Roundup: A debasing “debate” on inflation

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Because sometimes this is a media criticism blog, I find myself outraged at the hack job that Power & Politics has been doing on this bullshit story about inflation, and it’s turned to being completely irresponsible. Yesterday was a perfect example of how shows like this are more interested in horserace bullshit than they are in economics, and lo, for an MP panel, the host wanted each party to give a single example of how their party would tackle inflation, even if it’s a complex issue, and lo, each MP gave a pitch to their party’s platform. Nothing about monetary policy and the Bank of Canada and its mandate – nothing. Just parties serving up their talking points to one another. So enlightening! Later, during the “Power Panel,” said host kept saying “we’re not going to talk about monetary policy” when talking about inflation, and that makes about as much sense as talking about climate change while declaring you’re not going to talk about GHG emissions. It’s kind of central to the point.

More to the point, the show – and several other outlets – used a truncated quote from Justin Trudeau to frame his response in a misleading way. To wit, the question he was asked by Bloomberg:

 You mentioned the Bank of Canada’s mandate, that mandate is expiring at the end of this year. If re-elected, the review, or the extension of the mandate is probably the first big economic policy decision you will make after the election. There is some talk of allowing the Bank of Canada to make some tweaks to its mandate to give it the flexibility to tolerate higher inflation and help the economy a little bit more at this difficult time. Do you have a position on the mandate? Would you support a slightly higher tolerance for inflation?

And Trudeau’s answer:

I don’t know. When I think about the biggest, most important economic policy that this government, if re-elected, would move forward, you’ll forgive me if I don’t think about monetary policy. You’ll understand that I think about families. When we first got elected in 2015, the very first thing we did was raise taxes on the wealthiest one per cent so we could lower them for the middle class. Similarly, if re-elected, the Liberal government will continue to invest in supports for families, for students, for seniors. Investing in housing, because we know that it is not right that so many people right here in the Lower Mainland and indeed across the country can’t afford their first home. We know that these are the policies that make a difference in the growth of our country, in the jobs people get, and the opportunities people have to grow and prosper. That is what we will stay focused on.

The clear implication is that he’s not focused on the Bank of Canada’s mandate, but on his own affordability agenda. But all anyone picked up on was “I don’t think about monetary policy,” and turning that into him being flip, and the host of P&P went so far as to compare it to Trudeau saying that budgets balance themselves – itself a truncated quote, where the original line, when asked about a commitment to balancing the budget, was: “The commitment needs to be a commitment to grow the economy and the budget will balance itself.” Which is true. Erin O’Toole is making the same pledge in his platform.

While I yelled at the TV over Twitter, my reply column filled up with assertions that the show was in the tank for the Conservatives, or that they were out to get Trudeau, but that’s not really the case. They’re not really in the tank for anyone – they want to get clips that will generate headlines and simplistic narratives, and that’s why they ask inflammatory questions designed to give explosive answers, and why they truncate quotes to be as sensational as possible. Part of this is the current host’s fault – she’s a reporter who is geared toward getting a “gold quote” out of people rather than a nuanced understanding of the situation. A bigger problem is the people who produce the show, who are more concerned with partisan talking heads giving simplistic and facile responses than actually understanding what is going on, and they’ve chosen the laziest, least-effort format to fill air time and generate some kind of spark of interest, which is usually partisans sniping at one another. Yes, it’s a big problem for our civic literacy, and it hurts our media literacy as well. Nobody was served by the “debate” on inflation, particularly as there was no context to what it was about, or what monetary policy means, and all it did was make everyone dumber. This kind of “journalism” has become a scourge.

On the campaign trail:

  • Justin Trudeau made some specific pledges around long-term care, which is provincial jurisdiction and requires premiers to cooperate.
  • Trudeau also vowed (again) to make banning conversion therapy a priority, and attacked Erin O’Toole’s pledge for “conscience rights” as anti-choice and anti-LGBT.
  • Erin O’Toole reiterated his pledges around housing, saying he won’t tax sale of primary residence – which they don’t now.
  • O’Toole also pledged to support the queer community on the issue of decriminalising poppers, and I can’t even.
  • Jagmeet Singh promised new funds to train nurses (also provincial jurisdiction) and took swipes at Jason Kenney.
  • Justin Ling attempts to find what lessons the parties have learned about our experience in Afghanistan, and the consensus is surprising (but not really).
  • Kevin Carmichael correctly notes that we should be talking about monetary policy.
  • Lindsay Tedds explains in this thread the problems with the Conservatives’ plan to convert child care funding to refundable tax credits.
  • Susan Delacourt suggests that the Nova Scotia loss for the provincial Liberals could help shake the federal Liberals out of any complacency they may feel.

Good reads:

  • More reports of confusion around the Afghan resettlement programme, as the government admits they likely won’t be able to rescue all 6,000 on their rescue list.
  • Derek Sloan has decided to run as an independent in Banff–Airdrie rather than start he own party and run again in his current seat.
  • The Green Party has elected new members to its federal council, which could mean a reprieve for Annamie Paul’s besieged leadership.
  • Doug Ford kicked one MPP out of caucus for refusing vaccination, while ordering provincial civil servants to get vaccinated or face regular testing.

Odds and ends:

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