One cannot help but notice a rising stream of essays and dispatches in the Western Standard from those who speak plainly about Alberta’s independence. Some urge not only that Alberta depart from Canada, but that Alberta must also evict Canada from Alberta — rid ourselves of those national intrusions that have so thoroughly hollowed out freedom in the country at large.Others press the question: should Albertans continue to invest their energies in federal politics, or ought we turn inward, to the places where change can still be wrought — our towns, our ridings, our local councils? Their conclusion, if one is honest, is obvious: Ottawa is irretrievably set in its decline, and choosing this or that party is nothing more than a choice of deck chair on the Titanic..GIESBRECHT: How to fix CBC? Hire Ezra Levant.Permit me, then, to dwell on a different, but equally pressing matter: the state of our so-called “national” media.That the Canadian media is no longer a steward of fair inquiry is no surprise to Western readers. The moment they bellied up to the federal trough, they knew precisely which hand buttered their bread. Add to this the pervasive left-wing indoctrination that seeps from our universities into the editorial rooms, and what do you have? Not a national press, but a national chorus — repeating the government hymn, note for note..Three networks? Three perspectives? Hardly. All were birthed in the same seminar rooms, sustained by the same subsidies, and afflicted with the same intellectual monotone and idleness. Critical assessment? Independent inquiry? Those virtues have been exiled. Instead, journalists parrot what they were taught — that the great orthodoxies of the day are “self-evident.” That evidence should actually matter, or that dissent should be weighed, scarcely occurs.It was not always so. Mid-century media in Canada, for all its flaws, at least maintained councils and ombudsmen that imposed a degree of accountability. Journalists once answered to codes of conduct, and readers had avenues of complaint. But those bodies were voluntary. And when newspapers withdrew, the councils withered. What remains today is reputation without teeth, a hollow structure..MCMILLAN: To hell with the east, we want to be released.Small wonder, then, that Canadians have rendered their own verdict: the mainstream outlets are neither trusted nor read as they once were. The market place has spoken and they survive not by the trust of the people, but by the cheques of government.And so, predictably, when Alberta raises the question of independence, the national press sneers. They do not explore the reasons for our dissatisfaction. They do not ask why so many are disillusioned. Instead, they brand us “sore losers” in some electoral game. This is not journalism. It is laziness or worse, complicity..But Albertans are not without recourse. Independent journalists — many operating without subsidy, without protection, and often under threat of exclusion from government briefings — still labour to “follow the money” and expose what the state would prefer remain hidden. That is journalism in its pure sense, and it is to these voices that Albertans must turn.How do we answer this decline? First, by “changing the channel.” Seek out the independent outlets, recommend them to neighbours, support them with your businesses, advertise in their pages. Those with means should invest in new Western-based networks bound by codes of conduct, not codes of silence..STEPHAN: Alberta does not need a progressive justice system.For if Alberta is to stand as a nation, liberty intact, then we must restore the Fourth Estate to its rightful role: fair, balanced, and subject to standards that serve the public, not the government.Let Ottawa’s subsidized scribes cry “censorship” if they wish. They squandered their moral authority long ago when they failed to defend their independent brethren. They are in no position now to lecture Albertans on freedom of the press.No, Albertans want facts, not sermons. Debate, not dictation. A journalism that reports, not one that instructs. For democracy, like a prairie crop, grows only when planted in the soil of truth. And if we are serious about our independence, that soil must be tilled anew.
