Beware all the liberal media vipers in our midst
Canadian political junkies are in for a treat next month when former Conservative operative and Stephen Harper confidant Bruce Carson spills the beans about his brief sojourn at the center national power.
But we addicts of hysteria in statecraft may not actually need his upcoming book, “14 Days: Making the Conservative Movement in Canada”, to help us comprehend the true dimension of Tory paranoia. These days, the party’s power brokers are managing to do that all by themselves.
As the Globe and Mail reported last week, Conservative officials recently sent a fundraising letter to potential contributors asking them to pony up big bucks for what is certain to be a titanic battle against the Liberal establishment and their lickspittles and lapdogs in the mainstream media.
The Globe quoted portions of the letter from Fred DeLorey, the party’s director of political operations, thusly:
“(The) increase in the number of seats, plus the need to expand Conservative communications and outreach. . .will require the biggest campaign budget in Conservative Party history to ensure victory next year. . .To compete for these extra new seats in 2015, our outreach and communications budget must expand too – and we must do it now. If we wait until next year, it may be too late.”
Indeed, lefties lurk around every corner.
“Despite all his verbal flubs, lack of experience, and his failure to outline any practical economic policy for Canada, Justin Trudeau is still awarded a shining halo by liberal-minded journalists and pundits who are bedazzled by their own hopes of a Liberal second coming,” Mr. DeLorey fumes.
What’s more, he instructs, “Over 80 per cent of Canadian media is owned by a cartel of just five corporations – each of which owns dozens of publications and networks under various subsidiaries and affiliates. . .The Canadian newspaper industry today is largely controlled by a small number of individual or corporate owners, which often own the television networks.”
As a result, this “media convergence has greatly complicated our Conservative Party efforts to present the unfiltered facts and foundations behind our policies for economic growth, our faith in family values and our commitment to jobs, free trade and prosperity. . .The official campaign for re-election of Stephen Harper and our Conservative majority government won’t start until next year – but in the media it seems it has already begun.”
Fie, a pox on all your wobbly Fourth Estate houses, especially the CBC, which
“costs taxpayers too much and its operations should be privatized” before, presumably, “inexperienced Liberals like Justin Trudeau or leftist ideologues like Thomas Mulcair” make it their official mouthpiece!
This is not the first time Tory brass have taken a swipe at Mother Corpse (or, indeed, any media that doesn’t display the word “Sun” in its corporate letterhead) in a fundraising letter. In fact, for several years now, the practice has been all but required by right-wing etiquette.
In 2007, the late Doug Finley, who was then the Conservative Party’s campaign director, decried alleged incidents of political bias among frontline reporters at the CBC. Is this (he asked rhetorically) what $1.1 billion in taxpayers‘ money buys for hard-working, well-adjusted Canadians?
Still, though most citizens will dismiss such frantic hyperbole outright, the Tories do know their audience, which suggests that there’s less genuine fear than calculated fiat in the messaging.
The danger of a Liberal resurgence in this country is real, but right-wingers deal with their terror of fancy-pants, artsy-fartsy types by towing the party line. And they do it better than anyone else.
That’s why, in political terms, they have more money than God (despite their persistent and disingenuous poor-mouthing). It’s also how they have effectively demonized the mainstream media for a sizable chunk of the mainstream audience of news and opinion (again, despite their absurd and disingenuous claims to victimhood at the hands of commie-influenced press barons).
Time and again, the modern incarnation of conservatism in Canada makes claims to truth where none exists and then makes quislings of all who dare question its wisdom and virtue.
Still, we political junkies wouldn’t have it any other way. Most of us are journalists, anyway. Who else but a late-stage partisan paranoiac is going to keep us on our toes?
The Bruce Scribes 