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I took a break from the news

I was on holiday for three weeks in February and March. At home I have a routine of watching, listening to and reading the news, but when I’m on holiday (especially out of the province and country) that obviously goes out the window. The only item of international news that really came to my attention during that trip was the despicable way in which the leader of a country at war (and who had been invaded by a hostile foreign force, to be clear on how the war started) was treated by the leader of a country that isn’t, but was supposed to be an ally against a common foe, America’s traditional enemy of Russia. Those countries are Ukraine and the United States respectively, and Volodymyr Zelenskyy and donald trump respectively. It blew my mind. Shortly afterwards I was sent the following — obviously (and sadly) — doctored video of the meeting.

I say “sadly” because the dickhead trump deserves someone standing up to him forcefully like that, but I appreciate the situation Zelenskyy is in. I don’t envy him.

But besides that one issue, I had a great, relaxing holiday, with family (including new family) and friends, apart from the eerie feeling that I was missing something.

And I’m back, which means I’m back to blogging, after taking a break for several weeks after returning — apart from the emergency post I had to do a few days ago about how democracy was cast aside in Canada by the Leaders’ Debates Commission. I have a backlog of things about which to pontificate, so here we go.

How should I vote in the Canadian election?

After swearing that he was the guy to take on the Conservatives and Pierre Poilievre in the next election, Justin Trudeau finally read the writing on the wall and quit as leader of the Liberal Party. Until then I had predicted that the Tories would wipe the floor with the Liberals and win a majority government. In fact, I also predicted that the Liberals would be reduced to rump-party status. That was as obvious as the nose on my face, as anyone who has watched Canadian federal elections would note, so I’m not suggesting that I’m particularly astute. Trudeau, with all of his learning at the knee of his father, was unbelievably short-sighted to have ignored said writing on the wall but, even more importantly, he was derelict in not seeing the writing on the southern wall, that being that donald trump would be (and then was in November 2024) elected president of the United States and that we’d be in a trade war on day one! I mean, yes, how could any reasonable person have predicted the extent of it — especially considering we were and currently are in a free-trade agreement with the United States! — but with such a controversial president on the doorstep of the White House, we all knew well in advance of 20 January 2025 that Canada needed a new government with a new prime minister to take on the incoming bellicose American government, and Trudeau let down the country by not stepping aside weeks or months earlier.

And thanks to the fact that the new Liberal Party leader is a serious person — the former head of the banks of Canada and England, as opposed to a former drama teacher who always seemed as if he was competing in a speech-giving contest — the fortunes of the Liberal Party have done a U-turn! If they hold out until the election at the end of this month, that will be good for Canada. I don’t know how anyone can take seriously a career politician who sounds like donald trump’s clone — and I’m not just taking that opinion from the Liberal Party election advertising, I’m taking it from how Poilievre has always been known as the Conservative Party’s “pit bull” in the House of Commons — or who won’t take questions from anybody but hand-picked journalists who are fed questions by his handlers. (Have you seen how Poilievre so rudely handles journalists that step out of line and out of his cage?!) Canada would be in a world of hurt if he becomes prime minister.

And about his “pen” of hand-picked journalists at his press conferences, announcements, rallies, etc. We’ve seen at least one try to push the boundaries of their limits, and he branded her a “protestor”! There was anther time when journalists tried to shout out follow-up questions, and they were drowned out by their handlers who erupted into applause specifically to drown them out! These are people employed by the media to elicit information from people who want our votes! So they are effectively telling Canadians, “We don’t want to hear any questions from you. It’s just your job to do what we, the Conservative government/party, tell you to do. Without any questions, follow-up or not.” Even if I supported any of Pierre Poilievre’s policies, that behaviour right there would make me withdraw my vote. It’s arrogance in the extreme.

But back to my heading: How should I vote? Back before I grew a brain, I voted Conservative in my first election in 1988, when Brian Mulroney continued as prime minister, and the election issue was Free Trade with the United States. But since that election my knowledge of and thinking about Canadian elections have changed significantly. Let me fast-forward to 2015, when Justin Trudeau promised that the 2015 election that he won would be the last Canadian federal election run using the first-past-the-post method; that’s the foremost issue on my mind when I vote now, in both Federal and Provincial elections. As such, I now vote for underdog parties, simply as a statement of my dissatisfaction with our current electoral system. That means that I vote for the Green Party or the NDP. I know that neither will win the election, so in the current election, we won’t have either Prime Minister Jagmeet Singh or Prime Minister Elizabeth May (or that other Green guy whose name I can’t remember). I have no idea how many people vote as I do, but pretty much every vote of mine since 1988 has been a protest vote that is slightly more acceptable than spoiling my ballot. Do I really want the NDP or the Greens to govern this country? No, probably not to be honest, but I would like to cast my vote for a winning party for a change.

But Canada is in a trade war with the United States now. Thankfully it’s not — yet! — a military war of force, aggression, destruction, violence and death, but frankly I’m not convinced it won’t turn into one, given trump’s ridiculous rhetoric about making us the 51st state, and his generals’ apparent willingness to fall into line and follow “dear leader’s” orders. I have no desire to be dominated by the USA politically or militarily any more than we already are culturally, so I want to vote for the best candidate for the job of keeping us from becoming that way, whom I consider to be Carney. It’s certainly not Poilievre and, as I said, there is no way that Singh or May are going to become prime minister, so what do I do? There’s the old adage that one should vote for the best candidate in their riding — not the prime minister, for whom we don’t get to vote directly — but I’ve always had an issue with that suggestion because it’s ignoring the bigger picture — that will have a greater effect on our lives — for local issues; an MP or MLA is not a “governor” in any way. That’s why I won’t vote Conservative, because a local MP’s job will just be to provide excuses when I write to him or her with complaints about their government’s policies I won’t like.

So it means that I will likely vote Liberal for the first time in my life. Hopefully I’ll be able to go back to my protest votes in future elections, until someone with a pair of balls — male or female! — changes the federal electoral system to some form of proportional representation. But for now, we’re at war, and I believe we need to vote for a wartime government.

Who’s right? Right? Left? trump? The world?

In the last year or so, I have been in debate with an Irish school friend of mine, and a Canadian MAGA supporter friend of mine who lives in the States. My old Irish school friend seemed to be a level-headed person; I should have seen the writing on the wall, though, as he’s a gay guy who, if half of his fellow travellers had their way, would have him strung up! How a gay guy like him can be so far right I don’t know. But, you know, there’s more to him than his sexual orientation, so I figured it would be good to compare notes on issues as and when they came up.

Sadly, the guy can’t get past the platitudes and catchy sayings of the right. He doesn’t present any thoughtful defences of his political opinions.

The last straw came for me shortly after the American election in 2024. I wrote something brief about my unhappiness with the results, and that it blew me away that North Americans (including Canadians!) consistently vote against female leaders — as opposed to places like the UK, India, Israel, etc. — who have (among others) had female heads of state, and that we (in Canada) would have to live next door to “this piece of shit for another four years.” He wrote a short reply — it is SMS (short message service) after all — that included the observation, “And a cute VP as well!” I then sent him a lengthy six messages in reply that (I felt) focused on issues, except that I ended with, “And finally, it’s sad that your biggest positive statement about trump’s win is that you have a hard-on for the VP. FFS. I can guarantee it’s not mutual!” He replied with, “Not my biggest positive statement, just a bonus 😋”.

And that has been it! I can’t debate based on that crap.

I will probably look him up next time I am in Ireland and we’ll go for a pint, but I have to say that my opinion of him has dropped significantly after that exchange, sadly. 🙁

Similarly, with my MAGA friend. This is a person who, before she left Canada, went on about how the Liberal Party, the New Democrat Party (the NDP), the Bloc QuĂ©bĂ©cois and the Green Party with their combined majority in Parliament used their power — as is defined and allowed by the Westminster System of government — to threaten to vote non-confidence in the minority Conservatives to topple the government. She described this as a “coup”, despite the fact that it was anything but considering the government was a minority government voted into power by a minority of voters! And this despite the fact that she was apparently a political science major in university! This “coup” bullshit was typical (at the time) of the crisis, peddled by both the Conservative Party and Stephen Harper (who would immediately lose power if the majority of parliament voted non-confidence in them), and the far-right minority fringe! I never called her out on this bullshit, because our friendship was worth more.

So recently I couldn’t avoid poking the sleeping bear; I had to ask her about this “51st state” crap, and about trump’s tariffs on Canada that go against the spirit, if not the letter of the free-trade agreement between Canada and the US.

This is what I asked:

I have a question for you. It’s a serious question; I’m not baiting you or anything else negative.

What do you — as a Canadian, an immigrant in the US, and someone who has made a conscious decision not to become an American — think of trump’s attacks on Canada and his wanting to make us the 51st state?!

This was her reply:

Uggg. So many ask me this. I absolutely HATE 51st State like ALL Canadians do. However, it is a fact Canada charges US exorbitant tariffs for dairy et al… See photo below. I don’t believe he wants to annex Canada, but the tariffs have to be equalized. No one publishes what Canada charges. You know I don’t want to become American. Never will. Trump has a point about Canada not paying ita [sic] fair share to Nato and the fact US defends Canada by location proxy.. [sic] I honestly don’t believe he wants to take over Canada like Hitler. I think he wants a FAIR partnership and right now it’s not fair. Love me or hate me.

So she’s against the 51st state crap; I completely disagree that he doesn’t “want to take over Canada like Hitler” (she brought up a Nazi, not me) but I know I can’t prove that. (Just before he invaded Ukraine, putin and his foreign minister went to great lengths to claim that Western conjecture that Russia was building up troops on Ukraine’s border was just that, provocative conjecture. And then he invaded.) After that she just copied and pasted a screenshot of some text message with a list of Canada’s existing tariffs on American goods and services, the first third of which are, admittedly, high because (as is not noted in the misinformation) they’re subject to supply management! As I noted in my reply, it’s no secret that trump doesn’t like supply management, but it in itself is not the issue, trump’s tariffs are the issue! So the screenshot relies on the fact that the first third of the list — five of fifteen products and services — look bad, despite the fact that their levels are due to an unrelated issue.

What followed were more copied and pasted trump talking points — most of them lies, or based on lies or his complete lack of understanding of history and economics — and links to Fox News. There wasn’t a single point made by her that actually argued a point in favour of trump’s actions that I could address. And if I did, she’d just send another trump talking point or a link to Fox News! It’s maddening, but this is the modus operandi of the right. They think it’s all “common sense”, and if you disagree you’re either a communist or you don’t have any of their vaunted “common sense”.

So, no joy there either. I’m starting to think that the people I know on the right are incapable of debate. I’ve certainly struck out on these two far-right friends. But here’s part of my point: I don’t know where, on the political spectrum, most of my friends lie, and I get along just fine with them without knowing! I believe that I can get along with anyone no matter where they are on the political spectrum, but if you want to talk politics you have to have a brain and be able to discuss the details of policies, not just repeat slogans and tell me you have a thing for one leader or another. And I don’t care if you’re left or right, but if you support a moron like trump who is single-handedly turning the world upside-down with no plan presented for his endgame — other than, laughably, to “Make America Great Again” — how can you seriously support his policies?! If you know his plan and you believe it can have whatever results he says they will achieve, then great! But please share that information with the rest of us, just not in the same manner as his blonde bimbo press secretary Karoline Leavitt who, like Sean Spicer, thinks that every question is hostile, and has to be answered as if she’s conducting an assault on enemy territory.

When I finally recognised that our “debate” — which clearly wasn’t a debate at all — was going nowhere, I suggested we end it:

I don’t see this discussion between us being resolved to the satisfaction of either of us, so I think it’s probably best we end it. As I said before, it’s not likely we’ll know the real outcome before 15 or 20 years from now.

(I had suggested earlier that it would take three or four presidential terms before we’d see whether or not trump’s actions were correct … which, I suppose, are only twelve to sixteen years, not fifteen to twenty.)

The last word from this friend, after I made numerous points and questioned the validity of trump’s actions based on his egregious lies and ignorance which she countered with trump sloganeering and links to Fox News, was, “We can agree to disagree.” Normally I would support that conclusion, but in order to “agree to disagree” both sides have to present reasoned arguments, not political slogans, lies, misinformation and disinformation. That really pissed me off, so much so that I just did not reply. If I do, the friendship will very quickly be over.

Last point on this MAGA friend: Apparently, because of her support for trump, she claims to have lost a number of friends. I don’t know if it’s two or two hundred, but the number does seem to be significant, at least in terms of percentage. One is significant in my mind, and I say that as someone who has lost a few friends and family members over the years, because of their stupidity. (And I say that based on neutral, third-party opinion, including the opinion of the court.) But if we’re both still alive in fifteen or twenty years, we’ll see who was right in 2025. The dickhead trump certainly won’t be alive in fifteen or twenty years, and hopefully the rest of the Republican Party will have grown balls by that time and come to their senses.

Travel to the United States

The last time I crossed the American border — which is only a few kilometres south of me — was on 19 January 2025, the day before trump was inaugurated for the second time. I and hundreds of thousands of Canadians won’t cross the border again until 20 January 2029 … assuming trump doesn’t break more laws and more parts of the US Constitution to give himself an unconstitutional third term. (Or does the same putin/medvedev switcheroo that they did.) I do this despite the fact that California Governor Gavin Newsom and Palm Springs Mayor Ron deHarte have begged and pleaded for Canadians to return. I can’t speak for other Canadians, but I am not forgoing travel to the United States because I am “punishing” America for trump’s tariffs, but because, as a foreigner in their country, I won’t feel safe! Even if I just cross the border for twenty minutes to top up my gas tank! I love travelling all over the world, and I’ve been to countries where I wasn’t sure I was welcome, but I’m not taking that chance in America right now. America and trump are even musing about deporting American citizens to foreign jails! If they are willing to deport citizens, why in god’s name would I take the chance of being a foreigner in their country?!

Well, I won’t. The States have already jailed an innocent Canadian while she was at a border crossing dealing with her existing work visa, so that’s all of the examples I need right there. I told my MAGA friend above when I went to visit her and her American husband over the 2024/2025 New Year, that I would not cross the border again until trump was gone. I have some business accounts down there, but I will, in due course, close them from Canada. There just isn’t a hope in hell I’ll cross that border again until Americans and their alleged commitment to democracy have secured their country from dictatorship. I also make this statement based on the number of foreigners who have tried to enter the country legally and have been barred because they expressed opinions contrary to trump, which I have done numerous times in the past on this very blog and will no doubt do numerous times in the future!

I’m sure I’m on a list somewhere; I just don’t also want to be on the six o’ clock news.

That’s enough for now. I need to post this before the election on Monday and I will need to cover my other points some other time.

Charlie Hebdo se souvenait

"Charia Hebdo" cover defaced with a "Keep Calm and Carry On" pencil.

Charia Hebdo: Keep Calm and Carry On

It’s one year on (from 7 January 2015), and I’m remembering the attack on the offices of, and the cold-blooded murder of members of the staff at, Charlie Hebdo in Paris. Also of note is the concurrent murder of the protection officers that were detailed to protect certain Charlie Hebdo staff members after a previous terror attack in 2011 and two bystanders, as well as others who were murdered — another police officer and shoppers at a grocery store in Porte de Vincennes (a suburb of Paris) — in associated attacks in the days following.

I read somewhere recently that Charlie Hebdo was on the verge of closing down when the attacks happened, and that they have experienced a renaissance since. Perhaps that is the point behind their rather graphic tank cartoon, of which I heartily approve. If you believe in a higher power — Allah, God, whatever — I would call the recovery divine intervention. Take note: Your god does not approve of you killing people, certainly not in his name, and he’s not so fucking vain and insecure as to have issues with being drawn.

Vive la presse libre!

Amateur hour hits a new low at Global News BC

I have a very different view of what “news” on television is supposed to look like than (apparently) many people, and I have criticised TV news anchors and reporters for calling their news broadcasts a “show”. I’m sorry, a “show” is something that is supposed to entertain me. I do not watch television news to be “entertained”; I watch to see who has been bombed, blasted or burgled in the last 24 hours. OK, that’s not really my motivation, but I certainly don’t watch to see dog-and-pony shows between the glorified teleprompter readers (“anchors”) and the sports and weather talking heads. I appreciate that people at the Global BC TV station like Kristi Gordon, Chris Gailus and Robin Stickley look pretty and (as far as I can tell) have senses of humour, but really? Do we really have to watch them and Squire Barnes (whom, you will notice, I did not include in the list of people who “look pretty”) tell inside jokes to one another, live on air? Give me a break.

At Global BC my heroine on the news desk is Samantha Falk. She just delivers the news … just the facts, ma’am. No emoting (just a slight lowering of tone when delivering news of a death or deaths), no hand gestures, no sad faces, no big smiles, no snide or under-the-breath-type editorial remarks after a news story. She may or may not be the most fun at a party but, as far as I’m concerned, she is the consummate professional journalist on air. Bravo to you, Samantha. Please don’t give in to anyone who might tell you that you need to project more feeling when you’re reporting. Don’t even get me started on her diametrical opposite: Randene Neill (who seems to have taken on the heart-tugging role of the now-departed Deborra Hope). How is this woman higher in the pecking order at Global than Samantha Falk? It boggles the mind.

But back to the point of this post. Anyone who watches the News Hour at 18:00 on Global BC (and probably their other news broadcasts too, considering this is their “flagship” news programme … er, “news show”) is aware of the fact that first year journalism students at BCIT could do a better job of producing the programme than the jokers at Global BC. You know, I hate to be gratuitously critical — and lord knows I am not in the business and wouldn’t do a better job myself — but come on, there are some days it’s a complete gong show. However, the gong show doesn’t usually extend to the actual journalism. I’m not saying that the journalism at Global BC is top notch, that’s for sure — the aforementioned little editorial comments by the teleprompter reader … sorry, “anchor” … at the end of a story really irk me — but on 19 January 2015 there was a particularly puzzling incident.

Watch for yourself and note the second story (which comes after the first weather interlude) which starts at 3:51. At the very end of the story, at 5:19, the reporter (John Daly) concludes his report (presumably filed sometime before the start of the broadcast) by saying that the subject of the story (a man wanted for failing to return to a Vancouver halfway house) has been arrested in Parksville. At that point I reflexively asked out loud, “So, what was the point of the big build up? In fact, was this really news if they got the guy?” I suppose I answered my own question above: this is a “show” (after all), and it’s all about the suspense, which was broken in the final seconds by revealing that this guy isn’t, at this very moment, roaming the streets of Vancouver looking for his next victim. This should have been several reports down the list on this broadcast.

But that’s not the bizarre part. About twenty minutes later the teleprompter reader (Chris Gailus) interrupts the broadcast with “breaking news”! Seems that the missing con has been located and has been arrested in Parksville! Stands back in amazement!

Now, either this is utter incompetence on the part of the journalism staff and the teleprompter reader, or it’s a blatant attempt at misleading sensationalism. Leave the sensationalism to the American news stations, Chris; they have more helicopters buzzing the city chasing every emergency vehicle than Global BC has. Oddly, that “breaking news” is not in the online version of the News Hour, but then they have managed to compress an hour of “news” into less than sixteen minutes. Imagine how much less time we could waste in front of the boob tube if they could just get it over and done with (minus the advertising and dog-and-pony nonsense) in sixteen minutes! (I usually turn it off after the first half hour anyway.)

But one more complaint about “news” that doesn’t (at this point) merit a separate post. Read my lips: Weather is not news! The fact that it rained hard, or snowed heavily, or blew strongly in some part of the world today is not news. It is if a state of emergency has been declared as a result in the area where the news is being broadcast, but if some other part of the world is having weather, it’s just not news. At the very least, please don’t lead with a weather story, for god’s sake!

This has been an editorial. It is not an attempt at journalism!

But I will admit that I find this kind of stuff highly amusing, even entertaining!:

Criticisms of the Press: Canadian Edition

We, the public, need a free and professional press. Fortunately, in Canada, the “free” part is not usually an issue. But recently the “professional” part certainly took a beating, in my opinion, certainly on the television.

First up is the rail tragedy in Lac-MĂ©gantic, Quebec. I never thought I’d say this about the Milquetoast Peter Mansbridge, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation’s chief correspondent and anchor of The National news programme, but where is the guy? In his place we’ve had Mark Kelley anchoring the “show” (as he himself called it) nightly from the dark streets of Lac-MĂ©gantic, giving us hand-wringing man-on-the-street interview after hand-wringing man-on-the-street interview with grieving survivors and residents, done by him and his team of reporters, some seemingly reeled in from other parts of the country in an attempt to leave no grieving resident unturned.

Then the hue and cry started to arise about the conspicuous absence of the chairman of The Montreal, Maine and Atlantic Railway, Inc. (owners of the runaway train), Edward Burkhardt. Mark Kelley set the tone the night before Burkhardt was scheduled to show up in Lac-MĂ©gantic, four days after the derailment, by seeming to discount anything Burkhardt might say on his arrival. And so it was that Burkhardt arrived in Lac-MĂ©gantic and promptly made a fool of himself. However, he was aided and abetted in that endeavour by so-called journalists, whose weighty questions included, “How much are you worth?” and “Did you sleep last night?” What the hell?! What the fuck does that have to do with anything?! If we’re going to hang everyone in Lac-MĂ©gantic who has slept since the disaster on 6 July, we’re going to run out of lamp posts! The press displayed a pack mentality, savaging Burkhardt in a most tawdry and unprofessional manner like sharks in a blood-fuelled frenzy.

On a side note, Edward Burkhardt really does need to fire himself as the public face of his company until he gets some professional help in handling the press. That, some help with showing a little more empathy (he has the words figured out; he needs help with the delivery) and a kick in the arse for hanging his employee and a volunteer fire department out to dry before a full investigation, will help him and his companies immensely after future accidents. But he doesn’t deserve death threats.

And another side note is this use of the term “show” to describe a news programme. As I’ve pointed out, Mark Kelley of the CBC used this term, and I’ve heard Dawna Friesen of Global News refer to her news programme as a “show” too. My Concise Oxford Dictionary defines a “show” as, among other things:

· n.
1 a spectacle or display.
2 a play or other stage performance, especially a musical. > a light entertainment programme on television or radio.

Sadly, the use of the term “show” is actually accurate these days, especially with respect to the “light entertainment” part, as I’ll demonstrate in a moment. However, it shouldn’t be. I don’t watch, listen to or read the news to be entertained. (It’s mostly about death and destruction anyway. How is that entertaining?!) I’m not interested in the weather reporter with a joke a minute, or the (not so) witty repartee between the news reader and the sports guy. Sadly, I think I’m in the minority.

The other news item that sickens me is the treatment of the death of some Hollywood actor. Umm, what’s his name again? (Do web search for “dead actor”.) Oh yeah, some guy named Cory Monteith. I guess he was on some popular TV show or another, actually, so maybe he’s not actually a “Hollywood actor”.

Any death is a tragedy for someone, usually that person’s family and friends, not to mention the deceased him- or herself. Sorry, but Cory and I didn’t know each other, therefore I am not a friend of his and I’m pretty sure he’s also not a member of my extended family. (If either were true, I wouldn’t be getting my news about him off the TV.) So, as a human being, I extend my condolences to the Monteith family and Cory’s friends. However, I’m not going to grieve for him, and the “news shows” should not expect that I will. Nor should they pander to and perpetuate the cult of celebrity worship.

But what is truly sickening to me is that Monteith’s death was the lead item, getting a full five or six minutes of coverage on the six o’ clock news on Global News on 14 July (and a similar amount of time on CBC’s national news, although at least a predicted federal cabinet shuffle got top billing), while the deaths of two nameless “nobodies” on the following two news stories were accorded thirty seconds each. Where is the sense of proportion?!

Again, I’m probably in the minority with respect to the “light entertainment” that news has become; these days, it seems, if it’s not entertaining and keeping our short attention spans occupied, it’s apparently not worth paying attention to. After all, there’s probably a competitor with a shinier, more entertaining “show” on another channel. However, I don’t think it’s too much to expect a modicum of professionalism and at least an attempt at a veneer of impartiality from journalists when it comes to thinking of questions to ask stunned officials on the scene of a deadly disaster.