Winston Smith - Alive And Well At The CBC?

You may recall the protagonist of Orwell's 1984, the records clerk named Winston Smith whose job it was to continually rewrite history so that it accorded with the constantly-changing imperatives of Big Brother's government. The novel's ending is ambiguous; Winston, a broken man, may or may not die.

I am here to report that Winston did, in fact, survive, and is currently in the employ of the CBC, going about the old job he had at the Ministry of Truth.

And the Corporation is keeping him busy.

Winston's first order from feckless management is to deftly excise a segment of Stuart McLean's classic about Dave and the Christmas turkey:

In the wake of an online campaign waged by animal activists, the CBC’s Vinyl Cafe radio program has decided to edit out portions of Stuart McLean’s beloved holiday story, “Dave Cooks the Turkey.” The campaigners alleged some listeners deemed parts of the fictional tale degrading to animals.

What are the offending elements, exactly? Here's one of the "degrading" passages:

“As the turkey defrosted it became clear what Grade B meant,” a recorded version of the story goes. “The skin on the right drumstick was ripped. Dave’s turkey looked like it had made a break from the slaughterhouse and dragged itself a block or two before it was captured and beaten to death.”

That is followed by this "insensitive outrage":

Unable to operate his oven, Dave eventually brings the bird to a hotel for cooking, where the chef says that it looks like the turkey had been “abused.”

You can listen to the sequence starting at about the 18 minute mark here.

CBC has posted on Facebook the following exercise in political correctness:

“Clearly we don’t want any part in the abuse of animals, nor in promoting the abuse of animals,” the post read.

“The story will be on the show next weekend. But we have made a few small changes. We have edited out a couple of lines that, after reading some of the thoughtful letters that have come in over the past week, we no longer feel comfortable airing on our show.”

Won't hurt a bit, I'm sure.

But Winston has a far greater and more involved task before him, one that has been made only slightly easier by some preclearance work the CBC has done in its ongoing efforts to exorcise the troublesome visual spirit of Jian Ghomeshi:


Winston is now tasked with removing his haunting digital presence:

CBC management announced Monday they are pulling almost all interviews conducted by Jian Ghomeshi offline, sparking outrage from Q listeners on social media.

But master of doublespeak, Chuck Thompson, the CBC's media relations chief, was quick to clarify:

“We aren’t erasing the archives, we’re just taking them offline for now”.

With language befitting a politician, Thompson went on to say,

“There is no obvious right or wrong approach here”. ... “We’ve been giving this a lot of careful consideration over the last few weeks and want to give the program every opportunity to be as unencumbered as possible while some very creative people reimagine Q’s future.”

Listeners and viewers were not so accommodating:

“Jian did many wonderful interviews. It is part of CBC’s history. You must not erase it!” wrote one commentator. “Editing the past would be very disingenuous,” wrote another.

But, of course, editing and rewriting the past has always been Winston Smith's forte, hasn't it?

Breaking News

Wow!

Seven Wildrose MLAs are planning to cross to Alberta’s governing Progressive Conservative party, CBC news has learned.

Two party sources said the seven are: party leader Danielle Smith, House Leader Rob Anderson, and MLAs Jeff Wilson, Gary Bikman, Pat Stier, Blake Pederson and Jason Hale.

Members of the 14-person caucus met Tuesday afternoon to discuss an offer from the PCs, led by Premier Jim Prentice.

MLAs Shane Saskiw, Drew Barnes and Rick Strankman said on social media that they were planning to stick with the Wildrose, which is the official opposition.

Currently, the PCs have 63 seats, the Liberals hold five, the NDP have four. There is one independent MLA.

The executive of the party is holding a teleconference Tuesday night to discuss what’s next.

The PCs are holding a caucus meeting on Wednesday.

A Merger In The Offing?

My son, who lives in Alberta, keeps me apprised of that province's politics. Will Wildrose join Jim Prentice's Progressive Conservatives? Speculation is rampant.

The Canadian Wealth Gap - Far Worse Than Most Think

We hear a great deal about the giants who walk among us - the Canadian masters and mistresses of the universe, all those 'self-made' men and women who accomplished their feats thanks to daring, sheer hard work, and exclusive reliance on their own resources. They didn't ask for any 'handouts.'

You know who they are, the same ones who suffer a convenient amnesia about how their rise to the top was greatly facilitated by education at taxpayer-funded public institutions, government grants and loans, and access to public infrastructure and skilled workers without which they would have likely achieved little.

I'm sure those same people will dismiss the following as leftist propaganda.

The rest of us should receive it as disquieting truth.

Say It Isn't So!

It seems that the refusal of a petulant prime minister to meet with the premier of Canada's largest province is having some unfortunate consequences:



H/t The Toronto Star

Harper Exposed Once More

Those of us who follow politics closely and with a critical eye have long seen through the myth his handlers have perpetuated that Stephen Harper is a wise and reliable steward of the economy. Doubtless that gross mischaracterization will continue to be applied, and with greater frequency, as we move closer to next year's election. Happily, more and more people are recognizing the fallacious and fatuous nature of such claims.

In her column today, The Star's Carol Goar offers ample evidence that this emperor has no clothes by examining his 'crazy' approach to our economy and his obdurate refusal to take meaningful action against climate change:

It would be “crazy economic policy” to regulate greenhouse gases in the oil and gas sector with petroleum prices dropping, Prime Minister Stephen Harper told Parliament last week. “We will not kill jobs and we will not impose the carbon tax the opposition wants to put on Canadians.”

About as crazy as putting all the nation’s eggs in one basket: Canada becoming a global “energy superpower.”

About as crazy as ignoring the boom-and-bust history of the oil and sector.

About as crazy as assuming people will allow pipelines to snake under their land, carrying bitumen from Alberta’s oilsands to refineries in Texas and tankers on the Pacific coast.

About as crazy as forbidding federal scientists to say anything about climate change and threatening to revoke the charitable tax status of voluntary organizations that seek to protect the environment.

About as crazy as neglecting the price Canadians are already paying for climate change: power outages, damaged homes, spoiled food, lost productivity, higher insurance premiums, the cost of stocking up on everything from generators to non-perishable food.

About as crazy as pledging to cut greenhouse gas emissions by 17 per cent at a 2009 climate change conference in Copenhagen without any plan to limit the carbon dioxide, methane and nitrous oxide spewed into the atmosphere by the oil and gas industry.

To complicate the web of lies regularly spun by the regime, Goar points out some other inconvenient truths:

Public opinion is shifting. More than half of Canadians expressed deep concern about climate change in a poll conducted by the Environics Institute in October. Three-quarters said they were worried about the legacy they were leaving for future generations.

The provincial premiers, tired of waiting for leadership from Ottawa, have hatched their own plan to build a low-carbon economy by putting a price on pollution, developing renewable energy and capping greenhouse gases.

The central pillar of Harper’s economic strategy — being an aggressive fossil fuel exporter — has crumbled in a world awash with petroleum. Investors are cancelling their commitments. Employment in the oil and gas sector is shrinking. Government revenues are dropping.

It is to be hoped that as we move into 2015, more and more Canadians will realize that on these and so many other fronts, Stephen Harper is clearly yesterday's man.

Under The Bus

While these Raging Grannies could perhaps use the services of a good singing coach, their hearts, and their lyrics, are clearly in the right place: