BROADCASTING

Monkey see, monkey doodoo.

Now that banks and auto makers have sucked mightily from the public tit, the line-up of Big-Lipped Monsters is getting downright pushy.

Elbowing right to the front in Canada are broadcasters.

Global, CTV and the CBC are all behaving like rink enforcers in the corner shoving and biting and high sticking their way to The Big Payoff.

These people all want taxpayer bailouts.

My answer is simple.

No. No. No.

Canwest Global and CTV have consistently made fortunes by blithely ignoring any vague sense of responsibility to the country they have been fleecing. They basically are windows for American programs. The little that they have focused on local or national texture has been entirely at the end of regulatory shotguns. If they hadn't been forced to do local news or the occasional drama, they wouldn't have wasted a penny on such pain-in-the-ass hard work.

Now that times are tough, now that the sons have blown the father's gifts, now that ad revenues are migrating elsewhere, they want you and me to help out.

Huh?

Get lost.

Fold your cheesy tent, boys.

Let me watch CBS is that's what I want.

You want me to watch you, give me something to watch. Otherwise go the way of Eatons.

I cannot for a moment understand how or why I should pony a penny for your bad practices.

As for the CBC, let's quote the former chair, Carole Taylor:

"...go for broadcasting that is different from what the privates do, that is not going for ratings, but is proving a service that cannot be found anywhere else."

Bang on.

The CBC is a hideously deformed monstrosity, a twisted, unworkable hybrid. It is overgrown and knows not what it wants.

It should be cut in half or to a third and it should produce and show only entirely original Canadian content.

The claim by its current executive that the audience it gets at 7:30 pm for Jeopardy carries into its 8-11 prime time is utter nonsense. If this fool actually believes that fabrication, he has no business in the business.

The remote rules, Dopey.

The minute Alex says goodbye, we are all gone.

More taxpayer money for dunces and dissemblers like this?

No.

It should have absolutely no concern with ratings. It should be concerned only with doing good work.

What a concept!

DEMOCRACY ON TRIAL

Follow as closely as you can the proceedings in BC Supreme Court in the case of Susan Heyes and her civil action against the city, the province, the federal government, the Greater Vancouver Transportation Authority and RAV project Management Ltd.

You should stay with this story because it is important.

A small business owner's Cambie Street livelihood was not disrupted, but destroyed, by officials who lied to local merchants. The officials said the line would be build by boring underground. Of course, that's not what they did at all. They changed to cut and cover.

Most importantly, they never once considered for a second offering some kind of compensation for the financial and psychological damages they inflicted on innocent, honest, working citizens.

This case is about the heart and soul of democracy.

Heyes, who has since relocated her shop to Main Street, is courageous and feisty and determined and she should be recognized as an exemplary citizen for this action.

Of course, she has made a basic strategic error.

If only she had presented herself as a drug addict, she would have been given compensation by the carload: needles, places to shoot, housing, social workers, doctors, nurses, psychologists and the like.

That'll teach you to get up in the morning, shower and dress and go open the front doors of your business and try to earn a living and pay taxes.

What have we all been thinking?

Economics 101

When your personal property tax bill arrives and it sis almost 8% higher than it was last year, all you need ask is, "Am I getting 8% more in services."

But you already know the answer.

I've had the distinct displeasure of driving across the Oak Street bridge several times in recent weeks. Pothole City. 'nuff said?

A student told me yesterday that it took an hour and a half to get by bus from Westminster Highway and #3 Road to 49th and Cambie. But VANOV urges you to take transit. Hm...

Councillor Louie has proposed spending $300,000 to hire someone to save money at City Hall. Nice.

How about this, Raymond?

How about City Hall slash and burn a dozen useless offices on its rolls? How about the City stop trying to be all things to all people? How about leave Health, for example, to the province and the federal government where it belongs? How about getting out of the drug business? How about ending the personal fiefdom that exists at City Hall in Arts and Culture?

No one that I know of at City Hall has come even remotely close to tightening the City belt in the same way that everyone world-wide has had to in this economic climate.

The 8% solution is no solution at all.

Plea