So Thursday a reporter with the national gallery snapped at Prime Minister Stephen Harper for not taking more questions per day from Terry Milewski et all who are following him around. Just a reminder guys, the Prime Minister is travelling all over the country to visit as many people as mathematically possible in the next 30+ days, he's still taking your questions, isn't he? This isn't Trudeau circa 1980. This outburst was borderline ridiculous. Was it Copenhagen where Terry Milewski asked the PM a 5 minute question that was a rant with 20 different questions? We aren't always talking about 10 second clips, these things add up. Should the Prime Minister cancel more events to spend a greater amount of time taking questions at the events he's currently attending?
Terry was standing beside the guy who snapped, so I'd like to know if there is any behind the scene footage of what those national reporters were saying amongst themselves prior to the outburst? It is an issue of being on a fast time schedule, not the Prime Minister trying to be less accountable. It was one of the most loaded questions you'll ever see from a mainstream field reporter in an election campaign.
This whole hate in going on in the press is getting ridiculous. How many freaking clips have you even seen on the news from ANY of the pressers? Iggy and Jack claim they'll answer anything and yet still the nightly news is not playing the clips so what difference does it make? No one is going to go off script no matter how many questions you ask guys.
ReplyDeleteWhat's even worse is they try to make their job so important by using words like "democracy". Frankly the press are about as important as a burger flipper get over yourselves.
Latest tweet from Robert Fife :
ReplyDeleteHarper aides hand out lobster rolls to national media but Harper still refuses to answer more than 5 daily questions. #elxn41 #cdnpoli
Frankly, Robert Fife breached the boundaries of professionalism with his "Stephen & Laureen kissing on command" Tweet.
ReplyDeleteIt's time for him to retire.
Susan Lunn just tweeted :
ReplyDeleteReporters get lobster rolls but still limited to only five questions to harper #cv1
Poor babies.
CTV and CBC lost the trust of Canadians after the election in 2008. They lied about a coalition until it happened and then threw their full unconditional support behind it. Even going so far as calling grass root opposition to it ASTRO TURF. Why would anyone believe them now?
ReplyDeleteFour questions, 4 issues.
ReplyDeleteI doubt our pathetic national media can come up with 4 entirely different questions about 4 entirely different issues.
When our PM was overseas, the national media questions were about being late for a photo op and using the toilet.
pathetic then... still pathetic now.
Do Canadians accept the bias from the media in 2011?
ReplyDeleteSince the CPC have won in 2006 they have picked up 5/7 seats in by elections.
Has the effectiveness of the media lost its cachet is shaping public opinion?
I think so, Nov 2010 in the states routed the Democrats. The ratings for the left leaning tv news programs are below Fox.
The Prime Minister will take 4 questions from the travelling media and 1 from the local paper. The travelling media in all their wisdom wasted their questions on addressing their whiney poor me attitude and then gets upset when the Prime Minster won't answer more than 5 questions...What a bunch of dumb bunnies!!!
ReplyDeleteJust saw this Conrad Black quote on the net.
ReplyDeleteFolks might not like this guy but he was to the point, : "My experience with journalists authorizes me to record that a very large number of them are ignorant, lazy, opinionated, intellectually dishonest, and inadequately supervised. The ‘profession' is heavily cluttered with abrasive youngsters who substitute ‘commitment' for insight, and to a lesser extent, with aged hacks toiling through a miasma of mounting decrepitude. Alcoholism is endemic in both groups."
PM Harper is always asked by the reporters to say his answers in both French and English. ALWAYS. That takes extra time...
ReplyDeleteWhen Ignatieff and Layton are in front of the media they DO NOT DO THIS and they are NOT ASKED TO BY THE REPORTERS that follow those two.Check it out.
4 Questions a day over a 30 day campaign is 120 questions. It's the same media crew each day. Knowing they can only ask 4/day, maybe they can talk amongst themselves so at least they are asking 4 meaningful ones. Or wait till the next day and ask it then.
ReplyDeleteI think it has become painfully obvious that the media (Milewski, Fife etc) are not asking questions in a search for answers for Canadians but are asking potentially embarrassing questions and are also argumentative. We recall how the rat Milewski started the first press conference with the first question. I suspect Canadians are not stupid enough not to see and conclude that most in the media are partisan Liberals, and acting as attack dogs – they are trying for the “Gotcha” moment rather than the search for the truth.
ReplyDeleteCBC and CTV still refuse to play the video of 2004 which would definitively show that Duceppe is lying – they don’t get a free pass on that chicanery.
Maybe if those questioners quit giving an opinion speech before finally getting a question in the PM would have time for more. 4 english, 4 french, that is 8, where iggy/layton only have to answer in one language so can take more.
ReplyDeleteSame with the debates, ask a question without an explanation as to why you are asking it.
And get some competent interrupters for them, and for all speeches by the PM.
This was not a campaign but a time when Paul Martin was faced with reporters on some issues.
ReplyDeleteBut before Paul Martin were confronted by the msm Susan Boner CBC etc. I saw a woman with a clipboad on hand walk to each reporter asking for their names and company they work for. She told them that they were allowed 'two (2) questions. They reporters accepted the information.
CBC Susan asked a question re to Dingwall but couldn't get a proper answer from Paul Martin, she again asked the same question and as before, Paul Martin said nothing- instead,gave her a stern look.
Her reply to her unanswered questions : Thank you PM.
Here is Robert Fife on CTV Nightly news to Lloyd R.
"I asked Bob Rae a question but he told me to 'shut up'
It seems to me that the msm are frustrated with their own kind the liberals who treat the reporters like crap with garbage answers. But instead of the reporters demanding an answer from their beloved liberals they take their frustation on the conservatives.
Now, I would find greater pleasure asking the PM questions knowing that I would be treated with respect.
During the Obama visit in canada I remember the American media giving our PM a standing ovation while canadian sat on their hands.
Imagine Candidate A allows only five questions a day. No follow-up questions are allowed. Candidate A says that PMSH has horns and a tail. Reporter who asked question wants to follow up: 'But that is not true. I saw him on TV today and no horns or tail!' However that is not allowed. And Candidate A also says he'll only take other questions on another subject, not his horns and tail answer. See why reporters get PO'd? If you don't like answering questions and don't like reporters, get another line of work than politics.
ReplyDeleteWe all know that Bobby Fife hates Conservatives. He pretty much said so. Remember? He called Conservatives "knuckle draggers." So, whenever I hear him blathering, I mute the tv. After inserting his opinion like that into a news story, I don't think he has the right to refer to himself as a journalist.
ReplyDeleteBarb
Breaking News - Layton will be Leader of Coalition not Iggy
ReplyDeleteNow it turns out Ignatieff is out on his ear in a two leader debate. We learned today that if there is a coalition on the left, people want Jack Layton to be the leader by a long shot ( 59% to 27%), and not Count Iggy . So if consortium of broadcasters arrange the two leader debate, it will be Layton versus Harper - what a turn of events - but that is democracy that Ignatieff believes in and defends.
OTTAWA — If Canadians find themselves being governed by a Liberal-NDP-Bloc Québécois coalition following the May election, they want to see the NDP's Jack Layton become prime minister, results of an exclusive poll for Postmedia News and Global National released Friday suggest.
Only 27 per cent of the poll's respondents said they'd want Liberal leader Michael Ignatieff to be top dog, compared with 14 per cent who support Bloc leader Gilles Duceppe and 59 per cent who said Layton.
Read more: http://www.montrealgazette.com/news/Layton+prime+minister+there+coalition+most+Canadians+Jack/4545686/story.html#ixzz1IJnXwAbw
I just posted about the media nonsense going on - it makes me sick and it happens election after election. When are we going to demand better???
ReplyDeleteThe contrast in media coverage between Iggo and PM Harper is staggering. The media jackals stalking PM Harper are belligerent, hostile, and activist in their approach, while the media supporting Iggo are compliant and subservient. Everything PM Harper does or says is negatively spun, while everything Iggo does or says is championed as "brilliant". I've been keeping track of CTV, CBC, CPAC, and it's shocking to witness such unprofessional, blatant corruption of the electoral process by these media whores of the Liberal party.
ReplyDeleteWe all know that once Sun News is up and running, the "outraged" left will be flooding the CRTC with complaints about "false and misleading news" and hate and all that nonsense. I would suggest that we all write to the CRTC (CCing the news outlet in question).
ReplyDeleteCRTC complaints link is: http://www.crtc.gc.ca/RapidsCCM/Register.asp?lang=E