More on the Fair™ and Balanced™ one

[Barry the Sprout]

Gotta go with Grojlach on this one. The BBC were by no means either anti-war or anti-american as an institution. Gilligan probably was anti-war, but whilst the Hutton report claims that he exxagerated evidence from Kelly all the transcripts of the evidence from the inquiry seem to support the Today program. All the evidence we're hearing at the moment supports the fact that there aren't any WMDs and that the intelligence services had no hard evidence to suppose there would be other than the fact that Saddam wasn't letting in the inspectors. And in these circumstances the report stating so is considered to be a lie? The evidence supporting much of what Gilligan said is in the public domain. Its not acase of his word against Blair's anymore.

[Cerek the Barbaric]

Originally posted by Grojlach: *sigh* I'd love to see proof supporting your claim that the BBC was "anti-American" in their reports concerning Iraq, as that's quite an extreme claim to make, even in a "non-mouth-frothing" manner. I suppose the term "anti-American" has been over-, mis- and abused so often lately, that it has simply lost its actual meaning. Being against the Iraqi war is not anti-American. Disagreeing with Bush's policies is not anti-American. Being left of center in reports concerning the war isn't anti-American. Countering blatant war propaganda (Jessica Lynch, anyone?) with a taste of its own medicine is not anti-American, just war rhetorics. The only "frothing at the mouth" that occurs at the moment concerns itself with criticising Lord Hutton's report, which is regarded by a majority of the British as a shameless "whitewash" attempt; especially considering the fact that a large part of the evidence to support the BBC's case wasnt even taken into account. If you look beyond Gibson's childish and petty name-calling, it's not necessarily lying that he's doing, it's omitting a large part of the main picture that's the most reprehensible. Gibson's narrow-minded black and white perspective gave me the strong feeling that he hadn't even done the slightest background research... Good thing the British themselves are a lot better at it: http://observer.guardian.co.uk/hutto...027691,00.html But I somehow doubt anyone working at FOX News would seriously consider any of the criticism on Lord Hutton's report to be relevant enough to report in a neutral manner, without accompanying it with their usual self-indulgent flaming and twisting of the facts.

Well, my claim of "anti-Americanism" is based on my admittedly faulty memory of posts made in the War Forum. I realize that "anti-Bush" is not the same as "anti-American". And I realize it was often interpreted that way by the "pro-Bush" crowd. But I do seem to remember some articles that were critical of American soldiers and American behavior in general. I could be wrong...after all, it was several months ago and there were many, many threads on different subjects there. But even your own post implied they did express some "anti-American" sentiment in their rebuttal to the Jessica Lynch story.

Anyway, that is one point from the entire report. Barry said that he finally got tired of counting the number of lies in the report. All I'm asking is that he list some of these numerous lies. If the report contained that many, it should be easy to point them out.

Personally, I feel it is more of a reaction to the manner in which the news was presented. That is certainly understandable. But - as Timber pointed out - if you ignore the blantant spin of the presentation, the story itself does contain a lot of individual facts.

And, to incorporate your own reasoning used to describe what is or is not "anti-American sentiment, the manner in which the report was presented is not the same as lying. It was derogatory and condescending, but that is not the same as lying. Ommission of facts is (in and of itself) not lying. You say the majority of people consider the Hutton Report to be a Whitewash. That may well be true, but it is opinion, not verifiable fact.

As far as Fox not doing their research or reporting news in neutral fashion, that is just the way Fox News operates. As I said before, I don't know of ANY media outlet that actually reports the news in a "neutral and objective" fashion anymore. Every news program and newspaper tailors it's stories to appeal to their target audience. This is true for BOTH sides of the equation. And while the representation is relatively equal on both sides, Fox News is the most obvious and transparant in the conservative spin they put on their stories.

[Donut]

Originally posted by Grojlach: *sigh* I'd love to see proof supporting your claim that the BBC was "anti-American" in their reports concerning Iraq, as that's quite an extreme claim to make, even in a "non-mouth-frothing" manner.

I totally agree Groj - but if you say it often enough people begin to accept your opinion as 'fact'.

The BBC covered the 'anti' and 'pro' side of the war, it isn't anti-american and it isn't pro-american. It's fair and balanced. If one journalist makes a mistake (as Gilligan did in Baghdad) then it's a mistake, it's not a lie. it doesn't taint the whole of the BBC. Perhaps we should list all the lies about WoMD being discovered.

Just to pick one piece from the Fox rant

"After the war, back in London, Gilligan got a guy named David Kelly to tell him a few things about pre-war assessments on Iraq's weapons' programmes."

Where are we told who "a guy called David Kelly" is? You could be forgiven in thinking that this was some nobody who Gilligan pulled off the street. Where does it inform us that he was one of the most important experts in WoMD in the Ministry of Defence? He actually worked for the Government!!!!

You might also be led to believe that he killed himself because of the BBC. He only killed himself when his name was leaked to the press. The BBC went to extraordinary lengths to keep their source out of the media. His name was leaked by the Government and then he killed himself. Not according to Fox: "

"Kelly committed suicide over the story..."


I can understand how those who haven't followed the Kelly scandal and the Hutton inquiry in detail would accuse us of attacking the conclusions because we don't agree with them. You will have to take my word for absolute disbelief that I and the majority of Britons have for Hutton's findings. His conclusions just do not follow on from the evidence. Even senior judges don't agree with him and are asking for a judical review into them.

One slip that I loved from the Fox transcript though:

"The British government investigation slammed the BBC.." Many a true word spoken in ignorance. (in case anyone doesn't get it, it was supposed to be an independent review )

Glad to hear that this isn't typical of US news media. (An american friend sent me a package this week and some of the packing used was pages from the World news section of the Washington Times. I greatly enjoyed reading it.)

[ 02-10-2004, 06:53 AM: Message edited by: Donut ]

[Donut]

Originally posted by Cerek the Barbaric: You say the majority of people consider the Hutton Report to be a Whitewash. That may well be true, but it is opinion, not verifiable fact.

It's verifiable in so much as all opinion polls report the majority of Britons believe it to be so.

[Barry the Sprout]

Originally posted by Cerek the Barbaric: As far as Fox not doing their research or reporting news in neutral fashion, that is just the way Fox News operates. As I said before, I don't know of ANY media outlet that actually reports the news in a "neutral and objective" fashion anymore. Every news program and newspaper tailors it's stories to appeal to their target audience. This is true for BOTH sides of the equation. And while the representation is relatively equal on both sides, Fox News is the most obvious and transparant in the conservative spin they put on their stories.

My point is that this isn't true of televised media in the UK - its perfectly true of print media but not televised media. They simply aren't allowed to be biased in any way, and whilst you may think the Beeb was anti american I most strongly disagree personally. My whole point in the last thread on Fox was about the difference in convention in televised news media between the US and the UK. Over here we would be aghast at the concept of what you've mentioned above being the case, as its a convention that there can be absolutely no bias and largely thats been stuck to. Whereas of course in the US its considered so second nature and unobjectionable that people think we're just plain stupid to think we have it any different. My whole point is that we're both so used to what we've got that we have trouble comphrending the possibility of the other system working.

I'm not arguing that one system is better that the other just yet, I'm just saying that both systems do exist.

[skywalker]

Is there any way to get the BBC in the USA, short of a satellite dish?

Mark

[ 02-10-2004, 07:49 AM: Message edited by: skywalker ]

[Barry the Sprout]

BBC World Service via Radio? Thats all I can think of.

[Timber Loftis]

Originally posted by skywalker: Is there any way to get the BBC in the USA, short of a satellite dish? Mark

You can get BBC USA on one of the (basic) cable stations. I watch it occassionally.

[Timber Loftis]

Just to pick one piece from the Fox rant "After the war, back in London, Gilligan got a guy named David Kelly to tell him a few things about pre-war assessments on Iraq's weapons' programmes." Where are we told who "a guy called David Kelly" is? You could be forgiven in thinking that this was some nobody who Gilligan pulled off the street. Where does it inform us that he was one of the most important experts in WoMD in the Ministry of Defence? He actually worked for the Government!!!!

I'm reasonably certain the "guy called" reference is an intended downplay of who David Kelley was. It strikes me that the article assumes the reader is well-aware of who Mr. Kelley was. Which is why it doesn't spell it out.

[Donut]

Originally posted by Timber Loftis: I'm reasonably certain the "guy called" reference is an intended downplay of who David Kelley was. It strikes me that the article assumes the reader is well-aware of who Mr. Kelley was. Which is why it doesn't spell it out.

I'm guessing that some Fox viewers wouldn't even be able to spell his name right!