BBC's George Entwhistle Sacrificed - Victims of Paedophiles Forgotten

The BBC has made some terrible mistakes, it's true.

However, we would do well to remember that children were abused (too soft a word methinks) and that many of the guilty for that heinous crime are still out there.

The McAlpinegate row erupted in the shadow of Savilegate. The BBC was in the shadow of a huge row over "failing to act" which no doubt made it act with gusto in order to be seen to act and then some.

To pressurise George Entwhistle to resign was pointless. Barely there 50 days, when the likes of Rupert Murdoch and son stood their ground over phone hacking, is a bit silly. It would have been better to find out who made the mistakes at Newsnight and seek redress there.

Now 'they' are on about ending Newsnight, a programme I look forward to and watch most evenings. Whilst I certainly do not agree with all its content (the media didn't convulse with guilt when Paxo and Richard Dawkins had an atheist love-in/hugathon which included Paxo mocking Christians - hardly dispassionate and balanced), to get rid of Newsnight in a fit of pique seems a tad extreme, despite the preponderance of Guardianista rich urbane lefties like Kirstie Wark and Allegra Stratton that infest it.

In all of this the victims of mostly homosexual paedophiles in positions of power (Lucy Owen on BBC Wales News the other night reported that a Masonic link in North Wales was being looked into -- because of police, judge, big businessmen and political links of the paedo-ring there) are being rapidly forgotten.

George Entwhistle isn't the guilty one here. The evil paedos are. We should never forget that!

Private D.R. Hurley Remembered

Private D.R. Hurley

Just the other day I got in touch with an old school friend called Ashley via Facebook and we began reminiscing about the good old days, catching up etc.

It turns out he had gone on to join the Paras and did 119 jumps with them. It was then he spotted a post I'd done on Facebook, on All Souls Day in honour of my uncle who had served and died with the Paras in WW2.

He then told me that he was going to London for the Remembrance Day activities this weekend, and that he would be planting a Cross for my uncle at Westminster Abbey. I hadn't asked him to, it was clearly something he felt he had to do for a fellow Para.

I have to say I was deeply moved. All too often in our daily lives we bump into people who sap our belief in humanity. Then something like this happens and it reminds me that there are good people out there, who do good works because they should be done.

So thanks Ashley! You've done something fantastic for all our extended family, and reminded me that good deeds can have a much greater impact than we may think when we do them.

Atheists murdered 50 Million in USSR

I love history and take a keen interest in politics. Thus I often debate both with my captive audience. By debate I mean rant and wag my finger, and by captive audience I mean family.

Just this week one of my children told me their history teacher made some salient points which had previously escaped my very own lips. He said you can never remove religion (as GK Chesterton said when people stop believing in God they will believe in anything). He told the class that when Stalin tried to do this, he murdered 50 million Christians. Yet despite this the Russians (Ukrainians, Balts etc) clung to their faith).

The teacher said that we often hear about the holocaust, yet this paled in comparison to the huge numbers murdered by Stalin.

I have argued this with atheists on Twitter. They respond that the Soviet Union murdered for politics - conveniently forgetting that the USSR was an officially atheist state, and those murdered or shipped to gulags were Christian.

Imagine an officially Christian state, as a matter of policy, murdered, tortured and imprisoned millions of atheists in just a few decades. The atheists would be screeching it from the rooftops. Hollywood would churn out blockbuster after blockbuster. Richard Dawkins would have written a book on it.

Yet here we had an atheist state murdering Christians and we barely ever hear about it. Why?

And while we're at it, why did we declare war on Germany after they invaded Poland in September 1939, but did not declare war on the USSR after they invaded Poland (and Finland - another British ally). What's more, we went to war in 1939 because Poland was invaded, yet in 1945 with Europe in ruins, Poland was occupied by one of the very powers that had invaded it in 1939!!! As were many other countries!

You couldn't make it up.

But how comforting to know at least one history teacher is telling his class that the atheist USSR murdered circa 50 million Christians. The truth is out there...

Never again?

Government, GCSEs and Betraying Generations

What bugs me with the GCSEs - as someone who did the last O levels, is that my double A in English has been downgraded by 20 odd years of downgrading, dumbing down of marking, cheating/marking-up of course work by some schools etc. 

The politicos have made a right mess of education. Every year for 2 decades they told us pass rates were betters and yet we kinda know that literacy, historical knowledge etc. had been plummeting. Generally speaking of course.