Twisted tales from the tube

-Doug Collins

A chap I knew well — David Levi — was for many years the CBC’s correspondent in Moscow. I sometimes used his stuff when I was editing a page in the Vancouver Sun and he told me how Izvestia and Pravda managed the news.

“Mostly,” he said, “it’s old stuff that has been gone over with a fine tooth comb by the bosses. Either that, or they make it up or have a story two days ahead of it actually happening.They then let the presses roll when the time comes.”

I never thought the same sort of thing could ever happen here. But it does, especially with regard to “hate” and other politically correct fictions dealt with by big-time media like the CBC.

They assume they know the story in advance, so all they have to do is fill in a few bits on the day.

That’s what happened to me last March in Oliver.

You may remember the case. Sol Littman of the “Nazi-hunting” Simon Wiesenthal Centre had described Oliver as the “hate capital of Canada” on account of stuff going out on the Internet from there that he didn’t like.

I had never seen the material, but knew that the Littmans of this world want to control the Internet.So I agreed to speak there in defence of freedom of speech.The event got national coverage. Sort of.

While I was speaking, an hysterical woman started screaming about “this free speech bullshit.” For Terry Milewski of CBC TV, that was just what the doctor ordered. In his report, shown several times nationally, he said:

“She’s talking about Doug Collins, who says the Holocaust is Jewish propaganda.”

In fact, the little sweetheart in question had not even mentioned my name. Moreover, people watching the TV item would have thought I had just such a remark. But I had made no reference to the Holocaust. Nor had I ever stated in my columns or speeches that the Holocaust itself was Jewish propaganda, in other words a complete lie. I write what I think, and such a thought has never been in my head.

I have questioned the numbers, and said that the never-ending stream of movies and TV features coming out of Hollywood were propaganda. Which is a different thing, so I complained to the CBC Ombudsman, Mr. David Bazay.

“Nowhere did I state that the Holocaust itself was Jewish propaganda,” I told him. “There is a world of difference between that and saying that Jews are the main influence in Hollywood, as was shown on the recent CBC-TV feature “Hollywoodism.”

Also, Milewski had asked me on video tape whether I thought the Holocaust was a joke. I replied, emphatically, that it was not, and invited the Ombudsman to examine the “outs” (tape or film not used) as proof.

The complaint was passed on to the CBC TV news chiefs, who rejected it, as was to be expected. I rejected their rejection, as was also to be expected.The Ombudsman then began his own investigation, which took five months.

In their hunt for gold, CBC News delved into every nook and cranny of my writing and speeches, going back to the 1980s — assisted, I have no doubt, by the usual suspects. But they could not produce what they wanted.

The Ombudsman stated in his decision:

“While CBC News has pointed out many controversial things you have said, the CBC has not come up with an example where in so many words you say that “the Holocaust is Jewish propaganda” and I can only conclude, therefore, that your complaint is justified.”

Put that down with many of the other media mountains I have climbed in recent years, so far without falling off a cliff.

Milewski knew what his angle was going to be even before he went to Oliver. My speech didn’t fit his agenda so he reported not a word of it.The interview didn’t fit either.

As far as he was concerned the occasion was organized by the politically incorrect, and what they actually had to say didn’t count.

The Oliver event was a prime example of what a lot of reporting is like these days. Many of the other media didn’t do much better.

But Milewski gets the Nobel Prize for the most slanted reporting of the year.