The freak show

Well, the BBC gave prime time television space to the buffon Nick Griffin and they got their 8 million watching, so maybe we could take this story out of the news now. However, real news is not covered, or at least not covered properly, by the mainstream media and a story like this has to be milked for a number of reasons.

in today's 'Scotsman' there is an article on the BNP's candidate for Glasgow North East, a certain Charlie Baillie, who has said that he will "go to his grave" wanting his party to remain racist and white only." My own prose are really a waste of space on this one and I can only agree with one reader who wrote: "Has the Scotsman turned into the BNP website? It seems to be running BNP stories all the time. This guy doesn't have a cat's chance in hell - protest votes (which is what got the BNP their Euro seats) will go to Sheridan I imagine. The BNP came up here and tried to cause it when the asylum seekers first moved in. They failed to make any mark then, and they will fail (miserably) again. Can we please have some Scottish politcs. This freak show has run it's course."

Yes a "freak show" that about sums it up and, of course. the 'Scotsman' is only part of a much bigger freak show. Therefore, the question has to be asked, why the freak show? There is real news out there; the ethnic cleansing of Palestine is on-going, the war crimes of Blair, Bush, Cheney et al continue to go unpunished, the bankers are paying themselves big bonuses again just months after pocketing trillions of the taxpayers' money, welfare states all over Europe continue to be eroded bit by bit while unemployment rises; why the freak show? Well, maybe that question was partly answered in the first paragraph and the BBC has to think of how it can attract peoples attention. Well, even accepting that  why not put the spotlight on Jack Straw, a man who thinks that Indian visitors should pay a ten thousand pound bond before they are allowed into the country, a man whose comment on women wearing veils to as a “visible statement of separation and difference” apparently led to young thugs trying to pull the veils off Muslim women in the street, the two-faced opportunist who, as Home Secretary in 2000, refused to extradite General Augusto Pinochet but who now as Justice Secretary wants to change the law so that war criminals who live in Britain can be prosecuted. Jack was Foreign Secretary in October 2003 and as Foreign Secretary he asked members of Parliament to vote in favour of war in which, as his statement to parliament showed, he knew innocent Iraqis would be killed.

Yes Griffin is, indeed, a buffon and a buffon is always good for a freak show. Moreover, we cannot blame the BBC's 'Question Time' for wanting to hike up its ratings. Nevertheless, what about some serious television once you get the clown on the show, what about a show where this racist and "want to be" mass murderer is shown up for the amatuer that he is? Moreover, what better way to do it than expose the opportunist and war criminal, Jack Straw. Of course, that is never going to happen and I really am missing the point; the mainstream media is there to protect Jack and his partners in crime. Yes, the buffon hikes up the ratings but he also deflects the attention from the real criminals.