“Well there’s yer problem right there ma’am.”
Late today: Another news interview and another great answer from John Manley—the horse’s mouth—from his direct experience in Afghanistan while he was there. (Ties in nicely with this blog entry regarding Tellier’s remarks, to which I’ve also appended this quote.)
Note the first few words of this quote as transcribed by me from the interview on the CBC “Politics” show. Allow me to direct you to ask yourself and anyone who will listen: “why not?!”
John Manley:
…not that I would ever be critical of the media but Don [CBC “Politics” anchor Newman], when we visited a project in the center of Kabul—an amazing redevelopment project, largely funded by CIDA [the Canadian International Development Agency], you know, you’ve got the whole package there: redevelopment, girls in school, the whole thing.A group of Canadian reporters came to see it because it was a CIDA project. That afternoon, regrettably a Canadian soldier was killed — [so] the whole story was killed, so that we could report (a) the incident; then, a couple of days later we show the ramp ceremony; then we show the return; then we show the funeral. Canadians have the impression that all we do over there is sit and get shot! Well we’re doing a lot more. And balancing that story is an important element of ensuring that Canadians actually know what it is they either support or oppose with this huge investment of our resources in Afghanistan.
The interview pretty much ended right after that.
One of the key recommendations should have been to criticize the media. The media, far from being part of the solution, are actually part of the problem. I’m not sure whose side they’re on. Many are on the enemy’s side, I’m sure of that. They want America and Canada to lose. Some are only concerned about liberals’ prospects of winning elections if positive things happen while conservatives are in power —they want to lose until liberals are in power.
The liberals’ media LOVE to report on the deaths. They can’t write one story about Afghanistan without appending the latest death stats of Canadian soldiers. It’s just about all you hear out of Afghanistan in the liberals’ media. They apparently don’t WANT you to know about all the good news from there.
Similarly, did you know that the surge in Iraq is working beyond anyone’s wildest dreams, and violence has been quashed by something in the order of 60 and 80% since it took hold? No you didn’t know that. That’s because the media stopped reporting on Iraq as soon as things started looking better there and that surge they so detested (because it might help win the war, which they don’t want to see happen) was working. They turned their attention to the economy instead. Suddenly they noticed the economy (and they started talking it down, of course).
Amazing.
Manley Report Coverage at PTBC up to now:
• Manley Report’s Pamela Wallin also had good words
• Manley report’s Paul Tellier speaks to lack of balance in reporting the Afghanistan mission
• John Manley’s strong, good words: seemingly plays against Team Dion’s Modern Liberal Party stance
• Post-Manley report: Dion looks, sounds embarrassed, sheepish, and defeated
• Know the enemy: Stephane Dion lies—says Canada’s “tradition” is to train folks, pile bricks
PTBC was founded by Mr. Johannesen in 2000.
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