There once was a... quite astoundingly complacent article by Andrew Graham, who as well as being a non-executive director of Channel 4 is the Master of Balliol,and so really ought to have a limerick written about him but I can't think of a rhyme. He writes:

Third, bring the Iraq war into the picture. Notwithstanding the friction between the government and the BBC on the particulars of Gilligan's report, no one has cast any serious doubt on the much more important question of whether, overall, the BBC reported on the arguments about the war in an objective manner.

My, it must be a fine life in the seat of Wyclif and Jowett. Port at High Table, strawberries in the Quad and never, ever having to pay the slightest attention to anyone who disagrees with one.
That's the view taken by Norman Geras in this post. Normblog's general position is very much to the left of any of the posters to this blog, and I disagree with him in that I see no necessity for the BBC to exist at all. ("Il faut que le BBC vive." "Je n'en vois pas la nécessité.") But I agree with every word of this:

The war was, and is, one of the most momentous issues of recent times, and the perception was by no means an eccentric one – I'd go so far as to say it was widespread – that key aspects of the BBC's coverage were inflected, if not just downright biased, towards the anti-war case. I would mention here, particularly, the evening news on TV. If this perception is well-grounded, then the BBC's coverage was a public disgrace, one entirely justifying the complaint of people who supported the war, as to why they should have to contribute through the license fee to helping along a cause that was morally abhorrent to much of the country. It's not what impartiality about major political questions is supposed to mean.

Paley all?
Whaley oil?
Inspiration does not come. If you lot can't think of something I'll have to fail y'all.

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