Roundup: An own-goal that makes it worse for everyone

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It was an own-goal for the media today as CTV was found to have spliced a Poilievre quote in a news story and was forced to apologise for it. Of course, this had every single Conservative salivating and insisting that this was “proof” of “fake news” and that media were trying to be unfair to Poilievre, and that this was in service of their government funding (which television outlets like CTV don’t get), and other ridiculous accusations of bias. Because that’s where we are now.

While I don’t personally know what happened, what is likely to have happened was you had someone trying to fit the story into their both-sides narrative frame and needed a short quote, and took the long paragraph from Poilievre and extracted words to come up with what they were looking for to fit the piece. It’s bad practice, but it’s almost certainly not done with malevolent intention, but because they’re overworked, under-resourced, and lacking proper editorial supervision, as with nearly every outlet these days. Because that’s where every media outlet is at, and it’s not sustainable, and things are going to continue to deteriorate if we try to keep doing what we’re doing.

This being said, the Conservatives’ war against the media is only going to get worse, and this incident, plus others, shows that they have a vested interest in catching out every single mistake from media, or to invent problems where they didn’t actually exist. For example, Poilievre likes to go on about the three corrections that The Canadian Press made to a story about his remarks, but the “corrections” were because the writer had spelled out what Poilievre was only referring to obliquely (quite deliberately) and Poilievre complained that he didn’t say what the story says he did, even though he actually did if you thought about it for more than five seconds. But this is the kind of petty, bad-faith bullshit that they’re going to engage in, and most of our media outlets are unprepared to deal with it. Legacy media is in serious trouble in this country, and it’s only going to get worse as this campaign against them from Poilievre intensifies.

Ukraine Dispatch

Russian forces made a new series of strikes on Zaporizhzhia, killing one. At the Permanent Court of Arbitration in the Hague, Ukraine is accusing Russia of trying to illegally seize control of the Sea of Azov and the Kerch Strait. President Zelenskyy is in the US, not only to attend the UN, but to discuss his “victory plan” with the American government.

Good reads:

  • At the UN, Justin Trudeau had a meeting with Haiti’s interim prime minister while he made a call for more humanitarian assistance.
  • The Royal Canadian Navy is projecting that the new submarines won’t come online until 2037 (and that may yet be a generous estimate).
  • CBC got an interview with Michael Kovrig about his time in Chinese detention.
  • Speaker Fergus ruled that Jenny Kwan’s attempt to force a privilege debate on the names in the NSICOP report didn’t meet the threshold.
  • The NDP spent their day trying to push the government on recognizing Palestinian statehood, as the government says that now is not the right time.
  • Former PC members of the New Brunswick government are “sitting out” the election because Higgs has taken the party to the far right. (Don’t sit, organize!)
  • The Quebec government has now formally clarified that yes, anglophones in the province can access health service in English.
  • In BC, John Rustad has gone full anti-vax and wants to fire the provincial chief health officer (but hey centre-right voters, don’t worry that he’s not looney tunes).
  • Wesley Wark pushes back against the Globe and Mail editorial demanding the PM name the “witting” accomplices of foreign interference in the House.
  • Rob Shaw details how the BC Conservatives are essentially acting like a Poilievre cover band, which is providing a trial run to Poilievre ahead of the next election.

Odds and ends:

For National Magazine, I look at the implications of a Federal Court of Appeal decision on Facebook breaching privacy obligations.

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