Social Media Defence Force

Bit strawberry floated off by constantly reading this from people who've never worked there and don't have a clue about it.

I have, and I knew at the time and still know a number of Tory voters from among colleagues.

But let's move on from the anecdotal to the people I don't know, but are well-known, and whose political colours are known.

Tim Davie, the director-general, is a former Conservative councillor, his wife is still active on the Kensington & Chelsea Conservative association.

Sir David Clementi, the BBC's governor, is a former investment banker and a Conservative. He has recommended the former editor of the Conservative supporting Daily Telegraph, Charles Moore, replaces him next year.

Laura Kuenssberg, the BBC's political editor, was a Conservative activist at university.

Nick Robinson, the BBC's politics correspondent, was a former chairman of the Federation of Conservative Students.

Allegra Stratton, a former BBC Politics reporter, has just been made the Conservative's chief press officer.

Craig Oliver, the BBC's former Director of Political and Current Events Programmes, was David Cameron's chief press officer.

Jeremy Paxman, the former Newsnight presenter, has spoken of how he's always been a Tory.

David Dimbleby, the former Question Time and BBC Election presenter, is a Tory who also chairs a newspaper group that is one of the few in the UK to not recognise union members.

Andrew Neil, who presents a high profile politics programme on the BBC, is an open Tory and former editor of the Tory supporting Sunday Times.

James Harding, the head of BBC News until 2019, is a Tory who formerly edited the Tory supporting Times.

John Humphreys, until recently presenter of Radio 4's flagship Today programme and still a BBC TV presenter, has written about his support for the Tories and Brexit.

Rona Fairhead, the head of the governors before Clementi, is and was, a Conservative baroness. She's another investment banker.

Peter Fincham, former controller of BBC One, is a Conservative Party member.

Robbie Gibb, who was director of Political Programmes in the 2015 and 2017 elections, became Theresa May's chief of staff.

Former BBC Westminster editor Guto Harri was Boris Johnson head of media when Johnson was London mayor.

Stephanie Flanders, the BBC's former Economic Editor, is a Tory Party member who now works as an investment banker.

James Lansdale the politics correspondent for the BBC News Channel and now its overall foreign news editor was Harding's deputy at the Tory supporting Times.

Thea Rogers, a BBC Politics producer became first George Osborne's media advisor then his wife.

Kamel Ahmed, the BBC Editorial Standards director, worked for the Tory supporting Sunday Telegraph and the then-Murdoch-owned Sky News.

Another former BBC Governor, Chris Patten, was a former minister in Mrs Thatcher's cabinet.

Evan Davis, the new today presenter and former economics correspondent for BBC News, began his career at the Tory's favourite "think tank" the Social Market Foundation. The geniuses who plotted rail privatisation!

Former Tory minister Michael Portillo is a high-profile BBC presenter.

Conservative MPs Chris Grayling, Michael Gove, Damian Green and Esther McVey - among others - are former BBC journalists. Not to mention the Times's Matthew Paris and wife-beating Brexiteer Rod Liddle.

And on and on and on...

So, in short, the top level of BBC executive jobs is stacked with Tories and they more or less run the corporation's politics department.

But because Gary Lineker occasionally criticises the government on Twitter, right-wingers all lose their minds.

Knoyleo wrote:

Cuttooth wrote:

Knoyleo wrote:

Cuttooth wrote:

rinks wrote:

Knoyleo wrote:

Oblomov Boblomov wrote:But what is the response to that original quote? I want to say that, if socialist policies were properly implemented, it would only be the very top earners (<5%?) who would pay more and they have far too much so can easily afford to lose it, but is that a bit of a fib?

Well, "socialist policies" is a pretty broad term, too broad to be able to give any specifics about an exact % of the population affected, but if you look at, for example, the last Labour manifesto, and the tax plans in that, only individuals earning over £80k per year would have seen an increased tax bill, which is the top 5% of earners, so not even the top 5% of total population.

Remember the outrage of that berk on Question Time, who not only refused to believe that his £85k put him in the top 5%, but also reckoned he wasn’t even in the top 50%.

The audience reaction from "Too right my friend we can barely scrape by!" to "wait what" was amazing.

Labour: You earn over £80k?
Man: Yes, and I am not in the top 5%!
Audience, mumbling: You are.

I just don't get how you can get so far in life to earn £80k and think it must be some average wage.

I once lived with someone who genuinely wasn't sure if earning £40k in their early 20s was good or not, but they had literally arrived in the UK from Hungary a few months before, whilst renting in London, so I can see why she wasn't totally sure. This guy had no excuse. Not even in the top 50%

Moggy wrote:I saw a "BBC are lefties!!!" rant and thought it'd be great for this thread, but somebody got there with a perfect answer before I could do anything.

Bit strawberry floated off by constantly reading this from people who've never worked there and don't have a clue about it.

I have, and I knew at the time and still know a number of Tory voters from among colleagues.

But let's move on from the anecdotal to the people I don't know, but are well-known, and whose political colours are known.

Tim Davie, the director-general, is a former Conservative councillor, his wife is still active on the Kensington & Chelsea Conservative association.

Sir David Clementi, the BBC's governor, is a former investment banker and a Conservative. He has recommended the former editor of the Conservative supporting Daily Telegraph, Charles Moore, replaces him next year.

Laura Kuenssberg, the BBC's political editor, was a Conservative activist at university.

Nick Robinson, the BBC's politics correspondent, was a former chairman of the Federation of Conservative Students.

Allegra Stratton, a former BBC Politics reporter, has just been made the Conservative's chief press officer.

Craig Oliver, the BBC's former Director of Political and Current Events Programmes, was David Cameron's chief press officer.

Jeremy Paxman, the former Newsnight presenter, has spoken of how he's always been a Tory.

David Dimbleby, the former Question Time and BBC Election presenter, is a Tory who also chairs a newspaper group that is one of the few in the UK to not recognise union members.

Andrew Neil, who presents a high profile politics programme on the BBC, is an open Tory and former editor of the Tory supporting Sunday Times.

James Harding, the head of BBC News until 2019, is a Tory who formerly edited the Tory supporting Times.

John Humphreys, until recently presenter of Radio 4's flagship Today programme and still a BBC TV presenter, has written about his support for the Tories and Brexit.

Rona Fairhead, the head of the governors before Clementi, is and was, a Conservative baroness. She's another investment banker.

Peter Fincham, former controller of BBC One, is a Conservative Party member.

Robbie Gibb, who was director of Political Programmes in the 2015 and 2017 elections, became Theresa May's chief of staff.

Former BBC Westminster editor Guto Harri was Boris Johnson head of media when Johnson was London mayor.

Stephanie Flanders, the BBC's former Economic Editor, is a Tory Party member who now works as an investment banker.

James Lansdale the politics correspondent for the BBC News Channel and now its overall foreign news editor was Harding's deputy at the Tory supporting Times.

Thea Rogers, a BBC Politics producer became first George Osborne's media advisor then his wife.

Kamel Ahmed, the BBC Editorial Standards director, worked for the Tory supporting Sunday Telegraph and the then-Murdoch-owned Sky News.

Another former BBC Governor, Chris Patten, was a former minister in Mrs Thatcher's cabinet.

Evan Davis, the new today presenter and former economics correspondent for BBC News, began his career at the Tory's favourite "think tank" the Social Market Foundation. The geniuses who plotted rail privatisation!

Former Tory minister Michael Portillo is a high-profile BBC presenter.

Conservative MPs Chris Grayling, Michael Gove, Damian Green and Esther McVey - among others - are former BBC journalists. Not to mention the Times's Matthew Paris and wife-beating Brexiteer Rod Liddle.

And on and on and on...

So, in short, the top level of BBC executive jobs is stacked with Tories and they more or less run the corporation's politics department.

But because Gary Lineker occasionally criticises the government on Twitter, right-wingers all lose their minds.thread. But somebody got there first.

Oblomov Boblomov wrote:Just seen my first "Well I for one will not be accepting this vaccine!!" post on Facebook .

Assuming they don't turn out to be a total conspiracy nut, what is the counter argument against the seemingly reasonable point that there simply hasn't been enough time to thoroughly test any vaccine?

twitter.com/mark_toshner/status/1328837111869566976

- Covid 19 is from a family of viruses that we know quite well, such as SARS
- these are adapted vaccines, which are previously tested to some degree, not brand new

OrangeRKN wrote:The risk of long term health effects from the virus itself is likely much higher

Oblomov Boblomov wrote:I was hoping for a bit more from that Twitter thread, to be honest. He seems to just harp on about how you normally get stuck in a bureaucratic process for years and that he's confident once the data has been scrutinised, it will be deemed safe. Not the most convincing argument in the world!

Minty14 wrote:

Oblomov Boblomov wrote:I was hoping for a bit more from that Twitter thread, to be honest. He seems to just harp on about how you normally get stuck in a bureaucratic process for years and that he's confident once the data has been scrutinised, it will be deemed safe. Not the most convincing argument in the world!

But that's the explanation for it being so quick this time?

Also, think of it in man-hours, rather than X number of months, and the amount of time this vaccine has taken probably isn't as different to most others as it first appears.

OrangeRKN wrote:I listened to this the other day on Radio 4: https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000py6r (How to Vaccinate the World)

One of the guests is Paul Offit who responds to the question of reassurance on the risks of the vaccine (skip to 19.15)

OrangeRKN wrote:It's not stupid to be apprehensive about something you don't understand! Your approach sounds like the perfectly correct one - inform yourself and reassess.

Two questions:
1. Why did your Deputy Chief Medical Officer claim efficacy after one dose of the Pfizer and BioNTech vaccine is 89% after one dose, when the peer-reviewed data concluded it is actually 52%?
2. Why have you chopped off the top of the graph, so the three nations with a higher number of doses administered per million people are not included?

This is the data for Europe. Despite your claim, the graph has not been 'chopped' as you suggest.
· Reply · 9 m · Edited

I consider it misleading to publish a graph with a badge reading 'Our World in Data' then only include European countries without specifying as much.
It is also misleading (and potentially dangerous) for your Deputy Chief Medical Officer to provide us with false information around the vaccine. Why did he do that?

if you are a constituent, then please do email me with your concerns and I will respond to your further questions. I do not have the ability to sit on Facebook all day and respond to every question. Thank you.

I am a constituent but surely it is the interest of all of us to understand if there is a material discrepancy in something as important as this, and to then further understand why someone in a position of such authority and trust is providing us with dangerous false information.

I asked you two questions. I am not demanding an immediate reply and I certainly don't expect you to sit on Facebook all day. I don't think it's unreasonable to expect to be able to engage with my MP and/or her team in this way.

First of all, I reject your claim the graph is misleading. It is a graph provided by Our World In Data on the vaccine rollout in Europe. To answer your second question, Public Health England said that during the phase III trial most of the vaccine failures were in the days immediately after the first dose, indicating that the short term protection starts around day 10.6 Looking at the data from day 15 to 21, it calculated that the efficacy against symptomatic covid-19 was around 89% (95% confidence interval 52% to 97%). I note other countries around the world are beginning to follow the UK's approach, including the USA under the incoming Biden administration. Thank you again for your questions.