Did Hannan Coverage "Shame" the BBC?

The Daily Telegraph, that well known right wing mouthpiece, detects that a turning point in broadcasting history is imminent thanks to the internet reaction to Dan Hannan's speech:

Yes indeed, Dan Hannan has become a global internet phenomenon. And he is absolutely right to say that the stupendous impact of his speech proves that the web is a new force in the political game. But it is also true, as so many commenters and bloggers have noted, that this entire incident constitutes a shameful note in British broadcasting history - perhaps even a turning point. For this splendid speech and all the dramatic significance of a prime minister having to face a relentless critique across a democratic chamber, was ignored not just by the BBC but by all of the mainstream television and radio news media in this country. To put the final twist on this ignominious story, Fox News in the US - for whom British domestic politics are not generally a top priority - both carried the speech and gave Dan a lengthy interview.

The British broadcasters, rightly, gave the speech a wide berth because it was simply so much hyperbole from a virtually unknown British MEP.

The thing which turned this viral on You Tube was the fact that Fox News was all over it like a rash, pushing Hannan on to Hannity, Cavuto and any other right wing talking head who would have him. The Drudge Report and Rush Limbaugh also helped to push this thing viral.

It matters not to Hannity and Cavuto that much of what Hannan is saying is untrue - for example, no British car company has been nationalised, and the UK's national debt is actually lower than that of France, Germany the US and Japan - all that matters to the US right wingers is that what Hannan is saying is currently music to their ears.

Perhaps, before they hold him up, as Cavuto a did, as a possible "future British Prime Minister", they might pay attention to what he has said in the past.

He has long loved all things Icelandic, based on nothing more substantial than Iceland's refusal to sign up to the EU, but it's really hard to listen to a speech telling us where we are going wrong economically from a man who has previously sung the praises of Iceland's economy:

"In the ten years that I have been travelling to Iceland, I have watched an economic miracle unfold there. Today, Icelanders are absolutely rolling in it. A people two generations away from subsistence farming have become international tycoons.

Look at the City of London, for heaven's sake, which Brussels is doing its best to asphyxiate with its financial regulations.

Icelanders understand that there is a connection between living in an independent state and living independently from the state. They have no more desire to submit to international than to national regulation. That attitude has made them the happiest, freest and wealthiest people on earth."

Recognise that theme? Regulation is bad, deregulation is good. Now that way of thinking couldn't possibly lead to any financial problems could it? I mean, Iceland's economy is as solid as a rock, yes?

Perhaps it was with a gaffe that huge ringing in their ears that the BBC and ITV decided not to run with Hannan's latest rant.

Click title for Telegraph article.

Tags: Dan Hannan, BBC, ITV, Sky News, Fox News