Several weeks ago the Conservatives complained to CBC Ombudsman Vince Carlin about the CBC’s use of pollster Frank Graves as a putative non-partisan: “Why,” the letter asked, “is a pollster who conducts polling for Canada’s national broadcaster…also giving partisan advice to the Liberal Party of Canada?”
The usual suspects shrugged off the charge. The network’s editor-in-chief insisted that the CBC “is ‘politically neutral‘ and ‘scrupulously fair.'” EKOS denied that any of the data from any of the CBC-commissioned polls had been shared with the Liberals (notwithstanding, apparently, that fact that the results of one such CBC-commissioned poll induced Frank Graves to announce on air that the Liberals would do well to point out to Canadians that the choice between the the Liberals and the Conservatives was one of “cosmopolitanism versus parochialism, secularism versus moralism, Obama versus Palin, tolerance versus racism and homophobia, democracy versus autocracy.”)
In the aftermath of all the hoo-ha Graves dropped out of sight, only to reappear last Thursday on Power & Politics to discuss the results of a recent “viewer-inspired” poll “conducted for exclusive release by the CBC program Power & Politics.” Seems a citizen viewer had come up with a thought-provoking suggestion for an EKOS poll: “It would be interesting to find out what issues are most important to women. What qualities they look for in a leader and conversely what issues/characteristics negatively affect their vote.” Host Evan Solomon gushed “Frank, this is a fascinating poll, because it came based on a viewer question…a fascinating question, and very timely.”
Why yes, yes, and what makes the poll even timelier and more fascinating is that the viewer who suggested the subject matter of the poll, a woman named Mary Pynenburg, just happens to be a former two-time candidate for the federal Liberals.
The reactions from the usual suspects show a Liberal-headed entitlement to passive-aggressive redirection. Jane Taber, for example, elevates apoplexy-inducing non-accountability into a perfected art form: she acknowledges that yes, Mary Pynenburg is a former Liberal candidate, and yes, Mary Pynenburg submitted the question that Frank Graves conducted a poll on, but she still manages to type out that “the Tories allege” that the poll “was inspired by a Liberal Party candidate.”
CBC/EKOS pollster Frank Graves:
“I had no idea whatsoever who submitted the viewer-inspired question.”
CBC spokesman Jeff Keay:
“The question sent to us was reasonable, timely and relevant.”
To sum up: a two-time Liberal candidate who the CBC describes as just a “viewer” – a concerned regular-Jane citizen, in effect – submits, to the CBC and EKOS, a poll question that just happens to be on a matter that the Liberals and the CBC have been attacking the Conservatives on (as evidenced by the fake “Abortion” issue as it pertains to foreign aid), and then the poll’s results are announced coast-to-coast on the taxpayer-funded CBC, including the “finding” that “Conservative supporters had a higher than average propensity to say that women leaders would have a negative effect.”
“Timely and relevant” indeed.
Maybe the solution is to let the CBC continue on with adequate funding, but under the one condition that they call themselves the Liberal Party Propaganda Organization, with the subtitle Unfair to Conservatives.
This would be truth in advertising and they could drop the pretence of being “scrupulously fair” which I guess means Rex Murphy would be looking for work.
It’s a QUAGMIRE!
The CBC/liberal party’s culture war has become a Vietnam style quagmire!
Pull out the CBC drones now!
They will never survive the brutal Canadian summer.
Has the CBC turned over any captured conservatives detainees to the Liberals?
The constant denials from media agents in the Liberal crime syndicate are nauseating. “We’re not bias” We didn’t know the question came from a failed Liberano candidate. The credibility of these Liberal party shills in the MSM is pulp, much like their intellectual capacity. The contempt the CBC, CTV and the rest of the usual suspects in the MSM show for Canadians is disgusting. I mean clearly they know their bullshi##g us all, and we know their full of it, and yet they just deny, deny, deny, even when their caught Red handed. Sociopathic liars!!!
So Mary Pynenburg is a “citizen viewer.”
Wouldn’t that make Rahim Jaffir a private citizen?
In a way, Canadians are a strange lot.
We sit quietly as billions of our tax dollars are utterly frittered away annually on the CBC, the gun registry and human rights commissions. At the same time, politicians and common folk alike wring their hands and moan over the deteriorating state of our health care system. While billions are urinated away on lost causes, our soldiers are sent off to fight with outdated and inferior equipment.
If everyone would just give their heads a collective shake and insist that tax dollars be spent wisely, our health care system could be the envy of the entire world. Our soldiers could help to rid the world of vermin using modern weaponry and remain much safer while doing so.
As has been suggested, everyone contact his or her MP and demand that the CBC be sold off immediately. Remind everyone that you know that the CBC is costing taxpayers one billion plus dollars annually.
The time to rid this country of life-sucking crap is long past due.
“The CBC must go and this ought to be a constant refrain.”
I’ve started by sending letters to the advertisers on The National: Dear CBC supporter, I won’t support you or your products….