Sunday 16 July 2017

Anytime Open Thread


33 comments:

  1. Ellie Fant-Indaroom15 July 2017 at 20:47

    Here is the news...

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q7WHgGnyHtM

    Shows how a more objective broadcasting service (ie not the BBC) might treat certain "sensitive" topics. As far as I can see all the news items are genuine - it's just a matter of how you interpret those facts. According to the BBC mass immigration and the spread of Sharia ideology has been a huge boon to European societies. There is no particular reason to think the BBC's analysis is correct.

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  2. This contribution from Brian Wheeler Political reporter appeared on the BBC website:

    http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-40498232

    Reading through - What Chance for a new 'Centre Ground' Party in the UK - gives an idea of how the BBC views 'Centre Ground'.

    Macron has become the blueprint.

    Further down the page we see Gary Lineker, a we love Corbyn banner in a crowd of smiling supporters, and then, pictures of Vince Cable, Tony Blair, Robert Kilroy-Silk, Nigel Farage all depicted as village idiots.

    We get the message. The BBC are envious of the Macron phenomenon - How they wish for a similar leader to emerge here in the UK left of centre, pro EU - just like the BBC.

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    1. They certainly chose their pictures carefully there. A comparison of the Macron and Gary Lineker pictures with the unflattering Nigel Farage one speaks volumes.

      Andrew Marr's Sunday Times piece (posted about somewhere around here) shows that message you write about in full cry.

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  3. Has the BBC managed to maintain its pro-Macron line, despite his hopping (figuratively, one hopes) into bed with that nasty Mr Trump? Sisyphus

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    1. These are the double standards of the BBC. Pro Macron to the extent that they suspended attacks on arch enemy Trump whilst he was doing the biz in France - so that they didn't offend said Macron - him with his EU vision that the Beeb are so keen on.

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  4. The BBC appear to think it is their job to "judge" the performance of a foreign president for some reason...really! They do !!!


    http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-40524386

    Of course it's Trump, so that is just part of the continuing open season.

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  5. Zombie Media Will Fall16 July 2017 at 23:40

    Dover Sentry on BBBC asks a pertinent question: "Would the BBC continue to fight Brexit after we had left the EU?"

    He answers in the affirmative and so do I.

    I think it would take at least 10 years, virtual collapse of the EU (quite likely in my view of course!) and two or three major defeats for "rejoin" parties before they would accept that we were out of the EU and even then they would be griping...

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    1. Yes, Brexit would be (in the BBC's view) a diminution of their reach and influence in Europe. They might see themselves now as a big fish in a big pool, and after Brexit, how would this big fish resettle?

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  6. Ellie Fant-Indaroom17 July 2017 at 19:00

    Disgraceful bias on WATO, Radio 4 this lunchtime. Who shall we invite on to give a balanced view of the Government's troubles?...I know, how about arch-remainiac Michael Heseltine. Let's let him ramble on for ages with his Brexipobic nonsense in response to a series of the softest questions.

    Heseltine (like Blair) is now admitting that there is a serious problem with migration into Europe and the UK. Yes - hallelujah - they finally admit it's a problem. And Heseltine offers up some delusional stuff about a Marshall Plan for (unspecified) poor countries. Providing Marshall Plan style aid for the 4 billion in Africa and the few billion more in the Middle East and SW Asia by the century's end might prove a little bit on the expensive side for Europe's 500 million.

    Of course, not a single difficult question was asked of Heseltine. He wasn't challenged on why he now acccpted belatedly that mass immigration is a huge problem, and concern about it was the legitimate main factor in the the Brexit. He wasn't properly challenged about the practicality of his airy plan any more than Blair was given a roasting over his imaginary story about the EU being prepared to abandon the principle of free movement.

    BBC - the Home of Brexiphobia.

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  7. Daniel Barenboim gave a pro-EU, anti-Brexit speech at the end of his Proms concert. No mistake. Europe is a place for diverse cultures, nationalism is dangerous.

    http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b08ymnr0/bbc-proms-2017-barenboims-elgar

    Speech begins at 1:51:15

    That's two violations in the first week of the Proms. Let the backlash begin, I say.

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    1. PS: The Birtwistle was....okay. Whoever wrote the presenter's introduction text was obviously trying to be kind by saying it was typical Birtwistle noises and licks done in a new way. It wasn't, really. Well executed (by both composer and orchestra), but thin on material. He just put the cliché clock noises in the middle this time, first building up to it, then winding down. We've heard it all before, and just from him.

      I only heard brief bits of the Elgar, as I was more interested to hear the speech. What I heard was Straussian, which maybe Elgar would have appreciated. Will listen to it in full another time when I'm in a better mood.

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  8. Inflation down - from 2.9% to 2.6%.

    The BBC have been furiously spinning the 'widening' gap between cost of living rises, and pay awards.

    On this month's trends (wages up, inflation down), this state of affairs could be very short-lived indeed. Inflation is also now very close to the BoE's target of 2%.

    There are challenges ahead, and all in the garden is certainly not rosy, but it's certainly not as weed ridden as the Brexiphobic BBC have been desperately trying to portray.

    A new attack line now required - this will no doubt see a drop in the value of the £ on the currency exchanges as the prospects of an imminent rate rise recede. Expect the Beeboids to go after this one with gusto.

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    1. Presenting good news seems very difficult for the BBC Newsreaders. They habitually frown on reading the item, saying 'the inflation rate fell unexpectedly this month...' In this case 'unexpectedly' means running counter to the BBC narrative.

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  9. Daily Politics 17/7/2017 is a copybook example par excellence by Jo Coburn of pro Labour pro Corbyn anti Government anti Theresa May interviewing. Guests were Lab Jess Philips and Con Robert Halfon.

    She framed the questions to Robert Halfon - “do you not agree with the projected figure of £60 billion for the ‘divorce’ from the EU?” instead of asking for the current state of the negotiations, and whether they might or might not lead to a settlement figure, and if so what would his estimate of that figure be.

    On education ‘cuts’ she asked Jess Philips how much reversal of the ‘cuts’ might cost, and when Jess Philips (who didn’t seem to have a clue, but kept saying we want the Government to listen to our demands) prevaricated, she immediately stopped that line of questioning and led her gently into another question quoting sources from the weekend’s teachers’ protests. Philips had clearly been briefed to, when asked a question, attack the Tories.

    The camera work was such that when Halfon was answering, Philips could be seen tut-tutting. . She was amongst friends!

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  10. Another day, another photo on the BBC News website of Theresa May with a very dark background:

    http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-40639715

    But wait, she is shown with a trace of a smile!

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  11. Some recent observations:

    1. I heard a segment of the Godawful Feedback re whether Bridget Kendal's Cold War series should have featured a Vietnam War Green Beret atrocity story (involving a fire hose) without warning. Looking into this John Ketwig character (the source of the atrocity story)I noticed he had come in for some criticism for the uncorroborated nature of his stories and the fact that a truck maintenance guy should have found himself in so many interesting situations during the war. One commentator noted that in his book he retells well known legends like the bamboo snake story as though fact. I've no idea whether or not his uncorroborated stories are entirely accurate, but doesn't the BBC have some kind of responsibility to ensure they are, especially when they are so graphic and are being placed in the balance against the tens of millions of unjustified deaths on the Communist side. The My Lai atrocities were well documented as were some others...did they need to go elsewhere for sensationalist stuff? Who did the research?

    2. It's Blair'em Scare'em time...Usual unending run of scare stories about Brexit from the BBC while the "reasonable" Gestapo guy (Blair, Heseltine whoever) works on us psychologically..."You vill only make sings verse if you curntinue down zis parth. Please, be zenzible...you can stop zis turment now if you vill only agree to co-urperate."

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  12. More dreadful smugness from John Humphrys, (watch it - he's unable to keep a straight face) towards Jo Konta about her nationality. I thought the BBC mantra was 'we're all children of the world'.

    http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/av/uk-40645445/bbc-s-john-humphrys-to-johanna-konta-what-are-you

    Just imagine the furore if Humphrys had challenged Mo Farrah over his Somali roots and British nationality in the same sneering mocking tone.

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    1. I don’t know why, Humphrys has made a whole career out of being smug, but I was quite surprised by the direction that interview took. Why not just congratulate her on having such a successful grass court season? I’m glad to say Jo was not in the least bit fazed. Humphrys just made himself look like an idiot - not for the first time.

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  13. Here's some US news the BBC is censoring:

    Border Patrol union boss: Drop in apprehensions 'nothing short of miraculous'

    http://thehill.com/latino/342364-border-patrol-union-boss-drop-in-apprehensions-nothing-short-of-miraculous

    Nothing to do with the evil racist fascist rounding them up, breaking up families, and deporting them in record numbers, apparently.

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  14. Here's the BBC stoking up Trump hatred on the main BBC News homepage under the "Must See" section.

    http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-39732845

    "What has President Trump said about your country?"

    What the US president says in public about other countries has been a major part of international diplomacy for the last 100 years.

    Gratuitous, sensationalist, click-bait, and probably dishonest cherry-picking. They never did this for Obama.

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    1. The BBC censored that pic of Obama bowing deeply to the King of Saudi Arabia.

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    2. I don't recall that, but the BBC certainly censored a lot of Obama's awkward moments.

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    3. Like getting the Oath of Office wrong...and having to repeat it inside the White House.

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    4. No, the BBC reported the Oath of Office redo, but only because they could blame Chief Justice Roberts for screwing up and making Him do it.

      The BBC did not report the '57 states' gaffe, or the time when he said in a speech that Hawaii was in Asia, or when he said 'transcontinental railroad', or that 'Austrian' was a language, or when he wrote the wrong year in the Westminster Abbey guest book (the year of His election, 2008, instead of the actual year, 2011) or when he said "Three proud words: Made in the USA", or when he both made a gaffe and betrayed an ally when he called the Falklands "the Maldives".

      Links to all can be found here:

      https://biasedbbc.org/blog/2012/09/10/censoring-gaffe-o-matic/

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  15. Spot the missing statement by Jesus about how marriage is between a man and a woman in episode 2 of Helen Castor's 'Medieval Lives: Birth, Marriage, Death' series.

    http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b03d6c64/medieval-lives-birth-marriage-death-2-a-good-marriage

    Marriage having anything to do with religion and the Church was apparently a medieval invention, specifically because the nasty old Church leaders wanted to control everything, and because of their freak-outs about s.e.x. Also spot other missing statements by Paul which shows it was hardly a 12th century invention.

    http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b03d6c64/medieval-lives-birth-marriage-death-2-a-good-marriage

    See Matthew 19, 1 Corinthians 7, or Hebrews 13:3-5, for example. Castor isn't entirely wrong about the development of Church control over ritual and the whole procedure, but there's no need to pretend it came out of nowhere and has no basis in Jesus' own words.

    BBC rewriting history and religion.

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  16. Today today...

    Interesting to note Matthew Price's piece on immigration into Italy was in line with a new pattern I have detected and which we have seen being promoted by Blair and Heseltine in public discourse.

    Whereas 2 years ago (to put things into sharp relief) migration in Europe was considered by the BBC an entirely ethical issue, a matter of relieving suffering and was also being touted as a great boon, to ageing failing Europe...now there is a much more sober judgement: uncontrolled migration into Europe is a problem, a serious one, and it is not racist or unethical to say so. There was far less of the virtue signalling we used to get. Far more recognition that we are talking overwhelmingly about young men, and that they are impacting negatively on settled communities in Europe e.g. through rising crime. A very different tone I must say!

    The message has definitely got down to the BBC foot soldiers if Matthew Price is coming out with a dose of realism...

    So what's afoot? My guess is that Macron is driving this - saying the EU has to do something about the migration problem. What that something might be is open to question...but clearly it has given the Remainiacs like Blair and Heseltine licence to pretend that freedom of movement is about to be abandoned and so there is "no point" (lol) in us leaving the EU. My take is that the EU does not have the political will to stop illegal migration into Europe. Any Macron-inspired stuff will be tinkering at the edges.

    We shall see but the change in tone is striking.

    Whatever next will the BBC find to be the case? Single parenthood as a lifestyle choice has poor outcomes? Only in Ambridge are women clamouring to get into the village cricket team and making such a success of i when they do? If you try and satisfy demand for for increased public expenditure for every deserving cause you will bankrupt the country in six weeks? Some women like being at home looking after children? Mass immigration is the main cause of the housing crisis? Well...maybe not.

    In another segment Nick Robinson had the chutzpah to discuss inflated BBC salaries. In passing I note that John Whittingdon is "John" to Nick.

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  17. Well, well, what do you know. Just as the BBC is really taking a public beating over its Left-wing bias (with even the Proms causing headaches about anti-Brexit bias) there's a new row over BBC star top salaries.

    How many times have we seen this? Very convenient timing for a distraction. The BBC just had to publish these today, I suppose. Totally out of their control how this came about.

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  18. Tosh Alert!

    What a lot of tosh is being talked about the "talent" and the "market" re BBC top salaries and how the BBC is so lucky to have access to the special skills of its wonderful presenters and entertainers. We are a nation of 65 million. We probably have max 200 regular national news readers and presenters on our main news channels. The BBC itself probably has about 60 or thereabouts. The idea that the BBC couldn't find another 60 telegenic types with the education and communication skills to undertake the role at half the pay is ridiculous. I am sure in the early Victorian period magazine editors stressed what a difficult job they were involved in and how rare were the necssary skills to be found in a person. Scroll forward a 100 years and there would be hundreds more magazine titles, and yet somehow the people to edit them were miraculously found. It was the same story with TV news readers - they didn't exist 80 years ago...but the people with the necessary skills were found.

    The truth is the BBC have aided and abetted the growth of a celebrity culture of news and current affairs. The programme makers and management like that set up as well since it puts upward pressure on their pay as well.

    The BBC is a £5 billion organisation. It can find the millions to train up people. People with talent will not be in short supply in a nation of 65 million.

    Also, interesting to note that although the BBC does nothing but lecture the rest of us on multiculturalism and equal opportunity, its top earners are nearly all "hideoously white". This is because of all the aged job squatters like Humphries and the Dimbleby bros.

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    1. It's a cleverly timed distraction from the pressure of bias complaints. Now everyone can rally round the National Treasure and focus on salaries, getting lots of people to come out and defend the BBC, which they weren't doing in the last couple of weeks with the big problems of bias.

      This tweet from Simpson is a classic example. "Why are the nasty Tories trying to destroy the BBC?" The memory of Andrea Leadsom recently scolding the BBC saying they need to be more patriotic will be fresh in people's minds. That was spun as her saying the BBC must support the Government line.

      Seen it before. The focus is all on salaries and the license fee, the usual suspects leap to the BBC's defense, a poll comes out saying public trust in the BBC is as high as ever, trusted more than politiicians and the local vicar, and it's all heat and no light. Plus, the BBC gets to pose as being preternaturally transparent and pure as the driven snow for openly discussing and debating it's own problems.

      Soon, it all dies down again, nothing changes, and all the current noise about bias fades away, and the BBC skates free once again, and the institutional bias continues unabated, basking in its renewed status as National Treasure, loved by all.

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    2. Nothing changes indeed. It's too easy for the BBC to target a politician and destroy their career. We've seen that with Boris post-Brexit...they set their attack dogs on him in revenge for the Brexit vote.

      We need first a party to go into an election with a commitment to licence fee payers electing the senior BBC board. They will have no powerful argument against that - not least because we already have elections to building societies and trade unions and the like.

      That will cause a culture shock overnight.

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  19. Chris Evans, who is apparently the highest paid of the BBC presenters, was asked for his comments as he left work today. He was heard to say something like: "The BBC is the ultimate public company".

    If it were, and if it was run as one, we would know a whole lot more about its working methods, of its commercial arm, of its divisions, of its subsidiaries, of it assets, of the sources of its its earnings, of its balance sheet and its profits and/or losses. Oh, and of course its Directors would be voted into Office, and would have to stand for re-election by rotation.

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    1. There's plenty of information available about BBC Worldwide. The problem with what's made publicly available about the rest of the BBC is that sometimes we find out they lied about it. Until that whole protection of "We don't need to tell you about it because journalism" is removed, they will continue to get away with almost anything.

      They shouldn't be allowed to be involved in the renegotiation and redefinition of the Charter every time it's renewed. There should also be an independent definition of 'public service broadcasting' once and for all, something which can't be easily glossed over as 'ratings'. Plus, there needs to be some real legal avenue for redress that makes management personally responsible, just like in the private sector. Or, at least, how the BBC and Hacked Off and Leveson (but I repeat myself) claimed there should be for News of the World.

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  20. "What struck me about last year's election was how many voters were prepared to overlook Donald Trump's truth-stretching and falsehoods because of their determination to exact revenge and send a message. Trump's relied on slogans - Make America Great Again, Build the Wall, Lock Her Up - ­knowing they had more resonance than detailed policies." http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-40683038

    Is this not akin to the home grown "for the many and not for few" layered over a "truth-stretching" student loans policy?

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