DOES STOPPING FREEDOM OF SPEECH DEFEND DEMOCRACY?
Posted by Caledonian Jim in Daily Posts
The BBC’s governing body is to review its Director-General Mark Thompson’s decision to allow Nick Griffin, the leader of the right-wing British National Party (BNP), to appear on the political discussion programme “Question Time” this coming Thursday. UK Cabinet Minister Peter Hain (pictured above), the Welsh Secretary, has written to Sir Michael Lyons, the Chairman of the BBC Trust, to appeal against Mr Thompson’s contention that the BBC is obliged to invite the BNP on to the programme because 2 of its members were elected to the European Parliament this year. Mr Hain claims that the far-right party is not “lawfully constituted” because of its admission that its whites-only membership policy breaks discrimination laws. Mr Thompson told Mr Hain yesterday that the admission did not “legally inhibit” the BBC from inviting Mr Griffin to appear. He added: “We are also advised that if there were to be any election — local or national — tomorrow, the BNP would still be able to field candidates.”
What is it with Mr Hain ? How a long standing campaigner against apartheid can advocate the exclusion of any political faction is crazy. He’s got this blind blinkered contempt for freedom of speech that seems to assume that a TV appearance by a knuckle-dragging half-wit like Nick Griffin (above) will signal the end of the world. Presumably, with typical New Labour chattering class arrogance, he thinks that the plebs he governs won’t have the intelligence to discern that Griffin is talking bullshit. Or is Hain’s concern more fundamental ? Along the lines that he’s realised that it’s over the top political correctness from people like HIM that has driven numbers of pissed off people to vote for the BNP. And his juvenile policy of now trying to exclude Griffin from the debating process, thereby denying democracy, is doing nothing to dispel that impression. Let Griffin talk himself out of votes. Gag and martyr him and his constituency will grow. All Peter Hain is doing here is to fuel the suspicion that he cares as much about freedom of speech as Nick Griffin does.
Things must be pretty bad in the religious world when they’re stealing each other’s congregation. The Roman Catholic Church yesterday moved to poach thousands of traditional Church of England members (Anglicans) who are dismayed by growing acceptance of gays and women priests and bishops. The Archbishop of Canterbury Dr Rowan Williams admitted that he had been caught out after former Hitler Youth and Nazi anti-aircraft gunner Pope Benedict XVI (pictured above, giving what we trust isn’t a dodgy Nazi salute) announced a new “Apostolic Constitution” to provide a legal framework for the many thousands of Anglicans and former Anglicans who wish “to enter into full communion with the Roman Catholic Church”.
The announcement may pave the way for thousands of disgruntled traditionalist Anglicans worldwide to join the Roman Catholic church while maintaining elements of their own spiritual heritage. Although Dr Williams knew that talks had been taking place in Rome, he was unaware until 2 weeks ago of the radical nature of the proposals being drawn up by the Prussian Pontiff. Interesting – if any other organisation in the world was seeking to increase the numbers of its deluded adherents by exploiting hatred of gays and displaying blatant misogyny, not to mention acting as an internation organised front for paedophiles, the human rights lawyers like Cherie Blair would be out in force. But as usual, the Vatican gets away with its bigotted nonsense. And as for the Archbishop of Canterbury, maybe if he concentrated more on running the Church of England properly instead of wasting time advocating the introduction of Sharia Law in the UK, he wouldn’t lose his flock.
Prospective European President Tony Blair’s bodyguards had to rush to protect him yesterday when a protester calling him a terrorist (pictured above, as he appeared on Sky News) verbally abused the former UK Prime Minister in a Palestinian mosque. Mr Blair, currently the (useless) Middle East Peace Envoy, was on an official trip to the West Bank city of Hebron when the man started shouting at him. His bodyguards backed the man into a corner and tried to keep him quiet as he shouted “You’re a terrorist” at Mr Blair. ”He is not welcome in the land of Palestine”, the struggling man shouted. Mr Blair gave a tight-lipped smile and a pacifying wave in the general direction of the shouting man. So where does Blair go from here ? – After all, in the eyes of most Brits, he’s not welcome back in Europe either.
Afghanistan’s election commission has ordered a run-off election for 7 November after a fraud investigation dropped President Hamid Karzai’s (above) votes from the first round below the required 50% of the total. Mr Karzai accepted the fraud panel finding and endorsed the run-off election. Very gracious of him. The chairman of the Independent Election Commission, Azizullah Lodin, said the commission did not want to “leave the people of Afghanistan in uncertainty” any longer. ”The commission is agreed to go to a second round and say that nobody got more than 50%,” he said. Afghan electoral law says a run-off is needed if no candidate gets above that percentage. Surprising that Karzai didn’t get over 50%, considering the average 150% turnout in areas he was strong. And even more surprising that the UK government doesn’t pull out our brave troops defending this farcical travesty of democracy NOW.
Pictured above is a heartwarming scene of a father reading a story to his daughter. It’s part of a UK government TV advert. But the bedtime tale turns out to be a terrifying account of drowning puppies, rabbits dying of thirst and the end of the world as we know it. This is the Government’s controversial TV commercial about the dangers of global warming, which has led to more than 200 complaints being lodged with the Advertising Standards Authority. The ad is part of a £6 million campaign, shows a father telling his daughter a story about climate change destroying the world. Cartoon images appear on screen: A puppy drowns in floods, a kitten floats by on an upturned table and a rabbit weeps as drought sweeps the earth. The father tells his daughter that scientists say the “strange weather is being caused by too much CO2, which went up into the sky when the grown ups used too much energy”. He tells her that if “grown-ups turned off things such as lightbulbs maybe they could save the land for the little children”. The child looks up at her father and asks: “Is there a happy ending?” A female voice-over then says: “It’s up to us how it ends. See what you can do.” More to the point, in the middle of the worst economic crisis in 80 years, what cretin authorised the waste of £6 million of taxpayer’s money on this load of politically correct bollocks ? Especially when these ads are normally on immediately after the weather forecast, where they can’t even predict the right weather for the day after tomorrow.
And finally a good news story. Pictured above are the 3 white lion cubs that were born 12 weeks ago at West Midland Safari Park near Bewdley in Worcestershire. They are among only about 130 white lions left in the world – all 3 have been given names beginning with the letter P. They have been named Portia, Phoebe and Pandora by their keepers – who have kept a watchful eye on the cubs since their arrival at the park near Birmingham, 12 weeks ago . Think I’ll go up and see them.
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