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fiercewildanimal

Listed below are comments made by fiercewildanimal between Thursday, 23rd October 2008 and Thursday, 6th November 2008.

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Proud 11:02am on 06 Nov 2008 Pride is a personal emotion and you are entitled to feel it, however - the BBC extravaganza was way over the top!

The job of the BBC is to report the news in an informative and accessible manner. This goal could have been achieved at a fraction of the cost and far more effectively.

The coverage was biased, opinion-centric and patronising. The same mindless questions posed to interviewees and guests. Instant reactions sought rather than detailed investigation. Unconcealed bias from journalists preferring to express personal feelings rather than reporting the news. Not enough focus on the data - particularly not the data that didn't fit with the pre-chosen narrative.

Last night's Newsnight special covered most of the same ground. When 30 minutes in Paxo is again explaining the parentage of Obama - you know they have run out of new and interesting things to say.

The Breakfast news this morning continuing to run the election as the main story. Acceptable on a quiet news day and where they have researched new angles. Unacceptable when we have a by-election and other local news and Turnbull is still serving up 24 hour-old instant reactions.

At the moment the BBC just isn't working.
US08 II 4:53pm on 05 Nov 2008 I thought the coverage was weak. The party in Times Square was awful and I thought the presenters seemed pretty biased towards Obama. I much prefer my coverage to be more even-handed.

Particular annoying comments included:

Justin Webb talking about Obama's black children running around the White House - which seemed patronising and irrelevant.

Jon Sopel in Virginia asked the Republican representative to explain the Bradley effect - and then asked him if he was hoping that this would happen in Virginia. Basically - that is accusing the Republican (who seemed like a nice enough person) of being racist and hoping people would vote for their candidate because he had white skin.

There seemed to be many more borderline accusations of racism against the Republicans throughout the show - which were unnecessary.

John Bolton is wheeled out as a token Republican - when his views are extremely neo-con in nature. There are other sensible Republicans who better represent McCain's position in the party.

Having said all this - I was hoping that Obama would win - I just wish the BBC staff had hidden their preferences and reported the news factually. They need to get some practise before the next General Election.
Storm over Corfu 12:56pm on 23 Oct 2008 Not sure if this explanation is good enough.

No allegations of law-breaking were made against Osborne until Brown answered a planted question in the Commons yesterday - unless the BBC was already aware of the allegations and had been briefed by Labour early - this does not answer the early intense interest.

The allegations were originally about a lack of judgement - and on this case both Mandelson and Osborne were jointly guilty. Given that Mandelson was in a position of power - more coverage should have been on him.

Furthermore, the BBC shouldn't be hiding behind the letter of the law (both British and EU) and should highlight poor laws (as it does on shows like Watchdog). In this case - the party funding rules desperately need simplifying and EU law clearly need tightening.

Regardless of whether Mandelson hasn't broken a law in Europe - he would have done if he had been acting for Britain - so surely a huge story about why EU is so lenient over conflicts of interest - particularly when it isn't particularly transparent or democratic is long-overdue.

The Times can have it's scoop - it's the job of the BBC to investigate in an unbiased way. The spectacle of Peston reporting biased political gossip on his blog instead of business and economic issues was disgraceful. This is made worse given he is facing allegations from Osborne that he leaked sensitive market data and thus his reporting can be seen as a conflict of interest.

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