Ibbitson: Liberals trying to play both sides in Gaza conflict

2024/01/16 Leave a comment

Definition of middle of the road: road kill!

The table below highlights the number of ridings with more than 5 percent religious minorities, highlighting just how many more ridings have significant Muslim populations compared to Jewish populations.

The Liberals find themselves caught between an Israel/Conservative rock and a NDP/Palestinian hard place. And they don’t seem to have a solution, other than to placate both sides, which is no solution at all.

Source: Liberals trying to play both sides in Gaza conflict

Filed under foreign policy, Multiculturalism Tagged with , ,

Inside the crisis at TMU’s law school: It started with a letter of support for Palestinians. Now students and staff feel betrayed and donors are pulling out

2024/01/15 Leave a comment

Not really surprising that a school “branded as “a different kind of law school focused on equity and inclusion” would find itself in this mess. Kind of fitting for a university that changed its name from Ryerson to TMU, because of overly simplistic interpretations of history, activist pressure, and hurt to some students and groups, finds itself underlining its blind spot regarding anti-Jewish attitudes and anti-semitism.

Words matter, as advocates and activists rightly maintain. But now many of the activist law students are discovering this in a real personal sense with real consequences. A teaching moment:

…Public reaction was vicious. On social media, signatories were mocked and insulted in posts featuring their LinkedIn profiles, with photos of their faces. The Jewish advocacy group B’nai Brith put out a press release, calling on the school to “expel terrorist apologist students.” Some members of the legal community advocated for blacklisting all TMU students from the profession.

“I certainly wouldn’t hire any of these students,” one Toronto lawyer posted on X, “and the fact that some choose to ‘show’ their solidarity by keeping their names hidden means I’d have to write off hiring anyone from … the current crop at @LincAlexLawTMU.”

Under intense pressure from all sides, the institution waded in. What school leaders did would only further fan the flames.

The law school issued a statement that “unequivocally” condemned the “sentiments of Antisemitism and intolerance” the petition expressed, but made no mention of any possible action to address the conduct of signatories. That fell short in the eyes of two Jewish criminal defence lawyers. They penned a letter urging the school to impose consequences to “illustrate in no uncertain terms that hate speech and incitements to violence are utterly unacceptable.”

One of several non-Jewish signatories was former Ontario Court of Appeal Justice Harry LaForme, who is an Anishinabe from the Mississaugas of the New Credit First Nation. LaForme read the aspiring lawyers’ petition as a justification for what happened on Oct. 7, which, he said, disregards the rule of law, and is “completely anathema to Indigenous Peoples.”

LaForme hoped the school would create a safe space internally for signatories to distance themselves from the petition. “They (the students) have to be able to change their minds,” he said.

‘New McCarthyism’ decried by lawyers

In November, TMU hired a retired judge to conduct an external review. Former Chief Justice of Nova Scotia J. Michael MacDonald will meet signatories this month to determine whether their words breached the student code of conduct, which sets expectations for how students interact and communicate.

The school’s decision to outsource the job stoked acrimony, both from those who had been pushing administrators to quickly confront what seemed to them to be clear policy violations, as well as those who believed students were now being subjected to a witch hunt.

“A new McCarthyism” is how the response to the student petition was characterized in an open letter, signed by hundreds of members of the legal community, including Sealy-Harrington, Gadea Hawkins and other TMU professors.

Dania Majid, a Palestinian activist and head of the Arab Canadian Lawyers Association, signed that open letter. Majid, who faced intense Islamophobia as a young lawyer in the aftermath of 9/11, said the school’s characterization of the petition as antisemitic is “textbook anti-Palestinian racism.”

Majid said the students are being treated “as criminals.”

The fallout also highlighted divisions within the Jewish community, including at TMU. Shiri Pasternak, an assistant professor in criminology, is part of a group of Jewish instructors who don’t believe the petition was antisemitic and are concerned about the implications of the external review on academic freedom on campus.

“We didn’t necessarily all endorse the letter that the law students wrote,” Pasternak said. “But … we strongly believe that students should have a right to express, even imperfectly, their sense of injustice, and raise their collective voices to intervene when they see injustices.”

A campus turned tense

On campus, the atmosphere turned tense, students say. For the rest of the term, fewer classmates showed up for lectures; when they did, people who used to intermingle seemed to be sitting apart. Sam and Taylor said they felt ostracized by some of their peers, and uncomfortable coming to class.

One law school instructor, who is Jewish, moved her classes online after reading the petition. In a complaint to the university, she alleged the petition violated school policies, and had caused her to “worry for my physical safety as a result of my faith.”

Some of the law school’s roughly 450 students were upset by the timing of the petition, which dropped the week before on-campus interviews for placements at law firms.

At least one Bay Street firm asked TMU students whether they signed the petition, and refused to grant interviews to those who did. Ontario’s Ministry of the Attorney General also required law students working for the province to sign an attestation confirming they weren’t among the signatories, according to a memo from the deputy minister.

Noah Lister-Stevens, a second-year student who participated in interviews that week, was “disappointed” with his classmates for not better contemplating how their words would land. But he said the response of some law firms that seemed to be waging “a scorched-earth campaign,” was “disturbing.”

“None of the students in my school that I’ve ever spoken to are hateful people,” he said. “Everyone that I know who signed that letter is a kind person who deserves to be in that school.”

Sealy-Harrington shared with the Star several statements that he said had been provided to him by anonymous signatories. The statements accuse the administration of defaming the signatories by wrongly characterizing their petition as antisemitic, and of ignoring their pleas for help as they endured Islamophobia and racism from students, staff and the public.

“Nobody condemned the people calling us terrorists, or telling us to die, or describing in extreme detail the vile ways they would harm us or our families,” one statement said. “The school, named for an incredible justice-seeking Black man, acts only when white students complain, not when people of colour are tormented.”

The law school was renamed in 2021 for Lincoln Alexander, who was a lawyer and champion of racial equity. As Ontario’s lieutenant governor, he became the first Black Canadian to serve as a representative of the British monarchy in Canada.

A TMU spokesperson said “we respectfully disagree” with the claims of the signatories.

Administrators and staff have had nearly 200 meetings with students “to listen to their concerns and help them navigate the many available supports,” Karen Benner said in an email. “The university and law school categorically condemn any and all discrimination and harassment directed at our students and faculty, and have taken steps to address them.”

Donors cancel TMU law school scholarships

But the administration’s conversations with donors have been strained.

Criminal defence lawyer Brian Greenspan suspended a $50,000 scholarship. Greenspan said in a letter to the law school’s dean and the TMU president that the school’s namesake would be “appalled” by the petition.

The failure of administrators to categorically denounce the petitioners, Greenspan said, is “a derogation of the responsibility of those who support a civil society and a blemish on the legacy of Lincoln Alexander,” who believed in finding common ground.

The pulling of funding is an inappropriate response, according to Jim Turk, who is the director of TMU’s Centre for Free Expression, and says it takes away opportunities from future students.

Source: Inside the crisis at TMU’s law school: It started with a letter of support for Palestinians. Now students and staff feel betrayed and donors are pulling out

Filed under Multiculturalism Tagged with , , ,

Lisée: Exagérer avec Bock-Côté

2024/01/15 Leave a comment

Useful review, as much for Lisée’s views as MBC’s:

Je veux rassurer tout de suite ceux de mes lecteurs qui souffrent de mathieu-bock-côté-phobie — oui, oui, je sais que vous êtes là : je ne suis pas un admirateur inconditionnel de celui qu’on appelle MBC. Mais voilà, je dois maintenant vous peiner en ajoutant que j’en suis un admirateur conditionnel. En plus, c’est un ami.

Je suis social-démocrate, il est conservateur. J’exècre l’avant-dernier pape, il le vénère. Je suis critique de toutes les religions, il fait l’apologie de la chrétienté. J’applaudis les programmes d’accès à l’égalité, il en rejette le principe même. Je suis inquiet du réchauffement, cela ne lui fait ni chaud ni froid. Je juge essentiel de faire reculer la pauvreté, le sujet l’ennuie. Il m’arrive même de défendre les droits des Anglo-Québécois, s’il l’a fait, cela m’a échappé. Je suis indépendantiste, lui aussi.

Je viens de terminer son dernier livre, Le totalitarisme sans le goulag (La Cité). Il exagère. C’est bien écrit. Il manie le verbe avec talent, mène sa charge avec élan. On le soupçonne content d’avoir trouvé une habile formule pour trucider tel aspect du régime diversitaire dont il a fait son ennemi personnel, puis en imaginer une seconde, puis une troisième, plus mordante encore, qu’il ne peut s’empêcher de nous proposer. On voit bien qu’il se répète, mais on pardonne, car c’est goûteux. Mais qu’est-ce qu’il exagère !

Si on suit son raisonnement, nous vivrons bientôt, nous, Occidentaux, dans un monde où une banque fermera notre compte simplement par désaccord avec notre opinion politique pourtant légale. Un monde où des manifestations seront interdites préventivement, par crainte qu’y soient prononcés des propos haineux. Un monde où utiliser le mauvais pronom pour désigner le genre d’une personne sera un acte criminel. Où on pourrait être déclaré hors-la-loi pour avoir mis en doute le récit victimaire d’une minorité. Un monde où des policiers pourront nous arrêter simplement parce que nous avons chez nous un livre qui peut être jugé offensant envers une minorité et que nous aurions dû savoir que quelqu’un pourrait l’utiliser pour le montrer à une partie du public et ainsi l’inciter à la haine (Mein Kampf ? L’Ancien Testament ? Le Coran ? Relations des Jésuites ?). 

Un monde où nous pourrons être accusés d’inciter à la haine pour des propos tenus en privé, dans notre salon. Un monde où des employés de l’État ou de grandes entreprises seront soumis à des formations les instruisant sur ce qu’ils doivent absolument penser de l’histoire de leur pays. Et où exprimer un désaccord envers une opinion bizarre — que le racisme serait bien pire au Canada qu’aux États-Unis, par exemple — peut vous valoir des accusations de suprémacisme, vous plonger dans une dépression, vous conduire au suicide.

Quand je vous disais qu’il exagérait. On serait dans Orwell, qu’il cite d’ailleurs abondamment. Bon, c’est vrai, une banque a fermé son compte au politicien britannique Nigel Farage pour raisons politiques ; devant le tollé, ils l’ont rouvert. Bon, c’est vrai, des préfets français ont interdit à l’avance des manifestations, parfois de gauche, parfois anti-laïques, parfois de l’ultradroite, parfois aussi pour interdire de taper sur des casseroles sur la trajectoire du convoi présidentiel. Est-ce si grave ?

Penser que le mégenrage soit criminalisé, c’est du délire. Quoique ce soit souhaité par une pluralité de millénariaux aux États-Unis. Idem pour la remise en question du génocide culturel autochtone canadien. Ce n’est qu’une recommandation officielle, appuyée par le ministre canadien de la Justice, pourquoi s’énerver ? Et ce livre odieux que vous avez chez vous, ce n’est qu’en Irlande qu’une loi pourrait vous entraîner en tôle pour le posséder, pas ici. Et les propos haineux tenus en privé, ce n’est qu’en Écosse qu’on pourrait vous les reprocher devant un juge. C’est loin, l’Écosse.

Quant aux formations obligatoires nous contraignant à croire que nous sommes pires que les Américains, elles ne sont imposées qu’aux employés fédéraux, à ceux des grandes entreprises, pas aux PME. Et, oui, aux directeurs d’école de l’Ontario, dont un a osé dire que c’était inexact, fut accusé d’être un suprémaciste blanc, puis s’est suicidé. Mais n’était-il pas un peu fragile ?

Sérieusement, Bock-Côté trace le portrait de ce qui pourrait nous arriver de pire, si la totalité des assauts recensés contre la liberté d’expression et de conscience devaient s’arrimer et se généraliser. S’avisant qu’il existe un médicament qui semble réduire les opinions racistes, notant que des implants cybernétiques sont en développement, il nous avertit de ne pas écarter la perspective d’utilisation de ces innovations pour contrôler nos élans et nos pensées. Je voudrais lui rétorquer que le pire n’est pas toujours sûr. Je me retiens, car ses ouvrages précédents nous avaient souvent prévenus de dérives dont on ne pouvait croire qu’on les vivrait près de chez nous, mais qui, pourtant, sont arrivées.

Évidemment, s’il s’inquiète énormément des outrances issues de la mouvance woke (un mot qu’il n’utilise pas, préférant parler de régime diversitaire), il est moins disert sur les mouvements de droite qui interdisent des lectures, réforment les programmes pour qu’on ne parle plus d’esclavage aux États-Unis, matent la liberté de la presse en Europe de l’Est. Une partie du livre est destinée à prouver que l’extrême droite politique n’existe pas en soi (il ne nie pas l’existence de groupuscules néofascistes). Qu’il ne s’agit que d’une étiquette servant à marginaliser les porteurs d’un discours dérangeant. 

La démonstration va pour la France,où les thèmes du contrôle de l’immigration et de la lutte contre la délinquance, naguère portée par le clan Le Pen, sont désormais au centre de l’action d’un gouvernement qui se dit d’extrême centre. Mathieu n’en parle pas, mais l’utilisation par les conservateurs nord-américains du mot « woke » pour étiqueter la totalité des positions progressistes et écologistes, même modérées, relève du même phénomène et mérite la même réprobation. 

Et lorsqu’il défend sans la nommer la thèse du « Grand Remplacement » des peuples historiques par les minorités, on cherche en vain dans ses pages les chiffres, l’échéancier, le moment du point de bascule, même si la transformation est visible en France et en Europe dans des cités et des quartiers.

Il y a donc à prendre et à laisser — et beaucoup à ajouter — à l’oeuvre que construit énergiquement l’ami Bock-Côté. Je conçois que les avertissements qu’il nous lance peuvent agacer, déranger. J’estime toutefois qu’il est un combattant de la liberté d’expression. Et que c’est à nos risques et périls qu’on refuserait de l’entendre.

Source: Exagérer avec Bock-Côté

Filed under Multiculturalism Tagged with , ,

Immigration rules that jeopardized Russian activist’s citizenship bid need fixing, experts say – CBC.ca

2024/01/15 Leave a comment

Would be nice to know if this is an isolated case or part of a broader pattern. Could likely be addressed through an operational bulletin:

….While her supporters applauded the eventual outcome, experts and advocates — including a Russian opposition politician convicted under the same law — say Canada must clarify its immigration rules to avoid making the same mistake again.

“This is a shocking case. It’s a clear miscarriage of justice,” said Matthew Light, and associate professor of criminology and European studies at the University of Toronto, in an interview before Miller’s intervention.

“I can only assume it arose through a very basic misunderstanding of the nature of the Russian political system and the law in question, which is … a blatant attempt to silence opposition to the war in Ukraine.”

Light said the law has had a “dramatic” effect in Russia, where thousands have been arrested for allegedly discrediting the “special military operation” in Ukraine.

Now, Light said, the Kremlin appears to be taking aim at Russians who have fled.

“I think the fact that the sentence that was handed down in this [case] was so extreme indicates that the Russian government sees it as important to them to send a message to Russian citizens abroad that they can be found and that they can be in trouble with their [adopted country’s] government if they speak out against the war.”

Light believes the intent of the Russian law is “perfectly clear” and said it’s astounding that Canadian immigration officials failed to recognize it for what it is.

“The part about this case that’s so unbelievable is that anybody in the Canadian government would believe that this is a proper law,” he said, likening it to a Canadian citizen being imprisoned for criticizing the war in Afghanistan.

“It’s really that simple. This is somebody who’s criticizing a policy of their government, in this case the invasion of Ukraine, and being punished for that.”

Wesley Wark, senior fellow at the Centre for International Governance Innovation and an expert on national security and intelligence issues, called Kartasheva’s case extraordinary for its “sheer absurdity.”

He was also interviewed before the minister’s intervention.

“It’s really a kind of Kafkaesque situation that this person has been thrust in,” said Wark, who attempted to intervene with senior government officials on Kartasheva’s behalf and said her predicament reminded him of another case in which he was involved.

He said Russia might even seize upon the gaffe for its own propaganda purposes.

“In a broader perspective, it does bring … the conduct of the Canadian government into disrepute,” Wark said. “On every level — in terms of international relations, in terms of application of the law, in terms of what I call bureaucratic turpitude, reputation impact on the individual in question — it’s just so wrong.”

Wark suspects Kartasheva’s application became bogged down on the desk of a junior official who was operating strictly by the book, but said that doesn’t make the government’s handling of it any less egregious.

“The very idea that we would even for a moment contemplate looking for an equivalent to a Russian criminal sanction that is politically motivated and designed to stamp out dissent … just strikes me as absurd,” he said.

Source: Immigration rules that jeopardized Russian activist’s citizenship bid need fixing, experts say – CBC.ca

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Pierre Poilievre pledges to tie immigration levels to homebuilding – Financial Post

2024/01/15 Leave a comment

Given current housing starts, less than 250,000, and for illustrative purposes, 3 persons per housing unit, this would mean a total of 750,000 permanent and temporary residents, less than half the current amount.

An easy understandable slogan but, like so many by all parties, more complex than presented given the various interested groups and the hard decisions around trade-offs:

The Conservative politician who’s trying to take down Justin Trudeau said that if he’s elected, he would link Canada’s immigration levels to the number of homes being built.

Pierre Poilievre took aim Friday at Trudeau’s housing minister, Sean Fraser, arguing that when Fraser was immigration minister, he oversaw soaring numbers of new arrivals without ensuring the country could properly accommodate them.

“We need to make a link between the number of homes built and the number of people we invite as new Canadians,” Poilievre said, speaking at a news conference in Winnipeg, Manitoba.He said his Conservative Party “will get back to an approach of immigration that invites a number of people that we can house, employ and care for in our health-care system.” He cited data showing that Canada is now completing fewer homes than it did 50 years earlier, when its population was around 22 million. It’s close to 41 million today

There were 219,942 new homes completed in Canada in 2022, the most recent year for which complete data is available, compared with 232,227 in 1972, when the country was going through a construction boom.

Poilievre did not say whether he would roll back Canada’s permanent resident target or curb the number of temporary newcomers, such as foreign students. In the past, he has declined to say that he would scale back immigration.

Canada accepted about 455,000 new permanent residents in the 12-month period to Oct. 1 while bringing in more than 800,000 non-permanent residents, a category that includes temporary workers, students and refugees. Canada’s population growth rate of 3.2 per cent means it’s growing faster than any Group of Seven nation, China or India.

Many economists have also criticized the government for failing to ensure services have kept pace with Canada’s immigration targets.

Trudeau has fallen far behind Poilievre in public polling, and the high cost of housing is likely part of the explanation. His government has unveiled several measures meant to boost home construction, and they’ve pledged to examine reforms to programs that allow temporary immigrants.

The prime minister told reporters in Guelph, Ont., on Jan. 12 that there’s no “magic solution” to the housing shortage and touted his government’s program to transfer millions of dollars to cities that speed up development approvals.

“Construction workers and availability of labour is a challenge we’re facing, which is why we continue to have ambitious immigration targets,” he said.

Source: Pierre Poilievre pledges to tie immigration levels to homebuilding – Financial Post

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Teenage surfing star granted Canadian citizenship, now sets her sights on Olympics – The Globe and Mail

2024/01/15 Leave a comment

Unclear whether this is a one-off decision or signals repeal of first generation cut-off. From the reporting, weak connection to Canada, one that appears to be more elite athlete driven and that she was reportedly searching for different citizenship options to allow her to compete in the olympics. Unclear why she didn’t compete with the American team:

…Canada’s citizenship laws are complex, with amendments changing the rules in 2009 and 2015. But essentially Bill C-37 in 2009 ended the extension of citizenship to second-generations born abroad.

In an October letter explaining its decision not to grant a “discretionary grant of citizenship,” Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada says Brooks did not meet the requirements.

“The application is refused on the basis that the applicant is not stateless, has not experienced special or unusual hardship or provided services of an exceptional value to Canada which warrants a discretionary grant of Canadian citizenship,” the letter stated.

Source: Teenage surfing star granted Canadian citizenship, now sets her sights on Olympics – The Globe and Mail

Source: Chris Selley: An elite surfer finally gets rightful Canadian citizenship. Other ‘lost Canadians’ keep waiting

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Trudeau botched immigration surge, Canada’s top bank economists say – Financial Post

2024/01/13 Leave a comment

Hard to make a stronger condemnation than this:

Canada’s current immigration policy — among the most open in the world — is now causing economic damage and needs to be reconsidered, according to the country’s top economists.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s decision to dramatically increase immigration — and allow a flood of temporary workers and international students — without providing proper support has created a laundry list of economic problems, including higher inflation and weak productivity, chief economists at Canada’s biggest banks said Jan. 11 during a wide-ranging panel discussion in Toronto.

“Frankly I’m surprised we screwed it up because we sit in such a privileged position in Canada,” Beata Caranci, chief economist at Toronto-Dominion Bank, told a packed audience at an Economic Club of Canada event.

Unlike many other countries, including the United States, Canada is not dealing with poorly controlled flows of migrants across its land borders and has had time to think about the implications of its policies, Caranci said. “We designed our own policy, we put it in place, we implemented it, and we still screwed it up.

Source: Trudeau botched immigration surge, Canada’s top bank economists say – Financial Post

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Keller:The day DEI World entered Canadian politics

2024/01/13 Leave a comment

Keller has shifted from valid critiques of current immigration policies to critiques of DEI, given the blinders by some to anti-semitism, with one of the more blatant examples. Another one might be the KOJO Institute as their website does not mention anti-semitism based upon a word search:

….But today’s anti-racism training often isn’t at all like that. Which is how you end up with Laith Marouf. He worked for an organization that received federal funding to deliver anti-racism education, and whose contract was terminated after it came to light that he was posting antisemitic content online.

In Liberal World, claiming to be against racism, while discriminating on the basis of race, is not only wrong, it’s a philosophical contradiction. But DEI World’s anti-racism doesn’t work that way. It starts by putting groups of people into either the good racial box or the bad one, so that one can decide who is oppressed and oppressor, and who is entitled to what sort of treatment.

That’s how you end up with people posting things online that, in Liberal World, are clearly racist – and yet these same people, their minds in DEI World, sincerely believe themselves to be anti-racists.

Source: The day DEI World entered Canadian politics

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Deputy ministers’ report on values and ethics in public service lacks ‘a point of view,’ says expert

2024/01/13 Leave a comment

Valid critique and yes, the need to be more pragmatic and I would argue, concrete:

….Michael Wernick, a former Clerk of the Privy Council, said that while the document was a “decent consultation ‘what we heard’ report,” it left him asking “what now?”

“It’s oddly lacking a point of view or position or a stance on anything. It kind of just sends the ball back to the Clerk and the Secretary of the Treasury Board and says we really should have policy on acceptable use of social media, but there’s no advice on what that policy should look like,” Wernick said.

“It identifies a problem with the incursions of political staff, but there’s no advice on what to do about it. So it kind of left me hanging.”

The report’s authors said the document is “intended to serve as a prologue to a broader dialogue on values and ethics in the public service, and we begin by sharing what we have heard, frankly and without filters.”

Pierre-Alain Bujold, spokesperson for the Privy Council Office, said the Clerk is taking time to reflect on the report’s observations and recommendations and consider the best options for next steps. He said the report will inform the “next phase,” including how to broaden the discussion on values and ethics.

When Hannaford created the group of senior officials tasked with discussing values and ethics within the public service, he said he expected to see a “milestone report” by the end of the year.

Wernick said he agrees with the report’s call for more engagement, adding that he’d like to see the next round “drill deeper and be more pragmatic.” He added that it will be interesting to see if Parliament shows interest in the report and if the House of Commons committee on government operations invites the Clerk to speak about it.

“This looks like a picture of how the public service sees itself,” he said. “I don’t know exactly who they talked to but it sounds like they talked to a lot of those who were involved in diversity, equity issues. The report is a bit light on things that voters and taxpayers would probably be more interested in like money, productivity, excellence.”

Daniel Quan-Watson, a deputy minister for just under 15 years before his retirement last year, said he supports the report’s recommendation for conversations to be furthered “institution-wide” within federal government departments.

“We need to keep talking about this because things are evolving quickly and in different ways and because people have a lot of questions,” Quan-Watson said, adding that conversations will differ substantially from organization to organization. “I think that this goes a long way to making sure that they do that.”

Quan-Watson said it would have been “deeply problematic” for a tool on all values and ethics in the public service to have been developed or for any major changes to be made to the Values and Ethics Code over a few months.

“That would miss 90 per cent of the public service, I’m not sure that those changes are ones that would be that effective,” Quan-Watson said, adding that he hopes public servants feel free to raise their questions and concerns to managers and senior leadership. “I think the sensible thing to say is listen, here are the areas that we looked at, we’re getting consistent themes in this, so let’s go see what the broader public service has to say about it.”

“That takes time. It makes it stronger and it makes it incredibly more valuable when it’s done.”

Source: Deputy ministers’ report on values and ethics in public service lacks ‘a point of view,’ says expert

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When ‘conservatives pounce’: The right finds its cautionary tale of subtle media bias

2024/01/13 Leave a comment

Always find MacDougall’s comments reasonable and balanced:

“I can think of no reporters I’ve ever dealt with who had it out for a party or a worldview. Most were trying to do the job in the fairest way possible,” said Andrew MacDougall, who was director of communications for former prime minister Stephen Harper and is now a director at Trafalgar Strategy.

“But like all biases, you’re not really aware of them until somebody points them out. If you’re university-educated and urban-living, you tend to have a worldview that is different from somebody who isn’t — and it takes a lot of effort to open your eyes up,” said MacDougall….

While MacDougall agrees that conservatives generally have to work harder to get a fair shake from the media, he also warned people on the right not to get too caught up in playing the victim. He pointed to the current controversy around Prime Minister Justin Trudeau’s recent free luxury holiday in Jamaica as proof that, above all, the media craves juicy stories.

And when conservatives govern, he said, there are times when the negative reporting targeting them is just proper reporting.

“The hardest thing in government to do is to distinguish between the fact that you’re getting heat for being in government versus for being the party that you are in government,” he said.

Source: When ‘conservatives pounce’: The right finds its cautionary tale of subtle media bias

Filed under Politics Tagged with ,

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