Crappy moments in journalism, questioning love of country edition

From the not so great moments in journalism files comes this entry from Jane "tell me about your cats" Taber, who offers regular proof that giving some members of the media the increased bandwidth of blogging isn't really a good thing.

Yesterday, Taber posted this insulting and groundless entry that, hold your breath, Liberal leader Michael Ignatieff would be cheering for Canada in last night's Canada/Russia Olympic men's hockey game:

Michael Ignatieff is not conflicted.

In fact he takes umbrage with any hint of a suggestion that he would feel the slightest bit of conflict watching the Canadian men's Olympic hockey team play the Russians in a sudden death quarter final.

I'd take umbrage too, for it's an incredibly stupid question. I'm 1/4 Irish, should I be conflicted when Canada and Ireland meet on the field of sporting battle? Should I have my patriotism questioned? This is reminiscent of the Conservative attacks on Ignatieff's heritage, just like they attacked Stephane Dion's loyalty because his mother came from France. I expect such nonsense from the Conservatives, but not from the national newspaper of a nation of immigrants.

Taber's piece also begs the question, just where is this issue coming from? Who is raising this as a legitimate and newsworthy issue? As Ignatieff said:

Even just asking the question leaves him "stupefied by the proposition." He added: "I mean that."

So, who raised this issue? Rewind two weeks and oh, look, it was actually Jane Taber:

While Mr. Ignatieff faces many dilemmas as a political leader, his biggest right now would be who to cheer for if the men’s gold medal hockey game is between Canada and Russia, given his Russian ancestry.

Yes, that's right, she creates the flawed and insulting premise out of thin-air, with no sourcing to back it up, then forces him to respond to her made-up malarkey that not so subtly questions, without basis, Ignatieff's patriotism and love for Canada.

Stay classy San Diego.

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Stephane Dion can be a Liberal elder statesman

Speaking with several Liberal friends from Quebec over the course of the convention, I've been hearing that it's very likely Stephane Dion will run for re-election in his St. Laurent-Cartierville riding. It's not official yet, but I'm told nominations are slated to be opened in Quebec shortly, and Dion is more likely than not to opt to stay around.

I was asked to keep this low-key until official, but since La Presse seems to have reported it, it would seem the cat is out of the bag.

I really hope Stephane does run again. The LPC needs him, his voice and his concious. We actually gained seats in Quebec in the last election, showing Stephane is more of an asset there than many would care to admit. He was one of our strongest cabinet ministers under both Jean Chretien and Paul Martin. And, should the Liberals be lucky enough to form the next government, I know he would be a real asset in a Michael Ignatieff cabinet. Who better to lead he charge on cap and trade as Mi's environment minister then the man so respected in the domestic and global environmental community?

And let me just take this moment to observe that Jane Taber is completly full of crap on so many levels its a wonder she manages to walk upright. This section today in her gossip column or whatever the heck she calls it, really pisses me off, and shows just how out of touch with reality Jane is:

La Presse columnist Vincent Marissal is reporting today that former
Liberal leader Stéphane Dion will run again in the next election, creating
an interesting puzzle for new leader Michael Ignatieff. Whispers are that
there are some younger Liberals who had their eye on Mr. Dion's Montreal
riding; those quasi-safe Liberal ridings rarely open up. So there could be a
fight. As well, it's always awkward dealing with former leaders - what
job do you give them? How much influence should they have? And after Mr.
Dion's disastrous speech last night at the convention, there doesn't seem to
be a lot of goodwill around for him. Still, former Conservative prime
minister Joe Clark and former Alliance leader Stockwell Day have both
demonstrated how former leaders can make valuable contributions to a caucus
and federal cabinet.

First of all, Jane, I'm confident that Stephane's riding meets the minimums set out for incumbents to avoid a nomination race, so if Stephane wants to run again, there will be no nomination race. And besides, even if there were, Stephane's personal popularity in that riding is very high. And no one would be stupid enough to try to unseat him. Even Jean Lapierre was quickly warned off when he contemplated it as Paul Martin's Quebec organizer. And just how safe the seat would be without Stephane is debatable.

Second, I'm sure Michael will have no problem finding a key position for Stephane on the team. Michael is a smart man, who knows what an asset Dion is and the strengths he brings to the team. That's not an issue.

Third, your statement that there isn't much goodwill for Stephane in the LPC and that his speech was "disastrous" is complete horseshit, and evidence you should really stick to writing about Laureen Harper's cats. I don't know what you could see from your snarky perch on media row, but down on the floor, where the Liberals were, I saw a lot of emotion, respect and much goodwill for Stephane.

Yes, we Liberals may be disappointed with his term as leader. Ok, strike the may be. We are. But don't dare for a second mistake that for a lack of respect, and affection, for the man, and for what he has done for Canada and for the Liberal Party. While he didn't have the royal jelly to be leader, Stephane is an honourable, intelligent, decent man who has fought, sweat and bled for his party and his country all his political career. There was a lot of love for Stephane in that hall, and there's a lot of love and respect for Stephane in the Liberal Party.

On that, Jane Taber couldn't possibly be more wrong. Next convention I hope the Globe sends an actual journalist.

Anyway, rant done. I'm at YVR, having a few glasses of wine in the lounge (thanks to a pass from generous former blogger Bob the Red) before taking the red-eye back to YYZ. And once home, I plan to sleep much of Monday. After that, though, I'll be back with some convention big picture thoughts, and some commentary about the constitutional plenary, including OMOV and more.

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Not hot: Jane Taber's analysis

I really don’t know why I read her column. I guess it’s like a car-wreck, you can’t look away. But this analysis from Ms. Taber though is particularly not hot:

Not: The coalition. The Ignatieff Liberals appear to be lukewarm to the idea of it. Cozying up to the NDPers does not seem to be something that Mr. Ignatieff, who comes across as a centrist, is comfortable with.

Perhaps sensing this, NDP Leader Jack Layton seems to be less committed to the idea, saying on CTV's Question Period last week that the coalition has achieved what it set out to do: make a better budget.

Actually, as a coalition supporter I’m pleased with this development, and actually amused at Ms. Taber’s completely off-base read of the situation.

Ignatieff’s messaging on the coalition has been consistent all along. It has worked, it has brought the Conservatives to heel, forced them to back down on their controversial attacks on their opponents, on pay equity, and on public sector unions, and forced them to speed-up plans for the budget and for stimulus. With Harper proroguing until the budget, now we need to wait and see what’s in the budget. If it does what Canadians expect, we’ll support it. If it fails the test of leadership, we’ll vote it down and move into government to give Canada the economic action it needs. But we can’t say we’ll vote down a budget we haven’t seen. It’s not about grasping for power, it’s about the economy.

That has been the consistent position of Ignatieff and now the Liberals, and I’m very pleased to see the NDP and Jack Layton are now onboard with this same messaging. The fact we’re both pursuing the same strategy would seem to speak to the strength of the coalition, and as I’ve argued before this strategy gives a potential future coalition a greater chance of success. A coalition needs public support to succeed, and to secure public support it can’t be about just grabbing power or voting down Harper no matter what: it needs to be about the economy.

Now the Liberals and the NDP are both working toward that end, from the same page. And that’s hot.

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Good comments from Leblanc and Trudeau

With the election over, I’ve again returned to my sanity-saving habit of not watching shows such as Politics, Question Period and particularly Mike Duffy Live. I may still skim the transcripts though, and I liked these comments from Sunday’s Question Period by Liberal MPs Justin Trudeau and Dominic Leblanc.

JUSTIN TRUDEAU (Newly Elected Liberal in Papineau): I think a lot of people are jumping on the idea that we need to change leadership and that would suddenly fix everything. I think there's a lot of things broken within the Liberal party, there's a lot of rebuilding we have to do on party unity, on learning how to fundraise properly, on reaching out to our grass-roots and rebuilding an organization, and Mr. Dion is having a weekend of reflection right now to see whether he wants to be part of it, or how he wants to be part of it, and I'm all for leaving a man of integrity and honour and intelligence to decide what's best for him without pressuring him one way or another. I think the party's challenges are larger and more important than just leadership, and that's what we need to be focused on.

TRUDEAU: I think as far as ad scam and sponsorship, that's been completely put to the side. The challenge now is to rebuild the brand, rebuild ourselves into a competitive force on the ground as well, reach out to the values of Quebeckers that are so much more Liberal in so many ways than they are anything else, and strengthen the party from the ground up. That really needs to be the focus that we bring.

DOMINIC LEBLANC (Newly Elected Liberal in Beausejour): Well, Jane, it's probably a number of factors that were at play. There's no doubt that Mr. Harper's very negative campaign around the notion of the green shift, around the notion of taxing pollution and reducing income taxes created some havoc in terms of our ability to put forward what I thought was a positive message. It's not one factor. It's not just leadership. I agree with what Justin said, Jane. If the Liberal party is going to turn the page and look forward, there's no magic answer. We have to find a way to excite people about politics, to excite young people about politics, that they can make a difference, so it's a rebuilding exercise that doesn't start with just changing the siding on the house. We've got to go back to the basement and look at a number of factors, and that's what Mr. Dion is doing this weekend, and I think we should give him the time and the respect that he deserves to make that decision tomorrow.

LEBLANC: Jane, there's no simple answer. What I will tell you is that Liberals across the country, I think, are fed up, the Liberals I'm talking to, with us shooting at ourselves. We don't have enough ammunition to be firing on ourselves. If we want to behave like winners and act like winners we have to stop this sort of anonymous source or people questioning the leader every time something doesn't happen. It looks very amateur. Mr. Dion has deserved and earned the respect to make his decision. I will support whatever decision he announces tomorrow, and I think Liberals should do that. It's very premature to sort of do a
postmortem on the leadership. Let Mr. Dion have his say tomorrow. He's earned that. And I think the Liberal party then has to show more maturity than perhaps we have had in the last number of weeks.

And a reminder once again of why I dislike these shows, as gossip columnist Jane Taber keeps pressing them on Dion:

LEBLANC: I'm not going to discuss that today. Mr. Dion doesn't deserve that, and Liberals are tired of that kind of discussion until it's appropriate.

TABER: I'm not tired of it though…

Well as long as you’re entertained Jane, that’s clearly what’s important here.

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Unnamed, unsourced exclusive: Dion's not taking the dare

Like (See) Jane (Not run stories with people on the record) Taber, I have my own anonymous sources. All very senior Liberals. The most seniorest. Maybe even more senior advisory than Ms. Taber’s.

According to Taber, Stephane Dion is ready to accept Stephen Harper’s dare that he force an election.

I can report that, according to my own very senior, highly-placed sources within the Liberal Party, the Office of the Leader of the Opposition, and the Stornaway kitchen, this is absolutely false. Dion is not going to take Harper’s election dare. Nor will they give in to a double-dare, despite the insistence by Bob Rae and Michael Ignatieff that in no way would the Canadian people accept the Liberals backing down from a double-dare.

Dion and his advisers will meet with senior caucus members at Stornaway this weekend to decide what level of dare to hold-out for from the Conservatives before they’d be compelled to force an election. I hear the doves are holding-out for the infamous triple dog dare, while Dion and the others would go on the lesser double dog dare.

Surely we agree that, were Stephen Harper to issue a triple dog dare, Dion would have no choice but to acquiesce and agree to an election. I mean, that's the nuclear bomb of dares. We would be the laughing-stocks of the nation, if not the world, to wimp-out in the face of a triple dog dare. You can bet the NDP would make big use of it in their campaign literature, as would the Conservatives. It would cement the not a leader meme.

I just hope that this divide between the double dog dare and triple dog dare wings of the Liberal Party can be mended, as it has the potential to tear the party apart. This is a time when we need unity.

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Dear Jane Taber,

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Chretien and Martin teaming up?

I hear two former Prime Ministers will soon be helping out the Liberal Party on the fundraising front.

In the next little while I hear Jean Chretien and Paul Martin will be throwing their height behind some fundraising efforts on behalf of the party. At a minimum they'll be doing some e-solicitations, and maybe more.

While the cynics will have their fun I think it's a positive and helpful sign the party is uniting. I'm veering into speculation now, but I bet a dinner with the two of them as joint headliners would sell a few tickets.

And with that, I'll stop channeling Jane Taber...

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Sources say that's really crappy journalism

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