During last weekend's Conservative Party convention, interim leader Rona Ambrose suggested that Justin Trudeau was not our first "female" Prime Minister, but that that distinction went to Kim Campbell. It was met with a round of applause, resonating with the conservative crowd, but not so much with the Canadian public, who saw it as just another opposition cheap shot, born of envy. She would later deny she said it, or claim that her comment was misinterpreted, but we've seen the video.There's no backing out now. However, her closing remark is even more telling."So who's the feminist now!?"Certainly not Rona Ambrose, because you don't have to be a female to be a feminist, any more than you have to be a feminist to be female.Today, it's about a state of mind. In fact, for the new generation of millennials, it's more about sexism in general, not just women's rights, which they already enjoy.Income inequality is still an issue, but they will find the solution, and they will do it because it just makes sense. Looking at the U.S. Primaries, when the country seems poised to elect their first woman president, it should not be such a shock to anyone that the majority of young women plan to vote for Bernie Sanders, rather than Hillary Clinton. They don't care about gender, but that Sanders has a better understanding of the problems that impact their lives, while Clinton represents "the establishment.” In Ambrose's speech, she lauded previous women Conservative trail blazers (none of whom belonged to her party which was formed in 2003).However, to millennials, these names or their accomplishments would mean little.They don't have to look to female leaders of the past.They see female leaders everyday, and that's a good thing.It means that women of my generation have done our jobs. What they heard from Ambrose would sound like words from the parents in the Peanuts cartoon: "mwa-mwa-mwa" This is what the opposition and indeed the Canadian media, don't understand about Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.He is the epitome of the modern feminist.You don't have to be macho to be masculine, but you can be.You don't have to be a female to be a feminist, but you can be.It's all about equality and doing what's best for you.
In the United States millennials now outnumber baby boomers, and in Canada, they now represent the majority in the workplace. The media and politicians, must adapt to this new reality or step aside.Of course Trudeau won the "elbowgate" debate.He was having "a dad moment".Young parents could relate.But modern feminists could not relate to the aftermath. Pierre Elliot Trudeau came along at the right time, as we baby boomers were coming of age.We were also anti-establishment and viewed his antics through a different lens than the media and his political opponents.The same is happening today with his son. At the Conservative convention they have now embraced the baby boomer generation, even quoting PET's famous remarks about staying out of the bedrooms, but it's half a century too late.We've moved on. Our children and grandchildren did not grow up with the aproned women chained to the kitchen.They grew up with us. Now it's time for the media and members of the opposition parties to just grow up.
Stephen Harper is visiting China for trade talks, and many believe that as the heads of the two countries meet, human rights issues must be addressed.
Warning: These stories may be disturbing.
- A vocal opponent of the government and an advocate for human rights, is routinely questioned. They also target his associates and friends warning them that the man is an anarchist, despite the fact that he is merely a vocal opponent of the government . (1)
- A popular U.S. journalist is stopped at the border and held for 90 minutes as officials search her papers and computer then demand to know what she will be speaking about when in the country. (2)
- Foreign lecturers are routinely banned if it is deemed that their views contradict government policy (3)
- Without even engaging in protests, citizens are harassed on the chance that they might. (4)
- The government regularly monitors newspapers, broadcasts, and websites. (5)
- Policing at protests is militarized. (6)
- Journalists are silenced (7), arrested (8), intimidated by police (9) and held hostage (10).
- Books are banned (11), scientists (12), whistle blowers (13) and police (14) are silenced.
- University professors are targeted. (15)
- Anyone protesting government policy is automatically deemed to be an enemy of the state. (16)
- The country is even being investigated for possible war crimes. (17)
And things are not much better in China.
The media is criticizing Stephen Harper's down on his knees begging for Chinese exports, as being hypocritical. For years he purposely shunned them, saying that some things were more important than the "almighty dollar".
However, I think the real hypocrisy is coming from the Canadian people. We are demanding that China be held to account for its human rights abuses, while ignoring the growing number of human rights abuses at home.
"Everything that we see is a shadow cast by that which we do not see." - Martin Luther King, Jr.
Sources:
1. When CSIS rings your doorbell: With the G20 Summit approaching, political activists accuse the federal spy agency of trying to undermine democracy and freedom of speech, by Catherine Solyom, The Gazette June 11, 2010
3a. Too Dangerous for Canada
3b. Banned From Canada for a Year for War Protest, by Ann Wright, October 30, 2007
3c. U.S. anti-war protester barred from Canada: And Peace Activist Alison Bodine was banned for two years, The Chronicle, October 30, 2007
I watched Chris Matthew's Hardball yesterday, where the media panel was asked about their New Year's resolutions, speaking of them as a whole.
Most gave the obvious. Invest in hard journalism, ask the tough questions, cover politics seriously and don't get distracted by shiny objects. All important goals, but aren't they what journalism is supposed to be about? Does a doctor really have to make a resolution to heal or a teacher to teach?
The best answer came from Washington Post's David Ignatius. Recognizing that the media had to shoulder much of the blame for today's toxic political climate, he said that those in his profession had to stop contributing to the noise, divisiveness and confusion that is putting the United States near the point of breaking down.
And Ignatius is actually one of the few who can still call himself a journalist.
I thought that the Canadian media had hit bottom when those covering a Stephen Harper excursion were held hostage on a plane, because he didn't want them to ask him questions about unfolding events.
Prime Minister Stephen Harper is sneaking back into Canada through the front door. Harper flew back from Switzerland today. While in the air his office announced the appointment of five new Senators and the Supreme Court ruled he has the power to decide to ask if Omar Khadr could be repatriated.
What does Harper have to say about these developments? Nothing. Journalists travelling with Harper are being kept on the plane to ensure the Prime Minister doesn't face any questions in his short jaunt from the bottom of the staircase to his waiting limousine.
When the journalists live blogged this unusual tactic, a staff member came on board and said that they were free to leave, but would have to find their own way home. This sounds more like a Stalin move, and yet one those "kidnapped", actually tried to defend it.
David Akin, while writing that they were only allowed three questions in three and a half days, even before the hostage taking, suggested that he was somehow seeking balance in not being too critical.
... for what it's worth, our readers and viewers, of course, include both Harper's supporters and his detractors and reporters must remember that we write for all of them.
Harper's detractors may think we should just give the metaphorical finger to such directives from the PMO but, at one photo opp while we were here, a reporter who did just that and asked a question at a photo opp, despite warnings not to, was immediately warned that, if she continued, reporters would no longer be allowed to attend such photo opps. That would not be good for our access would be curtailed even further. PMO staff also made veiled threats that that individual's organization might suffer further sanction -- all because of the impertinence of asking a question. If you are a media organization in Ottawa, these are no small consequences.
Since when does crippling the media's ability to their job, mean that we are Harper detractors? Shouldn't everyone who believes in democracy oppose this? Akin was telling us that they are being threatened and yet still tried to defend it.
Fortunately for him, he is now with Fox News North where he no longer has to pretend to be a journalist. Only part of the noise.
There is something that our media, those left who still remember why they chose journalism as a career, can do. Stop covering Harper and his party. Only ask questions of the opposition and only publish their answers. If Harper wants his mug in the papers and his press releases printed, demand that he answer questions, and ones that are not presented in advance.
If he lacks the ability to think on his feet, then he is the one who can't handle his job.
The Conservatives don't have to impress the National Post or Sun TV, but if they want to continue to keep up the delusion that they are moderate "Tories", they need the press. It's time that the mainstream media remembered that.
And advice to the Canadian public came from Chris Matthews himself. Too much "noise" and not enough substance? Change the channel.
In her book The Right is Wrong, Arianna Huffington devotes a chapter to the media's search for truth, or abandonment of it, depending on how you look at it.
Huffington is a former Republican who left the party when she realized that they had gone completely crazy. If you recognize her name, it's because she is the founder of the Huffington Post.
She claims not to be angry with the right-wing media. After all, they are only doing what we expect them to do, so we don't read their papers, listen to their radio programs, or watch their television stations.
They have become part of our culture, so we're aware of them, but they don't have an impact on our own views.
Where the problem lies, she believes, is with what is supposed to be the mainstream media. Those charged with providing unbiased news and seeking the truth in every story.
However, in today's toxic political climate, an attempt to seek the truth, may be an archaic principle, because the mainstream media has allowed the Right's radical ideas to become "ordinary".
A key to understanding the fanatical Right's takeover of the Republican Party and how their ideas spread to the rest of the country is looking at the role of the media—not the Fox News pseudo-newsmen or the talk radio blowhards, but the respectable, mainstream media. Without the enabling of the traditional media—through their obsession with "balance" and their pathological devotion to the idea that truth is always found in the middle—the radical. Right would never have been able to have its ideas taken seriously. If not for the media's appeals to balance, nea-conservatives would have been laughed out of the court of public opinion long ago. And when the media do attempt to dig into the ideological underpinnings of debates about policy and current affairs, they get buried in another form of disorder. (1)
Fox News and Sun TV have contrarians on all the time, but only to set them up for ridicule. They are not seeking the truth, but simply reaffirming their truth, to the people who watch their programs.
When Shelley Glover remarked in a CBC segment, that "it is a well known fact that all cops vote Conservative and all criminals vote Liberal", she should have been rebuked. Yet her insane comment was allowed to stand as legitimate. A contrary point of view, that we have a Conservative law enforcement, instead of one paid with the tax dollars from those of all political stripes?
The Left/Right Paradigm
Richard Nixon was the first to suggest that there was a left wing media bias. From his inauguration in 1969, until the day he left office in disgrace, he exacted his revenge on the press, once stating: "One day we'll get them - we'll get them on the ground where we want them. And we'll stick our heels in, step on them hard, and twist." (2)
His anger wasn't unjustified, though it had nothing to do with a left bias, but a stalker columnist named Jack Anderson, who matched dirty journalism with dirty politics. As for the rest of the media, Nixon simply didn't like getting caught.
However, since that time, the media has enabled the Right to set the tone of debate, by establishing a left/right paradigm. Thus all arguments are now based on left/right "opinions", instead of established facts.
Climate change is a perfect example of this. Jim Hansen, a climate scientist and director of NASA's Goddard Institute, wrote in the New York Review of what happens when highly qualified experts try to make their case in the mainstream media.
I used to spread the blame uniformly until, when I was about to appear on public television, the producer informed me that the program "must" also include a "contrarian" who would take issue with claims of global warming. Presenting such a view, he told me, was a common practice in commercial television as well as radio and newspapers. Supporters of public TV or advertisers, with their own special interests, require "balance" as a price for their continued financial support. Gore's book reveals that while more than half of the recent newspaper articles on climate change have given equal weight to such contrarian views, virtually none of the scientific articles in peer-reviewed journals have questioned the consensus that emissions from human activities cause global warming. As a result, even when the scientific evidence is clear, technical nitpicking by contrarians leaves the public with the false impression that there is still great scientific uncertainty about the reality and causes of climate change. (3)
Can you imagine if today's media was around at the time of other scientific breakthroughs? When Jonas Salk developed a vaccine for polio, would we have Stanley Knowles (CCF/NDP) and Louis St. Laurent (Liberal) arguing its merits and pushing to immunize all Canadian children, with contrarian Solon Low (Social Credit) calling it a Jewish plot to suck money out of the treasury.
Of course not. We trusted science and science prevailed in combating the disease.
So why are we leaving information about the devastating results of climate change, and human activity that is accelerating it, to politicians and political pundits? Harper claims that it is only a "theory" and that Kyoto was "essentially a socialist scheme to suck money out of wealth-producing nations." (The Star, January 30, 2007) and we allow that to stand, just as we allow Glover's remark that all cops vote Conservative to stand.
Instead of truth vs lies, science vs non-scientific opinion, and fact vs myth, it has all come down to left vs right.
Not So Much Anger as Disappointment
I have found myself many times getting angry with the media, and not the obvious right-wing media, whose job it is to spout nonsense, but with the mainstream media.
As Huffington suggests, it is because of disappointment. We expect more and get less. In an effort to seek balance, they have allowed the conservative movement to frame all debate. We know that Canada's crime rate is the lowest in history, but apparently only those on the left pay attention to the facts. And by giving the contrarian viewpoint, that crime is on the rise, so we need more prisons; there is an implication that the facts may be open to debate. A confused public shrugs and moves on. They'll let future generations deal with the mess that this change in direction will create.
During Harper's first and second term, every time that conservative corruption was revealed, the MSM countered it by bringing up the Sponsorship Scandal. In other words, yes the Harper government was corrupt, but what about those darn Liberals? They gave him an excuse. And yet not one mentioned that most involved in the scandal, were hired by Brian Mulroney (4), in the first Adscam.
With such an entrenched right-wing media, the old rules of "balance" no longer applies. What we need is argument against right-wing nonsense, instead of providing it with a platform.
And What About the Auditions?
There is a joke often thrown around, that many journalists and columnists are jockeying for senate seats, so that their work becomes their portfolio. It is well known that Mike Duffy had been trying to get a senate seat for years, but it was his complicity in the annihilation of Stéphane Dion, that finally gave him his coveted spot.
But what of others, like Angelo Persichilli? I used to enjoy his columns, with the exception of the Quebec bashing, until he started acting weird. Becoming the Liberals' Jack Anderson (2) he turned into a tabloid writer, listening in on private conversations, in an effort to discredit them at every turn. He went from a respected columnist to a peeping tom.
So should we have been surprised that he was given the top job on Harper's communications team? They needed someone without integrity, who would do anything to dig up dirt on Harper's political opponents, and he proved with his latest columns, that he was up for the job. Or I should say down.
We have some very good journalists in this country, but the Chantel Heberts, Evan Solomons and Lloyd Mansbridges, must step up to the plate and debunk conservative spin, instead of turning the crank. Talk to experts not idiots, or risk joining the latter.
Sources:
1. Right is Wrong: How the Lunatic Fringe Hijacked America, Shredded the Constitution and Made us All Feel Less Safe (And What You Need to Know to End the Madness), By Arianna Huffington, Aldred A. Knopf, 2008, ISBN: 978-0-307-26966-9, p. 5
2. Poisoning the Press: Richard Nixon, Jack Anderson and the Rise of Washington's Scandal Culture, By Mark Feldstein, Farrar, Strauss and Giroux, 2010, ISBN: 978-0-374-23530-7
3. Huffington, 2008, pp. 23-24
4. On the Take: Crime, Corruption and Greed in the Mulroney Years, By Stevie Cameron, Macfarlane Walter & Ross, 1994, ISBN: 0-921912-73-0
Senator Mike Duffy has attacked the University of King’s College and other Canadian journalism schools for exposing students to Noam Chomsky and critical thinking.
In a speech Saturday to Conservative party members in Amherst, Duffy reportedly slammed journalism programs for churning out leftist graduates.“When I went to the school of hard knocks, we were told to be fair and balanced,” Duffy was quoted from his speech in yesterday’s issue of the Amherst Daily News.
“That school doesn’t exist any more. Kids who go to King’s, or the other schools across the country, are taught from two main texts.”
This sounds eerily like the speech Reformer Steven Flethcer gave to University of Manitoba students, where he referred to their newspaper as a 'socialist rag'.
Kim Kierans, head of the King’s School of Journalism clarified that the school does not teach from Chomsky, but does encourage critical thinking. Obviously they are preparing these future journalists to work for international papers, because Canada's media no longer engage in much thought of any kind.
...Now, Duffy calling someone a faker equals pot calling the kettle black. This is the same Duffy who, as host of his own politics show, presented himself for decades as journalistically neutral, then accepted Harper's $130,000 appointment ten months ago and now devotes his energies to shamelessly shilling for the Conservatives.
That's the definition of fakery for you, particularly given he was appointed after airing that infamous CTV interview with then-Liberal leader Stephane Dion, a bumbling performance credited by some as the turning point of the 2008 election campaign for Stephen Harper.
Yet journalism students are living on the fringe? Yep, that's it Mike. That 'fringe' is getting pretty crowded though.
Nik Nanos used to be one of the better pollsters. Accurate, fair, on top of his game. But how quickly he has fallen, as he got it so wrong on Canadians' reaction to prorogation. According to the Globe at the time:
But Nik Nanos of Nanos Research says you don’t need a bunch of surveys to tell you that prorogation is unlikely to have a significant influence upon voting behaviour.
“Will this annoy the opposition parties? Absolutely,” Mr. Nanos said in a telephone interview. “Will the opposition parties believe that this is a broader narrative of the government using Parliament to its own political devices? Absolutely.”
But the average Canadian is unlikely to be riled by a two-month break from partisan politics, he said. “Especially since, from the perspective of voters, there really isn’t a big issue that requires the emergency attention of the House of Commons.”
Wow. I don't know if he had quit reading newspapers, but there were several big issues at the time, and even bigger ones since Harper abused his power. The Afghan detainee issue was on the top of our list then and the Buy America/Sell Canada trade agreement, that was signed without input or debate, will be there when the vacationing prime minister returns from his two month hiatus.
Gee Nik. You need to get out more.
But poor man, after screwing up so badly in January, he decided to stick his size 9's into his facial aperture, and try to once again offer up an assessment of the Canadian psyche.
The survey by Ottawa-based Nanos Research offers insight into what weight politicians should give to Facebook sites like Canadians Against Proroguing Parliament (CAPP) which in a matter of days in early January attracted a quarter of a million members.
Not much, in pollster Nik Nanos's assessment. Canadians in the 18-to-29 cohort - who use Facebook the most - were little different from Canadians of other age groups in their thoughts about Facebook groups influencing government: They weren't keen on it. "They see it as an enabler of political discussion, and a kind of low-entry political transaction," said Mr. Nanos.
Now obviously Nanos has never been on CAPP, because we have very few in the 18-29 'cohort'; and as Murray Dobbin points out:
"...despite the perception that CAPP members are university and college students or recent graduates with active social lives, half of the respondents are 45 years of age or older. Thirty-four per cent of the respondents are 31-44 years of age and 16 per cent are aged 18-30. ...the respondents are politically engaged people: 88 per cent described themselves as either somewhat or very engaged in federal politics. In addition to this, 96 per cent of the participants indicated that they voted in the last federal election."
So Nik Nanos is dismissing on-line activism based on a mere 16% of 225,000 people. Brilliant.
But what our former pollster doesn't understand is that CAPP has become much more than just a single issue group. We are motivated and organized. Several spin off groups have emerged, including Canadians Rallying to Unseat Harper and Catch 22 Harper Conservatives; dedicated to getting our country back.
Mr. Harper should indeed pay attention to this. We are all voters and we are all mad. A lethal combination I can assure you.
So stick around Nik. Maybe you'll learn something.
I thought I had remembered a time when Persichilli was one of the good guys.
And by that I mean a fair and impartial journalist. According to his resume he's actually won awards.
Yes, he's used a lot of print trashing the Reform/Alliance movement as being the wrong fit for Canada, but that was a no brainer.
I don't know if he's just plagiarizing Kelly McParland at the National Post now, but he's certainly borrowed his writing style, and I use the term 'style', VERY loosely. I no longer read McParland and try not to read Persichilli.
When my mother was angry with someone, she'd say they were enough to make a saint swear. Well, I'm no saint, but the drivel these guys produce can create so much blue air in this room, that I think I'm under attack by the Tory death squad.
However, yesterday, an Angelo special came down the pipes at CAPP, so I thought I'd give it a read. Big mistake, because now I have to be the fact checker on one of his laziest and most ridiculous columns to date.
The difference between democracy and dictatorship is not so much in the way the governments behave, but in the capacity of their opposition to offer an alternative and of the media to expose any wrongdoing by either.
Hmmm ... where do I start? First off, in a dictatorship there is no elected opposition, and the media are not allowed to expose any wrong doing. And given the fact that Harper sent our elected opposition away for two and half months and refuses to speak with our media, defines our new dictatorship.
If we take the federal opposition seriously when it says say the government is not doing a good job, the logical course of action would be to offer Canadians an alternative and go to the polls. Unfortunately, for the past four years, while they have accused the government of not fulfilling its duties, the opposition parties have failed to fulfill theirs.
I'm not even going to get into neoconservatism that engages in filth to turn people away from the polls, but I might remind Angelo that the opposition did try to take Harper down with a coalition. The media imploded, the Conservatives went nuts, and it had no chance of getting off the ground; dying the same way that Harper's 2004 attempt did. The only difference with the more recent was that they learned not to include the full support of the Bloc, as Harper had done.
And let's not forget what happened this fall when Michael Ignatieff suggested that he was no longer going to prop up the Harper regime. He tanked in the polls and the media gave him the kiss of death.
In a democratic country like Canada, there is an official opposition that can freely do its job. If it is not able to defeat a minority government, the problem is not the government, it's the opposition. Governments deserve criticism when it's due, but they also deserve support, especially in difficult times like now when they are engaged in a massive fight against a global economic crisis .... I believe that the federal Conservative government could do better but, considering the difficult times we are now in, I believe it's doing a pretty good job.
OK, I really don't know where Persichilli has been, or if he even tries anymore; but this government is doing a lousy job. Even our auditor general has confirmed this.
So here are a few facts, not that I expect he'll read them, given that he's obviously no longer reading anything except his own tripe:
Economy
1. Rather than targeting stimulus money to areas hardest hit by the recession, the Reformers targeted it to their own ridings; especially those that could be vulnerable next election. They also set up a creative system of accounting, that makes it almost impossible to track the money.
2. Jim Flaherty has played fast and loose with this country's finances by allowing high-risk mortgages to infiltrate our once sound financial sector. The Financial Post recently called Canada the Fanny Mae of the mortgage industry, as the Canadian taxpayer has become the largest lender of sub-prime mortgages in the world.
3. The Harper government has encouraged liberalization at home and abroad, going so far as suggest that developing nations become 100% foreign owned; much like Haiti, which has become one of the poorest nations in the world. This has been described as "a high-octane form of financial speculation similar to gambling".
According to Ellen Gould: The thing is, the Harper government is responsible for pushing the envelope on deregulation both domestically and internationally despite cautionary events in the U.S. clearly indicating what could go wrong.
And if you were doing your job Mr. Persichilli, you would know that the opposition has indeed been working to restore democracy, by listening to experts ... and they refer to them as experts, not 'university types' or 'elitists'. Maybe that's why a recent poll has the Liberals 4 points ahead of the Reform movement you once detested.
But this once respected columnist did get one thing right: I guess, according to some, this makes me a Conservative.
I just read her list of the ten most irritating politicians for 2009, and while the topic does nothing to improve democracy in Canada, because it helps to turn people away from the polls; the photo used in the story was inexcusable.
What did Michael Ignatieff's wife ever do to Jane that she warranted such disrespect? Has our media really sunk to this level?
Glen Pearson wrote in October that the press was becoming Canada's natural governing body, because they have the power to make or break a politician. How true.
But while they may take credit as king makers, they must also shoulder some of the blame for what is happening today. They have handed Stephen Harper a dictatorship and so long as they have people like Jane Taber in their midst, that dictatorship will remain in place for the rest of his natural life.
Of course Janie named Michael Ignatieff as the most irritating because his TV ads did not personally attack his opponents. What a horrible man, right?
That Stephen Harper doesn't let the media anywhere near him or his caucus, apparently doesn't ruffle her feathers a bit. Maybe she's never actually tried to get near him, and hasn't yet been roughed up by the RCMP for her efforts.
Her next two choices are Pierre Poilievre and John Baird. That was too easy. That pair annoy the hell out of everyone. If she'd added the name of Dimitri Soudas, we would have our own homegrown Three Stooges.
She adds Rick Hillier next and I have to agree. Not because he's annoying, but due to the fact that he fell from grace so quickly. I actually gave him one of my Joe Canadian awards, but he has really let me down.
Another interesting choice was Liberals on Twitter. She singles out a 'fat joke' made by a Liberal MP against Dean Del Mastro. I linked to the article and was surprised to find this: "His staff uses Google to alert them to any mention of their boss."
While I'm thrilled that we are paying their salaries to perform such an important mission, it's peaked my interest. I have posted on Del Maestro before, and now believe I may have to run a little series. I'll call it "Google this trolls for Dean Del Mastro". Kinda' catchy don't you think? Eeeeek!
But perhaps Ms Taber should spend a bit more time on Twitter tracking down comments. Reformer Blake Richards tweeted a horrible remark about Pierre Trudeau. I don't remember his son singling out Richards, wasting valuable time in the House. Jason Kenney Tweeted that Liberal senator Romeo Dallaire was a fag.
Maybe twits twittering twas a twoubling twitch so lets twop twits tweetering twoubles by twitching their tweeters off! (say that fast three times)
Taber continues with her 'single' annoying politicians by including all environmental protesters and the entire NDP caucus. Way to go Jane. That education's really paying for ya', huh?
I think I'm going to compile my own list of the top ten most annoying media personalities. Don't worry Jane. I've got a special spot for you.
Stephen Harper has definitely been the most expensive prime minister to maintain, what with his enormous security team, $ 400.00 haircuts and full time image consultant, but his new request puts him over the top.
Taxpayers are being asked to pay an extra $1.7-million this fiscal year to help bolster Stephen Harper's communications support services – just as the Prime Minister's Office begins distributing government videos of Harper to the news media.
Supplementary estimates tabled last month by the Privy Council Office, the Prime Minister's bureaucratic back office, boosted internal operational spending by almost $7.3-million for 2009-10. That's on top of existing budgets.
Included in that total is $700,650 for 6.5 new positions “providing communications advice, service and support to the prime minister.”
There's also an extra $1-million for “events” preparation, including “broadcast sound, lighting and recording services, costs of transporting equipment, travel, overtime, office and logistical support...”
According to information provided to Liberal MP Martha Hall-Findlay, by PCO, $270,000 of the total is overtime pay owed to harried technical support staff, including videographers.
The Privy Council Office already has an archive of more than 300 videos of Mr. Harper dating back to his first months in office, according to an Access to Information request by The Canadian Press.
The video archive list includes everything from a Harper message to CTV anchor Lloyd Robertson on Oct. 27, 2006, to a speech at a Conservative Party barbecue in August of 2008 and the Prime Minister's historic address last Dec. 4 after his precedent-setting prorogation of Parliament in the face of a confidence crisis.
In the last two weeks, the PCO started sending news organizations links to new videos in the same way the PMO has routinely distributed photos shot by Mr. Harper's official photographer.
The photos, and now the videos, have sparked a debate over media access and when the use of government-produced and approved images may be appropriate in an independent news media.
“It's not access,” said Chris Waddell, who holds the Carty chair in business and financial journalism at Ottawa's Carleton University.
“Access is an opportunity to ask questions and an opportunity to engage in independent work according to journalistic principles. What they're giving you is public relations.”
Dimitri Soudas, the Prime Minister's spokesman, says there is no difference between a press release and a photo or video release.
“It's another form of communication with the media,” Mr. Soudas said in an interview.
Sometimes they say a picture is worth a thousand words.” Video releases are just the next step.
“The media can't have it both ways,” Mr. Soudas recently told CBC.
“They can't criticize us for not providing enough information, and then criticize us for providing too much information.”
Mr. Harper's extremely busy fall travel schedule – with successive trips to Singapore, India, Trinidad and Tobago, China and South Korea, with Copenhagen on deck – has run PCO technicians to the breaking point.
In an appearance last month before the government operations committee, Marilyn MacPherson, the assistant deputy minister at PCO's corporate services branch, said the prime minister's tour group is comprised of only 13 individuals, who work in smaller groups that are constantly “leap-frogging” each other to successive events.
“They are the ones who actually set up the stage, put up the drapes, do all the recording, make sure the TelePrompTer works – always trying to put the very professional face on our prime minister when he is acting as the head of our government,” she told the committee.
Reporters who have travelled with prime ministers past and present know the long hours logged by the infallibly helpful and good-humoured technical support staff of the Privy Council Office.
Where once these technicians focused on ensuring news media had access to broadcast quality audio feeds of the prime minister for speeches and formal news conferences, they now handle professional lighting and video services as well – and on a much broader range of events.
The Harper PMO prefers tightly scripted, immaculately staged public events that include limited or zero interplay between the prime minister and reporters. With cash-strapped news organizations being asked to pay up to $7,000 to put a reporter on a prime ministerial tour for a week, the combination of limited access and high price is causing some newsrooms to opt out.
That makes the government-provided photos and video all the more alluring to some media outlets, especially smaller ones – and all the more unsettling to critics of media manipulation.
“It's endemic in a world where the media is not willing or able to pay for going out and doing the coverage itself,” Prof. Waddell said.
“The Prime Minister's Office can put all this stuff out. The key question is: What are the journalistic standards being applied by the people who are taking it?”
Occasionally, the Privy Council technicians get some outside assistance.
Last June's showy, invite-only delivery of the Conservative report on the Economic Action Plan in Cambridge, Ont., included a bill of $30,000 for private-sector audio-visual and staging help. The Prime Minister did not take any questions from the news media at the event.
Videos of Mr. Harper at that June 11 “town hall” are among the 317 listed in a PCO archive obtained by The Canadian Press that runs from April 20, 2006, to Oct. 16, 2009.
The above is Part VII of Mel Hurtig's documentary on YouTube; Who Killed Canada.
In part one he gives an introduction to the infrastructure of the extreme right-wing movement; beginning with the hi-jacking of our media, to the many so-called think-tanks, that provide the 'facts' to that hi-jacked media.
In part two he discusses the reduction in federal revenue that weakened spending in important areas. We learned that we are 25th of the 30 OECD countries, in terms of spending on social programs.
Part three deals with our increasing poverty, that coincides with the increase in corporate profits. And though these 'free market' gurus try to convince us that we should throw in our lot with corporate Canada, they have done nothing to advance Canadian interests or protect this country's citizens.
Part four discussed the fact that although neo-cons would like us to believe that we are overtaxed, Canada is actually 21st of 30 nations in terms of the amount of taxes we pay. It also discusses the fact that our history has been rewritten to erase the important role the First Nations played.
Part five dealt with NAFTA and what a horrible thing this was and is for Canada. We are basically under the control of the United States. We got very little from the deal, and in fact 11,043 Canadian companies have now become foreign controlled.
In part six Mr. Hurtig continued to discuss the effects of NAFTA on Canada and the fact that we have the most foreign owned corporations of any other developed nation. He also mentions the SPP and the fact that the media has not discussed what this deep integration policy means for us.
Part seven discusses the fact that Canadians have become so apathetic in politics, that we are barely even a democracy now.
In a recent scathing report for the UK Guardian, Heather Mallick states: "Out of something as misty as mere indecision, Canadian voters have turned their country into a political freak show. Canada's Conservative government, run by an ideologue named Stephen Harper, does not represent Canadian voters..."
We can protest and advocate, but unless we get involved in the political process, it is all for not. So join a political party, write a letter to the editor, call your MP and above all .... VOTE! Because it is also my dream that this beautiful country will never die.
The job of keeping Canadians informed will now fall on Mrs. Peacock's kindergarten class.
In an exclusive interview with Pravda Ca-Na-Da, little Susie confirmed that they have learned to cut and paste and will use their new skills in all of their editorials. She is very excited, though it could be because she heard that they are having chocolate milk with their snack.
We have also learned that the little prankster Billy, is planning on breaking ranks. He was overheard on the school yard yesterday discussing how he plans to run between the legs of the RCMP officers, to try and snap a picture of the PM with his new Diego camera. Billy was unavailable for comment.
This is very good news for Canadians. We no longer have to worry about our media accidentally providing accurate accounts of events. We've learned not to expect more that kindergarten skills to be used in their jobs, so we will no longer be disappointed now that a kindergarten class is performing them.
News is that the National Post will continue to run attack ads against the Liberals, but who reads the National Post?
What in the hell is happening in this country? When did the RCMP feel it was their job to keep the press away from our Prime Minister? Why do we now allow the PMO to write their own press and snap their own photos?
WHEN IN THE HELL ARE WE GOING TO WAKE UP?
This is Canada? This is a democracy? Unfriggenbelievable!!!!
And you know what the sad part is? There are those in the media who think this is a good idea, because by controlling the message, we are being fooled into thinking this artificial recreation of a Prime Minister is the best thing for this country.
There is a movement on Facebook and other sites to boycott Canadian media because frankly they are not doing their job. I'm beginning to think they might be right. They should be ashamed. Is this what they went to journalism school for? They are an absolute disgrace.
OTTAWA—Prime Minister Stephen Harper has become legend for the iron control he exerts not only over the messages his government sends out over the heads of the Parliamentary Press Gallery, but also the messages his staff and MPs project ....
...For at least two years, following his battle with the press gallery in 2006, Harper has snubbed the front door of the Commons for Question Period. He established a covert route to get to the Chamber from his third-floor Centre Block office, ducking down through a narrow hallway behind the public gallery atop the west side of the Chamber, down a small staircase, and then scuttling into the government lobby through a back door across from the House Speaker's Chamber.
... No Prime Minister has ever avoided the front entrance to the Commons and no one, at least outside of Harper's inner circle, understands why Harper does. Is it part of his strategy for media management, avoiding unwanted camera shots or shouted questions ...Gallery President Helene Buzzetti says the struggle came to be too draining, a distraction from work ... ... Graves says their approach, a leftover from the Harris days, is "very disciplined, very, very focused, very political, tightly managing things, no rogue speakers to disrupt the apple cart." ...
I stumbled across a site called Word Warriors, part of the alternative media revolution, to provide factual information, or perspective to right-wing spin.
I often find myself lambasting the mainstream media, because I think they are complicit in destroying democracy in this country. Canadians are getting turned off politics and are no longer exercising their right to vote.
But when I'm in a better frame of mind, I think most journalists are just trying to do their job, and even if they have little control over how they must tell a story, they have deadlines and contracts and so it wouldn't be fair to always pick them apart. Not that I won't be mad again tomorrow, or even later today, with the latest spin; but I always get over it.
However, there is a growing citizen journalist movement that is providing alternative voices, whether on blogs, videos or small independent newspapers. But even without that kind of commitment, simple things like writing letters to the editor, can make a great deal of difference in moving political discourse, because sometimes they just validate things that other people are thinking.
If you are a social or political activist, you have heard the declaration a hundred times: the media is terrible – how can we win with such a biased media? The problem is that everyone complains about the media but few do anything about it. Word Warriors is designed to help you quit complaining and start acting.
As biased as they are, newspapers are still privately owned public institutions. We must, if we are serious, take advantage where we can. And one place is the letters to the editor pages – the one egalitarian part of the newspaper to which ordinary people have some access.
Letters to the editor are important political tools for two very practical reasons. First, the majority of Canadians share progressive social values, yet most feel they are alone when they read newspapers and watch TV.
If people see their values expressed in letters to the editor their values are reinforced – their gut sense that things are terribly wrong is given a voice. People’s values start to become part of a collective consciousness.
Secondly, many if not most reporters are actually on the centre or left of the political spectrum. In many cases, they are simply not permitted to cover the issues they want to write about. Often the story ideas of reporters are rejected with the claim that “No one cares about [poverty] [P3s] [private health care]…”
By writing letters about these issues we give reporters the evidence they need to convince their editors that these stories are important.
Word Warriors is a collective letter writing project whereby I send out periodic suggestions for letters to the editor along with data and analysis, and you use these to write letters to your local paper. If there are enough of us writing enough letters we can help change the political landscape.
Welcome to the world of acting – not complaining. Join here.
I do write letters to the editor often, if I read something that doesn't sound right. I had an uncle in New Brunswick who was a political activist and prolific letter writer, and his actions got things done. A new sidewalk here, a pothole repaired there. Though often asked to run for office, he always stated that he got more done keeping elected officials on their toes.
In fact he was once invited to have lunch with then Premier Richard Hatfield because in one his letters he stated something to the effect "...it's not that my legs would ever be found under your table." It's a funny family story because Hatfield ran a hog farm and apparently when my uncle got there the first thing he said was "Does it ever stink around here." I don't know if he really said that or was just trying to get my aunt riled up, but he was quite a character.
My point is that ordinary people can accomplish extraordinary things if they just get involved.
With the National Post and it's affiliates in receivership, and other publications struggling for subscribers, what is the future of newspapers?
As citizen journalism is becoming more popular, we've seen the mainstream media evolving, by providing instant stories online, allowing immediate responses from followers, and many journalists have even begun blogging.
However, in Canada I think the move to citizen journalism is an important step in trying to provide stories and commentary, as a defense against mainstream media; not to compliment it. This is especially true with political coverage. As journalist Lawrence Martin once claimed "... the press versus the people - that runs right to the heart of the debate over the future of our country and to the heart of politics." The media is trying to pull us to the right, when we are quite comfortable stuck in the middle.
The Press Versus the People
"Lawrence Martin has written several articles about the Canadian media's rightward migration. In a January 2003 column headlined It's not Canadians who've gone to the right, just their media, he quoted an unnamed European diplomat saying "You have a bit of a problem here. Your media are not representative of your people, your values." Too many political commentators are right of centre while the public is in the middle, the diplomat continued. There is a disconnect."
"Martin believes the disconnect began when Conrad Black converted the Financial Post into the National Post, hired a stable of conservative commentators like Mark Steyn, David Frum and George Jonas, bought the centrist Southam chain and turned the entire package into a vehicle to unite Canada's right and retool the country's values to U.S.-style Conservatism." (Winnipeg Free Press, December 12, 2007, Right-wing media covering up political scandal By: Frances Russell)
From Wikipedia: The term citizen media refers to forms of content produced by private citizens who are otherwise not professional journalists. Citizen journalism, participatory media and democratic media are related principles.
Citizen media has bloomed with the advent of technological tools and systems that facilitate production and distribution of media. Of these technologies, none has advanced citizen media more than the Internet. With the birth of the Internet and into the 1990s, citizen media has responded to traditional mass media's neglect of public interest and partisan portrayal of news and world events. Media produced by private citizens may be as factual, satirical, neutral or biased as any other form of media but has no political, social or corporate affiliation.
Canada's media now neglects our public interest and instead is merely concerned with how they spin a story, rather than just giving us the story and allowing us to decide for ourselves. What they might deem to be balanced reporting; bringing up similar scandals to justify current scandals, is only turning people off politics. In the recent byelection in Hochelaga Quebec, there was a 17% voter turn out. That is not democracy and does not reflect voter intent. And yet the media are falling all over themselves suggesting that it was a Liberal failure.
Author and publisher Mel Hurtig, in his lecture series 'Who Killed Canada' states that we now have the greatest concentration of media in the western world, and that that this would simply not be allowed in any other western democracy. Essentially there are three media conglomerates and all three are strong Conservative. In fact, Mr. Hurtig describes them all as being so right-wing they would simply fall off the map.
I've noticed this with our own local newspaper, which is now part of the Sun chain. We are seeing columns from the likes of Gerry Nicholls (Harper's vice-president when he was president of the National Citizens Coalition), Peter Worthington (co-founder of Harper's Northern Foundation and close personal friend of Conrad Black) , Monte Solberg (former Reform Party MP), David Frum (Instrumental in uniting the right, friend of Conrad Black and former speechwriter for George W. Bush. He coined the phrase 'Axis of Evil').
It's absolutely chilling. We don't even need to read the columns to know what they are going to say. 'Harper good, Liberals bad ... ugh ... scratch, scratch, scratch'.
And since these same media outlets control newspaper, television and radio news; we are essentially only being given one voice. There are few or no alternative views. Yet a healthy democracy should foster a healthy and independent news media.
Donald Gutstein, author of a new book called; Not a Conspiracy Theory: How Business Propaganda Hijacks Democracy, also wrote an article in 2005 on the subject, discussing talk shows: Fox News Format Infiltrates Canada
"CanWest's 'Global Sunday' bills itself as "Canada's number one current affairs talk show." But a lot of Canadians won't find their views reflected in the talk.
"Take the show that aired on February 20, featuring a panel discussion on equalization.
"The purpose of equalization is to ensure provincial governments have sufficient revenues to provide "reasonably comparable levels of public services at reasonably comparable levels of taxation. The left-wing perspective on equalization is that it helps fund programs that define who we are as Canadians, such as education, health care and social services. Canadians in every province should have roughly equal access to these programs, the left says.
"This perspective was not raised by the panel. Instead, all three panellists offered right-wing perspectives."
When was the last time you heard an honest debate on health care? Or on Harper's plans to privatize it? Several years, right? And yet polls consistently show that that ranks number one in the concerns of Canadians.
An American journalist, Richard Fricker, wrote a piece about the change in Canadian political discourse since Harper took office.
As an American journalist visiting my wife's relatives in Canada, I've always been struck by how ardently the country's political discourse focused on substance — the budget, health care, schools, roads — with little of the cheap theatrics and angry divisiveness of U.S. politics and punditry. Reading and listening to the Canadian news media during those family trips could be a tad boring, but it also was touching, like remembering your earnest grade-school civics teacher lecturing about the wonders of the American democratic process.
But in my visit this past summer, I noticed that the tone of Canada suddenly had changed. There was a nastier edge to the commentary. There were not-so-subtle appeals to racism and xenophobia, references to Muslim neighbourhoods in Quebec as “Quebecistan” and to Lebanese-Canadians as “Hezbocrats,” a play on the Muslim group Hezbollah.
To someone who has covered U.S. politics for three decades, there was a shock of recognition. Standing out starkly against the bland traditions of Canadian governance was the pugnacious 'tude of American political combat, wedge issues pounded in with a zeal that put the goal of winning and holding power over everything else.
It was as if a virus that had long infected the people south of the border had overnight jumped containment and spread northward establishing itself in a new host population. But — as I began to study this new phenomenon — it became clear that this infection did not just accidentally break quarantine. Rather, it was willfully injected into the Canadian body politic by conservative strategists and right-wing media moguls who had studied the modern American model and were seeking to replicate it.
Canada's Prime Minister Stephen Harper even brought in Republican advisers, such as political consultant Frank Luntz, to give pointers on how the ruling Conservative Party could become as dominant in Canada as the GOP is in the United States.
What is Our Media Not Telling Us
Toronto Star Columnist Linda McQuaig, wrote recently"If, as polls suggest, Stephen Harper is poised to win a majority, it's largely due to the media notion that his past reputation for extremism no longer holds."
This was a very bold move to remind us and her colleagues why we were always so frightened of Stephen Harper. He has not changed. He is not a middle of the road politician, he just plays one on TV.
The fact that the PMO is not only writing copy now but also provided their own airbrushed photography, means that we have no legitimate access to our own government. Admitting media complicity in this is a good first step, but is that step part of a journey or will it end there?
I'm guessing that nothing will really change.
And what has the media not been telling us? Among other things:
1. The fact that Stephen Harper once helped to create, what Dr. Debra Chin describes as a white brotherhood organization called the Northern Foundation. This is common knowledge and needs further exploration. Don't expect anyone other than citizen journalists to do that though.
2. The SPP. Mel Hurtig had transcripts of meetings on this new Security partnership, that is pretty much the selling of Canada to the U.S. He offered it to all the mainstream media outlets, but everyone turned it down. Why is that? Don't Canadians have a right to know that we no longer control our natural resources? That the Americans get first dibs on our uranium, oil and water, even BEFORE CANADIANS? Or that we can no longer make our own decision about whether or not we go to war, but must go where the Americans tell us to? That's not news?
3. Jim Flaherty was involved in a questionable land deal in Whitby. The only coverage I could find was on the blog of BCer in Toronto. No one else picked up the story despite the fact that the evidence was overwhelming.
4. The Council for National Policy has been described as the most dangerous organization in the United States. This was where Stephen Harper delivered his infamous 'I hate Canadians' speech. An American documentary filmmaker has a membership list from 1999 that includes one Stephen Harper. His story was not about our PM and his name was just read off matter of factly. Has anyone investigated this and what it could mean to our security? Nope.
5. Stephen Harper told another extreme right-wing group, the Civitas club that he has tapped into the theo-cons for votes, and as such put muscle into our foreign policy to accommodate them. This group wants to accelerate Armageddon by pushing for total destruction in the middle east. Only Marcie McDonald of the Walrus covered the story and has actually written a book about it. But don't expect anyone in the media to give the book any reviews. It will be met with silence.
This is simply not good enough. These are not little things. This is our future. And they wonder why they are struggling. Their job is to keep Canadians informed, by presenting us with the facts. They are not doing doing their job. It's that simple.
