MediaWatch: Terry Milewski At The CBC Twists The Robocall Debate Like Licorice…

Terry Milewski of the CBC

I’ve been a bit hesitant about Terry Milewski’s reporting on the Robocall issue. On the one hand, he’s done a good job covering the details- but, equally, I’ve always felt he hasn’t been critical enough of both sides. The Lefties were putting a lot of effort into sensationalizing the Robocall issue as the Right was trying to quell the debate. Back in April, at the height of the Robocall rallies I actually got Jamie Biggar of Leadnow.ca to apologize for over sensationalizing– he himself admitted that he appeared “like a shark that was looking for blood.”

Well, today my concerns about Milewski’s objectivity became much easier to prove after he published an article on the CBC titled Tories trying to block new evidence in robocalls case. This was a craftily written piece that could make PressTV blush. The basis of this article is that the Conservative party are doing their damnedest to stop evidence from being added to the Robocall case filed by the (Black Bloc supporting) Council of Canadians (Coc’s).

The CoC’s have recently made a request for details on the complaints about Robocalls voters sent to Elections Canada earlier this year. The problem is that they made this request after the June deadline for filing evidence. Lawyers understand the importance of deadlines, and we’ve all known this evidence existed since before the case was filed. I can only think of two reasons the lawyers wouldn’t have asked for this evidence earlier- either they are incompetent, and they forgot, or they are using this as a tactic to create FUD.

What Milewski doesn’t mention in the story is that everything discussed in this article is typical of any court case ever argued. When one side issues a request to the judge, the other side counters that request with their side of the argument. Had the Conservative’s lawyers not made this argument, their competency would have also been questionable.

Unfortunately, many people reading this story don’t understand enough about the courts to see this- Milewski should have done a better job explaining from a layman’s perspective. Let’s hope this is just an oversight on his part.

I’ve seen some buzz online that the people organizing the Robocall rallies are re-awakening. The Toronto group are having a meeting today. Let’s hope that they keep their future rallies more realistic, with much less rhetoric than past rallies...

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