Monday: In a story almost completely unreported within the mainstream media, the results of an Angus Reid poll showed that contrary to the headline on their press release, TV ads of the Conservative Party of Canada had in fact affected the standing of Liberal leader Stephane Dion. The ads, which used footage from the Liberal leadership campaign debates, was trumpeted as having done little to undermine support for Dion.
The press release stated "The television spots released by the Conservative party to question the traits of Liberal leader Stéphane Dion had a negligible impact on the perceptions of Canadians, according to a poll by Angus Reid Strategies."
However a reader of the blog www.smalldeadanimals.com dug into the Angus Reid website and found the actual questions asked of voters who watched the ads and their responses posted, and the truth was quite the opposite.
On page 4 of the poll, support for Dion in key areas such as "has what it takes to lead Canada", "trust to keep his promises" , and "manage taxpayer money ethically and wisely" slid from more in favor of the statements to more opposed; and on his supposed strong suit "will improve Canada's environment", a 23 point lead for Dion shrunk to a 10 point margin.
This was an invaluable opportunity to clue in listeners to the way pollsters manipulate their reports of voters moods and opinions to advance a slanted agenda, and to explain why the MSM's unquestioning use of such press releases is cause for concern.
The founder of Canada Sheli, Ron East, made his first appearance in our studio, along with a special guest from the Israeli Defence Force. Yiftach is a 24 year old IDF pilot on a public speaking tour across Canada to explain the challenges the IDF has faced in defending the State of Israel from terrorists attacking from Gaza, Palestine and Lebanon. What we found most interesting was the sense of obligation native-born Israeli's have to serve in their armed forces and protect their country despite a world political order which barely acknowledges their right to exist let alone defend themselves.
Frank the Italian Barber joined us for an abbreviated look at sports, which included a first person account sent by National Post columnist Scott Taylor about batting against the late fastballer Eddie "The King and his Court" Feigner and getting two hits which was a surprise to everyone especially Taylor. According to a wire report about his life and times, in a 1967 exhibition at Dodger Stadium, Feigner had struck out Baseball Hall of Famers Willie Mays, Roberto Clemente, Brooks Robinson, Willie McCovey, Maury Wills and Harmon Killebrew in order. The barnstorming act of Feigner and his 4 man team played 55 countries and was a very popular attraction in Winnipeg.
Tuesday: Three recent violent incidents were still being investigated by city police with varying success. A vicious sexual assault and shakedown off of Sargent Avenue had netted one of three suspects, all of them members of the Mad Cowz street gang. The Burrows Avenue shooting case saw the arrest of the second brother accused in the incident. However in the third case, the stabbing and shooting at the Jamaican Hall still had no suspects. Listeners noted that all three cases involved gunfire.
Enter Anita Neville. The Member of Parliament for Winnipeg South Centre had launched a tirade against Ottawa Tory MP Pierre Poulievre and demanded an apology for his comment that Winnipeg "streets are ruled by guns, gangs and thugs" because the previous Liberal administration was soft on criminals.
"It is outrageous, it is misleading ... I am so angry...They are casting aspersions on Winnipeg when there is all kinds of economic outreach happening to try to attract people to the city." Neville told the Winnipeg Sun.
In a terse conversation via telephone, she reiterated her view that Winnipeg was no worse off than other cities facing urban challenges. She completely dismissed the trio of cases we had just reviewed on-air as being any reason for outsiders to look at our city in the way Poulievre described. Neville did admit she would support legislation for mandatory minimum sentences
-- depending on which crimes were being included -- but otherwise seemed completely oblivious to the fact the civic election had been fought and won on crime and public safety and that growing issues like car theft and vandalism, gang warfare and downtown muggings had soured residents themselves on the state of the city let alone tourists.
Wednesday: Three interviews covered news sports and weather in fine fashion.
To start off CTV's Kelly Dehn discussed the memorial service for the two fallen firefighters as well as the three violent incidents we discussed with Anita Neville.
In the next segment, Valentine's Day was a significant milestone in Winnipeg and hockey history. On Feb. 14, 1975 the Winnipeg Jets faced off against the Gordie Howe led Houston Aeros in the season's 50th game. Bobby Hull was chasing the holy grail of hockey records, the 50 goals in 50 games benchmark set by Rocket Richard in 1944-45, and a full house of 10,418 including your then-youthful host crammed into the old Arena to cheer on the Golden Jet.
Former Jets defenceman Mike Ford joined us from his Westward Ford car dealership in Portage la Prairie and the years melted away.
The hard shooting rearguard described how Hull burst out of the gate and scored within 2 minutes to start the game. Ford scored a goal that night to tie it up at 3 -3 with 4 minutes left in the second period and Hull potted another with assists from centre Ulf Nilsson and Ford 42 seconds later. The third period was full of drama as Jets goalie that night, Curt Larssen made every save an adventure to hold the lead.
But gaining the win was secondary to the quest of the great Bobby Hull. Finally with only 1.33 left Nilsson and Ford again set up Hull whose hard shot deflected behind Aeros netminder Ron Grahame and propelled Hull into the record books, with 50 goals in 50 games.
Mike Ford agreed with our view that Hull's chase of Richard firmly established the Jets as a fundamental part of the community even though the team missed the WHA playoffs by a single point that season. In later years, NHL stars like Wayne Gretzky, Mike Bossy, Mario Lemieux and others (all beneficiaries of the changes in the game initiated by the Jets in the Hull/hedberg/Nilsson era) surpassed the 50-in-50 mark, but to our surprise a google search turned up no mention of the great achievment by Bobby Hull in 1975. Hopefully we have done our part to make sure hockey fans in Winnipeg never forget.
To round out the show, CBC-TV personality Murray Parker told our audience how he decided to return to the airwaves as part of CBC's expanded one-hour News at 6 package. After taking a buyout in the early 90's and getting his pilot's licence, Parker decided to audition for the new weather post and to his surprise, was chosen to join new anchor Janet Stewart. He had left CBC when computers were not the norm and the weatherboard temperatures were filled in by hand, but he told us he'll leave his chalk at home for now.
Thursday: The Driskell inquiry report somehow concluded that no charges should be laid against various Crown Attorneys and police officers, yet the public was expected to believe they had all failed in various ways to ensure James Driskell got a fair trial in the early 90's.
We explained how the inquiry was framed to deliver a foregone conclusion, and deliberately excluded evidence that formed the basis for the jury convicting Driskell of murdering Perry Dean Harder (that is, evidence besides the hair match which was proven faulty by DNA testing). We made the point that by blaming the officials and refusing to recommend charges, they ( ie. prosecutors George Dangerfield and the late Bruce Miller) were smeared with no recourse; similarly if any private citizens were ever accused or suspected of allowing witnesses to commit perjury, we'd be facing a court whether it was 5, 15 or 30 years later.
A new study from the University of Toronto generated a lot of callers angry with the conclusion of academics that organized team sports somehow contributed to male violence in youths by teaching bad things. You know, like teamwork, leadership, risk-taking, and that in life there are winners and losers. No one believes the study should be taken seriously so we won't.
Callers were split however, on the idea floated from CFL HQ that the league may look at selling naming rights for the Grey Cup game, but no one seriously believed it would be worth $1 million per team so once again, we won't either.
Friday: Fallout from the Driskell inquiry report continued in the form of a Tom brodbeck column inthe Sun. Tom reached the same conclusion we had, that a private citizen accused of participating in perjury would never escape a criminal charge. But Justice Lesage for whatever reasons felt smearing the public officials and cops was an adequate way to deal with their supposed misdeeds. Another good question is why, if key witness Ray Zanidean lied on the stand, why is he not being charged either?
A great story on www.dustmybroom.com discussed why Ralph Goodale owes the Mounties an apology. When the Income Trust leak investigation started, Goodale said his department was clean. With a charge now laid against an official of his former Ministry, the RCMP may have only scratched the surface of the insider trading scandal that helped propel Stephen Harper into the Prime Minister's office.
The blog noted a comment on radio by market analyst Fred Ketchen who explained that unless this single official had dozens of stock brokers, he was not the (only) reason for market fluctuations and voluminous trading activity in the hours before Goodale's policy announcement last year. For some reason no other media outlet has pursued this important question.
More about the speculation that the CFL was going to sell naming rights for the Grey Cup championship game. Our business specialist Shaun Myall of Victoria thought it was great idea and spoke about how naming title games after sponsors is commonplace in all but the very biggest events.
Ol' Dirty Money unloaded a special announcement at the end of the show. His Island Sports and Entertainment was flying your humble host to BC for a fast-paced weekend of prepping and voicing a demo reel, and presenting it to KVOS-TV on Monday at a meeting in downtown Vancouver.
With a chance to pitch a weekly pro wrestling show in a major market presented on short notice, Kick-FM was more than happy to prepare two very special "Best Of" episodes next week, a pair of Mayor Katz interviews on Monday and a double bill of Adrienne Batra and former Jets goalie Joe Daley on Tuesday...
