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CBC floats Russia theory for Canadian trucker protest
State-owned CBC suggests that ‘Russian actors’ may have instigated
massive protest convoy that shut down nation’s capital
© Steve Russell/Toronto Star via Getty Images
A cross-country convoy of truckers that has jammed the streets of Canada’s capital in protest against Covid-19 vaccine mandates might seem like grass-roots pushback against government overreach, but broadcaster CBC Television has offered a more sinister explanation: Russia did it.
Speaking in an interview on Friday with Canada’s public safety minister, Marco Mendicino, CBC host Nil Koksal suggested that possible Kremlin meddlers might have brought about the massive “Freedom Convoy.” “Given Canada’s support of Ukraine in this current crisis with Russia, I don’t know if it’s far-fetched to ask, but there is concern that Russian actors could be continuing to fuel things as this protest grows, but perhaps even instigating it from the outset,” she said.
Koksal didn’t offer any evidence to back up the theory or say who has raised such concern. Mendicino replied, “I’m gonna defer to our partners in the public safety, the trained officials and experts in that area.”
The interview came just before disgruntled truckers began to arrive in Ottawa on Friday night. Thousands of convoy participants and other protesters massed in the city on Saturday, bringing traffic to a standstill and sending Prime Minister Justin Trudeau into hiding. State-owned CBC said Trudeau and his family had been moved from his official residence to a “secure location.”
As many as 50,000 trucks were reportedly expected to flood into Ottawa, and traffic was snarled through much of the city. Some trucks were emblazoned with “F*** Trudeau” signs across their trailers, while other protesters demanded, “Mandate freedom.”
Government restrictions that went into effect on January 15 require unvaccinated Canadian drivers to quarantine for 14 days when they cross the border back into their country. Trudeau has condemned the angry truckers as holding “unacceptable views.”
Prior to floating the theory of a Russian bogeyman, Canadian media outlets have made other claims that appeared to smear the protesters, such as suggesting they are racist or extremist. The Toronto Star said the convoy became a “magnet” for such undesirable elements as “conspiracy nuts, Western separatists, far right-wingers and worse.” Others have suggested that some participants want to carry out their own version of last year’s US Capitol riot.
A counter-protester was seen on Saturday saying, “F*** your white nationalist agenda,” while Canadian television reporter Mackenzie Gray was quick to post a Twitter message proclaiming “our first Confederate flag of the day here on Parliament Hill.” Multiple observers replied that Gray had spotted the “first fed of the day,” meaning a federal agent seeking to discredit the protest.
Legacy Media’s Slanted Coverage of Trucker Protest
Is Reprehensible
Cory Morgan
January 31, 2022
As far as large protests go, the Truckers for Freedom protest at Parliament Hill in Ottawa has gone remarkably well. Thousands of upset people have converged in one spot and demonstrated with no reports of violence or vandalism. No clashes with police, no windows smashed.
If you watched nothing but legacy media coverage of the event, however, you would think that the demonstration was dominated by neo-Nazis and other assorted hate groups. The coverage has been nothing less than appalling.
Let’s review what has been making headlines since day one of the protest was held on Jan. 29.
A photograph of a person carrying a Nazi flag has been circulating. It was never actually seen among the protesters but it has been used to try to claim the protest has been dominated by Nazis.
A single Confederate flag was seen among the crowd. That picture has also been widely spread. But a video of demonstrators chasing that lone flag-holder from their ranks appears to have been overlooked by the media.
Some fools had parked on the steps of the National War Memorial and an idiot danced on the top of the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. This video is being constantly replayed by mainstream outlets, but they neglect to mention that this took part well outside of where the demonstration was held and it was only a handful of people. Those people were draped with Quebec flags by the way. Why isn’t the media trying to claim it was part of a Quebec nationalist movement?
A few twits draped a flag and put a mask on the Terry Fox memorial statue. The items were removed within minutes and the statue is unharmed (unlike many statues destroyed in past protests). It was disrespectful but hardly a capital offence. Still, we are barraged with images of the “desecration” continually on mainstream channels.
A Member of Parliament was photobombed by a jerk who had drawn a swastika on a Canadian flag with a felt pen. Ridiculous demands have been made that the MP apologize, though he clearly didn’t even know the flag was being waved behind him. Media is eagerly working to keep this story alive.
That’s about it. That’s all. That is the worst that the mainstream media could find after thousands of demonstrators spent an entire day in Ottawa.
Why couldn’t the media report on the thousands of Canadian flags being waved proudly through the demonstration? Why couldn’t they at least note that despite a week of predictions from “experts” that this demonstration would turn into another “January 6” event, not a single violent incident happened?
If we are going to pick winners and losers from the demonstration in Ottawa, the clear losers are the members of the mainstream media.
Trust in legacy media outlets has been in decline for years along with their viewership. The slanted coverage of news coupled with government bailouts has driven people to seek news from alternative news providers. The reprehensible behaviour from the mainstream media this week truly exposed to Canadians just how rotten that institution has become.
Nobody expects the media to support the trucker’s protest, but people expect coverage to be fair at least.
The legacy media is extremely protective of Prime Minister Trudeau. The media, like Trudeau, are far-left liberals and anti-conservative.
The media first ignored the convoy, then it tried to sow rumours about the legitimacy of the fundraising for the convoy, then it moved on to trying to paint the convoy as being extreme. The CBC even tried to link backing for the convoy to Russian interests.
Yet, we are witnessing an incredible event unfolding before us.
Despite the most vociferous efforts of Canada’s political and media establishment, an unprecedented nationwide movement and protest has emerged. The organizers didn’t need mainstream media coverage in order to bring together tens of thousands of people. They didn’t even need establishment banks in order to raise over $8 million from over 100,000 people.
This is what is at the root of the desperate and almost hysteric opposition to the Truckers for Freedom protest from the Canadian establishment. Canada’s political and media elites have lost control, and it scares the tar out of them. They don’t know what to do and are responding by hysterically lashing out.
Time will tell whether the protest will have the effect of actually pressuring authorities to drop pandemic restrictions. Even if it doesn’t, the convoy has already been a grand success.
The convoy has shown that citizens can and will stand up for themselves when pushed too far, and that the establishment isn’t invulnerable.
Canada’s political and media elites needed a good dose of personal insecurity, and they just got it. They now can choose either to change their tune or get left behind. I suspect that they will choose the latter—and we will all be better for it.
Russia about to invade Ukraine, NYT insists after Bloomberg fiasco
“Portions” of the Russian military have already reached their “full combat strength”, the newspaper reported citing an anonymous Ukrainian source
A new fear-mongering report regarding the alleged looming Russian ‘invasion’ of Ukraine was published by the New York Times late on Friday. The newspaper said it spoke to a “senior Ukrainian military official” who shared details of a highly sensitive assessment compiled by the country’s military.
According to the official, Moscow has recently deployed an additional 10,000 troops to the region. Additionally, “several units” in the Crimean peninsula have been put “on the Russian military’s highest state of military readiness,” they claimed. More forces, stationed in unspecified “other locations,” have been allegedly put on “the second highest level of alert.”
At the same time, the official implied that the supposed ongoing military buildup by Moscow was a part of its “real game of poker,” aimed at scaring Kiev and the West, rather than a sign of an imminent incursion.
“For now, they’re doing everything they can to panic us and panic the West,” the official said.
Should the ‘invasion’ actually happen, Russia is expected to start with “localized action,” and, should it be successful, Moscow may try to “expand the conflict zone,” the official noted. Still, Russia would be unable to sustain the offensive for more than a week in multiple directions, “because of a lack of supplies including ammunition, food and fuel deployed to front line positions,” as well as due to lack of “sufficient reserve forces,” the newspaper claimed citing the anonymous Ukrainian assessment.
The total number of troops located near the border between Russia and Ukraine is estimated to reach some 130,000 servicemen, the newspaper noted citing unspecified US and Ukrainian officials.
The New York Times report comes amid soaring tensions between Moscow and the West, centered around Ukraine. Over the past few months, top Western officials and media have warned repeatedly about an alleged imminent ‘invasion’ planned by Moscow. On Saturday, Bloomberg accidentally published a headline that read ‘Russia invades Ukraine’. It was later deleted, with the outlet apologizing and saying it will investigate why the story they prepared was unintentionally published.
No actual evidence to back up the allegations, however, apart from claims by anonymous sources and observation of troops’ movements inside Russia in relative vicinity to Ukrainian borders, has emerged.
Russia has consistently denied such allegations, maintaining it has zero plans to attack its neighbor. Moscow has also pointed out that it was in its full right to move its military units within its own territory wherever it pleases, rubbishing the claims that such maneuvers have been somehow related to the Ukrainian standoff.
Russia hits out at Western ‘deviants’
Moscow claims the US and its partners want to “ruin” the Olympics
currently underway in China
© Russia’s Foreign Ministry/Sputnik
A growing chorus of anti-Russian rhetoric in foreign media is part of a concerted campaign to overshadow the Winter Olympic Games, currently underway in China, with geopolitical tensions, one of Moscow's top officials has claimed.
In a statement issued on Saturday, Maria Zakharova, the spokeswoman for the country’s Foreign Ministry, said that bombshell claims Moscow could be poised to start a war in Eastern Europe had been timed for maximum disruption. “Bloomberg has written about ‘a Russian invasion of Ukraine’. That same American news agency Bloomberg two weeks ago published fake stories about ‘Russian-Chinese agreements on the invasion of Ukraine,’” she wrote, saying it was designed to coincide with the major sporting event.
It’s a global informational [and] political marathon of NATO’s desires. We’ve observed many times how Westerners ruin the Olympic Games. But the current attempt was thought up by real deviants capable of anything.
Media in Western Europe and the US featured purported Russian aggression toward Ukraine as a key narrative in their headlines over the weekend after weeks of rising tensions. On Saturday, Bloomberg was forced to apologize after accidentally publishing a headline that read, ‘Live: Russia invades Ukraine’, which stayed on the homepage for nearly half an hour before being removed. Meanwhile, in Germany, Bild published an article detailing how Russia would consolidate its hold on Ukraine after an invasion. Moscow has repeatedly denied it has any plans to launch an offensive.
Zakharova also pointed out that Bild’s piece quoted an unspecified foreign intelligence service as claiming that Moscow was preparing to set up a puppet parliament and internment camps in Ukraine after conquering the country.
The comments come after Zakharova criticized the decision to illuminate an iconic World War II monument in Kiev in the colors of the Ukrainian flag. Ukraine’s culture minister, Alexander Tkachenko, explained that the illumination symbolized the unity of Ukrainians amid tensions with Russia. “We’re grateful that many countries around the world support our efforts to fight the aggressor,” Tkachenko said.
Last month, Bloomberg also quoted an unnamed diplomat in Beijing, who reportedly said it was “possible” that Chinese President Xi Jinping had asked his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin not to attack Ukraine during the Games, which officially kicked off in the Chinese capital on Friday. China’s Foreign Ministry spokesman, Zhao Lijian, said at the time that the report was “purely made up out of thin air.”
I wonder how many reports in the legacy media are made up out of thin air? They used to have such integrity!
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