(Google-Cache Screen Shot Of The State-Of-Play, Monday Jan 23rd @ 9pm)
Conflictyness’RUs
HerdVille
So.
On Saturday CBC British Columbia British Columbia’s news division let it be known that it plans to ignore its own Ombudsman’s ruling regarding the potential for Legislative Bureau Chief Stephen Smart to be placed in a conflict of interest due to the fact that his wife is the Deputy Press Secretary for the Premier.
And what do we hear from the rest of the proMedia on Monday?
Why, as many may have predicted after Messr’s Good, Palmer and Baldrey ran up the ‘Close Ranks, Immediately!’ on Friday, it’s nothing but….
Crickets.
In fact, the only proMedia type who has had anything to say after the VSun’s Andrea Woo reported that CBC-BC was going to tell their Ombudsman, Kirk Lapointe, to take a hike has been Charlie Smith, who has written two insightful analysis pieces here and here in the Georgia Strait.
But, then again, we already knew that Charlie, who has called out the proMedia for their cozy and potentially conflicty speaker fees in the past (as blogger Norman Farrell discusses here), is not a member of ‘The Club’.
Right?
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And, for the record, Andrew MacLeod’s piece in the Google cache, while worth reading, does not count as it was written in the wake of Mr. Lapointe’s ruling on Mr. Smart’s potential for conflictyness but before CBC-BC told Mr. Lapointe to put his hikin’ boots on.
And who knew that…..In addition to once being the VSun’s editor that Mr. Lapointe is currently a blogger of sorts….For reals.
A couple of weeks ago I ran up a podcast wherein my central thesis was that, at the height of the darkest of dark days down south during the middle of the presidency of George Bush Jr., Left Blogistan was the only place to find vibrant analysis that actually mattered….Here and now, in Lotusland, especially now that Sean Holman’s site is shuttered, I’m starting to feel that the blogs, with all their warts, are now fulfilling that niche almost completely (and I’m not just talking the left-side here, I am seeing good stuff from all points along the continuum)….Now, please, do not misunderstand me – I am not talking about reportage here, where the proMedia still leads by miles…Instead, I am talking about reasoned, in-depth, non-pablumized analysis of the reams of important material that is already in the public domain….OK?
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