A fond look back at Fred C. Dobbs, scourge of the lamestream media

I'm still hot under the collar about the sorry state of the lamestream media in North America. See "Anus horribilis 2020: Noted in passing (media)", posted yesterday. The truth isn't out there. It's here, in the blogosphere.

Liberal group-think dominates the lamestream media of the Excited States of America, and Canada is just as bad -- worse, now, with the passing of Christie Blatchford and Allan Fotheringham. 

And there are those who say that, even at his best, Dr Foth was not really anti-establishment, but more of a court jester poking fun at the Powers That Be, from inside the charmed circle of the liberal elite.

His jibes were indeed tepid, compared with the vitriolic savagery of my favourite Canuck political commentator, Fred C. Dobbs, the Bard of Beamsville. Ole Freddy was the alter ego of the late Michael Magee, a part-time radio and TV personality and full-time fan of the sport of kings, based in Beamsville ON. And yes, there is such a place. You can look it up.

While we were writing yesterday's piece, Ed. looked through one of Fred's two published works, The Platinum Age of B.S. (Van Nostrand Reinhold 1981) and found some comments on the Canuck controlled media which are even more to the point now than they were 40 years ago.

It's a funny thing in this country, but nobody really wants to talk, nobody wants to get out there and tear strips off the government anymore. Everybody wants to suck up...everybody's just cowed into keeping their yaps shut....

In Canada, I think if we had a Watergate situation the fix would be in with the Toronto Star, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation and Maclean's magazine. These is the big three media knee-jerkers in the English language in this country. 

[They] would really not want the great, wonderful, golden image of the Liberal Party of Canada to be tarnished in any conceivable way. Because, after all, this image is as great, as bright and aas shiny as any kinda galaxy could ever be if it come along and upstaged the eclipse of the sun. I mean, the arrival of the Liberals for these poor bastards is like the Second Coming.

There's a climate of fear among broadcasters, there's a real fear of the CRTC [the Canadian equivalent of the FCC], that muddling, meddling government quasi-regulatory body that they see as a group of people really interfering with their right to do what it is they want to do. And it's kind of a valid argument against government interference in our lives; there's far too much of it.

This is what the Trudeau government gang really do stand for, cuz they passionately believe that unless they run, organize, regulate and produce everything that goes on, it ain't going to be up to some peculiar standards they imagine exists.

The Platinum Age of B.S. was the sequel to The Golden Age of B.S. (Gage, 1976), both long out of print. If you're a Canadian and want to see what Dr Foth called "the Natural Governing Party" get the disrespect it richly deserves, try to get your hands on Fred's books. Try your local library, but don't be surprised if they don't have them. As for his radio and TV broadcasts, those tapes have been erased, wiped clean. Wonder why....

If you're American and wonder what relevance this has to you, just reread that passage. Where Fred says "Liberals", substitute "Democrats". For Toronto Star, CBC and Maclean's magazine, substitute, New York Times/Wapo, CNN and Time magazine. They're all the same! Ask yourself, now that Dr Hunter S. Thompson and George Carlin are no longer with us, is there anyone left who's willing to stand up and say the liberal elites are full of BS?... Anyone?...

Footnote: The "Trudeau" to whom Fred refers is not Blackie McBlackface, the current Prime Minister of Canuckistan, but his father, Pierre, who began the destruction of Canada way back in 1968 and was still in power when Freddie was writing. That in itself tells you all you need to know about the Canaadian sheeple.

"The not-so-crazy case against Hillary Clinton"

You think the Canucks all love Shrillery Clinton, eh. Especially their lamestream media. Especially the Canadian Broadcorping Castration. About 95% of the time you'd be right to think that, but every once in a while a bit of sanity somehow makes it by the PC police. Check out "The not-so-crazy case against Hillary Clinton", by Scott Gilmore, on the Maclean's website.

The subhead says something that Walt has been trying to explain for months: "The U.S. needs someone who can be trusted to bring the country together and then forward. Hillary Clinton is not that person."

What's really worth reading, though, is the lead-in, which likens the 2016 race to the bottom to a prize pig contest at a county fair. Imagine (Mr Gilmore writes) that one of the two finalist Berkshire hogs goes berserk -- examples are given -- leaving the judges so appalled that they award the prize to the other hog without knowing what the other one even looks like. Great analogy, eh!

That (the author says) is exactly what is happening right now. The Republicans’ prized Berkshire has run wild in ways that are so outlandish they defy satire.... As a result, the Democratic contender has been relatively ignored by the media, and will likely be elected simply because "she’s not Trump."

Now, the good news: Hillary Clinton has been scrutinized before, in depth. She and her husband have been the subject of official investigations almost constantly over the last 30 years: from Filegate to her current email scandal, this woman has been thoroughly weighed in the balance and found wanting.

Numerous examples are given. Read the whole article to learn why Mr Gilmore believes "Hillary Clinton is not that person."

Islamic world disorder

Still more on what's wrong with the Muslims and their religion. Before you accuse Walt of being a racist [Surely not! Ed.], consider the argument that there must be something wrong with a people and a part of the world which is not progressing -- no matter how you measure "progress" -- as quickly as any other part of the world, not even sub-Saharan Africa.

The part of the world to which I refer is the Middle East and north Africa. At least three countries in those regions are actually regressing: Afghanistan, Iraq and Syria. Two others -- Somalia and Libya -- are "failed states". Somalia has been acknowledged as such for twenty years, and Libya was accorded that "status", more or less, in last week's issue of The Economist.

The people of those regions are followers of the Prophet Mohammed -- Muslims. So are their rulers, some fanatically so. (Hello, Saudis!) Is there, then, some link between their religion and the political, economic and social turmoil -- not forgetting civil and sectarian wars -- now raging in that area?

Thanks to Agent 3 for the link to "How the Muslim world is being left behind", in the current Maclean's. Read the article and judge for yourself. [Unless you're Pope Francis, of course. Ed.]

Scott Gilmore explains the meaning of the charts you see here, and concludes that the Islamic world is in decline. Where he goes wrong is in thinking that if we just reach out and embrace the Muslims, we can pull them up to our level. What do you think of that, gentle reader? Walt think Mr. Gilmore is wrong...WRONG!

Peruvian woman wants to meet Father Duffy

As Canadian readers of WWW know, "Independent" -- read "ex-Conservative" -- Senator Michael Dennis Duffy is not the undisputed king of the Canuck pork barrel. He is the pork barrel! He is currently suspended from his extra-wide seat in the Upper Chamber of Parliament, and under investigation (so they say) by Sergeant Preston of the Yukon [RCMP, surely! Ed.]

See "Moron* Mike Duffy", "'Bring me the head of Senator Duffy!'", and "Emotional and over-refreshed, Senator Puffy denies having his snout too deep in the trough", all posted here last year.

The circumferentially-challenged senator has been maintaining a low profile [Really?! Ed.] while the investigation drags on, but finds himself in the glare of the headlights this week after Canada's Maclean's magazine published an interview with Karen Duffy, a Peruvian woman who claims to be the Puffster's bastard daughter by a convicted drug smuggler.

Yvette Benites says she met Duffy's sister Moira in the early `80s at Kingston's old Prison for Women (P4W) while doing time after being conned into carrying a prohibited substance into Canada. Moira introduced Yvette to her brother, who was then a reporter and gossip-monger for the CBC, while Yvette was on parole at a half-way house, pending deportation.

The Maclean's story says the alleged affair lasted for a few months, ending when Ms Benites found herself, errr, up the duff, at which point Mr. Duffy's interest in her, errr, rehabilitation suddenly ceased.

Now Karen Duffy, allegedly the fruit of the illicit affair, wants the father she never met to at least acknowledge her existence. The 32-year-old said she is not seeking money from Senator Duffy, who is well known to be so impecunious that his "friend" Nigel Wright had to repay the Senate for the money Duffy scammed on his expense account.

Ms Duffy says all she wants is "to have a relationship" with her father. "I want to meet him," she said. "I want him to know me, and share the things that are important to me."

She told Maclean's that she and her mother tried to reach out to the journalist-turned-senator over the past few decades, with no response. So, she has brought a paternity suit in a Peruvian court. Although any order of a Peruvian court would likely be unenforceable in Canada (according to Agent 3), it would seem that the Puffster's options are either to (a) admit paternity or (b) submit to a DNA test to disprove the allegation. The rumour on Parliament Hill is that Nigel Wright has volunteered to take the test for Duffy, for friendship's sake.

Note from Ed. to Agent 9: "Father Duffy"...the other Father Duffy! Geddit?!

"If ignorance is catching, it's time to quarantine the USA"

Ed. here (again) with an absolute must-read for you! "America dumbs down" is from the current edition of Maclean's magazine, a Canadian publication. I can already hear some of our American readers whining (again) that Walt seems to give a lot of space to Canadians mocking America and Americans. This article, by Jonathon Gatehouse, is not mockery. Rather, the author describes the "advance of ignorance and irrationalism in the USA".

Dear American friends, Gatehouse is just holding up a mirror, so you can see what your country looks like these days. "The U.S. is being overrun by a wave of anti-science, anti-intellectual thinking," he writes. "Has the most powerful nation on Earth lost its mind?" If foreigners are distressed about what the USA is becoming, you should be even more so!

"The term 'elitist' has become one of the most used, and feared, insults in American life," Gatehouse writes, as a preface to this quote from Catherine Liu, the author of American Idyll: Academic Antielitism as Cultural Critique "There’s a pervasive suspicion of rights, privileges, knowledge and specialization.... We don’t educate people anymore. We train them to get jobs."

And who's to blame? The baby boomers -- "so triumphalist in promoting pop culture and demoting the canon", according to Liu -- and the lamestream media and politicians who pander to them. And the Internet -- the lamest medium of all -- just makes it worse!

Gatehouse argues that "The digital revolution, which has brought boundless access to information and entertainment choices, has somehow only enhanced the lowest common denominators—LOL cat videos and the Kardashians. Instead of educating themselves via the Internet, most people simply use it to validate what they already suspect, wish or believe to be true."

Another scathing critique of the deep and abiding stupidity into which the West has fallen. Read it. You're welcome.

Random House Canada fails high school English

Ed. here. Since the blog belongs to me today, my words will appear in Roman letters, not italics. [Italics are mine. Walt.] Ahem... The blog is mine because the topic is proper English, knowledge of which seems to be lacking even at venerable publishing houses such as Random House Canada, part of the vast [or half-vast] organization known simply as Random House, "the world's largest English language trade publisher".

Things being a little slow here, I checked Random House's Canadian and international websites under "careers", thinking perhaps they would be looking for editors or at least proofreaders. Apparently not.

But why would I think there might be such a vacancy? Because I have just finished reading Peter Newman's When the Gods Changed: the Death of Liberal Canada (RHC, 2011) which appears to have been published without any proofing beyond what might have been done by a spell-check utility.

The quality of the output is, frankly, shocking. Errors of vocabulary, grammar, spelling and even punctuation abound. Here are some of them, shown in bold, with page numbers so you can check for yourself.

Before the "Introduction", there are two untitled pages which I suppose might be called a preface. On p. xii we find "This incidence of non-recognition..." Arrrggghhhh. Didn't we just post "'Incidents' vs 'incidence' -- what's the difference?". Oh wait, that was just this past July -- too late for Mr. Newman. [But he's even older than I am. He should know better! Walt]

Page 71 - "each new wave of Grits hot off the grittle" - I'm hoping this is not a spelling error, but an intentional neologism, a play on "Grits" which is slang for (Canadian) Liberals.

Page 80 - "until the midfifties" - "mid-fifties", surely, or possibly "mid-50s".

Page 102 - "waking a spectacular international decision" - How do you "wake" a decision? Perhaps Mr. Newman writes in longhand and the typesetter can't tell his M's from his W's.

Page 164 - "humming 'Il a perdu son epaulettes'" - Should be either "ses épaulettes" or "son épaulette". If you don't speak French, don't try to write it and expect an anglophone proofreader to fix it for you.

Page 224 - "'We're looking at a growing gap between the successive previous generation of immigrants like my dad, and the generation coming in from Africa and Asia.'" - Supposedly quoting Michael Ignatieff. What is a "successive previous generation"? Did Iggy actually say "successful"?

Page 236 - "...to send the matters to their respective parliamentary committees for consideration; he committees found..." - Missing a T there, but the spell-checker wouldn't catch that.

Page 242 - "After the first week of the campaign, Ignatieff's approval rating jump from nineteen percent to twenty-five percent..." - Tense trouble.

Page 256 - "[The Conservatives]...came under the leadership of nineteen individuals, many of whom gave anonymity of big boost." - What does this mean?

Page 264 - "To shift the burden of justified criticism on to his shoulders..." - Should be "onto", and yes, there is such a preposition.

Page 266 - "aimed at demoralizing Michael Ignatieff" - Supposedly from a "partial transcript" of an interview with Peter Donolo. My guess is Donolo said "demonizing", not "demoralizing", although Ignatieff probably was demoralized.

Noted twice - a member of a municipal council would be a "councilor" in the USA, but a "councillor" in Canada.

And finally, the piece of resistance (as Mr. Newman might have said)... Page 218 - "There has been a hard edge in the Conservative's pursuit of national competitiveness..." GAAAAAHHHHHHH!!! Does he really mean just one Conservative? No, this is clearly an apostrophe error, committed by Mr. Newman [who should know better. Walt] or an editor or proofreader who doesn't know how to construct a plural as opposed to a possessive.

Those at Random House or elsewhere large who weren't paying attention in Grade 8 English should read "Apostrophe Catastrophe" and "Let's kill the apostrophe ???". You're welcome.

Short book review from Walt: Leaving aside the problems with English usage noted by Ed., is When the Gods Changed worth reading? No. Fifty years ago, when he wrote for Maclean's and authored Renegade in Power (about the Diefenbaker years), Peter Newman was a crackerjack political commentator.

His last opus was supposed to be about the making of a prime minister. Such was the working title. Sadly for him (and RHC) Ignatieff led the Liberals to the worst defeat in their history, and quickly resigned. Mr. Newman was left with under 300 pages (including generous leading) of shoulda/woulda/coulda. The book is proof positive that even a skilled writer can't make something out of nothing.