Hemlock on the BBC, Iraq and hostages:

Didn’t BBC TV news once have a reputation for being vaguely watchable? Or was it always as bad as it is this evening? The lead item, the kidnapping in Baghdad of three luckless civilian contractors, has been turned into a soppy human-interest story. The American pair have had their throats cut already, conveniently leaving a Brit (why else would it be the main story?) to boost the BBC’s ratings. Poor Kenneth Bigley’s brother and family are interviewed at length – newly discovered experts on hostage crisis management, terrorist negotiation tactics and large areas of UK foreign policy. Let murderous fanatics decide who should be in Iraqi prisons, they plead, and they will free our brother. It is as ridiculous as it is understandable, yet the BBC reporter just sits there nodding and feeling their pain, like those dribbling saps who did exclusive interviews with the saintly bimbo Diana. It’s all her fault. She turned this country from the land of the stiff upper lip – the nation that stared Nazi-occupied Europe in the face without blinking – into a place where unbridled emotion is a virtue, politicians cry on camera, and people leave piles of flowers and teddy bears at the scene of every mishap. And anthropomorphic lunacy has made fox-hunting a crime. I am getting homesick. Oh, to stroll down to the gai see and watch old Mrs Wong take her razor to a chicken's neck!