Why the BBC "secretly enjoys" Owen Jones's attacks on Andrew Neil

Roger Mosey, in BBC days gone by

Former head of BBC Television News Roger Mosey has written a piece for The New Statesman headlined Why Owen Jones’s attack on Andrew Neil secretly delighted the BBC. 

It's full of interesting points, and I suspect that you'll enjoy it.

It's his take on why BBC reporters' Twitter comments matter and how they seriously compromise 'BBC impartiality'...

...however much some people might discount such things as trivia not worth bothering about by blogs about BBC bias. After all, for many BBC reporters, it's now a key part of their reporting role and it's fully BBC-branded.

Roger singles out Laura Bicker for emoting in a dumbed-down way ("totes emosh") over the Kim-Moon "bromance", and regular anti-Trump sneerer Anthony Zurcher....

Zurcher often retweets Trump with caustic comments

(Very true!)

...and business correspondent Joe Lynam for being pro-EU ("on Twitter it’s clear he cares a lot about the EU"). 

All are absolutely fair comments from Mr Mosey - though I believe him to be seriously mistaken in thinking that their TV, radio and online reporting is "straight", impartiality-wise. It is no such thing. [Evidence from this blog of all three reporters behaving less than impartially? Well, please click here for Laura, here for Anthony and here for Joe].  

He then goes on, just as fairly, to criticise John Simpson for (despite himself) "revealing this thinking" on Brexit on Twitter.

And then he brings in Andrew Neil, long the BBC presenter those who deny that the BBC has a left-liberal bias like to cite. 

As I've said before, I agree that Andrew Neil - the fairest of all BBC interviewers - behaves as badly as these others on Twitter. He too thinks he can behave "without impunity" on social media. Unlike all of the above, however, his Twitter feed comes from 'the other side'.

And that's where Owen Jones leaps in, accusing Andrew Neil (quite correctly) of behaving in a less-than-impartial way on Twitter and, thus, "promoting right-wing causes" - hence 'proving' the BBC to be biased in 'the other direction'.

Roger Mosey says the BBC "secretly enjoys assaults like that" from Owen Jones, as it "undermines the usual claim that it is controlled by liberal lefties"

He concludes by posing a dilemma for the BBC:

All this points to a choice that broadcasters still have: to engage or not. One presenter who shuns social media told me: “I’m genuinely not persuaded that tweeting serves any useful purpose for broadcasters who must be seen as impartial. Maybe it raises the tweeter’s profile – but with whom? The people who matter are the audience and I suspect they reach their judgement on how we perform when we’re doing our jobs.” Some European public service broadcasters take the hard line of simply not allowing their presenters to vent on social media, and they don’t seem the poorer for it.

Please read it all (if you have time).

BBC partisans

The news about Donald Trump and Kim Jong-un's agreement to meet for talks has drawn some interesting reactions so far. 

So is the BBC being "partisan" over this? Well, all I can say is that their main BBC News website report about it waits for Paragraph 21 to devote one paragraph alone to citing someone giving President Trump credit.

And the usual suspects are being sour about it on Twitter. 

Anthony Zurcher's Twitter feed (so far) is particularly "partisan" and, yes, he gives North Korea all the credit for a possible "diplomatic triumph":

As for Katty Kay, well, she's been very quiet about it (so far), simply re-tweeting a rather sour comment from a former Clinton Era Democrat defence secretary: 

Take a look at Laura Bicker's prominent 'analysis' piece on the BBC News website, and you'll see that her take is just as jaundiced as Anthony Zurcher's.

Her write-up of South Korean president President Moon Jae-in's role is measured in tone and full of respectful language. He's the one she's giving credit to.

When she deals with Donald Trump, however, a disrespectful tone crashes in:

• "His administration has had very few victories, despite promising his voters there would "so much winning".
• "Reporters say he casually mentioned in the White House briefing room that he hoped they would give him credit for Kim Jong-un's offer. His voters certainly will".
• "...his Art of the Deal book will not be the guide he needs to deal with Kim Jong-un".
• and an expert whose quote begins, "Trump doesn't study or even read. He tends to fly wildly off script....".

How typical this is of the BBC's reporting of the story I'll try to find out after getting work out of the way today.

Update (17.15): And what's the first thing I see on my Twitter feed after getting in from work? This from the BBC's ever-so-impartial World Affairs Editor (his one tweet on the subject):

I can't help but think that if President Obama had done what President Trump has done John Simpson would be praising him as a peacemaker rather than damning him as a dupe.

#partisanBBCreporting.

Further update (20:28): From last night...

Who indeed?

Oh Donald!

Those impartial BBC reporters have been busy tweeting their usual kind of thing in recent days - 

- and one thing about reading their Twitter feeds is that they most definitely don't reckon the Washington Post's revelations (about the Hillary Clinton campaign and the DNC part-funding the sensational dossier into Donald Trump's doings in a Russian hotel) amount to much. They're sticking with the Russia-Trump collusion stuff instead. In fact I can only find one figure of equivalent prominence at the BBC reckoning anything much to the WaPo's findings:

The first reply to that tweet made me smile:

Update: Here's another one, concentrating on the really big Trump story:

Charlottesville

I read a tweet last night:

Well yes. Here's something I saw cited at B-BBC:

I assumed the B-BBC link would take me to a blog-post by someone like the ever-righteous Katty Kay or the ever-sarcastic Anthony Zurcher - BBC journalists who appear to have carte blanche to be as opinionated as they like (for some reason) despite that whole 'BBC impartiality' thing - but no, the link took me to a bog-standard, byline-free BBC report instead.

So even bog-standard, byline-free BBC reports about President Trump now read as if they are blog posts by opinionated BBC journalists.

(Ed - Shock horror! As if that's really something new!)

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Laura Bicker

Those self-same BBC types have been going into a frenzied overdrive against Donald Trump after what the BBC's Laura Bicker (on BBC One's main news bulletin) called his "failure" to denounce white supremacists for yesterday's violence in Charlottesville. 

I happen to agree with Laura there. I think it was a "failure" too.

That said, I'm entitled to express my opinions. I'm not a supposedly impartial BBC journalist. She is.

Yes, President Trump should have specifically slagged off the neo-Nazis, whilst acknowledging that, yes, the violence did initially come in roughly equal amounts from both sides until the neo-Nazi rammed his car into a crowd of protesters from the other side, killing a woman and injuring many more, of course - something which changed that equation considerably.

Slagging off people who bellow Nazi slogans ("Blood and soil"), give Nazi salutes (and yes they did give Nazi salutes!), spew antisemitic chants, march with torches, and tell black women to their face to 'go home' (complete with swear words), etc, is something a democrat ought to be happy to do - indeed consider it their duty to do (whilst simultaneously granting their right to free speech).

******

Back to the BBC though...

I'd challenge anyone who wishes to be considered fair-minded or objective to read any of the following Twitter feeds and then say that these BBC journalists are tweeting and re-tweeting as neutral, disinterested, purely objective reporters: Laura Bicker, Anthony Zurcher, Nick Bryant, Jon Sopel, Nick Robinson, Hugh Sykes, and Katty Kay.

Each and every one of them expressed (or 're-expressed') strong opinions galore there, and all of them said (or 're-expressed) pretty much the same things. They've been anything but impartial on Twitter.

Is this BBC groupthink in action? Of course, but shouldn't the BBC, which ought to promote democracy, be taking sides against neo-Nazis? Isn't it their duty to promote and protect democracy at the expense of totalitarians of all shades? So isn't this 'good' BBC groupthink?

Yes, of course, the hardcore 'antifa' types are deeply violent and have strong anti-democratic strains too, and it's significant (and predictable) that their violence, despite being much more pervasive, isn't dwelt on by the BBC anywhere near as much...

...but still Donald Trump should have distanced himself from the neo-Nazis - and questioning why he appeared to go all 'Jeremy Corbyn' by criticising violence from "all sides" (quite right actually) without adding that he personally abhors white supremacists (and any other shade of modern-day Nazi) and wants nothing to do with them, is surely appropriate questioning, isn't it?

Well yes, if it doesn't go beyond questioning into outright editorialising.

How fine a line is that?

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Heather Heyer

As I wrote earlier, until a white supremacist terrorist, aping Europe's Muslim terrorists, repeatedly rammed his car into a crowd of protesters, killing a woman (Heather Heyer) and injuring many others, the equation of violence at yesterday's 'alt-right' rally in Charlottesville appears to have been fairly evenly spread between the fascists and the anti-fascists - both sides brawling, and clubbing each other, and chucking pepper spray.

A lot of the BBC's early reporting, from what I saw of it, acknowledged that in passing.

Only later did reports like Joel Gunter's begin appearing on the BBC website, painting a different picture of largely one-sided violence (from the violent far-right against peaceful anti-fascist protesters who, according to Joel, only threw bottles and chucked pepper spray).

And then came the terrorist attack from James Fields Jr.

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Joel was a candle in the wind. By this evening any sense that the 'antifa' crowd had any violent intentions has vanished - if the reporting I'm seeing on the BBC News Channel is anything to go by. And it was all Democrats (not that the BBC report itself declared any of them as such):

Newsreader: One of the organisers of Saturday's far-right rally in the U.S. city of Charlottesville that resulted in a woman being killed by a car has been forced to abandon a media briefing following protests. Meanwhile the White House defended President Trump after it was claimed he didn't go far enough in condemning violence by white supremacists. Our North America correspondent. Laura Bicker reports.
Laura Bicker: After a violent day of division, Charlottesville has come together to pray, to show that this city condemns the hate brought here by neo-Nazis and white supremacists. The Virginia governor went from row to row, hugging worshippers in this Baptist church. He promised to keep politics out of the pulpit, but there is a message he felt he had to give:
Terry McAuliffe, Governor of Virginia (Democrat): It is about politics in that the political rhetoric in this country today is breeding bigotry.
Laura Bicker: The streets here simmered with tension yesterday before finally erupting into violence, as white supremacists gathered for a rally. The group, which included members of the Klu Klux Klan, said they wanted to take America back. Counter-protesters and anti-racism activists challenged them. Police tried to disperse the crowd but this day was not to end peacefully. A car, at speed, rammed into protesters. Shocked witnesses captured the aftermath. The crash killed 32-year-old Heather Heyer, who'd fought racism all her adult life. Many others are still being treated in hospital. Those who captured the scene on camera said they were not shocked the day ended in tragedy. The police have charged a 20-year-old James Alex Fields Junior with second-degree murder.
Brennan Gilmore (former Democrat aide): The Nazis who came to town yesterday clearly had the intent of causing violence. You don't come to town with shields and helmets and weapons and have a militia with automatic or semiautomatic weapons around their shoulders if you are here to peacefully express an opinion.
Laura Bicker: Others, who have lived here all their lives, say the scenes do not represent Charlottesville, and they want politicians to challenge those responsible.
Dr. Wes Bellamy, Charlottesville deputy mayor (Democrat): It is important to call these people what they are - white supremacists. I don't understand why that is so difficult, that is what they are. They're not hiding this behind a statue, they didn't come here because of a statue, they came here because just as David Duke said yesterday, they came here to fulfil the promise of President Trump and take their country back.
Laura Bicker: This city did not want bigotry on its streets. Its people now want to remember those who died trying to challenge it and to keep the peace. Laura Bicker, BBC News.

******

(Is this a coherent post? Answers on a postcard to the comments thread below.)

Going down well (so far)

I haven't seen much of the BBC's coverage of the Trump administration's military strike on a Syrian regime airbase but I'm getting a strong sense from the Twitter feeds of many familiar BBC reporter that the US military action is going down well with the (duly impartial) BBC.

Here's a small selection, beginning with the the BBC's Washington bureau chief, Paul Danahar:

...a point that Newsnight presenter James O'Brien has already taken on board: 

Even Katty Kay is positive about the strikes:

And for the first time ever, I've actually seen BBC reporters re-tweeting criticism of Stop The War types opposed to US military action - including Hugh Sykes:

...and John Sweeney:

John Sweeney is also among those BBC reporters re-tweeting Arab appreciation for President Trump's actions (and not - for once - re-tweeting Arab criticism):

...as is Katty Kay:

Others, like Kim Ghattas, are following their earlier tweets criticising the lack of action (by persons unspecified) over the last few years:

...with attacks on those critical of last night's strike:

Others are tweeting about editorials that back the action (and not tweeting about editorials which criticise the action), such as Ian Pannell: 

...while others are placing a positive gloss on the politics of the military strike, such as Barbara Plett:

Others are even hoping that President Trump might go even further and do something even better, such as Laura Bicker:

The BBC's Middle East editor, Jeremy Bowen, has tweeted nothing about the strikes yet. Nor has the BBC's World Affairs editor John Simpson.

How much of any of this is feeding into the BBC's actual reporting I can't yet say (as I've not had time to check it out), but a definite BBC point of view is emerging on Twitter. 

There are also, naturally, plenty of digs at Donald Trump for his past flat-out refusal to back military action in Syria, though even here - as with Quentin Somerville - there are surprising defences of Trump:

As for my Twitter feed in general, it's been fascinating seeing nearly all the anti-Trump types backing the strikes and nearly all the pro-Trump types opposing them - and Trump. 

It's all gone topsy-turvy today.

Trump, Obama, the FBI and the BBC

It's all kicking off again. Not long after the BBC posted its Echoes of Watergate resurface as Trump-Russia links probe piece (not that there's a connection!), President Trump sent out four tweets claiming that President Obama has engaged in Watergate-style activities:

• Terrible! Just found out that Obama had my "wires tapped" in Trump Tower just before the victory. Nothing found. This is McCarthyism!
• Is it legal for a sitting President to be "wire tapping" a race for president prior to an election? Turned down by court earlier. A NEW LOW!
• I'd bet a good lawyer could make a great case out of the fact that President Obama was tapping my phones in October, just prior to Election!
• How low has President Obama gone to tapp my phones during the very sacred election process. This is Nixon/Watergate. Bad (or sick) guy!

The BBC obviously doesn't buy it. The BBC News website's report states that Trump "gave no details to back the claim" and features a sarcastic analysis from Anthony Zurcher, who says "There is scant evidence supporting these allegations" and suggests it "could mark the beginning of a massive water-muddying effort" - something he also suggests, minus the caveats, in a tweet:

Jon Sopel, meanwhile, is being sarky about Trump's spelling and blaming it on Breitbart:

And Katty Kay - who links to a source debunking Trump's claim, saying that he was wire-tapped by the FBI and that (a) it's old news, (b) not illegal and (c) suggests the courts much have felt there were grounds to authorise it - is tweeting: 

Samira Ahmed, on the other hand, is living in hope of the lawyers:

Laura Bicker on BBC One's early evening news bulletin described Trump's tweets as a "tirade" and said he'd "trashed" the tradition that their should be "a peaceful handover of power", and the bulletin said that he'd "offered no evidence that it had taken place".

No-one at the BBC (as far as I can see) has quite got round to calling this 'fake news' yet. They clearly think it is though.

Protest

Watching the BBC News Channel about an hour ago, it's clear that the BBC are neither hiding their displeasure at the Trump administration's "media block" [as they are captioning it] nor taking it lying down. 

They have broadcast a 'gotcha' clip of Sean Spicer back in December being interviewed by "the news agency Politico", as Maxine Mawhinney called them. [Is Politico actually a 'news agency'?]:

There is a big difference between a campaign where it is a private venue using private funds and a government entity. And I think we have a respect for the press when it comes to the government, that that is something that you can't ban an entity from, conservative, liberal or otherwise. I think that's what makes a democracy a democracy versus a dictatorship, so I think there is a vastly different model when it comes to Government in what should be accepted and that is on both sides. 

Maxine put a lot of expression into pre-announcing this, saying "he said that barring media from government press briefings is [horrified tone] what dictators do". 

She then interviewed Silvia Borrelli, the London Politico reporter, noting that "Politico was one of the media organisations barred from the White House press briefing - [turning to camera] along with us, the BBC, as well."

Silvia was not at all happy at what the White House has done, and Maxine didn't exactly make much of an effort to play devil's advocate either, saying things like:

• And how do you fight back against it?
• And it is spreading, isn't it? It is not just in the United States now?
• And yesterday we were covering Donald Trump's appearance at the Conservative Association rally in Maryland and [incredulous tone] it only...it was less than two minutes before he started attacking the media. He just brought it up out of the blue and just kept going.
• Does it make any difference if organisations are barred from the White House briefings? 

Captions of media statements protesting the 'media block' ran across the right-hand side of the screen for much of the interview.

P.S. Laura Bicker's report just before this - repeated every hour - calls the President's conference comments on the media a "tirade". 

Reporting With Changing Parts

I suppose we all fall into habits and repeat ourselves. (I certainly do - as regular readers of this blog will be well aware). But the BBC's Laura Bicker has taken the art of 'repeating oneself' to a new high in recent days. 

I must have heard about seven or eight different reports from her and her coverage of the Trump rally in particular has, on the whole, been far less sarky than what you'd expect from the rest of her BBC colleagues, but Laura has found a particular formulation to fit into her many pieces over the last few days, and she's stuck with it (with slight variations), like Philip Glass with a chord progression. So much so that I've started laughing every time I hear it.

And it was there again on tonight's BBC One evening news bulletin - and, to my great amusement, it came in two versions:

• But he doesn't need to win friends here in Florida, he needs some on Capitol Hill, if he is to get his agenda through Congress. 
• This rally was hugely popular with his voting base, but it won't win over his critics.

Perhaps you will start noticing it too from now on. A fixation shared is a fixation halved. 

Other reading

While we've been a bit fallow recently (sorry again), The Conservative Woman has been highly fruitful, including several interesting pieces about BBC bias.

First up comes: 

David Keighley: Complaints unit makes no apology for pinning Harlow killing on Brexit 

This details the BBC's inflammatory reporting of the murder of a Polish man in late August. The BBC made much of claims that the killing was a Brexit-related hate crime. A boy has recently been charged for the killing and, importantly, the race hate charge in connection with the death is not being pursued. The BBC website article updating the story failed to mention that last point. Also, David's complaint to the BBC about that reporting got nowhere - other than receiving a misspelt and off-hand response from the BBC. 'Will the new ex-BBC-heavy Ofcom board be any better?', David wonders.

Then there's a piece on the BBC's transgender agenda:

Caroline Farrow: The insanity of the BBC promoting Paris Lees as a sex expert 

and a funny piece from Nick Booth: 

Nick Booth: The BBC throws a Christmas Party. Despite Brexit 

Laura Bicker. Probably not a conservative woman.

And then (today) it's back to David for a piece based on Thursday's Today, where Donald Trump's appointment of Scott Pruitt as the new head of the Environmental Protection Agency doesn't sound as if it went down at all well with the BBC:

David Keighley: BBC abandons impartiality over Trump’s assault on climate change zealots

Listening to the bit with the BBC's Laura Bicker (beginning around 6.39), I can well see what David means. Laura, as he says, does the classic 'one degree of separation' thing - "There have been a number of people who say this is a terrible choice", "He is a climate change denier", "He is a friend and ally of many (sic) fossil fuel industry", "Perhaps this is seen as a sign that Donald Trump, who was once a climate change denier himself, has not changed his spots". His backers, according to Laura, are "right-wing conservatives", "right-wing activists", "conservatives". It's "a real joy" for them.