal the wearer - a photographer. Had the prospect of a Corbyn led “gov’ment” been less catastrophic, this slow-motion ‘photo-bomb’ might have added a moment of slapstick hilarity. I wish the intruder was an absurdist performance artist, but I expect the chap just wanted a shot of the great man from an unusual angle; the back of the head.

The confusion about the four-year-old boy-on-the-floor drags on. Speculation abounds. Who took the photo? Why was it taken in the first place?  The plea not to politicise it -  from the boy’s mother and from Jeremy Corbyn, whose very insistence that he wasn’t politicising it was effectively politicising it, something of which he must have been perfectly aware.

The assertion that the boy was ‘being treated for pneumonia’ on the floor, yet the drip was plainly not in use; but was it a drip or an oxygen thingy?  Whatever had happened, it was all due to callous Tory cuts. 

The editor of the Yorkshire Post has written some dubious hyperbole in the Guardian 

 “His mother, Sarah Williment, found herself in a moment of panic: her baby needed her. Moreover, her baby needed medical care from the amazing doctors and nurses at Leeds General Infirmary (LGI) but such was the demand from patients, he had to be made as comfortable as possible – on a pile of coats on the floor – until a bed and care became available.

Is a four-year-old technically a baby? Well, I s’pose, to a parent, one’s adult offspring are still babies, at a stretch. 

Was he waiting for ‘a bed and care’ or had he already ‘had’ care? If he hadn’t been seen yet, who supplied the drip cum oxygen mask? P’raps they brought one with them from home? This is getting ridiculous now.

“With only good intentions, Williment contacted her local newspaper, the Yorkshire Evening Post. In times of trouble, people often turn to their local newspaper. In this instance, Sarah only wanted to others to see just how stretched the team at LGI was, and humanise the impacts of too few hands at the pump.

As you do when you think your child baby has pneumonia. I’m not going to go on and on, much as I could.  I must try going to my local newspaper in my time of trouble - but will the Western Morning News care that a bunch of antisemites are running the country?

Stephen Pollard is thinking what I’ve been thinking for ages. I can’t even remember if I’ve written about it before, but I’m pretty sure I have. Pollard, from his piece in the Telegraph:

"The truth is that I can now barely bring myself to contemplate what this election says about my fellow Brits' willingness to tolerate Jew-hate. Whatever share of the vote Labour ends up with, it's safe to predict that over a third of voters have no problem with the concept of installing as prime minister a man who is repeatedly labelled an anti-Semite, not least by those like Dame Margaret Hodge who have worked alongside him.
[…]
In 2017, it was possible to argue that they didn't know about all this. That's impossible now. The issue of Labour's anti-Semitism has been given a full and comprehensive airing both during and long before the campaign. 

[...]The worst of them all are the so-called moderate Labour MPs. In the four years since Mr Corbyn was elected leader many of them have tweeted and spoken a lot about solidarity with the Jewish community. But when an election was called and they had to make a choice, they chose – actively, consciously and unambiguously – to ignore the pleas of the Jewish community, and to side with the Jew haters. Their campaigning was not to stop anti-Semitism, it was to put the leading anti-Semites into power.

Momentum-inspired aggressive behaviour of the baying mob is spookily 1930s-like.

On an odder note, have you noticed, Jeremy Corbyn himself has succumbed to the fashionable Labour glottal stop. He suddenly started using the famous Labour Party pronunciation, referring to the organisation as The Labour Par’y.  

Might Angela Rayner impose the ‘silent T’  as part of Labour’s revolutionary educational policy: “Equality Rules for Dumbed-down Schools”?

Game changers ?

Talking of interfering in ‘another country’s’ election, (as I was a moment ago) you might have noticed in our sidebar a little article by David Collier.  

“BUSTED – Hamas linked propaganda unit interfering in UK election”

It has been picked up by some of the press. Some but not others.

“Exposed: Hamas running pro-Corbyn Facebook page and Labour knows it”

Influential Corbyn-supporting Facebook page run by Hamas.

Report: Hamas acting to get Labour leader Corbyn elected

No. The BBC is still obsessing about the Alan Kurdi  “4-year old Jack” story.

"Jack Williment-Barr. The 4-year-old with suspected pneumonia forced to lie on a pile of coats on the floor of a Leeds hospital."

Will it be a game-changer? I suspect the BBC hopes so, now that Boris has riled them with veiled threats to do something or other to the Beeb if he gets half a chance. 

The way that stunt was set up and ‘run with’ won’t really help the reputation of journalists in the final reckoning. I hope. 

Tried to show @BorisJohnson the picture of Jack Williment-Barr. The 4-year-old with suspected pneumonia forced to lie on a pile of coats on the floor of a Leeds hospital.

The PM grabbed my phone and put it in his pocket: @itvcalendar | #GE19 pic.twitter.com/hv9mk4xrNJ

— Joe Pike (@joepike) December 9, 2019

I haven’t been able to find the full facts surrounding this incident. And the other one, baby Lily. For instance, why was she “only covered with her mother’s cardigan?” Surely-to-God the parent had a brought a shawl or a baby-blanket with them? There are many unanswered questions. Banal but pertinent questions.

A Saturday evening rant

I'd value your advice here...

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The BBC pays - and I probably pay - far too much attention to the demented cries of bias from the Corbyn mob. 

I do it because it's important for a blog called 'Is the BBC biased?' to consider the question as broadly as possible and to dwell sceptically on the 'complaints from both sides' defence. 

And it's important to consider other perspectives too.

*******

Ah but...

The issue which I think I've somewhat lost sight of is that the BBC has normalised far-left extremism, thus paving the path to making the idea of a Corbyn-led, antisemitic, far-left-heavy Labour Party government seem worthy of acceptability in a country with a centuries' old tradition of democracy and reasonableness and a marked aversion to (European) continental fanaticism.

*******

If we get a far-left, antisemitic government after 12 December I'll hold the BBC partly responsible for failing to ring the alarm bells and warn the public anywhere near enough.

*******

Yes, I know that's exactly the same sort of language that Newswatch's Samira Ahmed has used in the past to complain about far-right extremism being platformed by the BBC. 

And by that she, very openly, meant the likes of Nigel Farage. 

But Nigel Farage isn't a far-right extremist...

...unlike, say, John McDonnell, who is a far-left extremist (albeit with a great taste in middle-class jumpers and a tendency to try to disguise his privileged background).

*******

From Ash to Grace, from Aaron to Owen, the far-left have been platformed to the nth degree by the BBC. 

No matter how extreme their views (and they are often very extreme), the BBC invites them on again and again and again. 

They're young and dashing and pretty and not working class, and none of them have ever been the leader of the EDL. 

They're acceptable extremists, and the BBC indulges them.

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Why? 

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The reason, in part, is because they represent one of the two main UK political parties.

The problem is that one of the two main main UK political parties has been invaded, conquered, hollowed out, and turned upside down and inside out by far-left extremists.

The extremists are now in charge of Labour, and it's now no longer the Labour Party that people have always voted for - including me, in the past, from time to time. 

It's now a weird, far-left cult stuffed with Israel-obsessed antisemites - and people who can't or won't see that their party is stuffed with far-left Israel-obsessed antisemites, and other forms of antisemites (including Muslim antisemites). 

And yet the BBC grants Jeremy Corbyn's far-left cult-of-a-party equivalent respectability with the Conservative Party, rather than leading the charge against them on behalf of moderation, democracy and opposition to antisemitism. 

It's just what they do though, isn't it?  It's all about due impartiality, isn't it?

And Jeremy Corbyn isn't Nigel Farage after all.

And the BBC is broadly soggy-left, so the far-left doesn't worry them as much as the moderate, pro-Brexit right does.

And Labour isn't pro-Brexit (despite JC, who might be).

*******

I fear that the BBC just don't see it. 

They have blinkers on. Lots of blinkers. Blinkers galore.

They should beware though, because the far-left aren't anywhere near as fixated as they are on Brexit and the Tories. 

The far-left, being far-left, are largely preoccupied with enemies closer to home and, so,  much more fixated on  soggy left types - such as the BBC.

They will come for the BBC, if elected. And many people at the BBC - who didn't see it coming - will not like it one bit.

*******

Rant over. What do you think?