BBC bullshit reveals business as usual*

The BBC is still trying to get out of the row over its fucking awful debate. All criticism of its presenter is removed or diverted into issues of 'format' ,although she was complicit in the fiasco. E.Maitlis is a woman who wants to be both a chair and a participant. She tries to set agendas and chairs only in the sense that she wants all the participants to address them. 

She is playing the gender card, of course. The BBC did the same to stave off a petition complaining about L. Kuenssberg who also makes speeches and sets agendas in the guise of intros and summing up. For the record, there are effective chairs of political debates who are women -- J. Etchingham on ITV and F.Bruce on BBC.

The BBC statement cited by the Graun is classic corporate quacking:

[It] will consider “additional steps” in its vetting process for guests [big of it really] ...[It] has defended its vetting process, saying that such programmes are likely to attract politicised contributors and unified opinion on political broadcasts would be “odd”. [generalising the issue instead of addressing a specific example]... further action may be considered in any similar shows [go away, now, we have patiently listened]

In glorious and pompous detail:

A BBC spokeswoman said: “This programme was an important contribution [who says? -- we do] to the current political debate. It was watched by a big audience [so that makes it OK] and the candidates to be the next prime minister were asked legitimate questions which our audience will have expected to have answered. [but who is the audience who decides what is a legitimate question?  How is this mystical contact between audience and the BBC producers, editors and presenters established? See blog below] “We have a long history of producing successful debate programmes and this was no different. [so sod off, you amateurs. We spoke for the nation during the War] We did however, adopt a different format for this programme and we will look at whether there are additional steps we might take on vetting and transparency should we repeat it in the future. [leave it with us -- the only problem was the vox pop bits,or perhaps the stools the politicians sat on] ...“We of course have long established procedures for programmes that we make on a regular basis, [and we have no intention of changing them, whether or not they work in specific circumstances. We formulate general policies which must be assumed to apply everywhere] and it is important to remember [you suspicious people are only expressing your own biases]  that a political debate programme involving members of the public will, by its very nature, attract people interested and engaged in issues who may well have been active in politics...“It would be odd only to have programmes involving the public where everyone agrees with the politics of those they are questioning.”[finger wagging to end, claiming some moral or intellectual high ground. Ignores the issue of the presenter having views of course]

I don't think this will fool anyone outside the BBC.