Boohoo poor Lou

Life is so unfair to the Larry King wannabe broadcaster Lou Bondi. He even started wearing the braces once (does he still wear them?) Someone should tell him that it takes more than sporting braces to make an outstanding interviewer.

You would never catch the veteran CNN interviewer calling people “tossers” (those who suffer from chronic masturbation), as Lou did on The Times online.

We really have gone downhill in this country when it comes to journalistic trends. I am of course referring to those whose arrogance, vulgarity and primadonna behaviour rule over the majority.

The worst thing is that the crude and rude language is used by the ones that set themselves up as non plus ultra. These are the people who think of themselves as sophisticated and are always telling others to grow up, while they are still squabbling and name calling in the schoolyard.

This latest tantrum from Mr Bondi was due to the Broadcasting Authority fining PBS €1,164 after finding that the March 8 edition of Bondiplus - billed to be about the government's activity in the two years of this legislature, where the guest was deputy Prime Minister Tonio Borg - broke political impartiality rules.

Why just the March 8 edition? Frankly, I have long given up on objective broadcasting here. But Lou found the fine “completely unfair” and claims that he is being discriminated against by the BA.
Well, I suppose when one has been getting away with pushing a partisan agenda on our national station for ages, it is shocking.

And before some of you start thinking that I am a Labour Party hack, forget it. The PL does not like me any more than anyone else I criticise.

The BA said it based its decision on the facts that although the presenter (Lou Bondi) raised some points of criticism, during the interview with Dr Borg, “it was only a feeble attempt to establish some sort of balance and did not balance out the features, which formed a substantial part of the programme”.

The features, which focused on projects, programmes and initiatives launched by the government, “were nothing other than promotion of government activity, with no effort having been made at critical analysis”

The BA also cited the lack of participation by people of different views.

Mind you the billing of the programme as “the government's activity in the two years of this legislature” should have given the game away. If there were going to be any criticism it would have been called “the government’s inactivity blah, blah...”.

“During the programme, of which, 38 per cent was about the problems of the PN backbench, I asked a total of 26 hard hitting questions to Minister Tonio Borg and the features on what the government accomplished during the first two years of office were purely and totally factual”, Lou told The Times.

BA’s beef is not that Lou did not present the government’s accomplishments factually, but that it presented a one-sided view with no serious critical element, which made it partisan in what is meant to be an objective political slot, or as the BA put it: “broke political impartiality rules”.

As for Lou’s claim of “26 hard hitting questions to Minister Tonio Borg”, I referred to the responses on line, because I did not watch the programme.

“We must have all missed the hard-hitting questions. Tonio Borg looked like he was getting a feather-massage,” was Claire Bonello’s witty comment.

“I felt embarrassed for you (Lou) when I saw the edition in question. Sycophantic doesn't even begin to describe your 'performance'”, said another commentator. Well, nothing new there.

“It is about time that some sort of balance and comments are brought to a decent level in order that viewers may be able to stick to the programmes rather than change channel after 5 or 10 minutes due to the biased political opinion of the presenter”, said another.

I have left out the comments, which although fair, were obviously from known PL supporters and the irrelevant ones from PN supporters who defended the programme because worse happened at the public broadcasting station when Labour was in government with Mintoff as PM.

There is no doubt that the country’s broadcasting has been regressing slowly but surely in the last decade, harping on about worse times in the Eighties does not make it any better and is no excuse for falling standards on impartiality and objectivity on our national station.

Mr Bondi thought it was also worth pointing out that the Labour Party did not complain about his programme to the Broadcasting Authority. Now that is very telling about the way he sees his television audience.

According to Mr Bondi’s thinking, criticism of partisan bias should only come from the other side. He neglects to see, as a commentator pointed out, “what counts is the people’s perception. That is what is relevant, irrespective of how many excuses Mr Bondi can come up with.”

Lou’s quotes: “This would not stop here” and online “It is going to be a pleasure for me to take the Broadcasting Authority to court. We will see who will laugh last,” and later, “I am looking forward with serenity and enthusiam (sic) to taking the Broadcasting Authority to court. I repeat, let us see who will laugh last”, do demonstrate a lack of maturity.

As far as I understood it was PBS that has been fined and according to a spokesman for PBS it is the state broadcaster that would be seeking a judicial review of the BA decision and was considering taking the case to the Constitutional Court.

But maybe it should have been the producers of the programme who got fined since PBS is financed through our taxes. We are not only not getting the programmes we deserve, but we also have to pay for that failure.

As a commentator with a sense of humour rightly pointed out “Mr. Bondi is right. The decision is totally unfair. In fact, it is he who should pay the fine, not us taxpayers! Hallina Lou.”