The winds of change continue to blow…
From Times Online
THE BBC is risking a new confrontation with Downing Street by launching an investigation into the death of David Kelly, the scientist at the centre of the storm over the ‘sexed up’ dossier on Iraq’s supposed weapons of mass destruction.
It is reopening the case less than three years after its management virtually imploded with the resignations of Greg Dyke, the director general, and Gavyn Davies, its chairman, in the wake of Lord Hutton’s report into the affair.
The corporation is filming a programme about the alleged suspicious circumstances surrounding Kelly’s death in an Oxfordshire wood. It has told officials who carried out a post-mortem and toxicology tests on Kelly’s body that it ‘wants to quash conspiracy theories’ about the death. But it has interviewed independent doctors who point to unexplained discrepancies in the results of Kelly’s post-mortem. They suggest that neither the wound to his left wrist nor the drugs found in his body was sufficient to kill him.
Via Blairwatch
Why does the BBC feel that it is its place to 'quash conspiracy theories'? Surely, it may expose frauds or raise questions as to commonly held views, but to 'quash'?
If the quotation is accurate then that is a measure of what the BBC really is – an arm of the information processes wielded by the State. In which case why do we pay for our licences – if indeed we choose to use its services at all? If the BBC is truly the mouthpiece of the Government then it should be solely funded by the State and we should recognise that it is a propaganda machine, no more and no less.
The claim of 'quashing conspiracy theories' is an excuse for peddling the self-same theories on the programme. It is supposed to provide a veneer of respectability to what is likely be little more than a rehash of old evidence. I can guess the conclusion right now – Dr Kelly probably killed himself, but doubts remain, etc.
Given the row between Number Ten and the BBC over the death of Dr Kelly, I hardly think that the corporation can be accused of being a mouthpiece for the government. If anything, this new programme may be regarded as positively unhelpful to Blair and co.