The Black Rod

Bias? What bias? Who said: " Any columnist who claims that personal bias is not an element of his/her writing is a liar"? It was Dan Lett, the, ahem, political columnist for the Winnipeg Free Press. Now, you didn't hear his confession of bias because he made it in February on the Internet in a response to comments about his alleged pro-NDP bias when writing a column about Manitoba Hydro. Of course, Lett denied his bias favoured the NDP, adding "But bias is not the issue; fairness and balance is. I leave the readers to assess my success in that regard." Well, since then, the jury has delivered its verdict and it's so very not good for Dan Lett. When the NDP delivered their latest provincial budget, Lett wrote how they were showing restraint by cutting spending by almost 4 percent from last year. That was like saying the drunken sailor has stopped buying triples on your credit card and promises to stick to doubles from now on.

They say animals can detect natural disasters before they happen. Well, we, too, can detect disaster in the making and we say "head for the hills, there's some bad s...t coming." The latest clue is David Asper's op-ed in the Winnipeg Sun telling people to stop picking on his baby sister, Gail, for the debacle known as the Canadian Museum for Human Rights. http://www.winnipegsun.com/2012/04/11/gail-not-demon-of-cmhr-asper David A. devoted so much space to rewriting the history of the CMHR that it set off alarms that only dogs can hear. It's obvious that there's some very, very bad news about the museum on the horizon and the Aspers want to put as much space between themselves and doomsday as possible. We first spotted this tactic in December when the Winnipeg Free Press, the propaganda arm of the CMHR, published an editorial writing the Aspers out of the museum narrative and replacing them with P.M. Stephen Harper. That's right

For a brief, shining moment two years ago a cheap two-bit car thief was a hero in Winnipeg media circles. His achievement? He was, declared the news media in the city, the victim of a police beating which had been CAUGHT ON TAPE. The media mob was unanimous. There was no doubt. Hadn't the Crown attorney dropped a raft of charges against poor Cody Bousquet because of the savage beating? Hadn't the judge convicted the police in the court of public opinion by declaring in open court that he had seen the beating with his own eyes? There, there, you could see the video for yourself posted as a public service on the news websites. Uh, oh. Along came Easter, 2012. Instead of hefty servings of turkey and stuffing, the reporters, columnists, pundits and sundry found themselves eating crow, bitter crow, sour crow and more crow with Matzah. A formal RCMP investigation that was universally expected to lead to criminal charges against the Winnipeg City poli

When it comes to Manitoba Hydro, the Public Utilities Board has set off more distress signals than the Titanic, with less response. Hydro has been in the news all week after the PUB granted the utility a two percent rate hike effective April 1st. Hydro says it needs the money to forestall large losses as a result of the warm winter just past. The mainstream media has parroted this excuse. Nobody has pointed out the strange coincidence that a rate hike denied Hydro just in January by the PUB was reinstated, with an extra 1 percent top up, exactly one day after the chairman of the oversight body retired and a new chairman, appointed by the NDP government, took his place . If this means what it appears to mean , it's bad news all around for Manitoba ratepayers since the MSM seems unwilling or unable to report the facts about Hydro. The Winnipeg Free Press is reporting on its front page today that Mayor Sam Katz bought season tickets to the W

Well, what do you know? The Mayans were right. It is the end of the world---if you're a bleeding heart liberal. We've gotten used to the weekly screech from Frances "Red" Russell declaiming the end of civilization at the hands of Stephen Harper, but on Saturday past her squishy colleague Gordon Sinclair Jr. (still suffering daddy issues) joined her for a chorus of Auld Lang Syne. It appears to be "the beginning of the end of the truly caring Canada," he wept. "Say goodbye", he declared, to the Canada "personified by caring..." The cause of this gloom? The federal budget. "We will be expected to take more personal responsibility," wailed Sinclair. Huh? Like that's a bad thing? It is in Sinclair's world. To prove it, he spun a story, "a parable, of sorts." His story begins with a woman "who had to compose herself before she sat down to compose her letter to me". (Ha ha. Note the

Talk about a rush to judgement ... In a case with no witnesses, no motive, no murder weapon and, if what was presented in court is any guide, NO EVIDENCE AT ALL, the RCMP considered the murder of Beverley Rowbotham solved within 3 weeks. Their conclusion: the husband done it because we can't find anyone else to pin it on and we got other stuff to do. ( See Part One - There must be a public inquiry into the bungled trial of Mark Stobbe http://blackrod.blogspot.ca/2012/03/there-must-be-public-inquiry-into.html ) Now we'll be the first to say that police always know more than they tell the public, and that its a losing bet to armchair quarterback a police investigation on the basis of years of CSI, Criminal Minds and Law-and-Order (all versions). But when they try to send a man to prison for the rest of his life based on a case so thin that it's invisible to the naked eye, the onus reverses and t