Two cases of blatant fake news in the Winnipeg mainstream media this week serve as prime examples of why consumers continue to abandon the MSM by the thousands.
The most egregious is the smear campaign being conducted in the Manitoba Legislature by the NDP and Liberals against Kevin Klein, the Progressive Conservative candidate in the upcoming Kirkfield Park by-election.
The smear was led by MLA Dougald Lamont, who has officially donned the crown as the slimiest politician in the province. Lamont is the "leader" of a rump group of 3 MLA's who sit in the far back benches under the banner of the Liberal Party of Manitoba, though they have no chance of ever becoming the government, and can't even elect enough members to qualify as a legitimate 'party' in the Legislature.
Lamont has been attacking Klein for working with Peter Nygaard, the "disgraced fashion mogul" as the Winnipeg Free Press labels him. Nygaard is in jail in Toronto awaiting trial on counts of sexual assault and forcible confinement.
The Opposition and Lamont have been trying to tie Klein to Nygaard (and thusly to the criminal charges) by stressing that Klein worked for Nygaard, a decade ago. He did, for four months in 2012 and two weeks in 2014.
The smear was inadvertently summed up by the Free
Press in this sentence:
"When can Manitobans expect an explanation of exactly
what kind of work Kevin Klein did for Nygaard and why the PCs have no problem
with it?"
That's it. That's the sum of the smear. Keep
mentioning the two men together to create a mirage of guilt by association.
No details, no facts, no truth. And rely on the press to do the rest by amplifying the smear.
It’s the sleaziest tactic possible, akin to the
apocryphal "when did you stop beating your wife?"
And the media, especially the Winnipeg Free Press and CBC, are doing their parts gleefully.
FP opinion columnist and King of Fake News, Dan Lett, tried to give the smear some legitimacy by calling it a measure of Klein's character and raising the question for Manitoban's of "how can you trust a politician who cannot be fully transparent..."
But if those are the issues, then the MSM has a
better, and bigger, target in the Legislature, particularly on Nov. 25, the
International Day of Elimination of Violence Against Women.
... Seeing Dougald Lamont get all the press attention,
NDP leader Wab Kinew decided to get into the smear business along with his
shrill sidekick Nahanni Fontaine.
The press ignored the baggage they carried with them.
Transparency? Kinew wrote a memoir that was released just before he entered politics in which he confessed to being that sterotypical "drunk Indian" in his youth, a lifestyle which led to criminal charges of drunk driving, assault on a cab driver, and cashing a stolen money order. He failed to mention the two charges of domestic abuse against his former common-law wife. (He was charged but the matter was dropped months later when the Crown allegedly couldn't reach the woman to proceed, something she denies.)
The Winnipeg MSM ran interference for Kinew at the
time, focussing on trying to identify the person who anonymously spilled the
beans on Kinew.
It was only after being shamed by The Black Rod for ignoring the woman who accused Kinew that reporters bothered to find andinterview her for her account of what happened.
Character?
Nahanni Fontaine said publicly she believes the woman's story, but she still
supports Wab Kinew because he has "changed".
Nice try, Nahanni. To this day Kinew says the incident of domestic abuser never happened. He hasn't changed much. He denies what Nahanni Fontaine believes is true, essentially calling his accuser of being a liar.
Nahanni
Fontaine is okay with that.
He has never given, or been asked by a reporter, for his version of what happened that night he allegedly terrorized a woman, dragging her around the carpet by her hair and sitting her on a balcony leaving her fearing he would throw her over.
The NDP never mentions the International Day of Elimination
of Violence Against Women anymore, either.
The
second example of Fake News comes courtesy of CBC Manitoba.
Province 'missing
the moment' amid staff shortages: Manitoba Health Coalition
Ozten Shebahkeget
· CBC News · Posted: Nov 20, 2022 3:06 PM CT |
[Photo Caption] Manitoba's desire to further engage with the private sector in public health care, which was expressed in last week's throne speech, may ultimately hurt Manitoba's health-care system, experts say. (Shutterstock)
The province said it intends to increase public-private partnerships in health-care to reduce patient wait times during last week's throne speech, drawing criticism from the opposition and raising eyebrows among health-care experts.
What "experts"?
The Manitoba Health Coalition. What's that?
we asked.
Their
website answers:
"Non-profit, non-partisan advocacy
organization bringing Manitobans together to protect & expand universal,
public health care. Provincial Director @tmlinner”
But we dug deeper.
And found that the Manitoba Health Coalition is
actually an NDP front group that's used to dupe journalists into spreading NDP
propaganda.
The provincial director is Thomas Linner. He was revealed 10 years ago as a Manitoba NDP policy analyst who tried to uncover dirt on federal minister of Public Safety Vic Toews by digging into his divorce records. Then he spent years in Regina working for the NDP caucus before taking the job in Manitoba in 2021.
The board of directors of the Manitoba Health Coalition is a mash-up of dyed-in-the-wool NDP supporting organizations: chairwoman Darlene Jackson of the Manitoba Nurses Union, Kate Kehler of the far-left Social Planning Council of Winnipeg, secretary John Baert of the Manitoba Government and General Employees Union (MGEU), treasurer Monica Girouard of CUPE.
Board members include reps from the UFCW, the far-left
Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, CUPE Manitoba, Bob Moroz of the
Manitoba Association of Health Care Professionals… and a vice president of the
NDP provincial executive.
Need we
go on?
Non-partisan? In what
dimension?
The story was written by a journalism neophyte who obviously has not learned how to use the search function on Google. She is, however, proud of completing a Master of Fine Arts writing program at the University of Saskatchewan "where she wrote a speculative verse novel set at the Manitoba Legislative building."
But she's learning how to write Fake News. She
will fit in perfectly at CBC.