The Fraud Of A 'Free Press' In Canada: Flat-Out Campaigning For Stephen Harper

The Fraud of a “Free Press” in Canada: Flat-Out Campaigning for Stephen Harper.

Some of it’s wide open.  The “national” newspaper founded by (present) jailbird Conrad Black was created to propagandize for the Right.  From the time the man I dub “Lord Black of Doublecross Harbour” began The National Post it has lost money.  Annually.  Millions and millions of dollars over the years.

“Well”, you might say, “Black and Leonard Asper are Right Ideologues.  Surely they would dump an on-going money-loser.” Except – as Stephen Harper demonstrated by opening his Election Campaign slashing funds to the arts and then insulting artists – Right Ideologues will pay a lot to articulate their reactionary ideas. Call The National Post the on-going election campaign sheet for Stephen Harper.  For the Aspers the money’s worth it.

CanWest  papers are all Harperite sheets – no free press there.  Indeed, not long ago the Aspers dipped deep into Goldman Sachs – the U.S. giant – for money.  Stephen Harper looked the other way (as you’d expect).  I suspect the transaction defies Canadian press ownership law in spirit and probably in fact.  That suggests Goldman Sachs has real presence in CanWest policy.  As if Asper wasn’t far enough Right already.

Not only have Black and the Aspers – in the opinions of many – turned the major press Right in Canada.  They also have, many insist, degenerated quality, breadth of reporting, editorial excellence, and columnist variety.

And so what have we remaining in Canada?  The Globe and Mail – calling itself Canada’s National Newspaper.  I’m afraid the title needs amplifying: “Right Wing Canada’s National Newspaper”.

Look, just for a sample, as the issue ten days before the Canadian federal election – October 4, 2008.

(1)    Big on the front page – a good (?) photo of Stephen Harper.

(2)    The Editorial makes a plausible (but fraudulent, to this reader) case for Stephen Harper’s beastly youth crime policies – which have failed everywhere else tried! (The Globe, of course, doesn’t report that.)

(3)    Then the Globe’s Huffer-and-Puffer, Rex Murphy, fibs his way through (as I judge) his column.  He repeats the Rightist Mantra: “ Poor Stevie Harper, four against one in the leaders’ debate – “the bear tied to the stake” in Rexie’s words.  Horse manure!  If the Prime Minister in that debate had been Pierre Trudeau or Jean Chretien, they’d have made mincemeat of the attacking four. 

Stephen Harper couldn’t.  For a very simple reason.  His Accountability legislation is a sham.  Never has it been harder to get information from the federal government.  His economic policy is … George Bush (going down in flames).  He IS giving huge tax gifts to huge corporations.  He has no Election Campaign Outline.  His environment policy is … George Bush.

Stephen Harper didn’t answer because he couldn’t answer.  Trudeau and Chretien had policies for Canadians and – being six times smarter than Stephen Harper – could have batted the other leaders down.

Rex Murphy spouts Right propaganda, while saying he “has no concern for Mr. Harper personally.  I am disinterested in the question of whether he wins the election.”  Horse manure!
 
(4)    Then there’s the Globe’s Christie Blatchford – a sure bet for columns “somewhat Right of Attila the Hun”.  And sure enough, Harper’s attack on the arts wasn’t really, actually an attack on the arts.  Get it?  Blatchford says things as stupidly as Harper does.  (Birds of a feather…)  She writes falsely of Canada, now, that people think “Big Brother must be the only funder of the arts….”

Then she goes on to say there should be more private funding of the arts.  So?  Who disagrees?  And she suggests – as I read her – that private money would encourage art less likely to lose sight of the public.

Quite apart from the fact that what she argues ISN’T what Stephen Harper said, she adds more horse manure to Rex Murphy’s pile. 
 
(5)    Should I go on?  I have to, because the Rightist Insult of Insults is the Globe and Mail’s barely disguised five-page advertising insert as Election Advertising for Stephen Harper.  (Obviously, the Globe thinks he isn’t doing well.)

Isn’t such huge Advertising against the law?

Is this “Special Feature” balanced?  (You may laugh.  Out loud.)  The nine sidebar comments in the “Special Feature” are all from people one might say are “campaigners for Stephen Harper”.  The tenth sidebar tells you how to see a “slide show on the life of Stephen Harper”!!!

The only good thing about the “Special Feature” is that it is so obviously false-fronting, so obviously sleazy propaganda, so obviously boring pap posing as “news” that it should make readers furious.  How much is a five-page Political Advertising Supplement in the Globe and Mail?  Someone must tell Elections Canada so it can investigate and add that amount to Harper’s Election spending account.

But that the Globe and Mail would stoop to such crass and brazen “cheating” turns the stomach of decent Canadians.  A “free press” in Canada?  Don’t make me laugh.  One can only hope Canadians take their revenge on Election Day.