I am not a sheep, I have my own mind
I have had enough of being told what and how to think
Whilst we are still allowed the remnants of free speech, I will speak out.
I also reserve the right to discuss less controversial matters should I feel the urge.
The recent Conservative improvement in the opinion polls means that, even more than might have previously been the case, the BBC will be desperate to boost Ed Miliband and denigrate David Cameron on tonight's Question Time.
We know that the audience has been split in a way that will reduce the right of centre voice to just 25% of those present.
Now will David Dimbleby be his usual impartial self?
If a news story is negative for a party, person or country that the BBC opposes, yes the BBC is not the impartial reporter of the news that it claims to be, then the word 'said' or 'says' is used. As an example the headline on the BBC News main page this morning is:
If the news story is negative for a party, person or country that the BBC supports then the word 'claimed' or 'claims' is used. Look at BBC reports that start 'Ed Miliband has promised', later on will come 'the Conservative party claimed...'.
Of course if the story is really negative for a party, person or country that the BBC supports then the story will just not be reported at all. Currently if you News Google 'Margaret Hodege' these are the returned results...
On the BBC it is this...
Do you see how the BBC operate?
Unbiased by charter? I think not, bias seeps through their collective veins, you can see it every single day.
Baker: What criticisms .. do you not think are right?
Pearson: Have you been on holiday for six months? Have you been away for six months?
Baker: I am not quite sure what specific criticism you are referring to?
Pearson: I think you must have been either head in the clouds, away on holiday or reporting on a different team because if you don’t know the answer to that question, I think your question is absolutely... unbelievable, the fact you do not understand where I am coming from. If you don’t know the answer to that question then I think you are an ostrich. Your head must be in the sand. Is your head in the sand? Are you flexible enough to get your head in the sand? My suspicion would be no.
Baker: Probably not.
Pearson: I can, you can’t. You can’t.
Someone: Any more questions, or shall we wrap it there?
Pearson: Listen you have been here often enough and for you to ask that question, you are either being very, very silly or you are being absolutely stupid, one of the two, because for you to ask that question, I am sorry son, but you are daft.
Baker: There hasn’t been much harsh criticism of the players.
Pearson: You are wrong. No, you are wrong. You have been in here, you've been here, I know you have so don’t give that crap with me, please don’t give that crap with me. I will smile at you because I can afford to smile at you. Now do you want to ask a different question or do you want to ask it differently. Come on, ask it, ask it, or are you not capable?
Baker: I just don’t know what, you, erm…
Pearson: You don’t know, 'what erm?'
Baker: I don’t know how you’ve taken that question...
Pearson: Well you must be very stupid. I’m sorry.
In my opinion Nigel Pearson started off just the right side of the line but crossed it with his flexibility comments and descended into bullying with his 'Now do you want to ask a different question or do you want to ask it
differently.'
I've heard that tone of voice from bullying teachers and supercilious bosses over the years, albeit not aimed at me. It says I'm superior to you and my understanding of the English language is so much superior to you that I'll help you out by emphasising the difference between two similar words. It reeks of, I am so much in control of you that you have no chance of winning this argument.
As for the impersonation 'what 'erm'' that was just plain nasty. Like the nasty teacher at school who everybody hated.
I had a lot of respect for Nigel Pearson before last night, the way he's dragged Leicester City back from relegation, but after that interview...
Imagine the BBC coverage if it had been a senior Conservative politician featured on the front page of The Times as having questionable tax avoidance actions to account (pun intended) for. The BBC would be headlining the story and the Conservative concerned would be being doorstepped and David Cameron and George Osborne would be being asked to condemn their colleague. 'Tory sleaze' would be the BBC headline and the outrage would be tangible.
However this Times story related to senior Labour MP (and Head of the Public Accounts Committee) Margaret Hodge. The Times has several pieces that are of special interest, first:
'... just under 96,000 Stemcor shares handed to Ms Hodge
in 2011 came from [Liechtenstein], which is renowned for low tax rates.
Three quarters of the shares in the family’s Liechtenstein trust had
previously been held in Panama, which Ms Hodge described last month as
“one of the most secretive jurisdictions” with “the least protection
anywhere in the world against money laundering”. The veteran
Labour MP was accused of sheer hypocrisy. She has repeatedly attacked
big businesses and bankers who used offshore arrangements, but has not
declared that she benefited from an offshore trust.'
But the extract that may be of most relevance is this:
'Ms Hodge's Stemcor shares were transferred onshore using the Liechenstein Declaration Facility LDF)... The LDF was established in 2009 to encourage people with undeclared income or unpaid taxes to repatriate their assets from Liechtenstein by offering favourable terms. Tax liabilities under the scheme need be declared back to 1999, rather than the standard 20-year period. Users must pay the back taxes due, plus interest for the period, but the penalty is set at 10 percent of the sum owed, rather than 100 percent, and there is no threat of criminal prosecution.'
When the BBC deign to cover this story, they will be probably be quoting Margaret Hodge or one of her BBC supporters, stating that all taxes due were in fact paid. I doubt that someone will raise the question of the LDF's 1999 limit and ask how much tax might have been due if the more usual 20-year period had been applied. Likewise how much penalty was saved by being applied at 10% rather than the normal 100%.
Here's what happens when you search the BBC new website for 'Margaret Hodge' this afternoon...
It's almost as though the BBC are deliberately trying to avoid any mention of this news story. Now why would they be doing that?
'At least 44 Palestinians were killed
by "Israeli actions" while sheltering at seven UN schools during last
summer's war in Gaza, a UN inquiry has found.
UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon said he deplored the deaths and stressed that UN facilities were "inviolable".'
Read on a little and you'll also discover that:
'The inquiry also found that three empty UN schools were used by
Palestinian militants to store weapons, and that in two cases they
likely fired from them'
Odd how the BBC choose to headline the anti-Israeli part of the report, it's almost as though they had some sort of anti-Israel bias.
What you won't find on the BBC is the detail behind the Hamas infractions, so here's some detail via UN Watch
Hamas and/or Islamic Jihad stored rockets in UNRWA schools. The
board found, in the case of the UNRWA Jabalia Elementary “C” and
Ayyobiya Boys School, referring to the discovery of weapons there on 22
July 2014, that “it was highly likely that a Palestinian armed group
might have used the premises to hide weapons.”
Hamas and/or Islamic Jihad stored rockets in schools that were in active use by children. During the war, former PLO lawyer Diana Buttu famously said on
Al Jazeera that “the rockets that were found in the schools in UNRWA
were schools that are not being used by anybody—school is out, I’ll have
you know.” However, in the UNRWA Gaza Beach Elementary Co-educational
“B” School, on 16 July 2014, the UN Board of Inquiry notes that the
school gate was unlocked during the period leading up to the incident
“in order to allow children access to the schoolyard.” School was out,
but UNRWA was inviting the children back in to play.
Hamas and/or Islamic Jihad fired rockets from UNRWA schools. In
the Jabalia school listed above, the board found that “it was highly
likely that an unidentified Palestinian armed group could have used the
school premises to launch attacks on or around 14 July.” Similarly,
concerning weaponry stored at the UNRWA Nuseirat Preparatory Co-
educational “B” School, the UN inquiry found that “the premises could
have been used for an unknown period of time by members of a Palestinian
armed group” — and that “it was likely that such a group may have
fired the mortar from within the premises of the school.”
Now why would the BBC want to minimise their coverage of criticism of Hamas?
I wonder what is Ed Miliband's definition of Islamophobia?
Is this Islamophobic?
I wonder if anti-Semitism will get equal protection from a Labour government? Of course not, there's a lot more Muslims than Jews in the UK, and so lots more potential Labour votes if Ed Miliband and his party pander to Islamism.
English MP Mrs. Mavis Tate shows proof of the holocaust with shots from
her visit to a German concentration camp. Taken from the original 1945
British Pathe newsreel "German Atrocities - Proof". This Pathe newsreel
showed the world at the time what atrocities had been committed. The MP,
Mavis Tate describes eloquently what she saw at Buchenwald
concentration camps.
The Holocaust - "Let no one say that these things were not real"
Maybe the holocaust deniers who occasionally infest my Twitter feed should learn some history.
Two charts from the IPPR's investigation into Britain's Immigrants that I think are interesting. The first shows how the 1997-2010 Labour government opened Britain's borders in a deliberate move to massively increase immigration into the UK; both to 'rub the right's noses in diversity' and to create a Labour voting bloc that would ensure permanent Labour government. The second shows the differences between the nationalities of immigrants in terms of willingness to work.
'Even if the Tories are the largest party, if there is an anti-Tory majority, my offer to Labour is to work together to keep the Tories out," Scotland's first minister said.
When pressed on whether that would apply even if Labour had secured "10, 20, 30, 40" fewer seats than Mr Cameron's party, she replied: "Governments in the House of Commons are about who can command a majority."If there is an anti-Tory majority, yes... we would work with Labour to stop the Tories getting into Downing Street."'
I forsee a political crisis if this happens.
Maybe a refusal by Conservative voters in London and the South East to pay for the policies of a Labour SNP government would be in order?
From tomight's Archers, right at the end. You can listen to this on the BBC iPlayer.
Jennifer Aldridge - "Kate was saying only this morning that she's sure that global warming must have a lot to do with it."
David Archer - "She could be right"
Jim Lloyd - "Well, it's common knowledge there's been a marked increase in the incidence of extreme weather"
Jennifer Aldridge - "And that's all around the world"
Is that common knowledge? Is it correct?
Here's some facts that Jim 'Professor' Lloyd should really take notice of before he opens his faux intellectual mouth to opine on this subject again. Maybe he should stick to the Classics.
23rd April is St George's Day, the national day of England. Not that you'd know that if you look at the BBC's England news page where there is not a word about it. Contrast that with the coverage that the BBC give St Patrick's Day.
The BBC really are desperate to destroy the English identity and along with the Labour Party they are doing their best to achieve this.
If the BBC do deign to mention St George's Day then there will be the usual dismissive comment that St George wasn't even English but was Turkish. Maybe someone could then explain to the BBC that St George did indeed come from Cappadocia which is in modern day Turkey but at that time there was no Turkey, Cappadocia being in the eastern part of the Roman Empire. It's odd how the BBC and their fellow travellers on the left are happy to call any Somali, Syrian etc. who sets foot in Britain, British but won't extend the same courtesy to the patron saint of England.
I'm not a huge Star Wars fan, I've not even watched the second batch of three films (Episodes 1 - 3), actually mybe that makes me a true Star Wars fan! Regardless of that, the new Star Wars film, The Force Awakens, excites me; here's the new teaser trailer
So what do we see and learn?
This desert planet may look like Tatooine, home of the Skywalkers, but is it?
What is the crashed battle ship? Empire?
Those words must be spoken by Luke but is that really him with the robotic hand sitting with R2D2?
Very Jedi hermit, if it is, and it must be.
'My father has it? Is Darth Vader stil alive?
That use of 'you', remember that 'you' can be both second person singular and plural.
The obligatory fighters flying, a yahoo, lots of running, heavy breathing and fires illuminating the darkness.
What is that TIE Fighter doing in an Imperial hangar shooting at other TIE fighters? Undercover heroes, Han Solo again?
I see there's a new 'cute' R2D2 replacement, figurines to sell?
More flying down tunnels; does the Millenium Falcom have a 'turn 90 degrees button', or does that automatiucally happen when it is chased into enters a narrow tube, tunnel or similar?
And here's Han and Chewie, looking old but good (Han that is). Leather jackets are coming back into style this Christmas then?
But where's home? Han is an orphan and smuggler who never had a home that I know of. The Wookies had a home planet but most of were enslaved or killed many years ago.
So is this Han and Chewie getting back on to the Millenium Falcon for the first time in a long time?
That would fit in with the images just preceding this excerpt.
Lots of questions, much speculation.
We must wait for the next teaser to learn any more. Or the film at Christmas 2015.
It is rather revealing that the news of Yemeni civilians being killed by Saudi Arabian attacks on terrorists is receiving so little coverage on British media. I did find this Sky News report which begins:
'More than 600 people have been killed in Yemen in the past three weeks as a result of airstrikes and ground fighting, over half of them civilians including 74 children, according to the United Nations.'
If this had been Israel attacking Hamas terrorists and killing 'civilians' then you can be sure that the BBC would be giving this story great prominence, but not so much as it's a Muslim on Muslim story.
I wonder why that's the case? Why do the BBC obsess over (and indeed hate) Israel so much?
