Cameron and the BBC - the gloves are off

[LadyBlaBlah]

www.newstatesman.com/blogs/the-staggers/2010/10/bbc-cuts-cameron-brussels

So why does he hate the BBC - is it just because it is public funded or is it because of his dealings with Murdoch?

Whichever, I would imagine this is a real problem with voters

On an aside, I have noticed that they refuse to put anyone of worth on Question Time, and do reluctantly on Newsnight to defend their policies

Claig - I am pointing out a perception - she made the poitn during the general election campaign - She basically felt the BBC was not unbiased, but was favouring the right .....

cliag I think you can safely add the Express and Star to your list.

The Indie seems to have had a great idea with "i" - all the reports I have heard have been very positive. I wonder which newspapers it will hit? My first guess would be the Independent itself and the Guardian, but maybe some Times readers too?

The Director General of the BBC said that there had been a massive left wing bias in the BBC.

But as far as the election is concerned, I think every media outlet deliberately hyped Clegg up. The Guardian even urged its loyal readers, who had swallowed Monbiodiversity's columns for years, to vote for Nick Clegg. So I agree that nearly every media organisation during the election (including the left wing cheerleaders) was in favour of Nick Clegg and a Coalition victory.

Yes I forgot about the Express and the Star. I never read them. I don't know what sales figures they achieve and how popular they really are.

Surely the job of political commentators is to comment on the actions of the government of the day (sometimes reporting on the unfavourable reactions of the public, business, Boris etc). We have a tory government so the bbc is accused by the tories of having a left wing bias. I seem to recall the reverse was the case during the blair years. Alastair Campbell rarely held back in accusing the bbc of having a right wing bias.

longfingernails, I'll give you that one :o I'd forgotten about ripping up the sun... all it's good for in my book though. However, I do feel the right wing tend to be more jumpy about left wing bias in the media. There are far more right wing newspapers than left.

Maybe you're right (was it you who said it?) perhaps the country is inherently right wing. Is that because right wing politics tend to focus more on the individual and left wing politics traditionally more on the wider society.

The BBC coverage of the US elections in the next few days will be very interesting.

Observe the tone of the reporting. Do the BBC attribute the projected Democrat losses to a contempt for big government, massive deficits and pork barrel politics? Do they sneer at the very fair criticisms of the Republicans, which are obviously resonating with the American public? Will they talk about the concerns about high taxes discouraging entrepreneurs?

I think Andrew Neil's documentary on the Tea Party will be fascinating - but I don't hold out much hope for the reporting on the main bulletins.

yes people are naturally more right wing, because right wing is about family, law and order, less taxation, less government interference etc. That is what most people prefer. It is only due to the media's left wing bias that the public are persuaded to vote for the progressives and their policies.

Most of the intellectual media is left wing (the BBC, Channel 4, Guardian, Independent, New Statesman etc.). The right wing is sneered at by MN posters who continually apologise for linking to the only paper worth linking to, the London Daily Mail.

I think it's too much of a simplification to say that the country is naturally right-wing.

Most of England is naturally right-wing, though not all. Most of Scotland these days is naturally left-wing. One of Thatcher's only mistakes was destroying the substantial Tory base in Scotland with the poll tax trials. This seems to have largely gone to the SNP, curiously enough, rather than Labour or the Lib Dems. Wales is naturally left-wing too. Of course cities tend to be leftier than rural areas - a phenomenon that is probably true in every country in the world.

Much of the middle-class actually became more left-wing during the Labour years. Blair's pivoting to the centre-ground, and not having to worry about their own financial security, meant that they had the time, energy and inclination to care more about non-economic issues. More of the English white working class became steadily more Tory since 2001, largely due to concerns about immigration I think. I don't really understand Scotland's voting patterns!

I think if there was no "massive left wing bias" in some influential media, then the left wing would never get voted in again. That is why left wingers are so keen on taxing the public to fund media with a left wing slant. If that public subsidy stopped, the left wingers know that they would rarely if ever see office again.

When is Andrew Neil's documentary on the Tea Party? I don't want to miss that.

Claig. Both you and I know the Daily Mail is a cracking good read and a great paper.

too right . The Labourites know it as well. That's why they get so angry at the mention of it. They wish they had a paper that was so popular.

Oh purlease, you like reading that all working women are evil, teenage mums are evil, all women full stop are evil, and by the way, have you heard? Women give you cancer....

HeadFairy, have you read it? The things you have mentioned are not in it. It sounds like you have been getting your information, on what is in the Daily Mail, from desperate Labour spin doctors, intent on building a progressive future on a pack of lies.

Nick Robinson is a Tory.

There is no story in the Guardians tax but there is a huge story in Lord Ashcroft and the sniveling, duplicitous behaviour of his tax avoidance.

The Daily Wail is aimed at an average age level of an 8 year old and takes its readers for the same kind of innocents.

There are no left wing papers only centre. There are left wing documentary makers and perhaps that is the only arena in which we still see some sort of fight against the mundane and middle of the road.

sooo haven't been getting myinformation from Labour spin doctors. I have read the Daily Mail, quite a lot. We get it every day at work and there is always some bullshit in the "Femail" section about how one working woman aged 38 has really regretted not having children earlier and how she'd been selfishly building her career, or how another teenaged mum really regretted fucking up her life. And there is a different story every day about something or other giving you cancer. While I might conceed the BBC can have a left wing bias you can't possibly claim the Daily Mail isn't mysoginistic!

I don't think it is misogynistic. It is aimed at women and I think that the majority of its readers are women. Granted not all of its stories are good, but I do like the health stories.

SylviaPankhurst, the Director General of the BBC said that the BBC had suffered from a "massive" left wing bias. A left wing paper is the Morning Star. Also the Guardian is fairly left of centre.

The Mail on Sunday has Suzanne Moore as one of its columnists, and she isn't misogynistic or particularly right wing.

A small point amidst all the reds-under-the-beds type craziness on this thread, but claig:

"right wing is about family, law and order, less taxation, less government interference etc"

You are aware that those four things do not make up any kind of category, right? "family" and "law and order" have nothing whatsoever in common with "less taxation" or "less government interference"

no they are not a category, but they are things that the right usually stand for and support, and they are things that the majority of people agree with them on

Claig the health stories in the daily wail are the standard joke of those trained in health care!

As for the morning star being a left wing paper of course but its only sold in about three places. the Guardian asked its readers to vote lib dem at the last election nothing left wing about that then.

'Claig the health stories in the daily wail are the standard joke of those trained in health care!'

are these people like the Chief Medical Officer who predicted tens of thousands of deaths due to swine flu, while the Mail was doing good reporting on swine flu?

I agree about the Guardian. The Oxbridge types who write for it are class warriors, but for which class?

if you think he's of the left, no wonder you think the media has a left wing bias!

So claig, what is it that makes you believe that most people prefer lower taxation and less government "interference"? Did you read it in the Mail?