Near the end of this lengthy and contentious comments thread arising from the Aaron Harris photo post, “Tony” suggests that my criticism of the “mainstream media” arises from …. jealousy.
Hell hath no fury like a wanna-be journalist scorned, goes the theory.
It’s not the first time that accusation has been floated, nor am I the only blogger who’s been confronted with it. After I’d addressed that question, Tony repled;
Like hundreds or thousands of other people (and like dozens of MSM types) I enjoy your blog, even if I don’t always agree with your take on things, and like the vast majority of your readers I’m grateful that you take the time to do this and am glad you’re doing well enough to find the free time.
Thanks for addressing my note.
But I thought your post on Aaron Harris was ill-informed and unfair.
There are plenty of reasons to find fault with the MSM and your blog serves a valuable purpose in challenging its approach sometimes.
But please excuse some of us for reacting angrily when you paint the entire fourth estate with one brush, and malign a whole institution under imagined or erroneous pretenses, which is what I believe you have done in this case.
Because this goes to a broader issue, and because I believe I can speak for at least some of my readers – I’ve decided to reply here instead of continuing the comments thread.
I’ll plead guilty to generalizing about the “mainstream media” insofar that I assume most readers know (or will figure out) that I’m referring to the general inclinations of the major players in the industry and the liberal “default setting” through which most of our news is filtered.
The generalization is mostly a result of the brevity required of blogging and not intended as a wholesale indictment of every individual practicing journalism.
However, as he is a self-described member of that fraternity, my response to Tony about his “angry reaction” is this: you have a lot of work ahead if you hope to undo the slow-motion suicide of the news industry – and don’t bother protesting the validity of that premise. The decline in newspaper and magazine circulation, and the ratings numbers of the major networks speak for themselves..
We may agree to disagree on whether the Aaron Harris “serial crownings” at the Empire Club are worthy of a closer look and open questioning. Again, that’s the nature of blogging. Sometimes people agree, sometimes they don’t. Sometimes they don’t care. Sometimes they think it’s unfair. I would point out that this is the nature of news reporting as well.
Unlike the news industry, however, when I present a topic, the readers look at the evidence, hash it out, bring new information to the debate, and sometimes I even change my mind. (As a footnote: the Aaron Harris post was originally prompted by an ordinary reader who directed me to the CBC item privately, in the belief that the photo had been willfully defaced. That should be a signal that something might be wrong.)
But in this case, what isn’t in dispute are the growing list of examples in the “mainstream” media of manipulated news “reporting”, reporter editorializing, and altered/staged photos. These examples are contributing to a significant problem with consumer cynicism about integrity and possible political motives within the MSM. The blogosphere has enabled comparison and criticism – and with that an unsettling realization that media sleight of hand and sleight of word are hardly new practices.
If members of the industry can’t withstand open scrutiny on this lowly blog without turning to rationalizations that I’m nothing more than a would-be journalist with a chip on her shoulder – then, you haven’t gotten it yet.
I’m not a competitor. I don’t want your job. I’m a frustrated news consumer. I’m sick of being spoken down to by people who can’t pronounce words correctly. I’m fed up with reading transcripts that reveal that reporters have quoted people out of context to support a pre-ordained script. I’m tired of having speeches and statements “explained” to me by pundits after I’ve listened to them.
I’m not interested in news stories created by polls commissioned to create news stories.
I’m tired of reading that wire services have stringent “ethical guidelines”, and that to suggest that a photo might be altered is well, just the realm of tin foil hat conspiracy mongering .
Better to ask yourself why so many of your former customers like myself – news “junkies” – no longer accept your stories and images at face value.
Call it the “fool me once” approach to news consumerism.
You’ve lost our trust. The question is now thrown back to you, Tony – how do you propose to earn it back?
Related: “Does the country really need 370 journalists to cover 308 MPs?”
“Newspapers Are Dying”
That’s the first line of Hugh Hewitt’s column today. The news business, though, is going to be just fine:
The mainstream media – MSM – are populated overwhelmingly by left- and hard-left-leaning writers and editors, and few people even bother to argue the point anymore. American newspapers are not unlike American car companies: Market dominance made them lazy and uninterested in their customer base, and a lot of that base slowly melted away, even before the new media arrived. When blogs and talk radio and cable arrived and offered a choice to news consumers long disgusted with biased product, remaining center-right readers began to bolt.
And nonideological readers, too, began to drift away. Internet news and opinion providers are by and large free. Let’s say I love Cleveland-area sports and live in Southern California. I can get the Indians and Browns news from the online editions of the Cleveland Plain Dealer and Akron Beacon Journal, the stuff the newspapers of Southern California never cover. Why bother even touching, say, the Los Angeles Times, when I can read the Washington Post for politics, the Wall Street Journal for business, Townhall.com and RealClearPolitics.com for opinion, and the Ohio newspapers for sports? The Times went hard-left years ago, with almost no center-right voice to balance its incessant cheerleading for Democrats. It left me; I didn’t leave it.
Hugh has nice words for Power Line and our news and video sites, too. Read it all!
SCOTT adds: Weekly Standard online editor Jonathan Last provides the excellent counterpoint to Hugh’s take: “Blog, humbug!” Hat tip to to Philadelphia Inquirer op-ed editor Kevin Ferris for arranging such an instructive exchange of views. +
http://www.powerlineblog.com/
links here
MSM soon to be a memory. I dont want to pay them to lie to us anymore.
The majority of these so-called journalists and reporters have not earned, nor do they deserve respect. The latest attack against Harper and the price of gas is just another example of their obvious and wilful bias. Harper promised tax relief on gas two elections ago – it wasn’t a promise made this election, as it was not part of his 5 point platform. Yet, all of the MSM weasels (except for Paul Wells) are attempting to make it look like a broken election promise, feeding the opposition and their lies.
It’s unethical and disgusting. Now do you understand, Tony?
Wrong link to “this” comments thread – you’re leading to World Lenin’s Birthday comments.
Good for you Kate – I too, am one of those “frustrated consumers” who is constantly yelling at the TV or at what I read in the newspapers.
Case in point – yesterday Greg Weston wrote an article in the Ottawa Sun about how the CPC daycare plan to give $1200 to parents can’t be called a “plan”, whereas the Liberal plan could be called such.
I sent an e-mail challenging him as to why he – an other media – continually “forget” to mention the second part of the CPC “plan” – the one which actually addresses daycare spaces.
His reply – because the CPC haven’t publicized any details they have nothing to write about????
My reply back to him is on its way!
This twisting the truth – or omitting parts of the details to “suit your bias”, Tony (and all the other “journalists” that are crying foul at being taken to task) – is why Kate – and many, many, many more Canadians are taking you less and less seriously!
About 12 years ago when computer alteration of photos became common I suggested to my local newspaper that they take the lead and include a mark or symbol in the photo credit line to indicate that the photo had been altered. Of course photographers had been enhancing their images in the darkroom for years but computers brought the practice to a whole new level. Long story short, I was ignored. I’d had my doubts before about the credibility of journalists but their complete inability to distinguish the importance of identifying photoshopped images hammered the point home.
Alberta Girl; Well said. I cancelled my subscription to my local paper, and find a lot more complete reporting on the internet. The “net is usually way ahead of the MSM, anyway.
Keep up the good work, Kate.
Thanks Agit – link fixed.
“Until this moment
I have been forced
to listen while media
and politicians alike
have told me
“what Canadians think”.
In all that time they
never once asked.
This is just the voice
of an ordinary Canadian
yelling back at the radio –
“You don’t speak for me.”
Maybe Tony should have just read your original “why”
Resonates with me as well.
When I get called by newspaper marketers, I refuse and when they ask why, I state: The newspaper’s politics. The last marketer, only yesterday, replied “I understand”.
The Canadian people are aware of this as can be demonstrated in the last election. Despite the media’s attempts, the Conservatives won. I was reassured by the Canadian people’s ability to see through the propaganda. You would think this would be a clue to the media.
Yeeeehaaaw , now that’s what I call getting her done , good job Kate.
Good Monday Morning engine starter.
Firstly, the accusation made regarding jealousy … the word ‘envy’ would have been the more appropriate word to use.
Jealousy is the fear of losing something or having it taken away … like your girl friend or job.
Envy is wanting something someone else has. Or perhaps hating them for the fact they have something you don’t have … Like most leftists feel about anyone who has become successful outside of Government.
I suggest it is Tony … the member of the MSM who is jealously trying to guard his profession. And is Envious that Kate has made such a success of her blog, on her own steam.
I can’t imagine a MSM reporter who wouldn’t die for a blog of their own with the hit numbers Kates gets.
I have never subscribed to a newspaper. However, before the INternet, I occasionally picked up a week-end paper to get the entertaiment pages. What do you do with all the paper if you have it coming everday? How much fish can you wrap?
I dumped my Quebecor stock long ago. It has been clear for sometime the the MSM was no long credible and one must now glean many quarters and draw conclusions for one’s own self.
Sadly, our educational system stopped teaching critical thinking about twenty five years ago. Pierre T. didn’t like people who can think for themselves.
What has happened to the news industry is the similar to what has happened to the food industry.
Ronald McFood
Ronald MCNews
You can’t take much of it seriously.
Although, I have subscribed to Western Standard recently, but for different reasons. It’s about jealously guarding freedom. And I do envy the USA for the higher level of freedom they have.
The onus now is on the heritage media to correct their behaviour as they have been exposed so many times. The problem is that as most people get their news from this same media, they don’t know about it.
A snippet from an article in today’s Ottawa Citizen may help to change some views.
Attacks toughen Canadian resolve in Afghanistan
The New York Times reported Sunday that an Afghan elder … was unhappy with Canadian operations.
“I am an educated person, and I know a bit about how they do things, but I am getting angry when they are bringing dogs to my mosque and to my house,” the elder is quoted as saying in a telephone interview. “I also feel like attacking them with an axe, but I lack the courage.”
“The New York Times has a stringer in town here in Kandahar who reports things without sources,” said Lieut. Mark McIntyre.
(I copied the last paragraph of the quote from the paper. It is not in the link I provided.)
I wake up to 680 News (an “all-news” format in T.O.).
This morning, the screaming lead item was that PM Harper is facing a major uproar for not lowering the flag for every soldier killed.
The proof? They had audio of some guy on the street saying that it would be nice if the government did so.
Major news, that.
I noticed an error at Nealenews in their link to Rampaging Chimps. It stated that a Canadian was killed. I emailed them about the error and within about 20 mins. it was corrected.
Excellent work Neale News.
That’s why I don’t bother with MSM.
Has anyone seen/heard this in the MSM? Please provide link(s). (Irony intended). +
2003 Document: Saddam Ordered To Treat The Arab Feedayeen Terrorists The Same As Iraqi Soldiers
Pentagon/FMSO Iraq Pre-War documents ^ | April 20 2006 | jveritas
Posted on 04/20/2006 2:00:22 PM PDT by jveritas
Document ISGQ-2004-00060580 is a memo that contains a direct order form Saddam Hussein in the middle of the war asking to treat the Arab Feedayeen i.e. the non Iraqi Foreign Arab Terrorists as equal as the Iraqi soldier in salary and benefits and not just any soldier but like those in the Special Forces. These are the same Arab terrorists who stayed in Iraq after the removal of the regime and caused those horrible attacks mostly on innocent civilians. This document is a follow on another document where the Iraqi were training Foreign Arab terrorist since the year 2000 (please see those two translations: Document: Iraqi Intelligence To Train Arab Feedayeen Terrorists In the Year 2000 http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1617431/posts Document: Saddam Regime Training and Using Foreign Arab Terrorists As Suicide Bombers. http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1600367/posts ). The extremely strong connection between Saddam and Terrorism is something that we need to tell the whole world about it, because for this reason alone we would have all the right to remove this Terrorist Regime after the 9/11, we just cannot afford to live with it.
Begining of the translation
In the Name of God the Most Merciful The Most Compassionate
Republic Of Iraq
Directorate of the General Military Intelligence
No 9/39/1/
Date: 4 April 2003
Secret
To: The 8th Directorate … +
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1618519/posts
Bypass the MSM: Here for more;;;
http://fmso.leavenworth.army.mil/products-docex.htm
Thank you Kate for the rebuttal to Tony without a last name.
You have presented the best summation of the situation as regards the vaunted “fourth estate” I have yet read anywhere.
The culture of biased manipulating and gatekeeping in Canadian MSM is simply the nature of the beast.
The internet and intelligent people like you Kate MacMillan, ordinary Canadian, have started to make a difference in that regard.
However, in my view unless or until some new ownership or competitor such as FOX news enter into the Canadian market fray, change will not come quickly.
Too many Tony no last name types to defend their tainted news disseminating turf.
“who claim to speak for them” (Who said this?)
Rosie got out of her comfort zone in TO; she met Death in Afghanistan.
Rosie cleared her head, real good for Rosie. Rosie and Death agreed: There is death and there is living death. It’s your choice. +
“It was, indeed, with dismay that they spoke about those back home who claim to speak for them out of a professed concern for their fate and the political parameters of Task Force Afghanistan, nee Operation Enduring Freedom.” +
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1620488/posts
“As for Me and My House, We Will Serve the Lord”
“And Joshua said unto all the people [of Israel], . . . choose you this day whom
ye will serve; . . . but as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord” …
http://www.lightplanet.com/mormons/conferences/98_oct/richards_missionary.htm
“However, in my view unless or until some new ownership or competitor such as FOX news enter into the Canadian market fray, change will not come quickly.”
I have FOX news on Starchoice sattilite TV, and I’m sad to say that they’re more interested in bashing thier MSM compeditors than they are in broadcasting the news.
When I watch the news, I want someone to tell me what’s happened, who said what, and then I want them to leave thier opinion out of it so I can form my own! But everyone editorialises, everyone says that phrase “Some people are saying…” that to me says “Duck! A truckload of unsubstantiated bullshit is coming your way!”
At least you know when FOX is editorializing.
And how do you know NBC, CBS, ABC, CBC are not editorializing during their “news”?
I’m sure you think of yourself as savvy?
What’s your answer?
…i can hardly wait for the day when the courts in their infinite wisdom declare SDA a media outlet and will be forced to pay taxes and adhere to journalistic integrity practices shown by crown corporations like the CBC.
*cough*.
But hey, I figured if the Liberals had won the last election, a blogtax wouldn’t have been too far down the path…
Oh, of course, we would need a blog committee arm of the CRTC to review and approve blogs like SDA, Angry, Lost Parriot’s and so on.
Ooooh I get the warm and fuzzies thinking this…
The MSM earn back our trust? Who said they ever had it in the first place? Even as a naive teenager watching or listening to the CBC way way back; I couldn’t help feeling that I was being sold a load. Today sadly, I simply know it to be so.
When thier mouths are moving.
Almost joking. If I want to know what parlement is doing, I watch it live on CPAC. Sometimes boredom melts my brain, most times I learn something. If I want to know what PM Harper has to say, I watch his speeches, preferably live. Same with the opposition.
I realise that most people have lives, jobs and damn near no time. (how I wish I still did, being a gimp sucks turds out of a dead ducks ass) But I have the time, and despite my trade school education, I’ve formed my own opinions politically.
I believe in the Harper Government, not because someone told me to, but because I took the time to do my homework and decide for myself.
Do I consider myself informed? Oh, yeah. Some won’t agree, but I’m a big boy.
Here are some Devils advocate kind of thoughts. Do we get the kind of media we deserve? What are we willing to pay to get good news?
The MSM numbers are dropping but are they dropping fast enough, and are the consumers moving to better products. Is there even a decent market for good news?
The few right leaning individuals in MSM, as with the even fewer Muslims criticizing Islamic terrorism are both apostate from their respective communities.
The former face never becoming The Head while the latter face losing theirs.
“I have FOX news on Starchoice sattilite TV, and I’m sad to say that they’re more interested in bashing thier MSM compeditors than they are in broadcasting the news.”
I give FOX more credit. The admit they are conservative upfront instead of pretending that they don’t have a bias. They show more uninterrupted press conferences during the day then the other networks. Brit Hume’s show is by far and away the best news program in the country and it’s one hour long compared to the ridiculous 30 minutes allotted at the lame alphabet networks. Neil Cavutto’s financial program is great.
How can you avoid not bashing the errors, omissions and behaviors of the other networks? That’s fair game. That is the news, like the Dan Rather affair, more and more.
FOX is hated because the left was used to no competition of any consequence and their abominable dribble and bias is being dissected and challenged at FOX. Controlling by omission, as in withholding any good news from Iraq or pro-Bush good economic news, is another big lefty game. FOX has nailed them many times on that.
Holey Schmoley Kate, you don’t suppose that there is someone in a major news agency pseudonomously calling himself tonythemediamoley much like the reporter with the Los Angeles Times who was outed by blogger Patterico. I have in mind a prominent Tony who happens to be located at the heart of all this fiasco. Using a Hotmail email address suggests someone who is not ready to reveal who he really is. You haven’t said either way but perhaps you already know who “Tony” is, and maybe prefer not to reveal his identity..
BRAVO, Kate!
Well said, and well spoken for so many of us “out here” who, like you, are news junkies who are just totally and utterly FED UP with the crap we’re being fed by the major MSM players in Canada. Fed up also with being, as Kate points out, condescended to, when we’re perfectly capable of reaching our own conclusions–which could, once in awhile, be respectfully listened to by and on the MSM.
tony: Listen up.
Increasing numbers of people are turning to blogs like Kate’s, because we have others in the blogosphere who are willing to listen to our often well-considered and informed opinions about things–and to challenge us to substantiate our opinions if we haven’t, or to add to what we have already shared.
I learn new things every day on Kate’s blog–a far sight more than I do when watching the CBC, for instance. Please, tony, do not underestimate the mood of a whole lot of us out here. I’ve been writing to the CRTC and the CBC ombudsman for years–about bias and unfair/inaccurate reporting–and except for the very odd time when a “ruling” has gone in my favour, I’ve been given the bum’s rush. You’d think that the regulatory flunkies would run out of justifications for journalistic practices that are clearly unjustifiable, biased, unfair, and unethical, but they don’t.
And, for heaven’s sake, the present CBC ombudsman once worked for the CBC, then taught ethics in journalism at Ryerson and WAS ASKED BACK BY THE CBC to be their ombusman. Could there be any pro-CBC bias on his part? He’s ruling on former colleagues, for crying out loud. Maybe a conflict of interest here?
I am, to quote a famous line from “Network” “mad as Hell” and “I’m not going to take it anymore.” Except for the Western Report, I have cancelled all of my newspaper and magazine subscriptions. I will get my news from Kate, Steyn, Frum, Hewitt, Warren, and a few other media outlets, and will occasionally tune into the Probe and Fail and The National Post via the Internet, and the CBC a couple of nights a week, chiefly to see what they’re up to. I have lost all confidence and trust in their ability to deliver the news fairly and in a balanced fashion.
tony, as Kate has already asked, how does the MSM propose to earn back the trust of Canadians who’ve had it with the MSM? It takes a lot longer to earn trust back than it does to lose it–and the MSM has been losing our trust for a LONG time.
Lead op-ed : “As publisher of these words, we demand that three commmisions be set up, 5 focuss groups convene, a full debate be held in the Senate, Gag be allowed to testify, free; a task farce be instituted with HQ in Moose Jaw near the birthplace of the Rev., and Hansrad be duly notified of this editorial.
This solution is terrible; it cannot stand. We, MSM, protest & we shan’t take it any more. You have been warned. ” +
A conservative solution, indeed, to a passport thing. +
Ottawa ponders 10-year passports
The federal government is considering extending the lifespan of a Canadian passport to 10 years from five, Public Safety Minister Stockwell Day said Monday. + via nealenews.com
Correction to recent post: Western Report should be Western Standard.
Good comment, new kid.
“Earn back” our trust??? Never. You first have to admit you’re wrong and repent. To do that you’ve got to have insight.
CNN and the NYT’s are cases in point.The NYT’s has had it’s stock cut 50% in the past two years. The idiots would rather pursue bankruptcy than examine their shrinking reader base and why. The numbers are diminishing of people reading their agenda driven swill. Maureen Dowd and Paul Krugman are so over that it’s laughable.
CNN has seen FOX diminish it to #2 in cable news by ratings.
Neither the NYT’s or CNN have toned their bias down in face of their financial setbacks. Even when increasingly more people write and tell them that is the problem, they ignore it.
CBC, BBC and NPR need to be fully privatized now. Then, they can sink or swim in the real world like their other commercial lefty news cousins.
Great comment Kate. Wish all the bloggers well who take the time out to get info to us that don’t have the time. MUCH APPRICIATED. I turned off the TV, don’t buy newspaper except the local, once every week. The time that news, photo and just plain lying is over. These f***s are getting what they deserve. When I need to look at the news, there are unlimited versions and takes, it dosen’t take much to turn on the computer and go anywhere in the world to track down the truth. Keep up the good work. Merle.
Good article on the decline of newspapers but paperless news like this doing just fine:
http://www.philly.com/mld/inquirer/news/special_packages/sunday_review/14405781.htm
For years I never missed a newscast, CBC, CBS, NBC, ABC, CTV and any others I could find. I lived in a rural area where I could catch them all, one after the other. I read every paper I could get and subscribed to numerous magazines. My distrust started with the hearings for Thomas for the SC of the US. I heard his stmts, and immediately following some female come on to tell us what he had said. She was so far off base I wondered how she kept her job. During the
2000 elections fiasco, I never missed a program. Since getting the internet I read all the papers, usually before my second cup of coffee. I screamed at the CBC, phoned them daily, wrote letters (ignored) and slowly left several networks. Now, I start my day with the Calgary Sun, then SDA. I have left CNN, and the rest of US news programs, except Fox on Sunday AM. Left Global after Kevin ambushed Harper with the abortion question. Still watch Don Newman, just to see how out to lunch he is. Western Report is in my house, along with a donation to his legal fight re the cartoons. Would Tony please tell me what I have missed during the past year. Will I go back, not on your life. Everyone should call the cbc talkback line 1-800-565-1422 every day and tell them how you have been offended by their bias. I also tell them that even tho I am offended, I do not plan riots in the streets or car-bqs. I also ask them if they are aware of how they have offended or insulted the deaf, with their hand movements and facial expressions. Even with her 15 million/yr, I won’t watch Katie.
Excellent rebuttal from Kate to Tony Schmoney.
THE reason I come here often: Because I feel exactly the same as Kate does. Her rebuttal was perfectly articulated and right on point.
Of course Tony’s attitude is an example of the snobbishness of the msm : WE will tell you what to think and we will ARRANGE it so you think the way we want you to think.
And WHAT does THAT smack of??!!
They are not repentant, only angry they got caught and continue to get caught.
They ignore REAL news in favour of skewing unimportant and inane posturing by the established news organizations in order to downplay what is really going on in this world.
Their job is to REPORT not create. They have failed and have been found wanting. Yet their reaction is to attack those who find them wanting, demanding WE change OUR attitude.
The arrogance of it tells me they will not realize their own demise even after the coffin is nailed shut on the industry. It will be only when they have no more oxygen left and perhaps not even then!
Moles are rodents too. (see top left corner of Kate’s blog for “underbelly of”)
I know John Moore librano$$$ fart catcher for CFRB 1010 in Toronto reads this blog when he is not mocking Albertans and running cover for librano$$ Insider Trust scandal.
“Trust me, there is no scandal here”
“MOLEY MOLEY MOLEY MOLEY”
Sorry, for that Austin Powers quote ,I just really like the way that rolls off the tongue.
Thank-you for this Kate and thank-you once again for your blog. I read your blog and the responses to your posts almost every day because I want to find out what is happening in this country. You will not find any unspun information in MSM outlets, I don’t buy anything they write. new kid on the block, great comment – I think the same way. The Report Magazines opened up the MSM’s complicity with the Elitist Liberano/Dipper control lusting billionares and their minnions. WS and blogs like sda ESTABLISHED the direct link – citizen’s who pay taxes don’t like the picture – get used to it Tony. I only watch the MSM to see how many times those fools can turn themselves inside out. I watch CPAC and get info from the PMSH’s website for my Political information.
Kate, you are far more credible and approachable than the LLL media is, I learn more from bloggers and their intelligent commenters than I ever have from the damn LSM.
We vote with our dollars and our time, I also see that the internet allows us to be better inform ourselves of world and domestic events, as others have said, I sure as hell don’t need the spin with some overpaid talking head’s leftist slant or sneers when speaking of another’s countries leader (read Bush). I’m fed up with the false stories and the lack of follow up when they are wrong (that really pissed me off so much I’ve blocked all news channels as possible off my CRTC approved cable package.)
Think of the BIG X placed over Rummy’s image on CNN…they don’t want to hear from real people like the bloggers, they only want their leftist’s pets, like juan cole, al-quardian reports, sick-of-her-whinnyness-sheehan, churchill the flake, all the empty headed hollywood types, like placenta eating prince curise, and etc…( ok I know the last one’s a joke, couldn’t help myself )
Kate, Blog on lady, if Tony is from the MSM and he’s whining at you, well I have a huge grin on my face! CBC spent a small fortune last summer on ads, telling us their journalists are there to ‘provoke’ us blah, blah… looks like they don’t like the shoe on the other foot too much, huh?
Yeah, provoked me me alright, right into banning all their garbage from my domacile. ( and this Tony, he’s projecting the envy thing me thinks)
I support Kate’s position, naturally.
Took me over a decade to come to understand that the MSM is indubitably biased. Against the Conservatives, against anything conservative, obsessed with political correctness. Also obsessed with making money and not much with getting important information and providing it to the people.
Of course people are disappointed in the MSM and are now more skeptical of pretty much everything they see and hear from these pompous elitists who think they know what we need and want to know without really asking.
I used to read the Globe and Mail every day, then switched to the National Post. But once I got online at home, I found myself no longer bothering to get a paper. Why pay when I’m already paying for a forum far greater and more comprehensive than a paper or a news program or whatever?
There’s the blogs, which do provide news and other information which the MSM either couldn’t or wouldn’t, but which the people really want to know about. I discovered the blogs a year ago perhaps today, was hooked and within months started my own to help spread information and another perspective unavailable in the narrow-minded MSM.
The internet is chock full of websites which provide eye-opening information and news ignored by the MSM. Bloggers and news aggregators find these stories and post them, widening the net for this information to get to more people.
Bloggers are citizens who provide a free service to the people which the MSM can’t or won’t provide for whatever selfish, biased, partisan, lazy or politically correct reasons they may have.
Bloggers also catch MSM dishonesty, errors and omissions.
As long as the MSM behaves as arrogantly as did the reviled former “Liberal” regime, we who blog are going to continue to grow stronger and bolder.
It’s a wake-up call for the MSM. Go ahead, MSM, smell the coffee!
Kate: you go, girl!!!
http://thecanadiansentinel.blogspot.com
Answer: Covering MP’s is an ancillary duty. The priority is job # 1:
To interface/schmooz/dine/carouse/mole & etc. with:
The Lobbyists: Counting… 1,2,…. +
Statistical Report
Types of Active Lobbyists
Consultant Lobbyists: 687
Registrations – Corporations: 271
In-house (Corp.) Lobbyists: 1752
Registrations – Organizations: 374
In-house (Org.) Lobbyists: 2281
http://www.paulding.net/bin/url.cgi/13262.17
Cheers Kate!
Media banned from Trenton Base tomorrow
Following Bush’s orders
Afghanastan is to Harpo what Iraq is to Bush
Craig Oliver CTV News this pm +
http://www.voy.com/178771/2704.html
Who is Craig O-liver?
Why does the CBC receive hundred of $millions of taxpayers’ money? The reason: because they tell “our stories” to nobody watching (if they watched the advertisers would follow), by people (sorry stars) we’ve never heard of. If nobody hears the story, does it get told? Let the CBC compete for our viewing, just like everybody else.
My beef with the MSM goes back to a story the CBC did on a company that went belly-up in Red Deer during the height of the NEP carnage, and the attendant fallouts’ effect on a number of investors. They ran the gamut from wealthy to the not-so-wealthy, and varying investments in the company. At one point, the CBC commentator alluded to the investors’ view that the NEP was the main culprit in the company’s demise, but did so in such a fashion as to make it perfectly clear that he thought that they were being unrealistic in that assessment. It was blatant editorializing, and I switched the channel at that very point. I was 22 years old, and had just spent that entire winter in the manufacturing plant I worked in painting the walls, epoxying the floor, and refurbishing lathes and milling machines that were just basically gathering dust because my own government had torched a wide swath of the Canadian economy in the name of Trudeaus’ Leninite dreams. Worse, the very news agency that I continue to fund unwillingly, was never once able to bring itself to tell the rest of Canada the truth about the devastation being wrought by a plan that was solely driven by a pathologically flawed ideology and had no basis in reality. Even worse is the Canadian MSM’s refusal to subject the CBC to the same kind of scrutiny that it applies to Conservative party politics and policy. Sadly, I think a wide swath of the Canadian journalistic community aspires to work for the CBC, both for ideological and finacial reasons.
Bill Greenwood: And after the CBC gig, under the Liberals there was the nirvana of a federal public service job.
http://www.cbcwatch.ca/?q=node/view/411
Not that CTV types are any better–in fact I think often worse.
‘THE SENATE
Tuesday, February 3, 2004
…
Hon. Jack Austin (Leader of the Government): Honourable senators, it is my pleasure to introduce two new colleagues, the Honourable Terry Mercer and the Honourable Jim Munson…
The Honourable Jim Munson has earned a national reputation for his work as a journalist and has covered many stories of international profile such as the Iran-Iraq and the Gulf wars. Senator Munson also served as CTV Bureau Chief in Beijing as well as Bureau Chief and senior correspondent in Halifax and in London, England.
Senator Munson has twice been nominated for a Gemini award for his outstanding work in journalism � and, no, Senator Munson, I will not mention your famous relationship with former Prime Minister Trudeau.
Senator Munson is a quick-witted and gutsy guy. The story I will now tell honourable senators took place in Beijing in 1989, during the Tiananmen Square incident. Senator Munson was in Tiananmen Square but knew that if he were challenged for credentials, he would be removed because he was a member of the international press corps. He was challenged and then produced, as proof of his identity, an American Express card. He pointed to the Roman soldier’s face in the upper corner of the card. The Chinese soldier promptly saluted and handed back the card.
Senator Munson’s professional experience in journalism and with political parties is essential as a basis for Canadian democracy. We may, perhaps, find in Senator Munson a leading spokesman for the Senate in the coming debates on democratic reform.
Honourable senators, I should like to extend my good wishes to Senators Mercer and Munson. All of us here hope that this will be a very productive period for you and for Canada…’
What Sen. Austin failed to mention:
http://www.cbc.ca/story/news/national/2002/11/26/ducros_resigns021126.html
‘Fran�oise Ducros has resigned as Prime Minister Jean Chr�tien’s communications director. Ducros referred to U.S. President George Bush as “a moron” in Prague last week…
Her replacement is expected to be former TV journalist Jim Munson, who works in the prime minister’s press office as a senior communications adviser. Munson is expected to serve as an interim replacement for Ducros. Munson worked as a television journalist at CTV for 23 years before he was dropped in a series of layoffs in 2001…’
Nice work if you can get it.
Mark
Ottawa
Bill Greenwood: And after the CBC gig, under the Liberals there was the nirvana of a federal public service job.
http://www.cbcwatch.ca/?q=node/view/411
Not that CTV types are any better–in fact I think often worse.
‘THE SENATE
Tuesday, February 3, 2004
…
Hon. Jack Austin (Leader of the Government): Honourable senators, it is my pleasure to introduce two new colleagues, the Honourable Terry Mercer and the Honourable Jim Munson…
The Honourable Jim Munson has earned a national reputation for his work as a journalist and has covered many stories of international profile such as the Iran-Iraq and the Gulf wars. Senator Munson also served as CTV Bureau Chief in Beijing as well as Bureau Chief and senior correspondent in Halifax and in London, England.
Senator Munson has twice been nominated for a Gemini award for his outstanding work in journalism � and, no, Senator Munson, I will not mention your famous relationship with former Prime Minister Trudeau.
Senator Munson is a quick-witted and gutsy guy. The story I will now tell honourable senators took place in Beijing in 1989, during the Tiananmen Square incident. Senator Munson was in Tiananmen Square but knew that if he were challenged for credentials, he would be removed because he was a member of the international press corps. He was challenged and then produced, as proof of his identity, an American Express card. He pointed to the Roman soldier’s face in the upper corner of the card. The Chinese soldier promptly saluted and handed back the card.
Senator Munson’s professional experience in journalism and with political parties is essential as a basis for Canadian democracy. We may, perhaps, find in Senator Munson a leading spokesman for the Senate in the coming debates on democratic reform.
Honourable senators, I should like to extend my good wishes to Senators Mercer and Munson. All of us here hope that this will be a very productive period for you and for Canada…’
What Sen. Austin failed to mention:
http://www.cbc.ca/story/news/national/2002/11/26/ducros_resigns021126.html
‘Fran�oise Ducros has resigned as Prime Minister Jean Chr�tien’s communications director. Ducros referred to U.S. President George Bush as “a moron” in Prague last week…
Her replacement is expected to be former TV journalist Jim Munson, who works in the prime minister’s press office as a senior communications adviser. Munson is expected to serve as an interim replacement for Ducros. Munson worked as a television journalist at CTV for 23 years before he was dropped in a series of layoffs in 2001…’
Nice work if you can get it. And you can get it if you try.
Mark
Ottawa
Sorry for the double.
Further to Mr Manning’s thoughts. If all those Press Gallery reporters coverered federal departments with some attention, and developed some expertise in the subject–as the US media do, then their reporting might have some real value.
As it is, almost all the time, they are regurgitators and opinionators with almost no independent value added.
If I may self-promote, as a genuine example, please see this guest-post at “Daimnation!”:
“Afstan update: about four months late” (March 25)
http://www.damianpenny.com/archived/006094.html
Mark
Ottawa
Bravo Kate!! I only started reading blogs during this last election. As I was a new “convert” to the Conservative Party this time around, I was very interested in following all aspects of the election (especially since I was working on our local campaign). Up to that point,I had basically been getting my “news” from the CBC & CTV. What totally blows me away is not only the extreme Liberal bias of the media in general but how, as you beautifully described in your post, the MSM distorts/omits information, opinionizes instead of reports, and even outright lies based on supposed “sources” (yeah, because some guy on the street said so..). Quite frankly the longer I read SDA and got opinions backed up with actual facts and figues, the more shocked I was at the abhorrent “reporting” of the MSM. Most of these journalists should be very ashamed of themselves. I no longer watch the “news” on TV, I only need check SDA a few times a day and I get 1000% more information that I ever would have before! Thanks to you Kate!!! Keep it up!!
Music to my eyes! It’s great to see I’m far from being alone, which I often used to feel before the bloggers came along. I generally boycott the CBC: any time I happen to watch, up goes my blood pressure!
My last complaint, a couple of years ago, to the CBC Ombudsman ended with my boycotting him; what a waste of my intelligence and breath when he’d admit–as usual–no indiscretions, despite chapter after chapter and verse of verifiable breaches of CBC’s mandate. What a decrepit outfit CBC is. (Though I do like Radio 2’s music.)
Thanks, Kate, for keeping the heat on the impostors of our MSM.
Richfisher:
John Moore visits here? Eeeeeewwwwww!
I remember when Gomery was at its absolute lowest for the Fibs, and there was that clown on the radio insisting he still supported the Fibs and fiberalism … what a limp-wristed metrosexual goof.