The playacting around Scott Moe’s threat about not remitting the carbon levy continues to play out in the media, and once again I will point to University of Alberta’s Andrew Leach calling out the media for how they are framing this, which is poorly.
I'm ranting about this piece. https://t.co/AVTSs5L5Eb
It is not remotely controversial to state that a natural gas distributor is required to remit the carbon charge and that intentional failure to do so is illegal and opens directors and officers of SaskEnergy to penalties.
— Andrew Leach (@andrew_leach) January 8, 2024
Today’s example is the CBC, once again egregiously both-sidesing this in the construction of their reporting. On a plain reading of the law, the Saskatchewan government can’t engage in the legal fiction of registering as the distributor of natural gas in the province, and a competent journalist should be able to say as much, but they won’t. The demands of both-sidesing means that they have to get someone else—“some experts”—to couch it so that they can’t possibly be accused of bias or an agenda, even when it’s the plain reading of the law. And this is exactly why parties, particularly on the right in North America, have learned that they can get away with outright lying about absolutely everything—because they won’t be called out on it, and when your reporters couch the language in “some experts” saying it’s a lie, and your populist schtick is to denounce experts as being the enemy of the “common people,” then that expert commentary is immediately dismissed, and the lie carries on without consequence. You would have thought that the past few years, particularly given how the American media entirely shat the bed with trying to cover Trump, that they might have learned something, but nope. CBC and The Canadian Press in particular will continue to egregiously both-sides Poilievre and his myriad of lies, much as they are with Danielle Smith and Scott Moe, and those same leaders will continue to lie with abandon because they will continue to get away with it.
Both sides!
They can’t possibly declare that something is illegal because they read the law, they need to couch it in “some say,” because reasons. https://t.co/HaLFWJtBFi pic.twitter.com/2veh7nJCuj— Dale Smith (@journo_dale) January 9, 2024
Evergreen tweet. https://t.co/3MMVQiliwl
— tina pittaway (@tinapittaway) January 8, 2024
Ukraine Dispatch:
Russia has launched more heavy waves of missiles at Ukraine, killing four civilians early Monday.
During the morning missile attack, in Kryvyi Rih, Dnipropetrovsk Oblast, Russia hit a shopping mall and more than two dozen private houses.#russiaisateroriststate pic.twitter.com/RmfncSatC1
— UkraineWorld (@ukraine_world) January 8, 2024
⚡️MP: Ukraine's latest draft law doesn't include provisions for female conscription.
The recent military mobilization draft legislation in Ukraine will not involve the conscription of women or implement a lottery system, said Yehor Cherniev, deputy chairman of the Parliamentary…
— The Kyiv Independent (@KyivIndependent) January 9, 2024