A classic example of BBC mock balance on the news tonight as James Cook devoted apparently equal time to Douglas Alexander and Mhairi Black in Renfrewshire East.
Of Mhairi we were told by Cook that her opponents say that her youth shows, and that she carries fighting talk too far. Well, of Douglas his opponents say that he is a war criminal, and that he stabbed his sister in the back. That was not mentioned.
Whereas the “equal time” allowed the SNP candidate included BBC commentary giving direct personal criticism of her, there was no critical note in the Alexander side of the coverage. An interesting example of how the state propaganda system works.
@ Lysias “I thought Murdoch was now a U.S. citizen.”
You’re right, according to Wiki he was naturalised in 1985. So he can get an “honorary” knighthood like Norman Schwarzkopf, Steven Spielberg and several others, but can’t, as Ba’al Zevul has pointed out, use “Sir” as a title (though again, in the case of General NS, people call him “Sir” all the time anyway).
Lysias
Yes, there was some controversy about Schwarzkopf. Christopher Hitchens made something of a fuss about it.
Kind regards,
John
Does anyone really care?
Although I suppose it’s more fun, not to mention easier, to discuss abstruse points like the above rather than to discuss solutions to complex problems in the real world.
Fred
29 Apr, 2015 – 9:28 am
Says:
“Reading through a piece in the Huffington Post just now and and one little snippet of information surprised me.”
“The SNP have more private school educated politicians than any other party in the UK including the Bullington Club Tories who they so love to bash.”
…………………………………………………………………………………………..
Fred, the writer of that piece in the Huffington Post, Azeem Ibrahim, is the founding member of the Scottish Institute. This institute is against an independent Scotland but pretends to be a neutral “think tank”.
Also Fred, although article does say the SNP have more private school educated politicians than any other party in the UK including the Bullington Club Tories who they so love to bash; the author supplies no evidence for that.
I don’t know if the claim is true or not but I suspect its not; perhaps you could research that and get back to me.
From the Scottish Institute website:
“Independence will enable Scotland to adopt more immigrant-friendly policies than the rest of the UK. This is a key part of the SNP vision. So post-independence, Scotland can certainly aim to adjust this demographic deficit by advertising itself to global migrants.
“But pursuing an agenda of boosting immigration raises its own problems. England has a completely different demographic situation, and the political climate at Westminster is decidedly against increasing immigration.
“This means that an independent Scotland and the rest of the UK will find that they need hugely different immigration policies. And that raises the spectre of the unthinkable: the rest of the UK may not be able or willing to support a Common Travel Area policy with Scotland as currently exists between the UK and Ireland.
“And if that happens, we will see border guards along Hadrian’s Wall before too long. That is unthinkable. But it may well end up being politically inevitable in case Scotland becomes independent.”
http://www.scotlandinstitute.com/news/immigration-in-an-independent-scotland-report-published
Border guards along Hadrian’s Wall? Ha Ha.
Doug – I don’t think Fred’s listening to people who disagree with him.
Mightn’t the Putin-cuddlers equally use it to explain your behaviour? (Node)
If they did it would be a welcome sign that they had at least understood the concept.
Ba’al : “If they did it would be a welcome sign that they had at least understood the concept.”
And how could you tell if they were right or not?
And how could you tell if they were right or not?
I wouldn’t much care.