Fox News North can't launch because regulation against lying in the news won't be repealed

[Wezil]

Everybody in the public eye needs their own soapbox. Dan McTeague (sp?) has been railing about gas taxes for years - in and out of government. It's his schtick.

[Wezil]

I agree with your earlier observation about there being something intrinsically funny about Ezra opening a new show with this years old personal outrage.

But it is an outrage.

[Wezil]

Btw, care to guess in which city this judge was sitting?

[Asher]

I agree with your earlier observation about there being something intrinsically funny about Ezra opening a new show with this years old personal outrage.

But it is an outrage.

I wouldn't even mind if he expressed he was outraged by the process.

The other problem is he intentionally misrepresents the situation. He talks about being "prosecuted", he cites absurd costs that are in no way possible, he frames every possible thing about the situation in the most dramatic way. He's fundamentally dishonest, and he intentionally puts himself into positions where he offends people either by doing provocative things like the Mohammad cartoons, or lying about things and libeling people. Then he gets outraged when there are consequences.

Read his wiki page about his history of being sued. It's quite impressive.

[Wezil]

Any cost is absurd. My time is worth more than this process should be able to demand.

The related problem of course is the lack of expense for the complainant. It's just too easy to abuse.

[Asher]

Any cost is absurd.

It shouldn't cost anything. You don't need an army of lawyers to be interviewed by a commission. You don't even need one.

I would certainly not be stupid enough to pay a lawyer for that.

[Wezil]

What is your time worth Asher?

[Asher]

Depends if it takes away from work or not. If it takes away from work, it's free.

[Wezil]

Was someone mean to you? Do you have hurt feelings? The tribunals can help.

A Toronto comic and Vancouver restaurant owner have been ordered to pay $22,000 for unleashing a tirade of insults against a lesbian couple.

Lorna Pardy filed a complaint in 2008 alleging she and her lesbian partner were the targets the offensive comments made by Guy Earle, who was hosting the open mic night at Zesty's Restaurant on Commercial Drive in May 2007.

Earle did not deny he was offensive, but claimed Pardy and her same-sex partner first rudely heckled him, along with the amateur comics onstage that night. Earle also claimed that Pardy threw two drinks in his face, and admits he broke Pardy's sunglasses in a confrontation after the show.

Earle's lawyer later walked out of the Human Right Tribunal hearing claiming it was an illegal restriction of freedom of speech.

But on Thursday the B.C. Human Right Tribunal sided with Pardy and ruled Earle must pay her $15,000 and the owner of the restaurant must also pay her $7,500.

http://www.cbc.ca/news/offbeat/story/2011/04/21/bc-zestys-comedian-lesbian-insults.html

Classic case of the truth not being a defence. He called them "fat lesbians". They are.

[Wezil]

Depends if it takes away from work or not. If it takes away from work, it's free.

My time is never free, working or not.

It is a finite resource.

[Ogie Oglethorpe]

Depends if it takes away from work or not. If it takes away from work, it's free.

Save to the stockholders of your company.

[Asher]

Save to the stockholders of your company.

I work enough overtime that it balances out.

[Asher]

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/arts/television/john-doyle/the-sun-came-up-and-it-was-dead-boring/article1995972/

The Sun came up, and it was dead boring

After all of that – all the fuss, the hype and hysteria – what has Sun News Network amounted to? Cheap, cheesy, terrible television. I encourage you to watch it. You can learn a great deal about the utter banality of well-meant but bonehead TV.

Now, me, I was anxious to see it and savour it. The more news outlets, the better; the more channels we have to choose from, the better off we are. Stands to reason. And Sun News promised a great deal.

So the other day, just back from Ireland and admittedly a tad jet-lagged, I started watching. First thing I saw was the ego that is Ezra Levant waving around a giant cigar and making a speech about Cuba. Odd, I thought. Here we are at the crucial point in a federal election campaign and Levant is anxious to let us know his views on events in Cuba.

Boy oh boy, did he go on. Cuba this and Castro that, interminably. Then it dawned on me that Levant had written a long, densely written analysis of matters Cuban and was talking it at us. It transcended terrible television to achieve the level of abomination. I was reminded that there was a guy with a sock puppet named Ed, who went from community cable TV to the CITY-TV channel a few years ago. The guy with the sock had a better grasp of the basics of TV than Ezra Levant and his producers.

Being away, I had taped the opening hours of Sun News, so I looked at it. There, again, was Levant making a speech. “We’re talking about truth and freedom,” he declared. “If you love freedom like I do, it’s a pretty happy day.” Well, sunshine, not if it’s like watching paint dry, it isn’t.

Levant is obviously meant to be the channel’s version of the outgoing Fox News personality Glenn Beck, but without Beck’s charisma. Mind you, just as Beck devoted a lot of time to promoting his radio show and books, Levant, on consecutive days, plugged his book about the oil industry. Beck wrote a hilariously entertaining paranoid thriller about do-gooders taking over the world. Levant wrote a windy book about the oil industry. Sorry – not the same thing.

Over the week the impressions mounted. Impressions of a shockingly amateurish channel with a giant media corporation, Quebecor, behind it. I noted that Sun News made a self-regarding fuss about some journalists mocking the dress style of the lady hosts and anchors. The word “skank” was bandied but then retracted, apparently. Well, now. There’s nothing lewd or lascivious about the frocks, skirts and tops being worn. It’s just that several of the women on air look like they dressed in the dark. Sun News has achieved a remarkable feat. It has made the comely and talented Krista Erickson, a noted spiffy dresser, look like a shoo-in for an appearance on What Not to Wear.

This Theo Caldwell character is another Sun News personality who goes on and on and on. Like he’d never heard of the word “brevity” or been advised that making speeches on air amounts to really bad television. Further, he cannot conduct an interview. He makes a speech he knows the interviewee will agree with and then listens, delightedly, when they concur.

The other night he was busy discussing the “surge” in NDP support indicated by opinion polls. His guest was the renowned independent thinker, Conservative Senator Linda Frum. She said of the poll results for the NDP, the Bloc and the Liberals in Quebec, “They’re going to conspire together and become one party and one coalition government, regardless of whether one party is up or down.” The idea that one single party is soon to ensue from a merged NDP, Liberal and Bloc Québécois parties is patently ridiculous. Caldwell’s comeback was, “I’m glad you came right out with that.”

This was the single entertaining aspect of hours of watching the channel. Not because of the political intent of the statements, but because they were laugh-out-loud wacky. Look, never mind the political bent of Sun News. It’s just fantastically inept broadcasting. And as such it does a serious disservice to the conservative cause in Canada. There is no news on the Sun News Channel. None. It’s just one fabulously self-regarding pundit after another jawing on with blatant disregard for the needs of viewers who expect to be informed in a professional manner, even occasionally entertained. The Fox News Channel manages to be gripping, lively TV every day, even as it irritates, embellishes and sometimes broadcasts blatant untruths.

Perhaps the most damning element of Sun News is its stunning misuse of Charles Adler. Most recently a radio host, he is a superb broadcaster, highly skilled, witty and incisive. Here he looks bizarrely out of his depth, unsure and wary. Little wonder – from what I’ve seen, he spends most of his show talking to other Sun News personalities who mostly talk about themselves.

I don’t give a rodent’s posterior about the political slant of the channel. Someone had the well-meaning but eccentric idea that a totally right-wing news channel was needed. Fine, knock yourself out. But to unleash a channel so devoid of charm, bite and spice is an insult to Canadian viewers of any political persuasion.

As I write this on Friday, Theo Caldwell is back on the channel and – wait for it – making a speech about Cuba. I’m not sure of his point but, he’s droning on about the fall of the Soviet Union and he’s using the words “flimsy subterfuge” and “wherein.” Again with Cuba. In the name of the gods of television, stop.

[notyoueither]

It is pretty bad.

[Wezil]

I think I said long ago that it will just be one more channel I won't watch. The medium is the problem and it sounds like Sun is the newest bad addition.