It's for your own good

I will take this opportunity to point out that several of my comments on the Peter Hitchens blogs about the 'hacking scandal' are being censored

Literally all I did was point out to people Guido's interesting post obtained via the Information Commissioner's office regarding the press and recorded offences of 'blagging' - that's it, in fact I didn't even mention details, but advised people to seek out information on the blogs

Absolutely nothing libellous, offensive, rude etc nor is anything in Guido's chart, it's all freely available government information - yet it didn't make it through

When I made the comment (which is often found on the Hitchens blog from a variety of posters) that my posts were disappearing without notice, this too failed the mods - I deliberately kept it that brief because I was pretty confident it would happen, I don't know of a way to prove this, I'm not that tech-savvy and didn't bother taking a screenshot, but I am hopeful a couple of other people had the same problem

I am not outraged by this behaviour - I think it perfectly reasonable that a company choose not to publish harmful information about itself - that's the job of others - isn't it?

Not if you listen to Hitchens arguments, last week he was warning us of the big bad politicians and how they need to be held to account

All true, but as we've just seen - nobody is holding the press, who lie, cheat and flout the law, to account and I can see no condemnation of this behaviour from Hitchens - he seems to take a 'better the devil you know' approach, and seems to justify the culture of silence between the press as a necessary evil to maintain commercial success

If we criminalise the press, and take away a vast resource of information from them (the tabloids at least) then they will not have the power to scrutinise the government

But I'd like to know who is meant to scrutinise the press - controlled by a tiny elite, they have vast power themselves and arguably papers like the Mail have a detrimental effect on our society by reducing debate to that of childish name-calling and scaremongering, we need these publications and they need to be allowed to do what they want? It's all for your own good you see

Hitchens, supposedly a man of strong moral conviction (something I've always questioned seeing as he opts to work for probably the least moral paper of them all), is quite happy to allow the press the freedom to make up s h one t, so they can make money and scrutinise the politicians, but yet won't allow people on his own blog to scrutinise one of the most powerful and influential industries in our society? The press do not scrutinise themselves ('dog eat dog'), that would just bring chaos - so how exactly do the public bring newspapers to account? They can't, which is why this hacking scandal has been quietly kept away from the public for the best part of ten years

Nobody is denying that politicians are scum, but the media are also scum, and it can quite easily be shown that the law has been violated for decades to make grubby stories about royals and celebrities to line pockets 'hold the government to account', this is not a price we must pay - scrutiny of the press will not bring about a North Korean situation, in fact the British press is infamous for it's cut-throat behaviour, you don't find it in perfectly free countries like the US, Australia, Japan or Sweden, a few ethical rules, such as those that we are supposed to already have and don't enforce, would quite easily control them

The real truth behind this is that the press in Britain need to behave in this manner to be successful, not because nobody would pay them without their gossip/nonsense, but because competition is fierce - Britain has a huge amount of national dailies, all vying for a piece of a dwindling readership - they need to be shocking, and therefore their tactics verge on the desperate - if the Sun doesn't do it, the Mail, or the Express, or the Mirror will

Whereas, in Australia for example there is only one populist rag - the Telegraph (or it's local NI equivalent), then there are two 'high-brow' papers - one left, one right - all controlled by one of the two main media players

While we're on it, virtually nothing the press do scrutinises politicians anyway, 'investigative journalism' essentially means celebrity/royal sex scandals - in fact I am struggling to think of an example of illegal activities bringing us a story for the public good (eg expenses scandal, WMD) - public interest arguments easily override this anyway, the crux of Hitchens defence (which I regard as a squeal) is that they need to be able to generate revenue, but the revenue is fixed - they just compete for a share, and in doing so engage in a race to the bottom (declining moral standards eh?)

Proper rules would not stop scrutiny, I find that scenario incredibly hard to believe when our media is so powerful anyway - it would just rid us of a few silly newspapers that are, in essence, solely there to sell smut

Losing a few unpopular (intelligent) papers might be bad for decent opinion you might say, but there'll be no trashed murder victims either

I know I have posted a few times before regarding Hitchens, first I lost respect, then I came to see him as a troll, but now I'm struggling to even take a word he says seriously - this act of self-serving deflection and hiding behind supposed 'freedom of the press' and an Orwellian nightmare is pretty abhorrent

Actually why do I keep going back? Silly boy

Why do we pay for this?

Imagine if you will, giving an MP or a minister breakfast in bed every morning, personally delivered by a tax-payer funded lackey who cooks all your meals and even gets your clothes out

Imagine the outrage - Brown got it in the neck for having a cleaner, Smith decorated her house, Tories cleaned moats - our elected officials were living the high-life at our expense, the audacity to have someone deliver them breakfast at 8am when most of us are already on our way to work on a rushed down piece of toast

But no-one ever mentions this side of the Queen - unelected, with no practical purpose, and yet she receives far more money than any individual elected politician, and not a peep from the press about our taxes wasted on butlers and footmen, in fact, while politicians constantly have to engage in hairy-shirt contests, the taxpayer-funded lives of royalty are practically praised and seen as something interesting and quite acceptable

Is it not a tad strange?

Yawn, yawn, yawn

I am getting so fed up with those who speak out at the BBC's decision to invite on the BNP - particularly the BBC insiders, because let's face it, there are plenty of people who don't have a problem with this (unless Mark Thomson is completely alone in this), and they are keeping quiet for fear of being called a racist, while those who I can only regard as being anti-free speech are getting a free ride

Michael Rosen, former Children's laureate and Radio 4 presenter, has said it will erode trust in the BBC which

'is like a public place – we all own it and need to be a part of it. It has a responsibility to everyone. "They make this very clear when you work for them. If I were to say anything remotely similar to the things Nick Griffin has said and will say tonight, I would not be allowed on.'

"The BBC is obsessed with putting things 'through compliance', to ensure no one will find programmes politically, sexually or socially offensive. I have been stopped from reading a poem that contained one swear word before. Yet while they go into palpitations over things Jonathan Ross says, they are allowing Nick Griffin airtime to say things that will offend millions." 

Yes, you wouldn't be allowed on to your show about the English language with such views, Michael, but neither would a Tory espousing Thatcher or a Labourite praising Marx, you numptie - you are an employee, political guests are allowed political opinions - your point is only valid if Griffin was David Dimbleby - Harriet Harman always offends me when she's on - by his logic I can object to her being on - I seriously can't believe he actually said that

He reckons it will offend millions and erode trust in the BBC in viewers - well, here's something for you, Michael Rosen - were the BBC to deny a legal party, who have the same level of representation as the Greens and UKIP, space on this show simply because they were disagreeable, I would lose trust in the BBC

Steve Richards, meanwhile, gets himself in a muddle by admitting the BBC are right to give the BNP, supported by nigh on a million people at the last election, a platform but then tries to demolish it by saying that they were 'mistaken' as

Research carried out by YouGov found that roughly half of BNP's voters were truly racist, the other half were people who feel insecure and alienated from the main parties. In other words just one per cent of the electorate last summer were racist BNP voters.

Dear god, Steve - they still voted for them! Do you go around checking if every Lib Dem voter isn't actually a narked off Labour voter? Or that some of the Labour votes in '97 weren't actually from Tories...should you discount all the protest and swing votes from an election?

They got themselves a million votes - does it actually matter if 'only half were racist'? They have other issues that they talk about - they may well be lying, but what political party hasn't lied and reneged on a promise or pledge...or manifesto commitment

Nearly a million votes is nearly a million votes - you don't have the right to second guess what those voters want

Chris Huhne, who will be facing the boogeyman Griffin himself, explains why he will be debating with him in the Guardian

Now I appreciate that he is appealing to the Guardian's audience, and so has to say that 'I really don't want to, but I must', and he doesn't criticise the BBC - as I said, Guardian - the cynic in me sees right through it as a watered-down version of a free speech argument to appeal to the typical Gruniad reader who opposes the BNP's right to exist, I think he's just paying lip-service

But, what a true Liberal should say, Chris is this:

---

Why I will debate with Nick Griffin
The decision was not difficult in the least

Because I believe in democracy and free speech, and racism is a part of that free speech, even if I don't like it, because there are always people out there who disagree with us, and the only way to defeat an opinion is to debate it, not censor it

I do not, of course, tolerate racism-based violence, that is a crime - but to hold racist views is not, and even though most of us regard the BNP as merely a legitimate front for something far worse, they are nevertheless a legitimate party with elected representatives

---

Of course, these are my own views and while I disagree with others on this, I respect their right to think and say what they want, unlike them, who seem to miss the irony of their views

All things to all men

I mentioned this article by David Elstein about the BBC yesterday, and I found it very interesting

I can broadly agree with the sentiment that there is little point in the BBC making populist shows (Eastenders, Strictly et all) because they can be easily produced by the market - one could argue that some people may want to pay for that, rather than watch it for 'free', where the cost is in watching hours of ads, but I think it's been shown that the commercial sector can make a reasonable fist of these things

But of course, they feel obliged to cater to this market because everybody funds them - if we are all forced to pay 140 quid for it then we should at least like something there - personally I think screw that, if people don't like current affairs or education and only watch tat then they should still be paying for something useful, it's a public service, like museums - just because you'll never go to one doesn't mean your taxes aren't going to fund it

But my view will never get off the ground, my brand of logic is too extreme for most and the principle remains that if we all pay, then we should all be able to watch, hence the BBC does need ratings, contrary to popular belief - if it has no viewers for Strictly then it can't justify itself

So what is the solution? - Elstein recommends a public service (PSB) fund, presumably for news, current affairs and education, and a subscription fund for everything else, after all, HBO is alright making the best dramas in the world solely off subscription

But do you really want to relegate the BBC to 80-hours of programming a year? HBO has an incredible impact for it's size, but it's solely in top-quality drama, and it's American - and so has far more people to fund it, and more money to spend on shows - so if an American subscription channel only makes 80 hours a year, how much would a British one make? 40?

That's not a lot - it's a handful of series in a year, or about a full length James Bond marathon

The BBC would fundamentally change from iconic broadcaster to a news/politics channel and niche programming provider - is that what people really want?

An Ofcom survey (source 13) found that the vast majority of people supported the BBC, and the other opinions are all about the way it is funded, not its existence - supported by c.80% of the population

The licence fee on the other hand has it's opponents

following an ICM poll for their current affairs programme Panorama, which showed that 31% were in favour of the existing licence fee system, 36% said the BBC should be paid for by a subscription, and 31% wanted advertising to pay for the programmes

So we have a situation where people want the BBC, but do not want to fork out 140 quid a year for it - fair enough, it's expensive and bad value in my book, but if we have a situation where essentially 70% of people are opposing the licence fee then how many do you think will be subscribing? The people who want a subscription are, generally speaking, against having to pay for it themselves, so it seems unlikely they'll be subscribing themselves - so we've already reduced the BBC's budget to about 30%

So the question I must ask now is - can the BBC exist in the form we want it by shifting to a subscription? The answer is probably not - I don't understand Elstein's reasoning that people would subscribe for news, the Proms, and children's shows when there is a PSB fund - if it's going to provide public service AND subscription shows then you're still going to have to be able to provide PSB for free, while presumably subscription would be on a stand-alone channel - so the subscription package is nothing but another HBO...

The idea is that basically those roughly four-fifths of the population who still want the BBC, would still pay for it - that's twenty years of Ofcom research apparently, except, when it came to the crunch, would those people who so adore the BBC bother to pay for it? Would they actually willingly pay for it when they didn't have to? I'm willing to bet ideological support for Auntie would be gone in a decade or two

It says it will survive, no doubt it will, but in what form will it survive? Further research shows 70% don't actually fancy paying, so what will we be left with?

Elstein claims PSB is just stuff that the market can't provide but that is beneficial to society (e.g. the arts/politics) - but if people like the BBC - if they like it's lack of advertising, it's pervasive news content, it's production of comedy and drama, and it's presence in general, then removing the areas that attract the most people to the channel will relegate it to being a small broadcaster - if there's no Eastenders, no Dr. Who, no My Family (note: I watch none of these) on then why will people even turn over for the news or Question Time, when the commercial networks with these popular shows will advertise their own news and draw a bigger audience share, why will people care when the BBC ask a big question to the government?

As I've said, people seem to like the BBC - it's incredibly dominant in the British media, it's an icon - they just dislike paying so much for it - so basically people want to have their cake and eat it, while a significant few don't want the cake at all

A tricky situation indeed, I believe Ben Bradshaw is right (I'll try not to let that happen again) when he says that BBC news is better than anything on offer in America, or anywhere else for that matter - it is, American news is all 'action news' to chase ratings and horribly partisan, and while I believe the BBC has gone downhill in journalistic quality, it's funding has kept the British media in check - ITV and Five can't become American-style commercial channels, and I think that's a very good thing - I've seen the US networks, and they're mirrored in Australia, and they are dreadful - it makes you long for some decorum, I think the BBC protects the British people from rampant commercialisation, and I've yet to find a country with a better media establishment - HBO is the only example ever given of a decent US channel

Likewise with the radio industry, it is often said that Radio 1 should be commercial, as it plays commercial music

Except, why should people who like that sort of music have to listen the mindless commercial networks? People who say they would be improved by the removal of the dominant BBC are wrong - and they need some evidence to back it up, because I've yet to see a decent commercial radio set-up in America or Australia - it boils down to a fundamental choice, either you want to pay for it or you don't, I would rather help pay for some of my own media outlets then let them all be commercially funded - only society can make the decision whether to keep that idea, there's no right or wrong here

I think the main issue is funding - it is unjust to force a regressive tax on people, but if people want such a broadcaster what is the fairest way to pay for it?

Subscription: as we've just seen, would probably destroy the BBC as we know it

Public funds: would be more fairly distributed, although the poorest/unemployed amongst us wouldn't be paying for it at all - it would be a further drain on the government coffers, and it would have to be significantly smaller to justify this funding, it would lose its impact and probably end up similar to the Australian weakling, ABC

I think in the end it comes down to a toss-up between the compulsory telly tax, which is a rather unfair method, and an optional payment - which is fairer, but runs the risk of removing something that most of us support - I am happy to pitch in even though I don't care for Radio 3, Songs of Praise or Antiques Roadshow, because I accept that I get something else back - if all the people who agreed with this actually paid up voluntarily then maybe it could work and we'd all be happy, but the question is: will they? Maybe it is best that the BBC is in fact, all things to all men

If there's actually someone out there who can find a decent solution to this then they're a genius

Me been reeding!!

I thought I would compile a list of stuff I found interesting

Clarkson is worth a read this week, with a bizarre list of rules that Brown has apparently imposed on farms, I never knew it was so complicated...

The Fink pointed me out to strangemaps.com - and I found this one which removed the bottom 5% of global GDP, rather intriguing

Roy Hattersley made me chuckle, telling Labour to rediscover its old principles and stop worrying about gaining votes and winning elections, the problems started back in '94 - right...

Bias aside, I liked David Elstein's particular take on the BBC, so much I want to write about it myself (maybe later..)

William Rees-Mogg demonstrates why having a life-peer system that naturally favours the elderly has it's problems, oh and something about banking regulations...

And that's enough for the Times - they must be very happy that they managed to direct me towards several good articles

The only thing in the Independent I particularly liked was Yasmin Alibhai-Brown's criticism of Israel's nuclear arsenal - I tend to avoid anything about Israel as it's always the same boring tripe from both sides, so I thought it worth noting

Guido reminds why he's so popular with this bitchslap to the media who are having a go at Marr over 'that' question (Guido and Marr...now that's a weird scenario)

The Mail...ummm...admittedly they did a good job with the Ofsted idiocy, they have a reasonable piece about saving the pint, but not from the EU! - Albeit very prematurely...

I also can't help but agree with this on the birthmark/human rights issue - especially considering it's basically my last post..

and finally in the Sun - Rihanna's in her Nundies

I thought discrimination was still illegal?

We all know about the allegations of ageism at the BBC, what with Arlene-gate (yeah, I made that up...), Moira Stuart and however many other older women have complained

And broadly I agree - it's notable that there is an absence of older women (over 50), particularly compared to the old geezers still hanging around the Beeb (as I found out in a ridiculously lengthy post before)

But this has always been an allegation - the women either retired or were dropped, like any other worker - there was no 'you're too old, bye!!' - it's a perception that it's deliberate, there's no actual proof

Of course, the BBC has to be receptive to public opinion, and clearly it's justified, especially in current affairs programmes (dramas and soaps are full of old women) - but is not deliberately looking for newsreaders based on age and sex against the law?

Under the Equalities bill it wouldn't be, but right now to select based on any kind of physical discrimination is illegal - I know that the media deliberately pick people for certain 'qualities' - but is this not blatant enough to actually be a breach of discrimination law? Seems to me the BBC are leaving themselves open to prosecution, if they, for example, ignore young people or men - they could be cutting off their nose to spite their face here

Not that anyone would normally care - except that this is the BBC and I would bet the Mail will jump on it - they love a good bit of hypocrisy, I'd put money on it and I'll be looking out for it

I do of course, have to ask - does this mean the Mail now support Hattie's 'equality' bill?

Role models

In what hardly qualifies as news, apparently David Beckham and Cheryl Cole are the top role models for our children...this will not do!!

More than half of the adults questioned - 55 per cent - said the former England captain was a good, or very good, role model.

However, not everyone believes that Beckham is someone to look up to, with 18 per cent saying he sets a bad example.

The chief role model for girls was Cheryl Cole, who came second in the poll, with 40 per cent rating her positively. She was regarded as a bad role model by 27 per cent.

Homer Simpson was voted the worst role model for children.

Hardly the most hard-hitting conclusive poll ever done, but it raises a few interesting questions

For starters - what is wrong with Beckham? Aside from the tattoos the bloke is one of the best behaved people in football - he has showed absolute commitment to his country and barely ever puts a foot wrong, for some reason the Mail focus on that Rebecca Loos thing, but I would hope most people remember the 11 years of football and 100+ England caps he gave us

I think he's an excellent role model and have always respected him as a player - even if he hasn't got a left foot...and can't run - all the more impressive really

Cheryl Cole on the other hand - more famous for being a judge on a talent show and getting into fights with her husband and nightclubbers, is perhaps less so

It is a shame that she is perhaps the most famous woman in Britain and says a lot more about our celebrity culture than children - it is the media that choose to make her the news over far better female role models - such as athletes or real singers

And why? Because she is attractive, fortunately for the males of this world we have to at least have some sort of talent to be famous (being pretty just helps) - but it is of course us who are only interested in women for their looks, and I don't doubt having these sort of people as role models has an effect on young girls

But then, when haven't we? It's always been pretty women or no-one - why do we need 'popular' role-models, our whole lives are dictated by the media, and this is just a tiny aspect of that, if you're smart you will form your own opinions and won't be a sheep who follows Cheryl Cole or Lindsey Lohan - you'll find your own role-models, a la Lisa Simpson

So in short - why should I care about the sheep?

Speaking of Lisa, it is sad to see Homer as the worst role-model - I expect the poll had a list to choose from and no doubt he was very clearly the most idiotic of the group

But Homer, who was voted the best TV character ever, remember, is actually a decent role-model - aside from the regular child-beating, gross incompetence and alcoholism, of course

He is an average man, albeit exaggerated - he is of low intelligence, has a job going nowhere, a family tying him down and has a pretty dull existence at the root of the show (we're going back a bit, before the 'crazy adventure' Simpsons) - he is all about making us feel better about how crummy and average our lives are - for the majority of us who can't become David Beckham or Stephen Hawking I think he's a pretty good role model on how to just survive everyday life (as I said...old Simpsons...like 1994 Simpsons) - he takes pleasure in the small things

Or perhaps he is the opposite - a warning to what we can become if we live by what the TV tells us and just coast through life - the Simpsons has always been critical like that, just because most people can't see through the silliness doesn't make it a negative influence - it just reminds me of George Bush's ignorant comment about the show

So frankly if you can't see past the bilge in the media, and life in general, then it's not surprising you can't find a good role model

The role models you get, you deserve, as Greg Lake might put it

A Tory who speaks sense on drugs

Pity he's retired (aren't they always)

Over at Mark Reckons there's an interview with Phillip Oppenheim on drugs policy - some absolutely bang-on analysis

Sadly it's true that the mainly-conservative media dominate the agenda despite the reasonable views held by many...Mark Easton at the BBC really needs a bigger profile

another reason to say good riddance to the dead tree press

hat-tip: Guido

On the BNP...

September and already the news is getting more interesting

No doubt you have heard the news that the BBC may invite the BNP onto Question Time (or will, according to other outlets)

Well personally I'm all for it - as far as I can see the BBC are 100% right to represent a party with two MEPs, there's no way anyone could justify not giving them airspace while seeking to be 'fair' - hence, I do not agree with 'anti-fascist' groups like Searchlight, who are just as scary to me - and nor do I agree with Labour's strange boycott, more reason why I could never be a leftie

But I thought I should take a look across the spectrum at who thinks what

The Indie, as I would expect, agrees with me

The Times, again unsurprisingly is quite happy to promote free speech with an article from Matthew Syed and gets a kick in at Labour as well, happily pointing out the Tories are happy to debate with racists

The Telegraph do much the same, again criticising Labour for being cowards

The Gruniad next: they've gone for the liberal approach and are still shying away from Labour

Now we move onto the tabloid hacks: The Mail have predictably gone for the man (or the Aunty), rather than the ball and apparently support Labour MP Denis MacShane and Searchlight...anything to get a dig in at the BBC, eh, boys? I can't find any other comment on that so therefore I must conclude they are pro-Labour on this

The Express ('crusading for a fairer Britain' these days) don't seem to have covered it...

The Sun have tried to have their cake and eat it - there is only 'anger at the BBC' in the headline, and they have been 'blasted' apparently - but it then goes on to say Labour (the only people doing the attacking) are in a 'panic' and presents a two-sided argument...some truly great journalism there

And the Mirror...sigh, I guess I have to...have gone for the attack on the BBC route and put more weight against giving them airtime - they call it a BBC stunt and give MacShane the most space, allowing him to imply the BNP aren't a 'democratic party' (aren't they? Racists maybe, but I think they like the whole voting thing)

So in conclusion, pretty much all the papers are happy with debate, and only the Mirror really have a problem, the Sun and the Mail just want the BBC's blood

And also, if you subscribe to the Mirror you're a moron, but we already knew that

This is quite amusing

Peter Hitchens and some bloke called Medhi Hasan at the New Statesman are having a public debate over BBC bias

Here is PH's latest entry

Here is Hasan's response

I shall leave you to work out who is making the better case, and I am struggling not to make too many comments.........

All I shall say is that according to Hitchens, Andrew Neil is not conservative, and neither are the neo-liberal policies of the free market

We're going back to 1836!!

This is the best they've got at the Guardian?

As I've said before, I rarely bother with the Guardian anymore, and here's a prime example of why:

'Compare the Meerkat ad is racist'

Right, so to parody an accent is racist...

Even if Peter Jones' 'Ukranian girlfriend' is offended it doesn't matter - should we always listen when somebody is offended? Bollocks should we, we'd never be able to speak, let alone have media - and there's a pathetically flimsy argument being used here

Meanwhile he says TV would never use Indian or Caribbean accents in such a way - wouldn't they? There are lines to be drawn (such as drawing an Indian as smelly perhaps) but using an accent is not generally regarded as offensive is it? In what way is this accent being used - is it saying Russians are meerkats? Wear smoking jackets? It's a meerkat with a Russian accent, if it had a French accent would it be a problem...and would the French be offended? (He also says Meerkat is how 'Eastern Europeans' commonly mispronounce market - do they? The Russian Meerkat himself does a pretty good job of separating the two)

I don't particularly like the way British accents are portrayed abroad - either as toffs or cockney geezers and I would argue seeing an anthropomorphic animal with one of my nation's many accents would probably offend me less than the usual portrayal of stereotypical British behaviour, simply using an accent does not imply anything and therefore his whole case is based on mocking a dialect for not being able to pronounce a word, something I have yet to be shown is even remotely true - I hope he had a go at Team America's 'So Ronery' song, which actually did what he seems to take offence at

It's just a silly parody - and as for we don't allow accents to be mocked - I give you the Lilt advert and of course, Apu from the Simpsons - voiced by white guy Hank Azaria, which must surely be far worse than a bloody meerkat with an accent

And then there's this gem:

[The ASA] said it had not had any other complaints.

I asked my girlfriend why that might be. She told me that people from eastern Europe were brought up in a society where it was not normal to complain, especially to such sectors as the government and the media....they would not know of the existence of the ASA and the power to demand that an advert was taken off television. It is also the case that...they would not want to be seen to be causing trouble. It then dawned on me that this ad was targeting a sector of the population who would be unlikely to fight back.

Right, that's not at all specious reasoning - because no-one has complained those offended must be too scared to complain...this, based on two incidences of unverified anecdotal evidence - that in itself is enough to can this article for poor analysis

Just read the comments for what people thought of this bilge, I just hope his girlfriend was worth it...

Hat-tip: Guido

Being Obtuse

I have a somewhat spurious suggestion - what would you say if Abdul Baset Ali al-Megrahi was British and had been held in Libya?

Different circumstances perhaps - you may not respect the governance or legal system of a country such as Libya, but they are nevertheless a recognised nation of people

Imagine if there was a British man held abroad for terrorism charges that we refused to believe - wouldn't you be happy to see him return home? You may have a lack of respect for the laws in the Islamic country, but no doubt they have an equal lack of respect for us, why should we regard ourselves as somehow 'better'?

A very messy affair

Another big smear-gate story!!

But this time it's about the Tories! And the Guardian have it!!1!1!

I don't know about you but I have this image of the Guardian as the poor kid who has picked up another's discarded toy and thinks it's the bee's knees

It's all incredibly exciting, the left think they have got the Tories stitched up like they did them with McBride...Unfortunately they haven't

As the Guardian are quick to point out, they have nothing on Coulson himself, just a lot of suspicion surrounding him and his former paper

No doubt this is a legitimate story, but there is no 'smoking gun' as it were - no e-mail telling McPoison what a good smear campaign he was running

In actual fact the McBride saga was completely about public opinion, there was no criminal act - which is ironic because it was far more damaging politically than the criminality of the NoW saga

McBride was seen to be completely underhand and dirty and was offloaded for the sake of image, Coulson has only been implicated in a potentially criminal act involving his underlings a few years ago - there won't be an email saying he was involved

Now that doesn't mean he won't be up against it - this still has the potential to damage the Tories by association and he may be forced out, 'spin doctors shouldn't be the news etc' but this seems unlikely to be as damaging as the McBride affair - that was a story about how the government was conducting itself, this is a skeleton in the closet for someone employed by the Tory party - in that sense this doesn't look anywhere near as damaging

He may well lose his job, but the Guardian should tread carefully because they already look like they've gone overboard here - this may begin to look like a hatchet job on the Tories by the left-wing media

*And no I'm not being put up to this - I don't even vote Tory

A bit o' bias

I must say, I wasn't too impressed with this BBC (magazine) article on battling the pirates

It is principally focused on trying to stop 'pirates', and then goes to pains to point out that people doing the downloading are using a false logic to justify what they do

This is one area I could see bias - it's rare that I find an article that I feel cheated by, most complaints of BBC bias are from right-wingers whinging the Beeb don't criticise gays or promote the death penalty

As I would say to them, it's because the law supports that position - you can't place a huge amount of emphasis on a minority group who oppose the right to be gay, they are allowed to exist of course, but you can't promote every group that opposes the law (although the BBC 'balance' policy may become that farcical one day)

If you look at more mainstream issues - there's plenty of space given to debate gay marriage, but there's little point pandering to a small group when society is broadly in favour and the law backs it up

The same goes for piracy, it is technically a crime - some areas are grey, but to give too much space to this sort of act would be very anti-establishment and would arguably be just as biased, I wouldn't expect it from the Beeb

I would expect a slightly less one-sided article, but welcome to the Magazine, it's a very strange and opinionated area of the site for old people - and I also remembered the fairer write-up the Pirate Party of Sweden got recently, and here's a clip from them

This article does grate at me, but thinking rationally I don't regard it as making the BBC biased, but what I will point out is the patronising of those who promote downloading as 'neutralisation' - there is no weight given to those theories and that I felt was going too far (allowing the industry to get their own way basically)

Issues such as regional coding, DRM, and exploitation are all valid - this is very much a battle between those who want to keep the power and those utilising a new method of distribution - for the article to simply belittle those arguments as being some sort of denial was wrong in my view

Just because there's a law against something doesn't make it wrong (so Lisa, go to your room) - when seven million people apparently break that law it means something needs to change, or be ignored (mince pies...)

What's the old adage - when one person does it, you arrest them, when five people do it, you move them along, when fifty people do it...you join in

You can't expect the BBC to promote it, just like they can't promote cannabis use - but they will do regular features on the issues because they are largely in the public interest

And as an aside - if the government actually want people to take note of their arguments they should stop lying in cannabis adverts - nobody trusts you to tell the truth so telling somebody 'piracy' is wrong is doing nothing when you aren't seen as a trustworthy public guardian

Aside #2 - why do Labour allow bullying in their 'knock-off Nigel' advert? As far as I'm aware it clearly promotes bullying of somebody doing something they dislike - calling a person names, seems pretty low to me, and if I were called Nigel I wouldn't be very impressed - should the government be picking on a name? Not that I hugely care, you understand, but that this government is so PC it seems rather hypocritical to me

A real pandemic!! woohoo!!

I have a question about swine flu

Why do we care? True, this is the first time a disease (bird flu, SARS etc) has actually reached 'pandemic' which sounds alarming, but just means it's cross continental

I'm watching Newsnight, who have a special on it, as a doctor says it's nothing to worry about - slightly more pathogenic than regular flu, dangerous to pregnant women etc and they interviewed three people who have already recovered

So they had the flu!! There are thousands of cases in Australia now, which is expected based on the season - nobody has died yet! A sodding rugby team caught it! Regular flu kills off 36,000 people in America alone each year

This has got to be the most boring pandemic, ever

The only real difference is we couldn't get in first with vaccines, which no doubt they will eventually aim at high-priority groups, which may hurt us a little bit, it's never nice to lose a baby or have an elderly relative die, but this will not result in people dying in the street, losing millions of the workforce, mass graves etc

It's just flu, people...we get it every year

Beware the Status Quo

Another article for me to argue with

This time Dominic Lawson is saying the public are too hard on MPs, and that expressions of Rousseau-esque popular will can lead to fascism, see Hitler's speeches against the ineffective politicians of Weimar Germany for evidence

He also points out that celebrity independent politicians offer little - there is no guarantee they will be any better - after all 'power corrupts', right?

So what should we do? Sit back down and shut up? - Most of the broadsheets tend to advocate this approach: fix the expenses and tighten up the rules a little, then our MPs can get back to work as usual

Only 'usual' was never right - it's not surprising that political classes like Lawson (how could he be anything else?) want to maintain the status quo, because they're the ones who benefit

He is right that we can't expect an independent to be squeaky-clean, although history has shown the safer the seat, the more corrupt the politician - but he is missing the point (deliberately) that we need more voices in parliament - our debating chamber needs to be a debating chamber, an area in which ironically the Lords puts the Commons to shame

I have heard very few voices against independent MPs, and they are almost solely from the right or hard-left - they argue that it would be too hard to pass laws, parliament would be too argumentative and the MPs would eventually cut deals

This is code for: 'bills can't be rubber stamped by parliament' and this is a very good thing, at present we elect a solid majority based on a system that is heavily weighted towards the two main parties, that majority then have absolute power for 4-5 years, which in reality is in the hands of only a few people at the top, who aren't elected and represent the interests of their donors first and foremost

That majority do whatever they feel like, only fighting one battle every 4-5 years - that is not democracy, when the Tories and the Lib Dems oppose Labour there is nothing they can do - it makes you wonder why they are in the legislature at all

To properly represent the people the legislature needs to be effective - that is a fairly widely believed political truth, you can argue the finer points but its function is to check government - I think anyone would agree that it currently doesn't

However in this country we have a bizarre attachment to the idea of a 'strong government' - by which they mean handing absolute authority to the cabinet, and it has been like only since Churchill really - if you actually look at the 'golden age' of the British Empire, which Tories love, our parliament was much more flexible, with members crossing the floor willy-nilly and frequent minorities in power

We are of course fearful of becoming like Italy or Israel, with their weak politics - but we ignore the several countries (like Germany, New Zealand) that operate fine with a 'weaker' system - in truth stability probably comes from the population and somehow I think Britain is closer to German stability than Israeli instability

Of course in the old days politics relied on patronage more than the people, and you can hardly say politicians have ever been whiter than white - but that doesn't really matter, Parliament functioned better because it was working as it should (more or less), now it has been taken over by the professional party system - even though we have a more democratic and fair process, Parliament itself has become worse

I'm not sure if the article really refers to me, but I feel as though I am being attacked for supporting reform, which I have supported since I was a teenager - I am not baying for every politicians' blood or wanting protest votes - I simply want a fair Parliament, I don't want to have to put with a situation where the only way you can beat those who are caught cheating is to vote for a celebrity and where I have to have a government elected by default - it's wrong, and it's been wrong for a long time

The expenses saga is not really the issue - it has merely exposed the reality of politics and given people the best chance of actually changing the system, but people like Dominic Lawson try to twist the situation into saying the BNP will benefit and that oppression by the majority is worse than by the minority - true that, but that is just his opinion, and this is mine: I don't fear the BNP one jot, and all Dom wants to do is preserve the minority (ie. Labour and the Tories)

The irony of course is that independents weaken the power of the oppressors even more, but then we would be too weak - so we should just keep it the way it is - eh, Dom?

*I do agree that 'celebrity' independents are pointless, you are just swapping one elite for another, helping no real people
**Anyone who doesn't see the flaw in comparing the fledging German state that Hitler exploited to Britain should be shot - a very sensationalist bit of spin there

Pay Me For Talking

I saw this little piece by Christina Patterson this morning, and to sum it up: what utter guff it is

She is of course talking about the imminent death of the 'fourth estate' - how the newspapers are in terminal decline thanks to the internet, what with it's up-to-date and (crucially) free, information

She bemoans the people who decided to give away the news-stories for free on the net as lacking any sort of business sense

Well, personally I think she's a little naive - firstly, it's not bad business sense, it's far better than simply printing a paper and not offering any online content, or the ludicrous idea that people would pay to read an opinionated rag when they can read everything else for free, surely you should be trying to rake it in with advertising?

Yes, it's true that paper sales are down - but here is the important point: they would be down anyway! Why do you think people want to buy a paper that's full of yesterday's news when they could read it before they even go bed the night before on the net, or watch a news channel? Papers do not provide news to people anymore, they barely ever reveal anything in the morning release - we already know what has happened, and as a result all a paper is nowadays is a collection of opinions on the stories, anything 'exclusive' will be around non-stories (ie. the tremendous rise of 'celebrity' news that dominates our most popular papers) - the era where one gets their news for the day from the papers in the morning and the six o clock news in the evening is long gone, and I'm afraid the newspapers have to keep up

What Christina wants is for her content to not be read by those not willing to pay for it, and I'm afraid she sounds like an outdated protectionist, akin to the music companies determined to keep profits for themselves in an era when someone off myspace can have more fans than 90% of their clients

The system is simply unworkable - I think she wants to set up a system where the press only provide their online news to paying customers - the idea is frankly ludicrous, I barely need to explain why, but for one: news sites are not just run by newspapers! There are plenty of free news sources out there - the BBC is a slightly odd example as it's public-funded, but nonetheless a valid one, as it's the most used news website in the world - you don't need to go to the Indie, Sun or Telegraph, you can go direct to Reuters if you want

Because let's face it, what do the newspapers offer now? As I said, they don't have the exclusives anymore, and if they do, an online outlet can easily pick up the story, as they have done with MPs expenses - I'd love to know how she would justify stopping someone like the BBC not covering a story broken by the Telegraph.... I digress, my point was that newspapers really have little to offer now - all they have left is opinion, which is exactly what she is peddling - why should I pay for that? I can go all over the net and find opinions, the Indie and all the rest have the benefit of a brand, but opinion is opinion and it means bugger all in reality, I only peruse the newspapers' sites to have a look at how they are manipulating people on any given day, and to have a good rant - I don't need to, and wouldn't pay for the privilege when I have the BBC, Guido and Reuters, to name but a few, available to me for the actual story

No, this is merely another case of what I call 'deer-trapped-in-headlights' protectionism - look at any industry through the past centuries and see how they fight tooth and nail to prevent their own destruction as new technology makes them redundant - it's human instinct to protect your livelihood, but it's also counter-productive and never wins out in the long run

Information will become free, and I don't see anything wrong with breaking people like Murdoch's grip on it - they are at the end of the day only out to serve their own interests and line their own pockets, they have (or had) a monopoly on it

She does make one valid point however - the issue of investigative journalism (which I note, does not seem to be part of her job as a 'cultural commentator') - who will pay people to investigate dodgy dealings? And how can you trust a blogger? These are valid concerns that have been raised occasionally - but as we've seen, the people on the net can do a pretty good job at investigation, all Dizzy does is send off FOI requests and finds great stories - that is actual journalists' work, all done for free, and money can be made with advertising revenue. There are countless examples of information being exposed first on the net (see: Drudge) and at the end of the day that can be used by sites to make money, and no doubt a system of regulation will be built, just as happened around the two centuries we've had of print dominance - and to use a rather cheap and lazy argument: while we have the convenience of the powerful BBC to investigate (scoff if you wish) there remains some authority in the media

She also worries for prose - well, casting aside her obvious snobbery (she's covers 'culture' after all) she is being quite rude to a lot of bloggers out there - many write superbly, and I myself tend not to 'vomit out vitriol' too often (noticed a mistake?), it is simply a case of separating the wheat from the chaff - and let's not forget the ridiculous spelling and grammar issues in those well-respected names, the Mail and the Sun, oh and Gruniad anyone? She is in a very privileged position being paid to comment on her arty topics, but that doesn't mean others can't do it - part of the threat from the internet is that it shows 'real' people can provide just as much insight as those who've been fortunate enough to get their name in lights, as it were - why do you think people in the 'blogosphere' are popular? It's just sheer arrogance to assume those in the papers are really any better

People have always found a way to make money out of information, and I'm sure it will continue, just in a new form that we are only just coming to realise - the newspaper, however, is a dying form, much like typewriters and VCRs once were, and it will take some business nous to properly tap into the new system, but people will, and if an old media outlet does adapt then it will do fine, but there will be casualties, and Christina Patterson is simply a fearful Luddite

*Note: I am aware the FT has an online subscription service - but that is a specialist publication with a dedicated readership and an actual product to sell, there is nothing of that sort in the other papers