Subject: Regulators Reject Proposal That Would Bring Fox-Style News to Canada
From: "Michael Andrews" <[email-masked]>
To: "Hunter Biden" <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 3 Mar 2011 09:10:12 -0500

Robert F. Kennedy Jr.President, Waterkeeper Alliance; Professor, Pace  
University
Posted: February 28, 2011 09:54 PM
BIOBecome a FanGet Email AlertsBloggers' Index
Regulators Reject Proposal That Would Bring Fox-Style News to Canada
Amazing
Inspiring
Funny
Scary
Hot
Crazy
Important
Weird
Read More: Fox News , Stephen Harper , Sun News , Media News

SHARE THIS STORY

12,878
2,644
1266
2,402
Get Media Alerts
  Sign Up
Submit this story
As America's middle class battles for its survival on the Wisconsin  
barricades -- against various Koch Oil surrogates and the corporate  
toadies at Fox News -- fans of enlightenment, democracy and justice  
can take comfort from a significant victory north of Wisconsin border.  
Fox News will not be moving into Canada after all! The reason: Canada  
regulators announced last week they would reject efforts by Canada's  
right wing Prime Minister, Stephen Harper, to repeal a law that  
forbids lying on broadcast news.

Canada's Radio Act requires that "a licenser may not broadcast....any  
false or misleading news." The provision has kept Fox News and right  
wing talk radio out of Canada and helped make Canada a model for  
liberal democracy and freedom. As a result of that law, Canadians  
enjoy high quality news coverage including the kind of foreign affairs  
and investigative journalism that flourished in this country before  
Ronald Reagan abolished the "Fairness Doctrine" in 1987. Political  
dialogue in Canada is marked by civility, modesty, honesty,  
collegiality, and idealism that have pretty much disappeared on the  
U.S. airwaves. When Stephen Harper moved to abolish anti-lying  
provision of the Radio Act, Canadians rose up to oppose him fearing  
that their tradition of honest non partisan news would be replaced by  
the toxic, overtly partisan, biased and dishonest news coverage  
familiar to American citizens who listen to Fox News and talk radio.  
Harper's proposal was timed to facilitate the launch of a new right  
wing network, "Sun TV News" which Canadians call "Fox News North."

Harper, often referred to as "George W. Bush's Mini Me," is known for  
having mounted a Bush like war on government scientists, data  
collectors, transparency, and enlightenment in general. He is a wizard  
of all the familiar tools of demagoguery; false patriotism, bigotry,  
fear, selfishness and belligerent religiosity.

Harper's attempts to make lying legal on Canadian television is a  
stark admission that right wing political ideology can only dominate  
national debate through dishonest propaganda. Since corporate profit- 
taking is not an attractive vessel for populism, a political party or  
broadcast network that makes itself the tool of corporate and  
financial elites must lie to make its agenda popular with the public.  
In the Unites States, Fox News and talk radio, the sock puppets of  
billionaires and corporate robber barons have become the masters of  
propaganda and distortion on the public airwaves. Fox News's  
notoriously biased and dishonest coverage of the Wisconsin's protests  
is a prime example of the brand of news coverage Canada has smartly  
avoided.