Want democratic reform? Let’s start with our newspapers

[Oscar]

Want democratic reform? Let’s start with the country’s newspapers

[ http://murraydobbin.ca/2015/10/30/want- ... ewspapers/ ]

by Murray Dobbin Posted: 30 Oct 2015 04:04 PM PDT

Observing the cathartic effect of the end the Harper regime reveals just how traumatized millions of Canadians were by nearly 10 years of rule by this vindictive prime minister. The analogies and metaphors keep coming: like getting out of jail, like waking up from a nightmare, like the end of an occupation.

This election will provide students, pundits and authors with career-building opportunities to dissect the results. Part of that analysis will, of course, examine the unprecedented assault on democracy carried about the Conservatives. As it should, because undoing the damage must be the litmus test for the new Liberal government and Parliament.

However, while it is critical to track these efforts, the other democratic institution which needs renewed attention is the media and in particular the newspapers in this country. Regrettably, we have adapted to the outrageous concentration of newspaper ownership in Canada, greater than in any other developed Western nation.

But the newspapers perhaps did us a favour in the last week of the campaign with their inane endorsement of the Harper autocracy for yet another four-year term. Postmedia and the Globe and Mail actually managed to write editorials justifying the re-election of a man turfed from office by a tsunami of voter revulsion.

The Globe and Mail and the National Post editorials both declared their support because of Harper’s economic record — but ignored all the actual evidence. The Globe declared: “The key issue of the election should have been the economy and the financial health of Canadians. On that score, the Conservative Party has a solid record.” And the National Post: “Harper’s commendable record in office cannot be dismissed. Our economy is in good shape…”

These declarations are infuriating because the exact opposite was recently meticulously documented by Unifor economist Jim Stanford, who co-wrote an analysis of all the prime ministers back to 1945 using 16 separate indicators. It wasn’t even close: Stephen Harper’s government had by far the worst economic record of any government in 70 years: “For 13 of the 16 indicators, the Stephen Harper Conservative government ranks last or second last among all postwar Prime Ministers. And its average ranking across all 16 indicators is by far the worst.”
(LINK added. Ed.) [ http://unifor.org/en/whats-new/press-ro ... s-post-war ]

It should come as no surprise that the National Post and the Globe should rank the Harper government as having a “solid” economic record. They don’t mention in their assessment the many aspects of the economy that are not solid — aspects that affect ordinary people: unemployment, growth, job creation, youth employment, job quality, real personal incomes, inequality, or personal debt.

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