CanWest Betrays The Public Interest
Posted on Sunday, October 09 at 13:39 by BC Mary
Who would have published such vile falsehoods? Certainly not the Vancouver Sun, not the Vancouver Province, not the Victoria Times Colonist, nor even the North Shore News, not any of the other CanWest newspapers. Who, then? Who??
It was "bloggers' bombast, union rhetoric, and writers who should have known better ... " says Enchin. And he's not joking. Nor is CanWest. This nearly full-page story includes a flattering photo of Premier Gordon Campbell blocking a football tackle. Just pretend, of course.
The Sun has cooled down a bit, since the May 2005 B.C. Election. Although I, for one, will be a long time before I can forgive the Sun for what they said about Joy MacPhail on 13 July 2005.
Joy is the great granddaughter of Agnes MacPhail, one of the Famous Five women whose political gallantry is memorialized in the bronze sculptures on Parliament Hill in Ottawa; that in itself merits celebration, given the courageous 4 years Joy, with Jenny Kwan, upheld that tradition by representing the British Columbians who opposed the Campbell decisions.
In May of 2005, Joy retired from political life. She married James Shavick, a film producer from Los Angeles, starting a whole new life there.
To mark the occasion, what did the louts at Vancouver Sun publish in her home-town newspaper? "SOCIALISTS CAVORT IN L.A., THE LAND OF CHEAP DRINK" ran the heading. "Even progressive socialists can be forgiven for trying to save a buck ..." said the Sun on its editorial page, about "Comrade" MacPhail's wedding.
There ought to be a law ... a Press Council ... some way for citizens to protest this kind of gratuitous insult masquerading as a free press in the service of the public interest.
We know this about CanWest: they think it's OK to subvert the democratic process, to publish warped, carved-up, slanted, or outright fallacious stories as news. Remember the erroneous claim published 2 days before the B.C. Election, that BCTF would take a strike vote immediately after election day and in the midst of year-end exams? Wasn't true. But it was cleverly timed so teachers hadn't time to respond before the vote ... and undoubtedly, this report scared some voters into changing their outcome of the election. It was, after all, New Democrats 41% and BC Liberals 46% -- a close-run thing. As CanWest well knew.
CanWest's tactics create two kinds of readers:
1) Those who believe everything they read in those newspapers and therefore are ill informed,
2) Those who become extremely disillusioned and have difficulty believing anything they read.
Neither group is well served ... and yet they (we) are the public. We are the public interest which is being subverted by CanWest. We are the people whose lives are changed by an unaccountable board of directors.
CanWest might continue to make corporate profits off misleading news reports in future. You can see it beginning, for example, in the way they are handling the CBC Lock-out and aftermath.
Watch how they print only the stories, editorials and Letters-to-the-Editor which suggest that it really wouldn't matter -- and nobody would care -- if CBC were destroyed. The Sun prints things such as:
Viewers will seek unique networks like the CBC
and:
How relevant is CBC in a 200-channel universe?
I kept asking myself why CanWest would publish such things which are so blatantly unfair and unhelpful to our public broadcaster. Silly me.
It eventually dawned upon me that CanWest has enormous illusions of grandeur ...
CanWest sees itself as the one, the only national news service. Heaven forfend.
Let us contemplate the CanWest universe: Stephen Harper (or Stockwell Day) will be prime minister of Canada and he/they will do no wrong, not ever. Ms Belinda Stronach will be offered her chance to come home (for a certain price) and to wear the mantle of Minister of Finance. The federal Liberal/Reform/Socred government's Opposition (whoever they may be) will be referred to, if at all, in disparaging terms and they will never be re-elected to govern. Canadians will be urged to sell anything that's left to sell (if it isn't nailed down).
How relevant is CBC in a 200-channel universe? asks the Vancouver Sun.
I'd say that the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation as a public service is absolutely essential to Canada's future. And CanWest is the reason why.
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All editorial content is vetted from the central office - in such a fashion that would make Soviets proud. One sided news coverage is not one-sided, it's called framing the debate.
They are open about their one-sided support of Israel, the US, the Conservative party, big business and anti-union moves. Don't act surprised - I am not.
What does surprise me is that so few Canadians realize just how concentrated their media is, who owns it, and what their agendas are. That is the issue, not the CanWest empire. For if Canadians knew, the Aspers empire would be no more. It's really that simple.
Before these low lifers could hide, but not know, they are being found out and we are becoming more cautious.
I said it many times, more and more media types, reporters and anchors can be found as speech writers, spin doctors, public relations spokes person for "government" department or trying to get elected as MP or MLA's these days than ever before or working directly for political parties trying to do their spin.
Lately I have been hearing more and more from people how little they trust the media and would be hard pressed to discuss any dirt they have on the governing party with them. One lady said she had first hand information that one reporter here in Nova Scotia got his job as government spokes person, because he killed many hot stories about this one party. Go figure !!! Just look at the number of media connected to one party or the other.. so who do you trust any more?
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Good government is not a party government
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Good government is not a party government
Given the importance of balanced communication throught the media to ensure a vibrant democracy through a well-informed electorate that is exposed to a multiplicity of ideas, isn't it about time a campaign be organized to push for limits on concentrated ownership of media (say to one TV station/network OR one newspaper sold either locally or nationally such as the Globe and Mail is today)? Allowing concentrated ownership of the media is just as evil and just as much a threat to democracy as concentrated government ownership is.
The problem we have is not bias itself, but a total lack of contrary bias! I want to be able to choose between a pro-fudalism publication like Canwest's papers or pro-democracy papers like... er... Well, if we had one I'd like to be able to choose it too.
Actually, I have found one pretty decent magazine: Common Ground. Its been around for a few years but I was confusing it with other publications like Shared Vision. Common ground actually has good articles.
As an example, this month's issue had a piece comparing the hype from the pro-fudal press about a new cancer drug to the reality of its effectiveness. I don't remember the exact numbers, but the fudal articles all parroted the drug company claim of a 50%+ decrease in reoccurance of certain breast cancer tumors and the calls by Canadians to approve the drug immediately in order to save lives. However, the truth was quite a bit different. The 50% figure was misleading in that it only looked at women with recurring tumors, not at all similar breast cancers. When the entire group was counted, the number was much less dramatic.
Also not mentioned was survival rates. What good is reducing the number of tumor recurrances if the survival rates are not improved? A serious side effect of this drug is death from heart failure. So serious in fact, that the survival rates of those treated were only improved by 1%.
This new drug is also a LOT more expensive than the old treatment; costing $4,000 plus per month. When you consider how badly underfunded the healthcare system is already, throwing this kind of money at a 1% improvement makes no sense. How many people more would die waiting in ERs because the money was being spent on this drug instead of doctors and nurses? That 1% extra survival for one specific disease could easily translate into an equal or greater number of deaths elsewhere in the healthcare system due to the drain of money to pay for marginal (at best) improvements in certain drugs.
Another thing not mentioned by the pro-fudal press: The "Canadians" that are most vocal about "cutting red tape" to get drugs approved fast turn out to be lobby groups funded by the drug companies themselves. Just like the Canadian Taxpayer Federation, which is in reality a lobbying group for corporations, the fudal press fails to point out who these pro-profit-damn-the-people groups really are.
I'd turn that around and say that it is because of the left-wing, anti-American, anti-Israeli, politically correct, Torontocentric bent of the CBC that having a strong contrary voice like CanWest is essential. You statists had your way for a long time.
Conrad Black created the National Post *because* of the CBC and Toronto Star. You liberals and left-wingers were used to a privileged, protected space on the airwaves and in print. A little competition comes along in the marketplace of ideas, and you people freak.
of which, it's funny you think of Conrad Black as the hero of
Canadian values!).
I said I thought CanWest's empire ought to be broken up, not
vapourized.
With even one of those West Coast newspapers (and I was talking
about British Columbia's situation) speaking in left-of-centre terms,
what a lively debate that would be. Useful. Illuminating.
"A little competition comes along ..." you write. Ha ha ha ha ha ha.
(Rural)
between print and broadcast. You pose a good question.
And yet, I can't think of a radio or TV broadcast which would have
referred to Joy MacPhail as "cavort in L.A., the land of cheap
drink" at the time of her retirement from B.C. politics.
CanWest publishes The National newspaper from Toronto. Its neo-
Conservative founder, Conrad Black, used its editorial page to
wage open war against all who weren't rightwing.
I believe that a free press is essential to a just society. And I also
believe that there must be a way in which any news media can be
held to a fair standard.
Any suggestions?
As far as the CBC, before they went on strike they were going overboard trying to give a voice to the most radical right wing voices in the country. I don't know about anyone else but I certainly had my fill of David Bercuson and Don Martin on the CBC who invariably have nothing of any value to say. I long ago stopped reading either in the Calgary Herald because what they have to say is so predictable and usually amount to rah-rah articles for the US and Conservative Party (Bercuson's articles are quite often unintelligle).
unfortunate, ill-advised, Canada-unfriendly doggone Lock-out for
which CBC management should be thoroughly ashamed.
And yes, I agree that they were trying too hard to appease certain
people in the powerful far-right.
David Bercuson is IMO a very weak historian with an inexcusable
bias. I've wondered how he landed up in so many plum jobs.
Jerusalem Post (jointly with MTL Media) which includes magazine and radio components. refreshing to note as well
the recent partnering with Entertainment Tonight to keep us
all abreast of the hollywood machination with our own canadian version of said program. there is no coincidence to the aspers' selection of the word global to define their "empire". global is as global does, and when national,
regional and independant media vanishes, guess what remains
of so called democracy???