Not very long ago (even if it does seem that way now), the Chairman and the Director-General of the BBC both had to resign after Alastair Campbell took umbrage at a single, passing remark, live in the early morning, which was factually correct anyway.
No it wasn't.
ReplyDeleteNobody should resign or be sacked over this nonsense, which has been stirred up as a distraction by the Mail on Sunday and which inspired no significant level of protest when it actually went out.
ReplyDeleteNot that anyone should have resigned or been sacked over Andrew Gilligan's comments either, of course.
What "wasn't"? Have we found the last person alive who still defends the Hutton Report? Or even the only person who has ever actually believed it? Almost touching. Almost
ReplyDeleteRobin, looks like dear old Auntie is way ahead of you. I love her really, you know.
Maybe you could point out the ways in which the Hutton Inquiry's conclusions weren't supported by the evidence.
ReplyDeleteWhere does one even begin?
ReplyDeleteYes, you really do BELIEVE it. No one else has ever done that. Not Hutton himself. Not Blair. Not Campbell. No one.
Except you.
He's just an agent provocateur David. Nobody believes the Hutton Report.
ReplyDeleteFor his sake, I hope that you are right.
ReplyDeleteAs the R4 report said, this is a generational issue - and the target audience didn't object.
ReplyDeleteThis to me is key. People should, on the whole, keep out of things that are not aimed at them. No doubt Brand's fans find the opinions expressed by Peter Hitchens when he appears on Any Questions? deeply, profoundly offensive. But they don't launch moralistic campaigns to ban Hitchens from broadcasting.
Those who would walk on hot coals if Hitchens told them to don't seem anywhere near as tolerant.
If the BBC had always been willing to surrender to mob rule in this way, Radio 1 would never even have existed and the whole corporation would have collapsed by about 1980.
What "generation"? Brand is well into his thirties. And Ross is nearer 50 than 40, the archetypal middle-aged uncle embarrassing everyone with his Travolta impersonations at a wedding reception.
ReplyDeleteThey were on Radio Two, not Radio One, to which no one listens anymore, anyway. Radion One is now purely and simply the duplication of the commercial sector, except not as attractive to the target audience. Which doesn't even pay for it.
Peter Hitchens has never, that I can recall, gone on Any Questions and committed a series of criminal offences.