From where do you get your local news? Which newspaper do you read? You may feel like you have a choice in Vancouver. After all, there’s the Vancouver Sun and the Vancouver Province. While there is indeed a choice between these two major newspapers, the differences between them is little more than the format of paper used. This is because the newspapers are both owned by the same company.

Yes, the fact that the three major newspapers in BC are owned by Canwest Global seems to be generally known in the province. The implications of this, however, have not registered with the average reader. What happens when the same company owns all three newspapers is that diversity is reduced. Democracy requires that citizens be able to choose from a variety of perspectives.

It is true that most people don’t get their news exclusively from the newspaper. Local news is available from several different television stations. But not only is one of these stations also owned by Canwest Global, but the television news channels all take their cues from the newspapers.

If both the Sun and the Province are owned by the same company, they don’t need to compete with each other for readers. Rather than constantly trying to get the scoop before the other paper does, they share information and therefore report the same news from the same point of view.

The other thing that happens is that advertisers become the focus of the newspapers attention. According to a former editor of the Vancouver Sun, funds were cut from the actual newsroom and diverted to the budget for courting advertisers. I’ve observed the result of this myself in what the weekend edition of the Sun looks like. Section after section seems to be created exclusively as a platform for advertising. You’ve got your “new homes” section, a couple of sections about buying cars, a section dedicated to travel and so on. It seems that these advertorial sections now make up the bulk of the newspaper. Even within these sections you’ve got to question how critical the stories will be of a particular car, for example, if they’re trying to get the manufacturer of that car to buy adspace on the opposite page.

There are many other factors that make this situation troubling, yet unfortunately there seems to be little public unhappiness with this. Suprisingly, the United States has stricter media ownership regulations than does Canada (although there have been recent efforts there to change this). This is a problem that can be fixed, if there is enough public will. In the meantime, I plan on exploring my options when it comes to getting local BC news. One great alternative is an online newspaper called The Tyee.

Any other suggestions? What do you think about these media ownership issues?

For millions of Evangelical Christians, the recent US election was about values. They came out in droves to vote for a president and party that would stand against abortion, stem cell research and same-sex marriage.

With all this talk about values, little explanation is given as to why these values are so important. Where do they come from? Most people would probably say the Bible. But if this is the case, why was helping the poor not an issue in the election? Jesus spoke repeatedly and emphatically about the poor, yet this issue was addressed only by the Democratic party.

I think that most people agree that when it comes to political parties, the Republican party stands more for big business than it does for the marginalized of society. Why then, don’t more Christians vote Democrat? Why do most Evangelicals care so passionately about issues like same-sex marriage, issues that are extremely unlikely to ever affect their lives?

The Bible is far more clear about poverty issues than it is about same-sex marriage. If Evangelicals are truly concerned about Biblical values, then perhaps the concern for issues ought to be proportional to the emphasis the Bible places on them.

I just watched the CBC news town hall meeting where Canadians and Americans were brought together to discuss the U.S. election. I found it frightening how so many “opinions” expressed were a mere parroting of talking points. Does our whole culture now suffer from a collective ADD where complex thinking has been replaced with the repetition of slogans, catch-phrases and sound-bytes? “Strong and resolute”: does anybody know what this actually means?

From a tactical point of view, talking points are sheer genius. Everybody wants to have an opinion and a way to articulate it. Why not provide it for them? This way the average citizen need not trouble his or her mind with all the complicated details inherent in every issue. Moreover, by carefully selecting the proper terminology for people to use, you can solidify their beliefs and prevent them from changing or softening their position. Think of it as a way to “consolidate your base.”

Unfortunately this tactic is highly effective. Inevitably it will become only more common. The result, however, promises to be devastating. It will only lead to a more homogeneous society, lacking in diversity of opinion, where assumptions are not tested or questioned. How can we stop this from happening?

Lawyers have a bad reputation, especially in the United States. This is probably why Republicans (and FoxNews) like to say “trial lawyer” any chance they get when talking about John Edwards. In the Vice-Presidential Debate tonight the issue of tort reform came up. The Bush-Cheney camp has been working this issue on the campaign trail saying that they will change the legal system.

I think that almost everybody would agree that the legal system in the United States needs some fixing. The next question is who is best equipped to fix it?

At first glance it would be fair to say that John Kerry and John Edwards aren’t the right people for the job. After all, Edwards is a lawyer and has the backing of lawyers across America. Since lawyers are making a lot of money in the system right now, Edwards is unlikely to make changes that have a negative impact on the legal profession. George Bush and Dick Cheney don’t have this same motivation.

But let’s step back from this question for a moment and consider the potential positive and negative implications of tort reform. Currently companies are forced to pay extremely high liability insurance premiums and doctors may be afraid to take on certain patients for fear of risking a lawsuit. Tort reform could solve these problems.

So we can see that corporations and medical professionals are among those who would benefit from tort reform. Interestingly, private citizens and trial lawyers account for only a fraction of the lawsuits filed in America. Businesses are actually accountable for four times the number of lawsuits than average joes. While most people believe that there are too many frivolous lawsuits out there, not many people realize that it is corporations who are launching the lion share of these frivolous suit.

If tort reform initiatives are targeted at curbing lawsuits against corporations, this will be a grave mistake. As it stands right now, the average citizen has almost no effective recourse against a corporation other than through the court system.

The threat of lawsuit is a deterrent to corporations. They know that if they bring unsafe products to market or act in ways that harm the public that they can be held accountable. The political trend has been one of deregulation. Corporations are not being watched as closely by government as they once were. Tort reform should not curb the ability of the average citizen, with the help of a lawyer (who often get paid only if their client wins the case), to hold a negligent corporation accountable.

Let’s return to the question of whether Bush-Cheney or Kerry-Edwards is best to reform tort law. We have already noted that the Kerry-Edwards ticket may be in a conflict of interest because Edwards is a trial lawyer. But the Bush-Cheney camp is equally, if not more, in a conflict of interest because both George W. Bush and Dick Cheney have vast corporate interests. Just like in court, this election pits the trial lawyer against the corporate CEO. If the Democrats decide how tort reform is enacted, corporations may loose. If the Republicans change the tort system, we all may loose.

Increasingly young people are tuning into the news. But they’re not watching CNN; no they’re getting their information from The Daily Show with Jon Stewart. The reason this is strange is because The Daily Show is actually a late night talk show carried by the Comedy Network. The presentation is in a news format including headlines, reports, correspondents and interviews with special guests. And it’s hilarious. Full of biting satire and ironic commentary on politics and world events, The Daily Show, is the perfect format to reach young people with the news.

When so many young people are disillusioned with the traditional news media which often presents a bland and homogeneous package, The Daily Show is a breath of fresh air. Often the news media itself is the target. For example, CNN commentator Wolf Blitzer was recently a guest on the show. In his light-hearted and funny way, Jon Stewart grilled Blitzer about the media’s failure to ask the tough questions during the build-up to the invasion of Iraq. In another episode, when Stewart asked one of the show’s mock field reporters for his opinion, he responded, “I’m a reporter, Jon; I don’t have an ‘opinion’. My job is to spend half the time repeating what one side has to say and half the time repeating what the other side has to say.”

The list of guests on the show has also been quite impressive. Tonight archbishop Desmond Tutu made an appearance. The first question Stewart asked the respected religious leader was how Americans are viewed abroad. Tutu responded that Americans are seen as generous and kind people but that they were troubled with what the country has been doing lately. He said that the United States should “export compassion, not bombs.”

It’s the combination of humour and relevance to current issues that has gotten me hooked on the Daily Show. If you want to see how young people today are getting their news, check it out.

The war in Iraq and terrorism have been linked from the beginning by the Bush administration. The latest slant on this, however, has been to suggest that the war in Iraq is making the United States safer because the US is now fighting terrorists abroad, rather than at home.

The optics of the current situation back up this claim. With no terrorist attack on American soil since 9/11, and images of U.S. tanks and fighter planes firing on masked Iraqis, the average viewer can surmise that Iraq is indeed the battle ground for terrorism today.

This violence also serves as a gruesome depiction that a war on terrorism can and is being fought. Were it not for the invasion of Iraq, what could America look to in order to see that their government is waging such a war on terrorism? Bankers freezing the accounts of terrorist organizations? Manhunts through the mountains of Afghanistan? No, Americans were promised a war, so a war they got.

The problem with war, however, is that it must be fought by soldiers, many of whom will die. To date, over one thousand American soldiers have given their lives. Have they been sent out as targets for angry Arab fighters, so that terrorists don’t target American civilians? Are these soldiers our sacrificial lambs, giving their lives so that we can feel safe?

The U.S. presidential campaign has seen the deployment of a powerful new weapon in the war of words: repetition. The formula involves taking a point of criticism about one’s opponent, turning it into a catchy sound-byte and repeating it over and over again in the media.

Let’s consider the example of the labeling of John Kerry as a “flip-flopper.” This was a successful campaign of repetition whereby every time a Republican politician or pundit was asked by a reporter about Kerry, the term “flip-flopper” was used.

While this tactic is extremely effective, but has been largely neglected by the Democrats. In fact, they’ve had a hard time in general getting their message across in sound-byte form. Is this intentional or not? I’m not quite sure myself.

Well the debate is on. Who is the worse debater? Bush or Kerry? For perhaps the first time in this presidential election, Republicans and Democrats are trying to out-compliment each others’ candidate for president. Democrats are saying Bush is a great debater; Republicans are saying that Kerry is extremely articulate. What a bizarre turn of events.

Of course, this is all a set up for the debate this Thursday. Republicans want to pump up Kerry’s orating prowess in order to set the stage for Bush to exceed expectations. Democrats are trying to counter this by pointing out that Bush actually is good at the podium.

Who will win this debate about the debate? I guess we’ll have to wait until Friday to see what viewers think.

Today CBS and its main anchor, Dan Rather, have made a much anticipated admission. Apparently the documents showing George W. Bush avoided his National Guard duties and benefited from “string-pulling” were a forgery.

The conspiracy has long been that the people behind these fake documents were pro-Kerry and did this in order to discredit Bush. Well while we’re talking conspiracy, I have another possibility.

Dan Rather has a bit of a reputation (particularly among the conservative right) of being pro-Democrat. For example, he once spoke at a democratic event. There is a battle for the airwaves in America. I regularly hear pundits complaining about the so-called “liberal media.” Meanwhile, the radio stations across the country are broadcasting shows by such clearly right wing perspectives as Rush Limbaugh. Plus, Fox News is amidst a controversy over an alleged pro-republican bias. The way news is presented can have a crucial effect on how viewers see the world. Given this fact, it should not be surprising that political players may want to encourage a particular bias in the media.

Perhaps the fake document was leaked to CBS not by a Kerry supporter in order to make Bush look bad, but by a Bush supporter in order to discredit Dan Rather and CBS. Even if there is no conspiracy, this is what happened. CBS’s credibility has been compromised thereby potentially neutralizing the threat Dan Rather and CBS may present to the Republican Party. Moreover this debacle has succeeded in distracting the nation from something that everybody knows to be true: George W. Bush benefited from the power his family has in order to avoid duty in Vietnam. This fact is no conspiracy.

Today CBC reported that Canwest (publishers of the National Post, Vancouver Sun, Vancouver Province, among others) has been changing words in news stories it is reprinting from the Reuters newswire (Click here to read the article). Apparently the words “fighter” and “insurgent” had been replaced with “terrorist” when reporting on the war in Iraq.

What is the difference between using one word or another? Well for one, it may be an indicator about which side you’re on. There are those in Iraq and elsewhere who would probably refer to the insurgents as freedom fighters, for example. Today “terrorist” is a highly charged word just as “communist” once was. It should therefore be used carefully.

The strange thing about the change in terminology is that it seems unnecessary. Why would editors go to the trouble of replacing “insurgent” with “terrorist?” Why not just print the article as is?