Opinion / Mass Media and the Internet

Climate Change (Not?)

Over at Spiegel Online is an energetic and extended article knocking hard at some key arguments proposed by those who insist that human activity is causing grave long-term damage to the Earth’s climate. Here is the essence of what I think about this policy area. Over at Watt’s Up With […]

Continue Reading

Major ‘Letter’ to Hogg, 1993: World’s Most Pathetic Islamist Forgery – Ever!

Remember the world scoop/poop of Sarajevo newspaper Dnevi Avaz, featuring what was said to be fascimile copy of a letter from Prime Minister John Major to FCO Minister of State Douglas Hogg, back in May 1993? In the so-called letter Prime Minister Major says a number of nasty things about […]

Continue Reading

Libel Law Reform: Progress?

The energetic campaign to reform the British libel laws is making progress. Yesterday the three largest UK political parties all indicated wilingness to make significant changes. And see Jack Straw in the Guardian: … perhaps most importantly for the media – we’ll be looking at whether to introduce a statutory […]

Continue Reading

Labour’s Lobbying Corruption: Defended

On BBC Radio Five Live yesterday there was a significant piece about Labour lobbying revelations. It dwelled at some length on the general problems of principle arising from what Stephen Byers and other senior Labour politicians have been offering, but without placing the blame firmly on Labour in general or […]

Continue Reading

Fame. In Malta

Oh dear. I have achieved media prominence of a sort in Malta today, becoming a leading story in the Malta Star. This publication does not like the current Malta government. Its article boldly asserts that I am the Maltese Prime Minister’s new ‘Spin Doctor’, brought in to help the PM ‘deal with […]

Continue Reading

USA TV News Ratings: Fox v CNN

Simon Heffer ponders the decline of the Obama Administration’s credibility, arguing in part thus: "Obama’s big problem," a senior Democrat told me, "is that four times as many people watch Fox News as watch CNN." The Fox network is a remarkable cultural phenomenon which almost shocks those of us from […]

Continue Reading

USA TV Ratings: Cume Again

A reader argues that I am underestimating the impact of Fox News in the USA: Thus the numbers of people ‘reached’ in America are not the paltry 2.8 million you purport, but rather 80% of the total viewership for the day, 18,166,000, (again ridiculous, 20% of 18 million people did […]

Continue Reading

Ejup Ganic – Another Week In Prison?

Dnevni Avaz in Sarajevo reports that the UK court has ordered that Ejup Ganic stay in prison for a further week, apparently to give Serbia more time to present evidence against him for the Dobrovoljacka St massacre in 1992. A protest demonstration is to be held outside the British and […]

Continue Reading

BBC Freedom Of Speech: Global Warming (Not)

Update:  Bishop Hill (being a lot smarter than I am) has found a way to save the key sound-clip. See also the interesting comments the posting has prompted. * * * * * Quick! Listen before it disappears down the iPlayer memory hole. BBC presenter Peter Allen on Radio 5 live […]

Continue Reading

Recognising Post-Democratic Tyranny

Via The Browser a rather lame article by Jay Rosen arguing that journalists in the USA have become so non-judgmental that they are striving for an impossible professional ‘innocence’ and are just missing the point. By way of evidence he cites a long analysis of the Tea Party tendency in the USA […]

Continue Reading
Newer EntriesOlder Entries