If you want to see why the CBC's ratings continue to tank and why so many people in Canada have trouble trusting it and attribute to it a political agenda, watch the Wendy Mesley "interview" of Bernier 1/x
Right from the start you know it's going to be more slur than interview: the first image is a picture of Bernier under the label "mad max." 2/x
and then in the introduction it makes a big deal of the dress his former girlfriend wore to a swearing-in ceremony, as if that has any relevance to what he's doing now -- and since when did slut-shaming become CBC news practice? Jesus. 3/x
Then Wendy ties herself in knots trying to describe Bernier's ideology. He's libertarian, she says, which is "a form of conservatism," which will be news to left-libertarians and libertarian socialists 4/x
She then mashes up libertarianism, conservatism, populism into one big insurgency responsible for Trump and Brexit and changing governments in Brazil and elsewhere, all of it being organized and fuelled by billionaires and big corporations 5/x
I could have sworn a lot of the big corporations and billionaires were against Brexit, and that a lot of billionaires were behind Hilary, too, and that there are "vast influence networks" on both sides of the political divide, but you wouldn't guess that listening to Wendy 6/x
She then connects dots from the evil Koch brothers to the Atlas Foundation to a couple of Canadian think tanks -- Fraser and Montreal Economic Institute -- and suggests they are about to infiltrate Canada thru their dummy, Bernier... 7/x
a bit of research would have told Wendy there is foreign money all over our politics. Then, bizarrely, she says Fraser Institute has received "hundreds of thousands in donations" from Atlas. Does she mean dollars? Not clear, and she don't care so long as it sounds bad 8/x
She forgets to mention that there are legal limitations on political participation by all think tanks in Canada. She next says that Bernier's admiration of Ron Paul makes him a magnet for bigots. Are you a bigot Max? You sure? No, really, you sure? 9/x
Not only can Wendy not handle the ideas or the questions, she can't handle Bernier's answers. She cuts him off and reinterprets what he says to try to fit him into this pre-determined view of him as a bigoted tool of a global right-wing/populist/libertarian insurgency 10/x
And through it all she wears this weak, insincere, pasted-on smile to mask her condescension and contempt for Bernier, her deep-seated fear of ideas and intellectual engagement, and her determination to ensure viewers know ideas are louche, racist, foreign, and dangerous 11/x
I'm not a Bernier supporter. I don't really know what he's about yet and I don't think he does either, but I would appreciated it if she'd let him speak. 12/x
I've been a CBC supporter but performances like this and barton's of a couple weeks ago betray arrogance, a massive deterioration of journalistic standards, and scorn for a huge part of Canada (people who don't share the values of the CBC newsroom). It's becoming a menace 13/13
