2013-05-21T06:42:40-04:00 George Stephenson http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/author/index.php?author=george-stephenson Copyright 2008, HuffingtonPost.com, Inc. HuffingtonPost Blogger Feed for George Stephenson Good old fashioned elbow grease. tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2012:/theblog//3.1756884 2012-08-08T14:11:49-04:00 2012-10-08T05:12:32-04:00

George Stephenson http://www.huffingtonpost.com/george-stephenson/ legal argument over misleading advertising.

Rogers is claiming that its right to free expression trumps truth-in-advertising regulations in a case where the company was cited for an alleged misleading campaign. It is asking that the Ontario Superior Court strike down a requirement that companies do "adequate and proper" tests of products before touting claims in advertisements.

Apparently Rogers claimed that customers using Rogers discount cellphone carrier had no worries about dropped calls, which were supposedly fewer than its competitors. The Competition Bureau investigated and found that wasn't the case and sought a $10-million penalty against the company.

Now, Rogers claims that requiring actual tests be done on products before their benefits are advertised violated the company's freedom of expression.

As Postmedia News quoted Rogers' legal position, the law "prohibits and penalizes entirely truthful claims, including claims made on a reasonably held belief that such claims are entirely accurate and claims that are proven to be entirely accurate through post-claim testing."

In other words (those not created at several hundred dollars an hour in legal fees): Companies should be able to say whatever they want on the chance that their claims might be true. And if they aren't, well so what?

Absolutely!

We, as customers, look forward to the day when Rogers extends that same principle to those of us tethered to any number of its properties by weighty, impossible-to-read contracts that seem to extend well beyond the Mayan apocalypse.

When you inadvertently miss a monthly payment and get that ominous call from the Rogers "Tony Soprano call centre," you should be able to exercise your right to freedom of expression by telling them you have a reasonable belief that the bill was paid or that the cheque's in the mail.

That should be enough for Rogers because it could turn out that such a claim may be entirely accurate and may be proven to be entirely accurate through post-claim testing. And if it isn't, well, so what?

In the Rogers world there shouldn't be any consequences to making a claim that isn't true, because you should be able to freely express whatever cow pie you want. Whatever is claimed is, automatically, true or could be, or might be.

Just as Rogers argues, it shouldn't have to pay a penalty for making possibly unsubstantiated claims, it should not cut off your service for doing the same thing. Yes, we have a reasonable belief that Rogers would extend that convention to its customers.

Really. Believe it.

CORRECTION: This blog was originally published under the wrong author name, Shirley Muir]]> tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2012:/theblog//3.1476160 2012-05-03T19:39:55-04:00 2012-07-03T05:12:03-04:00

George Stephenson http://www.huffingtonpost.com/george-stephenson/
In the wake of your Mayor's most recent public exhibition of delusion, calling the police on and aggressively confronting a Toronto Star reporter near his property, there have been numerous calls to remove Rob Ford from office at the first opportunity.

As someone viewing the situation from afar in Winnipeg, but no doubt speaking for many across this country, I can only say, please don't.

Canada, if not Toronto, needs Rob Ford, and (bonus round!) his brother Doug.
As we bump along through gloomy economic times, the Rob and Doug show is comedy gold. A comic duo truly fit for the 21st century. The new Harpo and Zeppo, Laurel and Hardy, Abbott and Costello, Buzz and Woody, Lady and the Tramp. (Picturing them smiling at each other, while munching down opposite ends of a spaghetti noodle is not beyond the bounds of imagination, although one would want to keep such images from the children.)

And the entertainment is all free, at least for those of us who are not within the boundaries of Toronto or, as Ford calls that area: "my back yard." Really, there has been nothing like it to watch since HBO cancelled "The Sopranos." Ford is kind of like a mixture of Tony Soprano, Raging Bull and Curly Howard all rolled up in a giant, loose cannon ball.

The only difference, of course, is that Tony Soprano probably wouldn't call the police on a middle-aged comedian in front of his house or skinny reporters roaming around on public property behind.

But Ford does talk the talk. After confronting the reporter who was within a dog whistle of his property, Ford was hilarious, although equally disturbing, when he was quoted as saying that "every single person said I should have just cooked the guy."

Well, no wonder the reporter was frightened. Who wouldn't be if they saw Ford thundering at them with that Hannibal Lecter glint in the eye and a notion that he might cook them? You might end up like that Uruguayan Rugby team that crashed in the Andes. Was that a fork in his hand?

Wow, you can't make this stuff up.

Torontonians may feel embarrassed by the mayor's endless magic acts, where he presto change-o transforms himself from bully to whiny victim at the click of a microphone. But, hey, no need to be mortified. The rest of us feel your pain. Well, no, we revel in it actually, but that's just because it makes us feel so much smarter.

Our mayors are just bland. They spend much of their time in their offices (or, in Winnipeg's case, Phoenix), rather than calling the police on reporters.

Anyway, Toronto owes us, especially here in Winnipeg. Ontario stole Glen Murray, our last mayor with any vision. He's now in Dalton McGuinty's cabinet as Minister of Training Colleges and Universities. He, of course, is the one who caused great wailing and gnashing of teeth when, before the municipal election, he identified Ford as part of a trifecta of right-wing ignorance. A visionary, indeed.

So, Toronto, you bought the Ford (although this is one that drives you). Stick with it. From the Hindenburg-like explosions, to the weigh-ins, he brightens the landscape beyond the big tower to the sea. And always remember, we are laughing with you.

Well, OK, that's not true, either.]]> tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2012:/theblog//3.1254910 2012-02-05T23:41:41-05:00 2012-04-06T05:12:02-04:00

George Stephenson http://www.huffingtonpost.com/george-stephenson/ broadcast a phony Canadian citizenship ceremony right from its own studio fits in nicely with all the other fakery coming from Quebecor, owners of Sun News and persistent CBC adversary.

The Sun News version of reality programming underscored the stark difference between it and the CBC. While CBC did, and has, telecast real citizenship ceremonies, the Sun sham occurred because it would not leave its studio to actually go to an actual event like, well, real reporters do.

The citizenship and immigration department even suggested a number of ceremonies Sun News could cover but, according to documents released to the Canadian Press, somebody at Sun News responded with "We can fake the oath."

The end result was that most of the people reaffirming their oaths were federal employees described as "new Canadians" in the broadcast. Immigration Minister Jason Kenney's office apologized and blamed underlings for rounding up the phony new citizens. No responsibility was taken by Kenney. Ironically this is the same Kenney who has banned Muslim women from wearing veils when reciting the Canadian oath of citizenship in case they were pretending to be someone else behind that burqa.

Of course Quebecor's Sun News did not accept any blame either. Everyone was so busy pointing fingers at each other, it's surprising nobody lost an eye.

Had the fake performance happened at the public broadcaster, one can just imagine the apocalyptic coverage Quebecor's Sun newspapers and TV network would have given the story. And at the centre would have been the evil, uncaring, unprofessional, wasteful CBC.

Quebecor's media properties have been conducting for some time an eye-rolling vendetta against anything CBC does because, big surprise, it is a competitor. It cloaks its animosity with the virtuous fig leaf of concern for taxpayer dollars but that is about as genuine as its "new Canadians." If it was truly concerned, it would attack the people handing out the money, not the people receiving it. But that would mean criticizing its friends in the Harper government. Much easier to bark at the CBC.

We have both worked for lengthy periods for both Quebecor and CBC as senior editors and producers and neither of us work for them anymore. To witness the continual attacks on CBC from Quebecor and its supporters in the Conservative caucus is disheartening.

The CBC is not without serious flaws. It has been badgered, especially in some local markets, to virtually abandon news and chase ambulances and fire trucks for ratings rather than chase meaningful stories. It is hidebound by middle and upper management long in tenure and short in creativity. It spends too much time contemplating its own genius and not enough time showing it.

It also continually drops anvils on its own feet by doing things like refusing to release how much it pays for various jobs in the organization. You can go on a CBC web page and find out how much a host/producer earns with the Ontario Educational Communications Authority, but you can't get see how much a CBC host/producer makes. Add tone deaf to the flaws.

But, by the end of the broadcast day, with all its faults, it is journalistic light-years from the fizzling firecracker that is Sun News, which ignores in its enmity how much CBC is required to deliver.

CBC provides radio and television and online productions in English and French across the country, including the barrens of Northern Canada for which no other media outlet, save the Aboriginal Peoples Television Network, shows much interest.

And to provide those services, yes, it is funded by Canadian taxpayers. But so are some of Quebecor's operations. CBC has accused its various divisions of accepting government handouts through a number of taxpayer-funded programs, so it can hardly claim virgin status while portraying CBC as some kind of brothel that must be shut down.

But, these are all facts and realities that play no role in Quebecor's corporate agenda nor, apparently, in its definition of news: "Welcome to Canada, you immigration department bureaucrats; now back to our top story on the number of trucks CBC uses."

George Stephenson, an award-winning journalist, is a former Manitoban newspaper editor and radio producer having worked at the Winnipeg Sun and CBC. He is currently a publications editor and web master for a Manitoba union.

Shirley Muir has been a print editor and broadcast producer working for The Winnipeg Sun, CBC and WTN, racking up several awards. She was President of the Canadian Association of Journalists in the 1990s. She is now president of TheMediaBank.ca, a public affairs firm headquartered in Manitoba.
]]> tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2011:/theblog//3.995403 2011-10-05T09:25:27-04:00 2011-12-05T05:12:01-05:00

George Stephenson http://www.huffingtonpost.com/george-stephenson/
At least that was the reporting of polls heading into the provincial vote on Tuesday, Oct. 4. Close, sure; like Vancouver is close to Winnipeg, like reporters are close to understanding polls.

For a record-setting fourth election in a row, the NDP rolled over the Progressive Conservatives. Left in NDP Leader Greg Selinger's dust were PC Leader Hugh McFadyen, the Liberals and the myth-like reputation of former Premier Gary Doer.

Selinger managed as well as his old boss ever did.

When Doer left Manitoba to become Canada's ambassador to the U.S., some of the big foreheads predicted major problems for the NDP since Doer was supposedly far more popular than the party.

As it turned out, the party continued long after the guest of honour left.

The same can't be said for McFadyen, who announced he would quit his party in the wake of his loss. He ran an odd campaign after an apparent conversion on the road to Damascus. For years his clarion call had been against such demons as deficits, debts and government spending.

Once the election began he promised more spending than the NDP and that he wouldn't bring in a balanced budget until 2018, four years later than the NDP. It didn't quite catch the imagination of his supporters. One of the more prominent Manitoba right wing blogs dubbed him NDP 2.0.

He did, however, manage to increase the party's popular vote, raising it from 38 per cent in 2007 to almost 45 per cent this time. That was pretty much as the polls predicted. In other provinces that would be enough reason for political parties to pump some coins into the juke box and roll out a few kegs, but this is Manitoba.

"We obviously didn't get those votes where we needed them," McFadyen said in his concession speech.

Obviously.

There is a great political divide in the province between the urban ridings and those that embrace more fields of wheat and corn than people. In almost all the rural areas the Conservatives could run a bale of hay and still win. Adding votes in those ridings is about as helpful to the party as urbanization.

McFadyen failed to make much of a dent in the NDP's Fortress Winnipeg which holds more than half of the province's total ridings, despite promising to hire more cops and pave all the alleys in the city. If nothing else, the results showed that a vote in Manitoba is worth more than 40 metres of asphalt.

Overall, the Conservative campaign had as much chance of catching fire as a soggy log. It was difficult to see any strategy beyond talking about how every Manitoban was in danger of being murdered in their beds. Selinger dubbed McFadyen the Grim Reaper.

Between the two main parties was the small campaign of the poor old Liberals and their leader Jon Gerrard who had the grimmest results of all. He was left with his single seat and a decline in the popular vote to seven per cent from 12 per cent.

The NDP ran its typical, cautious, centre of the road campaign; a somnambulant symphony, punctuated by attack ads dragging up McFadyen's administrative role in draconian government cuts taken more than a decade ago.

Whether they worked or not, who knows? What isn't in doubt is that the whole campaign was a wheezer that did little to keep the public awake. It showed up in the voter turnout, which, at around 55 per cent, was one of the lowest in the province's history.

George Stephenson, an award-winning journalist, is a former Manitoban newspaper editor and radio producer having worked at the Winnipeg Sun and CBC. He is currently a publications editor and web master for a Manitoba union.

Shirley Muir has been a print editor and broadcast producer working for The Winnipeg Sun, CBC and WTN, racking up several awards. She was President of the Canadian Association of Journalists in the 1990s. She is now president of TheMediaBank.ca, a public affairs firm headquartered in Manitoba.
]]> tag:www.huffingtonpost.com,2011:/theblog//3.992154 2011-10-03T10:55:45-04:00 2011-12-03T05:12:02-05:00

George Stephenson http://www.huffingtonpost.com/george-stephenson/
If nothing else, the final vote will put the last shovels of dirt on a campaign that wheezed its last breath some weeks ago.

The media, bolstered by a couple of late polls, have tried to magically raise the dead by invoking clichés as exhausted as the campaigns, claiming that the race is "neck-and-neck," a real "nail-biter," a "toss up."

The last poll, released five days before the election, showed the NDP leading the Progressive Conservatives by three percentage points, 46 to 43, with the Liberal vote collapsing to match its current irrelevance at seven per cent. A poll a week earlier also put the NDP at 41 per cent, with the Tories at 32, with a bunch of people still undecided.

But the surface results of province wide polls are of little value since the only battleground over the past few decades has been in the City of Winnipeg, which holds 31 of the province's 57 seats. In Winnipeg both polls give the NDP a huge percentage edge, 46 to 25 and 53 to 35. Not exactly "neck-and-neck."

The importance of the city vote became apparent early on when PC Leader Hugh McFadyen made the promise to pave all the back lanes in Winnipeg. It didn't come from a deep concern for the travails of gravel-challenged homeowners. It was more a concern for the votes in a couple of key, swing ridings where alleyways suffer from a lack of asphalt.

It wasn't the only oddity of the Conservative campaign. After the NDP said it would balance the provincial budget by 2014, the Tories promised they would do it by 2018. Huh? No typo, there. They said that was just being realistic, if not traditionally Conservative.

To underscore the latter, McFadyen went on to promise even more spending than the NDP. The differences in the promises became so minuscule the leaders should have had jerseys with their names on the back so voters could tell them apart.

The most apparent variances were carried in the tsunami of negative ads each of the main parties unleashed.

The NDP recycled its endless loop about the massive Conservative cuts in the '90s that were carried out by former Premier Gary Filmon, whose senior advisor was Hugh McFadyen. These ads ran so often voters could be forgiven when on Election Day they are surprised to discover Gary Filmon's name isn't actually on the ballot.

Conservative Leader Hugh McFadyen had hoped his former boss was gone and forgotten. Before the campaign had officially begun, McFadyen had tossed Filmon overboard like an old anchor that was holding back the HMS Hughie. He said the cuts in the '90s went too far and were a "mistake," so let's move on, nothing to see here, folks.

Rather than envision cuts, McFadyen joined with NDP Leader Greg Selinger, promising to put more and more police officers on the streets of what is already one of the most heavily-policed cities in Canada per capita. Aside from giving tourism industry officials the vapours, McFadyen's constant depiction of Winnipeg as the "Violent Crime Capital of Canada" seemed to show just how well hiring more and more police officers has worked so far.

They matched each other nurse for nurse and promised more and more and even more doctors. About the only doctor with fading career prospects turned out to be Liberal Leader Dr. Jon Gerrard. Try as he might, he was pretty much the guy sitting against the wall at the big dance. It went from bad to embarrassing when two prominent former Liberal MPs endorsed an NDP candidate a few days before balloting.

Overall, that was about it for the campaign, boiled down as it was to the NDP warning that a vote for McFadyen was "too risky" and the Tory lament that Selinger didn't fulfill promises made by former Premier Gary Doer. Too risky! Less fulfilling! Too risky! Less fulfilling! Too risky! Zzzzzzzzzzzz.

The media couldn't even keep its eyes open, only occasionally looking below the surface of the promises and policies. Then again, the resurrected NHL Winnipeg Jets were beginning their pre-season games and the Bombers were in first place. The media can only do so much.

About the only spark in the campaign was that provided by third parties which launched their own campaigns calling on the parties to take action on a list of issues. And they had some success. Cancer patients were promised free drugs, homeowners a reduction in education tax and caps on early years' school class sizes.

It has, however, always been in the NDP interests to keep things safe and cautious, play some pan pipes and hope everyone goes to sleep. That has been typical for three winning elections now, where the priority has always been to avoid the bad headline at all costs.

The Tories, on the other hand, have for three losing elections made bold promises from bringing the Jets back to town (missed it by that much) to creating schools of excellence in Manitoba.

This time their only education promise that came close was the commitment to create a Centre of Excellence -- for police dogs.

George Stephenson, an award-winning journalist, is a former Manitoban newspaper editor, radio producer and columnist having worked at the Winnipeg Sun and CBC. He is currently a publications editor and web master for a Manitoba union.

Shirley Muir has been a print editor and broadcast producer working for The Winnipeg Sun, CBC and WTN, racking up several awards. She was President of the Canadian Association of Journalists in the 1990s. She is now president of TheMediaBank.ca, a public affairs firm headquartered in Manitoba. Email them at themediabank@shaw.ca]]>