It's Official: We *Are* Indeed Here.

(Updated below) (Update II)

In three previous entries of mine (here, here and here), I discussed on the current state of our Canadian MSM and how quickly it was becoming as superficial, fatuous, vapid, asinine and fact-free as the American one has become.

Well, I now feel comfortable enough now to say that, indeed, our MSM has fully become as fatuous, vapid and incompetent as its American counterpart. Take two examples taken from today only:

Bloviating Defies Logic
Peter Worthington, a news columnist, wrote a column in the Toronto Sun, titled: "New isolationism defies logic". Let us read his first four opening lines:

"Opinion polls show that an increasing number of Canadians think we should pull our military out of Afghanistan if casualties rise. That new isolationism appeals to many media commentators and politicians, eager to defeat the government, regardless of merit or logic."

What actually defies merit and logic here is that Worthington conflates the desire of the majority of Canadians to see their troops out of Afghanistan (and back home) with some sort of intangible phenomenon he christened "new isolationism", and which he invented out of the addled reasoning centers of his brain, in order to posit that such a new phenomenon is being used by those who are eager to defeat the neocon Harper government.

I will put this as succintly as possible: Worthington's conflation has as much merit, and is as logical, as accusing me of "new pyrophobia" - meant of course to defeat the Harper government - for desiring to pull my hand out of a burning fire.

Worthington then follows up directly with the following mind-boggling assertion:

"Whether we, as a country, should have gone to Afghanistan in the first place, almost as a sop to the Americans for refusing to join the English-speaking alliance of the U.S., Britain and Australia in Iraq, is a valid but pointless argument."

First, we did support/go in Afghanistan in the first place, which occured wa-ay before Iraq, Monsieur Worthington (Afghanistan invasion: 2001; Iraq: 2003). Then ....

"English-speaking alliance"? What about the Italians, Polish, Romanians and those other non-english speaking partners who constituted the so-called Coalition of the Willing for the invasion of Iraq? I wonder if Worthington can spell "fact" correctly ... And then -

"Valid but pointless"? Sounds the same as saying that my supper tonight was "good but bad".

Perhaps Peter Worthington likes to live in a fantasy-universe vacuum, where one does not bother to verify facts nor debate bad decisions and mistakes of the past, because, well, gosh darn it, what's done is done, it's a fait accompli and there is no use for crying over spilled milk! Such an attitude is plainly parochial and wrong on so many levels, if only because all of us who actually use the brains that we were born with know that we must know and understand the fact-based past, in order to not repeat its mistakes and see clearly where we are going in this reality we live in. But apparently, the glorious news columnist that Worthington thinks he is would have none of such pointless argumentations.

Besides, such arguments are only meant to defeat the Harper government - says Peter Worthington. It is glaringly interesting how he does not expound on such an insipid rationalization with something like ... you know ... facts? Furthermore - who's fault is it if a government keeps screwing things up in order to follow in the footsteps of the neocon Bushies and the Commander Guy himself? The only thing that is defeating the Harper government is ... itself.

And not surprisingly, Worthington then goes on in his column to argue for the all-time favorite neocon line of all: "stay the course".

In other words: we are in this Afghanistan mess and the best way to get out of said mess is to ... stay in it. Bravo, Monsieur Worthington! Heck of a job as a news columnist: your column of today was completely fact-free, full of outright falsehoods, devoid of any in-depth analysis whatsoever, filled with impressions and pontifications, full of logical fallacies and gratuitous attacks, and, most "important" of all, in full Harper defense-mode.

Just like he did so dutifully in attacking Al Gore who dared to criticize the Harper/Baird Kyoto-ultra-light plan some two weeks ago.

At least, Worthington is quite consistent in his incompetence.


Attack and Smear Them Traitor-Leakers!
Then, there is news columnist Ezra Levant who wrote today in the Calgary Sun a column titled "Anarchist leaker covets disorder", concerning Jeff Monaghan, the communications worker in the federal environment department who leaked a confidential draft of the Harper government's policy on Kyoto.

Right off the bat, Levant categorizes Monaghan's leak as illegal, without any basis whatsoever and even mentioning one paragraph after that the leaker was arrested but not charged with anything! Maybe Ezra Levant needs to take a good, long look in the dictionary concerning the definition of "illegal", eh? I mean, if you are not charged with anything, maybe - just maybe - you did nothing illegal and did not deserve to be arrested in the first place, right? Seems to me this is as simple as 1-1=0, if one puts aside his intellectual sloth and actually takes the time to think about it (But then, what is the use of writing a smear article if you can't insinuate, conflate and bloviate without basis, right? Right. But I digress ...)

In any case, the serious, thoughtful Levant goes onto an adolescent tirade to demean as much as possible the leaker and, in the process, to fully discredit him - because, once again, the government must be defended and protected by the MSM, right? Forget about the simple truth that leaking the Harper/Baird Kyoto-ultra-light plan did one thing and one thing only: embarass the Canadian neocons in power by exposing their duplicity and incompetence with regards to Climate Change.

But no, no, no, "says" Ezra Levant - the leaker is a ba-a-ad guy and ... and ... and don't mind the Harper Kyoto plan because it is good-good-good and the leaker is bad-bad-bad and dangerous: that is how Levant's insipid column of character assassination can be summarized. Heck of a job, Ezrie!

Of course, serious news columnist Ezra Levant was not alone in doing his duty to smear the leaker in order to defend Harper and his neocons. Take for instance today's comment from Lorrie Goldstein, who used a different approach: he first grandly writes that "Every whistleblower is different. Some are noble. Some brave. Some frightened. Then there are the pompous jerks." Care to guess in which category he places Monaghan? (And yes - this is the same Goldstein who also dutifully attacked Al Gore for daring to criticize the Harper/Baird Kyoto-ultra-light plan some two weeks ago).

In conclusion, these examples illustrate all too clearly that our Canadian MSM is now:

All about propaganda;

All about enabling the warwagers, warmongers and chickenhawks;

All about fawning over Da Commander Guy-emulator;

All about never calling out bald-faced contradictions or lies;

All about parotting fact-free right-wing, neocon mindless spin;

All about infotainment and certainly not about information.

All about being unable (or unwilling) to be accountable to itself, let alone respecting its own journalistic ethics/standards or acknowledging its mistakes.

In short: the Canadian MSM is currently failing as the 4th estate.


The feuilles de chou that I have used as examples herein are proof enough of that. As I have written before: we must remain ever vigilant - lest we end up as far into the propaganda and disinformation zone as our neighbor south of the 49th ...


Update: 05/15/2007 - Nothing to see here, move along now. Three days ago, Scott Taylor of the Toronto Sun (is it just me or is there a pattern here, with regards to Sun Media/Québecor?) penned this article titled "No signs of torture", with regards to Afghan detainees captured by Canadian soldiers and handed over to the Afghan National Directorate of Security and/or Afghan police officers, then being tortured and mistreated by their own in Afghan detention centers. In his article, Taylor was given a tour (approved in advance by the Afghan government and supervised by Afghan officials - wink, wink) of the Kandahar Detention Center and he consequently describes his "findings". Of course, concludes Taylor, there were no evidence of torture or mistreatment of detainees and thus the "liberal media" has been conflating everything in order to assault/embarass wrongly and maliciously the poor Harper neocon government Taylor played the perfect, attentive stenographer and moutpiece (for both the Harper government and the Afghan government) without bothering to do any actual investigative journalism ... like, for instance, visiting a detention center completely unannounced, maybe?

Once again: Q.E.D.


Update: 05/17/2007 - Lorrie Goldstein goes again with all guns blaring against Al Gore. His primary source? Discredited, abyssmal ratings-generator, right wing nutt Glenn Beck, ladies and gents - I kid you not! Yet once again a superb example of incompetent journalism in our MSM.