Lobbying and the media in the U.S.

The videos speak for themselves.

Craig Murray on the Conservative’s European Alliance

Craig Murray on the Conservative’s European Alliance

I watched him [Silvio Berlusconi] this morning on EuroNews making a European Election campaign speech. He said: "How do I feel when I see all these non-Italians walking around Milan? When I look around Milan, I think I am in Africa!" […]

Still more alarming, even Berlusconi is not right wing enough for David Cameron's Tories and they have allied themselves with some truly horrible nationalist parties from Eastern Europe.

I was First Secretary at the British Embassy in Warsaw heading the Embassy's political and economic sections. I speak Polish. I can tell you definitively that the Kaczynski's Law and Justice Party - the British Conservative's now main ally in the EU parliament - consists of a large number of anti-Semitic and ultra-conservative Catholic crazies of the worst kind. […]

Kaczynski continually condemns anti-Semitism in public. You might ask yourself why he has to do that. One prominent member of his party (and of ther Sejm) once walked out of a lunch with me in Warsaw where a girl from the Adenauer Foundation was also present, because she was Jewish. I have heard casual anti-Semitism from components of Law and Justice which you would not believe.

A few links about immigration

Stumbling and Mumbling - Immigration and the left – why the left should not support extra immigration controls.

Stumbling and Mumbling - Taking “our” Jobs?

Immigration and tabloids

Tabloid Watch - When truth means lies

Tabloid Watch - Omission of fact

Enemies of Reason - BNP opportunism supported by racist media

No Sleep ‘Till Brooklands - International fugitives come from other countries, Mail finds

Enemies of Reason - A quiz - Melanie Phillips or Geert Wilders?

A few links about The Press, Politics & Animal Welfare

Some classic Littlejohn from Five Chinese Crackers

Chicken Yoghurt on the all too often overlooked issue of deportation & the hypocrisy of Gordon Brown in regards to hospices.

Enemies of Reason considers what to do with your BNP leaflet.

The smooth, shiny texture isn't really absorbent enough to wipe your arse with, and there's enough shit in the leaflet already without you needing to add to it. [...]

Incidentally, it was most welcome to see the Daily Mail calling the BNP "vile racists and thugs" today. Unfortunately, their readers appear to have disagreed with this assessment, if you care to have a look at the comments. Oh well, that's the price you pay for telling lies about immigration all the time...

Toynbee links this - but in case anyone missed it, Mark Reckons illustrates that the safer the seat, the more likely the MP is claiming for dodgy expenses.

In Australia there is currently a debate surrounding the welfare of horses involved in Jump Racing. A friend of mine, who is particularly concerned with animal rights, sent me a link to the video below. You might find it distressing.

RSPCA Australia & Animal Liberation have more information.

A few links about death, war, lies, homophobia, and the Media

Robert Fisk reflects on the time that he met Baha Mousa’s father as British operations in Iraq come to an end. ‘Robert Fisk: A historic day for Iraq – but not in the way the British want to believe’.  For Fisk’s first article about meeting Baha Mousa’s father - ‘Robert Fisk: A cry for justice from a good man who expected us to protect his son’.

A good post from Tabloid Watch on racism in the press and crime reporting - ‘How the tabloids cover crime’

Another good post from Tabloid Watch on homophobia in the Sun. ‘Sun's shower of homophobia’

3 good blogs on the evidence presented to the Culture, Media and Sport Select Committee.

• Five Chinese Crackers – ‘Paul Dacre's evidence to the Culture, Media and Sport Committee’
  

• Rhetorically speaking…  - ‘paul dacre: the daily mail was never against the MMR vaccine’
  

• Roy Greenslade on Peter Hill’s 'mistakes' as he gave evident to the committee on behalf of the Daily Express - ‘Express editor's catalogue of 'mistakes' in evidence to MPs’ 
  

To Carol Thatcher, “That is why it is not on the jam jars – because we have moved on.”

Witness Carol Thatcher being asked whether she regrets "using the word that she did" by Andrew Marr twice. "No" is her obstinate response, at the second time of asking. Her initial response was obfuscatory - she attempted to reposition herself as the victim. She also suggests that plenty of people agree with her. If The Daily Mail agrees with her about political correctness, how could she be wrong? (!). She had over two months to construct a response. The best she could muster was arrogant denial.

Another thought occurred to me after the initial disgust for her misplaced conviction. What was she doing on television? Of course, she should be granted a right of reply, but she has already had many opportunities. What this short clip does not reveal is that she was on there to review newspapers primarily. It is only for the 1 minute 28 seconds that it was even acknowledged that she had been offensive and is unrepentant about it. For the most part Carol Thatcher was treated in a familiar cosy manner.

Although not entirely relevant - here is Stewart Lee’s response to an audience poll that revealed that the majority thought that political correctness had gone mad.

Thank-you Stewart Lee – that makes me feel better.

UPDATE
Since originally writing this post, I have stumbled across Mongoose Chronicles. She offers a spirited assessment of Carol Thatcher’s performance worthy of a link. 'Carol Thatcher disgusts me'

[J]ust because you grew up seeing golliwogs on the side of your jam jar as you sat at your breakfast table with your white, wealthy family and friends, does not entitle you to decide for another group of people what they are and are not allowed to be offended by. […]

I was disgusted by Thatcher in this Andrew Marr interview, because alarmingly, she seems to be part of this club of golliwog collectors who think their quaint little hobby is more valuable than the historical and current subjugation of an entire group of people; and worse, she is also one of those who has assumed the role of victim because The Man wants to take away her right to hurl racial slurs at people. And the rest of us should just get over it so she can have her golliwog fridge magnets and make fun of black people.