Part One:
Our guest is Steve Paikin, host of the Toronto TV show “The Agenda.” To the great dismay of most Canadians, the relationship between the US and Canada has deteriorated a great deal since Pres Trump came into office. For decades thinking of our two countries as the closest of friends and allies, Canadians were deeply offended when Trump said that he views Canada as a national security threat (with no facts to buttress this 180 degree turnabout).
Then Trump set tariffs on trade with Canada, adding economic hardship to the diplomatic offense. And now, with COVID-19 and Trump’s utter failure to get the pandemic under control, Canada has had to shut its borders to anyone coming from the US. We are concerned about the chill that has befallen the two former good neighbors of North America.
Part Two:
We speak with Alex Shephard of the New Republic about his piece: “Senate Republicans Have No Intention of Stopping Trump from Stealing the Election.”
People – including the media – have to start believing Donald Trump and his Republican enablers when they say they’re going to do something horrible and unamerican, such as refuse to leave office even if they lose the November election. Yes, they really mean what they say. They’re making plans – mobilizing their troops and lawyering up – to carry out their authoritarian, anti-democratic agenda.
The media owe it to their audience – and to the ethical values underlying their journalistic profession – to stop apologizing for this Administration’s hate and “otherizing” of anyone who disagrees with Trump. The media must desist from bending over backwards to put a sympathetic spin on Trump’s threats. The media must stop buying into the false equivalencies, to realize that Trump is lying when he says that Democratic excesses are actually the equivalent of Republican voter suppression and paramilitary intimidation of Americans exercising their First Amendment rights.
Yes, the media must be objective. Yes, they have to offer “fair” coverage and right to reply for both political parties. But “fair” treatment does *not* mean giving equal time – with no fact-checking or questioning – to actual experts (trained scientists reporting on their research following best practices scientific protocols) as they give to a politicized hack who has the opposite viewpoint based on commands he’s receiving from Martians speaking to him through the tinfoil hat he wears on his head.
