A thought on the now-only-referred-to-as-secret -using-finger-quotes memorandum on food safety
By kadyomalley - Friday, August 22, 2008 - 0 Comments
Is the Globe and Mail - or, for that matter, CanWest News – under any legal* obligation that would prevent it from posting the full CFIA document online?
Let’s assume, for the purposes of this discussion, that the government considers this particular document – the letter, and the list of proposals for budget cuts at the Canadian Food Inspection Agency – to be a cabinet confidence, despite the fact that there is no way of knowing whether it actually went to cabinet. Even if it did, documents that would otherwise be made public but are attached to a cabinet confidence are still public; the only thing that needs to be kept secret is the fact that it was part of a submission to cabinet.
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Megapundit: Young, broke and Liberal
By selley - Thursday, August 7, 2008 at 2:04 PM - 0 Comments
Must-reads: Don MacPherson on the magic of legislation.
Media matters…
National Post attacked fromMust-reads: Don MacPherson on the magic of legislation.
Media matters
National Post attacked from the left! CBC attacked from the right! All is well at The Globe and Mail!If the Post were to fall into liberal (or Liberal) hands, the Globe‘s Lawrence Martin says “it would be like the Liberals losing the Toronto Star.” No more daily bashing of Stéphane Dion; no more giving “the Harper government the benefit of the doubt on every issue imaginable”; no more gross caricaturization of other newspapers’ editorial positions… oh, wait, that’s Lawrence Martin. In any case, we’re not totally clear on why Jerry Grafstein (or anyone else) would necessarily turn the paper hard to the left just on principle, if there was a business case to stay in bluer territory. The current owners aren’t exactly right-wing ghouls, after all—heck, as recently as 2005, David Asper himself gave $5,000 to the Liberals!
The Toronto Sun‘s Peter Worthington isn’t surprised to learn CBC employees are profoundly unhappy with their jobs, because unlike private sector media, there’s no “accountability” to the viewers, listeners and readers, and no chance to really make a splash. “The Mother Corp. knows best,” he sneers. “It forcefeeds listeners and viewers with what it thinks they deserve. If the public doesn’t like it, let them write letters or phone Rex Murphy on CBC Radio Sunday afternoons.”
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Even more on the National Post!
By Paul Wells - Thursday, August 7, 2008 at 1:15 PM - 0 Comments
Lawrence Martin ponders the implications.
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Nine candles and ten months
By Paul Wells - Sunday, August 3, 2008 at 11:56 PM - 0 Comments
This excellent article in the Globe and Mail, bearing the fingerprints of no fewer than five reporters, details CanWest’s difficulties and suggests two possible solutions: the Aspers, and apparently Leonard more than the others, might take the company private; and the company might cut the National Post loose. Senator Jerry Grafstein is listed as a possible buyer.
This news has already inspired the usual snickering from the usual suspects. It’s unfortunate that, along with the rest of their yeoman labour on this CanWest story, the Globe‘s armies weren’t also able to do what Richard Pérez-Peña, a very fine New York Times reporter working these days on the media beat, was able to do singlehandedly: put the troubles of one media corporation into a little perspective. A lot of media companies are in profound trouble — Pérez-Peña cites several cases of market capitalization falling by more than 90% in a year and a half. So several of the English-speaking world’s most venerable news outlets could be bought for a song tomorrow, if only any buyer could believe they won’t simply decline in value still further. Continue…
