Uncategorized
Inside the Shocking Parliamentary Ethics Hearing That Reveals the Depth of Media Bias in Canada
CTV’s Richard Gray
“CTV spliced together three short soundbites… to create an entirely made-up sentence. Literally fake news that entirely changed the meaning of what Pierre Poilievre said.” — Michael Cooper
It’s no secret that the mainstream media is a propaganda machine for the liberal elite, but the recent Parliamentary Ethics Committee hearing exposed just how deep this rot goes. The first hour of the committee meeting was a clinic on media corruption, and guess what? CTV News is at the center of it. This isn’t some tiny newsroom mistake—we’re talking about the manipulation of news to actively undermine Conservative leader Pierre Poilievre.
Let’s break down what we saw in that first hour, because it’s a lot more than just journalistic malpractice—it’s corporate media colluding with Trudeau’s Liberals to smear their political opposition.
CTV Gets Caught Red-Handed
In September 2024, CTV ran a story about Pierre Poilievre’s opposition to Trudeau’s carbon tax. Sounds simple, right? Except that the clip CTV aired wasn’t Poilievre’s actual words. They spliced together three different soundbites, in a way that fabricated an entirely new message. They deleted Poilievre’s key reference to the “carbon tax election,” making his comments sound more benign than they were.
The outcome? Canadians saw a falsified version of Poilievre’s stance on one of the most critical issues facing voters. And, surprise, surprise—it conveniently played into Trudeau’s hands by diluting Poilievre’s criticism of the carbon tax.
CTV’s manipulation wasn’t exposed by some internal review or journalistic conscience. No, it was called out by a Conservative staffer. Let that sink in. The most trusted name in Canadian news, caught fabricating news to attack the leader of the opposition—only to issue an apology after being called out.
Michael Barrett Drops the Hammer
The star of this hearing? Conservative MP Michael Barrett. He didn’t pull any punches when he confronted Richard Gray, Vice President of CTV News. Barrett’s opening salvo hit at the heart of the issue: “We’ve seen a lot of examples of CTV acting as activism masquerading as journalism.”
And he’s right. Barrett systematically tore apart CTV’s defense, pointing out that this wasn’t some innocent error. CTV deliberately altered Poilievre’s statements to undermine him politically. Barrett challenged Gray to explain why CTV had turned into an arm of Liberal propaganda, essentially parroting Trudeau’s talking points in their coverage.
Gray’s response? The same tired excuse we’ve heard time and again—“It was a mistake.” Well, no, it wasn’t. You don’t accidentally splice soundbites together to create a new sentence. That’s deliberate manipulation. And you certainly don’t edit out key phrases like “carbon tax election” without knowing exactly what you’re doing.
Barrett’s performance was masterful, exposing Gray’s weak defense and making it clear that CTV can’t be trusted to cover conservative leaders fairly. And why would they? Their cozy relationship with Trudeau and his Liberal government guarantees them favorable treatment, including regulatory relief worth millions.
Media-Political Collusion Exposed
Here’s where it gets even more disturbing. CTV is owned by Bell Media, a corporate giant that benefits directly from the Liberal government’s policies. Andrew Scheer hammered this point home during his cross-examination. Scheer pointed out that while CTV loses millions in its news operations, Bell Canada profits off government regulatory favors—to the tune of $40 million in “regulatory relief.” So, you think Bell Media has an incentive to help Trudeau out? Absolutely.
This isn’t just about biased reporting. This is about a corrupt relationship between a corporate media empire and the Liberal government. Trudeau’s regime is propping up CTV with regulatory favors while CTV is turning around and attacking Conservative leaders. It’s not a conspiracy theory—it’s fact.
Richard Gray’s Pathetic Defense
What was Richard Gray’s defense? Predictable. He fired two employees and insisted that this was an isolated incident. But here’s the kicker—Gray never even spoke to those employees directly to find out their intent. That’s right, the head of CTV News didn’t bother to personally investigate the two people who altered the clip of Poilievre. Instead, Gray claimed there was no “malicious intent” based on an internal investigation he didn’t personally conduct.
Even Liberal MP Anthony Housefather, who was hardly interested in holding CTV accountable, pressed Gray on this point. Housefather rightly asked how Gray could possibly testify about the employees’ intent if he never personally interviewed them. The answer? He couldn’t.
Gray kept repeating the same line—that there was no malicious intent—but how could he know? The truth is, CTV got caught, and now they’re scrambling to limit the damage without addressing the deeper issue of institutional bias.
NDP and Bloc MPs Play Softball
To no one’s surprise, the NDP and Bloc Québécois didn’t push CTV nearly hard enough. René Villemure of the Bloc briefly raised the question of whether CTV was dealing with just the consequences and not the intent behind the manipulation, but Gray dodged, and Villemure let it slide. Meanwhile, Matthew Green of the NDP expressed concerns about the incident undermining public trust but failed to dig deeper into why these mistakes always seem to hurt conservatives and help Liberals.
Here’s what the NDP and Bloc MPs missed: This isn’t just about one bad news clip. It’s about the systemic bias that runs through CTV and the rest of the mainstream media. These so-called “mistakes” always seem to happen when it comes to conservatives, don’t they? Funny how the Liberal government and its media allies get a free pass every time.
The Liberal-Media Swamp Is Real
This committee hearing made one thing crystal clear: CTV News is compromised. They aren’t interested in fair, unbiased reporting. They’re interested in maintaining their cozy relationship with the Trudeau government and attacking anyone who dares challenge Liberal orthodoxy.
Richard Gray’s weak defense and the media’s failure to self-police is just another sign that the swamp runs deep in Canada. Mainstream media outlets like CTV aren’t just making “mistakes.” They’re deliberately manipulating the news to protect their financial interests and political allies.
If you’re still watching CTV or any other mainstream outlet expecting fair coverage, you’re part of the problem. Turn them off. Find your news elsewhere. Because CTV—and the Liberal media establishment—sure as hell aren’t looking out for you.
Subscribe to The Opposition with Dan Knight .
For the full experience, upgrade your subscription.
Uncategorized
Mortgaging Canada’s energy future — the hidden costs of the Carney-Smith pipeline deal
Much of the commentary on the Carney-Smith pipeline Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) has focused on the question of whether or not the proposed pipeline will ever get built.
That’s an important topic, and one that deserves to be examined — whether, as John Robson, of the indispensable Climate Discussion Nexus, predicted, “opposition from the government of British Columbia and aboriginal groups, and the skittishness of the oil industry about investing in a major project in Canada, will kill [the pipeline] dead.”
But I’m going to ask a different question: Would it even be worth building this pipeline on the terms Ottawa is forcing on Alberta? If you squint, the MOU might look like a victory on paper. Ottawa suspends the oil and gas emissions cap, proposes an exemption from the West Coast tanker ban, and lays the groundwork for the construction of one (though only one) million barrels per day pipeline to tidewater.
But in return, Alberta must agree to jack its industrial carbon tax up from $95 to $130 per tonne at a minimum, while committing to tens of billions in carbon capture, utilization, and storage (CCUS) spending, including the $16.5 billion Pathways Alliance megaproject.
Here’s the part none of the project’s boosters seem to want to mention: those concessions will make the production of Canadian hydrocarbon energy significantly more expensive.
As economist Jack Mintz has explained, the industrial carbon tax hike alone adds more than $5 USD per barrel of Canadian crude to marginal production costs — the costs that matter when companies decide whether to invest in new production. Layer on the CCUS requirements and you get another $1.20–$3 per barrel for mining projects and $3.60–$4.80 for steam-assisted operations.
While roughly 62% of the capital cost of carbon capture is to be covered by taxpayers — another problem with the agreement, I might add — the remainder is covered by the industry, and thus, eventually, consumers.
Total damage: somewhere between $6.40 and $10 US per barrel. Perhaps more.
“Ultimately,” the Fraser Institute explains, “this will widen the competitiveness gap between Alberta and many other jurisdictions, such as the United States,” that don’t hamstring their energy producers in this way. Producers in Texas and Oklahoma, not to mention Saudi Arabia, Venezuela, or Russia, aren’t paying a dime in equivalent carbon taxes or mandatory CCUS bills. They’re not so masochistic.
American refiners won’t pay a “low-carbon premium” for Canadian crude. They’ll just buy cheaper oil or ramp up their own production.
In short, a shiny new pipe is worthless if the extra cost makes barrels of our oil so expensive that no one will want them.
And that doesn’t even touch on the problem for the domestic market, where the higher production cost will be passed onto Canadian consumers in the form of higher gas and diesel prices, home heating costs, and an elevated cost of everyday goods, like groceries.
Either way, Canadians lose.
So, concludes Mintz, “The big problem for a new oil pipeline isn’t getting BC or First Nation acceptance. Rather, it’s smothering the industry’s competitiveness by layering on carbon pricing and decarbonization costs that most competing countries don’t charge.” Meanwhile, lurking underneath this whole discussion is the MOU’s ultimate Achilles’ heel: net-zero.
The MOU proudly declares that “Canada and Alberta remain committed to achieving Net-Zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050.” As Vaclav Smil documented in a recent study of Net-Zero, global fossil-fuel use has risen 55% since the 1997 Kyoto agreement, despite trillions spent on subsidies and regulations. Fossil fuels still supply 82% of the world’s energy.
With these numbers in mind, the idea that Canada can unilaterally decarbonize its largest export industry in 25 years is delusional.
This deal doesn’t secure Canada’s energy future. It mortgages it. We are trading market access for self-inflicted costs that will shrink production, scare off capital, and cut into the profitability of any potential pipeline. Affordable energy, good jobs, and national prosperity shouldn’t require surrendering to net-zero fantasy.If Ottawa were serious about making Canada an energy superpower, it would scrap the anti-resource laws outright, kill the carbon taxes, and let our world-class oil and gas compete on merit. Instead, we’ve been handed a backroom MOU which, for the cost of one pipeline — if that! — guarantees higher costs today and smothers the industry that is the backbone of the Canadian economy.
This MOU isn’t salvation. It’s a prescription for Canadian decline.
The cost of the bureaucracy increased by $6 billion last year, according to newly released numbers in Public Accounts disclosures. The Canadian Taxpayers Federation is calling on Prime Minister Mark Carney to immediately shrink the bureaucracy.
“The Public Accounts show the cost of the federal bureaucracy is out of control,” said Franco Terrazzano, CTF Federal Director. “Tinkering around the edges won’t cut it, Carney needs to take urgent action to shrink the bloated federal bureaucracy.”
The federal bureaucracy cost taxpayers $71.4 billion in 2024-25, according to the Public Accounts. The cost of the federal bureaucracy increased by $6 billion, or more than nine per cent, over the last year.
The federal bureaucracy cost taxpayers $39.6 billion in 2015-16, according to the Public Accounts. That means the cost of the federal bureaucracy increased 80 per cent over the last 10 years. The government added 99,000 extra bureaucrats between 2015-16 and 2024-25.
Half of Canadians say federal services have gotten worse since 2016, despite the massive increase in the federal bureaucracy, according to a Leger poll.
Not only has the size of the bureaucracy increased, the cost of consultants, contractors and outsourcing has increased as well. The government spent $23.1 billion on “professional and special services” last year, according to the Public Accounts. That’s an 11 per cent increase over the previous year. The government’s spending on professional and special services more than doubled since 2015-16.
“Taxpayers should not be paying way more for in-house government bureaucrats and way more for outside help,” Terrazzano said. “Mere promises to find minor savings in the federal bureaucracy won’t fix Canada’s finances.
“Taxpayers need Carney to take urgent action and significantly cut the number of bureaucrats now.”
Table: Cost of bureaucracy and professional and special services, Public Accounts
| Year | Bureaucracy | Professional and special services |
|
$71,369,677,000 |
$23,145,218,000 |
|
|
$65,326,643,000 |
$20,771,477,000 |
|
|
$56,467,851,000 |
$18,591,373,000 |
|
|
$60,676,243,000 |
$17,511,078,000 |
|
|
$52,984,272,000 |
$14,720,455,000 |
|
|
$46,349,166,000 |
$13,334,341,000 |
|
|
$46,131,628,000 |
$12,940,395,000 |
|
|
$45,262,821,000 |
$12,950,619,000 |
|
|
$38,909,594,000 |
$11,910,257,000 |
|
|
$39,616,656,000 |
$11,082,974,000 |
Why Japan wants Western Canadian LNG
Disclosures reveal Minnesota politician’s husband’s companies surged thousands-fold amid Somali fraud crisis
What Do Loyalty Rewards Programs Cost Us?
Mainstream media missing in action as YouTuber blows lid off massive taxpayer fraud
-
International22 hours agoTrump confirms first American land strike against Venezuelan narco networks
-
Business22 hours agoHow convenient: Minnesota day care reports break-in, records gone
-
Business2 days agoThe Real Reason Canada’s Health Care System Is Failing
-
Opinion2 days agoGlobally, 2025 had one of the lowest annual death rates from extreme weather in history
-
Business22 hours agoThe great policy challenge for governments in Canada in 2026
-
Business2 days agoFederal funds FROZEN after massive fraud uncovered: Trump cuts off Minnesota child care money
-
Addictions2 days agoCoffee, Nicotine, and the Politics of Acceptable Addiction
-
Business2 days agoDark clouds loom over Canada’s economy in 2026