Ignatieff and the media

Yesterday, aboard the Liberal Express, we got several glimpses into Michael Ignatieff's feelings about the media.

There were, first of all, these comments, about his personal feelings toward the arts, CBC and the Canada Council. Essentially, Ignatieff  told the crowd in Kingston that his personal past is all tied up in these institutions, so they could all be reassured of his allegiance if he becomes prime minister. 

But there was another, more provocative question posed to Ignatieff yesterday as well, about how Liberals could try to regain favour with the national media. Given that my own newspaper has delivered a bit of a kick to him this morning, Ignatieff's answer is probably worth noting:

There are representatives of the national media here. I say that for a reason. It’s a waste of time in politics to blame the messenger. It is a waste of time to try to manipulate the messenger. These guys have got a job to do. ... (CTV national reporter) Roger Smith is five feet away from me here and he’s got a job to do. And we welcome him here and he can report any darn way he wants. And if I get it wrong, it’s my problem, not his problem. So let’s get out of the Harper mindset, which is: we’ve got to control this, we’ve got to spin this, we’ve got to manipulate this, we’ve got to keep them 45 miles away, we’ve got to set up a roster of which questions get asked and which can’t get asked. If the bus breaks down, we don’t tell them some story. We try to get a replacement bus and try to get them on the bus as soon as possible. And we did.  I don’t know any other way to do it, other than ‘what you see is what you get’. And you go to Canadians and you make your pitch.

Later on last evening, on the patio of the Holiday Inn in Peterborough, Ignatieff and his wife Zsuzsanna convened a dinner of reporters travelling with him. I was there, along with the National Post's John Ivison, Sun Media's Brian Lilley, The Globe and Mail's John Ibbitson and Matthew Pearson from the Ottawa Citizen.  The talk was pretty much the same kind any folks would have over dinner -- movies, books, sports and  travel were the main subjects. Scotland figured heavily into the discussions, funnily enough, because three of us have direct roots there (Ivison had just returned from a visit to his homeland) and Ignatieff's daughter has just graduated from the University of Edinburgh. Other than that, no great state secrets were revealed. If it's true that an exit strategy from politics is being contemplated, as my paper is reporting, Ignatieff gave absolutely no hint of that over dinner with the media.

Oh, and before anyone is tempted to start carping about cozy dinners between reporters  and Liberal politicians, I should note that Stephen Harper also had many social contacts with the media before he became prime minister and continues to invite reporters over for garden parties and Christmas gatherings.  If memory serves, I believe I was at a small dinner party at Harper's house only a couple of months before the 2005-06 election.

Comments

[David Gagnon]

Maybe if the big lazy entitled parties, their "salarymen", and their twitchy advertising pros were concentrating on the long term ... some of today's politicians would have a longer shelf life before early coups by over-eager successors.

Instead, voters are subject to never-ending leadership and election campaigns about the next big "winner". Parties beg for money for advertising but not to develop appropriate long-term policy from, like, you know ... census data.

If leaders have actual "policy ideas" based on actual "evidence" ... maybe they should be encouraged to stick around even if defeated once.

Having good ideas is hard, but anyone can read a teleprompter, go to Tims, give the Queen a hockey sweater, and kiss a general (repeat) ... as we have seen.

[Joe Colangelo]

What this Canadian is not going to forget is the fact that the Liberals were MIA during Canada's greatest hour on need. The need was to stop that insane budget from passing. What Harper has put into place is exactly the kind of regulatory system in the US that lead to the Gulf disaster. It is even worse. IN the USA at least someone had to get paid off before they got an exemption-now with the oil companies doing their own environmental assessments where is the need. Unless of course they go to the Minister in charge to ask for an exemption-another mistake that lead to the gulf disaster-and here it is built right into the system. And all of this in the ARCTIC no less. Harper simply does not care about Canadians, unless they are from Alberta and in the Oil business. Indeed he uses Toronto for the G20 but won't consider Toronto Ontario the financial capital of Canada for the location of the new national stock exchange he is trying to initiate. "Being an Albertan../." the P.M says makes him loath to do so. Well Mr. Harper you are the head of the government of Canada and should be thinking what is best for all of Canada not just your home province. He has gutted our environmental laws, he is dismantling Atomic Energy Canada-and Ontario is 50% nuclear dependent for energy. One gets the impression that Harper would like to help the American's fulfill their manifest destiny and assimilate the country. We are not stronger with him at the helm. Quite the opposite. A hostile take over of Brand Canada is in the making and Harper is leading the charge-with Goldman Sacs along for the ride-say goodbye to CPP, teachers pension and any other capital in this country. Harper has not only opened the door-he stacked the deck with foreign interlopers waiting with baited breath to abscond with savings that took Canadians 50 years to amass.

[MyThought]

Well, I don't know how much reporting is getting done. I looked at the headlines this morning - keeping in mind that Ignatieff has only been on tour a couple of days, and it attack after attack.

In other words, media have already made up their minds.

Lazy, partisan and pathetic.

Would it be more honest to give it more time before making decisions about the tour?

...sigh...the media frustrate the hell out of me.

[Will]

Seems to me that no matter what Ignatieff does on this tour, the national media will simply twist it into something negative, from where the bus ends up getting fixed to the weather. The 'opinion' writers will result in his downfall. They will make sure of that.

[Daryl]

If that quote from Ignatieff is correct than Liberals have a serious problem. Messaging is key to be successful in politics. They will get killed if they think otherwise.
He is either naive with his "what you see is what you get" or he is exaggerating and Liberals will continue efforts to spin and control the message.

[Dorothy]

Mr. Ignatieff is as bad for Canada and is Stephen Harper. Ignatieff is more concerned with his own career (getting elected) than about what is being done to this country of ours. If he truly believed in what is best for Canada, Ignatieff would step down and allow the liberals to select a party leader with some cahones. Someone who can take on Harper and his band of ministers who seem to know very little of what they were sent to Ottawa to do. Just look at any of them during an interview. If they didn't have to tow the party line as well as spin, spin, spin, there would be nothing coming out of their mouths.
It's a sad day when people like Flaherty, Clement are going along with Harper just to keep their jobs. Do they even know what this country and it's system of government is all about. Apparently not.
Such a disappointment for all of Canadians. Why do we have to wait for Harper to completely destroy Canada before Canadians wake up and see just what is happening? Don't we all see what happened in the U.S. and the difficulty now in cleaning up the mess that Cheney/Bush left? Why should we let it happen here?