"Impartiality" at peril!

"Senior BBC journalists are threatening to boycott strikes targeted at next week’s Conservative Party conference because they fear the corporation’s ‘impartiality’ is in peril" says The Mail.

Now you might well think that certain staff are making a principled stand by being prepared to cross picket lines "because they fear the corporation’s ‘impartiality’ is in peril". However this would pre-suppose that the corporation is actually 'impartial'. We rather suspect they fear that the corporations partiality will become all too apparent through this action.

Read more: dailymail.co.uk/news/article

More interestingly, what we want to know is whether there will be a commensurate refund for those who have paid for a TV Licence.

Google TV about to launch

If you have been following the plot you will know that we expect great things of Google TV. Hence we are excited that Sony are about to unveil thier first hardware that supports Google TV. The 12th October is the date mentioned here.

A particularily interesting question is the date when Google TV will be available here in the UK. Sometime in 2011 seems to be the consensus view. However Google TV is an operating system that will connect to "Google for video" on the net. Is there a reason why we cannot operate Google TV enabled devices without being able to connect them to "Google for video"? I guess we are about to find the answer to this issue fairly soon.

Update: Actually it seems that the operating system is going to be called Android TV. Which probably answers the question. This is what we really want to get our hands on.

Church vs Beeb, next round

Obviously this blog is protestant (its writer is also Protestant). As refuseniks we are naturally suspicous of organisations with a global reach which lay claim to moral infallibility for thier spokesmen.

As far as we know the BBC does not sell indulgences but in many ways it does resemble the pre-reformation church. The faithfull do not question the world view that is presented by the priest (news presenter). Excommunication (not being invited on Question Time) is widely feared. Its financial power has grown far beyond that required for what was originally envisaged as being its mission. It has a symbiotic relationship with the state.

On the other hand the actual world view held by the BBC is entirely antithetical to that of the Catholic church. In so far as the BBC does believe in morality, it is an entirely relative and permissive version. The BBC therefore has a problem with religion in general and Christianity in particular.

As the Pope himself puts it "let us never forget how the exclusion of God, religion and virtue from public life leads ultimately to a truncated vision of man and of society". He probably was not thinking of the BBC at the time but his words are apposite none the less.

So we welcome the Pope to Britain. If nothing else, his presence will doubtless annoy many of the BBC's resident hacks.

Fearfull freeze fixed

The TV Licence fee will be frozen for two years says the BBC Trust (subtext: we dont want any further cuts). I accept your idea of a freeze for next year says Jeremy Hunt (subtext: it might actually be cut during the following year).

We hope that Jeremy will actually abolish the licence fee. If not he should go for a cut of at least 25%. That is what other government departments are suffering.

Guido guns for Gruinard

Whether Guido was justified in victimising William Hague seems rather doubtful. Despite which, his blog remains a must read as it is so often accurately targeted. We might well have guessed that much of the BBC's advertising went to the Guardian, but there it is. As ever the facts vindicate our cause.

A neatly circular arrangement where the BBC places ads in the Guardian to recruit 'suitable' staff and said staff then use the advertising budget to support their favourite paper. Your licence fee is not only propping up a left leaning broadcaster but a newspaper as well.

PS: Sorry the story is originally from Biased BBC. Qudos.

PPS: Which originally came from a letter to the Telegraph. Research before headline please.

A brave admission?

We wonder whether Mark Thompson's recent admission that the BBC was biased against Maggie will prove a critical own goal. Draw a line under the issue and move on, was obviously the thinking. Unfortunately for the BBC, its critics have found some validation for thier stance and are unlikely to shut up anytime soon. If the BBC was "massively biased" during the 80's it seems rather unlikely that it would have reformed itself while under no pressure to do so from a friendly Labour goverment.

The usual suspects have been quick to respond with telling pieces from Peter Hitchens and Daniel Hannan. Then yesterday a new player appeared on the scene, the Catholic Church did not mince its words. Unlike the Anglicans who meekly asked for a Religion Editor the Catholics alleged that the BBC harbours "a consistent anti-Christian institutional bias".

We can only imagine Thomson asking his aides "how many spin doctors does the Pope have?"

BBC to "sell cuts"

Mark Thompson has been busy explaining to Number 10 how the BBC is nowadays impartial, even though they might have been biased against Mrs T in the past.

Whether Mark can actually exert any control over his editorial staff is somewhat questionable. However the ability of the government to put pressure on the BBC to provide more favourable coverage is one of the best arguments for the abolition of the Licence Fee.

We are also struck by his repeated use of the word "impartial". Perhaps he is being somewhat disingenuous. To quote a BBC hack from some years ago "we are impartial but not neccessarily unbiased".

Who would have thought....

that the BBC, that model of impartial objectivity would have shown political bias. Surely our Mark must be mistaken when he says that they did not like Margaret Thatcher. Look at the range of topics that the BBC handles in the most professional and dispassionate way; global warming, the EU, the state of Israel, the Catholic church, posh Dave from Eton, etc.

Then again maybe not.