The Reminder is making its archives back to 2003 available on our website. Please note that, due to technical limitations, archive articles are presented without the usual formatting.
Managing the news A wise man once said something like, "Believe nothing of what you hear, little of what you read and half of what you see, and you will be close to the truth". It is true that a lot of news articles show bias or are slanted towards the opinion of the writer, publisher or owner. There are plenty of examples. When the Asper empire took over a chain of Canadian newspapers they insisted on approving most editorials and even fired an Ottawa editor for demanding their friend Chretien's resignation. Governments regularly send out pro-government articles on an endless stream of topics, which are disguised as news stories and which they hope newspapers will print as is. In mid-February an article on the short March session of the Manitoba Legislature appeared in the Free Press, saying that the MLAs would meet to deal with water legislation and to ban smoking, etc. On the same page, complete with picture but without the author's name, a story was printed entitled "Disgraced Tory to run North Dakota hotel project". It referred to businessman Taras Sokolyk, Gary Filmon's former chief of staff as a "disgraced Tory strategist" who will be managing a Canada Inn entertainment complex soon to be built in Grand Forks. The article then rehashed Sokolyk's "crime" in supposed vote-rigging, then mentioned Tory leader Stuart Murray who was criticized (mainly by the Free Press) for hiring Taras as an election worker. See 'Manitoba' P.# Con't from P.# It also claimed "The vote-casting scandal continues to cast a shadow over Manitoba's electoral politics." The biased diatribe blatantly attempts to continue the long-forgotten incident, cast aspersions on Stuart Murray and the PC's and to denigrate Mr. Sokolyk whose new position has nothing whatsoever to do with Manitoba politics, any more than Stuart Murray, who had nothing to do with the 1995 election incident. One would expect this in a commentary as such writers deal with items from a point of viewÐright, left, etc. Unsigned it is a biased point of view designed as a news story, certainly not uncommon in today's media. On March 2, the lead story in The Reminder entitled "Big items on Legislature agenda" factually presented what was supposed to happen in the 10 day session of Manitoba's 38th Legislature. However, any political insider knows that the tone and substance of all sessions are dictated by the opposition, hence attacks on the NDP's non-balanced budget, the health care system, and even the NDP's forgotten promise from 1999 to give workers six days of unpaid leave to deal with family emergencies occurred daily. As for the promise, the new labour minister said she didn't know when or if it would happen. At the time it created an uproar from small businesses opposed to he idea. Best bet is it won't happen. By the way, the water legislation discussion was to forbid any non-union workers from working on the floodway, causing the opposition to charge that it will increase the costs by $65 million. Sitting governments generally dislike sessions of the legislature (Manitoba's only sat for 37 days in all of 2003) except after winning an election in which they humbled their opponents. Even then, opposition MLA's do everything they can to exploit the foibles of the ministers and present alternative ideas. Returning to news stories, one out of Toronto featured federal NDP leader Jack Layton who is predicting historic gains for the NDP. Layton, who never tried to win a seat in Parliament, said, "We stand on the edge of some historic gains" and brushed off polls showing only 15% will vote New Democrat. They currently are fourth with 14 seats and have never held more than 44. What Layton can best hope for is a Liberal minority government with the NDP holding the balance of power. Canadian news reports, however biased, are small potatoes compared to the large U.S. papers especially in an election year. For example, a front page January article in the liberal-democratic St Pete's Times dealt with two young men who in July of 2002 burned down a boat yard building in Maine destroying several boats including one belonging to former President George Bush Sr. The youngsters were tracked down by the secret service, jailed and sentenced in federal Ð not juvenile Ð court. The article downplays the $800,000 in damages and plays up the youth's age, their prison sentences in Federal court, and blatantly accuses the ex-president of influencing the court, quoting their parents and lawyers who have appealed the youngest one's 30 month sentence. The fact is there is no evidence or reports at all that Mr. Bush said or did anything in regard to the loss of his boat. This was ignored by the writer who found plenty of professors who voiced similar suspicions. Even wilder "news reports" will multiply as the presidential election approaches.
