For as long as I can remember, I have been troubled by the very existence of the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (the CBC).  With the exception of Hockey Night in Canada, there was nothing in their programming schedule that had any appeal to me.  “B” AND “C” grade actors, and artificially created,  self-absorbed so-called personalities were foisted upon us as alleged legitimate television “stars” when, in fact, they were nothing more than a creation of the annoying, self-absorbed, so-called Eastern Canadian elites. 

We were required, whether we liked it or not, to endure political left-wing commentary from over-exposed news readers who were anything but neutral in their approach to all things, but especially political commentary.  Fortunately, as cable television services expanded, we were rescued by the truly professional programming available in abundance from the United States.  And with the exception of the Public Broadcasting System, US television networks were standalone enterprises, non-reliant on government handouts to survive.  That is, they were free enterprise entities that lived, or died, based on their abilities to deliver first-class content, attract viewers and earn the resulting advertising revenue.  Most, if not all, were public corporations and as a result, both investors and viewers were able to see what their popular personalities were being paid, along with other relevant financial information a viewer, and certainly a shareholder, would like to see.  The CBC brass did not condone this kind of specific disclosure and it fought tooth and nail to keep what it was paying its “stars” from the taxpaying public, notwithstanding that these “stars” were able to live the life of the rich and famous and did so, year after year, on our dime.  And the obscenity, I suspect, continues into post-employment, gold-plated retirement plans.

In Canada, we have three networks:  the aforesaid CBC, CTV and Global.  In my opinion, all three networks have become lackeys to virtually all things advocated by Eastern Canadian liberals based in Toronto, the CBC being the worst offender. (By the way, the French language arm of the CBC can best be described as being dishonest and completely misleading when it comes to any type of reporting that may be even remotely critical of the province of Quebec.  There are many egregious examples of what I have just alleged, but those examples are not the subject matter of this blog, and I will leave that topic for another day).

This liberal, left-wing dominated media triopoly situation is particularly offensive to those of us who live in Western Canada.  The Eastern Canadian print and electronic media depict those living west of Thunder Bay (excluding British Columbia and its predominately crazy, communist, limousine liberal citizens) as red-necked rubes who love guns, hunting, oil, Ford F-150s and tattoos.  The same kind of “deplorables” Hillary Clinton vilified and who helped elect President Trump. 

In Canada, left-wing media news personalities, falsely advocating political neutrality, went out of their way to assist in the political defeat of Stephen Harper, notwithstanding any reasonable person’s opinion that he was the best Prime Minister this country has had in the past 100 years.  Instead, they presented us with, and pandered to, an ill-qualified pretty boy as their chosen one and they used their media clout to advance the fraud that this fellow was capable of leading anything. As numerous subsequent events have clearly revealed, the wrong choice was made in the last election to the great and lasting embarrassment and detriment of Canada.   It was bad enough that Global and CTV got down on their knees for Junior, but to have the CBC, an outfit that owed its very existence to government grants and pander to the least qualified PM in history, was really hard for those of us living in the Prairie Provinces to stomach.  The mainstream Canadian media, simply stated, used their unchallenged access to Canadians to mislead us and unduly influence the election’s outcome.  Think Andrew Coyne, a frequent, regular guest on CBC and National Post columnist.  I can’t help but wonder what his remuneration is for expressing opinions which so many of us disagree with.

In researching for this blog, I found that the most recent numbers indicate that although the Harper Conservatives did what they could to cut back the amount of money wasted each year by the CBC, the Liberal Government, acting in “pay back mode,” not only reinstated the grants to the CBC but increased the annual waste to a whopping 1.2 billion dollars!  You heard that correctly.  The number is 1.2 billion dollars, not in a onetime payment but that amount, each and every year with the very real chance that the number will be revised upward if the CBC is successful in getting Prime Minister Sunny Ways elected for a second term.

As noted above, I really thought Stephen Harper was a very good Prime Minister.  Was he perfect? No he was not.  I was disappointed he did not ram all pipeline approvals through to the finish line as being in the national interest, and not only cut back on CBC funding but sell the entity to a free enterprise, standalone, buyer who would not require government money, and lots of it, to exist.  If a buyer could not be found, I wanted him to disband this ineffective, anachronistic leech on the Canadian public.  As an aside, these clowns couldn’t even maintain their hold on its flagship program, Hockey Night in Canada, as it lost out to a free-enterprise competitor.

If the CBC were disbanded or sold, would your life be affected?  I don’t think it would.  Do you think that $1,200,000,000 of our tax dollars could be better spent in a way that would either reduce taxes or be reallocated to more meaningful social programs?  Doesn’t it bother you that when examining the CBC’s financial statements, one cannot find anywhere in the disclosures what members of their executive team, Board of Directors, and so-called television personalities, are paid?  What is disclosed are ranges of compensation for various positions but specifics remain a secret. And when determining the salary range for various executives, they have the gall to compare their people to those individuals employed by legitimate, privately funded, extremely large and very successful, media companies throughout North America.  For the CBC brass to try and compare themselves with these ultra-successful, world-class, for-profit ventures is nothing short of being a sad joke!

Publicly traded corporations are required by law to divulge what they pay their senior people but not the government coddled, publicly funded, CBC.  Could it be that this information, if it were revealed to the public, might just cause rioting in the streets?  Do you think that the CBC’s Board of Directors are primarily recruited from the Eastern Canadian “in crowd,” a group designed to maintain the status quo and advance whatever politically correct position which happens to be the flavour of the month, and do so through a medium that is, for all intent and purposes, denied to others with opposing viewpoints?  Think indigenous issues.

For years, curious people wanted to know what those employed by the CBC were paid.  Inquiries in that regard were rebuffed by those running the organization on the grounds such information was private, and disclosure would violate privacy laws.  As a result, the public was denied any information pertaining to what the likes of Peter Mansbridge and David Suzuki were paid, and the details of collateral benefits such as pension plans, paid periods of leave and other monetary perks.  Although that information remains guarded by the CBC, one can, I believe, reasonably assume that the salaries paid in the past and other direct and indirect remuneration, in both examples cited, are I would wager the high side of being obscene.

As far as Suzuki is concerned, he continues to be the darling of the left-wing environmental zealots as he advocates doing what he says but not what he does.  The fact is, neither the CBC nor the federal government would dare release the compensation information to the public because if they did, what little credibility the outfit has would be forever lost.  The CBC, and its compatriots, can have all the back slapping award shows they want, but the fact remains, these self-indulgent phony “B” grade wannabe’s enjoy salaries that are not even close to being commensurate with their abilities and what they would be entitled to anywhere else on our planet.

To be somewhat fair to the CBC’s political views, the other two Canadian networks are content to parrot left-wing mumbo jumbo as well.  We, unfortunately, do not have any counterbalancing opinions when it comes to a political conversation, unlike what is available and extremely popular in the United States.

If the CBC must exist, and continues to be the never ending recipient of corporate life-saving government handouts, it might just take a lesson or two from the most successful cable programming in the United States.  If they do not, at least, do that, please give the organization a quick, and hopefully, painful death.  It has misspent our hard-earned money, enriched over-rated employees and unduly influenced election results in Canada for far too long.