American election

[fbg40]

Morning all
Am I the only person who is fed up with the news coverage given to the Presidential election ? Do the American media give as much importance to our elections ? The money that the BBC spend sending Bill Turnbull and Huw Edwards out to the US is, in my opinion, wasted - they already have journos out there ! Soory to be a kiljoy, but that's me !
FBG40

[AB Editor]

Er, it's done... some of us enjoy it. I am certain you enjoy expensive parts of the BBC which I think are a total waste :)

[LazyGun]

As Ed has said- its done and dusted now. We cover the US elections as comprehensively as we do because there is some traction in that notion that what happens in the US will effect their economy, and the US economy is still if not the one of the major drivers of the global economy.

I doubt the US will pay anything like as much as attention to UK voting simply because we do not have that level of influence on the global or US economy.

[weecalf]

seen there where whats his name the orginal jermery kayle said it was important to us who won .Forget who was competing.Banks run the countries so no doubt its more of the same .

[Canary42]

It always amuses me when people attack the BBC on spending - the Commercial channels have far greater budgets, and it all comes from the same people who pay for the BBC, i.e. Joe Public.

But NEVER do you hear people complaining about commercial channel's spending - how weird.

[Playbill]

I have access to hundreds of tv channels but rarely watch any apart from the BBC. Whilst I do not always agree with their political bias, I value the quality of their programmes and lack of irritating, banal advertising.

[squarebear]

In that case can we get rid of Eastenders? I can't stand it and think it's a waste of licence money.

There are always going to be programmes you like and programmes you don't. Do you expect them to confer with you before planning the schedules?

[vulcan]

To a certain extent I agree with fbg40, the BBC should, of course, cover the American elections but why send additional reporters? They already have reporters there who are surely capable of dealing with it. Huw Edwards was on the radio yesterday and said he spent some of the time locating and visiting his relations, which had nothing to do with the elections.

[chris1957au]

Good news it all over ( for 4 years anyway)

[Nibble]

Any American seen with begging bowls??? Well they have to raise at least $1B for the next election, anyone going to donate?? Anyone??




anyone??








Hello?

[ludwig]

I think TV news has eased off on the coverage since last time, following complaints about overdoing it.

It wasn't just the election, but the election of each party's candidate, what seemed like constant updates about how McCain was doing against whoever else in connecticut blah blah blah. Fair enough, cover the presidential election, but does anyone outside the US really give a s*t about the race to become the candidate?

[emmie]

perhaps Huw would like to stay there, his dour countenance fair puts me off my cornflakes, or what passes for food

[zebo]

They're already discussing 2016! I like the conspiracy theory that Biden will stand down on some pretext at the mid-terms, Hilary Clinton will become VP and then run in 2016. Roll on the next 4 years.

[zebo]

All the world leaders will be congratulating him, it's the norm, not everything is a cause for political sniping Owdhamer.

[emmie]

Cameron hasn't done that, sorry i find that quite a horrible statement, all world leaders will have called to congratulate Obama, not so they can curry favour.

[owdhamer]

Everyone is entitled to an opinion and to voice it, my opinion is Cameron is bum licking,take it or leave it, bothered I am not.

[stewey]

And the complaining original poster uses the Stars and Stripes as an avatar?

[Dodger666]

I agree FBG40

After seeing the result on BBC Breakfast this morning I haven't watched any other news programme today as they'll just be the same thing over and over again. They even had the first question on tonight's edition of the BBC quiz "Pointless" asking contestants to name the states on a map won by Barack Obama at the last election. Given the programme was recorded some time ago that couldn't have been a coincidence.

I did notice yesterday the Beeb had Jane Hill in Washington too. Why couldn't the Beeb's North American correspondent, Mark Mardell, have played a bigger part, or did the rest want a nice jolly at licence payer's expense?

Mind you, Huw Edwards did get to met a distant relative earlier this week. Perhaps he'll be in "Who Do You Think You Are" some time soon.

[weecalf]

If we had that kind of election in GB .who would you like to see go head to head .Mine would be Liz Smith and Nicholas Parsons Id vote for Liz

[modeller]

Aren't you glad we have a Monarchy .