Suggestion box

Somebody whom I consider to be a media guru emailed me the other day with this advice.

Trying desperately hard not to throw kerosene upon passengers fleeing a downed aircraft, it seems to me that your commentary - and the comments thereby engendered - on the current war between Israel and Hezbollah is becoming a tad inflammatory. (Apologies for the odd metaphor and bad pun.) I understand and respect your point of view on the issue itself. I don't necessarily agree with it, but that's beside the point.

It might be more useful in your unique position as media observer and commentator to attempt to understand your own cognitive environment, and through that understanding, construct an anti-environment that will enable you to better comment on the issues of the hot media war that parallels the shooting and bombing war. The Middle East conflicts (and now I'm including the wider region) are unique in contemporary history for being as much (or more) about the media war as they are about the actual military action. At the risk of being a scold (again, my apologies) that should be your beat, not the question of Israel's wrongness, rightness, or otherwiseness. (Besides, the back and forth between Jay/Steve on one side and Arthur/Jim/etc. on the other is getting tiresome, I think).

For example, this conflict might be seen as a turning point in the ongoing media war from Israel's perspective because it is the first in which Israel is on top of managing the U.S. mass media (European is another matter). In past conflicts, those opposing Israel (eg. Palestinian spokespeople, with a certain few exceptions - Aaron Brown getting the boot comes to mind) have typically been given sympathetic hearings. Now, my perception is that Israel is getting a lot better coverage than perhaps they deserve. Why this is, is an interesting question, perhaps relating to how the American media has been systematically softened up by the Bush Administration. Among those non- U.S., non-Middle-Eastern media outlets that have played heavily to the anti- terrorism theme, it would be interesting to see if they are following the same hymnal, so to speak.

And so forth. Much more interesting digging and thinking on these themes, I think.

My friend prefers to remain anonymous but said it was okay to post this advice.

I agree with most of it.

What do you think?

Blog bombs away

THIS POST HAS BEEN UPDATED:

The right-wing blogosphere has erupted with claims that Israel is not responsible for the deaths of all those civilians at Qana. Commenters below have posted links to blogs and alternative news sites which raise questions about a supposed gap between the time of the IDF bombardment and the building's collapse. So far I have found nothing in the mainstream media, including Israeli media, or on the wires that picks up this issue.

Near as I can tell, the whole thing started with this story in Israel's more progressive paper, Ha'aretz.

There is an unexplained gap of about seven hours between the one Israeli air strike that hit the Qana building housing the civilians, which took place around 1 A.M. Sunday, and the first report that the building had collapsed, said the chief of staff of the Israel Air Force, Brigadier General Amir Eshel. Speaking at a press conference at the Kirya military complex in Tel Aviv last night, Eshel said that of three Israeli air strikes on Qana early Sunday, only the first strike hit the building in which the civilians were staying. The other two hit areas at least 400 meters away.

"I can't say whether the house collapsed at 12 A.M. or at 8 A.M.," said Eshel. "According to foreign press reports, and this is one of the reports we are relying on, the house collapsed at 8 A.M. We do not have testimony regarding the time of the collapse. If the house collapsed at 12 A.M., it is difficult for me to believe that they waited eight hours to evacuate it."

Meanwhile questions are being raised here and here and here and here and here.

Eshel reported that as recently as two days ago, military intelligence reported the building area had been used by the terrorists for storage or firing of weapons. It was a bad place to cram dozens of women and children.

There are other mysteries. The roof of the building was intact. Journalist Ben Wedeman of CNN noted that there was a larger crater next to the building, but observed that the building appeared not to have collapsed as a result of the Israeli strike.

Why would the civilians who had supposedly taken shelter in the basement of the building not leave after the post-midnight attack? They just went back to sleep and had the bad luck to wait for the building to collapse in the morning?

National Public Radio's correspondent reported that residents of that building had left and the victims were non-residents who chose to shelter in the building that night. They were "too poor" to leave the down, one resident told CNN's Wedeman. Who were these people?

What we do know is that sometime after dawn a call went hour to journalists and rescue workers to come to the scene. And come they did, in droves.

While Hezbollah and its apologists have been claiming that civilians could not freely flee the scene due to Israeli destruction of bridges and roads, the journalists and rescue teams from nearby Tyre had no problem getting there.

Was this a brilliant piece of Hezbollah propaganda? Are the media guilty of falling into line? Or is this a case of the pro-invasion blogosphere seizing a piece of information which is not even close to being confirmed and running away with it?

If you ask me ...

TUESDAY UPDATE: So far this appears to be nothing but unsubstantiated speculation, perhaps even wishful thinking on the part of the right wing blogosphere which just can't handle the truth of this tragedy. Not even a a legitimate Israeli news source has challenged the notion that Israel's bombardment was the direct cause of the deaths of all these children.

Incidentally, here's a bit from Fox News yesterday, one which may help shed light on the disinformation campaign by the pajamahadeen.

HILL: AThe Israelis are reporting, and it hasn't been disputed yet  (my emphasis), that the - that that house that was struck by Israel was struck eight hours before it collapsed.

DOOCY: Midnight.

HILL: Which which - and it collapsed around 8 AM. And so it raises the question of why, after the building was struck, there would be women and children using that for shelter. Perhaps it was just slightly damaged but it also brings up why did it come down then. And some have speculated that it is because of secondary explosions, because we know, from what we have seen on video and from what our reporters have experienced, that frequently Hezbollah has been using houses and the basements to store their own munitions.

DOOCY: Human shields.

The rest of the piece is a highly recommended debunking of this attempt to whitewash the bombing.

Nice try guys.

Maybe next time.

ONE MORE: Even Miri Eisen, the official Israeli spokeperson, doesn't mention this, in the kind of unflinching CNN International interview many of us would love to see happen more often (and not just on this subject) on domestic CNN. The anchor is Rosemary Church.

YET ANOTHER ONE: It gets curioser and curioser. This is from Ha'aretz:

As the Israel Air Force continues to investigate the air strike, questions have been raised over military accounts of the incident.

It now appears that the military had no information on rockets launched from the site of the building, or the presence of Hezbollah men at the time.

The Israel Defense Forces had said after the deadly air-strike that many rockets had been launched from Qana. However, it changed its version on Monday.

Many more twists and turns in the report. But nothing appears to confirm the rightwingosphere's wishful thinking that this was somehow Hezbollah's fault.

COMMENTS ON THIS THREAD HAVE BEEN CLOSED AS ISRAEL HAS APOLOGIZED AND ADMITTED RESPONSIBILITY FOR THIS ATROCITY.  SO MUCH FOR THE FLOGOSPHERE'S ATTEMPT TO MAKE THIS SEEM LIKE ANOTHER MEDIA CONSPIRACY.

I bet Mel Gibson really helps everything

THIS POST HAS BEEN UPDATED:

Jim Wallis, editor-in-chief and executive director of Sojourners, a progressive Christian community, wonders where all the American churches have gone on the crisis in the Middle East. In The Body of Christ in Lebanon (reg. req'd.), he writes

It's time for American Christians to start listening to Christians and churches in the Middle East, and Lebanon would be a good place to start. How many American Christians even know that Lebanon has had, for much of its history, a sizable number of Christians? Current estimates are 1.5 million Christians, or 40% of the population - which means there are fellow Christians potentially affected as casualties and refugees by the U.S. backed Israeli military attacks. It's time to challenge the theology of Christian Zionism advanced by many of the American Religious Right who are completely uncritical of Israel's behavior and totally oblivious to the sufferings (or even the existence) of Arab Christians in the Middle East. These Arab Christians may not be sympathetic to the tactics of Hezbollah, but they are certainly not supportive of the highly disproportionate military responses of Israel which now target their own families and fellow Arab Christians. Where is the American church's solidarity with them? In the Middle East battles between Islamic terrorism and Israeli military attacks, the perspective of Middle Eastern churches might indeed provide a much needed third perspective.

I raise this here because the media

(1) have been allowing the right, religious or otherwise, to portray this Middle Eastern mess, including the war in Iraq, as World War III -- a Biblical clash of civilizations between Muslims and everybody else, when that's not true.

(2) been giving too much voice to the Religious Right and none to moderate and progressive Christians (and Jews) who are against violence, and are horrified by what is happening. Incidentally, as Tikkun magazine points out, the Religious Left is rising up. Hallelujah.

And besides, I love Sojourners, am a regular reader and I just wanted to bring it to your attention.

H/t to David B.

SPEAKING OF BRAVEHEART: Can anybody else remember Mel's charming comments about gays? Funny how those old accusations of homophobia were forgotten in the media rush to document his anti-Semitism.

Charming guy.

Good Christian too.

Bi-blogging

THIS POST HAS BEEN UPDATED:

Lisa Goldman is a Canadian journalist in Israel who blogs here. She has been hosting a rather poignant exchange between, well, here are her words ...

Samir El-Youssef is a Palestinian author and journalist who was born in a refugee camp in Lebanon; today he lives in London. In 2005 he was the recipient of the Swedish PEN Tucholsky Award. His friend Etgar Keret is a bestselling Israeli author, screenwriter, playwright and film director who has won several prestigious awards, including the Prime Minister's Prize.

There are other "Letters of Peace" in that section, including some from Canada.

H/t to Mark Federman.

WELL THAT WAS FAST: Lisa writes:

Thanks for the kind words and link. Just a couple of small corrections: It's true that I am Canadian, a journalist and live in Tel Aviv, but I am also Israeli.

Also, the letters of peace are strictly a one-off exchange between Etgar Keret and Samir El Youssef. They were originally published in Corriere Della Sera, for which I work. There are no Canadian letters of peace on my blog, although there are some nice comments from Canadian readers.

Why there's blood on my walls

CORRECTED TO FIX THE LINKS!

When Tom Tomorrow is as good as this -- available free with if you go through the ads on Salon -- then I just have to share it with you.

More Tom Tomorrow here.

Shields of battle

Does Hezbollah use civilians as human shields, as Israel charges?

It's one of the central questions in this conflict -- and yet I have yet to see any serious investigation of it in the MSM. It's taken as a given. Meanwhile, the right points to photos of Hezbollah flags planted in civilian areas or near that bombed out UN installation where four observers, including one Canadian, were killed last week.

So far Salon magazine (free with one day pass) has produced the only real journalism I have read on the subject.

My own reporting and that of other journalists reveals that in fact Hezbollah fighters -- as opposed to the much more numerous Hezbollah political members, and the vastly more numerous Hezbollah sympathizers -- avoid civilians. Much smarter and better trained than the PLO and Hamas fighters, they know that if they mingle with civilians, they will sooner or later be betrayed by collaborators -- as so many Palestinian militants have been.

For their part, the Israelis seem to think that if they keep pounding civilians, they'll get some fighters, too. The almost nightly airstrikes on the southern suburbs of Beirut could be seen as making some sense, as the Israelis appear convinced there are command and control bunkers underneath the continually smoldering rubble. There were some civilian casualties the first few nights in places like Haret Hreik, but people quickly left the area to the Hezbollah fighters with their radios and motorbikes.

But other attacks seem gratuitous, fishing expeditions, or simply intended to punish anything and anyone even vaguely connected to Hezbollah. Lighthouses, grain elevators, milk factories, bridges in the north used by refugees, apartment buildings partially occupied by members of Hezbollah's political wing -- all have been reduced to rubble.

In the south, where Shiites dominate, just about everyone supports Hezbollah. Does mere support for Hezbollah, or even participation in Hezbollah activities, mean your house and family are fair game? Do you need to fire rockets from your front yard? Or is it enough to be a political activist?

The Israelis are consistent: They bomb everyone and everything remotely associated with Hezbollah, including noncombatants. In effect, that means punishing Lebanon. The nation is 40 percent Shiite, and of that 40 percent, tens of thousands are employed by Hezbollah's social services, political operations, schools, and other nonmilitary functions. The "terrorist" organization Hezbollah is Lebanon's second-biggest employer.

<SNIP>

Perhaps once a year, Hezbollah will hold a military parade in the south, in which its weapons and fighters appear. Media access to these parades is tightly limited and controlled. Unlike the fighters in the half dozen other countries where I have covered insurgencies, Hezbollah fighters do not like to show off for the cameras. In Iraq, with some risk taking, you can meet with and even watch the resistance guys in action. (At least you could during my last time there.) In Afghanistan, you can lunch with Taliban fighters if you're willing to walk a day or so in the mountains. In Gaza and the West Bank, the Fatah or Hamas fighter is almost ubiquitous with his mask, gun and sloganeering to convince the Western journalist of the justice of his cause.

The Hezbollah guys, on the other hand, know that letting their fighters near outsiders of any kind -- journalists or Lebanese, even Hezbollah supporters -- is stupid. In three trips over the last week to the south, where I came near enough to the fighting to hear Israeli artillery, and not just airstrikes, I saw exactly no fighters. Guys with radios with the look of Hezbollah always found me. But no fighters on corners, no invitations to watch them shoot rockets at the Zionist enemy, nothing that can be used to track them.

<SNIP>

Israel, however, has chosen to treat the political members of Hezbollah as if they were fighters. And by targeting the civilian wing of the group, which supplies much of the humanitarian aid and social protection for the poorest people in the south, they are targeting civilians.

Earlier in the week, I stood next to a giant crater that had smashed through the highway between Tyre and Sidon -- the only route of escape for most of the people in the far south. Overhead, Israeli fighters and drones circled above the city and its outlying areas and regular blasts of bombs and naval artillery could be heard.

The crater served as a nice place to check up on the refugees, who were forced by the crater to slow down long enough to be asked questions. They barely stopped, their faces wrenched in near panic. The main wave of refugees out of the south had come the previous two days, so these were the hard-luck cases, the people who had been really close to the fighting and who needed two days just to get to Tyre, or who had had to make the tough decision whether to flee or stay put, with neither choice looking good.

The roads in the south are full of the cars of people who chose wrong -- burned-out chassis, broken glass, some cars driven straight into posts or ditches. Other seem to have broken down or run out of gas on the long dirt detours around the blown-out highway and bridge network the Israeli air force had spent days methodically destroying even as it warned people to flee.

<SNIP>

So the analysts talking on cable news about Hezbollah "hiding within the civilian population" clearly have spent little time if any in the south Lebanon war zone and don't know what they're talking about. Hezbollah doesn't trust the civilian population and has worked very hard to evacuate as much of it as possible from the battlefield. And this is why they fight so well -- with no one to spy on them, they have lots of chances to take the Israel Defense Forces by surprise, as they have by continuing to fire rockets and punish every Israeli ground incursion.

And the civilians? They see themselves as targeted regardless of their affiliation.

Dawgie puts it rather succinctly here.

By the way not much has been written about how Israel may be using Palestinians as human shields.

Obviously, as shields, no matter which side may be using them, they aren't very effective. Too many people are dead and there seems to be no end to the bloodshed.

IP on my paranaoia

Arik is a commenter who recently popped up on this blog. A staunch supporter of Israel's incursion into Israel Lebanon, s/he has a number of IPs, perhaps half a dozen. So many that I have stopped tracking them.

At one point, I even suspected that Arik was more than one person, perhaps even a lobbyist for the pro-Israel side. But I quickly dismissed that notion because, really, I have better things to think about. Besides, I welcome all commentary, as long as people are reasonably reasonable.

Then reader H.S. tipped me to this, from the conservative Times online (I added the link):

WHILE Israel fights Hezbollah with tanks and aircraft, its supporters are campaigning on the internet.

Israel’s Government has thrown its weight behind efforts by supporters to counter what it believes to be negative bias and a tide of pro-Arab propaganda. The Foreign Ministry has ordered trainee diplomats to track websites and chatrooms so that networks of US and European groups with hundreds of thousands of Jewish activists can place supportive messages.

In the past week nearly 5,000 members of the World Union of Jewish Students (WUJS) have downloaded special “megaphone” software that alerts them to anti-Israeli chatrooms or internet polls to enable them to post contrary viewpoints. A student team in Jerusalem combs the web in a host of different languages to flag the sites so that those who have signed up can influence an opinion survey or the course of a debate.

Jonny Cline, of the international student group, said that Jewish students and youth groups with their understanding of the web environment were ideally placed to present another side to the debate.

“We’re saying to these people that if Israel is being bashed, don’t ignore it, change it,” Mr Cline said. “A poll like CNN’s takes just a few seconds to vote in, but if thousands take part the outcome will be changed. What’s vital is that the international face of the conflict is balanced.”

Which is why you must never trust Internet polls.

In fact, last week, I received a ''bulk'' email friom an activist for the Palestinian side in this debate, asking that I rush over to the Globe and Mail's website to vote no to whether Prime Minister Stephen was handling the crisis well. The no's won.

But this is the first time I have ever heard of an organized state-supported effort to troll through blogs and post comments, to propagandize and to fight back, online. It's quite brilliant really, a new form of viral idea marketing.

So maybe Arik is not really Arik? (Interestingly, the name means lion in Hebrew, and it is Ariel Sharon's nickname.) Not that I care mind you, but I am the type of person who believe in standing up for your convictions, with your real name and IP number.

UPDATE: CJR Online has more here.

The result: Deeply entrenched partisans yelling at each other in a sort of orgy of catharsis long overdue in a region where people literally could not speak directly to each other while remaining in their countries. Now, with chat-rooms and the like, a space that transcends borders has been created, where dialogue can bloom. Sure, right now it doesn't sound like dialogue, but there is some evidence in these discussions that there is room to hear The Other -- once partisans get over the initial shock of being confronted with positions that hate had until now shielded them from hearing before.

That dialogue is perhaps a far better chance for lasting and viable resolution in the region than any military campaign or ceasefire.

And here's the software being employed for this propaganda action.

Take debate

THIS POST HAS BEEN UPDATED & CLEANED UP TO FIX A FUNKY FONT:

The National Post's Adam Radwanski was, like me, appalled at that offensive post last week on the Western Standard's Shotgun. Here's what he wrote about it last week on his own  blog.

I normally find it easy to ignore the yahoos at the Western Standard's site, who pretty much represent the worst tendencies of the blogosphere (ideologues with nothing fresh to say sitting around stroking each others’ egos and paranoia until they’re convinced they’re in the mainstream). And I’m not generally in the habit of following Antonia Zerbisias’ lead. But two of their recent discussions, here and here, are truly jaw-dropping – at least to those of us who don’t spend a lot of time reading hate literature.

In sum, we’ve got a frequent poster (and blogger in her own right) ranting about “the devil that they call Allah,” labeling Islam “a death cult” and calling for the entire religion to be banned in Canada…and when she slightly clarifies her position (without backing down) after Chris Selley calls her on her bigotry, the rest of the Western Standard community turns on her for being too moderate.

If I were Ezra Levant or Kevin Libin, both of whom frequently post on there, I’d either get this hatred the hell down or clearly and unequivocally distance myself and my magazine from it. The fact that they’ve done neither is a much better reason to avoid the Western Standard than any reprinted cartoons.

To date, there has been no repudiation of that post -- at least none that I can find -- from the publishers of Western Standard or its blog overseers.

Anyway ...

Radwanski columnizes on the matter today for the paper's ''Issues'' page. (sub. req'd.) He argues that political blogs are about two warring sides dug deep into their opposing trenches from where they lob their verbal fireballs.

If Right Girl had stood on a street corner calling for Islam to be banned, passers-by would either have shouted her down or dismissed her as a kook. Any newspaper that published her views would have been deluged with disgusted letters to the editor. But in this forum, the comments that followed her post lauded her for taking such a brave stand -- and, in some cases, went even further in their attacks on Muslims.

The blog in question was The Shotgun, found on the Western Standard's Web site. But the issue wasn't the conservative magazine, which of course can't be held responsible for the messages that wing nuts post on its blog. The issue was the broader blog medium that's having a nasty effect on public discourse.

The blogosphere is good for music and trading notes on pop culture. It can be great for sports commentary. It's a way to pass time for those interested in reading the mundane details of strangers' personal lives.

But what it is absolutely lousy for is political debate -- mostly because what it encourages is not debate at all, so much as support groups in which the converted preach to one another about the evils of some dark and mysterious enemy. Those frequenting blogs don't learn much and their views are rarely challenged. What they get out of the experience is having their own views reinforced over and over again, until even relative moderates are converted into hard-liners.

Frankly, I think he's wrong. Just look at my comments threads although, admittedly, since July 12, the ones relating to the Middle East smell of burning flesh. My blog is not the only one that has contributions from both sides of the political spectrum. Radwanski, who has no comments on his blog, has some nerve knocking other blogs that do.

This is not to say that he's completely wrong. For example, I agree with him completely here, although it's not a new idea:

Go to right-wing political blogs, forums and online magazines, from the big names -- National Review Online, Instapundit, Little Green Footballs -- to an army of smaller ones, and you'll read only of the joyous success of U.S. foreign policy and the evils of Democrats, the "mainstream media," Hollywood and all things "liberal." Go to their equivalents on the other side of the spectrum, notably the enormously popular Daily Kos, and you'll find left-wing types working themselves into a lather over the evils of the Bush administration, the right-wing media and all things conservative.

Both sides would have you believe they're engaged in a righteous war with one another for the soul of America. But because they never actually engage each other, it's not a war at all -- it's just two sides endlessly rallying the troops.

<SNIP>

This would be a relatively minor concern if such fulminating was limited to the Internet. But conditioned by their online reading, as well as listening to Fox and talk radio, consumers are demanding the same stuff elsewhere.

The rise of an (she-who-will-nevermore-be-named-on-this blog) on the right or an Al Franken on the left -- commentators who spend most of their time attacking cartoon versions of liberals and conservatives, respectively -- suggests where this culture is taking us.

<SNIP>

In Canada, we're moving slower. But there's little doubt we're headed in the same direction.

Here, the right is a little more organized than the left -- the "Blogging Tories" group creating a community of hundreds of like-minded blogs with similar obsessions (the liberal media, pacifists, etc.) to the ones found south of the border. But it's the Canadian left that has actually shown the biggest crossover into mainstream media, courtesy of Antonia Zerbisias -- a media columnist and blogger for the Toronto Star whose main job appears to be attacking conservative commentators on both sides of the border.

Uh, did he just make me out to be the lefty Canadian version of that right-wing she-who-nevermore-etc. in the U.S.? Doesn't he read my stuff about CBC??

But Radwanski is correct: So far in Canada, we have avoided that all-heat-no-light partisan political punditry that ''informs'' Americans.  And we should strive to make sure it doesn't happen here.

But with commentators increasingly emulating the zealous partisanship of the online crowd in the hope of eliciting similarly strong reactions, it might not be long. It's a trend that should remind us to hold ourselves to a higher standard, to seek out dissenting views and think critically about the perspectives being sold to us -- because the last thing we need is a nation of Right Girls and their sycophants.

But you, my sycophants on either side of the debate, you get the thumbs up.

Just do me a favour will you? Keep it down to a low roar. I am now being bloody ruthless about deleting or editing comments. No appeal.

UPPITY DATE: Robert McClelland in the comments below found this response posted today by Western Standard publisher Ezra Levant.

I think it is a better approach to let the marketplace of ideas sort these things out. Artificially censoring what can and can't be written -- like Zerbisias does -- or not permitting feedback at all -- like Radwanski does -- are old media calling cards. In the new media, if you don't allow people to react and respond, they'll go elsewhere where they can. It's quite democratic, and like other aspects of democracy, it can be grubby.

In the end, I believe that by maintaining a balance of views on the blog -- libertarians, conservatives, hawks, isolationists, people from different countries and different religions -- we will get a great debate. I acknowledge that some of the comments have been less than smart, or even vulgar. But that, too, is the nature of democracy, and it is far more interesting reading than the bowdlerized letters to the editor of the MSM.

Give Zerbisias and Radwanski some credit: At least they know what a blog is, and have one themselves. But I'm loathe to accept criticism about our rough and tumble free comments threads from writers whose own newspapers don't allow them to have free comments threads. It's like when Zerbisias came out against the Danish cartoons -- the fact that her employer had ordered her to comply with their censorship undermined her claim to independently having come to that journalistic conclusion on her own, and she knew it.

The Western Standard will continue to have the freest blog of any in Canada affiliated with a corporate media organ. That will ruffle the feathers of politically correct enforcers, but it will also continue to make us a center of the debate, and give us 2-million page views a month and growing. In fact, the very idea of an MSM enforcer shaking a finger at too-rough bloggers sums things up pretty well -- an impotent scold who can't get the public to obey their politically correct line. That's the MSM in a nutshell.

Two things.

One, I wonder, had RightGirl had said "Judaism" instead of Islam, if Levant would have been so unperturbed.

Two, I am hurt Ezra! HURT! That it took a column in the National Post for you to finally pay attention to this matter.

UPBRAID DATE: J. Kelly Nestruck, bless him, calls Ezra Levant out in the comments below. Seems that Levant has indeed edited Shotgun, to protect his friend Prime Minister Stephen Harper or, more specifically, Laureen Harper. Wonkitties has the details.

One more

Further to ABC's axing of The One: Making of a Music Star.

I just caught an ad for the CBC-TV simulcast  -- ''what promises to be the must-see show of the season!'' -- on CNN.

Uh ...

Anyway, CBC-TV will be plugging the simulcast holes with U.S. movies which, even if they're straight-to-video barkers, will do better than The One did. Meanwhile, Arthur Lewis, spokesperson for Our Public Airwaves, a lobby group associated with CBC's unions, sent this statement on the cancellation.

Clearly they've been expecting and planning for this -- they've already announced plans to replace it with American movies.

That's what they always do because clearly this whole episode has been about generating advertising revenue and nothing does that better at the lowest cost than American movies.

How sad that our national public broadcaster has been reduced to this. It demonstrates the degree to which CBC Television has lost its way. It also demonstrates the financial desperation of CBC and the degree to which programming choices are being determined by commercial considerations.

The Harper government seems to have backed away from its plan to review the CBC's mandate.  This sad episode demonstrates very clearly why that mandate review is needed and why it's needed now."

One added thought:  "I would encourage CBC to go ahead with its planned Canadian version of The One.  There's nothing wrong with CBC doing a reality show of that type.  It's clearly within the CBC mandate.  And it's important for CBC to do programming that reflects all aspects of Canadian life to Canadians.  So why not?"

Meanwhile, Kirstine Layfield, executive director of CBC-TV programming, told the Globe and Mail today that the ratings were improving, which they were. Kind of.

“That's one of the things we've learned from watching the show overseas, that it does take time to build,” she said, noting the show's setup isn't a “straight-up talent format.”

“It is one where you need to find out more about the contestants, they're raw talent so early performances aren't going to be as good as later performances,” she added.

“It's all part of them being coached and trained. The BBC stuck with it through its first year and renewed it for multiple years because it found its way.”

But in the U.S. corporate media, it's perform right away or die, even if the reviews are great.

Which, in The One's case, they weren't.

Dem Aspers dey run everyding

Further to this story yesterday, the Winnipeg Free Press (sub. req'd.) today published a GREAT! BIG! OOPSIE!

WE APOLOGIZE

Friday, July 28th, 2006

We reported wrongly yesterday that Lloyd Axworthy, a former Liberal foreign affairs minister, criticized Winnipeg's Asper family for using its media empire to defend Israel and shape Canadian foreign policy. He did not say that. In fact, Axworthy was referring to groups of diaspora -- various ethnic communities in today's multicultural society -- influencing Canadian foreign policy. Where we quoted Axworthy as saying "the Aspers," he in fact had said "diasporas." We sincerely apologize to both Axworthy and the Asper family.

Can you imagine what went on behind the scenes on that one?