The Belarus representative of this year’s Eurovision song contest has revealed that he plans to appear on stage naked and accompanied by two wolves.

Normally, Ms Raccoon stays as far away from the European Broadcasting Union (EBU) as humanly possible. She is well aware that good friends of hers think that the Eurovision Song Contest is the best thing since moroccan hammams and join with the mainstream media in gorging themselves on obscure Ukrainian folk dirges sung by men in drag with performing dogs and dancing weegie boards. It’s the height of ‘no borders’ sophistication, but it’s a ‘metro-London-man’ thingy – if the man in the South Shields street, or the Glasgow wynd does watch the programme – the BBC oft employing the cunning ruse of putting nothing else of interest on the ‘box’ or ensuring that it clashes only with a documentary on transgendered grave diggers with syphilis, then Ms Raccoon is firmly with the man in the South Shields street yelling ‘get that caterwauling lezzy off’ and ‘For God’s sake man, get yer haircut and enunciate’ at the flickering screen. No matter how metro-London tries to educate us, in the privacy of our own homes, with just the Eurovision contest to watch, we turn into a heaving mass of politically incorrect humanity.

The media, though, do love it – to a man and woman. They think the European Broadcasting Union is just the bestest thing since garlic infused polenta, and they stuff their fishy columns to the gills with its output. Most of the time.

Strange then, that they have (with one notable cherry picked example) totally ignored their latest offering. An analysis of how European citizens view their various media outlets.

The Guardian managed to stomp through its 32 pages and graphics and emerge triumphant with the news that ‘Countries that have popular, well-funded public service broadcasters encounter less rightwing extremism and corruption and have more press freedom’. Let’s hear it for our colleagues in the BBC – keep funding them and keep the EDL away!!!

They happily accepted that ‘55% of European citizens trust radio the most, 48% trust TV, with the internet and social media less trusted in most countries, including Britain, than other sources’. Take that upstart Internet. Bish! Bosh!!!

Notice something missing from that statement? Ms Raccoon did, and set off in search of the original report. There it was, in all its glory. What is that lurking at the bottom of the page? Net Trust Index of the Written Word? United Kingdom – minus 51%?

Can it be true? We trust our written media less than any other country in Europe?

No wonder the little darlings have been so quiet on this front!

Even Serbia and Montenegro have more faith that their newspapers will tell them the truth.

A state of play all the more alarming when you look at the figures for radio and TV. Britain just managed to creep into positive figures for ‘Trust in TV’ – but it was Radio that saved the day for us. Seems we believe that listening to the radio will give us a closer approximation of what is really going on than TV with its dire documentaries. Richard Vadon will be pleased.

Which brings me onto something else of interest today. Some of you may have noticed a new ‘badge’ appear at the bottom of the page. ‘A Martin Scriblerus Blog‘ and wondered what it is all about.

I’m not much of a one for joining groups – but this was one group of bloggers that I was more than happy, flattered even, to be asked to join. Several of the people involved were my heroes when I started blogging and I watched them daily in order to try and figure out ‘how to do it’.

I’ve never been able to have an ‘updating blogroll’ on this site for technical reasons, and technical reasons very nearly defeated me yesterday when it came to putting that badge on the site! – if it is meant to be a live link, it doesn’t work, so suggestions as to how it should work are welcome.

So HERE IS THE LINK LOUD AND CLEAR: it will take you to a page that updates and lists some of best written, most informative and educative articles on the Internet. Including, as of yesterday, Ms Raccoon’s temperamental contrarian output.

I particularly liked their description of ‘what makes a good blog‘. I would add that having too small a font or a purple background is like the death knell for me – my eyes are too old to read with those handicaps!