I spend much time on the internet reading reliable sources. (Well, mostly reliable.) My subscription list for mainstream media is lengthy, although I consciously avoid Postmedia. While the company employs some excellent […]
Dan Froomkin — one of my favourite American commentators — offers several suggestions for the New York Times style guide. Here are a few published at presswatchers.org:
We learned this week that Black Press Ltd. and associated companies applied for protection under the Companies’ Creditors Arrangement Act. The BC based company’s main business is print and digital newspapers and magazines operating in Western and Northern Canada and in the USA. This shows companies affiliated with Black Press Ltd…
Writing in The Economist, former New York Times editor James Bennet commented about the state of his profession. He thinks today’s mainstream media too often fails to provide open and objective, truth-seeking journalism…
With disputes and condemnations over coverage of the mayhem in Gaza, it is worth considering the ethics of journalism. Whether or not generally accepted rules are followed by media is a subjective evaluation. But I believe there has been a general decline in ethical behaviour as ownership of mass communications has concentrated in the hands of financial elites…
People outside the United Kingdom should pay attention to opinion pieces by The Guardian’s Jane Martinson. The article that caught my attention today was ‘Why own a newspaper in 2023? Ask the very rich men trying to buy the Telegraph.’ This desire says a lot more about power than profit.
I began following the Washington Post decades ago, when journalists often held the feet of powerful people to the fire. Today, that is unlikely since many media owners rank among the world’s wealthiest people. In general, they oppose changes to the status quo that do not provide personal benefits. That may partly explain why newspapers have about one-third the number of serious readers per capita than they had in the days of my parents…
After 28 years as a key contributor at the Georgia Straight, Charlie Smith moved to Pancouver, a new arts and culture media outlet that aims to “shed light on how this history has shaped artistic creation in Vancouver.” Charlie Smith occasionally writes at Substack and recently he asked if it was “time for Canada’s older political journalists to call it quits?”
Fiction and invention are handy tools for politicians. Legacy media often repeats lies with minimal or no fact checking, although perhaps with opposing comments added to suggest balance. That process gives the same standing to false or unsupported claims as it does to well-accepted facts. After Pierre Poilievre released a video taken in a Toronto subway station, Globe and Mail columnist Gary Mason wrote an incisive opinion piece that skewers the Convoy Party of Canada leader, a man who wants to be Prime Minister. Mason’s commentary is worth sharing widely. . .
Canada’s largest newspaper chain promotes climate change denial and works to elect right-wing politicians, even Danielle Smith who a Postmedia columnist said was surrounded by “guaranteed chaos.”
Political observers who expected BC NDP to live up to electoral promises of 2017 are by now thoroughly disillusioned. Broken promises could pave the the grounds of the BC Legislature…
PoP BC formed after health professionals became concerned about inadequate health policies in BC. Are participants qualified to express opinions different than government officials who balance political issues with health optimization? The answer to that question is a resounding yes.
Most journalists, particularly ones occupying the BC Press Gallery, have spent little or no time examining Site C, the costliest public project in BC history. In contrast, I remember daily headlines and aroused commentary when Premier Glen Clark’s government thought ferry construction would invigorate BC’s shipbuilding industry. In financial terms, the bungled fast ferry project was 1/20 the size of Site C, destroyed no valuable farmlands and disrupted no cultural sites…
It is not the first time a Postmedia newspaper has presented a misleading report on public affairs. This one doesn’t rise to the level of Brian Lilley’s ugly dog whistle implication that Canada’s Chief Public Health Officer Dr. Theresa Tam is more loyal to China than Canada, and should be fired. Rob Shaw authored the latest…
A comment on my article at The Tyee is repeated here along with some hints about how dollars might have influenced reporting on IPPs by members of the corporate media.
Despite newspapers being longtime supporters of Fraser Institute teachings that call for reduced public spending, they are now more than happy to get in line for corporate welfare. That’s not surprising. While many Canadian journalists are principled professionals, rather few of their employers share that virtue.
Politicians, not too long ago, feared the press. Much has changed, not because corporate media owners are suffering financially, since most are not. Good journalism is available, much of it from new media that survives on the knife edge between survival and insolvency, ever in need of financial support. Tenuous job security ensures that few real characters survive in today’s mainstream media. It was not always so…
Are citizens of British Columbia protected from massive financial fraud? Frankly, we have little protection…
Yet more evidence that important parts of corporate media do not practice good journalism…
Neoliberalism has brought us extreme concentrations of wealth and power and a society governed by and for the rich. The Guardian reports America’s three wealthiest billionaires—Bezos, Gates and Buffett—have as much wealth as the bottom half of the US population combined. Funders—like the American Koch brothers and Fraser Institute directors who are connected collectively to around a trillion dollars in assets— do not want creative solutions to labour’s stagnant wages or growing inequality…
Job Displacement? Can’t be stopped. It's just inevitable. Translated as: Let’s see how bad it can get first then talk…
To halt the spread of homelessness as a top housing priority few things matter more than affordability. What does matter…
On the subject of Wealth Extraction... Has BC Hydro Chair Mr. Clark studied info comparable to this video? Should Hydro…
Renewed interest in “interest”? https://ellenbrown.com/2025/11/04/how-a-fed-overhaul-could-eliminate-the-federal-debt-crisis-part-ii-curbing-fed-independence/ Albert Einstein is often quoted as saying that compound interest is “the most powerful force…
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This Just In https://www.msn.com/en-us/technology/general/microsoft-to-use-2-8-million-gallons-of-lake-michigan-water-in-2026-for-mt-pleasant-project/ar-AA1ML7Mw Too bad about Lake Michigan. Where did you say hundred of thousands of gallons of data…