Sue's Blog wanted to delve further into the House of Assembly today - particularly the new buzz word "cluster".
That and further discussion on the Lower Churchill fiasco and the bad Peter Kiewit joke will have to wait a day while I issue the following warning to the public.
If you have an opinion on a politician or a particular political party and you express that opinion publicly you must appreciate the following:
Not only do politicians listen to Open Line programs but they record and transcribe them as well. Next they identify the individual expressing the opinion and depending on the persons commentary - you are marked.
Politicians and their zealous supporters will hack your facebook account, hack your blog, hack twitter, set up pages under your name and generally violate your privacy. Worse - certain politicians will attempt to impact your employment and try to have your opinions suppressed.
With respect to the VOCM list of talk shows - while informative to the general public and a great place to get issues out and debated - politicians will mark you if they feel you are impacting in any way whatsoever the message they wish to deliver.
It is fine for Bill Rowe to suggest to the caller that there are no punches pulled - however Mr. Rowe must appreciate that while listeners and callers to his program are great contributors and supporters - and in fact generate good advertising dollars - they may find themselves subject to partisan political intrusion into their private and professional lives.
In our political environment and the strong-arm tactics used by those in power - it is important that callers know that their lives may be very negatively impacted by the choice to participate publicly.
Since my blog was resurrected in January of this year - I have had all my online social media accounts hacked. I have had threatening anonymous comments to my blog. I have experienced attempts by politicians through several people to undermine my employment. This of course was also the case when I was an active and regular contributor on talk shows both on CBC and VOCM.
The latest came from a "opaline darwin" making me the administrator of a facebook page. Interesting choice of name they used and certainly is one more confirmation that evolution needs some help.
You have all heard talks of whistle blower protection in the past - where employees of government or government agencies should be protected if they reveal information of significant importance to the public and government programs. We have heard that teachers, nurses, and other professionals employed by government are "frightened for their jobs" if they speak publicly. This includes information that is of importance to public health and safety.
Unfortunately - the person working in the private sector, or those running a small to medium size Newfoundland and Labrador business are also under constant professional threat if they participate in public debate where politicians or their parties are being critiqued.
So what do we do? The easiest thing is to shut-up, go away, mind your own affairs, and learn that if you want to be successful in your personal life - grab on to and promote those in power. Change your political stripe to whichever party is in power. Praise don't criticize government or big business. Call talk shows to congratulate whatever Minister of the day is making some announcement or another. Praise the media and the host of the program you are talking to while saying how great a job the government is doing.
The other option is to speak openly about it and tell our politicians that this behavior will not be tolerated and learn once again to protect our freedom of speech. Protect one another and our right to express an opinion and demonstrate loudly when political hacks call a program to personally attack or threaten a genuine caller.
In our past there have been two great travesties:
1. The giveaway of all our natural resources - while everybody stayed silent to protect their own interests.
2. The Mount Cashel affair and the associated atrocities perpetrated on generations of innocent children while everybody stayed silent to protect their church, priest and in some cases politicians and their own interests.
Newfoundland and Labrador is one tenth of what we could be today because the pride has been beaten out of us both figuratively and literally.
The fighting Newfoundlander and Labradorian has been told to shut-up - tow the party line - listen to your leaders - and do not object.
You really think this is a mature and sustainable democracy? Do you really believe that those in power are not using that power to silence critics?
Do you remember when myself and Ed Hollett were chastised publicly by Premier Danny Williams for daring to challenge things like the fibre-optic disaster? What do you believe this does to a person working in the private sector. Has the Premier not just said to every potential employer and business opportunity out there - to avoid these people?
If a project such as the Lower Churchill can be argued economically and socially as a good project for us the people - then these tactics would not be required to sell it. It is the largest red flag that anyone could plant in front of you - the voting public. It is telling you that critics have real points to make and that something stinks.
The talk show hosts will not lose their jobs and will forever be able to continue on in private life without a blemish. They also have the power of the microphone. Callers - however - who criticize government policy or a big resource deal should really understand that until the public starts to protect the right to speak without enduring unwarranted and damaging punishment from those they criticize - they should hold their tongue and understand the consequences.
Look around you and see who is sitting on boards of crown agencies or in high profile positions within government. How do you think they got there?
For those of you who do call the talk shows - how many times have you heard your neighbours and friends say you should get on and talk about that - while they refuse to do the same? Or they might say - you are good at that - and I can't do it - you know my job and all.
If we do not change this culture of essentially forced silence - we will lose whatever future might have been for our children and grandchildren.
What way are we going to have it? What will we accept as people? If you are one of those involved in these negative partisan activities - shame on you - you are hurting the future of your own children.
To the politicians - our "leaders" - what a disgrace you are - particularly when you let a colleague engage in such backward behavior while you sit by like the gang of a bully and do and say nothing while allowing tax dollars to pay for some of these activities.
If we don't find the guts of our codfish - we will either sink to the bottom or be pecked into oblivion by a seagull standing by like the opportunistic feeder of the dregs.
5 comments:
The **STARS** have been in Perfect Alignment for 62 years now for the rip-off on the ordinary Newfoundlander and Labradorian from their RAW natural resources and their Human Resource. When a province doesn't get to process its raw natural resources, the result is no industry, no jobs and human resource has to move away to follow their raw resources to the locations which became the beneficiary of our resourcs.
The only ones who profitted from the province of Newfoundland and Labrador being part of Canada is Canada itself and those corruptors who toed the line for what Ottawa wanted from our province,tney were our elected Newfoundland and Labrador politicians and their Bureaucrats.
What a Shame for our elected Politiians to have made us shoulder the abuse we had to take from Canadians because of how our politicians handled our raw natural resources. We were told we were beggars, and indeed we were, simply because other provinces became the primary beneficiary of our natural raw resources which they created their own vibrant economies that included jobs. Everything became skewed in the eyes of the ordinary Canadian who had no idea of what the province of Newfoundland and Labrador was contributing to Canada. They weren't told of our great contribution, so they simply thought we were unabashed beggars! The unknown facts that the ordinary Canadian that was not exposed to were as as much of a crime as was the fact our natural resources were allowed to be freely exploited with very few benefits to our province and our people.
There was another contributor to the silence that kept the **STARS** being so perfectly aligned on what the enormous contribution of the province of Newfoundland and Labrador was to the Canadian economic scene over the past 62 years, of course, it was the Media, both the National and Local Media were party to this complicit scheme.
Just try to talk about the destruction of the Fish Resource on the local radio stations and you'll be shut up very quickly. The hosts start playing the Devil's Advocate card. I guess the Radio Stations must rely on Advertisment Contracts and they don't want to jeopardize that line of revenue. It is shocking how "the Star Alignment" makes everything play into perfect longerterm silence, Government and Media work together smoothly. The Media was as much a part of the cover up of what happened to our resources as were the politicians and bureucrats on the provincial and federal scenes. They were all complicit.
If they weren't complicit why did they not not broadcast the abuses that were occuring that caused the Province of Newfoundland and Labrador's Fishing Industry to become defunct, while all around our fishing waters foreigners were allowed to fish at their heart's content and rape our stocls all the while being hosted by the Ottawa Government,the holder of the fish resource?
The call in shows and their roll in spinning us:
Sensing the shift in public opinion against the Muskrat Falls deal Randy Simms of VOCM openline has recently stated on air that he wasn't convinced the Muskrat Falls deal makes economic sense because Nova Scotia would get the power cheaper than we can get it.
And now to cushion the blow to the government of the day Simms has invited Shawn Skinner to spend around an hour on one of his shows to spill out the government spin. I doubt Simms will give any dissenting voice as much time on air as he is going to give to Skinner.
As soon as Randy Simms questioned the government line on how great the Muskrat deal is he turns around and now will give Skinner a hugh slot on his show to spin the governments position. After all he just got 4 new shiny recycling trucks for his city. What a great way to return the favor for making him look like a good mayor.
I am all for getting more information out to the public about the Emera givaway but this is clearly a stunt to appease the government. Now that public opinion is starting to turn against this "legacy" sham the propaganda is starting to heat up and Simms is right there to score brownie points with Skinner. If Randy Simms were truly interested in getting all the facts of the Muskrat deal he would be giving an equal time slot for the other side. Instead we have Simms kissing the ass of a minister, saying please sir, use an hour of my show to convince me (and spin to the listeners that) this is a good deal.
I would look forward to Skinner getting a hour on Open Line. Time and time again, these politicians put their foot in their mouth when they speak publicly. Keeping them silent would actually help them.
I don't want the Grand River of Labrador to be destroyed. The project is not economical, unless you live in Nova Scotia. The peoples and the species that live along the river will be subjected to methyl mercury poisoning. How can our government poison our people, Saddam Hussein did that and we didn't like it.
I would love to get a chance to press Skinner with questions in a public forum. Thousands listen to Open Line and thousands would hear Skinner tell lies and see it as that; lies.
Dave - I want to debate with all or any of them. Not one has the guts or the knowledge to do it. We will stop this legacy of shame.
Harper first - Dunderdale next.
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