BBC News Boss Slams 'Flag-Wrapped' U.S. Media

Yahoo News ^

[Ain Soph Aur]

LONDON (Reuters) - The head of the BBC's news operations accused U.S. media organizations on Tuesday night of being overly patriotic in their coverage of the lead-up to the Iraq (news - web sites) war.

"Before Iraq, it seemed to me that some U.S. news broadcasters wrapped themselves in the flag and, as a consequence, did not perform the role the public expects of them," said Richard Sambrook, director of the BBC's global news division.

"Our natural instinct is to support our country. But the responsibility of the news media is to ask the difficult questions, to press, to verify," Sambrook said, according to an advance copy of his speech to the Columbia Journalism School in New York.

The New York Times, earlier this year, acknowledged it had failed to adequately challenge information from Iraqi exiles who were determined to show Saddam Hussein (news - web sites) had weapons of mass destruction overthrow him.

The BBC lost a high-stakes battle with Prime Minister Tony Blair (news - web sites)'s government over its own coverage of the lead-up to the Iraq war.

The publicly funded broadcaster's chairman and director general were forced to resign after a judicial inquiry into the suicide of David Kelly, a weapons expert who was the source for a BBC report that the government "sexed up" evidence of Iraqi weapons of mass destruction.

"We now know that all of us failed to ask the right questions about WMD in advance of the war. That isn't to say the war was wrong: each can make their own mind up about that," Sambrook said.

"But to do so they need accurate information, evidence that has been tested. And if a news organization imbues itself with patriotism, it inhibits itself from asking some of those questions."

The speech was in part to announce a new international committee to investigate the dangers facing journalists around the world, under the auspices of the International News Safety Institute. Eighty-five journalists and support staff have been killed in the past year.

[Ain Soph Aur]

This is so pathetic. Especially considering the BBC is pretty politically motivated. Remember this from a few days ago? The last thing the BBC needs to be doing is trying to criticize any person or organization for being overly political or patriotic, even though the BBC is pretty blatantly antipatriotic in Britain.

[unspun]

A display of the attitude in "Great" Britain that caused the disintegration of their influence in the world --and caused sensible people to get out of there generations ago.

[Arizona Carolyn]

I'm starting to dislike my ancestors.

[Moconservative]

If I lived in England I would want the government to stop supporting the BBC. I wish we would stop supporting Public Television and Radio here.

[Mo1]

Hey BBC ... How Gillgan doing these days??

[Pastnowfuturealpha]

I don't understand why the reporters are being made to think they can't be "for" their own country -

During WWII - reporters were there to cover the war and report the news back to the citizens. The subject concerning if they were for or against the US never came up -

My how things have changed - Honestly - what country should our reporters be for in this war - ? Brainwashing has led to people losing any common sense they may have had -


in my opinion -

[ProudVet77]

Actually we are funding BBC through PBS. In Boston they have an hour or so of BBC news every day. Talk about left leaning! Pure garbage. Also PBS buys a lot of TV shows from Lionheart, which is the BBC operation in America.
If we got rid of funding PBS, we'd also be hurting the BBC. Two geese with 1 shot. Not even Kerry can do that.

[MEG33]

Really?..I had not noticed.

[DTogo]

Another modern-day Neville Chamberlain...

[Jim_Curtis]

If the US media was "wrapped in the flag" they'd be suffering third degree burns.

[Bandaneira]

My Great-Great-Great Grandfather received a one-way ticket courtesy of the Georgian Crown in 1817, England to Hobart Town, Van Diemens Land. Lucky man that he was...

[GeronL]

Government broadcasting should be banned in all 'free countries'... if there are any left.

[Darkwolf377]

"Our natural instinct is to support our country. But..."

When someone like this says "But" you know the previous words are "inoperative"--said just to head off any criticism. Everything after that "But" is the speaker's real feelings. If one was confident that he wouldn't be accused of bias he wouldn't have bothered with the first sentence.

[spyone]

Love it! The left wing liars vs. the left wing liars! Socialism soon to be set back decades and they all start pointing the fingers...thus starts a GREAT 7 days!

[Question Liberal Authority]

"Before Iraq, it seemed to me that some U.S. news broadcasters wrapped themselves in trampled upon the flag and, as a consequence, did not perform the role the public expects of them,"

[kingu]

My view to the BBC creature: Your pond scum world, living off the wages of hardworking people because you couldn't figure out a way to earn your own way is hardly a mountain from upon high to sit there and complain about how anyone else in the world does their job.

Your view that the media of this country was too patriotic? How ungodly Monday morning quarterback of you. Do you sit there and talk about how a soccer game should have been played two years ago on a regular basis? It makes just about as much sense.

You're not whining about the coverage of US media; you're trying desperately to keep people from reminding how much you predicted that the US would end up sending home tens of thousands of caskets, how Iraq would not only never be conquered, but it would end up as a political war without end. You don't give a rip if there are popular elections already occurring in the new nation, you're too busy staring so far back into space that your mind has been sucked out through your own nose.

No matter how good the events are over there, you'd rather report the most embarrassing and minor segments of the war. The spectacular successes of not only our armed forces, but those of Britain and Australia just stick in your throat.

Well, you lazy self centered useless piece of belly button lint, where was your extreme examination of the attack on Kosovo? Where was your critical appraisal of not being able to prove the genocide that everyone 'knew' was going on? Why was it permissible for you to wrap yourself in the Queen's banner while it wasn't for your contemporaries in the United States?

Go crawl back under a stone, you piece of slime, and be aware: people are already getting sick of your biased coverage of all things conservative, both in your country and elsewhere. You've lost half of your American viewership, and are barely holding onto a thread in most cable markets. A few more cancellations, and you lose all those posh benefits that Americans are paying for through license fees. Without that, you will be forced to pontificate in the men's room, and praying that no one flushes.

[xJones]

A display of the attitude in "Great" Britain that caused the disintegration of their influence in the world --and caused sensible people to get out of there generations ago

Good grief, look at CBS, NBC, ABC, etc. Where should we immigrate because we have had lousy MSM for nearly three generations now.

[Question Liberal Authority]

I'm starting to dislike my ancestors.

Do what Kerry and Hillary did - invent new ones.

[Howlin]

Just thank God they had to sense to LEAVE and then fight for our independence.

[unspun]

Good grief, look at CBS, NBC, ABC, etc. Where should we immigrate because we have had lousy MSM for nearly three generations now.

We're working on it.

It's really drab on the Moon.