Jonathon has his knickers in a twist (see his comment on yesterday's blog) because
1. the CBC should be neutral
2. the CBC is a Liberal tool, which is wrong
3. the CBC should not be asking politicians questions unless in a neutral way
4. questions given to the Liberals were meant to embarrass Mulroney and the Alliance, and,
5. the CBC promotes its far left leanings.
A whole lot of codswollop in there Jonathon. Murky, muddled, misinformed musings substituting for thinking.
The CBC was not created to become some kind of eunuch of the airwaves. It is meant to reflect Canadians to themselves, to provide a mirror, as it were, in which we can look at all things Canadian, including our various governments. The corporation should not be biased and, in fact, I think CBC reporters do quite well at keeping their thoughts to themselves. And their news reports are as free of bias as I think it is possible to be.
To suggest that the CBC is a Liberal tool is nonsense. Harpoon was elected was because he was given a free ride in the last election by the CBC and almost every other media outlet. Paul Martin was put under a microscope. The CBC and other media gave huge play to the RCMP's "investigation" into Ralph Goodale re the suspected budget "leakage" several months before. The investigation and the stories turned out to be a complete crock, fueled by the irresponsibility of the NDP and spread irresponsibly across Canada by the "Liberal" media.
It was the final straw for many people, including many Liberals. Hundreds of thousands of votes bled away on an untrue rumour and it cost the Liberals the election. I don't recall anyone saying then that the "Liberal" CBC shouldn't be asking questions. In point of fact they should have asked a hell of a lot more than they did, but that's another story.
Jonathon also whines (why do right wingers whine so much?) because it was unfair of the CBC to give MPs questions to ask Mulroney. Geeeeze marie Jonathon. Where did you grow up? They have any schools there? You ever stick your head in one? Last time I looked it wasn't a crime to suggest a question to someone in a position to ask questions. Last time I look Mulroney wasn't part of the Alliance govt. And last time I looked the media wasn't suggesting that because Mulroney might be full of it then so, too, is the government. Not even the dastardly CBC has made that linkage.
Given the voting trends of the last 75 years, and given Jonathon's assertion that he pays taxes and his taxes are as important as anyone else's, the CBC should probably tilt to the left 80% of the time. They don't. Not even close.
Take the expert panel Mansbridge has on once a week. Mainstays are Allan Gregg, Andrew Coyne and Chantal Hebert. Gregg and Coyne are noted right wingers, supporters of the conservative view point for years, Hebert may be a Liberal. She writes for the Star but her columns, unlike Coyne's, focus on facts and without large dollops of her own ego intruding, as is the case with Coyne.
The CBC also has a couple of far right profs from the University of Calgary who get far too much air time for the teeny bit of intelligence they impart on the odd occasion.
But the whole argument is silly on one level because bias exists in us all - always has and always will. The challenge is to keep the bias out of reports and news stories as much as possible - it's up to directors and producers of various programs to ensure newscasters, columnists and commentators focus on facts and on presenting information sufficiently clear and uncolored to allow listeners/readers/viewers to form their own opinions. On the whole they do a pretty good job, Jonathon's views to the contrary.
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19 comments:
"I think CBC reporters do quite well at keeping their thoughts to themselves. And their news reports are as free of bias as I think it is possible to be."
If you can find Christina Lawand, please ask her what she thinks of CBC reporters being 'free of bias'
I think the concern is the way in which the CBC reporter asked it's questions of Muldoon. It does seem troubling that the reporter may have provided questions to Liberal members of the Ethics Committee when it's not the role of the media to do that... at least not in my books. This isn't about some grand anti-Tory conspiracy in the ranks of the CBC either. (Sorry Tory supporters)
What do these grumpy neo-cons want..... every tv station, every newspaper, to be Conservative. 85% already are. What more do they want ?
If you don't think the CBC is biased towards the left and the far left, what can I say?
You must be mentally retarded.
Liberal's are mentally retarded seeing how over 4 million of em' supported a party who was proven to be corrupt.
Am I surprised you don't think that the CBC is biased?
Not really.
I shouldn't expect anything else from a left wing socialist.
There not the smartest people in the puzzle.
After all, if the Liberals hadn't imported millions of people into Toronto , there would be no Liberal Party.
The Liberal Party of Canada is a manufactured party who wouldn't exist if not for their importing policies.
If you really think the CBC is not biased, then I can understand why you're a Liberal.
Watch this video form YOUTUBE.
This is a clip of the CBC lying and taking Harper out of context, on purposr mind you.
The CBC has already apologized for this brutal reporting.
http://youtube.com/watch?v=bDw5a0_iFBk
So, after watching this video, how can you argue the CBC is not a left wing tool.
After watching that video and seeing how the CBC lied put Harper out of context on purpose, here is a little more info for you.
An internal British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) memo reveals senior figures admitted the national news agency was guilty of promoting left-wing views and anti-Christian sentiment.
News of the memo, reported by British media, comes as the BBC continues to struggle against claims of biased reporting on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and distorted coverage of the global fight against terror, reports the Israeli YnetNews.com.
The admissions of bias were made at a recent "impartiality" summit the BBC held. Most executives admitted the corporation's representation of homosexuals and ethnic minorities was unbalanced and disproportionate, YnetNews.com said. The British news agency, the report said, leaned too strongly towards political correctness, the overt promotion of multiculturalism, anti-Americanism and discrimination against the countryside.
At the summit, executives were given a fictitious scenario in which they were asked to make a judgment.
In the illustration, Jewish comedian Sasha Baron Cohen would participate in a studio program in which guests were allowed to symbolically throw in a garbage bin things they hated.
What would you do, the executives were asked, if Cohen decided to throw kosher food, the Archbishop of Canterbury, the Bible and the Quran in the trash.
Everything would be allowed, the executives said, except for the Quran, for fear of offending the British Muslim community.
The BBC also revealed its executives favored interviewing terrorist leader Osama bin Laden if the opportunity arose, the Washington Times reported.
The executives were presented with a current hot-button issue in Britain, the wearing of Muslim veils. Should a veiled woman be allowed to present the news, they were asked. The BBC's diversity editor said yes, since news anchors were allowed to wear crosses.
A senior BBC executive admitted to the British paper Daily Express, "There was a widespread acknowledgement that we may have gone too far in the direction of political correctness. Unfortunately, much of it is so deeply embedded in the BBC's culture, that it is very hard to change it."
SO LETS SEE HERE.
THE BBC HAS ALREADY ADMITTED ITS BIAS.
THEY FAVOR HOMOSEXAULS, PALESTINIANS, MINORITIES AND ARE ANTI AMERICAN.
THE CBC IS THE EXACT SAME.
THEY JUST DONT HAVE THE BALLS TO ADMIT IT.
Well, Johnathon, enjoyed your piecework examples, which could be found and chopped apart by any news network of any capacity. What about the glowing reports of Harper during the last election, with positive mentions of the conservatives in the news dwarfing favorable mentions of the Liberals. Should we devote an entire segment to that as well.
If you pick apart every news piece ever made, you could argue a different piece with a different message could have been produced. What does that have to say with the overall balance.
And what does it say about a government or a movement who is so weak in their own abilities that a major initiative is to destroy their "perceived enemies" instead of governing? Not much.
Nothing you have said comes close to grounds to destroy a national public institution just because you think so.
But the heart of the matter is that you hit upon the real point of your "ALL CAPS" tirade right at the end. God forbid we should remain a country that values minorities and individual rights!
If you're so ashamed that Canada supports minorities, human rights, and has an independent foreign policy instead of blithely following the US in lockstep, perhaps you should leave - just as I suggested yesterday.
My point is this.
The CBC has had to apologize to Harper twice now for lying and making up news.
Why would the CBC do that?
No other network has done it.
But since your a liberal, and the CBC is liberal, I can understand why you want to keep the CBC in operation.
Why would a liberal want to get rid of a liberal "tool"?
If I was a liberal, I would fight tooth and nail to keep the propaganda machine going.
Why wouldn't I?
No, Johnathon, your point - which you typed in all CAPS to make sure no one would miss it - is that minorities, homosexuals, palestinians, and "an independent foreign policy" (I'll call it since I haven't seen any parties chanting death to america in canada) are not to be tolerated if you have any say in the matter.
If I thought your post was even for one moment about balance in news coverage, it might be worthy a discussion.
But it isn't. I've put up with your type most of my life so I'm pretty good at seeing through the clutter. So, you can try to repackage that box of bullshit you're handing out all you want.
But you've already made your real point, even if you didn't mean for it to slip out.
If you look at my posts, dummy, you would see that I never once mentioned anything about Canada's foreign policy.
What I mentioned was how the CBC has already apologized to Harper for lying and creating news.
I also pointed out how the BBC admitted that it favors homosexuality, ethnic minorites, anti-Americanism, and multiculturalism.
The CBC is the exact same.
The CBC tries to undermine the USA anytime it can. Watching the CBC news coverage about the IRAQ war is case in point.
They try to make it seem as though George Bush is a bad person for getting rid of a brutal dictator.
After all the CBC wants people to think they love human rights, but not when it comes to the Iraqi people. Fuck the Iraqi people, they don't deserve a chance to live in peace.
Next, an "independant foreign policy" as you put it, is completly different that anti-Americanism.
I can understand how Canada under the Liberals supported the terrorists in Palestine and Sri Lanka and how they supported Saddam and were against his removal.
That is up to the Liberals to defend themselves when they support killers and homicide bombers.
The Liberals and Jean Chretien should also be proud that if they had their way, Saddam would still be killing his own people.
The Liberals should be a proud bunch of people.
Anti Americanism is a shameful trait that only the left and far left in Canada support.
When you hear Jack Layton saying, Bush style this, Bush style that, when referring to Harper's policies, it shows just how deranged the left is.
Being Liberal means being anti-American. Paul Martin and Jean Chretien are a perfect example of that.
The CBC is anti-American just like its cousin the BBC.
Again, they don't have the balls to admit it.
You are absolutely right, Jonathon. Media favours small 'l' liberalsm ideology. Your view of the world, as I read your posts, is that homosexuals should be jailed; women who abort should be jailed; people of ethnic origins different from yours should be discrimminated against. Is that the American way? Are you sure that the US did not support Saddam at some point in time? You speculate, as is your right, about Saddam, but could it be that if the US had not moved in, Iran might have 'taken care' of Saddam? Don't I have the right to speculate this without being called 'retarded' by a Jonathon?
The sponsorship scandal broke out after Daniel Leblanc if the Globe and Mail reported on the Government's visibility campaigns. Are you suggesting that opposition MP's such as Harper should not have had the right to question the government because the Globe and Mail was ahead of them? Are you suggesting that the Washington Post should not have had the right to publish questions related to Watergate?
By the way, people who don't think like you are not necessarily retarded or morons. They just don't think like you. That's what humanity is about.
"Your view of the world, as I read your posts, is that homosexuals should be jailed; women who abort should be jailed; people of ethnic origins different from yours should be discrimminated against. Is that the American way?"
Loraine, you leftist loon, I never said anything like that.
Where did I say that queers should be jailed, or women who murder their child should be jailed?
I never said that.
Don't put words in my mouth.
Only retards do that.
Grow up.
The CBC is a TAX PAYER FUNDER news organization.
The Globe and Mail is not.
The CBC should not be asking any questions to anmy members of the government, unless they do so to all parties.
Do you not find it a coincidence that the CBC only gave questions to the Liberals?
Why not the NDP or the Bloc or the Conservatives.
My tax dollars should not be going to the CBC.
If the CBC wants to play partisan politics, they should be privatized and then nobody can complain.
Until then, they should be fair and balanced and not in ved with the Liberals.
You understand that?
I understand you completely, Johnathon. Just keep dog-paddling away from what you've advocated.
Your beloved conservatives can't stand on their own two feet so you have to keep attacking the "enemies" that are preventing your neanderthal beliefs from breaking free.
Damn the courts! Damn the press! Damn the mis-use of your hard-earned taxes for things you don't believe in! Damn the teachers! And, above all, damn the Liberals for, well, existing!
I'm not a Liberal, but this government can't seem to stand on its own, and instead has to go on attacking and insulting Canadian individuals and Canadian institutions. It happens constantly and I for one am sick and tired of it. Grow up, already! Does the government have any actual policies they can advocate on their own merits without trying to tear the country apart?
CBC has been a thorn in the side of any government in power because they ask tough questions, as any news source should. Cretien was said to be enraged about them during his time as PM. I'm sure Mulroney found them a pain as well. And Martin couldn't get favorable notice from any media source on anything during his final year in power. But none of them called for the dismantling of the institution because they recognized a free press, and they recognized the value of an independent and respected public media entity.
Conservatives are trying so hard to latch onto this issue because they need to deflect from the obvious obfuscation that Mulroney stepped into when we started finding out he knew a bit more about Schreiber than he ever wanted anyone to know. Match his recent answers to his answers to what he said in the 90s. Oh, wait, you can't because the answers then were completely different. Meeting over coffee once or twice has now become getting envelopes stuffed with cash and squirreling it away in untraceable foreign safety deposit boxes.
The old twinkle doesn't get him as far now so conservatives are desperate to try to change the channel. You're a good foot soldier for trying, but your own blind hatred keeps getting in the way.
Personally, I don't think its good form for a reporter to contact an official of any stripe to suggest questions for a public inquiry. But, you know, at the end of the day, it's just not that big a deal. If you think reporters aren't trying to get answers to their questions through government contacts - of any stripe - you are truly living in dreamland. And we don't even know if it went that far. For all we know, it was a conversation in which the reporter asked questions of the Liberal MP, who decided on his own that they were good questions to ask to Mulroney. So what's the big deal? A reporter going after answers. Wow - what horror (in Russia, at least).
Were the questions valid? And did Mulroney answer them or did he just bemoan the injustice and indignity of having to answer questions about cash-stuffed envelopes again?
Where a handful of questions came from is certainly not worthy of dismantling an institution like the CBC.
My hard-earned taxes pay for plenty of things I don't personally appreciate as well, but that's how government work. I, for one, resent the government issuing two or three polls per day to see how they can peddle their bankrupt policies. And I certainly don't want my taxes paying to support your prejudices.
But worrying about the existence of CBC? HA! I expect governments - of any stripe - to be able to withstand a little scrutiny. And, if they can't, I expect they'll fold soon enough.
The CBC gave questions to the Liberals because they form the Official oppositon.
You certainly don't seem very rational to me. Calling people who disagree with you mentally retarded, retards, dummy, leftist loon... and you are telling us to grow up! Ha! At least the CBC has the courage to apologize when they lie about someone. I did not hear that Harper has apologized to Lucienne Robillard or her ex- husband or to the chair of the nuclear energy regulatory board.
The CBC is being funded by Canadian taxpayers but it should not act any differently from other news organization. If they believe they possess pertinent information they should use it.
BTW, Jonathan, how about Paul Martin supporting child pornography? When did Harper apologize for that?
An oh, before I forget, how about this?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U9mibZYpVPY
Do you think Harper will ever be man enough to apologize for this lie?
Trying to have a debate with a Liberal is like trying to debate a 2 year old.
The Liberals are so insecure with their invisable policies that they resort to ad hominem attacks at every turn.
When all else fails and you've been exposed, go for the jugular with that line, johnathon. What a withering attack . . . think I'll go have some coffee. And maybe listen to some CBC. You know, toy with the dark side.
Happy New Year, you hateful small man. Be careful of the homosexuals, minorities, civil servants, court officials, and media types you might encounter in that scary world you occupy. They are all plotting conspiracies to destroy your way of life. Movie suggestion - Invasion of the Body Snatchers. 70s version with Donald Sutherland is the best but any stripe will strike a chord with you.
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