There are a lot of big feelings about media bias in Canada since Oct 7, but not a lot of facts.

One big "bias" exposé was written by a fictional CBC producer & included claims about CBC journalists who were never asked to comment. No verified facts.

But I have some facts..🧵 If you want to know the truth about media bias in Canada since October 7th, you need to pay attention to what is getting covered, not just how it gets covered.

Max Krangle spent 12 years working as a lawyer for Big Tobacco companies, including RJ Reynolds.

He gave me a fascinating interview in which he shared some insights about smoking that were new to me.

For example...🧵 I had no idea that the tobacco industry is much more profitable now than before the war on smoking.

This is not because of vaping... 2/x

Are you active in pro-Palestine/ceasefire/BDS protests?

Do you reject accusations of antisemitism in your movement?

I really want to talk to you. 🧵 First, a promise: I have no intention of trying to convince you that anti-Zionism is antisemitism. I don't believe that it de facto is. I think it's entirely ok to criticize (or to oppose, or even to denounce) the government of Israel, and that doesn't make you anti-Jew. 2/x

What happens when the news industry is gutted?

Important stories go unreported. So we try to fill in the gaps. Like the mystery brain disease in New Brunswick.

It's worse than you were told. 1/x 🧵 Whatever this is, it's horrible. It strikes young and old. Neurological symptoms that get worse and worse. Patients can't remember how to write, they lose mobility, they hallucinate. Eventually, many have died.  At first, the authorities tried to solve it. 2/x

Pierre Poilievre has launched a major campaign attacking Safer Supply drug programs & pushing Trudeau to scrap them & redirect funds to detox/rehab.

He says there's now hard proof Safer Supply doesn't work – a National Post article by @ZivoAdam.

Let's look at that article. 1/x I suspect that few have actually read it. It's 11,000+ words long and lives behind a paywall that few can access. 2/x nationalpost.com/feature/how-th…

Interesting and scary: this sweetheart here is telling the world that PIERRE POILIEVRE'S WIFE IS THE SECRET FORMER CEO OF (Covid-tester) SWITCH HEALTH!!! It's bullshit, easy to disprove & impossible to confirm, so of course it's going viral. Nothing new so far. But check this..🧵 ..he says he learned this shocking truth via ChatGPT(!) It spat out an article citing Anaida Poilievre as the former Switch Health CEO (lol) so he asked the AI to provide source links. And it did! It linked to posts about Switch CEO Anaida from Forbes, CTV, & a press release! 2/x

Pierre Poilievre has a very specific vibe. How would one even describe it? 

Today, @jengerson and I try to nail it down. (thread) Pierre Poilievre looks like he's foreclosing on Adam Sandler’s grandma’s house.

This is what is poorly understood due to secrecy: the media bailout + the Online News Act puts ALL legacy news in Canada under government-dependent support. TV, radio, newspapers: all of it. (thread) A combination of government money plus Facebook money plus Google money will fund ALL legacy news production in Canada. In over 100 cases, it already does+

In 2020 the Trudeau government started paying ongoing subsidies to newspapers.

It was a trip into the unknown! How did gov't decide which papers to bail out and which to let die? What about independence of the press?

Big questions. Now, there are 2 years of answers...(thread) Meet the five people who decide which news orgs are Qualified Canadian Journalism Organizations (QCJOs).

It's a board of news experts – academics & retired journalists – paid by gov't to read articles from every news organization that applies and decide which are up to snuff. +

Canadians generally feel glad that we don't have an equivalent to CNN, doing round-the-clock coverage on big bloody stories.

But sometimes, we need something like that.

The Portapique inquiry is such a case.

This was the biggest massacre in modern history... (thread) We know that the cops were incompetent. We know their mistakes may have cost lives. We know that the
cops lied to cover their tracks.

But there's so much we don't know... +

Cheering for Ukrainians is easy. Cheering for Ukrainian Nationalism is more complicated. Ukrainian Nationalism is a movement with fascist roots, a movement that eagerly collaborated with the Nazis to exterminate 1.5M Ukrainian Jews. (thread) In cheering for Ukrainian Nationalism, the CDN media (and others) launder the movement's enduring Nazi sympathies. @globeandmail ignores the blood and soil symbol on this teen's cap, perhaps unwittingly. @LeDevoir just goes for it, glorifying this Azov battalion soldier. +

Locked down again. Why? The virus is now significantly less harmful than before. And before, our bodies had zero defence. Now, 77% of us are vaccinated. So why are we here again? Is it because of anti-vaxxers? + It's true that a minority of selfish zealots kept us from herd immunity. But that's the case in almost every country in the world.

No, we're in lockdown again because of bad government. +

Daniel Shlafman of the well-known Montreal Shlafman family (Fairmount Bagels) died last month by his own hand after allegedly murdering a sex-worker. Six days later the same newspaper that reported the crime ran a glowing obituary for him... + montrealgazette.remembering.ca/obituary/danie… How did this happen? Did the Gazette choose to honour and respect the Shlafman family at the expense of the well-being of the murdered woman's survivors? Would they have disrespected the victim like this if she had been Shalfman's wife, and not a sex worker? +

I always knew that if Canadaland investigated the WE Organization, there was a good chance we would get sued.

That's why each time, before we published a story on WE, I'd ask myself two crucial questions...(thread) pressprogress.ca/craig-kielburg… Question #1: is this story important enough to be worth the potential trouble?

Question #2: is our reporting solid enough that we can defend every detail of it in court? Because we very well may have to... +

Last weekend, the biggest newspaper in Canada dedicated a 2-page spread in their A section to a takedown attempt on Desmond Cole.

Things got fucked-up even before it ran. Somebody leaked it to Jon Kay, who gleefully teased that The Star had explosive shit on Cole. (thread) Sure enough, when the piece dropped it *looked* like heavy stuff. Heavy author: Royson James, The Star's most senior black voice. Heavy length, heavy art, heavy accusations. Such as... +

Maybe the most fascinating thing about the WE saga (to me anyhow!) is the path the Kielburgers took over the years from doing labor-left activism w unions, to delivering re-branding campaigns & PR services to multinational corporations w bad reputations.
canadaland.com/podcast/chapte… When Craig started at age 12, Canadian labor unions embraced & funded his cause. After all, jobs shipped overseas to child workers/slaves meant fewer manufacturing jobs here in Canada... Craig kinda began as an anti-globalization crusader!

So about this sordid CBC story... canadaland.com/cbc-fired-repo… Rewinding to the start of it, think about how @AhmarSKhan worked for a public institution that glorified & normalized a bigot who routinely incited contempt for people who look like @AhmarSKhan. Don Cherry was at the top of the heap, a star, Khan at the very bottom...

This deep-dive into the #WEscandal by Bloomberg's @natalieobiko @daniellebochove @herbling moves on to the record things we heard about but didn't have enough sources to report.

It also includes a disturbing allegation I hadn't heard.

Here's the new stuff I took from it... 1/x

https://twitter.com/business/status/1343816036156657665

WE buildings in Kenya dedicated to visiting donors were then rededicated after those donors left. A plaque would be installed for a visit then removed & replaced with a new plaque for the next. Multiple parties were led to believe they had "built" the same charity project. 2/x

BBQ boy played the media for suckers.

A few minutes of digging reveals who he really is: not a blue-collar freedom-fighter but a kid from one of Canada's richest neighbourhoods, whose dad owned the property on which he ran his faux-Texan smokehouse. If you've eaten at his joint or read the reviews, you know his schtick: the fetishization of Lone Star realness. Meticulous recreation of Texas "authenticity" not just in the food but in the room and in his persona.

It's a Disneyland simulation and he's the princess.

1. Well, we're getting sued. 

But not by who you think.

The person suing us for defamation is this guy – Keean Bexte. 2. Bexte works for Rebel Media.

Its owner, Ezra Levant, threatened to sue us in August after I called The Rebel "assholes, conmen and grifters" and criticized Bexte's behaviour.

Levant asked for me to retract & apologize. 

I refused.

Then we got a visitor to our newsroom.

Can you imagine Nixon advertising how wonderful & credible newspapers are, during Watergate?

Or Chrétien, during AdScam?

No politician who feels seriously challenged by the press would say something like this.

Praise from a Prime Minister should shame Canada's newspapers. 1/x

https://twitter.com/JustinTrudeau/status/1313132319784529923

Trudeau in fact disparaged the Globe's credibility, the last time they actually became a problem for him; SNC-Lavalin.

They caught him, and all he could do was deny, and shoot the messenger.

I guess he's not too worried about the press right now.

theglobeandmail.com/politics/artic…