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Darcy Hickson's avatar

For those of us who became accustomed to holding a broadsheet newspaper in our hands to read quality political content this is a pretty sobering article.

Mr. MacDougall notes that there are many serious questions that the media are not asking politicians anymore, and that is a damning statement of a decline of a quality product. A follow up to that is, ya but what if the questions are asked and the politicians dodge them with non answers or spit balls that insult a mature adult who knows what’s going on? Where is the leverage to get politicians back to a level playing field where serious questions are asked and answered? I certainly don’t know, other than to weed out the worst offenders at the ballot box.

Why does it take months and months to even obtain answers that are self evident? (See: who availed themselves of a $7,000/night luxury suite to attend the Queen’s funeral?) Some responsibility for that lies with the politicians themselves, who need to pass proper access to information laws that compel the government to provide timely information regarding expense matters. Spending money is not top secret, nor is who was on a guest list to attend a government sponsored event. Hiding behind privacy laws to cover up abuse of expense accounts is giving everyone the middle finger.

Lastly, is the erosion of public trust in the media playing into the hands of politicians? Is the poor treatment of reporters by politicians linked to the disdain that many Canadians have for what they read, watch or hear?

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PJ Alexander's avatar

The mainstream legacy media’s troubles with being accountable and holding politicians to account seem pretty directly correlated with some of the mess Canada now finds itself in. Thank you to the Line and others out here working at creating something new.

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