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Will the Potential New Buyers of The Montreal Gazette and Two Other Papers Finally add Balance?
January 20th, 2010 | 
Author: One can only hope. When something makes Jabba the Roy’s knickers go up in a bunch, one has to believe it can be a good thing. Before I go on: I have to know: since when do real doctors have time to call in radio shows? I think someone likes the sound of their own shrilly voice.
Beryl Wajsman, editor of The Suburban, Montreal’s largest community weekly, is one of the potential buyers along with Ray Heard, former managing editor of the now defunct Montreal Star and head of Quebec Global TV along with former Liberal Senator, Gerry Grafstein are going to be submitting a bid for the Montreal Gazette, The Ottawa Citizen and the Conservative Bird Cage liner, the National Posties. If they get to purchase these three papers, could this mean more balanced journalism? A better balance of opinion writers?
What the hell is so wrong with that? Isn’t that what responsible media is supposed to provide for the public? Stevie and the Harpercons have more than enough media right arms and Cheerleaders for them.
Besides, in spite of the trio’s pasts with the Liberals, I doubt it would steer the papers sharply to the left. In fact, one of them said they wouldn’t change the Right leaning NP (groan!). Why that would be, I don’t know. Perhaps to keep them competitive during the bidding war.
In fact, it appears that a so-called small ‘c’ conservative will be joining this consortium. Also, they say that they wouldn’t change the National Posties. Too bad. Question: When has this wingnut daily turned a profit? One should perhaps take this as a sign that even the National Posties should change direction. Maybe this particular consortium is just saying they won’t make changes in order to remain in the bidding game.
Who is this so-called small ‘c’ conservative, anyway? Personally, I don’t believe they exist anymore: they seem to have either shifted their support for liberals or most of them followed Stevie on that sharp right turn (that is, until prorogation). Where does this individual fall?
All of this may be moot given that Canwest has always preferred to sell all to the same buyer. It appears that offers from the larger media conglomerates: Astral, Corus Entertainment and Torstar Corp (owner of the Toronto Star) are being considered. In the past, it had been said that the enterprise as a whole has more value than if the assets were separated. John Douglas, spokesman for CanWest had this to say:
“When third parties have looked at these operations they have concluded that they’re collectively more valuable than they are as single entities,”
However, are all of these papers worth more together than separate? Chris Diceman, senior vice-president with Dominion Bond Rating Service didn’t seem clear on that at the time he was interviewed.
“We saw in the case of Nortel if you can split it up and create auctions for specific pieces that other companies want, you end up generating more value,”
According to a report by Scott Cuthbertson, a TD Securities Analyst, says that a conventional media company bidding for CanWest assets would would raise their debt loads to unacceptable levels. He was considering the bids from Astral, Corus and Torstar. Such a report could well keep these corporations out of the running. That’s already a plus.
Whether it is the consortium Wajsman, Grafstein, Heard and Mr./Ms Mystery ‘small c’ conservative purchasing only part of the operations or someone else purchasing part or all of CanWest’s assets, I can only hope for more balanced journalism of days’ past: no political cheerleaders for any party. Columns & Opinion pieces? Great; but make sure there is an equal mix of these writers with different views all getting published equally. What’s old should be new again.
As for Jabba the Roy and his ilk, there are still plenty of Harpercon cheerleaders to spoonfeed them without CanWest.
I think most Canadians share my wish for balanced and unbiased responsible media. Is that really too much to ask?
Posted in Main Stream Media, What's old is New again | 
Tags: Beryl Wajsman, CanWest, corporate media, Mainstream Media, Ray Heard, Senator Jerry Grafstein
One Response to “Will the Potential New Buyers of The Montreal Gazette and Two Other Papers Finally add Balance?”
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LOL… it’s too much to ask as long as the managing editor (Raymond Brassard and his Francophone management team) have control.
I first ran across Monsieur Brassard back during the days of the referendum when I called to ask him why he was putting so much French content into the Gazette. I reminded him that it was the ONLY English Daily we had left in the city. I can only remember parts of the conversation we had but what stayed forever etched in my head was: He told me he’d come to Quebec from Vermont to ‘Help save the French language’ and that the Gazette was NOT an English Paper. I remember I hung up stunned. After I managed to regain my breath, I called him back and got his voice mail. So I left him a message asking what he meant by, the Gazeete is NOT an English paper.
He left me a reply on my voice mail that said: “What I meant by that is: The Gazette is not an English paper, it’s not a French paper, it’s not a Chinese paper, it’s a Montreal paper.”
From there, I knew we were in big trouble (should have known it with Joan Frazier at the helm – who imo was rewarded with a Senatorship for NOT voicing her outrage over the language laws) in Montreal. And I knew that further conversation with Monsieur Brassard would be a total waste of time; so I wrote Conrad Black who owned Southam at that time. I faxed him a 3 page letter, after speaking with his wonderful secretary – whose name I sadly can’t remember at the moment and lo and behold I got a personal signed reply asking me to be patient – he’d fix it. A few months later to my delight, and I’m sure to the delight of ALL the readers of the Gazette, there was an added heading to the title. It was: Montreal’s English Language Daily!!!
Unfortunately, Mr. Black being the democratic employer he was and is (even though he’s a political conservative that I still don’t get) – he didn’t fire M. Brassard as I surely would have, for not having a handle on the papers readership etc.. And for not being fired M. Brassard ran as many “Let’s get Conrad Black’ articles as he could – during the witch hunt Conrad Black days. Nice guy that M. Brassard, no?
Of course ever since then the Gazette has gone steadily down the toilet. It’s new owners Astral media – fired just about all its reporters, replaced English Management with French management (Gee do you think they discriminate in their hiring and/or promotion practices?) because it seems M. Brassard and pals believe they KNOW what’s GOOD for its English readership and they know what we Should believe better than we do! So they took all that made the Gazette GREAT and turned it into a piece of garbage that’s in the toilet – where most readers put it after enduring the years of most often bile being foisted upon them. You know like Josse Legault and her regular op-ed spot singing the praises of the parti Quebecois – and its public lynching of Steve Olynick – the only 25 year mayor of Greenfield Park who refused to remove the hated English STOP signs in his city. Within one year they destroyed the man and his reputation. imagine, after 25 years of the Gazette singing his praises as a mayor, with a couple of articles a year about him; The Gazette published over 200 negative stories about him in one freaking year. He by the way, was my friend and I watched him crumble and get sick. This big strong – best mayor Greenfield Park ever had – a man who was always true to his word and true to his heart – was destroyed in one year by the Gazette. I still have copies of all those articles. I was going to help him fight back but he DIED. He aged 20 years in one year.
Ah the power of the press and the damage it can do. I know Steve wasn’t the only one damaged by our once fantastic Gazette. In my opinion, the English community has been dealt the same kind of blow and same kinds of wounds by the paper that’s supposed to represent us, The ONLY ENGLISH LANGUAGE DAILY we have left.
So there you have it. Why is the Gazette broke? Why has its readership plummeted? To the new owners – whoever you may be: Read the above.