´óÏó´«Ã½ in the news, Wednesday
| 10:17 UK time, Wednesday, 20 December 2006
Daily Telegraph and others: Report on Margaret Beckett's interview on Today programme ()
Daily Mail: Claims ´óÏó´«Ã½ didn't report background of two men convicted of killing PC Sharon Beshinivsky. (No link available)
Times: Magnus Linklater on Contempt of Court rules ()
Guardian (and others): Cartoons on the Bishop of Southwark's return to Thought for the Day. ()
Comments
I am astonished that there was no analysis or mention on the 10 o'clock news of Beckett's incorrect answers to John Humphreys' simple questions on Today programme. Doesn't the TV public have the right to know that we have at worst a liar as a Foreign Secretary? Or at best an utter incompentent?
I was appalled at the supine interviewing technique used by John Humphries on Tuesday, 19th December, when interviewing the Bishop of Southwark.
This is a man who has forced members of his clergy to resign when there have been problems with alcohol. Yet JH let him off without any searching questions, such as:How DID he manage to get that head wound? Why can't he remember anything about that evening?
Why didn't he go home in a cab? JH let us all down when he didn't ask him about his policy with his clergy and what a hard line he has taken.
Yet we are supposed to accept his dubious answers? Strong smell of BS...I think.
JH got his groove back with Margaret Beckett, though!!
Will Adrian Van-Klaveren be responding to the 60 or so complaints on his last post?
Re Margaret Beckett's three-quarter-hour backtrack:
For 'WMD' - read Wilful Media Distortion, perhaps?
Was this in fact the bigger threat to the democratic fabric? One of my concerns in this OTT marketing of the campaign is, "can we ever justify a move against other regimes - based on 'What the Politicians Say'- when there really might be a global risk?
Cry Freedom! - or cry wolf?
Not sure I agree with StarryAuthor.
There are 'horses for courses' and in the case of the Bishop of Southwark he needed to be given some latitude given that 'trial by media' had already been carried out. This did bring out more information than an adversarial interview might have. \
Regarding Starry's question about the 'head wound', JH did remind the Bishop that the police were not treating this as a mugging, to give him opportunity to comment on that aspect.
JH didn't ask 'why can't [he] remember anything about that evening', but he did ask about what he drank at the reception.
The fact that the answer was guarded, and there was no denial of having touched any alcohol whatsoever was significant. If that turns out not to be the version of events which other witnesses put forward, then that will give people the chance to decide.
Who is to say that his drink was not 'spiked' - whilst this seems unlikely it is certainly not impossible.
Although my impression is that the Bishop Of Southwark has been less than totally candid about the events of that night. That may well be down to memory loss. But I think he needs to start choosing his engagements considerably more carefully in the future.
Thank you Britain, and thanks to Jimmy Launders if he is still with us, for torpedoing the German ship bound for Japan with the toxic mercury. You have saved many American lives with this act. My brother died at the Battle of the Bulge but many other brothers would like to thank you too.