That left wing bastion ( ) having to defend it's loathsome, racist, right-wing reactionary presenter once again.
Good viewing figures though.

Is it a left wing or a right wing bastion ?

Depends which newspaper is having a pop at it I suppose.

You have to wonder though where The Mirror got hold of the clip of tape that can be seen today in The Times, its one of three takes that were never aired on TV as Clarkson himself told the producers that he was worried that his mumbled sentence might be misinterpreted, so presumably in the olden days the physical bits of film would have been destroyed as useless but now the digital recording is kept, and then stolen at a later date and leaked to whichever strand of the printed media pay the most or suits their agenda.

I'm not a fan of Clarkson or the silly program that he presents and don't really like his journalism pieces either but I find the whole thing rather strange and not quite right in a way that I can't put my finger on.

I was being sarcastic.
It's politically independent.
That's what the [establishment hope we keep believing anyway.

Depends which newspaper and/or political party is having a pop at it.

If you listen to it, there is no clear evidence that Clarkson said the N- word, and unless you believe that despite his normal very clear diction, he suffers from occasional bouts of mumbling and grossly slurring words and phrases, you can work out that he was using the classic "picking" nursery rhyme but deliberately censoring the offending line. Nothing else explains the mumbling/slurring.

Why he or the producer didn't just substitute a different word would be a bigger mystery. If you know any popular video sites then you can watch the various versions by using /watch?v=nlQjdUWqBLE

if he was a rapper, black or white, and had used the word, nobody would have made any comment. It's because he is who he is.

Shouldn't this be in the witch-hunt thread?

I've seen some people say they used to use the N word when they were kids, and I've also seen some people say they used the word beggar.

When I first listened to it he just seemed to be mumbling words because he couldn't remember what the actual words of the rhyme were. I can't remember the rhyme from when I was a kid. So I just thought he was mumbling the sounds of the tune rather than actual words. But when you read the transcript it does seem a lot clearer. But whether that's because of the suggestion of the word and the way the mind works or because he actually said them I don't know.

But I do think is that if a forensic audio expert analysed the audio then they should be able to offer the use of the word in a sound file and making up our own opinions rather than trusting the opinion of a paid expert to provide a transcript.

There are more important things in the world to be worrying about.