Juno News - Legacy media take the money and run!

00:00:00.000 A legacy media outlet took a bailout from the federal government to protect journalism and

00:00:05.420 then they turned around and fired the journalists anyway. It's Fake News Friday, I'm Candice

00:00:09.120 Malcolm and this is The Candice Malcolm Show. Hi everyone, thank you so much for tuning into

00:00:17.780 the show. It's a favorite day of the week here at The Candice Malcolm Show. It's Fake News Friday

00:00:21.780 where we go through the legacy media, we dissect and pull out some of the examples of the most

00:00:27.260 egregious journalism and we just generally talk about the problem in Canada when you have a legacy

00:00:33.540 media by and large that is subsidized and funded by the federal government. There are so many so

00:00:39.400 many inherent contradictions and conflicts and ethical issues with this structure and yet they

00:00:45.940 all kind of carry on as usual but of course so much malfeasance comes out of that structure and so

00:00:51.060 we dedicate the Friday edition of The Candice Malcolm Show entirely in just focusing in on this problem

00:00:56.880 and talking about the very many ways that it manifests. So if you're watching this video on

00:01:00.820 YouTube, I'm going to stop you right now. I'm going to ask that you please like this video. Don't forget

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00:01:12.300 drop us a comment and leave us an idea for a video show. Don't forget to head on over and like the

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00:01:21.540 leave us a five-star review over on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts or wherever you get your podcast.

00:01:26.200 It really helps us out in the discoverability of the show and don't forget to subscribe to The

00:01:30.980 Candice Malcolm Show so that you never miss an episode. So before we get to this ridiculous story

00:01:35.240 of a media company, a major media company taking taxpayer dollars and then turning around and firing

00:01:39.920 journalists anyway, I want to talk about the major political development of the week with regards to

00:01:44.840 the Conservative Party, the infighting that we have been focused on so much on the show this week and

00:01:49.460 just talk a little bit about how the media has covered it. So usually with a Conservative leader,

00:01:53.120 be it Doug Ford, Jason Kenney, Scott Moe, Stephen Harper, Andrew Scheer, whoever it is, usually the

00:01:58.880 media do their best to demonize the leader, to point out all their flaws, to make them seem like

00:02:03.620 a scary right-winger and to really make them repulsive. But Aaron O'Toole has done everything

00:02:08.220 he can. He focuses all of his attention on winning over those media skeptics, making sure that they

00:02:12.600 like him, that they know that he's one of them. He's part of the team, he's progressive, he's liberal,

00:02:17.100 he's left-wing on the social issue so they don't have to be afraid of him. So this has led us to a place

00:02:21.100 where the media sort of has this like sympathetic view of Aaron O'Toole, where they sort of feel

00:02:25.380 sorry for him, they don't think that he could beat Justin Trudeau, but they don't want him to be

00:02:29.420 replaced because they fear that whoever replaces him could be a scary right-wing Conservative. So

00:02:34.420 they kind of treat him with kid gloves and you see a lot of editorials saying, you know, making the

00:02:38.940 case as to why Conservatives should leave him in power. All of these liberal and left-wing columnists

00:02:43.900 who would never in a million years vote for the Conservatives are trying to give advice to

00:02:47.420 Conservative members to keep the more sort of left-wing party leader in place. So then at this

00:02:53.200 point, when someone in the Conservative Party does come out to criticize Aaron O'Toole, we see the

00:02:57.280 media sort of shift and try to portray and paint that person in a negative light and demonize them.

00:03:02.820 And that is what we're seeing with Senator Denise Batters, who came out this past week and launched 0.86

00:03:06.960 a petition to ask for a leadership review of Aaron O'Toole. Now, it should be noted that Denise Batters

00:03:11.780 is an eminently reasonable person. She came forth with a very calm, very reasonable, very logical

00:03:18.140 position. And it should be noted that Senator Denise Batters came to the Conservative Party from the

00:03:23.900 Progressive Conservatives. So she didn't come from the Reform and the Alliance, the more right-wing

00:03:27.600 part of the party. She came from the more left-wing part of the party. So she is not a right-wing

00:03:32.460 figure. She's more on the center-left of the party, of the Conservative Party. And she backed Peter

00:03:37.240 McKay in the last leadership race. He was the Red Tory candidate. He was sort of the standard bearer

00:03:42.040 of Red Toryism. So it's not like Denise Batters is from the sort of more Conservative side of the

00:03:47.820 party. She isn't. So this was a headline over in CP's Canadian Press. It's the wire service. So they

00:03:52.760 write the news stories that go in most of the newspapers. Most of the news websites are all based

00:03:56.800 on this wire service. And this was the story. This was a headline. It says, Expelled Conservative

00:04:01.580 Senator Denise Batters' defense position lashes out at O'Toole. Lashes out, we're told. She's lashing 1.00

00:04:08.360 out. Now when I saw that verbiage, I was just sort of put off because I watched Denise Batters. I saw

00:04:14.560 what she wrote. I saw what she put on Twitter. Lashing out. Let me just read you the definition of

00:04:19.680 what it means to lash out. To lash out is to suddenly attack someone or something physically or to

00:04:25.420 criticize him or her in an angry way. Okay, so we're told that she's lashing out, which implies

00:04:31.560 sort of physical violence or at least lashing out, criticizing someone in an angry way. When I

00:04:37.860 looked at what Denise Batters was saying, I didn't see an angry lady. Again, I saw a reasonable, logical, 1.00

00:04:44.680 calm, clear-headed plea for the party to review this leader. And so the fact that the media is

00:04:52.360 painting this as her lashing out. Now, even if you read the story, read the article that's attached,

00:04:58.100 it's a very short one, and nothing in there suggests that she's lashing out. Okay, let me

00:05:01.880 just read the news story. It's really short. And again, nothing in here suggests anything close to

00:05:08.000 lashing out. Okay, so it says, Senator Denise Batters is taking off the gloves in her fight 1.00

00:05:12.780 with conservative leader Erin O'Toole. Okay, again, this sort of builds it up and implies that

00:05:16.600 by taking off the gloves and that she's engaging in this fight with Erin O'Toole, that maybe there's

00:05:21.660 like a war of words or she says something harsh. But as we'll see, that's not the case. Let's go on to

00:05:26.260 see what Canadian press is writing about a fight, taking off the gloves and saying that

00:05:30.300 Denise Batters is lashing out. So it just says this, O'Toole announced late Tuesday that the 1.00

00:05:35.900 Saskatchewan senator will be expelled from the Conservative caucus after she launched a petition

00:05:39.380 calling for a referendum on his leadership within six months. A leadership review is currently

00:05:43.400 scheduled for the party's national convention in 2023, though MPs did vote in October to give

00:05:48.060 themselves the power to potentially host him earlier. Okay, so that's just all background,

00:05:51.660 nothing about Denise Batters yet. Now it comes on to tell us what Batters is actually

00:05:56.240 doing and it says this, Batters in a statement this morning says she is and will always be a

00:06:00.880 Conservative and says members deserve to have a say on the leadership and direction of the party

00:06:05.900 after an election loss. So how is this lashing out? How is this taking off the gloves? How is this

00:06:11.420 fighting? She issued a calm statement just saying that she's still a Conservative and she believes

00:06:15.660 that members should have a say on the direction of the party. How is that lashing out? How is that

00:06:20.540 fighting? How is that taking off the gloves? Give me a break. Okay, the story goes on. It says,

00:06:24.040 she goes on to question why she's being singled out. Another Conservative senator, Michael McDonald,

00:06:29.060 urges Tories ahead of the October vote to give themselves the power to hold an early

00:06:32.480 leadership review. And Batters says if a tool is truly confident in the direction he's taking the

00:06:36.760 party, then he should have no fears about an expedited leadership review. And then that's it.

00:06:42.340 That's it. Then the story just goes back to explaining the background of the story and saying

00:06:46.540 that Batters is kicked out of the party before the caucus, the Conservative caucuses meeting in Ottawa.

00:06:51.320 And again, that's it. That's the whole story. It's like, it's like a 10 line story and that's it.

00:06:56.280 So nowhere in there did we see anything like the headline was saying. So much so they've actually

00:07:00.480 have changed the headline now. But this was the initial headline that was out for the first day

00:07:04.280 of the story was up and across the internet. Again, the media just love creating a narrative.

00:07:09.120 They love trying to create conflict, trying to make it seem like Denise Batters here is just like 1.00

00:07:12.940 crazy unhinged bad guy villain. Really, she's just being very reasonable. And the media just can't help

00:07:18.860 but demonize and create these really, really ridiculous caricatures of the Conservatives. 0.96

00:07:24.420 Okay, going on. This is actually pretty amusing. So as so as the MPs were heading into go into this 0.96

00:07:29.900 meeting, journalists were sort of camped out and again, trying to exploit this division,

00:07:33.680 trying to drum up the drama and asking MPs what they thought about Denise Batters petition and where

00:07:39.660 they stand on Aaron O'Toole. Now, let me just pause from the show for a moment to just say that things

00:07:44.940 in British Columbia are absolutely horrendous. I know my parents are out there. Most of my family

00:07:49.260 lives in the Lower Mainland and Vancouver, and they are dealing with a catastrophic flood. It is

00:07:54.060 unbelievable, probably will end up being the most costly natural disaster in Canadian history.

00:07:59.720 And of course, if something like this was happening in Central Canada, if something like this was

00:08:02.900 happening in Quebec or Ontario, it would be all the news. It would be everything wall-to-wall coverage,

00:08:07.880 nothing but. But in our country, because it's happening out in Vancouver, barely anyone's paying

00:08:12.280 attention, barely anyone's talking about it. And this is a sad reality of the sort of regionalism

00:08:16.480 in our country that that anything that happens out West is kind of an afterthought. And anything

00:08:19.940 that happens in British Columbia is even more than an afterthought. It's almost like a different

00:08:23.260 country out there. It's a sad state of affairs. And this MP, this conservative MP rightfully points

00:08:27.780 it out. So as these conservatives are walking in, this is again, Wednesday afternoon, right in the

00:08:31.600 the height of the flooding and the chaos in British Columbia. So we have conservative MP Brad

00:08:37.340 Vese, who is the MP for Mission, Matt Squee, Fraser Canyon, and a unidentified reporter jumps in to

00:08:44.080 ask him about the air neutral drama. And to him, it's like he is completely focused on this crazy

00:08:49.820 disaster that is happening in his writing, in his constituency, completely worried about the lives

00:08:54.200 of his constituents, the lives of Canadians. And that is where he's focused. And he just sort of

00:08:58.120 takes the media to task for asking sort of like a dumb political partisan question instead of really

00:09:04.500 asking the more pressing question at that moment in that time about his writing and the people in

00:09:09.380 his writing and how he's acting to represent them and to help them. So here is a BC conservative MP

00:09:15.700 just sort of smacking down the media. Do you support Erin O'Toole's decision to remove Senator Batters?

00:09:20.340 You know what, the most important question needs to be, why aren't you asking me about Mission,

00:09:24.500 Matt Squee, Fraser Canyon, and the devastating flooding that's taking place in Chilliwack Hope,

00:09:29.860 Abbotsford, in the Okanagan in Dan's riding. I want to thank Minister Blair for meeting with us this

00:09:37.940 morning to discuss the dire situation on the ground. Our constituents, 7,000 people were evacuated

00:09:46.100 in Dan's riding. All of the major roadways in British Columbia are destroyed. We don't have rail

00:09:52.580 infrastructure right now. Our country is facing an unprecedented situation in the province of BC.

00:09:58.100 Do you think Batters should have been kicked out of caucus? Right now my only focus is on supporting

00:10:02.900 the people of Mission, Matt Squee, Fraser Canyon in British Columbia. There's no time for partisan

00:10:07.380 politics. Right now there's only time to support British Columbia and get people safe. That should

00:10:14.820 be your only question right now. Keeping British Columbia safe. The people need our help. They don't

00:10:19.860 want to hear about a senator. They want to hear about what we're doing here today to help our province and to

00:10:25.540 help our country. Do you attribute this to climate change? How do you prevent this from happening again?

00:10:29.540 Well, right now we need to focus on the safety of British Columbia. How do you prevent this from

00:10:34.420 happening again? You've talked about the fires. You've talked about the flooding. How do you prevent this from happening again?

00:10:37.540 Ed, why don't you comment? It's Barrow Towns in your riding. Listen, there are many things that are going to have to take place going forward to rebuild all the infrastructure that has been damaged. There's infrastructure that needs to be upgraded to seismic standards.

00:10:43.540 There's a lot of work that has to be done going forward. These are long term fixes that won't be resolved overnight.

00:10:59.540 And you can just see how completely tone deaf these journalists are. He makes a passionate plea about his writing and how dangerous it is and how worried he is. And the journalists can't even compute that. They don't even care. They just go and ask the same question.

00:11:13.540 But do you think batters should have been kicked out of caucus? It's like so tone deaf and so unbelievably callous of these journalists. They don't actually care what somebody has to say. They don't care about the Canadians that he represents. They don't care about the real challenges that are being faced out there. They just care about the drama.

00:11:27.540 They just care about the soundbite. And they just want to possibly exploit this drama even more to get even more news out of it.

00:11:35.540 And then finally, once he really just schools them and says, look, this is not my priority. I don't care about the partisan infighting. I'm completely focused on this flood and saving my constituents.

00:11:43.540 And then, of course, they pivot to, well, do you attribute this to climate change, like trying to sort of like trap him and again, turn it into a partisan wedge trap manufactured by the liberals to say, well, if you care about this flood, then how can you not admit that it's climate change?

00:11:58.540 And therefore, don't you want a carbon tax? Like it just again just shows how out of touch and bad these journalists are at their job.

00:12:05.540 OK, so I want to move on to this story about the media company taking taxpayer money and then firing its ploy because this in a nutshell is the problem with Canadian media.

00:12:13.540 So this comes to us from our friends over at Blackhawks Reporter, also reported by us at TNC.News, and it's about a newspaper company called the Halifax Chronicle Herald.

00:12:22.540 So the media company, the Halifax Chronicle Herald, took taxpayer funded media rebates, but then they ended up firing employees.

00:12:29.540 So according to Blackhawks Reporter, the media outlet, which is part of a broader company called Salt Wire Network Inc., they ended up firing 111 employees on September 1st, 2020.

00:12:39.540 In the same year, the company received an undisclosed amount of taxpayer COVID-19 funding and was also benefiting from payroll rebates passed by the liberal government.

00:12:47.540 So they're getting the $600 million newspaper bailout.

00:12:51.540 The whole idea was that these all of these media companies couldn't compete with the CBC, the Trudeau government was giving the CBC money and then the newspapers couldn't compete with them.

00:12:59.540 So they went hat in hand and asked the Trudeau government for money as well.

00:13:03.540 So Trudeau gave them money.

00:13:04.540 The purpose of that was all under the guise of protecting local journalism to make sure that in all of these markets across Canada, these companies could still employ local journalism because the role of a local journalist was so important to democracy.

00:13:16.540 And it was so important that we had these reporters on the ground to keep our democracy strong, to hold politicians accountable.

00:13:22.540 Never mind the contradiction there about the government paying journalists to investigate them, which, of course, doesn't happen in the way that it should.

00:13:29.540 But regardless, the idea is this media company is taking our money, taking taxpayer dollars to protect journalism jobs.

00:13:35.540 And then on top of that, when the economy crashed, when the government forced us all into lockdown, the idea behind the COVID rebate was to keep things afloat,

00:13:43.540 was to make sure that people didn't lose their jobs, to make sure that companies didn't go out of business.

00:13:47.540 So here is a company, a media company that's basically double dipping.

00:13:50.540 They're getting a bailout from the government for the newspapers, for local journalism.

00:13:54.540 And they're also getting a bailout from the government for COVID.

00:13:57.540 And yet on top of this, they still fire 111 employees.

00:14:01.540 It is such a joke.

00:14:02.540 So here it says under the Rebit program, the company could have received up to $13,750 per employee.

00:14:09.540 Court records show that six former employees pursued legal action with regards to their dismissal.

00:14:14.540 Saltwater contends in March 2020, its business was significantly impacted by COVID-19 pandemic revenues were substantially reduced.

00:14:21.540 So that's all justification as to why they were taking taxpayer money.

00:14:24.540 What we still don't understand, though, is why they took taxpayer money and then turned around and fired a whole bunch of people, 111 people.

00:14:31.540 Well, some of them are now suing the paper, regardless, you know, it's going to be stuck in the legal court battles for a while.

00:14:37.540 But again, what a sad state of journalism where you have these big, big companies taking all this money, basically part of their business model now to just lobby the government.

00:14:44.540 Rather than go out there and try to find a more successful business model, rather than try it, go out and try to build your audience or try to find new revenue streams.

00:14:51.540 These media companies are part of the revenue. Part of their business plan is spending money on lobbyists, spending money on consultants and going hat in hand to the government.

00:14:59.540 That is part of the revenue stream. And you see it across the spectrum in the media.

00:15:03.540 So another example is the FP Newspaper Inc., the Free Press newspapers, including the Winnipeg Free Press, which is one of the most left wing papers in the country.

00:15:12.540 As of May of this year, the company had received $6.2 million in taxpayer funds, majority of which were the COVID subsidies, federal grants.

00:15:20.540 They make up 54% of the company's revenue. So more than half the money that this newspaper and this media company are bringing in every year is from the government.

00:15:28.540 I can't imagine, you know, we talk a lot about the CBC and how they get billions. Well, more than half of the money that this, I mean, it might as well be a state broadcaster as well.

00:15:36.540 They're taking so much money from the government. They're so beholden to the government and the governing party.

00:15:41.540 It's just absolutely wild. The landscape in Canada, it deserves to be criticized because you're not going to get a situation where opposition parties and other politicians get a fair shake.

00:15:50.540 When these newspapers that are so influential in telling the stories and reaching Canadians are so beholden to Justin Trudeau and the governing Liberal Party.

00:15:59.540 It is a huge problem in Canada. It's all the more reason why we need independent outlets like True North.

00:16:03.540 It's Fake News Friday. I'm Candice Malcolm and this is The Candice Malcolm Show.

00:16:06.540 The Candice Malcolm Show.

Juno News - November 19, 2021

Legacy media take the money and run!

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