The criticism of Prime Minister Harper was uncharacteristically sharp: “During last night’s debate, Mr. Harper continued to downplay the threat to Canada’s financial system by saying it is not in crisis. This not leadership, it’s lackadaisical.” Wow! Strong words … especially coming from in Friday’s Globe and Mail … traditionally a Conservative newspaper.
The Globe and Mail! Toronto-based! Conservative! But concerned enough to express concern and criticism of Harper’s laissez-faire attitude to the plummeting Toronto Stock Exchange values , the billions of lost capital value of Canada’s corporations, the millions upon millions of dollars lost to ordinary Canadians’ savings, pensions, the tightening of credit .. and how this will all affect our economy.
But in B.C.’s editorially weak, corporate-controlled mass media … all is well; Harper’s confidently enduring the whining of those ninnies on the other side.
The headline on the main debate story in CanWest’s The Vancouver Sun: “Harper fends off leaders’ barbs with diplomacy”; in the National Post “Harper fights back with attack on Dion” with a sub headline “You panicked” and in The Province “Harper takes a beating from all sides” with a sub headline ”But mid-debate poll says Harper won English one”.
If Stephane Dion, Jack Layton or Elizabeth May scored ANY points at all with their criticism, their revelations, their facts or their own proposals, none of THEIR statements or ideas could make it into the headlines … or even the sub headlines … and nor did any concerns about Harper’s “lackadaisical” performance.
In my blog Media Conspiracy: Myth or Reality (Aug 28), I told the story of how a reporter from China’s Xinhua News Agency suggested to me that although media writings are censored in his country … it really isn’t necessary here because the censorship is done in the hiring: ie many privately owned media hire those who share their own editorial, sometimes even political views. And that is often reinforced in the decisions on whatv topics to tackle on air, who to invite and how to stack the deck .. ie have five right-wing on-air hosts or interviewers for every single (if any) leftie!
I could not help but think of that Friday morning again when I heard BC’s highest-rated radio morning show, on Corus Radio’s CKNW, invited Greg Weston, Ottawa correspondent for none other than the Sun Media Newspaper chain to react to last night’s second Election debate.
Sun Newspaper Group is not The Vancouver Sun’s newspaper group (CanWest). Sun Newspaper group is an Eastern based tabloid publication group of dailies .. . that, let’s just say, I would NEVER accuse of being editorially left wing!!! LOL.
Weston is a seasoned reporter … but I was not surprised when, despite even the conservative Globe and Mail’s reaction to the debate .. he concluded “Harper defended himself admirably” while the others just “shrieked” at him.
Apparently no concern of his that, with the markets collapsing all around, our savings and pensions plummeting, our Prime Minister mostly just sat there, looking bored or amused or lackadaisical. Naw, Harper looked “prime ministerial” Weston concluded … AHA!!! See my pre-debate blog below! LOL.
And NW host Philip Till, also not surprisingly, agreed. Great for Harper!
But ten minutes later, BC’s best media commentator The Vancouver Sun’s Vaughn Palmer, appeared on the show praising NDP Jack Layton’s debate performance and he even complimented Bloc leader Gilles Duceppe for a rare accomplishement: getting Harper to admit he was wrong when he advocated sending Canadian troops to Iraq! Ooops!!!
Till sprung to Harper’s defence “I don’t give a damn about whether Harper was wrong on the weapons of mass destruction,” the NW host proferred (although hundreds more young Canadians could be dead today if Harper had succeeded in getting the Liberal giovernment at the time to follow Bush into Iraq!). Apparently no matter. Till explained that today, the economy and people’s savings are much more important!!
Oh?
Well, too bad Till didn’t read .. or chose to ignore … what was said about the debate, and Harper’s performance, in the conservative Globe and Mail!
Harv Oberfeld
3 responses so far ↓
1 BC Mary // Oct 4, 2008 at 3:05 am
Harvey, I don’t think you can possibly realize how welcome these words are to people who have suffered the outrageous slings and arrows against every decent Leftie who ever dared to speak in the West Coast’s so-called newspapers.
Thanks … and thanks again.
(Response: Believe it or not, things were not always the way they are now. Quality, competition, individuality and diversity in political reporting used to count … and draw readers, listeners, viewers. But now the media owners are such huge corporations … media outlets are in danger of just being messengers for their corporate masters. Lucky I worked through the Golden Era ..and retired just in time. Just wish we could get more public discussion about all this going! ho)
2 BC Mary // Oct 5, 2008 at 4:54 pm
Good to see your response, Harvey.
Were you still a working journalist when Queen of the North sank?
Remember the day Glen Clark, former head honcho of BC Ferries, opened his mouth to say that an accident report by the Transport Safety Board on the tragic sinking should’ve been presented a year earlier … at least, that’s what Clark tried to say. But he was howled down.
In news reporting, first CanWest insisted that we had to read/hear paragraphs about what a bad, bad, very bad person Clark was (not).
Only with that bias firmly reinstated, were we permitted to hear what this former BC Ferries Cabinet minister was saying.
Glen Clark was saying that when he was in government, he got TSB reports within 3 months; that we shouldn’t have to wait a year or more to know why we lost that ship and two citizens.
I’ve never forgotten the cruelty of that incident. Why wouldn’t a former premier, democratically elected not once but twice, be free to speak? Why was the BC public cut off from hearing his advice?
There are dozens, hundreds of other examples. Perhaps there are none more interesting than the three (yes, 3!) burglaries into the offices of people connected to the Legislature raids — only one of which was reported.
Not to mention the misinformation published on the eve of the last provincial election, misinformation which is alleged to have tipped the scales just enough to allow G. Campbell to cling to the reins of government. Co-incidence? Of course it was.
And “more public discussion” pretty much depends upon those guys who have already decided on what British Columbians should and shouldn’t say.
(Response: I retired a week after the ship sank .. no connection!
But I believe your comments go to the heart of BC’s media reality. Just wish more people/groups were aware/speaking out about it all! ho)
3 Tony M // Oct 7, 2008 at 12:44 am
Harv, I dunno if you pay attention to the media in the Interior, but it’s so weak as to be sad. The Kamloops Daily is okay (just), but the Prince George media is terrible. They run nothing but grip-and-grin photos featuring the three Liberal MLAs. There’s never any real critical analysis of anything – with the occasional exception being some decent stories by Gord Hokestra – because they’re so concerned with all the cat-in-tree stories.
I am first and foremost interested in good journalism, regardless of the slant. Yes, I’m a lefty, but I’m more tolerant of the Post for all its ideologues than I am of the weak, say-nothing newspapers.
It’s not the journos that I blame for this, but rather the editors and publishers with their story quotas and size limits. If, heaven forfend, the Libs hang onto power in 09, it will be a combination of bias and flat out poor newspapers that’s at the root of it.
(Response: I dont see much of the media from around the province since Ive retired ..but I can understand the frustration. The worst thing is silence ..so I hope blogs like this can keep the discussion of issues and the media going! Pass it on ..because the major media sure won’t!
ho)
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