Nigel Farage

[Arglwydd Golau]

I did not realise that you were so many years younger than me..

The Falkland Islands are quite a distance offshore from the Argentinian continental mainland, whereas Gibraltar is actually part of the continent where Spain so is situated. With Gibraltar being situated where it is, try to imagine Llandudno and the Great Orme being owned by Spain and of any attempts by Britain to try to bring it back under British control.

....or try to imagine Spain having territories in North Africa and the Moroccan Government trying to bring them back under Moroccan control! Oh, wait a minute, they have...Melilla and Ceuta, it's all a bit of colonial sabre rattling!

 

[Xenophon PCDGS]

Will France now consider their position on certain of their offshore islands under British control? With a previous posting in mind, one could make a play on foreign named islands:-

Islas Malvinas is to Argentina as Iles Anglo-Normandes is to France...:roll:

 

[yorksrob]

Will France now consider their position on certain of their offshore islands under British control? With a previous posting in mind, one could make a play on foreign named islands:-

Islas Malvinas is to Argentina as Iles Anglo-Normandes is to France...:roll:

Again, France have rather too many "terretoires d'outre mer" to go complaining about Jersey (including a rather large chunk of mainland South America).

 

[Xenophon PCDGS]

Again, France have rather too many "terretoires d'outre mer" to go complaining about Jersey (including a rather large chunk of mainland South America).

Listen, I shall say this only once...

Jersey, Guernsey, Alderney, Sark, Herm, Jethou, Brecqhou and Lihou

 

[yorksrob]

Listen, I shall say this only once...

Jersey, Guernsey, Alderney, Sark, Herm, Jethou, Brecqhou and Lihou

Yeah but Jersey's the important one (at least that's the on where Bergerac came from )

 

[kylemore]

Did anyone else see the picture of the malfunctioning big screen that gave him a mustache like an infamous German dictator?

I didn't know Angela Merkel had a moustache!

 

[TheKnightWho]

I would be curious to know what those supporters of Farage would make of this blog, which aims to correct misinformation spread about the EU in the British media. By the looks of things pretty much every single story is filled with rubbish, with the Daily Express being the worst offender and the Mail not far behind. No surprises there.

Strangely enough, the Sun seems to be quite factual (but is definitely not totally innocent).

http://ec.europa.eu/unitedkingdom/blog/

 

[WessexEclectic]

I would be curious to know what those supporters of Farage would make of this blog,...

Whilst not a supporter of Farage; "...they would say that, wouldn't they?"

And why would you expect anything else from this country's newspapers when they couldn't grasp the European dimention to the horsemeat controversy? Journalists write to sell copy, nothing more, nothing less.

 

[Xenophon PCDGS]

Let us not forget the old journalistic adage....

"Don't let the truth get in the way of a good story"...

 

[TheKnightWho]

Journalists write to sell copy, nothing more, nothing less.

Of course they do, which is why I was more wanting to know what Eurosceptics think of it, rather than what the journalists do. It is curious to see quite how much of an agenda some of these papers have, though, when you look at the other side of the story. (Although often that wasn't very difficult to work out...)

 

[Greenback]

Far too many people seem to rely on what a newspaper says as being the truth, rather than questioning the slant of the paper, or looking behind the sensationalist copy and asking what are the real issues here.

The EU is a cracking example of this. Only a couple of days ago, while in a cafe, i heard about a dozen inaccurate statements from one party to a conversation about Europe. By what they said, all their information had been obtained from the print media.

 

[SS4]

Far too many people seem to rely on what a newspaper says as being the truth, rather than questioning the slant of the paper, or looking behind the sensationalist copy and asking what are the real issues here.

The EU is a cracking example of this. Only a couple of days ago, while in a cafe, i heard about a dozen inaccurate statements from one party to a conversation about Europe. By what they said, all their information had been obtained from the print media.

Indeed, a two pronged attack is needed IMO - one to educate people that what they read may not be entirely true and the other to force responsibility on the newspapers. Self-regulation has failed and the whitewash of the Leveson enquiry gives me the impression the government are scared of the media.

Still, that can of worms is for another topic

 

[TheKnightWho]

Indeed, a two pronged attack is needed IMO - one to educate people that what they read may not be entirely true and the other to force responsibility on the newspapers. Self-regulation has failed and the whitewash of the Leveson enquiry gives me the impression the government are scared of the media.

Still, that can of worms is for another topic

Of course they're scared of the media; they're accountable to no-one but their readers, the majority of whom are neither informed nor motivated enough to do much about it in the first place, and the only thing they can do is stop buying, which has minimal effect anyway.

Is it any wonder that the papers continue to demonise politicians relentlessly? It puts them in the strongest possible position: they can run the show through blackmail and lobbying, and then throw the relevant politician under the bus as and when someone has to be held accountable for this irresponsibility. If anyone challenges them on this, they simply cry about free speech and the importance of a free media, as they did when all this business about Leveson came up.

Ultimately they're only trying to make money, but what better way to do so than by creating the scandals themselves? It is, itself, a scandal!

 

[DynamicSpirit]

Just discovered this thread

Of course they're scared of the media; they're accountable to no-one but their readers, the majority of whom are neither informed nor motivated enough to do much about it in the first place, and the only thing they can do is stop buying, which has minimal effect anyway.

Is it any wonder that the papers continue to demonise politicians relentlessly? It puts them in the strongest possible position: they can run the show through blackmail and lobbying, and then throw the relevant politician under the bus as and when someone has to be held accountable for this irresponsibility. If anyone challenges them on this, they simply cry about free speech and the importance of a free media, as they did when all this business about Leveson came up.

Ultimately they're only trying to make money, but what better way to do so than by creating the scandals themselves? It is, itself, a scandal!

I very much agree with these sentiments. Unfortunately though I doubt many readers of these papers would be motivated to stop buying them, because on the whole the 'lies' that these papers print tend to be exactly the kind of things most of their readers want to believe - which is of course partly why they buy those papers.

 

[radamfi]

The only way that papers (not 'newspapers' as they aren't really news) will change is if the public stop buying them. On the plus side, they are in terminal decline, already bought by a small minority of the population, and hopefully will be irrelevant in a few years time. I do think the BBC and other broadcasters should stop doing 'paper reviews' as that is essentially free advertising.

 

[yorksrob]

Hey, less dissing of the newspapers.

Yes, some of them are less than savoury, but reading a decent one can provide a good overview of what‘s happenning in the world (providing you critically filter some of the editorial opinion ).

Plus, fundamentally they're somthing to read on the way to work !

 

[radamfi]

There's no need to buy a newspaper to get an overview of world events. There are many highly resourced broadcasters in the UK, notably the BBC, and many other world broadcasters have news websites in the English language.

 

[yorksrob]

I enjoy a mix of good journalism and opinion (much of which makes my teeth grate, but it's worth considering anyway ) A newspaper provides the ideal way to do this.

One thing I find with electronic media is that the reader (I include myself) is restricted to what links he decides to click on, and doesn't get a full view of the whole journal, whereas by a newspaper's nature, you're forced to flick through the whole thing (even the annoying adverts) and at least scan the headlines, thereby becoming aquainted with items that previously you would have had no idea that you would be interested in.

I say long live the printed press.

 

[radamfi]

I no longer click on newspaper websites, as they get paid when you do so.

 

[table38]

Apropos of nothing, there's some interesting statistics in this Ofcom report which make me wonder why people get all worked up about "the power of the newspapers", whose influence pales into insignificance compared with the competition of the taxpayer-funded BBC!

Although then interestingly it points out that a lot of people aren't giving the TV or Radio News their full attention (so "multitasking" with the TV/Radio on).

There is one activity I think of which you can perform whilst devoting your full attention to reading a newspaper, which can be handy if you are out of loo roll

 

[radamfi]

taxpayer-funded BBC

Strictly speaking, the BBC is not primarily taxpayer-funded. It is mostly funded by the licence fee. Of course, taxpayers are typically the same people as licence payers.

 

[Butts]

I enjoy a mix of good journalism and opinion (much of which makes my teeth grate, but it's worth considering anyway ) A newspaper provides the ideal way to do this.

One thing I find with electronic media is that the reader (I include myself) is restricted to what links he decides to click on, and doesn't get a full view of the whole journal, whereas by a newspaper's nature, you're forced to flick through the whole thing (even the annoying adverts) and at least scan the headlines, thereby becoming aquainted with items that previously you would have had no idea that you would be interested in.

Isay long live the printed press.

Totally agree with you, I always read a Newspaper seven days a week to compliment other sources of information.

Also a Kindle is no substitute for a real book....

Luddite signing off !!!

 

[yorksrob]

[/B]

Also a Kindle is no substitute for a real book....:!!

Hear hear !

I sit at a screen for too long as it is, a newspaper is a nice break.

To add to other posters, I love the BBC as well.

 

[DynamicSpirit]

Apropos of nothing, there's some interesting statistics in this Ofcom report which make me wonder why people get all worked up about "the power of the newspapers", whose influence pales into insignificance compared with the competition of the taxpayer-funded BBC!

Aside from the issue of multi-tasking that you mention, I suspect there are two possible reasons for thinking newspapers may have more influence on public opinion than the graph you presented indicates.

Firstly, if you read an accurate non-sensationalized story on - say - bbc.co.uk - and then read a highly sensationalized, unfair, and not accurate version of the story in - say - the Mail, it's likely that the sensationalized version is going to stick in your head more. That's simply because the sensationalized version has been specifically written to shock you or to make you worried - to stir up an emotional reaction, and that tends to impact people much more than a simple reporting of facts. There's also the no-smoke-without-fire tendency in how many people will think.

Secondly, given that many people are aware that tabloid newspapers are often not seen as fully respectable, there may be a tendency in surveys for people to under-report how much they themselves read or are influenced by them. (The same phenomenon that leads to opinion polls tending to under-estimate support for those political parties that have an unpleasant reputation - I can't recall offhand what the name of that bias is).

 

[yorksrob]

I see the old "current bun" seems to be punching above its weight in comparison to the other rags.

 

[TheKnightWho]

I see the old "current bun" seems to be punching above its weight in comparison to the other rags.

It shouldn't be surprising, considering it has the highest readership. The Mail coming in second is also unsurprising.

The fact that these papers come in at 10% and 8% when they have readerships of 2.8m and 2m respectively, however, says a lot about how seriously their readers consider their opinions, as they seem to be the primary source for almost all of them, rather than just a source, which wouldn't be recorded on that graph.

 

[Requeststop]

Apropos of nothing, there's some interesting statistics in this Ofcom report which make me wonder why people get all worked up about "the power of the newspapers", whose influence pales into insignificance compared with the competition of the taxpayer-funded BBC!

Although then interestingly it points out that a lot of people aren't giving the TV or Radio News their full attention (so "multitasking" with the TV/Radio on).

There is one activity I think of which you can perform whilst devoting your full attention to reading a newspaper, which can be handy if you are out of loo roll

Very surprised at the high percentage for the Daiiy Mail.

Wasn't that the newspaper that thought Hitler was a good thing for the World until the 1st September 1939? My parents read the Mail for many years. The only good thing I saw there was Flook by Trog (look it up on Wikipedia) and Fred Bassett. The rest of the rag was a right-wing, neo fascist piece of paper that could only be useful in an emergency in the public WC's and to be honest I'd have rather used a couple of ten shilling notes!

Also very surprised that Radio 4 is so low in the table but I suppose the figure for the BBC at the top would include so many Radio 4 listeners and supporters. Radio 4. The best thing about the UNITED KINGDOM!

 

[TheKnightWho]

Very surprised at the high percentage for the Daiiy Mail.

It's the second-most-read newspaper in the country (unfortunately). It gives some comfort to the 'back in my day' and 'Broken Britain' camp, who never really seem to be able to provide any evidence other than a gut feeling about anything.

 

[table38]

Wasn't that the newspaper that thought Hitler was a good thing for the World until the 1st September 1939?

The Daily Mirror said the same thing at the time, odd that no-one seems to mention that!

On Monday, 22 January, 1934 the Mirror ran the headline "Give the Blackshirts a helping hand". The paper went one further than the Mail, urging readers to join Mosley's British Union of Fascists, and giving the address to which to send membership applications.

"As a purely British organisation, the Blackshirts will respect those principles of tolerance which are traditional in British politics," the Mirror told readers

 

[Butts]

Can anyone honestly say Parliament would not be improved with the presence of Nigel Farage.

Whoever you vote for he is a character , something sadly lacking in today's plastic politicians