Excerpts from John Pilger's email correspondence
(presumably published with his permission) which,
unfortunately, show him gratuitously attacking
fellow dissident George Monbiot. Just when the
left needs more unity...
This is an issue we've covered many times before
(eg here).
The latest estimate (mentioned in a Guardian
article) is that we're giving our employers
£29 billion a year in free labour (unpaid
overtime).
More Daily Express "fury"
Here's a classic tabloid front page,
from the Daily Express. The
£28bn figure is for a ten year
period, and represents what the Express
thinks has been the cost to taxpayers
of "falsely claimed sickness benefits":
The "Fury over..."
headline is a good one. Whose fury?
Well, presumably, the Express
editor's? And no doubt a good proportion
of the Express's readers, once
the "fury over" instruction
has processed inside their brains.
Express 16/8/2010
Previous bulletins
Iraq Body Count vs Chilcot
Iraq Body Count (IBC) has successfully drawn
media attention to the failure of the Chilcot
Iraq Inquiry to take account of Iraqi casualties.
The media coverage has, for once, been fairly
prominent on the "official" failure
to take responsibility for Iraqi bloodshed. http://www.thecommentfactory.com/why-is-the-chilcot-iraq-inquiry...
Pre-election scare tactics
Predictable scare-semantics in the run-up to
the 2010 UK election: "Broken
society", "social
recession" (as opposed to economic
recession), etc. Not all media bought it - The
Economist pointed to a "steady,
deep fall in crime", claiming: "The
broken-Britain myth is worse than scaremongering
- it glosses over those who need help most".
(Economist,
6/2/10, p15, 61-63).
Media attention has now moved from "broken
Britain" to "Britain
broke" (ie out of money). But
"expert" pundits don't agree on whether
to blame the banks. Dissident
93 has some interesting observations on
the BBC downplaying the effect of the bank bailout.
(See Diary
of Distractions, 26/5/10, for more detail).
Daily Mail "makes stuff up" shock
The Daily Mail made up a story
(based on a press release from Rentokil) about
"every train compartment" containing
"2,000 bugs". The Guardiancriticised
it. (Daily Mail, 3/3/2010; Guardian, 12/3/10).
Space Hotel vs Doomsday bunker
A space hotel is apparently on schedule to
open in 2012. (Reuters,
2/11/09). Alternatively, if you think it's
all getting a bit too much, check out the plush
community doomsday bunker available in the Mojave
Desert: http://www.terravivos.com/
Handcuffed for free speech
A man was handcuffed by police for displaying
(in his own home) a poster of David Cameron,
with the caption "wanker". The audio
of his phone conservation with a policeman,
on the semantics of onanism (halfway down the
page) is amusing. (Guardian, 11/5/10) http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2010/may/11/david-cameron-poster-police
Which costs more: the bail-out of the banks
or people taking sick-days? The Guardian
has provided a useful chart for putting these
huge sums in visual context:
Answer to above question: the cost to industry
of sickies is tiny compared to the cost of bailing
out the banks (as you probably already suspected).
Most UK newspapers, on September 8th, 2009,
headlined with the "news" of a massive
terrorist plot. Actually, the story was recycled
from April 4, 2008. And when it appeared in
April 2008, it was recycled from August 2006
(when the plot was originally reported as foiled).
Compare the front pages, 2008 & 2009:
According to Metro (19/8/09), "The
[UK] Home Office has drawn up plans for mass
graves in London to deal with a second wave
of swine flu expected this autumn." http://tinyurl.com/swineflugraves
Police use of Tasers increases
Police use of Taser stun guns has increased
by nearly a third (Independent,
17/8/09). This rise followed the decision
to give Tasers to officers who don't carry traditional
firearms. The official line is that the 50,000-volt
guns "defuse dangerous situations",
but the Youtube video below shows a
more disturbing use:
BBC cherry-picks latest crime figures
Latest The latest crime figures were released
in July. The BBC 10-O-Clock news (16/7/09)
focused on the "rise" in burglary.
Actually, burglary is either "stable"
or up 1%, depending on whether you look at British
Crime Survey or police figures. And the
police figures show that burglary has halved
since the mid 1990s. BBC TV news didn't mention
that, but the BBC crime web page did provide
some context: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/8153392.stm
Official crime figures: http://www.homeoffice.gov.uk/rds/pdfs09/hosb1109vol1.pdf
Netherlands closes prisons due to lack of
criminals
The Dutch justice ministry is to close eight
prisons because a decline in crime has left
many cells empty. 1,200 jobs in the prison system
will be cut. http://tinyurl.com/o6z3ot
Following an internal review of the Lancet
2006 study on Iraqi deaths, Gilbert Burnham
(its lead author) has been suspended for violating
ethics protocols by Johns Hopkins Bloomberg
School of Public Health. This follows a rebuke
of Burnham by the American Association for
Public Opinion Research (AAPOR) for repeatedly
refusing to publicly disclose essential facts
about the Lancet study's methods. AAPOR's president
went as far as saying that Burnham's conduct
"violates the fundamental standards
of science". This is the first time
in 12 years that AAPOR has brought a charge
of ethics violation (the last time was against
the rightwing pollster Frank Luntz).
"A growing culture of fear triggered
by widespread misconceptions about the risk
posed by threats such as crime and terrorism
is exacerbating the economic downturn and hindering
recovery", according to research published
by the The Mental Health Foundation. The study
finds that a catalogue of fears are eroding
confidence, diminishing the quality of life
for millions of people and damaging mental health. http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2009/apr/14/mental-health-study-fear
Former MI5 head accuses UK government...
...of exploiting fear of terrorism with new
freedom-eroding laws. Also, the International
Commission of Jurists (ICJ) accuses US and UK
of undermining international law. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7893890.stm
IT projects over budget by £18 billion
The Times
(2/2/2009) reported that government IT projects
have total cost overruns of more than £18
billion. (See also our article
containing a list other expenditures costing
the public billions).
A recent study found that only 23% of people
in the UK count newspapers as "highly trusted"
- roughly the same proportion who consider Wikipedia
as highly trusted (BBC news online, 31/12/08).
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/7789494.stm
Lie-detector nation...
Trials of lie-detector tests for benefit claimants
have been declared successful by the government,
and it seems that this technology will be made
available for use nationwide. http://tinyurl.com/5s2ma4
... or taser-gun nation?
Better odds than the lottery? UK police are
to be armed with 10,000 Taser guns. That's one
for every few thousand households. Will you
be the lucky recipient of 50,000 volts when
you're mistaken for a troublemaker? (Sunday
Times, 23/11/08). http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article5204516.ece
Benefit fraud exaggerated
According to Neil Bateman, a welfare rights
specialist, most benefit fraud is exaggerated.
In a letter published by the Guardian
(5/12/08), Bateman claims that out of 41 cases
of alleged fiddling which he investigated, only
three were correct. He writes of "an
alarming trend for prosecutions to be based
on fundamentally flawed evidence".
And in cases where fraud has occurred, eg with
people working while claiming, they often would
have received as much, or more, in legitimate
(but unclaimed) tax credits. http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2008/dec/05/letters-welfare
A million fake copies of the New York Times
Last November (2008) around 1.2 million fake
copies of the New York Times, dated
July 4, 2009, were handed out by the 'Yes Men'.
It might have worked better if it weren't so
obviously a spoof, but perhaps that would've
led to prosecution under anti-terrorism laws.
http://gothamist.com/2008/11/12/fake_new_york_times_hits_readers.php
According to a YouGov survey, workplace unhappiness
is growing, with workers having to work harder
and longer, while seeing their pay cut in real
terms. 46% said the amount of work asked of
them has risen. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/7592050.stm
Newspapers recycle terror scares
A good example of how newspapers recycle old
stories to create terrifying new headlines was
provided earlier this year. It's best illustrated
by looking at these front pages of the Daily
Mail, Daily Telegraph and Herald:
The shocking April 2008 headlines actually
refer to an alleged crime that was foiled (and
originally reported) back in August 2006. The
headline should have read: "FAILED PLOTTERS
FINALLY APPEAR IN COURT", but that's not
frightening enough to sell newspapers. http://tinyurl.com/mail040408
The latest official crime figures have just
been released (23/10/08). They show crime falling
or stable in most categories (violence, firearm
offences, serious knife crime, burglary, vehicle-related
theft). Total recorded crime fell by 6%; recorded
violence fell by 7%; recorded robbery fell by
16%. "The risk of being a victim remains
at a historically low level". http://www.homeoffice.gov.uk/rds/pdfs08/hosb1408.pdf
There was a media backlash against Conservative
leader David Cameron's use of the phrase "anarchy
in the UK" to describe crime levels. The
Independent (21/8/07) ridiculed Cameron
in a leading article titled "Anarchy
in the UK? Hardly...". Ken Jones,
president of the Association of Chief Police
Officers, criticised Cameron and pointed
out that "Violent crime is at the lowest
it has been since the mid-90s" (Press
Association, 31/7/07). But BBC2's Newsnight
decided to use the "anarchy" phrase
as a headline to their coverage of the Rhys
Jones murder a few days later. See our correspondence
with Newsnight at Media Hell:
http://www.mediahell.org/BBCanarchy.htm http://comment.independent.co.uk/leading_articles/article2881392.ece http://society.guardian.co.uk/crimeandpunishment/story/0,,2159918,00.html
Former BBC Crimewatch host accuses
media of fearmongering on crime
Nick Ross, the former presenter of BBC1's Crimewatch
upset the Daily Mail by claiming that
newspapers are guilty of fearmongering over
crime. Ross stated on BBC Radio 4's Today
programme that "the media have long
been peddling a big lie about crime".
He went on to say: "The most common
forms of crime have plunged. Burglary is down
58 percent, car crime down 61 percent, violence
by 48 percent". He referred to the
media as "hunting in packs and hungry
for the narrative regardless of the underlying
truth".
We first read about Ross's statements in Roy
Greenslade's Guardian blog (brought to
our attention by a correspondent). A comment
on this blog adds: "Ross made the same
point during an interview on BBC1's Breakfast
programme. Sian Williams' fixed smile almost
cracked while the dashing Dermot quickly dif[f]used
the outbreak of accuracy by abruptly ending
the interview." (Daily Mail,
21/7/07; Guardian Unlimited, 23/7/07) http://blogs.guardian.co.uk/greenslade/2007/07/ross_traduced_by_telling_truth.html http://tinyurl.com/2zbjq2
(Daily Mail link)
