The Crucial Blog

WATCHING BBC Breakfast this morning has left me choking on toast crumbs as I endured yet another delivery of a serious news story riddled with jokey puns in the voiceover to match a (staged?) visual image.

Does the act of naming a child in a newspaper picture caption expose the youngster to paedophiles?
A simple question but an answer that engenders a big debate.

Good morning dentist - that tooth extraction you did was absolute rubbish. It's not what I wanted at all. The procedure you followed was all disjointed, your whole approach was wrong. Oh never mind I'll do it myself.Rubbish! Good morning electrician - the rewiring work on my house was not what I was expecting at all - nothing flows properly, the connections are terrible. I've rewired it all myself and this is the system I want...

Q. How many journalists does it take to change a light bulb? A1. We just report the facts, we don't change them. A2. Three. One to report it as an inspired government programme to bring light to the people, one to report it as a diabolical government plot to deprive the poor of darkness and one to win a Pulitzer prize for reporting that Electric Company hired a lightbulb assassin to break the bulb in the...

My name's Juliette and I am a journalist. There - in these current climes it sounds like an admission of something shameful. Well, the evidence coming out of the Levenson Inquiry into press ethics has indeed been shocking, disturbing and downright shameful. Only today Alistair Campbell is being reported as saying in his written evidence that the press is "frankly putrid in many of its elements" and that a very small number of people have "besmirched...