Even Google’s algorithm throws up the occasional surprise, today’s UK section of Google News being an example today.

Among the links to serious newspapers, news agencies such as Reuters and major blogs, the search giant’s secret code decided that the second most important story was ‘Anti-fascists targeted by police at EDL demo’ and the most relevant article on it was that by the Morning Star Online – the internet site of the Morning Star newspaper (formerly the Daily Worker) and official rag of the Communist Party of Great Britain! Its current policy is that Britain’s Road to Socialism (the programme of the Communist Party of Britain) underlies the paper’s editorial stance.

They’ve probably had more page views this afternoon than in the last decade…

With all the health warnings and notices of caution these days – “Caution: this bag of peanuts may contain nuts” – it’s a wonder that newspaper articles don’t have to carry warnings of their columnist’s vested interests, editorial bias and ideological bent. This article by the hopelessly unfunny David Mitchel falls under all three categories. Having earlier calculated that the BBC costs me £1.40 per hour watched, I’m not feeling that sympathetic to the Beeb, but this article really takes the biscuit.

In the space of 1121 words there’s the politics of envy and class war, with a cheap personal jibe…

When the Conservatives’ deputy chairman, Lord Ashcroft, revealed that his party donations are dwarfed by the sums he’s withholding from the nation by tax avoidance, the Tories didn’t panic. They decided the crisis didn’t require large-scale political fire-fighting – a little squirt would do. But George Osborne’s terribly busy these days so they plumped for Michael Gove.

I doubt he was thrilled. Ashcroft is what an old-school Tory might describe as “the sort of chap who wants to run the club but won’t pay his subs”, the club in this case being Britain. It’s a difficult position to defend and interesting that Ashcroft didn’t try himself. Maybe he kept saying: “Shut up or I’ll buy you!” when he practised TV interviews. That doesn’t go down as well on Channel 4 News as it does when booking a table at a busy Belizean restaurant.

…A bit of a “nasty tory” imagery and “Tories to wreck BBC” lying…

Gove did a decent job fielding Jon Snow’s questions and then beetled over to the BBC to face Newsnight’s Kirsty Wark. Gove’s tactic was to keep repeating that the other main parties were bankrolled by men with equally poor senses of civic duty and ignore Wark’s point that Ashcroft’s role as deputy chairman made his case different. Then, at the end, Gove went on to the attack.

“We’ll be watching, Kirsty,” he said darkly (although it’s not as if he ever sounds like Bagpuss) and then, in a significant tone: “The broader question will be, ‘Is the BBC failing in its duty to hold other parties to account?’”, leaving Wark to wrap up the interview in a fluster ill-concealed by a pretence of being hurried. Maybe she had the director general screaming in her earpiece: “Tell him we’ll get rid of CBeebies if he’ll just leave us alone!”

How should Gove’s remarks be interpreted? The cheap tricks of a deft debater? The usual politician’s paranoia about BBC bias? Maybe it’s my own paranoia but I thought he meant: “We’re not going to have to take much more of this. There are going to be some changes round here.”

The next morning, as Mark Thompson announced his plan to close a couple of radio stations, slim down the website, spend less on imported programmes and sport and generally get his tanks off the Murdochs’ lawn, and reseed it, he insisted in the Guardian: “The proposed changes are not a piece of politics.” Smashing! That means they can’t be. If politics were involved, he’d have to say so, wouldn’t he? There’s probably some sort of law, like with salt in ready meals. But who can blame him for addressing political realities when the Tories are sharpening their knives live on Newsnight?

…And then the real meat in the form of a truly dire defence of the BBC…

Over the last two years, as recession and internet have obliterated their profits, the BBC’s competitors have conspired to make headlines out of its failings. Not even Katie Price’s insatiable thirst for publicity can elicit as much press as the corporation gets while trying to keep a low profile. Every night, it’s metaphorically falling out of some nightclub.

And the politicians have joined in, as if they genuinely believe this torrent of negative coverage is an expression of public concern rather than corporate envy. This, in turn, forces the director general to court the politicians. Not that he can ever win, as Ed Vaizey, the shadow culture minister demonstrated. When it was first leaked that 6 Music may close, he welcomed it; three days and a Twitter storm later, he said he’d become “an avid listener”. What would Thompson have had to jettison to keep him onside for a whole week?

The BBC exists in a nest of paradoxes. First, it’s supposed to be impartial yet accountable – impartial politically, but accountable to the licence fee payer. But how is that accountability to manifest itself other than through politicians whom its impartiality should empower it to ignore? Getting people to text in their snow pictures seems to be the current best guess.

Second, it’s supposed to provide content that the free market wouldn’t otherwise support and not hamper commercial competitors too much, and yet remain popular enough to prevent viewers resenting the licence fee. People, including Thompson last Tuesday, say the BBC should “concentrate on what it does best”, but most of us wouldn’t pay £142.50 a year just for the Proms and Storyville. We also want Strictly Come Dancing, Football Focus and, in millions of cases, Jonathan Ross.

And third, the licence fee is unfair. It’s basically a poll tax (maybe that’s why Mrs Thatcher kept it). It would be much fairer to fund the BBC from income tax. But that would destroy its independence and leave its future in jeopardy at every budget. That’s why I firmly believe that the licence fee is the only workable system, a fudge though it undoubtedly is.

These contradictions make it very easy to find fault with the BBC and let its critics evade the real question which is, simply: do we want it or not? It’s a binary choice, all or nothing. I once came across a very persuasive analysis of organisations (it’s from the book Intelligent Leadership by Alistair Mant) which divides them into two categories: bicycles and frogs.

A bicycle is put together from interchangeable parts. You can take a bicycle-like system apart, polish or improve elements and then reassemble it into something that works better. A frog, however, evolved as a whole. If you chop a little bit off, it’ll muddle along. And another little bit and another and it’ll still be a frog, albeit a less functional one. But finally, with one tiny further change, it will cease to be a frog and nothing you can do will ever put it back together. Well, the BBC is an organisation to melt Miss Piggy’s heart.

Its anatomy isn’t perfect, as I’ve discovered while making The Bubble, a BBC news-based panel show with which BBC News has refused to co-operate. But sometimes a frog kicks itself in the head, I suppose – or to characterise BBC News’s decision in a way to better reflect how they see themselves in relation to comedy, head-butts itself in the rectum.

I understand why the BBC frustrates the private sector – it makes business much harder for them. But I don’t know why they expect the public to care, other than out of concern for the Murdoch and Rothermere families’ finances. In all their whingeing, they’ve consistently failed to point to any other country where, thanks to the unfettered function of a free market, better television, radio and online content are available.

On the contrary, the BBC is the envy of the world. Why are we letting its competitors, and the politicians they have frightened or bought, tell us that we can’t keep it as it is?

Now I always thought the NHS was the “envy of the world”, so is it that we are so lucky to have two such things that are universally envied? If that is the case, why has no country on Earth copied either?

Mitchell’s little argument is woeful. He argues that “its impartiality should empower it to ignore [politicians]” but does not realise its impartiality is not meant to be about ignoring politicians – to instead pursue their own BBC agenda – but rather treating them in an impartial, balanced, fair way.

He then argues that if it opted to provide content that the free market wouldn’t otherwise support “most of us wouldn’t pay £142.50 a year just for the Proms and Storyville”, seeming to forget that a slimmed down BBC wouldn’t cost £142.50 per year. It would cost less. That’s the whole point. No one is arguing for the BBC to cost the same but do less!

As for the argument direct tax funding “would destroy its independence and leave its future in jeopardy at every budget”, I can’t see that being any worse. It’s hardly unbiassed now, if it was “little squirts” like David Mitchell wouldn’t be making party political points in the press!

Last night on the Sky News Paper Review the Mirror Editor Kevin “Labour Muppet” Maguire reached new lows alongside an Editor/journo from the Indy who’s name I forget. Discussing Army equipment shortages the pair were both quite certain that Gordon Brown wasn’t to blame but instead – in their contrasting “chippy northern” and “Islington liberal” tones – decided to blame the Army! “If it was so bad they should have resigned,” they agreed, advocating in effect dereliction of duty in the middle of a conflict. Then they decided to excuse the equipment shortages – “all wars are like that to begin with” – and cited World War 2 as evidence! Of course WW2 was somewhat larger in scale than Iraq/Afghanistan and most wars do not have equipment shortages to begin with – indeed this one doesn’t if you’re American! – but when you’re either delusional or just mad reality doesn’t really matter. (And come to think of it we’ve been at war for nearly 9 years so it’s hardly still “in the beginning” yet there’s still shortages!)

This morning however I notice Maguire is at it again!

Armchair generals bad-mouthing Gordon Brown sound like tinpot dictators plotting a military coup. The pensioned-off commanders are yomping into a political minefield, dangerously close to overstepping the line of acceptable criticism ahead of a General Election.

If the equipment was so bad, and young men were sent into battle without the weapons to do the job, why didn’t the chiefs do the honourable thing and resign?

Instead, the top brass enjoyed the Brideshead lifestyle on the taxpayer – with lavish dinners served by domestic staff in large houses. I listen with growing cynicism to what sounds like the armed wing of the Tory Party.

The Mirror: Rank bad form to have a go at Gordon Brown

Having again insulted those who have fought for Queen and Country as “pensioned off arm chair generals” and insinuated partisan politics in their comments – the full article also has some very cheap envy politics about military pensions that I decided not to copy – he then decides to attack and insult the Queen!

The Queen stands accused of gross disloyalty to her subjects by threatening to sell off their homes. Secret files released under the Freedom of Information Act reveal the Crown Estate’s “Project Blue” to flog 1,280 London houses and flats.

The properties, in Camden, Hackney, Lewisham and Pimlico, are currently let at decent rents and include “homes fit for heroes” built for returning servicemen after the First World War. Yet the documents, which I’ve read, show flunkeys more worried about making money and “reputational considerations” – flak – than the welfare of the families living in these homes.

Now, it’s possible Her Maj doesn’t know what the Palace sharp suits are doing in her name. In which case, she should get a grip. Or, if she actually wants to sell homes to a “blue-chip private landlord” which would inevitably put up rents, brace yourself, our noble Queen, for those “reputational considerations”. Because a state-subsidised multi-millionaire grandmother – who inherited Buck House, Windsor Castle and the rest – owes ordinary families a roof over their heads at affordable rents.

The Mirror: Queen’s rotten estate

Now the article is an interesting case of language use for a political point. Using the words to suggest a threatening, Sheriff of Nottingham type figure – and the line “currently let at decent rents and include ‘homes fit for heroes’ built for returning servicemen after the First World War” to invoke the image of a charitable basis to the rental agreements and utilise a charity group currently in vogue (veterans) – he assassinates the character of the accused. Who doesn’t want to let homes at decent rents to heroes? That nasty “multi-millionaire…..”.

However Maguire is either ignorant or deliberately deceitful.

Google Crown Estates and their website clearly reads its purpose is “to enhance the value of the estate and the income it generates”. It is therefore not and never has been a ‘homes fit for heroes’ charitable venture as Maguire suggests, and I doubt anyone has been a tenant since 1918 either. And as Maguire mentions no figures for these “decent rates”, I’m guessing they’re in line with the market rates, it’s main objective after all being “to enhance the value of the estate and the income it generates.”

Then there’s one other thing. Maguire used his article to make attacks on the Queen, a childish character assassination from the book of envy, but the Queen doesn’t run or benefit from the Crown Estate. As their website says, “We have two main objectives: to benefit the taxpayer by paying the revenue from our assets directly to the Treasury; and to enhance the value of the estate and the income it generates.”

So it’s not the Queen who should be “accused of gross disloyalty threatening to sell off homes…currently let at decent rents and including ‘homes fit for heroes’ built for returning servicemen after the First World War, and more worried about making money and flak than the welfare of the families living in these homes” – it’s Maguire’s beloved and cash-strapped Labour Government!

Wonder if he’ll issue a correction/apology?

It’s been announced that the BBC “licence fee” is to go up 2%, which takes it to £145.50 per year. Just a decade ago it was £104, making a 43% increase in ten years! Doing the maths – where did I put that calculator? – that equates to 40p a day. But I don’t watch the BBC every day – I might watch Sky or ITV or a DVD, I might be on holiday or out or suffering a powercut – which got me thinking: how much does the BBC cost me per hour? I did the maths.

With the assumption this last week was a normal week, I have watched the following programmes:
Seven Ages of Britain (BBC1)
Country House Rescue (C4)
The Mentalist (Five)
I watch Sky News because the BBC News is inferior, and never listen to BBC Radio. I watch a programme on BBC4 probably once a month or so on average, recently Indian Hill Railways and – as there was nothing else on – a documentary about Skippy the Bush Kangeroo, these being the only things I’ve watched on BBC4 for upwards of six months. I watch New Tricks and Spooks when they have new series. So this week I’ve watched 1 hour of the BBC, but adding in these I probably average 2.

So 2-hours of BBC1 costs me a mandatory £145.50 a year, or £1.40 per hour watched. Click, click, click… What’s that Skippy, you think it’s a rip off?

One of my current projects is MyBillboard.Net, a conservative version of MyDavidCameron – the site by Labour activists for spoof Tory billboards – and its automated billboard generator. This new website will be linked up with ConservativeHome’s new MyLaboutPoster, to which I have offered the generator. Currently I’m finalising a few server issues for v1 to launch tonight I hope, this initial launch offering users the ability to add their text to a number of pre-made poster designs and share them from the site. By Friday and possibly tomorrow however I hope to have v1.1 live, which will allow users to upload their own background images as well. In the meantime try not to get too excited about the possibilities and enjoy these posters I’ve generated featuring some new Labour voters – be sure to read the small print.

And you should read this to go with the last one.

My condemnation of yesterday’s chart victory by anarcho-communist rock band Rage Against The Machine and the envy fuelled hate campaign behind it caused several comments on this blog. Television talent shows are coming under a lot of criticism it seems, but I think they deserve defending for three reasons.

The first is of large impact to a small number of people, and that is that television talent shows such as X Factor and Britain’s Got Talent are very good financially for the talented people featured. Though small in number, those that win, place well, or somehow catch the public’s attention, can have their lives transformed to various degrees. The likes of Paul Potts, Susan Boyle, Leona Lewis, Alexandra Burke and Joe McElderry would probably never have “made it” without these shows. They may have long or short careers, sell millions of records or have a club career, but that’s besides the point – the point is that they benefit and I for one am pleased for them all.

The second is further reaching, and that is the fact these programmes and the acts they give a springboard to are popular, bringing joy and entertainment to millions. The critics argue it is “unreal”, “synthetic”, “commercialised”, “manufactured”, etc, or that the singer isn’t playing an instrument, or didn’t write it, but who cares? Do you go to the theatre and complain that it’s a manufactured cover version of Hamlet? If you don’t like it, don’t watch/buy it, but don’t use music snobbery to demean the tastes of others.

But the third reason is THE most important, and that is the mass promotion of aspiration and optimism, an effect enhanced when you include quasi-talent contests such as The Apprentice, especially the USA version, Dragons’ Den, and The Restaurant. The very fact that nearly 200,000 people applied for this year’s X Factor, and millions in total to previous series and other such programmes, shows we are still an aspirational and optimistic nation. These shows promote that aspiration and optimism, particularly in children, and if a few more start to aim higher in life, and start building their talents or planning a bright future, rather than never dreaming a dream, that can only be good for a free capitalist society.

They can’t all be pop stars, The Apprentice or open a restaurant with Raymond Blanc, but aspiration spreads and can only be a force for good. If one more kid aims higher thanks to talent shows on TV, that’s a World more good than hatred ever achieves. That is why it’s such a shame Hate beat Hope yesterday, and perhaps why talent shows get so much “stick” from the anti-aspiration envy fuelled Left, but somehow I feel the Hope of talent shows will have the last laugh.

I’m not an advocate of censorship, but I do believe in two important caveats.

The first is that there is a time and a place. Whilst I do not support laws against ’speech crimes’, responsible adults should respect others and know when certain language or behaviour is not appropriate. Genuine libertarians should accept this, focus on defending political free speech, and preserve the good name of libertarianism and honour of free speech from radical nutters who want every other word to be an expletive. As they say in America, enjoy freedom responsibly.

The second is that contractual obligations are kept. If you enter a building or take a job or make an agreement you are accepting the rules that are set by the owner, boss or deal maker. If you don’t like it, don’t do it, no one is forcing you; buy your own building, start your own business, find another deal. Just as people who don’t like a film or book should switch channel etc, so can you.

This leads me back to Rage Against The Machine and their chart battle with Joe McElderry of X Factor, started by an envious hate campaign.

Speaking on BBC 5 Live this morning, Rage Against The Machine [RATM] frontman Zack De La Rocha said: “Simon…seems to have profited greatly off humiliating people on live television and has a unique position of capturing the attention of people on television, but also the airwaves. We see this campaign as a necessary break of that control.”

Like most celebrities trying to make a political point, words of which they have no real knowledge are bandied around like confetti at a wedding because they think it makes them seem smart. After “profiting” and “control” it gets worse, as the Rage Against The Machine crew aim for a full house in anarcho-socialist bingo. [The band use Soviet, socialist and communist imagery almost exclusively].

Guitarist Tom Morello added: “People are tired of being spoon fed one schmaltzy ballad after another. They want to take back their own charts. We’re honoured they’ve chosen our song to be the rebel anthem to topple The X Factor monopoly.”

“Take back”, “rebel”, “topple”, “monopoly”…still lacking “exploit”, “commercialised” and “dictatorship”. But then they didn’t get chance. The band then performed the song – including the repeated lyric “f*** you I won’t do what you tell me” – leading to the station cutting them off air.

Presenter Nicky Campbell had asked them to perform a clean “radio edit”, it is after all a BBC breakfast show. They childishly broke the agreement, and the BBC were right to pull the plug on them.

After pulling the plug on the fourth repetition of the lyric, co-host Shelagh Fogarty said: “Sorry, we needed to get rid of that because that suddenly turned into something we weren’t expecting. Well, we were expecting it and we asked them not to do it and they did it anyway.”

“So buy Joe’s record!”

A BBC spokesman later added: “Five live Breakfast featured a live broadcast of the song Killing In the Name by Rage Against the Machine. We had spoken to the band repeatedly beforehand and they had agreed not to swear.”

Rage Against The Machine have widened the gap over X Factor winner Joe McElderry in the battle for the Christmas No 1, according to UKPA. The RATM record, which has been the subject of an internet campaign to “ruin Simon Cowell’s Christmas£ has buildt up an impressive lead of more than 60,000 sales.

The release, seen as an anti-X Factor protest vote by music fans, edged ahead of the show’s winner yesterday – and new figures show the lead is growing. Surprise contenders RATM today praised the internet campaign which has driven their sales and declared: “Let the people decide.”… RATM’s guitarist Tom Morello told BBC 6 Music the campaign was “a little dose of anarchy”, but was not aimed at Joe or even Simon Cowell.

However I would contend that last comment. This isn’t Rage Against The Machine, it’s Envy and hatred, much like that which was directed at Susan Boyle. And as my evidence, these sample comments from iTunes.

“X Factor continues to pollute music. Why do we have to put up with this endless stream of X Factor cheesy commercialised cheap covers being no1 every year?”

“Rage Against The Machine. Not another X Factor Christmas dictated chart please.”

“Absolute Rubbish! This person cannot sing to save his life, if you want a decent song buy Killing in the Name by Rage Against The Machine.”

Now you may or may not like Joe McElderry and Simon Cowell, that’s your choice, but buying Rage Against The Machine to deny them a #1 is just plain stupid. Even if you are an envy-fuelled person who hates to see a youngster achieve something, they’ll still sell as many records and make as much money, who cares about charts?

I couldn’t put it better than Fraser McAlpine, who links the campaigners dislike of the people behind the X Factor song but also those that buy it.

“It strikes me that there is a nasty streak of snobbery to the Rage Against The Machine campaign, because essentially the people behind it not only don’t approve of the song the X Factor has made – before they have even heard it, which is always lovely – but they don’t like the people who DO like it. They think these people are easily-led. They may use words like ’sheep’ or ‘masses’ or ‘plebs’ or ‘chavs’, and they believe themselves to be above such obvious mind-control.”

But who started this campaign? I wouldn’t be at all surprised if this campaign has links to the band or label, who are certainly encouraging it, after all who started it and picked Rage Against The Machine? Wouldn’t it be funny if those envy filled music snobs that brand Joe’s fans as sheep turned out to be, errr, sheep….

Something incredible is happening. On September 6, 1943, Winston Churchill famously told an audience at Harvard University that “the empires of the future will be empires of mind”. It was interpreted as a signal Britain understood the age of empire was coming to an end; but of all Churchill’s great soundbite quotes this is perhaps the most insightful, and least understood.

The age of empires did indeed draw to a close, but Churchill’s empires of mind have only just begun. These new empires of mind aren’t built by armies, run by colonialists or shaded pink on the map (or any other colour). They have no Head of State, nor State for that matter either. They are ideas and information, and one such idea – free western liberalism and democracy – and the information about it, is conquering new territory every day. Ronald Reagan said that information was the oxygen of the modern age, for it “seeps across the borders topped with barbed wire, wafts across the electrified borders.” The internet has turned that seepage and waft into a tidalwave – and the results are staggering. Unrelated and distant events are all proof.

Why did the public in Pakistan so suddenly turn hostile to a Taleban threat they had been happy to appease? They got a viral email featuring a YouTube clip. No one knows what the poor young girl had done; what they did know is what they saw done to her – held to the ground and whipped – and that they were reviled. Video killed the radio star, YouTube killed the Taleban (or their PR anyway).

What’s letting protestors communicate and the public stay informed in Iran? Twitter and its #hashtags. It’s not so much a case of “They may take our lives but they may never take our freedom” but more “they may rig our election but they may never take our Twitter and Facebooks.”

Why do we know Labour planned to smear its rivals? How can anyone reach a global audience? How can the World, his wife, his kids and the pet parrot all have a say? Blogs.

From video of state wrongdoing – the recent taser incident being newest – to blog journalism, YouTube video to Twitter updates, the ever more rapid and open flow of information is going to be the biggest force for change – and it’s good news for freedom and democracy.

Most of it may be rubbish – YouTube videos of cats yawning, blogs about Ukip, Twitter Tweets about the weather – but that’s its biggest strength. They can block the BBC, but they can’t stop someone outside pasting articles onto an email or blog (and if they find and block that then another will take its place). And they can’t stop people imparting information about other places and lifestyles from even the most mundane of things.

The Internet will change the World, and the revolution won’t just be televised, it’ll be YouTubed.

Sir Alan Sugar is one person who really annoys me. The Apprentice is one of my favourite shows, I’m extremely pro-business and have no qualms with any other businessman in particular – but he drives me mad.

Maybe it’s because I’ve not agreed with a single one of his final choices on the series – James and Miriam in Series 1 then Lucinda and Raeph from S4 were the only ones deserving a six figure salary – or maybe it’s because he is just such an envious, arrogant and obnoxious misery (as Paul Merton discovered when Siralan went on Room 101).

But most of all I think it’s because he promotes himself as one of Britain’s top business gurus. Margaret Thatcher ones said that being powerful was like being a lady, if you had to tell people you were then you probably weren’t. I get that feeling with Siralan.

He sits on his raised chair in a TV studio’s mock-boardroom with its bizarre shortage of seating, presiding over grovelling Apprentice hopefuls who had never heard of him before the series started, telling us all how he’s an acclaimed business expert. But has anyone bought an AMSTRAD lately? No, me neither.

Alan Sugar was extremely successful at producing and selling cut-priced consumer electronics; mass market versions of more expensive products. There is no knocking him for that. But that does not qualify him to be the nation’s business guru, the government’s oddly titled ‘Business Tsar’. He failed to innovate, stifled creativity, built shoddy products, fall out with buyers from chains such as Currys (reportedly being rude, swearing at them etc)…and got left behind.

From its heights to its sale last year, Amstrad had lost 90% of its value.

If the government wanted a real advisor on business, I would recommend Sir James Dyson. Also a self-made man, he exemplifies innovation, quality, and sound business practice. Worth £1.1 billion according to The Times, Dyson is the market leader (by value) of vacuum cleaners in the USA – outselling Hoover in their home Hoover market!

He also knows – as he told the Money Programme recently – that Britain’s future lies in the creative industries, innovation, design, technology. Being the best rather than being the cheapest. The polar opposite of Siralan.