12 January 1999
The woman's voice at the other end of the phone line was pleasant enough."Hello, I'm calling for the Windsor Star. We'd like to know if you wish to take advantage of our special offer to subscribe?"
"No thanks", I replied. "I rarely read the Star anymore".
"Really? Why?", she asked.
I gave her my spiel. "I find the Windsor Star's editorial stance so supportive of corporate control, the status quo, so anti-labour movement, so anti-worker and so poorly argued that I find it distasteful."
There was a moment of stunned silence. She went on. "I can understand that, but don't you want local news coverage?"
Despite my anger at the National CBC's cowardly suspension of reporter Terry Milewski for calling Chretien and the Liberal government "the forces of darkness" while reporting the APEC controversy, the local CBC keeps me informed about what is happening in town.
The salesperson admitted, "I don't care much for my home town newspaper either (she lived in Scarborough, Ontario, most likely an out-sourced worker and part time) and honestly, I've never read the Windsor Star myself. But thanks for enlightening me. It was a refreshing."
No, I rarely read the Windsor Star. Sometimes though you just have to do it, like finding a carton of milk that's gone bad. You just have to smell it before you pour it down the drain.
The urge came the next day. I bought the January 9 edition of the Star, grabbed by the headline story - "Job growth in '98 best in decade, And things looking up for young people".
Every month or so the Star (like other corporate owned media) prints a front page rah-rah cheerleader article telling us that the economy is healthy, capitalism's great and we're all going to get a piece of that pie in the sky.
The article was a typical example of the blinkered view of so-called "objective" journalism. It was not concerned with little ugly facts, nor big ugly ones for that matter.
The article stated that the economy created 24,000 jobs in December, 1998 - 449,000 for the year. An increase of 3.2 per cent. It whispers . . . the recession is no more!.
In December, full employment rose by 9,000 following "hefty" gains in November. The proportion of working Canadians "jumped" in a "significant increase".
It quoted John McCallum, economist for the Royal Bank that "anyone still left in the recession camp is quietly packing their bags today."
Excuse me? Does Mr. McCallum, this paid apologist of finance capital, really believe this drivel? I assure you that when he says "we" are out of recession that his "we" doesn't include me or you.
Analyse the statistics.
9,000 jobs were full time - 15,000 jobs were only part time.
Full time work increased 2.7 per cent in '98. Part time, increased 5.3 per cent. The Globe & Mail reported that women "reaped gains". Their employment "climbed" 3.7 per cent. Men's by only 1.6 per cent.
Youth "enjoyed the strongest job growth". Youth unemployment decreased to . . . get ready . . . 14.4 per cent! Of course, most of the jobs are also part time.
The overall unemployment rate is still unchanged with 1.27 million Canadians without work. But hey, the recession is ending!
Interestingly, the reporter's other article (buried on page 11) admits that Finance Minister Paul Martin refused to meet with Canadian Labour Congress president Bob White to discuss cuts in Unemployment . . . oops . . . I mean Employment Insurance. White is referred to as a "union boss". Between you and me, I've never met an elected boss. If they want to call elected union leaders "bosses", I think it even more appropriate if they then referred to real bosses as "Masters" - just to be "objective" mind you.
So, let's review this. Numbers of jobs created increased, the ugly fact is the unemployment rate hasn't changed.
A significant share of the jobs created were part time, amongst youth and women. The ugly fact is that part time work is often minimum wage, poorly paid, no benefits, and women's wages are significantly less than men's wages. So, in effect, the jobs created pay less. Probably just enough to keep the landlord at bay, keep some creditors away.
Not mentioned are the ugly facts that workers in Canada work longer hours than ever before, that the wealth disparity between those who own the capital and the rest of us is greater now than in the 1980s, the 1970s . . . the 1920s!
After digesting the tripe of this "news", I recalled a conversation from a year ago with one of the Windsor Star's personages. He assured me that the newspaper's reporting was "objective", that editorial policy was not imposed by the vehemently right-wing mucketymuck multi-millionaire owner Conrad Black, that many editorial stances were in fact very "left-wing"!
Did he regard me as if the words "I'M STUPID" suddenly flashed on my forehead as he was telling me this. I thought about what he said and considered it utter bilge.
I picked up the Star's Business Section. There at the bottom announcing next week's edition, "If you want 1999 to be successful financially, think of yourself as a mini-corporation and act accordingly - call yourself Me, Inc., and pretend you have a monetary empire to watch over."
I threw the paper into the recycle basket. Who is fooling who?