Trump vs The BBC
There is a degree of irony in terms of how much President Trump is set to sue the BBC for speech doctoring. Latest figures show that there are 23.8m foolish people in the UK paying / having to pay for “Ministry Of Information” style propaganda. Doing the math (yes American) this equates to around £4bn of revenue for the state broadcaster, who managed to sucker the public into paying a poll tax on watching TV. If one cannot fool the people all the time, it would appear that one can fool them for a long time. The question is how long the license fee can survive? Presumably even if Trump wins he will only receive say millions rather than billions. But in the very unlikely scenario that the full $5bn was won, it would represent approximately a year’s worth of license fee.
Of course, we know that there is rarely a dull moment with the US President. But the doctoring scandal has played so well into the MAGA mentality, one really could not make it up. We have been treated to an Orwell / Third Reich / North Korea type action, which in a digital age everyone can see is a slam dunk in terms of the BBC being caught red-handed. That said, there is an element of context hear to consider. The Wokerati / Left were in shock with the victory here of Brexit, and the victory in 2016 of Donald Trump. For them, despite the democratic mandate on both key issues, not accepting defeat was never an option.
Indeed, it is a strange characteristic of the left in politics that democracy or the will of the people comes second to what they perceive as the greater good. Enter the storming of the Capitol episode in 2021. At the time President Trump had lost the election. But the panic that ensued from then was to make sure he could never become President again. All sorts of legal actions ensued, all of which Trump managed to survive, along with the assassination attempt. But there was certainly a conspiracy within the largely left wing dominated media to ensure until his large victory last year, of his demise. Cue last October’s Panorama programme in the run up to the 2024 Presidential election, and an opportunity to defame / affect the result with a doctored speech. How could this not be deliberate? However, it could very well be the case that of all the people involved in the episode at the BBC, no one took action, because everyone there was anti-Trump.
What we have seen this week is that after being caught red handed, the BBC has apologised, something that ordinarily should have been an apology that was accepted. On the face of it the doctored speech was an individual / solitary affair, and not something which could or should have tainted the BBC as a whole. The issue now is whether the organisation is really the unbiased, diverse opinion place that it is supposed to be, or the home of left wing only journalists and management, who whether they admit or not have a specific agenda.
This agenda might be one that has only has one view on issues such as climate change, immigration, Brexit, trans issues, and the supremacy of the state (which enables its funding). In its defence, the gene pool from which it derives its editorial is and was always going to be from a certain background. One can tell this from the type of people who present and appear in leading positions at the BBC. The hierarchy is dominated by what many would label the Liberal Metropolitan Elite, with the rest of the “workers” those who have worked their way up the system by towing the company line. This explains the denial of bias claim of the outgoing Director General and CEO of News. To be fair they are probably so much in the groove of being Liberal Metropolitan Elite that they do not even know it. It is also the case that their replacements are likely to be identical.
Legal Action
So where does the doctoring crisis go from here? President Trump has indicated he will push the button on legal action this week, something which should sorely test the old adage of there being no such thing as bad publicity for the BBC. It is difficult to see how this will end well. The BBC will be facing its worst nightmare opponent. It does not have a leg to stand on. All its previous scandals could perhaps be ring-fenced. In this case it is squarely in the firing line. The only way out from this disaster with dignity would be some kind of out of court settlement. What we do know is that given what a bastion of the left the BBC is, and what a sacred cow (like the NHS), the broadcaster will survive, even if it is relegated to being a subscription service.
Trump has to prove in court that the doctoring was done with malice in order to win. Those on the left will say that it was not and it will be difficult to prove. But it seems impossible that such a conclusion will not be reached.
The Rocky Road To The Budget
It must have been the case that the no new taxes pledge was something that even this government felt was a step too far, even given the way that since being elected its approach has been totally disingenuous as compared to what was promised. “Working people”, which really means its core voters, the working class as they were previously known. In fact, one could argue that apart from the ongoing degradation of the middle class in this country, the chief victims of what Starmer and friends have achieved since coming to power have been those of the working class not on benefits. Evidence for this comes from the rise of Reform, who have captured the previous Essex Man and Woman, that Thatcher did in the 1980s.
However, there is now a problem for Labour. The numbers in the polls, and the disquiet on the backbenches means that the government is having to feel its way in terms of what the right thing to do is. It is already boxed in as far as taxes being maxed out, the rich either leaving or gone, and new migrants to feed on a daily basis. In terms of those with the broadest shoulders having to step up to the plate, they now either have only very narrow shoulders, or have taken their shoulders out of the country.
However, the real jaw drop in the run up to the Budget later this month is the policy by press leak that has been going on over the past few weeks. Hemmed in by the no new taxes on working people, the triple lock and the two child benefit cap, there is nowhere to go without borrowing even more. The unpopularity of the government makes it all even worse, as we have seen with the U-turn on an income tax rise. This upset the bond market in a way that it would not have been upset if the subject had not been broached in the first place. We are already starting to look like a re-run of the brief premiership of Liz Truss, with Keir Starmer having the issue that removing his Chancellor after the Budget, would mean him having to go soon after too. Ironically, the best thing would be if there were somehow no Budget at all this year. This is especially the case that there is hardly any policy that delivers increased cash that flagging via the media would not lead to further unpopularity or a further loss of credibility.
