Media
Liberal-appointed senator brags about getting media to censor political opponent’s op-ed
From LifeSiteNews
Ontario Senator Lucie Moncion, who was appointed by Trudeau in 2016, told the Senate she was able to get a August 21 piece published by Senator Donald Plett, who serves as the Opposition Senate leader, edited from its original form.
A Canadian Senator who was appointed by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau boasted to her colleagues that she was able to successfully get edits made to a commentary piece published by her political rival in a well-read newspaper.
Ontario Senator Lucie Moncion, who was appointed by Trudeau in 2016 and is a former banker, recently told the Senate that she was able to get a August 21 piece published by Senator Donald Plett, who serves as the Opposition Senate leader, edited from its original form.
The incident prompted Plett to state that Canada now has a “Senate communications police.”
Plett, who is a Conservative Senator, wrote a piece in the Ottawa weekly newspaper the Hill Times titled, “Trudeau’s Experimental Senate Changes Are Turning Out To Be A Dud.”
As per Blacklock’s Reporter, Moncion took issue with what was written in Plett’s piece, telling Senators, “Inaccurate information was presented,” and that they had to “remain vigilant.”
According to Moncion, who serves as chair of the Senate committee on internal economy, she was able to get edits made to Plett’s piece. She had members of her staff make the revisions to Plett’s commentary, which included complaints about overspending in the Senate.
Moncion claimed that “[o]nce a newspaper has the facts it is free to change an article, remove it or leave it as is,” adding, “I repeat: The newspaper is free to make corrections.”
“In a democracy, it is essential to ensure information that is disseminated about our institutions is true in order to avoid contributing even passively to the spread of misinformation and disinformation that characterize our media landscape,” she said.
Senators were told that the corrections made to Plett’s piece were not due to libel, or misstatement, but rather because of a technical aspect, according to Moncion.
The Hill Times is one of Canada’s most heavily subsidized weekly newspapers, getting over $1 million in the last 18 months from grants, subsidies and sole-sourced government contracts.
Censored Senator blasts edits, says Canada now has a ‘Senate communications police’
Plett was not too pleased with the changes made to his commentary, telling his fellow Senators that the Liberals wanted to “minimize” the actual cost increases made in the Senate since Trudeau took power in 2015.
“They wanted to change the meaning of the text, trying to minimize the increase in Senate expenses since Justin Trudeau took power,” he said.
“This is outrageous. We now have a Senate communications police that will not only ‘fact-check’ what senators say or write outside the chamber, but they will also, in secret, change how you present your thoughts.”
According to Plett, the Liberal government has a pattern of “doing anything to silence dissent and opposition.”
Other Conservative Senators expressed their disgust with the fact Plett’s piece was seemingly force-edited by a Liberal-appointed Senator.
“This should concern each and every one of us,” said Senator Leo Housakos.
Housakos observed that there can be disagreement on public opinion as well as what is written in op-eds, but Senators “don’t have the right to instruct my staff to call any news outlet in the country to edit anything you say.”
This is not the first time the Hill Times has been caught editing its news pieces. In 2020, it admitted that it had deleted a column critical of then Governor General Julie Payette, at the request of an unnamed official.
When it comes to government officials trying to influence people’s opinions via the media, LifeSiteNews recently reported on how disclosed records revealed that the Canada Revenue Agency (CRA) spent over a quarter of a million dollars tasking employees to create “news” reports, some of which were published by Canadian media.
Trudeau has pumped billions into propping up the mostly state-funded Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) as well as large payouts for legacy media outlets ahead of the 2025 federal election. In total, the subsidies are expected to cost taxpayers $129 million over the next five years.
Despite the interplay of the state in media, Trudeau has claimed that Canadians must continue subsidizing the CBC and others to “protect our democracy.”
From LifeSiteNews
The decision was otherwise roundly condemned on X as “horrific,” “horrendous,” the hallmark of a “dictatorship,” and even “the biggest breach of privacy Western civilization has ever seen.”
Apple Store on New York’s Fifth Avenue.
Apple pulled its highest-level security feature in the U.K. after the government ordered the company to give it access to user data.
The U.K. government demanded “blanket access” to all user accounts around the world rather than to specific ones, a move unprecedented in major democracies, according to The Washington Post.
The security tool at issue in the U.K. is Advanced Data Protection (ADP), which provides end-to-end encryption so that only owners of particular data – and reportedly not even Apple – can access it.
“Apple can no longer offer Advanced Data Protection (ADP) in the United Kingdom to new users and current UK users will eventually need to disable this security feature,” an Apple spokesman said.
According to Apple, the removal of ADP will not affect iCloud data types that are end-to-end encrypted by default such as iMessage and FaceTime.
The nine iCloud categories that will reportedly no longer have ADP protection are iCloud Backup, iCloud Drive, Photos, Notes, Reminders, Safari Bookmarks, Siri Shortcuts, Voice Memos, Wallet Passes, and Freeform.
These types of data will be covered only by standard data protection, the default setting for accounts.
Journalist and Twitter Files whistleblower Michael Schellenberger slammed the U.K.-initiated move as “totalitarian.”
The decision was otherwise roundly condemned on X as “horrific,” “horrendous,” the hallmark of a “dictatorship,” and even “the biggest breach of privacy Western civilization has ever seen.”
Elon Musk declared Friday that such a privacy breach “would have happened in America” if President Donald Trump had not been elected.
Jake Moore, global cybersecurity adviser at ESET, commented that the move marks “a huge step backwards in the protection of privacy online.”
“Creating a backdoor for ethical reasons means it will inevitably only be a matter of time before threat actors also find a way in,” Moore said.
Britain reportedly made the privacy invasion demand under the authority of the Investigatory Powers Act of 2016.
Business
Federal Heritage Minister recommends nearly doubling CBC funding and reducing accountability
The Canadian Taxpayers Federation is calling for the CBC to be completely defunded in the wake of the federal Liberal government’s recommendation to nearly double the state broadcaster’s cost to taxpayers and hide its budget reporting.
“It is outrageous for the government to try to hide the cost of the CBC from the taxpayers who are paying its bills,” said Franco Terrazzano, CTF Federal Director. “This government is totally out touch if it thinks it can nearly double CBC’s cost to taxpayers and try to hide its costs.”
Heritage Minister Pascale St-Onge said the government should nearly double the amount of money the CBC takes from taxpayers every year.
The CBC will cost taxpayers about $1.4 billion this year.
“The average funding for public broadcasters in G7 countries is $62 per person, per year,” St-Onge said. “We need to aim closer to the middle ground, which is $62 per year per person.”
Canada’s population is about 41.5 million people. If the government funded the CBC the way the minister is recommending, the CBC would cost taxpayers about $2.5 billion per year.
That amount would cover the annual grocery bill of about 152,854 Canadian families.
St-Onge also recommended the annual taxpayer funding for the CBC be removed from the government budget report and instead be entrenched in government statutory appropriations.
“I propose that it be financed directly in the legislation instead of in the budget through statutory appropriation,” St-Onge said.
“Canadians have told this government that the CBC costs them too much money, that it is not accountable to taxpayers and they don’t watch it, and now the government wants to double down on all those problems,” said Kris Sims, CTF Alberta Director. “The CBC is an enormous waste of money and journalists should not be paid by the government.
“The CBC must be defunded.”
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