Frances Russel, Lawrence Martin, Linda McQuaig & Conspiracy Theories as Journalism

"FOX North" conspiracy theory jumps the shark

With SUN Media's new television network applying for a category one broadcasting license from the CRTC -- which would require cable and satellite services to offer it -- the far left's compunction for conspiracy theorizing has officially jumped the shark.

Writing for Rabble.ca, Frances Russell is alluding to an article by Lawrence Martin, wherein he himself alludes to anonymous "insiders" who infer that Prime Minister set to, at his earliest opportunity, appoint a CRTC chair and vice-chair who would be in favour of the network.

Martin goes on to suggest that Kory Teneckye, Harper's former communications director, has been molding what individuals like Martin already argued was a conservative-biased newspaper chain into a conservative-biased newspaper chain.

His evidence is the firing of Greg Weston, whom Martin suggest was fired as retaliation for breaking the G20 "fake lake" non-story. (The "fake lake" which was, for the record, a hit with international media. The Canadian government showcasing Canadian media technology to the global media -- what an outrage!)

Martin deliberately overlooks the detail that various news outlets have been tightening their belts in the current economic climate. (Perhaps if Weston spent less time chasing non-stories and more time chasing real stories, he may have escaped the axe.)

The irony is so deep it could be grilled medium rare and then eaten with a knife and fork: Lawrence Martin, the long-time Liberal party shill, declaring Sun Media to be a Conservative party shill.

Perhaps the most suitable response is to admit that he may be right: after all, it's long been said that it takes one to know one.

Moving beyond Martin, it's clear that vitriol, rather than any rational objection to a conservative news network, drove Russell's pen as she wrote this column. If not, one would wonder what to make of this:

"The tone of political discourse, already shifted sharply right with the advent of Conrad Black's National Post in 1998, is about to take a quantum leap further down that road. The signs are numerous and ominous: The internet is already doused daily with the vitriol of thousands of anonymous far-right bloggers who slander and libel politicians, the media and all opponents with vile, often illiterate postings. Parliament and the country's entire political culture is being dug ever deeper into a mire of character assassination, personal insult and attack, smear campaigns, relentless and ruthless partisanship and denigration and demonization of any and all opponents."

Naturally, Russell the far-left demagogue has nothing to say about the legions of far-left bloggers who not only do precisely the same, but are often even more vicious and ruthless about it.

Russell's next exhibit is a column by none other than the Toronto Star's perpetually-reality-challenged Linda McQuaig:

"'There's been a tendency in the Canadian media to dismiss the threat of a Fox News transplant on the grounds Canadians wouldn't fall for that sort of nasty, right-wing extremism,' she writes. 'But that comforting notion may be naïve.' Most people don't have time to follow politics in detail, she continues. 'If they hear constant sound bites suggesting global warming is a hoax or public health care just doesn't work, after a while the message starts to seem believable.'

She points out the media already blasts Canadians with a steady chorus of right-wing ideas. 'A Fox-style network here -- if Harper gets his way -- would turn that into a deafening cacophony.'"

Of course, McQuaig doesn't elaborate on this particular claim. Would it be the CBC "blasting" Canadians with "right-wing ideas"? The same CBC whose executives overwhelmingly donate to the Liberal Party?

Of course not. This is simply another case of McQuaig refusing -- simply refusing -- to familiarize herself with reality.

It's hardly surprising that for all the objection to SUN Media starting a TV news network, there isn't one rational, factual or even coherent argument among them. The worst-kept secret regarding media bias is that everyone is in favour of media bias: they simply prefer that the media would share their bias.

Underlying this controversy is the fact that Canada's left seems to want the CRTC to, for no rational or logical reason, enforce the maintenance of the the dominant bias they prefer -- and they're peddling some rather bizarre conspiracy theories in order to justify it.