Marr still won’t call the prime minister a liar
Millions of people have seen Boris Johnson lie. ITV‘s flagship breakfast show even allowed a debate about it. So, you may have been hoping the Andrew Marr Show was going to tackle the issue. But if you were – prepare to be disappointed.
A viral video on GMB
Peter Stefanovic is a campaigning lawyer. He’s been vocal on issues surrounding the NHS, disability rights, and others. Recently, a video he produced about Boris Johnson’s lies to parliament has gone viral. As of 12pm on Sunday 11 July, it’s had nearly 26 million views on Twitter alone:
25 MILLION VIEWS!
Working TOGETHER we have sent a powerful message to UK News shows if they won’t hold this Prime Minister to account for his rampant lying in Parliament we will do it ourselves!
How long can you ignore it now @BBCNews @BBCBreakfast ?
pic.twitter.com/PlvEkEij1V— Peter Stefanovic (@PeterStefanovi2) July 1, 2021
Read on...
Until 7 July, the corporate TV media had not reported on Stefanovic’s video – nor Johnson’s lies. But then, Good Morning Britain (GMB) did. The show had Stefanovic on. He said:
the public really do care about the almost rampant lying that we are witnessing in parliament at the moment. And the film itself appears to have become a public protest at the outright lies that we are being seen told on the floor of the house practically every week.
So, would Marr follow GMB‘s lead and allow Johnson to be called a liar? Not likely.
Marr just can’t say it
Marr had vaccine minister Nadhim Zahawi on the show. First, the host showed a clip of the government’s chief scientific advisor Patrick Vallance. Vallance said that the vaccine “weakened” the link between cases and hospitalisations. But he noted it wasn’t a completely “broken” link. Zahawi said he agreed with Vallance, but he also knew where Marr was going with this.
Because the show then cut to Johnson during Prime Minister’s Questions (PMQs). The PM said that the vaccine had:
severed the link between infection and serious disease and death.
Marr put it to Zahawi that what the PM said was “wrong”. Of course, the vaccine minister defended Johnson. Then, Marr asked him if the PM had ‘misled’ parliament by saying this. Zahawi disagreed. But throughout this bit, Marr couldn’t bring himself to say the word ‘lie’:
Clearly, thinking the BBC‘s flagship Sunday political programme would call out the PM as a liar (or even allow a debate on whether he is or not) was too much to ask. It’s a damning indictment when the non-publicly funded ITV is holding our corrupt politicians to account more than the public service broadcaster is.
Featured image via the Andrew Marr Show – YouTube and Chatham House – Flickr
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There are more lies than those exposed by Stefanovic – BJ is an inveterate liar & he has always gotten away with it.
Staggering that this immoral clown can be voted in to the highest office in the land, given that he is also unbelievably incompetent. The BBC has lost all credibility with people capable of rational independent reasoning. Those interested in more of the sordid details should read Peter Oborne’s Assault on Truth which lays out where BJ & his ilk stand on decency & truthfulness. It’s a short read but quite illuminating.
What Mr Zahawi was trying to do with his repeated uses of the word ‘severely’ as in ‘severely weakened the link’ was to try to imply that Johnson’s use of the term ‘severed’, was simply a slip of the tongue.
I gave up with the idea Marr was an non biased journalist some years ago. He’s as complicit in supporting this vile government as much as Kuenssberg. The biggest joke of all is when the Tories go on about the left wing BBC.
As Chomsky pointed out, of course if Marr didn’t believe and behave the way he does, he’d never be in the postion he is in.
Bliar didn’t ‘lie’ when he said Saddam had WMDs, even though the UN Mission itself said that he didn’t. Bliar didn’t ‘lie’, when he claimed this illegal invasion hadn’t been planned long before, he just ‘forgot’ all those previous conversations where the agreement to invade was made. Easy slips to make.
Scameron didn’t ‘lie’ when he claimed that Gadhaffi was planning a “massacre” in Misrata, although no-one in the UN took it seriously as that wasn’t how politics was done in Gadaffian Libya, and there had been no massacres before. 40-60,000 Libyan deaths later, and then the civil war starts… but that wasn’t a ‘lie’. Nor claiming that no UK Intel was on the ground… although as it turned out later yes they were, aiding Islamic extremists to plan that civil war, and quite likely planting the very bombs that lead to the conflict.
However, lifelong anti-racism campaigner Jezza very much DID ‘lie’, when he said he was not anti-Semitic, and was tackling it in the PLP (Although as we now know, what he SHOULD have been doing is expelling Jewish Socialists, and anyone who believes Palestinians are actual humans.). And thankfully, the BBC spent many thousands of hours calling Jezza out on those lies.
Because, priorities.
The only things holding the UK together, is the Queen, NHS, and the BBC.
The NHS is being rapidly privatised, the BBC quickly becoming Murdochlite, and sadly the Queen won’t live forever.
It seems obvious that ‘Little Englanders’ like their politicians liars, thieves, and sociopaths.
The English have got the govt they deserve. Shame for everyone else.