The facile and vapid Globe and Mail

Steven Chase is the only honest and professional journalist I know who works at the Globe and Mail. Showing true initiative, Steven has unearthered some very interesting facts about what makes Jim Flaherty’s Tax Fraudulent Plan , so grossly unfair and inherently self destructive for Canada. Unfortunately for us, Steven is a news gatherer, as opposed to an opinion provider. It is the opinion providers at the Globe and Mail who give the publication its reputation as being facile and vapid. The opinion writers at the Globe prefer to remain oblivious to the many powerful nuggets of truth that Steven Chase has uncovered or that have become obvious from the world around us and which are impossible to reconcile with the views expressed by the Globe and Mail on income trusts.

The views expressed by the Globe and Mail on the matter of income trusts are devoid of any factual underpinnings, which is what makes these views, facile and vapid. On other occasions the opinions expressed by the Globe and Mail make use of outright falsehoods and misleading statements, such as Andy Willis’ attempt at slamming the Liberal’s trust policy in an article entitled “Liberals reopen income trust wound” that ends with the erroneous and highly misleading statement that:

“The Liberals are also going to have trouble defending a trust regime that shifts the tax burden of corporations on to individuals.”

This statement is either (1) grossly misleading, or (2) factual incorrect, as their are only two possible explanations to what Andy was saying. If by “shifting”, Andy was referring to “tax leakage”, then his statement is false, since tax leakage has long been discredited as being a government conspiracy hoax. Andy should know that.

If by “individuals”, Andy was referring to Canadian taxpayers at large, then that too is factually incorrect, since this would require “tax leakage” to be a reality, which it is not. Failing that interpretation of “individual”, Andy could only have been referring to “individual” investors, (i.e. the people who actually own the income trust in question, who are gladly paying taxes at the average rate of 38%) then that is quite a different thing, and leads to quite a different conclusion and a policy outcome that no-one, including the individual investors themselves would object to.

As such. Andy was engaged in a practice of either fostering known falsehoods (tax leakage) or he was conflating two concepts into one, with the (intended?) effect of misleading his readers, who would be easily confused by such a technique, in common practice at the Globe and Mail and in use throughout its sister organizations

Occasionally the opinion writers at the facile and vapid Globe and Mail, will provide us insight into how they “think”, such as these comments by Eric Reguly in the piece entitled “Trust lobbyists, that's enough of your fury”. This piece was written on December 1, 2006, one short month after Flaherty’s drive-by trust tax announcement. At that point in time, no information whatsoever had been forthcoming from the government about their central premise alleging tax leakage and Eric Reguly seemed hell bent on shutting down any discussion on this far reaching policy for fear it be reversed. This despite the fact that I, as a citizen journalsit, had uncovered in one short email discussion with Jack Mintz (the person most often quoted by the Globe in promulgating falsehoods about the government’s alleged tax leakage matter) that what Mintz was saying in public was completely contradictory to what he was admitting to me in private, which was:

“I do want to point out that there is a serious flaw in some analyses especially on the taxation of pension and RRSP accounts. Finance was not right to treat the impact as zero”. (November 28, 2006)

The Globe wasn’t just engaged in a rush to judgment, they were engaged in a rush to execution. They simply wanted us to roll over and play dumb. We would have no part in such an exercise of intellectual capitulation, especially to a group of journalists who have zero formal business education or real world business experience to draw from. Our only recourse was to employ the internet and emails to rebut the nonsense being printed by the Globe, as the comments on the Globe’s website are highly moderated, and I have yet to succeed in getting any pf my comments posted by the Globe in my last 10 (?) attempts to do so. That was a decision that would backfire for the Globe, since we simply took our commentary to a higher level that was free of the Globe’s editing. Their strict control on the news had been superceded by technology. Sorry guys, you lose. The internet won.

To make their point and impose this irrational trust policy onto Canadians, the Globe thought inciting physical violence would be their answer, and Eric Reguly wrote: “Someone should encase income trust lobbyists in concrete and fling them off a bridge into deep water. On second thought, forget it; even that wouldn't stop the misguided creatures. Houdini-like, they would somehow break free and call for Jim Flaherty's head the moment their lips broke the surface. They are unstoppable and insatiable”

The sentences that followed are however the most revealing, which read: “Still, the trusts lobbyists are lusting for blood, as if it's their god-given right to determine tax policy. They should be ignored.”

When did “trust-lobbyists” ever hold the position that it is their “god-given right to determine tax policy”? This only becomes an issue in Eric’s mind because he is fronting for people, namely the various owners of the Globe who think it is “THEIR god-given right to determine tax policy.” Failing that, Eric must be of the view that it is HIS “god-given right to determine tax policy”?

Either way, that isn’t going to be the case, as I insist and maintain that the CAPITAL PROVIDERS are deserving of input on how CAPITAL USERS will make use of the resource that is being provided to them. Unless, of course, they are going to forced to so so with more of Eric’s plan for physical violence. Maybe the CAPITAL PROVIDERS will be required, at gun point, to fund the needs of the CAPITAL USERS, in Eric Reguly’s central command capital marketplace? I know that BCE, Teachers’, Torstar and Woodbridge would just love that, and each for their own unique and obvious reasons.

And to the extent that ONE party gets to make the decision on this matter, it would be the capital provider and not the capital user. Capital providers should not be forced, through government intervention, to provide capital on terms dictated by the capital users, and most certainly not the terms dictated by Eric Reguly of the Globe and Mail, on behalf of whomever he claims to speak for and on behalf of.

So as not to be unfair to the Globe and Mail and condemn them as being a vapid and facile news organization, without giving them a second chance, now that I have been able to get two honest news organizations, namely the Hill Times and Sun Media, to print the definitive counterpoint to the Globe’s spurious claims and opinions of the past, perhaps some bright light at the Globe and Mail, would like to rebut my Hill Times article, and this time please try to incorporate at least one or two facts to corroborate your “world view”.

Otherwise, I can only conclude that we should follow Eric Reguly’s advice, insofar as the Globe itself is concerned, which is to engage in something that is one step shy of “book burning” and which is the very definition of ignorance, which is “They should be ignored”. Sorry guys. This is the bed you have made for yourselves. Remember, at some point you have to wake up?