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Archive for the ‘The Media’ Category

Whichever political party is in power, they always accuse the BBC of reporting and briefing against them which looked at dispassionately, would seem to indicate that they (BBC) must be doing something right. Unfortunately, I don’t think that matters are quite as simple as that and whilst Leveson is about the past, it does give us an opportunity to examine how all media outlets function which includes the BBC.

The Music and Film industries have failed to establish a successful business model to deal with the digital age, Newspapers are no different and if Murdoch is right that that they will have disappeared completely within 20 years, we really should be projecting our thinking forward towards a totally digital age and asking questions about both news delivery and news management within the UK. In this context because the BBC is paid for from taxation, this is where we need to start, both the staff and management need to know that the party is over, change will have to come.

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I really don’t know whether it is a change in my own disposition brought on by increasing years but of late and most certainly over the past 12 months, I have become ever more irritated by the greater number of people who write in to the “comments” sections of the Media just to complain. You may think that my objection is all down to my not agreeing with their opinions but to me, that is not important whether I agree or not, it is that their complaints are most often about something they declare they don’t care about anyway.

My reaction to that is if this is true, why bother writing in the first place ? What idiocy makes people imagine that they should have an opinion on everything and then give voice to it, imposing their stupidity on the world at large ? Still, it fits in with a culture that includes Twitter and Facebook, both the refuge of the intellectually barren.

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I knew that it had to happen, it was a racing certainty once they stopped distributing the local free weekly newspaper because it became uneconomic to keep publishing it. Inevitably the day would dawn when for the first time in almost 5 years, I would have to go out and buy a newspaper and on the basis of my ‘needs’, it was obvious that only The Sunday Times would do.

As is most often the case in these things, there were several factors at work which combined to force my hand. Of course losing the ‘freebie newspaper’ was crucial but, it was most certainly exasperated by the amount of print making and framing that I had been doing of late, without the latter, I could have put off the evil day for some months I suspect.

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Although it started with a piece by by John Rentoul in the Independent on Sunday and him contemplating the shortly to open film on Margaret Thatcher starring Meryl Streep, it did set me to thinking about the whole concept of “Leadership” in a modern democratic society. http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/john-rentoul/john-rentoul-a-missed-chance-to-tell-the-truth-about-mrs-t-6283694.html

It was a good article but if anything and looking at some of the comments posted to it which seemed to be rooted in past battles long since lost by the Left, my feeling is that it is far too soon to even make a half decent attempt to judge the significance of Margaret Thatcher or indeed any other recent politician. The reality is that if you try to do so, you are not debating “facts”, just unproven myths…

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I was slightly amused by Chris Huhne giving an opinion on the motives of the “Tory Right Wing” with regard to the EU the other day but more than that, I also read a number of articles on Der Spiegel http://www.spiegel.de/international/ with regard to the current Euro Crisis which gives an interesting insight to some German thinking on the whole thing.

What struck me about these articles and however ‘reasonable in tone’ they are, the authors completely miss any basic understanding of a “British Perspective” which has been shaped over a long period of time and is largely influenced by us being “island races”. By the same token, I don’t suspect that we can easily understand Continental Europe with its contiguous land borders either that have shaped their present day views in both peace and war.

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For all the fuss over the EU, we really must concentrate on more important things like Christmas because the farce over last Friday, is emerging into a Pantomime in it’s own right. There was a LibDem MEP called Sharon Bowles who is chair of the European Parliament’s Committee on Economic and Monetary Affairs, declaring that she wished she could change her nationality to Irish to show support for the Euro – daft cow !

What made it all the funnier was she both looked and sounded like Julie Walters playing her role as “Mrs Overall” in the mock soap “Acorn Antiques”, I almost wet my pants watching the woman being interviewed, it was hilarious…if also slightly sad too.

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As a sign that this Country is on the verge of terminal insanity, there can be no clearer indication than the nonsense and furore surrounding an appearance by Jeremy Clarkson on the “One Show”.

The “One Show” is an indifferent “chat show” BBC TV programme that goes out around 19:00 in the evening and is fronted by a couple of totally colourless people who clearly have had their brains sucked out through their bottoms before being given the ‘gig’. What followed was embarrassing, if the chat show host had even been ‘Parky’ who was never the sharpest tool in the box, the result might have been different but with this simpering pair of nobodies…

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As someone who updates this personal blog fairly frequently and “follows the news”, I can understand to some extent, just how difficult life must be for a professional journalist tasked to deliver “opinion pieces” for the national dailies at set intervals. But all that said, sometimes it might be better to ‘not deliver’ than to deliver half baked tripe as Peter Oborne did today in The Telegraph, check it out for yourself: http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/peteroborne/100120951/george-osborne-should-be-looking-after-the-purse-strings-not-the-politics/

My ‘objection’ to this piece was nothing to do with whether or not I agreed with the author, it was quite simply down to what in substance was a really stupid stance to take so for me, it was not one to ‘let pass’…as it were.

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With the fall of Sirte and more importantly the death of Gaddafi, this phase of Libya’s past ends and a promising if difficult future beckons. Yes, it could all go horribly wrong but providing the Libyans keep their heads cool, a small population of 6 million, substantial oil based income and therefore the money to rebuild their infrastructure, if corruption can be avoided, their future will be very bright indeed.

David Cameron was quite rightly very businesslike in what he said following the news concerning the death of Gaddafi but I have been quite amused by some of the comments and their undertones which have been made by some that can be summed up as: “Now like Tony Blair, he has got a successful war under his belt, he might get a taste for it…” I have to wonder just how perceptive or sober some of these people are, these are very silly words.

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It has become all too common regardless of which political party is “in power” to see the BBC as their “enemy” when it comes to reporting the ‘News’ But and to be fair, there may well be some justifications in such claims and a not too bad example is the following: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-15199000

The “Story” comes from a supposed row over ‘Pussy Cats’ and illegal immigrants given ‘leave to stay’ under the ECHR. Ms May stated that the illegal was allowed to stay because of a ‘pussy cat’. The reality was likely that in considering whether the person could appeal further up the legal food chain, said pussy cat figured but thereafter got not a further mention in subsequent proceedings.

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