Dear Postmedia Editorial Board

This : 

is not an adequate response or apology for what was previously published in that same space by the Postmedia Editorial Board on August 24th : "[Elizabeth] May must renounce anti-Israel resolutions". Excerpted :

You are not RebelMedia. 

You are not some partisan advocacy organization that can pass off the blame for this appalling libelous attack on some hapless newbie book reviewer - although I notice you share with them the phrase "figleaf of Jewishness". 

No, you are the editorial board of Vancouver's largest newspaper. Shame on you for stating Independent Jewish Voices supports terrorism and denies the Holocaust.

IJV Statement On Canadian Media Giant Libeling Us

Corey Levine : Why I Asked The Green Party To Challenge The JNF's Charitable Status

The only upside to this ridiculous op-ed is the thorough drubbing you received in comments below it. First five comments, excerpted :

"As a former journalist and chair of Langara's journalism program, I'm shocked by the degree of distortion in this editorial."

"This editorial is preposterous!"

"What a very sad editorial, full of errors and inaccuracies and probably conscious lies."

"This 'editorial' is purposely disingenuous."

"This editorial could have been written by the Likud party."

Indeed.

Your op-ed also condemned a resolution sponsored by Elizabeth May and 28 other Greens calling for Canada Revenue Agency to revoke the charitable status of the Jewish National Fund, the largest private landowner in Israel. JNF has used its tax-deductible status in Canada to build and maintain the infamous “Canada Park” on the ruins of three Palestinian villages.  As you note in your correction, at the convention the language was watered down to call for any charitable organization's status to be revoked if they are in violation of Canadian or international law. 

In 2014 Postmedia CEO Paul Godfrey was Honorary Chair of the Jewish National Fund's annual Negev Gala.  
Elizabeth May has attended their galas in the past and consulted with JNF CEO Josh Cooper prior to the Green Party convention vote.


The offending op-ed, now taken down, published in the Vancouver Sun and Ottawa Citizen :

In February, the House of Commons passed a motion 229-to-51 condemning any actions by Canadian groups or individuals to promote the BDS movement. IJV was the first national Jewish organization globally to support the non-violent BDS movement; the Green Party is the first national party in Canada to follow suit. Bravo to you both.

h/t  Waterbaby
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Pay to Play in BC with Postmedia real estate

In June 2013, the ailing Vancouver Postmedia papers, The Sun and The Province, dumped 100 employees, plus two out of four floors of their downtown Vancouver offices. 
Colliers International, "the biggest player in the domestic commercial real estate industry", subleased the two now empty middle floors.

The previous year, Colliers and Postmedia had launched their joint venture "Property Post", described in their presser as providing :

"up-to-the minute news, commentary, information and videos that are accessible via the Financial Post website and the online business sections of The Vancouver Sun, the Calgary Herald and the Edmonton Journal.

Property Post also features content provided by Colliers, including twitter feeds, videos, and industry reports. Property listings will be a key component, allowing Colliers to use the site to market properties on behalf of its clients."

Ok, so it's a publisher-advertiser symbiotic partnership, similar to the one Postmedia proposed to CAPP a year later, providing Postmedia with revenue and Colliers with eyeballs :

"It is absolutely exciting," said Sudeep Balasubramanian, manager of digital sales at The Vancouver Sun and Province newspapers. "What we realize in terms of our digital strategy is that it is no longer just about selling advertising on a website.

Postmedia will support the site with editorial content that will be anchored by the Financial Post, and each of The Vancouver Sun, Calgary Herald, and Edmonton Journal newsrooms. It will also showcase commentary by Financial Post business columnist Gary Marr, Postmedia reporters, and freelance writers." 

While enthusiastic quotes from Colliers spox are liberally sprinkled throughout both papers, it's not always easy to tell whether it's an embed when they wander into a straight news story. This story from last week, for instance, quoting David Taylor of Colliers International on evictions and demolitions as 106 office towers go up in Burnaby : 

Demovictions' rising as Burnaby towers do the same : 

"Burnaby has faced “less public opposition during rezoning” because ...the land is “primarily occupied by older rundown apartments where tenants have, seemingly, less influence with the city than single-family homeowners."

Or this one about money from China being laundered through real estate : 
Chinese police run secret operations in B.C. to hunt allegedly corrupt officials and laundered money

"Kirk Kuester, executive managing director of Colliers International Vancouver, said the pool of money from Mainland China seeking investments in Metro Vancouver is so vast right now that he has to turn away potential clients.
“The money is staggering, quite honestly,” Kuester said. 

Kuester said, for example, that on Wednesday he had two or three potential clients with “half-a-billion” in private funds ready to put to work, but there are simply not big enough deals to satisfy them."

In addition to two middle floors of the former Pacific Press, Colliers International has ten offices in China.

Two years ago the BC Libs sold off 370 acres of Crown land on Burke Mountain at "$43 million less than its market value to allow Christy Clark to balance the budget", according to the NDP and a bureaucrat's leaked memo.
Colliers International won the marketing contract which saw the "fire sale" land bid go to WesBild. 
WesBild director Hassan Khosrowshahi has given $900,000 in donations to the B.C. Liberal Party since 2000, while Colliers International has only enriched the Libs by just over $100,000 in donations over 10 years. 

In BC there are no restrictions on private fundraisers or corporate donations or foreign donors or foreign ownership of farmland.  
Last year the BC Liberals raked in $10 million in donations. 
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Postmedia and the invisible handjob of the marketplace

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G&M Endorses Harper's Perps with Perks Without Harper

Hilarious G&M editorial election endorsement today: "His party deserves to be re-elected. But after Oct. 19, he should quickly resign." 

In other words, as Antonia Zerbisias put it : "The flying monkeys but not the wicked witch"

Editor-in-Chief David Walmsley then went on Faceplant to perform the 'little man behind the curtain' sketch. He bombed.  #MoreGlobeEndorsements followed.

Munchkinland flashback! Here's the G&M's 2011 Harper election endorsement :

"Only Stephen Harper and the Conservative Party have shown the leadership, the bullheadedness (let's call it what it is) and the discipline this country needs.

.... during his five years in office has demonstrated strength of character, resolve and a desire to reform ... 

Those who disdain the Harper approach should consider his overall record, which is good. The Prime Minister and the Conservative Party have demonstrated principled judgment ..."

With few exceptions, the rest of the media Munchkins also follow the yellow brick road of Harper endorsements with a yellow front page Con attack ad buy today ...as they have for the entire nine year Harper regime.

Saturday update : I'm updating the media graphic above as new editorial endorsements are published today.  Original graphic found at Reddit  

Also : Not only the Ottawa Citizen but the PostMedia chain is apparently running the same attack ad on their front page today, using Elections Canada's trademark yellow. Note : not merely an endorsement for the Cons, but an attack ad that mimics an Elections Canada notice.

Who are you getting your news from lately?
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Sunday update : 
National Observer : YELLOW STAIN : the bystander bigotry of newspaper endorsements
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Kinder Morgan: Taking the BY out of NIMBY

h/t Waterbaby

That's very good, isn't it? "Kinder Morgan has solved the NIMBY problem by taking the backyard".

I also liked his debunking of the attempt to de-legitimize protest itself - the argument that "protesters undermine the rule of law by claiming to speak for the whole community".

Hey, here's one now from the senior editorial board of the Vancouver Province!
Mountain mob don't speak for the rest of us

The Province senior editorial board wonders why the protesters are available to protest in the middle of the day and aren't at work "generating taxes", and whether the protesting "clever university professors" understand where their salaries come from. 
My personal fave here - Are their tents made from oil products? Oh, the hypocrisy! 
This one is akin to the argument that First Nations should only have 'preferential fishing rights' if they are restricted to using 14th century tools.

But then of course the protesters don't speak for you, Province editorial board, because you're already speaking for your editorial partner CAPP, the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers.




And a bang up job you're doing of it too -  introducing Postmedia stories that "CAPP needs to bring to the forefront of Canadian consciousness".

Last month, backed by its major shareholder New York hedge fund GoldenTree Asset Management, Postmedia added to its stable of CAPP-promoting opportunities with its purchase of Sun Media and 175 more newspapers and websites across Canada, including the 24 Hours daily. 
At left is the before and after effects of the buyout - just another day of tarsands-friendly media concentration in your backyard.

Fun story : Seven years ago, Texas Governor Rick Perry was pushing to build the Trans-Texas Corridor, a quarter-mile-wide swath of truck-only toll lanes, railway lines and multiple traffic lanes rolling from Mexico to the Oklahoma state border. The prime bidder was Cintra SA, Macquarie Infrastructure Group's partner in the Ontario Highway 407 ETR 99 year lease, of which Australia's Macquarie is the largest shareholder. 

To many Texan ranchers and farmers, Perry's superhighway just looked like a royal pain in the ass and opponents of privatizing roads came out against it in the thousands. All up and down the proposed route, ads and editorials critical of the proposal ran in the local newspapers. Macquarie bought those local newspapers out. All 40 of them. 
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Update : Carol Linnitt : Canada’s Petro-Politics Playing Out on B.C.’s Burnaby Mountain

Meanwhile on BC's Burnaby Mountain, RCMP act as Kinder Morgan's private security force, protecting a foreign corporation against the municipality of Burnaby and the people protesting in a public park who actually live here.

Updates from Burnaby Mountain

Media advertorials

Hey kids, remember PostMedia's pitch for their tarsands promotion partnership with the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers :

"Postmedia is proud to present its 2013 media partnership with CAPP.

We are a media company national in scope but community-focused. Canadians know our brands, trust our content, and welcome us as a vital member of their communities.

CAPP's messaging will extend to our massive mobile and tablet network so that vital energy information is never more than a click away. Our print coverage will include weekly energy editorial across our entire newspaper chain*, along with monthly joint ventures and quarterly special reports on subjects CAPP needs to bring to the forefront of Canadian consciousness."

* National Post, Financial Post, Vancouver Sun and Province, Ottawa Citizen, Calgary Herald, Windsor Star, Edmonton Journal, Regina Leader-Post, Saskatoon Star Phoenix, Montreal Gazette, and canada.com

Here's a few of the last two weeks' crop of Postmedia stories that "CAPP needs to bring to the forefront of Canadian consciousness".  If you only scanned the headlines, you might mistake them for actual news : 

Pipeline, barge, tanker, truck or rail-car: Producers putting safety first in oil and gas transportation

Strong global demand has Canada’s oil production on target to almost double by 2030 

Five Canadian oil and natural gas companies awarded for innovation in sustainable resource development

Oil Industry set to grow

Production of conventional oil on the rise

All five carry this byline at the bottom :

"This story was produced by Postmedia’s advertising department on behalf of the Canadian Association of Petroleum Producers for commercial purposes." 

Here's a bonus one from CIBC :

Skilled trades shortage in Alberta a tremendous opportunity for new and growing businesses

"This story was produced by Postmedia’s advertising department in collaboration with CIBC to promote awareness of this topic for commercial purposes."  

Then it was the Globe and Mail's turn. Currently the G&M staff are threatening strike action over this :

Leaked memo confirms Globe and Mail wants journalists to write advertorials

Globe executives want to monetize the integrity and reputations of The Globe and Mail’s journalists – the same award-winning reporters and editors that management proudly (and rightly) claims are vital to the enterprise’s future as a powerful, independent, fearless and profitable news organization. 

Under the company proposal, editorial staff would be assigned to write or produce advertiser sponsored “branded content” (i.e. native advertising) that is vetted by the advertiser prior to publication and held out to readers as staff-written content.
That content cannot offend a paying advertiser’s specific opinions and corporate interests or it will be changed. 

This proposal was presented to us by editorial management and has been vetted by the Editor-in-Chief. 

That would be Editor-in-Chief David Walmsley, recently busted for portraying his own published endorsement of teabaggin' Tim Hudak for premier of Ontario as the choice of the G&M editorial board :

The Globe's editorial board endorses Tim Hudak's Progressive Conservatives

when in fact the G&M editorial board had endorsed Kathleen Wynn instead.


So ... where are you getting your news lately?
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Joint CAPP/Postmedia tarsands promotion

Postmedia - CAPP Showcase - January 2013 from Postmedia 3i on Vimeo.

Thurs AM update : Postmedia just yanked the vid.

Transcript :

"Postmedia is proud to present its 2013 media partnership with CAPP.

We are a media company national in scope but community-focused. Canadians know our brands, trust our content, and welcome us as a vital member of their communities. 

In 2013, we'll join Canadians in discussing what really drives Canada's economic engine - energy.  With a multi-media strategy that includes a digital sponsorship of the Energy Channel across our national network. Our editorial coverage will be tied to multiple touchpoints for CAPP including : 100% of all advertizing on energy pages, sponsorship logo, live conversation feeds, social media feeds, CAPP's partner representation, videos, promotional links, homepage takeovers, and more. 

CAPP's messaging will extend to our massive mobile and tablet network so that vital energy information is never more than a click away. Our print coverage will include weekly energy editorial across our entire newspaper chain, along with monthly joint ventures and quarterly special reports on subjects CAPP needs to bring to the forefront of Canadian consciousness. 

We'll direct our audience to the CAPP Energy Channel, Direct Mail, with a combination of promotional advertising and social media amplification.
The CAPP and Postmedia program will be executed with seamless project management and continuously optimized throughout to ensure your success. 

Be where your audience is : Postmedia."

Vancouver Observer posted slides from an alternate joint PostMedia/CAPP presentation that turned up on twitter yesterday.

Postmedia includes National Post, Financial Post, Vancouver Sun and Province, Times Colonist, Winnipeg Free Press ***, Ottawa Citizen, Calgary Herald, Windsor Star, Edmonton Journal, Regina Leader-Post, Saskatoon Star Phoenix, Montreal Gazette, and canada.com.

In November, 19% of Postmedia was acquired by a second New York hedge fund, raising the total percentage of its foreign ownership to 54%.

*** Ooops - sold in 2011. Serves me right for copying the list of papers directly off the Postmedia 2013 presentation at top. I guess they were referring to their *brand*.
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