Strong, Thoughtful Stuff

Following the Pope's appearance on Thought for the Day, BBC staff have been paid out of public funds to place abusive comments about him on BBC websites, and a flurry of complaints has either been organised by the Corporation or simply invented by it. He came to Britain, Auntie, even though you specifically instructed him not to. There was no assassination attempt, despite your relentless incitement. Get over it.

Banging on about Catholic child abuse now has a certain dated ring to it, a feel of the belated trendiness that is so characteristic of the middle-aged pseudo-undergraduates about whom we are talking in this case. But we still shouldn't let them get away with it. We should respond: Paedo Pete Tatchell, Harman, Hewitt, Fry, Channel Four, Greer, Dawkins, Oz Robertson, Pullman the Groomer, numerous Social Services Departments, the Police, and a great assortment of others besides.

However, Peter Hitchens has good news about the BBC's Director-General, Mark Thompson, who "has now said several things that go to the root of the matter. Here are two of them: 'Avoiding party political bias is a subset and only a subset of impartiality. It’s possible for all major parties to agree on a given subject and for there still to be a legitimate opposing view which should be heard and scrutinised', and: 'People sometimes confuse impartiality with centrism, i.e., a bias towards more "moderate" world-views as opposed to more "radical" ones.' This is strong, thoughtful stuff, not that he will be glad that I think so. But then, I’m biased."