CBCGate: Name That Journo
I realize that an internal investigation is under way, but why is the CBC so reluctant to even name the journalist under investigation? Why the suspense? Doesn’t refusing to name someone leave at least the impression that the CBC is protecting its own?
The CBC is a publicly-funded organization. The public has a right to know if one its journalists is under investigation for improper practices.
35 Comments:
The CBC has got " too long in the tooth" Politically too one sided.
Perhaps time to privatize.
CBC or Communist Broadcasting Corporation should be privatized and not too soon for me. The whole corp. is extreme left and very bias when it comes to any Tory governments.
The fact that the public broadcaster, CBC has admitted that its journalists were involved in planting questions under parliamentary privilege is outrageous. That they were doing so by colluding with the Liberal party is even worse.
At least they have admitted that the allegations made by Jean Lappierre and supported by Liberal researcher Jay Ephard on Mike Duffy Live are true and are investigating. The Liberal party has now provided 4 different explanations and are looking for cover.
When is the Liberal party going to fess up to their role and tell us exactly how long they have been colluding with the CBC? That's what we really need to know.
Dean Del Mastro
M.P. - Peterborough
It's Krista Erikson. The questions regarded lobbying for wireless spectrum.
Your graphic could make a small fortune if arranged in a circle , and accompanied with darts ..
I'm thinking this has something to do with the Friendly Giant Fiasco.
Wow! Dean Del Mastro commenting on your blog, Aaron. I'm impressed!
When is the Liberal party going to fess up to their role and tell us exactly how long they have been colluding with the CBC?
That is an excellent question.
Give Democracy a chance! Hold the CBC accountable!!!We want value for our tax dollars.
Talk about 'much ado about nothing'!
Typical right wing outrage over fly shit in their pepper. Only took a few minutes before the extremists turned up here demanding that the "Communist Broadcasting Corporation should be privatized ..."
Yawn .....
The CBC is investigating this incident, and if so, we have the right to know which reporter is under investigation. Also, I would like to know how we can find out how much of our money has been spent by the CBC to investigate and try and trash Mr. Mulroney. If we have a publically owned media supporting one party in Canada, we must do whatever we can to have this stopped. They want the Government to fix everything else, it is time the CBC is accountable to someone besides the liberal party... I honestly have watched the tapes of that ethical committee over and over, and I think all the liberals on that panel were involved.... especially the Chair, he knew that line of questions were coming and he was prepared very quickly to rule on the matter...
Talk about 'much ado about nothing'!
Typical right wing outrage over fly shit in their pepper. Only took a few minutes before the extremists turned up here demanding that the "Communist Broadcasting Corporation should be privatized ..."
Yawn .....
Whenever you see the yawn or zzzzzzzz in a comment from the left, you know the translation is, stop looking into this. Even better when they say, Right wing bloggers are whining about..... Again, just signs that you need to dig even deeper into the matter.
==
For years now the CBC has been an LPC public-relations war room paid for by billions in taxpayers' money.
Biased coverage is one thing, but if a CBC reporter has in any way colluded with the Liberals to plant, in a HOC committee, partisan cheapshots which the CBC then "reported" on, this is a scandal of historic proportions, and very bad news for both the CBC and the Liberals.
Any news organization that would collude with a political party -- in this case, the party of the entrenched bureaucracy -- to manipulate parliamentary business should be dismantled.
BTW, no one who has watched her in action would be surprised if the reporter in question is in fact Krista Erickson. My first guess would have been Paul Hunter...
Sounds like the Conservatives are mounting a strong offensive as a defense. In other words, spin.
Were the questions legitimate? Who else would have asked them?
We have a right to know the answers to all the questions and I don't imagine the Conservatives would freely volunteer any information to create those questions. Ergo, a good journalist will get the information where he/she can.
As for broadcasters with they're own agenda, did anyone watch Global throughout the election process and lately? Pretty conservative if you ask me, but I don't hear any complaints about it.
Frankly, I don't care who dropped the ball here, Liberal or Conservative, I just want my $2.1 mil back!
Collusion by Canadian companies is illegal, collusion by the CBC and the Liberals should also be illegal.
What bothers me most, is that the CBC reporter intruded into a parliamentary committee, where Mulroney had sworn to tell the truth, so he could NOT avoid Pablo's questions. That reporter wanted a story at all costs, even if it meant distorting our democratic process.
I was most struck by the attempt by Mulroney to read into the proceedings, the guidelines he had been called to appear under, the Chair shouted him down, and would not let him continue. Yet Schreiber was allowed to ramble on, and on, and on. A clear bias, a clear setup by CBC and the Liberals.
As for broadcasters with they're own agenda, did anyone watch Global throughout the election process and lately? Pretty conservative if you ask me, but I don't hear any complaints about it.
Why does the difference between one news source being funded by taxpayers and all the others that are not have to be explained over and over and over again to those on the left?
Now it looks like Mulroney was right when he said what he did about the liberal and journalistic personal vendetta against him. You want your 2 million back Biddy? Good luck with that; what is Mulroney going to win in a lawsuit this time around? Thank you Liberals, you bloody idiots. You can't even be an effective Opposition and you think you are an alternative Government? I'm so looking forward to the coming Tory majority.
Dean Del Mastro commented!!!!
Wow, I've got a boner!!!!
Were the questions legitimate? Who else would have asked them?
In a different forum, for example in the House, the questions were perfectly legitimate. In fact, I think they were already asked. Were they relevant to issued being discussed before Mulroney? In my opinion no. The chair ruled that it went to Mulroney's character.
So the question is, do you agree with the chair's ruling.
Dean - your attempt to divert attention from the other important issues isn't working for me or for many others.
Even you article in the local newspaper is a joke.
Silly, you think that partisan negatives is a way to be a good MP - uh, huh. It's not.
Now, Dean, really, try to look like an intelligent MP instead of being Harper's brown noser.
Dean Del Mastro - please enlighten us all...
Why is it that it just happened to be Jean Lapierre who works for TVA which is owned by Quebecor - on the board of directors - Brian Mulroney?
Just asking if this was a scandal set up by the CPC????
We know here in Canada IS IT SUPPOSED TO BE "innocent until proven guilty" -remember?
Ruralsandi says" We know here in Canada IS IT SUPPOSED TO BE "innocent until proven guilty" -remember?"
Her other comments regarding Jean Lapierre indicate to me that her earlier statement should have continued "except for Brian Mulroney"
I have little use for Mulroney, but have to agree that there is a leftwing conspiracy against him.
What make anyone think it was a reporter from the Ceeb that was feeding the script to the Liberals?
Why not the management of the Ceeb?
Although there is little doubt of the mutually parasitic relationship between lefty media tools and the Liberal Party you could also look at who the players are in the bandwidth lottery.
Which Liberal loving business mogul owns and operates wireless communications and broadcasting enterprises and does not want to see the CRTC open space for upstarts?
Maybe I'm missing something here, but I don't see why there's any investigation at all. Saying "Hey, can you ask this question?" to an MP is not corruption unless you're offering incentives, which it doesn't seem that Reporter X has done. If the MP thinks it's a question worth asking, I see no problems, generally speaking. Obviously, feeling the need to investigate a journalist and keep the process secret is shady, and probably wrong, but I'm not sure there's any real problems here worthy of investigation in the first place.
Alex,
I think on the face of it, you have a point: why should we care if media organizations are biased? They’re allowed to be. Some people might even prefer it. And if The Toronto Star wants to call up the Liberal Party and say “hey guys, here’s something that might be useful to you”or “here’s some advice on what you might want to hit the government with”, that’s their own prerogative. So long as they don’t pretend they aren’t doing it if they’re found out, of course. And so long as they’re prepared to suffer the marketplace consequences of abandoning their journalistic integrity.
The reason it’s different with the CBC is because it’s publicly funded. Because of this, they are supposed to be above improprieties, because they are also above market demands. If CTV did something like this and it was enough of an outrage, CTV would, at least in theory, end up paying for it by losing ground to its more-objective competitors. But the CBC doesn’t need to worry about being self-sustaining. They get money right from the pockets of me and you. And that is the problem with this alleged behaviour.
Sheck out the Frank site, Secret Diary of Stephen Harper for stuff on the CBC:
http://fakestephenharper.blogspot.com/
Lyndon MacIntyre of the CBC and Stevie Cameron both have an awful lot to lose if Mulroney isn't found guilty of anything other than poor judgement.
The Pablo Rodriguez prompter had to have been from an English language media, probably Rodriguez didn't have time to put it into French, his first language. Most people in Quebec noticed how unusual it was for him to question a fluent French speaker such as Mulroney in English.
The CBC has been playing this dangerous game for years. It's almost painful to think that CBC receives billions in tax dollars each year.
What I would like to know is, how long does the CBC think it has for this internal-wait-and-cover-up?
I'm also very interested to know why the CBC, our tax hungry piggy who is supposed to be reporting on Canadian events, failed to report on this massive story? After all, when a group of partisan liberals get together and drag the integrity of our parliament through the mud -- I consider that news.
Yet CBC has no coverage...
We need more than just and internal investigation. CBC is a public institution, paid for by public funds, MY TAX DOLLARS, and I want to know what happened, the only way to get to the bottom of this is a full fledged public enquiry. We need to know:
- What exact questions did Krista write for the Liberals?
- What did Krista promise to the liberals in exchange for asking those questions ie. favourable reporting on their leader ?
- Which MP and staffers did she deal with ?
- Who else at CBC knew?
- If someone else in authority know, where her actions questioned?
- How does this affect the supposedly unbiased nature of a respected tax payer funded institution?
- Was this a 1 time event or is there a bigger hidden agenda, are there other actions taken by CBC that could be demed as unethical thowards Mr. Mulroney?
- Are there other instances of collusion between the Liberal Party and CBC?
- and the list goes on.
We live in a society where we expect private or publicly traded company boards and executives, public officials and even sports stars (as seen in the US last week) to move about their business with a high level of transparency, ethical behaviour and good governance. We should expect no less from the CBC. The CBC should at least pro-actively make public all relevent documents and communications regarding this situation including all e-mails, notes, memos, letters, etc... Now I am a realistic individual and would tend to believe that all that information was ''Conrad Blacked'' or ''Enroned'' into oblivion. So that the trail will start and end with Krista, who will simply be promoted away from the Hill beat for sone time... Thus goes the double standard of the media!
The CBC consipiring against Brian Mulroney? You don't say.
That wouldn't be the same CBC whose first order of business was to shut down the TV station in Baie Comeau when the Mulroney government reduced its funding? Nah. The CBC is an organization of unimpeachable journalistic integrity.
"Just asking if this was a scandal set up by the CPC????"
Yep. The CPC brass subliminally made the CBC reporter call the Liberals, and then somehow got inside Pablo Rodriguez head(probably not too hard as its empty), and made him write down the question. They then secretly had Paul Szabo hypnotized so that when he heard the word Quebecor at the ethics committee he would be programmed to automatically allow the question.
Sounds pretty stupid eh? So does your original statement.
Here's the response that I got from the CBC Ombudsman.
Dear Pat Patrick:
I write to acknowledge receipt of your e-mail, which I have shared with John Cruickshank, Publisher of CBC News, along with the request that your concerns about the questions be addressed. I have also shared it with senior programmers in Arts and Entertainment Programming.
Yours truly,
Vince Carlin
CBC Ombudsman
15/12/07 1:40:28 AM
Hi Vince,
What is happening to CBC? Pumping questions of a hostile nature through Liberal MP's? The bias is well known but I think that this time it has crossed the threshold of good management.
Time to take a steam cleaner to CBC. And while you're at it, get rid of Little Mosque on the Prairie, here's why..not my words but good ones.
"Sixteen-year-old Aqsa Parvez did not want to wear the hijab.
The Middle Eastern head covering has become the most significant icon for Islam in the West, which is unfortunate, since 90 per cent of Muslim women in this country don't wear one. By extension, they get dismissed as not being authentic Muslims.
The CBC's own Little Mosque on the Prairie plays into this stereotype by showing every prominent Muslim woman in a hijab. This superficial measurement of Muslim-ness has become so prevalent that a small but increasing number of families are pushing it on their daughters."
What are you guys doing? Arrogance coupled with an overwhelming sense of self importance render the decision to impose the CBC ideology on Canada .
Motives:
All this stems from Liberals lusting to revive a 15 year old investigation on the word of a known perjurer and weapons dealer.
The Liberal party forces this issue in the hope of gaining public support.
They can not lose. First they gain points on just re-raising the question.
Secondly, if Mulroney sues for Million$ a second time, we pay the penalty, not the Liberal party.
The CPC can not stop the sillyness without it appearing as cover up.
Collusion between the CBC and Liberals only worsens an already disgusting distraction from the real business of Canada.
If the ethics committee can find nothing concrete in Schreiber's 3,500 papers then he should be released to German authorities.
More questions are a total farce because Schreiber's mouth has been proven unreliable. = TG
Left dog said
"...Talk about 'much ado about nothing'!
Typical right wing outrage over fly shit in their pepper. Only took a few minutes before the extremists turned up here demanding that the "Communist Broadcasting Corporation should be privatized ..."
Yawn .....
Typical bone head left wing answer. It is precisely for this reason that CBC should be privatized. At least that way, tax payer dollars are not funding this facade of objectivity. This organization wouldn't last a month in the real market place. Yawn indeed.
ALW:
I guess that depends on why they were asking the question. If it was being asked so that the CBC could get a few partisan shots in against Mulroney, then your point is valid - we shouldn't be using government funds to sponsor partisan politics. If, on the other hand, it was asked because the reporter thought it was a good question from a news perspective, and one that would give a better story, then it seems reasonable to allow it. Of course, the line between a question attacking for a sound bite vs a question attacking to attack is almost as clear as mud, but in principle it's possible for a publicly-employed reporter to slip nasty questions to a partisan MP without actually violating journalistic ethics or their responsibility to the public dollars they're paid in.
Of course, I'm of the opinion that this is just another reason we should look at ditching the CBC entirely - ethical questions of this nature are both unnecessary and nigh-impossible to unravel - but maybe that's just my (privately funded) biases showing through.
i wonder how Lee Richardson felt about Dean Del Mastro's comment?
I wonder if the CBC gave under-cover impetus to the HRC to
attack Ezra Levant for publishing political cartoons on behalf of these sweet and gentle folks.
http://BendGovt.blog.ca
CBC helps first make it happen and THEN reports on the news.
http://theCanadianSentinel.blogspot.com
= TG
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