Warren Kinsella - the purple dinosaur of the MSM.

Yeah I mocked Warren's predictions at my place too. "Emo bands"? "The environment"? "Chretien and Martin"? Great predictions for, say, 2002...

Whatever they're paying that guy, it's too much.

C'mon. The guy is writing for the National Post. What's he supposed to say?

WK is just 'whistling past the graveyard'.

If the MSM did a serious job of fact checking instead of sensationalizing in the hopes of gaining ratings/ advertising contracts (which are also declining BTW) then their economic model wouldn't be springing so many leaks.

The online model of news is the way of the future, and live blogging for those with topical interests, will be the supplanting/augmenting traditional media.

As the old saying goes:

"You can either drive the steamroller or become part of the road."

Kinsella represents the Ottawa "elite" who had not seen the blogsphere influence coming.

The MSM (Kinsella included) are very much like Microsoft who didn't see the Internet coming until it almost overtook them. Microsoft responded , but the MSM is so heavily laden with left-wing types and elitist mentality that they may not be able to adapt.

As the blogsphere becomes more adept at exposing MSM bias and false reporting , and more of the younger generation continue to use the Internet , MSM fortunes will continue to wane.

His prediction is particularily laughable considering the Blogger's recent exposure of the mid-east photoshopping, use of suspicious stringers, which is now threatening the business foundation of AP (via its refusal to come forth and clear up Jamilgate, and its getting wider and wider, with even Eason Jordan making significant note of it).

It's kinda like predicting the weather will be nice as a hurricane approaches the coastline.

I think willy has it right. It's the flexibility of the Internet that is its strength.

The Internet is not one person; it acts as a massive knowledge base which is immediately and openly self-correcting. The MSM is as willy also points out, elitist. It is linear; information passes from a top-down presumed authority to you, the passive uninformed reader. Errors and biases can't be corrected. Sure you can write a Letter to the Editor, but, that doesn't change that first statement, while the Internet immediately adjusts its information - because the information is on many sites. Not just one column.

The Internet doesn't operate by elitism but the opposite. It's a 'complex adapative systme', a network with many voices, none of them hierarchical. What emerges as authoritative is the information itself. Valid information must be supported by hard data. Biased opinions etc are rapidly exposed as unsupported and remain on the Internet as 'unsubstantiated opinions'.

Kinsella simply doesn't understand that the Internet and Print are two different structures and they deal with data in two very different ways. The print media is linear, authoritative, unable to correct its data. How can it survive in a world where data comes from multiple sources, where data evolves into information (ie valid) as more and more data emerges from these sites?

Blogs are part of the Internet. An important part because they supply the analysis and commentary. The key aspect of validity in blogs is their adherence to data. Sure, there are lots of blogs that are biased opinion sites, just like lots of columns in the MSM. But, they aren't read; they are ignored except by their die-hard clique (eg, Ti-Guy and Robert McClelland). The dominant blogs acknowledge facts, and opinions are based on this hard data. Analysis is varied but must respond to the facts - or it will be 'called' by other commentors.

The Internet is the most powerful information processing system we've developed so far - and blogs are an important aspect of it.

Perfect example of the MSM and their writers. Without checking facts or even in opposition to facts, they present their feelings as facts. Pathetic.

Torstar is dropping like a brick as well and getting real thin as a result.

Nice catch, Kate! I was wondering how you'd approach this one.

I know a lot of people, especially in those in their 20's and 30's that rely on blogs for information and rarely touch print media.

It is clear that these types of people would love for blogs to lose their influence, as people across the globe are able to stumble upon these blogs easily after typing keywords into google, yahoo, etc.

I don't expect blogs to die down anytime soon. I never really thought they had that much influence either until I started tracking unique visitors from across the globe on Toronto Tories. We're a joke compared to Small Dead Animals, Little Green Footballs, and all the other big time blogs, so I can see why people are becoming nervous.

The internet keeps people accountable. No more of this one sided agenda that we have forced down our throats everyday. People from most parts of the world can get opinions from individuals, not overly dogmatic and overly politicized mainstream media outlets.

Irwin, I don't think you're being entirely fair to Warren.

I doubt even he would call himself a "writer".

From WKs blog:
"There you go. Clip and save. If I get 'em wrong, I look forward to being roundly chastized!"

Consider the chastising to have begun!

Cheers

Interesting because the most elementary combination of home economics and arithmetic would suggest the newspaper industry alone is indeed in trouble.

Take my own example here in London. I rarely buy a weekday paper now. I used to get both The Times and The Daily Telegraph as well as their weekend versions. That amounted to (roughly) £9 or £10 a week (over $20).

Now I just check the Internet sites on weekdays and take papers on Saturday and Sunday because I have the time to relax and read them at breakfast. So that's about £4 (or around $9). I'm a big "news consumer" but revenues from me to the papers have actually halfed over the years.

I know that lots of others do the same; many don't even pick up a weekend paper. And the demographic here for reading papers like The Times and The Daily Telegraph is "getting on."

I have to believe the same is true for Canada. Why buy the Globe and Mail or The National Post when you can pick and choose from them online?

So these papers have lost the younger folks to the Internet and the remaining loyal readership is getting older.

Not auspicious for business.

I know a lot of people, especially in those in their 20's and 30's that rely on blogs for information and rarely touch print media.

i'm wondering where the blogs these folks read get their information? it seems to me that blogs, mine included, rely on the MSM for the facts and then spin it to suit their partisan bend.

in fact, if someone told me that they got all their news from their favourite blog, i would consider them unbalanced and at the very least uninformed.

many here will call bullshit! they may cry," we read small dead animals and little green footballs, we're very well rounded!"

As an X shareholder of media stock things are getting lean. Although some of these stocks appear ok on the surface, ie stock prices, a lot of these same ones are now under the control of the CFO's squeezing out the last drops of life/profit instead CEO's. The difference being, one squeezes, CFO, and one creates and manages, CEO. Add to this a loss of credibility and I have to disagree with Kinsella.

Warren ain't never been right.
How much do the Aspers pay for this kind of crap?

"7. Jean Chretien will receive a major international award; "

If Warren were in business he'd be a copy writer for an offshore Buggy Whip Income Trust shell company .

Find the money your boss stole Warren.

i'm wondering where the blogs these folks read get their information? it seems to me that blogs, mine included, rely on the MSM for the facts and then spin it to suit their partisan bend.

Point taken, Jeff. But if you do find a blog that reflects your own partisan interest, and you don't have a lot of time to keep up on things then these folks are quite happy to have certains blogs bookmarked. I admit that if you don't consider other media you may get a skewed view of things, but some people don't care about that.

Also, some bloggers do a credible amount of investigative journalism themselves without relying on MSM. I would count Stephen Taylor in that category.

Guys like Kinsella are employed for their outspoken views. Media companies believe that the added colour generates interest in their product, resulting in a higher profile and therefore higher sales.

In the new world where the means of disseminating information has been extended to the pajama-clad, outspokenness is simply not enough. There are millions of competing stories and opinions out there; ease of navigation requires that a pundit not only grab the reader’s attention but also inspire and engage through persuasive reasoning backed up by facts.

Corrections two days later buried on page 12 or a few letters to the editor are no longer acceptable. “Fact checked your ass” are the new watchwords of the digital domain.

The consumer must also be allowed to participate and have his say. No more one-way conversations where the state of the world is pronounced from upon high down to the plebes.

Good old "Wornout" Kinsella . . . so far past his "Best before Date" that the garburator would get a good workout trying to grind up the petrified grizzle that was his little brain.

Whether bloggers admit it or not, the MSM will remain a big part of the information ecosystem for years to come. Blogging will not supplant big media, but it will help keep it accountable.

Nonetheless, Warren's point is well taken. Bloggers should not let hubris delude them about their importance. It didn't help the MSM. It doesn't wear well on bloggers either. We matter, but probably less than we think.

The troubles of big media are not without precedent. Newspapers managed to avoid disappearing with the advent of television news, like many predicted at the time. To be sure, they stopped growing, but they did find other ways to augment their revenue streams, if not their audiences.

The danger is that newspaper editors and managers will continue to bungle their businesses and eventually slip into irrelevance. That they do not yet know what to do is all too evident. But somehow I doubt they will disappear. They will adapt leaving a ready target for bloggers to continue doing we do.

I was subscribing to as many as 3 newspapers at one time. I dropped the Calgary Herald as I could no longer stomach the left bias from that rag.There was absolutely no balance! The Post was the next to go when they dropped Steyn and I hung on til Blatchford left. The Sun was the third casualty when they changed their format and looked more like a rag tabloid. I also cannot stomach a paper that continues to allow a hate-monger and anti-semite like Margolais to continue spewing his verbiage at the public. I started reading all my news on the internet and read several blogs a day plus National Newswatch and Jacks Newswatch. I used to read Neale news and found it very fair and balanced and I do miss you Brian. Kinsella is so yesterday, he just cannot accept that his day is done. Go home Warren.

I think if you look at newspaper profits and subscription rates and readership historically, they have been in decline for much longer than the rise of blogging. So the connection some make between the decline in newspaper reading and the rise of blogging simply aren't there.

I'd suggest that Warren is right in saying that blogging is not supplanting the mainstream media. TV, online news from the mainstream media, infotainment, cable... all these are far far far bigger factors on readership/viewership and profits. As is competition among newspapers and TV broadcasters, and rising costs of information distribution and publishing.

As much as we like to think we are changing the world - and we probably are in small ways - very very few people in the world get their news and information only from blogs. In fact, I'd go farther and say there are zero people who get their news exclusively from blogs because most news posts on most blogs is still merely highlighting or linking to a mainstream media news item and not originally sourced from the blog. Also much originally sourced blogging news is in fact a reaction to or investigation of reports in the mainstream news.

William makes the point that the internet will always hold people accountable. I think that is the role blogs will continue to play as well as its role in spreading gossip (good and bad) about politicians and celebrities.

I doubt very much that the culture of blogging news generators will supplant the mainstream media.

Ted
Cerberus

Steve - how is " Warren's point is well taken" when virtually no blogger I know of has made that assertion??

Kinsella's latest for the Post, about the execution footage of Saddam Hussein, managed to say absolutley nothing original in the space of 700 words, using most hamfisted prose imaginable.

Couldn't they just give Colby Cosh Kinsella's space instead? He's got more hair, too...

Warren who? If he is from the dead tree media he must be older than dirt (and about as bright)

It must be hard to see your empire crumble.

Kate: Bloggers tend to think they have the MSM on the run. The reality though is that most people I talk to are oblivious to the points we make. There is no doubt that my understanding of events is greatly enhanced by reading blogs. Consequently, I could not live without them.

The big question, though, is whether blogs can expand their influence beyond a relatively small and insular group of committed blog readers. No doubt we are here to stay, but we do need to keep our egos in check. That's all.

I don't know if the Blogosphere will supplant the MSM. I do know the hacks currently running the MSM should all lose their jobs. $13.5 -BILLION- dollars?!!! In a bull market no less!

Imagine if that happened to almost any other industry. There would be heads rolling right out into the parking lot. Are there heads rolling in the MSM? Nuh uh.

Pinchy baby is still running the NY Slimes like his own private blog, just to name one egregious example. They are going to ride the wreck down in flames, right into Chapter 11.

The problem isn't just North American either. Here's a beauty I spied yesterday regarding fox hunting in England. www.thisislondon.co.uk/news/article-23379539-details/Hunters+defy+the+ban+with+record+turnout/article.do

"Record numbers of hunt supporters gathered at Boxing Day events across the country in defiance of Labour's ban on hunting with hounds."
...
"The Countryside Alliance said that the record turnout proved the two-year ban on the blood sport was irrelevant and called for the law to be changed."

Blood sport, forsooth! I'm sure the Countryside Alliance press release had that in it. Not.

In fact I'm so sure that I can even check to see what they actually said. Here it is for y'all to see too.
www.countryside-alliance.org.uk/our_news_and_comment/views_and_comment/Boxing_day_meets%3A_%91the_sooner_such_a_bad_law_is_scrapped_the_better%92/
Nope, no mention of the word "blood", just sport. Making me suspect I'm not going to get the straight goods on this issue from This Is London. Maybe not any other issue, either.

That little action of going and looking is what has made 13.5 billion bucks worth of market capitalization for media organizations evaporate in the US alone. If I know they are lyin', I ain't buyin'.

The MSM hasn't changed, this is what they've been doing since time immemorial. What's changed is I can fact check their sorry asses whenever I want.

Frankly I doubt blogs will take over from the MSM. Bloggers don't have the money or the time to go places and see for themselves, and there's a limit to what you can do from a computer. Some places like Somalia don't have local bloggers to report on what's up, so somebody respectable has to go see. That's what the MSM is supposed to be doing and isn't.

What will happen is the current crop of morons will get shaken out of the MSM, and some respect for the truth will get re-injected. You know, professional ethics. Something journalists are supposed to have, but mostly don't.

Man, I am sure glad this cat is in Canada.
,

The advent of new media has always brought us more choice. Now we have the ultimate decision making powers. Not limited to local sources, not just provincial or even national sources, now we can pick and choose from the world.

Blogs and aggregators allow us to see what is relevant to us either individually or collectively. The same old, same old argument that a blog may be unbalanced or incorrect etc applies just as well to the MSM. Do you trust these multinational corporations to be any more impartial or truthful than say a blogger in saskatchewan?

As always we the media consumer has to pick and choose and filter what we see and read. Bloggers such as mclelland and jeff(buggo)have already been filtered and the decision has been made to ignore them. From jeff this sounds more like sour grapes. No one wants to read what he has to say. Something lefties hate to hear. Why else would the MSM not see what is happening and adjust their content?
enough

Kinsella not a writer. Agreed. How about (groan) 'lefter' then?

Warren Kinsella, lefter at large.

"many here will call bullshit! they may cry," we read small dead animals and little green footballs, we're very well rounded!"

Jeff, you obviously read SDA, and it doesn't seem to be working for you.

Kate and others,

I recommend you read The Long Tail by Chris Anderson. It reveals how the mass market for goods, including newspapers, is fragmenting into millions of pieces as technology rips down the barriers between demand and supply.

Take music: when radio and TV funneled our demand to a select few artists, we bought their albums in huge numbers. But now iTunes has shredded that dynamic and demand has spread out so much that we will probably never see an album sell in the numbers of a Thriller for example.

Same goes for news. Newspapers no longer have a near-monopoly on information and people are deserting them for the online media. Why on earth would I rely on CBC's or Canwest's tiny selection of usually shallow journalism when I have at my fingertips direct access to information all over the world: instant news aggregators in South Korea, personal blogs in Baghdad, real estate blogs in the US with detailed price data on 70,000,000 homes. The examples are countless, and growing.

I suspect Kinsella refuses to see the obvious because his disposition is inherently undemocratic. The highlight of his life was working for a secretive thug like Chretien. The dispersal of information is linked to the dispersal of power, and autocrats aren't going to be happy with this kind of thing.

"So the connection some make between the decline in newspaper reading and the rise of blogging simply aren't there."

Is "the connection" here: craigslist, e-bay,kijiji, etc.

Classified ads: For Sale: One Librano$. Best offer. Cheap. Cash only. No refunds, no returns; No stamps, please. Brown envelopes welcome. Ask for WK Dingwall, by gum.

Thanks, maz2 ;-) ;-)

7. Jean Chretien will receive a major international award;
*snicker*
Could that guy be any more of a geek if he tried?

Hey, I think I just found the perfect gig for balding, portly, middle-aged fluffer Warren Kinsella once the Post goes mams skyward:

Citizen journalism website seeks sex-trade worker to cover Pickton trial

VANCOUVER (CP) - Wanted: Sex trade worker with some writing skill to cover the trial of accused serial killer Robert Pickton.

www.cbc.ca/cp/national/070103/n010357A.html

Kinsella is no longer an important person in Canadian politics (if he ever was).

Couldn't they just give Colby Cosh Kinsella's space instead? He's got more hair, too...

With Kinsella, you have to put up his annoying habit of talking about his glory years as a punk rocker. Colby on the other hand occasionally talks about his passion, chess.

Colby’s love of chess is a natural extension for a man with such obvious intelligence. When old geezer Kinsella enthuses about punk music, it’s all rather embarrassing.

Within minutes of John Baird being the new environment minister, there was a poll up at the Calgary sun-Will John Baird be a good minister, or words to that effect. For heavens sake, give the guy a chance. Glad to see Goodyear Tire has taken Quebecs concern for the environment to heart, and closed a factory, to reduce emmissions. Wonder what those 1000 now unemployed quebecers think of Kyoto now. Maybe this will wake those people up to the fact, kyoto is more than punishing Alberta. It is also a message to the union folk. Didn't they just settle a new contract for higher wages. 1000 union workers out of a job, but I bet the union head honchos will not lose a cent.
As the first act as environment minister, JB should call a press conference, and detail the kyoto accord, and what credits mean and how much they will cost the taxpayer, and how it will impact on each cdn. To this point in time all we have ever heard it the word Kyoto, and credits. No one has ever said what they are or what they will cost or how buying credits at millions of dollars from China will not make any difference on canada emmissions.

Kinsella is to prose what Hair Club for Men is to testosterone.

MSM, in Canada, stopped reporting and commenced preaching when the PET took over. Then the education system in Kanadar stooped teaching students to think and began indoctrinating young children with what to think at the same time.

The New Media like the New Conservative government have both delivered a wind of change to education and to News reporting. News has become real and exciting again and education, via the Internet, is once again become a lesson in learning to think not regurgitating what some spinner of lies tells you to believe.

'The real challenge is in the hunt. The kill is just justification for the hunt'. (I read this line somewhere and liked it; I cannot remember where I read it; maybe someone here knows..) I think the above quote defines the argument here; living vs existing.

Ever since worn out Kinsilly attacked Stockwell Day on msm with a snarling, spit laced, non factual, 'better than you God Faring cowboys from the colonies - Alberta', mean spirited, partisan, verbose, vicious verbal hate; I have never given him a moment of my time. He just ain't worth it.

7. Jean Chretien will receive a major international award;

Let's all hope that it is the Darwin Award!

Nah, the influence of the blogs will not wane...just the influence of Kinsella's blog. It is too too eastern elitist, self-congratulatory (in a weird kind of renaissance man sort of way)to keep anybody interested. Except maybe for his friends in the MSM who would really dig this sort of crap. Maybe he should get a job at the CBC.

in fact, if someone told me that they got all their news from their favourite blog, i would consider them unbalanced and at the very least uninformed ... many here will call bullshit! they may cry," we read small dead animals and little green footballs, we're very well rounded!"

I do call B.S.! There is only one story in the MSM, and it is repeated over and over again, on every single page and every newscast.

The story is this: (1) Explain some real-world event by nominating a bogeyman, and imply that this bogeyman is the one and simple explanation of the event under consideration. CO2, trans fats, Islamists, greedy CEOs ... it doesn't really matter what is nominated, the main thing is that it must resonate with people's existing prejudices and preconceptions. (2) Imply that the only possible way of defeating the bogeyman is to expand government ... while simultaneously downplaying (a) the flimsy grounds on which the deduction was made (b) the severe and negative long-term consequences that inevitably result from the expansion of government, and (c) the amount of money which corrupt government politicians, bureaucrats, cronies and hacks will pocket as a result of the proposed new program.

Occasionally a "good cop" story will thrown in, which attempts to demonstrate some wonderful result which has been achieved by a government flunky (e.g. literally a cop, a fireman, government scientist, Gerald Ford, ...). Real-world, non-governmental achievements, since they mostly occur as a result of private enterprise and capitalism, are usually confined to advertisements and "advertiser friendly" sections such as investment and auto reports, in which the media are often flat-out whoring for ad revenues and freebies.

Sports is largely free of government B.S., but even here you get a lot of crap about how urgent it is for government to subsidize facilities, fund "amateur" athletics, fight doping, etc.

And then there are the freak stories, for example about a 2-headed dog or about Britney Spears. These are considered freakish for the simple reason that the reporters can't think of any way of relating them to something that the government can or should be doing.

There are some other exceptions, but it really isn't worth my time or even necessary to wade through all the drivel trying to catch one of the smarter MSM commentators on a day when he/she hasn't been sipping on socialist (or nationalist) kool-aid.

Even blogs mostly ape the same bogus stories as the MSM, but the advantage that they have is that there is far more diversity of opinions represented (due to the low cost of production and the absence of government regulation), and because the commenting mechanism allows the diversity of opinions to expand exponentially. You have a greater possibility of stumbling across the truth in one hour of surfing the net than in ten years of consuming CBC/FOX News/TorStar/Globe and Mail.

...witness the seepage of a name-calling contest that originated on The View into news reports across the mainstream... how many days and counting?

Hey Justzumgai
What a handle and you nailed the Msm to a tee.I do like the way Kate picks from the ether ,gives her views and let it roll,She pops in and can be corrected.Not very often and with a bit o class too.
I think MSM should be lower case these days has not adjusted to the internet (altho they are starting to notice).These things ,I find swing like the pendulum,back and forth.Msm has to watch out or they'll miss the swing.
Hey Kate Hair or not Trump called a spade a spade and several other thingsand he ain't goona git fired either.Nuff Said ,Keep it up girl

Wornout Kansellit's list is not really a list of predictions...it is more a list of his wishes.

Sorry Warren= punk is as ded as your relevance.

This is the LA Times *Professional* reply to my Email proving their recent headline about INCREASES in troop loses in Iraq were wrong.

Smooth, but sorry LATimes, no banana.

**
Readers Rep
to me

show details
3:22 pm (2 hours ago)

Thank you for writing regarding: "Monthly U.S. toll in Iraq at 2-year high."

In looking into this with your comments in mind I'm seeing that when there's been a notable month-to-month increase or decrease on Iraq death tolls this past year, that The Times has written stories about it. (For instance, there was a front-page story at the end of August on a decline in the monthly death toll in Baghdad.)

So just to make sure there is no misunderstanding: The headline refers to the toll in the most recent month, that of December. That story states that it was the highest monthly tally since January 2005, according to the website icasualties.org.

I get, however, that you see a yearly differential of two less U.S. deaths and about 300 less wounded as representing a more significant trend than the highest monthly death toll in nearly two years. And that you also view information that's in the 6th paragraph of a 20 paragraph story as being "buried."

Thank you again for sending your take on the article so that I can let others know of it.

Kent Zelas
Asst. Readers Rep.
==== LATimes
= TG

PS:

I get however, that you think I am a cave-dweller when I suggest anything can buried in a story of only 20 paragraphs. = TG

The Internet is an organism. It has no agenda since the many agendas of its participants counterbalance and counteract each other. The MSM does have a more and more visible agenda. People want the truth.

I haven't bought a newspaper in years. The bias of the reporters and editorializing makes me ill. No revenue from me for mainstream media. Not until they clean up their act. I make every attempt to make sure that the MSM's advertising clients know that they can't reach me through the MSM any longer.

I can't agree with WK this time.

Um... Where are the numbers for Canadian publishers? I know at least one major Canadian publishign company that has grown substantially in the last year and had its share price increase, but I haven't followed all of them.

Anyone care to comment? Or just gloat about the misfortunes of Americans? Oops... Isn't that the province of the Candian "left"?

I'm just sayin'.... hypocrites

Ohhh Warren

You seem to have missed the wave.

The internet and bloggers in particular are not attempting to supplant the MSM. What bloggers are supplanting is smarmy, smug, superior strategists (I just got to the chapter on alliterations).

That said, there are much more cognisant lib bloggers than WK. CG or Ceberus come to mind.

On the other hand there are also the likes of Cherniak and McLelland. I read both of these "sources" just to see what's going on at the precipice. I have a decided preference for dark humor.

As an aside:

Ted.

That's the point. Folks are formulating their opinions from many sources. The fact checking ability borne in this information revolution (just as significant as the industrial evolution or so I've been told) is what makes the internet powerfull.

In this vein I have seen some excellent journalism on the net. AGWN and Stephen Taylor seem to have exposed a few truths. Or at the very least the accused didn't have the nuts to challenge them. Nuff said.

Steve @ 11:49 makes a point. In rebuttal. Word of Mouth....the Moccasin Telegraph....The peons, surfs, stooges, and dipshits now have a voice.

And that's what really wrankles WK...the unwashed are getting uppity.

At least he's still an authority on punk.

Syncro

P.S. The internut also allows the ability to compare and contrast. Those of you who figure this is an echo chamber for whingers might want to re-read what Enough, Shaken, TG, Justzumgai, Irwin Daisy and many others have had to say here.

Now go to Myblagh, Rabble or the Kos and check out the discourse.

You decide.

Syncro

wornout kantsellit

Well, I think Warren Kinsella takes writing more seriously than anything else professionally. I sure as hell don't agree with him, but if yer going to waste timing reading blogs, you might as well be somewhat interesting and coherent.

SmallPettyIdiots. So ideologically impaired, and historically simple. And really I only come here to this blog not for enjoyment or enlightenment (lol), but because I like to know what psycho right-wing militias are going to firebomb next.

"I think Warren Kinsella takes writing more seriously than anything else professionally"

That sir, is what we call "damned by faint praise".

I wonder why kantsellit is using "Gawd you people" instead of his real name?

My name is Aimee, not Warren. Thanks though, FREE. Who I am guessing is who? Levant? Steyn?

"And really I only come here to this blog not for enjoyment or enlightenment (lol)"

I think it would be hard to "enlighten" an idiot of your magnitude.(lol)

Free; because he can't spell God.

I see that this has become a Warren Kinsella hate-a-thon for conservatives with “important points of view”, (so I’d better provide some balance).

And this despite the fact that he has so much in common with conservatives - his columns for the laughably turgid National Post, his constant plugs for the Alberta “that formed him”, his obvious affection for Steve, his strongly-held RC beliefs, his Fundamentalist “Israel/Holy Land right or wrong” position, his apparent support for capital punishment, hockey, Canadian beer and the sanctity of marriage.

Other than the National Post thing, these are all noble positions, and reflect the best of conservative values.

What conservative’s cant abide about Kinsella though, is that he holds opposing views … and dammit, he seems to be having such a good time! Conservatives know that no “serious minded person” does either of these things. After all, things are black-and white, with us or agin us, and heaven forbid that one should be outspokenly supportive of harmless fun.

Kinsella is a social conservative who’s positions on issues he allows to be modified by the more important principles of social conscience. In other words, he’s what we call a liberal.

Absolutely puerile. And I'm not refering to Kinsella.

What is this main-stream media?

Isn't it really the long-standing media?

They have been there so long they feel it is their right to be there forever.

Sounds like new ideas and new technologies are taking them over and they are not able to see it.