- Kevin Bakhurst
- 21 Jun 06, 12:08 PM
Quite a strange - but nice - one this.
The BBC News team out in Baden Baden were talking to the England squad last week and the players said how much they would appreciate getting a feel of the World Cup fever back home.
But they can't get British TV in their hotel. After a brief conflab, my colleague Kevin Bishop and I suggested a possible idea: that we could arrange with the BBC engineers to provide them with News 24, and arrange a time for them to see a special World Cup Sportsday to see how England was reacting to the tournament so far.
The players were very keen - so we're up and running. We're also asking for viewers' messages for the team, with some help from Breakfast and Newsround. It's 18.30 UK time on Thursday - straight after their dinner.
Kevin Bakhurst is controller of BBC News
- Peter Barron
- 21 Jun 06, 11:05 AM
When the BBC starts running programmes called "How to beat Jeremy Paxman", you know there's trouble lurking.
Last night we booked Ann Coulter, the extraordinary new phenomenon of the American right who has been topping the US bestseller list with, among other books, her own guide - "How to Talk to a Liberal (If You Must)".
Now, Jeremy wouldn't categorise himself as a liberal, and Newsnight certainly welcomes conservative and alternative thinkers, but in the course of the day he wondered with some anxiety how best to talk to her.
Her many utterances are so outrageous - for example, "I think the government should be spying on all Arabs, engaging in torture as a televised spectator sport, dropping daisy cutters wantonly throughout the Middle East and sending liberals to Guantanamo" - that he had to challenge them, and ask if she really believed it or was just saying so for effect.
Once the interview was underway (watch it here) it quickly became resoundingly clear that she believes everything she says, otherwise why would she have said it?
Some bloggers felt Coulter beat Paxman. I prefer to think that in this electric encounter TV was the winner.
Peter Barron is editor of Newsnight
Daily Mail: BBC radio presenter Jeremy Vine apologised on air on Tuesday after his show ran a spoof news item saying that Soham murderer Ian Huntley had been murdered in his prison cell (link)
The Guardian: "A request from the England camp for news of how their World Cup performances are going down back home has prompted BBC News 24 to adjust its schedules" (link)
Financial Times: The BBC's director-general writes, "all BBC journalism must be rooted in our values and in an agenda, not just of what is interesting, but what is important" (link)
