Media – Page 9 – Slugger O'Toole

Is the BBC biased? (Is the Pope a Catholic?) If so, how can it speak for the nation?

Mick Fealty on June 9, 2016, 5:15 pm

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Is the BBC biased? Is the Pope a Catholic? Do Bears defecate in the woods? Yes, yes, and yes. Next? Well, I only ask because media bias is a hot topic ever since the Internet enabled us to upload our views and share them with others, giving us a work-around of the voices of authority on the box. The spark was this controversy when Corbynites jumped up and down last week demanding the head of Laura Kuenssberg, the first female BBC News …

“‘New language’, my arse!”

Pete Baker on June 6, 2016, 6:41 pm

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At his Broken Elbow blog Ed Moloney has some fun with the same Detail report that Brian noted in his recent post – “another important waypoint in SF’s bewildering, extraordinary journey“. I have read this piece several times. It is based on a speech given by SF MEP Matt Carthy and no matter how I hold it – up to the light, sideways, upside down or at various angles – it seems to be saying the same thing: the Good Friday Agreement is …

“The bullshitter is indifferent to the truth; he will say anything to suit his purpose…”

Pete Baker on June 4, 2016, 3:13 pm

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From Friday’s Irish Times, Brian Boyd with a timely reminder [for any number of reasons… – Ed] of a topic noted in the Slugger archive back in February 2005 – “On Bullshit“. From the Irish Times article – “Bullshit can be more dangerous than lies in politics” …as Dr Frankfurt explains himself: “Bullshit is trying to impress the listener and the reader with words that communicate an impression in a way that obscures the fact of the matter.” And it’s …

The Ultimate Eurovision Song Contest Winner…

Pete Baker on May 16, 2016, 2:56 pm

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With Russia discovering the joys of the politics of the Eurovision Song Contest this year, here’s the undoubted highlight from Saturday’s Grand Final in Stockholm – the interval act! Just in case anyone from the BBC, or from RTÉ, are looking for any tips for next year. Let’s face it, on recent form they could do with some. All together now! Love, Love, Peace, Peace… Pete Baker

Martin McGuinness: “We now wait to see if SDLP will stand by the principles of the Good Friday Agreement or follow the UUP into opposition…”

Pete Baker on May 12, 2016, 8:57 pm

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The response of Sinn Féin’s new MLA for Foyle, Martin McGuinness, to being upstaged – at the moment of his re-appointment as Northern Ireland deputy First Minister – by the UUP leader Mike Nesbitt’s announcement that his party had unanimously agreed to go into official opposition in the NI Assembly, betrayed a confused, or forgetful, party lashing out at sceptics, and potential sceptics, alike. [Nobody puts Baby in the corner… – Ed] From the Sinn Féin press release [added emphasis throughout] Speaking after …

Mercury in motion

Pete Baker on May 10, 2016, 4:23 pm

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If you missed yesterday’s rare Mercury transit across the Sun – the last was in 2006, the next in 2019 – then where were you! [Busy… – Ed] But even if you were paying attention you’re unlikely to have had as wondrous a view as that of Nasa’s Solar Dynamics Observatory. They’ve helpfully released a stunning time-lapse video compressing the entire 7 hour spectacle into a digestible couple of minutes. I recommend switching to full screen mode and cranking up the volume. Enjoy! [Video …

McGuinness: “Work on the programme for government has been going on prior to the election for some months.”

Pete Baker on May 9, 2016, 2:55 pm

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With only two weeks set aside to allow the new Northern Ireland Executive’s Programme for Government to be thrashed out, and agreed between the parties, you might think that time was of the essence. But apparently not… The BBC are reporting that there will be a delay to the start of those negotiations. That may be a surprise to the new Sinn Féin MLA for Foyle, Martin McGuinness. On Sunday he told the BBC that “On Monday, we will be entering discussions …

Another view…

Pete Baker on May 4, 2016, 10:33 pm

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Vote… don’t vote… In the meantime, here’s another in an occasional series of wondrous views from the International Space Station, via the Nasa Crew Earth Observations videos – Sunglint over the Ocean. [Video courtesy of the Earth Science and Remote Sensing Unit, NASA Johnson Space Center] This video was taken by the Expedition 47 crew on board the International Space Station. The sequence of shots was taken on March 25, 2016 from 11:45:02 to 11:57:17 GMT on a pass over …

Sinn Féin’s partitionist approach to united Ireland referendum(s)…

Pete Baker on May 3, 2016, 4:23 pm

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… or an attempt to avoid ‘stupid’ questions about the party’s stated commitment to campaign against the fundamental principle of consent – that it is for the people of Northern Ireland to exercise their right of self-determination. Those are the options from a comparison between the commitments on Irish unity Sinn Féin presented to the people of Ireland in their manifesto for February’s General Election, and the ones presented in the slim-lined version to the people of Northern Ireland ahead of …

President Obama jumps the Sinn Féin shark…

Pete Baker on April 23, 2016, 4:14 pm

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One of the benefits of being a US President in your final year in office, as well as getting to decide who can and can’t come to your party, is the freedom to say what you really think – even if President Obama continues to appear to be mis-briefed on shared, as opposed to integrated, education here… ANYhoo… As the BBC report notes, US President Barack Obama was speaking in London to an audience of young people when he responded to …

David Beresford hunger strike journalist and historian, RIP

Brian Walker on April 23, 2016, 10:31 am

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The best journalists are often oddballs. They can win close access to power, regardless of whether power is of the state or anti -state variety. They lack – and often spurn – status. They tend to walk alone and barely recognise dress codes. Perhaps their greatest quality is persistence against the odds, in which courage and ego play equal parts. If they have to, they skirt round or quietly ignore the rules of the institutions they work for and …

Mark Cousins: “In the middle of the joy, modernity and new tolerance that we have, we have to allow a bit of space to acknowledge that creature from the Black Lagoon, that sense of, ‘Wow, did we really do that? Were we that inhuman?’ Yes, we were.”

Pete Baker on April 9, 2016, 4:05 pm

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The Guardian’s eminent film critic Peter Bradshaw, briefly and favourably, reviews film-maker Mark Cousins’ “meditative tribute” to his hometown, “I am Belfast”- a “valuable, heartfelt tribute to a city”. …there is much food for thought. He notes the fact that images of the Titanic, created at Belfast’s Harland and Wolff shipyard, are everywhere in the city since the movie, creating a veritable tourist icon. Cousins indirectly and interestingly suggests that the catastrophe of its sinking in 1912 may have fed, or even …

“This is not an abortion war, completely not”. Facebook trolls lay off

Brian Walker on April 6, 2016, 4:35 pm

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This is an exclusive interview with an Ulster woman of a very different character. Deborah McAleese’s interview in the Belfast Telegraph with a housemate of the young woman convicted of self aborting is searing, very hard to read. Oddly the impact was less in voice on the Nolan show ( substitute ) because the housemate was composed two years after the event. In Nolan style she was pressed repeatedly for her reaction but held her ground. Her line was ” You can’t …

The Michaella McCollum interview: big mistake by the broadcasters

Brian Walker on April 5, 2016, 9:48 am

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The Irish Times joins the Belfast Telegraph in criticising the soft focus treatment of drugs smuggler Michaella McCollum. She was interviewed for RTE Features by independent film maker Trevor Birnie of Below the Radar films, an outfit that is usually associated with investigative journalism. As the Irish Times’ Hugh Linehan points out.. Given the circumstances, one might have expected a few hard questions. How much were you going to be paid for the job? Did you get money in advance? …

“as head of British intelligence, you would be derelict in your duty if you did not do everything in your power to assist that process…”

Pete Baker on April 4, 2016, 2:09 pm

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Via the Pensive Quill. In this transcript of a discussion on Radio Free Éireann in New York, with John McDonagh (JM) and Martin Galvin (MG), veteran journalist Ed Moloney (EM) has some “stupid” questions for the leadership of Sinn Féin, British Intelligence Services, and the local media. From the transcript EM: There’s a whole untold story of the peace process in the latter years of the IRA’s existence in relation to the influence of British intelligence – to what extent that was …

Former Sinn Féin Cllr Sorcha McAnespy: “There’s too much nepotism and misogyny present in the party locally. It’s jobs for the boys. It is not open and transparent.”

Pete Baker on April 2, 2016, 4:22 pm

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Omagh Councillor Sorcha McAnespy launched a broadside against Sinn Féin in West Tyrone after her sudden resignation from the party on Thursday, and announced her intention to stand as an independent candidate in the forthcoming Northern Ireland Assembly election. The Ulster Herald appears to have broken the story on Thursday. The former vice-chair of Omagh District Council said she made the shock decision because she was “left in an untenable position at local level” by Sinn Féin councillors and other members …

May’s #AE16 could be a precursor to a more open and competitive contest in 2020…

Mick Fealty on March 29, 2016, 12:33 pm

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Apart from in West Belfast, there’s not currently much in the ‘big politics’ column for the elections in May. The Lucid Talk figures are remarkably stable (it’s a relatively stable methodology), which doesn’t suggest there’s any kind of democratic tumult. In unionism, there’s speculation about who’ll get Basil McCrea’s seat, his former partner, John McCallister looks set to be squeezed out in a tough three-way battle for two Unionist quotas in South Down, and in East Londonderry Claire Sugden faces …

“The report’s Canadian authors made their numbers add up by using a ‘Tory island’ model of small government, low taxes, free markets and no debt…”

Pete Baker on March 26, 2016, 6:50 pm

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In the Irish News, Newton Emerson has fun with the recent Sinn Féin re-launch [and re-re-launch! – Ed] of the report they commissioned, under cover of the “Knights of the Red Branch Inc”, of the benefits of an economically right-wing united Ireland. From the Irish News An academic study showing Northern Ireland would be better off in a united Ireland, commissioned last year by Friends of Sinn Féin in San Francisco, has been re-launched in Dublin and Belfast to immediate denunciations …

“Would you favour a united Ireland?”

Pete Baker on March 22, 2016, 4:09 pm

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With Sinn Féin trying, again, to drum up interest in the report they commissioned of an ‘independent’ modelling of the benefits of an economically right-wing united Ireland, TheJournal.ie reports on the responses of the RTÉ Claire Byrne Live / Amarách Research Panel to the question, “Would you favour a united Ireland?”. From TheJournal.ie report The question was posed “Would you favour a united Ireland?” The question was asked in the run-up to this weekend’s Easter Rising celebrations. In total, 54% said Yes, 24% said No and …