Maybe because newspapers are subsidized by govenments in europe they think they have the right to censor the news. This alone is reason enough for the US government to never subsidize the news industry.
On Mar 27, 9:29 am, bruce majors <[email protected]> wrote: > Dan Hannan shames the BBC and proves need for broadcasting freedom Dan > Hannan shames the BBC and proves need for broadcasting > freedom<http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/janet_daley/blog/2009/03/27/dan_hannan_s...> > Posted By:Janet Daley<http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/janet_daley>at Mar > 27, 2009 at 11:08:25 [ > General <http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/janet_daley/blog/cat/general>] Posted > in: > Tags: > BBC <http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/janet_daley/go/tag/view/blog_post/BBC>, > broadcasting > deregulation<http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/janet_daley/go/tag/view/blog_post/broadc...>, > Dan > Hannan<http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/janet_daley/go/tag/view/blog_post/Dan%20...> > > submit<javascript:OneUGCTagCollection.addTag(591950381,document.getElementById('txtTag591950381').value,35875127);>| > cancel <javascript:OneUGCTagCollection.toggleUGCTagFormView(591950381);> > > Yes indeed, Dan Hannan has become a global internet phenomenon. And he is > absolutely right to say > <http://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/5056587/For-once-Gordon-Brown-had-...>that > the stupendous impact of his speech proves that the web is a new force in > the political game. But it is also true, as so many commenters and bloggers > have noted, that this entire incident constitutes a shameful note in British > broadcasting history - perhaps even a turning point. For this splendid > speech and all the dramatic significance of a prime minister having to face > a relentless critique across a democratic chamber, was ignored not just by > the BBC but by all of the mainstream television and radio news media in this > country. To put the final twist on this ignominious story, Fox News in the > US - for whom British domestic politics are not generally a top priority > - both carried the speech and gave Dan a lengthy interview. > > Belatedly, and presumably out of sheer embarassment, one BBC programme, *The > Daily Politics *showed a brief clip of the speech followed by a discussion > between two bloggers - the whole segment being designed to depict this > phenomenon as a rather amusing internet story rather than a political > one. On the BBC website, the item is now being carried under a > headline implying that an obscure MEP has become a surprise hit on the web > by attacking Gordon Brown: so Dan's speech is categorised as a kind of weird > popular oddity, like a skate-boarding duck. But the really significant thing > to remember is that it was not just the BBC that systematically ruled his > performance out: all of the news and current affairs programmes on the > terrestrial and digital channels did the same. (Channel Four's seven o'clock > news eventually made an effort, on very similar lines to *The Daily Politics > *: this was a story about the power of the internet.) > > What must we conclude? That there is a pernicious consensus in news > broadcasting about what matters and what should be conveyed to the public. > It has very little to do with what the public wishes to know and hear. It > has a great deal to do with the regulation of news broadcasting which > stipulates a statutory "neutrality": what this amounts to is a narrow set of > criteria for what counts as being acceptable and of mainstream concern. You > can interpret this as journalistic laziness, cowardice, lack of imagination > or something more sinister - but we have now had a quite dramatic > illustration of how pervasive and restricting it is. It is time that > we liberated news broadcasting - particularly on radio and the digital > channels - to be as politically lively and differentiated as it is in the > US. Then you could choose your news broadcaster just as you do your > newspaper, on the basis of its convictions. Maybe then we would have a > chance of seeing and hearing things that, at the moment, nobody wants us to > know about. --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ Thanks for being part of "PoliticalForum" at Google Groups. For options & help see http://groups.google.com/group/PoliticalForum * Visit our other community at http://www.PoliticalForum.com/ * It's active and moderated. Register and vote in our polls. * Read the latest breaking news, and more. -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
