Episode 504 – The CBC Exposed

The CBC has just declared you’ll never wonder what’s real and fake when it comes to CBC News. But maybe that’s because CBC News doesn’t broadcast anything real at all. Join James for another blockbuster edition of The Corbett Report podcast where he dives down the rabbit hole in search of the truth about Canada’s public broadcaster.

TRANSCRIPT

JAMES CORBETT: So, you know how everyone has been looking for that single, solitary, infallible source of truth?

Well, good news, everybody! It’s been discovered! It’s the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation!

BRODIE FENLON: At CBC, our journalism is fact-checked. It’s verified. We don’t put anything out into the world unless we know it to be true. Or, if we haven’t verified it, then we’ll tell you that.

 

Our journalism is produced by humans who have to meet a really high bar in terms of standards. We’re accountable for our journalism, and in the rare cases where we get something wrong, we’ll own it. We’ll tell you what we got wrong and how we fixed it

 

And you will never ever have to wonder what is real or what is fake if it comes from CBC News

 

SOURCE: “You’ll never have to wonder what is real or what is fake if it comes from CBC News.”

CORBETT: “You’ll never have to wonder what is real or what is fake if it comes from the CBC.”

“What a strange and Orwellian thing to say,” as Cosmin Zerdza correctly observes on Twitter.

But, you know, call me cynical, but maybe, just maybe, the CBC has gotten a thing or two wrong in its 90 years of broadcasting history. And maybe, just maybe, some of those errors have never been acknowledged or corrected. And maybe, just maybe, rather than randomly, by chance, by bad luck, getting a thing or two wrong here and there, the CBC is in fact part of the lying establishment media oligopoly that has created the fake news paradigm that defines the modern establishment media.

What do you think?

Let’s find out.

CORBETT REPORT THEME

CORBETT: Welcome back, friends. Welcome back to another edition of The Corbett Report. I’m your host, James Corbett of corbettreport.com, coming to you, as always, from the sunny climes of Western Japan here in June of 2026 with Episode 504 of The Corbett Report, “The CBC Exposed.”

And, as longtime listeners of The Corbett Report will recall, I had an episode of the podcast, specifically Episode 253, on The BBC Exposed back in 2013. And, naturally, as a Canadian, I always intended to follow that up with a report on the CBC—the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. And given the release of that bizarre Orwellian Instagram short that we just saw, I thought this would be a prime opportunity to broach the subject.

So, let’s roll up our sleeves and dig in. And we can find out more information about aforesaid short from this post up on The Counter Signal Substack; “CBC demands blind trust from viewers in bizarre Instagram video: According to CBC News’ Editor in Chief, Brodie Fenlon, Canadians will ‘never ever have to wonder what is real or what is fake if it comes from CBC News,'” which notes that, “The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation’s news division released a video urging Canadians to ‘trust’ its reporting, saying Canadians will ‘never ever’ have to determine what is ‘real and what’s fake’ in its coverage.”

And after repeating that really bizarre and really incredible statement, it goes on to quote Fenlon’s other statement: “At CBC, our journalism is fact-checked, it’s verified. We don’t put anything out into the world unless we know it to be true, or if we haven’t verified it, then we’ll tell you that.” But then it goes on to correctly note that the CBC receives approximately $1.38 billion annually from the federal government, the Canadian federal government. (Do you think that in any way influences its reporting on things to do with the Canadian government?) And it is “made by humans” and “meets a really high bar of standards.”

What does that mean, exactly?

“We’re accountable for our journalism. And in the rare cases where we get something wrong, we’ll own it. We’ll tell you what we got wrong and how we fixed it.”

Is that really so?

Well, this article goes on to cite some examples of times the CBC got things wrong and didn’t fix it. For example, they note:

[…]Critics pointed out several instances where they said the CBC blurred the line between politically charged fiction and accurate reporting.

One such article was reporting on a [First Nation tribe’s] claim that they “uncovered” confirmation of 215 children buried at the site of the former Kamloops Indian Residential School. To date, no bodies [precisely zero] have been found at the site and full excavations haven’t taken place despite millions of dollars in funding for the First Nation to do so.

The article includes an editor’s note stating the band later clarified the discovery was of soil anomalies they believe may indicate unmarked children’s graves. [Who can say?]

Following media reports—some more definitive than others—more than 132 churches have since been burned or vandalized, as the Catholic Church ran the school.

Another critic pointed to one of the CBC’s now-deleted footage of what appeared to be a man in an ICU bed hooked up to a ventilator, supposedly due to the COVID-19 crisis. The CBC had to apologize for airing the image “outside of the context of training facilities.” Critics at the time said that using the image exaggerated the severity of hospital crowding during COVID-19.

What are they referring to? Well, that has been preserved in this tweet where somebody took a picture of the report as it was airing on CBC Edmonton News. And it was a report about, “oh, man, the Alberta hospitals have been overwhelmed by the scadmemic, guys. And you all better live in mortal fear!”

And they decided to illustrate this story with some b-roll of one of the men in the intensive care unit receiving life-saving treatment from the valiant doctors and nurses…Except that b-roll quite clearly featured a literal mannequin. No, this was not an ICU. This was a training facility. And as this person on Twitter noted, “it’s called fraud, but because it’s media, they get a pass. Look very closely!”

Yes. Well, unfortunately, all we can do is scrutinize this screenshot because, contrary to what Brodie Fenlon was saying in that short, the CBC does not go out of its way to explain what it got wrong and how it got it wrong and how to fix it, they instead delete all evidence of that particular broadcast. Yes, that particular broadcast in which they aired that misleading B-roll footage has since been deleted. 404: cannot be found.

But luckily, the fact checkers over at Reuters have figured it all out. And they issued this fact check back in October of 2021, shortly after the report aired: “Fact Check: CBC Edmonton news report featuring a mannequin was filmed at a training facility, not in a hospital Intensive Care Unit,” which sounds like a fact check that might actually get at the heart of things and might actually put a bit of egg on the face of CBC, right?

Not really, of course.

They explain that this was originally part of a report that the CBC Edmonton crew had done on how an intensive care unit operates, which featured a mannequin. So they certainly admit to that much and then admit that that footage was then later used for other stories aired on the channel and it was not filmed inside an ICU.

But, and here comes the editorializing that we know and love from the fact checkers, “it is not evidence that the pandemic is a scam, despite claims made online.”

Well, anyway, use your own judgment. But they go on to tell the story of how this report originally was broadcast as clearly being in a training facility using mannequins. They were just demonstrating how an ICU operates. But that footage was then later reused as B-roll in a report about the overcrowded hospitals because for some reason they couldn’t take any actual footage of the overcrowded hospitals. It was too dangerous, perhaps, to set foot in them. So they used that b-roll of a mannequin without letting on that it was a mannequin that they were showing in a test facility, training facility, not an ICU.

And you can still see the original report, at least on Twitter. Or it’s been preserved here, if you are so inclined. But for some reason, as I say, that footage of the actual broadcast in question was 404’d. So that’s the type of journalistic standards and ethics that the CBC adheres to. Although they did, as it says, they did issue an apology for airing that image outside of the context of training facilities. “We won’t do it again, guys!” Down the memory hole it goes

And this article goes on to talk about other examples of CBC’s skewed and obviously politically charged reporting. “Repeating,” as it were.

But I realize at this point, perhaps I have already lost some section of the audience, namely that section of the audience that did not grow up with the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation in their eyes and ears, like myself and like every other good Canadian did.

So, hmm, how would I explain the CBC to a non-Canadian?

If you want the picture of a CBC journalist, imagine, conjure in your mind, the most insufferable, arrogant virtue signaller that you know. The type of person that likes to lecture the little people about the virtues and wonders of this glorious democracy that we live in on one hand and fret about the rise of populism on the other hand. The type of person who dismisses every claim that threatens the establishment as conspiracy theory. The type of person who believes that they have a lock on truth and it is their lot in life to lecture and tell their audience about how to properly repeat those truths to others and to correct the misinformation of anyone who deigns to disagree…

…And you still won’t get anywhere near the level of insufferable arrogance and condescension of a CBC “journalist” like Adrienne Arsenault.

ADRIENNE ARSENAULT: What do you do when this happens? A loved one, let’s say it’s your dad, drops into the family group chat with something he thinks is real.

 

It’s something about China manufacturing the coronavirus. There’s a link to a site you’ve never heard of with a message calling it “Scary stuff!”

 

So, what do you do with this. Do you ignore it? Do you call him out, saying how ridiculous you think this is?

 

CLAIRE WARDLE: If you do that to your dad, you’ve actually shamed him.

 

My name is Claire Wardle and I’m the US director of First Draft, and we are a non-profit that will help people navigate the challenges of misinformation online.

 

What happens is that your dad doubles down on his view and he dismisses what you’re saying. Use language that’s empathetic and to say, “We’re all in this together” rather than “You’re wrong. I’m right. Here are the facts.” Because that does not work.

 

ARSENAULT: So, hold back on all that reactive talk. Maybe try something like this: “Yeah, these are scary times. We’re all a bit afraid. But let’s be careful. What you’re sharing is inaccurate, and it feeds into that fear we all feel!”

 

WARDLE: Everybody’s anxiety is so heightened right now. People are sharing this stuff not for any malicious reasons but because they’re scared, too.

 

ARSENAULT: Sending more context could also be a good move, but don’t drown ’em in evidence. Maybe send them an article from a legitimate source quoting credible scientists on why the virus wasn’t manufactured. Conspiracies can be just as infectious, just as dangerous as a virus, so you have to guard against them.

 

WARDLE: It’s very easy to just mute your crazy high school friend on Facebook, or to leave a Whatsapp group where people are sharing false information. But right now I think there’s kind of a responsibility on all of us to help people understand that sharing that kind of information is increasing the level of pollution.

 

SOURCE: Is uncle Bob spreading COVID-19 misinformation in the family group chat? This doesn’t have to be awkward.

CORBETT: Oh yeah, do you remember that one? Well, hopefully you do, because I did air it in Episode 381 of the podcast on Who Will Fact Check the Fact Checkers?, in which I talked about that Adrienne Arsenault piece—a propaganda piece, masquerading as some form of journalism designed to teach you how to lecture your loved ones not to send any information that isn’t CBC approved. Basically, setting up the Ministry of Truth-level propaganda dissemination that became par for the course, not only for the CBC, but certainly for the CBC during the dark depths of the scamdemic era.

What a sterling example of what the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation is all about and how it really operates.

But in case more information was needed to really convey the accurate sense of what the CBC is and how it operates, perhaps we should get into some bare-bones details about the CBC.

Now, the CBC itself, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, was technically founded in November of 1936, although it did have a forerunner called the CRBC that we’ll get into in a moment. But it is a Crown corporation that is focused on providing Canadian content for a Canadian audience. And it was founded on the back of a government commission. So, obviously, it has always been and presumably always will be at least accused of being a government mouthpiece in one form or other by its critics, but “we are just a neutral source of information,” say the CBC journalists.

So, who can adjudicate this claim?

Well, perhaps we can start by looking at some of the actual founding documents from which the CBC ultimately derives and see what we can find from them. And let’s apply a little lesson that we’ve learned here on The Corbett Report, most recently in Episode 498 on How To Stage A Cover-Up, where I reminded people about Dr. Tim Ball’s observation that a cover-up can be performed by the terms of reference of a commission. By committing a commission towards certain terms of reference, that commission can thereby be steered towards a certain preordained conclusion, as Dr. Tim Ball very rightly observed. If you don’t remember that, please go back and re-familiarize yourself with that interview.

But let’s see if we can apply that observation to this: the Report of the Royal Commission on Radio Broadcasting, which was a report known as the Report of the Aird Commission, which was issued in 1929 on the back of a commission that had been appointed by then-Prime Minister Mackenzie King to look into the prospect of Canadian public broadcasting and whether they should proceed with a public broadcaster in the then-nascent medium of radio.

And this is an instructive document along those very lines, because, for example—let’s see, again, can we apply Dr. Timball’s observation here to the “Object of Commission”:

“The Royal Commission on Radio Broadcasting was appointed by the Government to inquire into the existing situation in Canada and to examine the different methods adopted in other countries.”

All right. So far, so straightforward.

“The purpose of the inquiry was to determine how radio broadcasting in Canada could be most effectively carried on in the interest of Canadian listeners and in the national interests of Canada.”

But let’s get rid of the feel-good filler words there: “The purpose of the inquiry is to determine how radio broadcasting in Canada could be most effectively carried on […] in the national interests of Canada”…which obviously are defined by the federal government. So, can you see how the terms of reference might have determined a certain preordained conclusion to come out of this report?

Well, obviously, it goes on to say in this report that, “in a country of the vast geographical dimensions of Canada, broadcasting will undoubtedly become a great force in fostering a national spirit and interpreting national citizenship.” So, ultimately, what became the CRBC and then eventually the CBC would be part of that fostering of and interpreting of national citizenship.

But more specifically: “it is desirable, however, that provincial authorities should be in a position to exercise full control over the programs of the station or stations in their respective areas.”

Of course! This is going to be some sort of government-run broadcaster, so the government will get the final say on what does or does not get broadcast. And it goes on to talk about the requirements that the report was setting for this national broadcaster they were proposing.

“(1) A national company which will own and operate all radio broadcasting stations located in the Dominion of Canada, the company to be called the Canadian Radio Broadcasting Company (C.R.B.C.)”

So, right away, first of all, abolishment of all private media in favor of this government service. And:

“(2)  Provincial Radio Broadcasting Director for each province, who will have full control of the programs broadcast by the station or stations located within the boundaries of the province for which he is responsible.”

There you go, guys. Yeah, the total government final say over what can and cannot and what will and will not be broadcast on the public airwaves, right? Because the government is the people!

Anyway, I think you understand the roots of the CBC and what it ultimately became. And as a result of this report, the CRBC was eventually set up as a forerunner to the CBC. And there is a story to be told there, which can be found in such exciting material as “The Beginnings of Public Broadcasting in Canada: The CRBC, 1932-1936,” which was published in the Canadian Journal of Communication back in 1994.

I jest, of course. This is not exciting reading material, but as bland and dry and basically uninformative as this report on the CRBC—that lasted, as this report notes, for less than five years. As it goes on to spill the beans in ways that maybe it doesn’t even realize, it talks about, “One of the first tasks of the CRBC was to draw up a list of 108 rules and regulations for all Canadian broadcasting stations; these were adopted by Order-in-Council on April 15, 1933”. And it goes on to note that Regulation 91 reads: “The Commission reserves the right to prohibit the broadcasting of any matter until the continuity or record or transcription or both have been submitted to the Commission for examination and have been approved by them.” I’m assuming there’s an “of” missing there: “continuity of record or transcription, or both have been submitted to the commission for examination and have been approved by them.”

Of course, again, the commission gets to determine what will and will not be broadcast. And then there’s more detail about the CRBC and what it did and didn’t do. But actually, why did the CRBC fail? Why did it eventually get turned into the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation in 1936?

Well, you can find out about the “Founding of the CBC” in this perfectly putrid piece of propaganda barfed out by The Canadian Encyclopedia, which has all the kind of ridiculous flowery, rhetoric you would expect in a patriotic post like this.

Besides hockey and the maple leaf, there is little as symbolically Canadian as the CBC – the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. It grew out of a developing nation’s need to express its identity and find its voice. The country had emerged from World War I with a degree of autonomy and sense of independence. It was a country ready to speak up for itself. The audio for that voice, and later the video, were added by the CBC.

Yay. Salute the flag and pour some maple syrup on it. It’s golden.

Interestingly, this includes the story of the CRBC and how and why it came to fall apart.

It suffered from a sponsorship scandal, of a sort, between September 24 and October 5, 1935, with the “Uncle Sage” radio series.

 

Robert Lucas, as Uncle Sage, told the public what outright scoundrels the Liberals really were. The accusations stung, coming in the wake of the Beauharnois energy scandal, in which the Liberals were accused of accepting substantial contributions in exchange for permission to divert the St. Lawrence River to generate hydroelectricity. No connection could be proven between the donations and King’s reinstated Liberal government, but one senator was forced to resign and another was dismissed.

 

The alarmed Liberals demanded that the sponsor of the Sage series be identified in each broadcast. He was – as R.L. Wright, an employee of the Conservative ad agency.

 

King was persuaded by CRL lobbying to replace the CRBC with a stronger public agency. On June 23, 1936, a new Canadian Broadcasting Act created the CBC with better organization and funding and less vulnerability to political pressure. It was established as a Crown Corporation on November 2, 1936.

So, you see what they’re ultimately admitting here: it was actually because the CRBC had the temerity to broadcast something that was impugning the sterling reputation of the Liberal political party. That is why the CRBC ultimately got scrapped by a Liberal government. Surprise, surprise!

So, there you go. Dare to question the government and, “Don’t worry, we can scrap you and start a whole new thing and it will be even better!” And yes, that whole new thing, as it says here, created on November 2nd, 1936, was the Crown corporation, the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation.

And then, of course, it ends with this purple prose, which I have highlighted in purple on purpose here.

It is often with surprise that Canadians living or travelling abroad realize how much they miss CBC broadcasting. An Ipsos-Reid poll released on May 14, 2004 reported that Canadians feel the CBC is doing a good job protecting Canadian culture and identity and 85% of voters would support political parties that fostered domestic ownership of broadcasting. Clearly, Canadians find their voice in CBC.

Well, I’m proud to be part of the 15%. Actually, I’m not a voter. So there you go. I’m a non-voter. So I guess my opinion doesn’t even count in such a poll.

But there you go. This is the type of rhetoric and propaganda that has been force-fed into every Canadian since the time of their birth. It is fed to them with their mother’s milk. And that is why so many Canadians probably do feel some sort of patriotic pride at the CBC and this wonderful, venerable journalistic institution that is CBC News in particular.

Really?

Well, obviously, there are things to say about the CBC and its very many controversies and scandals over its decades of operation, some of which you could turn to the good old bastion of truthiness Wikipedia to see what they have to say about “Controversies,” like allegations of bias.

Several outlets and politicians over many years have accused CBC News of bias. Surveys have found the Canadian public perceives a centre-left/Liberal Party bias in CBC News coverage.

And in other news, water is wet!

It goes on to talk about a Beyond the Red Wall: Persecution of Falun Gong documentary that was set to air on the CBC in November 2007 [and] that was shelved because of, oh, the crisis in Pakistan was considered more urgent and much more newsworthy. And then when it was eventually aired weeks later, it was heavily edited. So, hmm. There are some obvious questions about that.

And “CBC’s president’s comparison of Netflix’s influence to colonialism closed captioning.” Yes, of course, this is the watered down Wikipedia list of controversy surrounding CBC. The CBC is so unimpeachable that their biggest controversy is about…closed captioning. Right? Right. OK.

Well, more substantially, we can find, for example, CBC whistleblowers who have attempted to blow the whistle on the CBC’s inherent biases and the way that it fosters the complete lack of intellectual diversity, which is that form of diversity, that for some reason is not celebrated in establishment media. For example, National Post reporting back earlier this year on “Former CBC host says he was silenced, bullied and intimidated by senior leadership: Dhanraj said that he even faced discipline after interviewing Conservative deputy leader Melissa Lantsman,” which talks about former CBC journalist Travis Don Raj, who “told MPs Tuesday he was silenced, bullied and intimidated by senior leadership and hosts at the public broadcaster, which he says needs a ‘wake-up call.'”

Specifically, Dhanraj accused the public broadcaster of “tokenism masquerading as diversity, problematic political coverage protocols, and the erosion of editorial independence.” And he “detailed his allegations further, telling MPs that he was barred from inviting Conservatives on his show because they did not appear on the broadcaster’s flagship politics show, Power & Politics.” And there’s more about his story and the counters from the CBC, et cetera, which shows, again, the public perceives that there is a left/centre-left bias amongst CBC News hosts and journalists. Well, I wonder why.

Perhaps more substantively than the left/right usual distractionary bickering that divides and conquers the public is about more core issues, which the CBC does not report on fairly. We can find out about that in a report from the Review of Journalism from 2022 on the “CBC’s Palestine Exception,” which boasts “behind-the-scene accounts from current and former CBC staff, which raise concerns about transparency, bias, and fear when pitching about the region.”

And this goes on to talk to numerous whistleblowers who have experience in the CBC newsroom trying to report on the Palestine situation. And this was pre-October 7th. This report notes that:

Three days after the bombardment started [in 2022], and after the Palestinian death toll reached 137 people on May 14, an open letter addressed to Canadian news editors began circulating on social media. Signed by more than 2,000 people—500 of them journalists and media staff—the letter accused newsrooms of playing down escalating violence directed at Palestinians, both historically when covering the Israeli occupation, and during the first three days of Israel’s military bombardment that month. The letter called for more equitable treatment of news coverage on Palestine and Israel, pointing out that Canadian media were taking a “selective” approach to deciding which international human rights violations to cover.

And this report has much, much more very in-depth detail about the ways Palestinian voices are marginalized at the CBC. Not necessarily as a part of established policy, nothing that is, of course, written down, but it is the way the newsroom operates, which, of course, is the much more pervasive form of censorship and propaganda. So people can consult that, the “CBC’s Palestine Exception,” for much more on that particular issue. And obviously, there’s probably much more to say about that since October 7th.

But if there was any one issue that has done more to wake up, the Canadian public and hopefully the people of the world to the inherent biases and propaganda of the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, it was the scamdemic, in which it went full mask-off when it comes to the CBC’s “objective reporting of the truth and nothing but the truth.” Well, obviously, that mask was ripped off during the scamdemic, where we started immediately—just weeks into the so-called declared emergency—we started getting some of that propaganda, like Adrian Arsenault’s piece, lecturing people about how to tell off your loved ones and relatives when they dare to send you information that the CBC doesn’t approve of.

Just remarkable arrogance that really showed and demonstrated what the CBC was about. It was about setting an acceptable level of discourse. These are the facts that you are allowed to talk about, and here is the exact Overton window. You can go this far or this far, but you cannot talk about or point to any information outside of this window until we say it’s okay, because eventually, certain problems with the COVID scamdemic narrative had to be admitted. But of course, only grudgingly so and only years after the fact.

But in that time frame of 2020, 2021, no, you were not allowed to say what the CBC did not want you to say. And that was not just something that spontaneously came out of the ether. That was not just some honest, good faith, journalistic response to the events that were developing there in 2020. Far from it. It was part of a coordinated, internationally coordinated campaign of which the CBC was a key part to set an establishment of the Overton window of narrative about what could and could not be talked about. And that was done through the creation of a number of institutions and initiatives and organizations which sought to create that Ministry of Truth-level propaganda narrative of what can and cannot be discussed.

And if you want some receipts to back up what I have just said, well, boy, do I have some receipts for you! Specifically, these come by way of Rodney Palmer, who is a veteran Canadian journalist who has worked for many of the establishment media outlets in Canada over the years, but [who] was appalled and shocked to see propaganda like that Adrian Arsenault piece coming out of the CBC during the scamdemic. And in the National Citizens Inquiry—which took place over the past few years in Canada, and which hopefully you’ll recall I testified at—which was seeking to bring truth and information about what really occurred during the scamdemic in Canada to the attention of the world, Rodney Palmer testified about the CBC and the propaganda that it was pumping out during the crisis. And he goes into depth, first of all, in the context of that Adrienne Arsenault piece and about the things that it was lecturing the public on versus what actual reporting showed about the facts surrounding the situation just weeks later. Facts that presumably a journalist like Adrienne Arsenault could have dug up herself and actually reported on instead of lecturing people about what they can and cannot say.

But specifically in that testimony, Rodney Palmer goes into a great degree of specificity when it comes to pointing out the organizations that the CBC was an active, willing, important part of that were seeking to control the public discourse on these matters.

RODNEY PALMER: March 4th, 2021, about a year after the emergency, the editor in chief of CBC News, Brodie Fenlon, wrote on his blog: “A recent survey found that about half of Canadians think journalists are purposely trying to mislead them.” Well, that’s because we’re on to you. At least half of us pay attention to our gut and we know that you are purposely trying to mislead us.

But Mr. Fenlon said that CBC is going to correct this. To promote trust in journalism, the CBC has joined four organizations. I didn’t know that they joined these organizations until I began to look into this a little bit. One of them is called the Trusted News Initiative, which is designed to filter news through its own “Trust Filter System.” Another one’s called the Journalism Trust Initiative. It’s basically the same name, but this one does more or less the same thing. Another one’s called the Trust Project, and then Project Origin. Notice that none of these organizations have the word ‘truth’ in them. If you tell the truth consistently, trust is automatic. If you don’t tell the truth consistently, you have to say things like, “please trust me.”

I’m just going to quickly outline what these things are, because they’re all basically the same thing. The Trusted News Initiative and the CBC announced together on the 27th, prior to the Adrienne Arsenault piece, that CBC and Radio Canada are “joining an industry collaboration of major media and technology organizations to rapidly identify and stop the spread of harmful coronavirus disinformation.”

I think the pandemic really started in China about four months prior to this, and four months prior to an unknown virus killing so many people, there is no disinformation. The scientists among our commissioners will tell you there is only information, and all information is critical at the beginning—particularly at the beginning. So immediately, they were in a position of pushing one side of the story. Stopping misinformation means censoring, censorship, pure and simple.

The Journalism Trust Initiative, a second organization that they joined, is run by an outfit called Reporter Sans Frontières, Reporters Without Borders. And when I was working as a correspondent in the Middle East, Reporters Without Borders would take the side of, say, a Syrian journalist who was writing something against the dictator Hafez al-Assad and maybe had been imprisoned, and they were trying to bring the attention of the world to this imprisoned journalist. That’s the kind of excellent work this group did.

In 2020, it shifted completely to start something called the Journalism Trust Initiative, starting an algorithmic indexing based on their criteria to improve your revenues. Meaning if you run your news organization through their filter, they’ll make sure that it gets up to the top of the Google page, so you’ll get more clicks and more money will improve your revenue. There was an incentive there.

Project Origin is another one that is a collaboration between the CBC, the BBC, the New York Times, and Microsoft. And one of these organizations is not a news organization, it’s a tech organization. One of the things they talk about here is that the “technical provenance approach, in conjunction with media education and synthetic media detection techniques” to help “establish a foundation of trust.” Not truth, trust is what they’re looking for.

One of their tools is called “The power of the machine—harnessing AI to fight disinformation.” I can only surmise from this that Microsoft is using AI to identify anybody speaking words that they want to identify as to be censored or call misinformation, label misinformation, so you will agree with their censorship.

The next one is called the Trust Project. Now this one is largely tech. Craigslist, Google, Facebook, and Microsoft are involved, again, “Helping tech support trustworthy news.” Helping tech. What do we care about tech and truth and news? How are they together all of a sudden? “We stand for integrity.” They say: “Look for our 8 Trust Indicators. We built the trust indicators.” So they have listed— All they have to do is tell the truth, they don’t need no eight trust indicators. And interestingly, Google, Facebook, and Bing all use the trust indicators in display and behind the scenes. So somehow, they are censoring it before it gets to you.

These are the members of the Trust Project. Now, this goes way beyond the CBC. The Globe and Mail is also in there. CTV is a member. The Walrus magazine in Canada is supposed to be an independent thought magazine; they’re part of this project. The Canadian Press. I put this up there to let you know that it is not just the CBC. The reason they all sound the same is because they’re all part of this trust campaign.

But the CBC is also part of something else, it’s something with just public broadcasters. It’s called the Global Task Force for Public Media. “The Global Task Force exists to defend the values and interests of Public Media.” Excellent. But it was formed to develop a consensus and a single strong voice among them. And that’s the CBC, BBC News, ABC Australia, Korean Broadcasting—they joined recently—France Television, Radio New Zealand, ZDF from Germany and SVT from Sweden. Now, I can’t imagine having worked at the CBC for almost a decade and being told every day, “Our job is to elevate the voices of Canadians on Canadian stories, to unite our vast country and make us all feel as one.”

What single issue do we have with Korean Broadcasting when that is our mandate? What issue does Radio New Zealand have with Swedish television when their mandate is the same, to elevate their own people. This is a bizarre conglomerate of public broadcasters. And I would put forth to the panel that the public broadcasters are the ones that are not easily bought because the advertisers don’t exist and therefore, they have no influence. So something else was done here.

Now the public task force is headed by our CBC president, Catherine Tate. She is the current president. Three months ago, she gave a speech at Simon Fraser University. The first word out of her mouth was “trust.” “Trust seems to be in short supply.” The next phrase is “disinformation,” “conspiracy theories,” “YouTube rabbit hole.” This is the Trusted News Initiative mantra. This is what she was talking about at Simon Fraser University. She goes around, makes speeches and says, “Please trust us.”

SOURCE: Mr. Rodney Palmer – Witness Testimony

CORBETT: That’s right. The “Trusted News Initiative.” The “Trust Project.” The “Global Task Force for Public Media.” Yes, there are a lot of cookie crumbs on that particular trail that have been expertly laid out there. So, I hope you will go and watch Rodney Palmer’s testimony in its full context so you can see all of those pieces being connected together.

But yes, suffice it to say, the CBC is firmly ensconced in the web of thought control organizations that have come together to weave this tapestry of establishment fake news narratives and to essentially establish the Ministry of Truth, dictating what can and cannot be said in public conversation.

So, what of those genuine journalists who had given decades of service to the CBC in pursuit of what they believed to be journalistic ideals and ethics, who found themselves, obviously, working for a propaganda-pushing organization?

Well, you don’t have to take it from my perspective. You can take it from the perspective of someone who actually was forced out or ultimately stepped out of her position at the CBC, specifically Marianne Cloak, who spent 34 years as a journalist at the CBC who ultimately did step away because, in her words, “I saw stories that should have been covered but weren’t. There was an increasing reluctance to explore viewpoints that didn’t fit the preferred frame. It felt like the mandate for balance was being quietly set aside in favor of something narrower.”

And if you’re interested in hearing more about Marianne Klowak’s experience at the CBC during the scamdemic, when she was being asked to put out propaganda and to avoid stories that should be reported because they didn’t fit with the establishment narrative…What did she have to say about it? If you’re interested, you can, for example, listen to her testimony, also at the National Citizens Inquiry.

MARIANNE KLOWAK: I mean, the way I saw it—I’m just going to give you a little bit of a synopsis, and then I’ll get into specifics in terms of what was done with my stories—but we betrayed the public, we broke their trust. And we had been riding on a reputation of excellence for years. And now we were quickly shutting down one side of the debate. And how were we doing that? We branded the doctors and the experts the CBC chose that we used in our stories: we branded them as competent and trustworthy. And those who questioned and challenged the narrative were portrayed as dangerous and spreading disinformation. And that was regardless of what their specialty was, what their background was, and what their experience was.

And I just also want to sort of give you a window into how this affected me personally. As a veteran journalist, I had solid contacts in the community. I had people calling me with stories. So I was seeing and I was hearing and I was absorbing all their stories of suffering and pain. And they were sharing them with me, and these stories weren’t being told. Some of those were from the vaccine-injured. Some were from people who had lost their job because of their vaccination status. Those whose families had been blown apart, and they’d been ostracized. University students who were depressed over repeated lockdowns and mandates. And parents who were calling me that were agonizing on whether they should vaccinate their child or not. So all these stories were sitting inside of me. They were left with me. And I felt the crushing burden and the weight of their truth not being given a voice. And it affected my well-being because these people trusted me, and I felt I had failed them and I had let them down.

SHAWN BUCKLEY: So can I just interject? So when you’re a journalist and people are coming to you with stories that should be reported, you’re feeling a responsibility to give voice to those stories, but you’re not being allowed to do so for the first time. And that’s what was causing the distress internally.

KLOWAK: Absolutely. I was losing sleep, it was distressing. It was like I had failed these people as a journalist to give voice to their truth.

So, I had witnessed in a very short time the collapse of journalism, newsgathering, investigative reporting. The way I saw it is that we were in fact pushing propaganda. And to define propaganda: it’s information, ideas, opinions, or images that give one part of an argument which are broadcast, published, in order to influence a person’s opinion.

And mental health workers have their own definition of propaganda as manipulative persuasion in the service of an agenda.

In a published article written by a former CBC editor-in-chief in 2018, she outlines what’s called the Journalistic Standards and Practices [JSP]. And these are the most fundamental principles that govern who we are as journalists and who we are as a public broadcaster. Basically, these are the pillars—the holy grail for journalists. This is what every story we do can be measured against these: they are accuracy, fairness, balance, impartiality, and integrity. She goes on to say that “the JSP is not merely a guide for the people who work at CBC/Radio-Canada. It’s a key component of our promise to Canadians that the work we do is, first and foremost, a public service.” Then she says, “The real test, of course, is ensuring that our journalism is credible, reliable and worthy of your trust.” So in other words, you the audience decide if we’re trustworthy, if we’re telling the truth. It’s not up to us to hammer you with what we define, decide, or think that the truth is because the pillars of balance and fairness require us to present both sides. And after you examine them, you ultimately decide what the truth is. She says, “. . . you can hold CBC News accountable against the principles that are laid out in the Journalistic Standards and Practices.”

In my last year and a half at the CBC, we violated all of them. Not only had we shut down one side by silencing and discrediting anyone opposing the narrative, we had elevated and designated ourselves as the gatekeeper of the truth. We no longer believed our audience was capable of critically thinking for themselves. I’m going to give you very specific examples of that. But before that, I’d like to read you a page out of a journal that I wrote a month after I left the CBC. It gives you a sense of the culture and the toxic work environment that led me to leave before I had wanted to.

For months prior to my departure in December 2021, the complaints and criticism from listeners and viewers continued to mount from the public. Calls, emails, people stopping me on the street and saying, “What the heck is going on at the CBC?” People telling me they felt betrayed, lied to. A gut feeling that they weren’t being told the whole truth. They no longer trusted the CBC to tell them both sides of an issue.

SOURCE: Ms. Marianne Klowak – Witness Testimony (VIDEO)

CORBETT: That was a clip of the testimony from Marianne Klowak at the National Citizens Inquiry. And if you found any of that interesting, I would highly suggest that you follow the link from the hyperlinked transcript of today’s episode at corbettreport.com/cbc in order to watch that full testimony, in which Klowak relates, for example, her experience, of the how and when and why the term “anti-vaxxer” started being deployed by the CBC in its journalistic reporting on the scamdemic, and how she tried to push back against that term and what resulted from that. It is a fascinating and sad story in a number of ways, but very instructive for the purposes of today’s exploration, is it not?

But why stop there? Because it wasn’t just the scamdemic itself and the rise of the “anti-vaxxer” narrative that the CBC was involved in pushing. It was the subsequent knock-on events, like, for example, the Declaration of the Emergencies Act that was used—illegally, as it was later deemed—to crack down on the Freedom Convoy. Remember that? Well, hopefully you do, and hopefully you remember specifically the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation’s role in bringing to you and making possible the fake news story of the year for 2022.

JUSTIN TRUDEAU: The small fringe minority of people who are on their way to Ottawa, who are holding unacceptable views that they are expressing, do not represent the views of Canadians who have been there for each other, who know following the science and stepping up to protect each other is the best way to continue to ensure our freedoms, our rights, our values, as a country.

 

SOURCE: Trudeau decries ‘fringe’ views of some in trucker convoy, as police prepare for its arrival in Ottawa

CORBETT: Yes, ladies and gentlemen, not only was Canada’s own prime minister the spreader of the biggest fake news story of the year but the absolutely sickening way that the official stenographers and lap dogs of the Canadian press fell into line to denigrate peaceful protesters demanding their basic human rights in one of the most oppressive countries on the planet was one of the most disgusting displays of disinformation and gaslighting ever seen.

There was of course the government-owned CBC with their assertion that the Freedom Convoy protesters were being secretly aided, funded or organized by those dastardly Russians.

NIL KOKSAL: 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 from the outset.

 

SOURCE: ‘This is not a convoy that is about freedom,’ says public safety minister ahead of weekend demonstrations

CORBETT: A baseless piece of weaponized and—as was later confirmed—utterly false speculation so galling that even the CBC Ombudsman had to conclude that it breached the CBC’s own journalistic standards and practices guidelines, noting that this loaded hypothetical question with no factual basis whatsoever did not meet the standard to clearly explain the facts or contribute to the understanding of issues of public interest

And who can forget the CBC’s February 11th report, “Convoy protest received hundreds of donations that appeared to be from abroad,” which claimed that the most common source for foreign donations was the United States…a report that was later revealed to be fake news when GoFundMe stated that in fact 88 percent of donated funds originated in Canada and most were small, individual donations by ordinary, law-abiding citizens, a fact that the CBC quietly buried on its “Corrections and Clarifications” page but didn’t append to the article.

SOURCE: Episode 435 – The 6th Annual Fake News Awards

CORBETT: Alright, I could go on for hours and hours on this topic, but in the interest of time and keeping this podcast relatively short, I will stop the rabbit hole exploration here…but with an invitation for any interested listeners out in the audience to please leave your favorite example of CBC misinformation in the comments section at corbettreport.com/cbc for others to enjoy.

But if you are interested in that rabbit hole in particular, I would suggest that you go back and, as I say, listen to the full testimony from Rodney Palmer, where he goes on to talk about that infamous photo op of the Nazi flag at the Freedom Convoy and how that particular photo came to be and what role the CBC had in not reporting properly on that, let alone on the Freedom Convoy in general. There’s obviously much more valuable information to explore there.

But we know the problem. Again, I could talk about it for hours and hours, but we understand the problem: the CBC is propaganda. They are part of a network of international organizations that are seeking to control your thoughts and perspective and to stop you from spreading any information that the establishment doesn’t want you to share with others. So if we know the problem, obviously the question is, what is the solution?

Happily, for an anarchist like myself, the solution to this problem is not only rather self-evident and not only something that I think the vast majority of the Canadian public and people around the world would support, but it’s also one that’s perfectly in line with my anarchist principles. Namely, stop funding the CBC.

Why on earth is the Canadian taxpayer literally on the hook for their own propagandizement?

Why is the Canadian public being forced (at the implied threat of the gun) to fund these known liars and fake news disseminators?

It is ridiculous. And obviously the vast majority of the Canadian public would be in favor of defunding the CBC if it was ever put to them in a straightforward manner like that, because the vast majority of the Canadian public doesn’t watch or like the CBC very much. If the CBC was an actual, private broadcaster that had to make its own money instead of suckling at the government’s teats, it would fail, of course, which is something that has been a truism of Canadian politics and observation for a very long time.

In fact, the entire idea that the Canadian taxpayer is on the hook for the CBC’s crimes against humanity is itself not a new or novel idea to anyone in the Canadian public.

MARK MCKINNEY: Wow, what a bad sketch. And in such poor taste, too!

 

You know, we’re going to get a lot of telephone calls and letters about this one, and why not? Because every Canadian has a right to complain about that sketch because every Canadian owns a piece of that sketch.

 

You see, your tax dollars feed into the government which in turn mandates the CBC which in turn provides funding, both whole or in part, to shows such as ours. So, like a cup full of water poured into an ocean the atomic particles of your tax dollars mix with the whole and wind up providing for the budget of the show, for the budget of that sketch, and for this piece I’m doing now, which we call:

 

AUDIENCE: Screw you, taxpayer!

 

SOURCE: Screw You Taxpayer

CORBETT: Screw you, taxpayer, indeed.

And yes, as I say, it is not a new idea amongst the Canadian public that maybe we shouldn’t be funding the CBC to the tune of 1.8 plus billion dollars per year.

But, you know what? Actually, it’s even worse than that. Because the Canadian taxpayer isn’t just on the hook for the CBC. It’s also now on the hook for a large section of the establishment mainstream media, the fake news media in broadcast and print.

Because, in case you haven’t heard, yes, the Canadian government has, for the better part of a decade, very explicitly gotten into the practice of “bailing out” the dinosaur repeaters of the establishment journalism world.

DAN DICKS: Alright, so the Trudeau government literally just bought the Canadian media for $600 million in an effort to better control the free flow of information online. Here’s what some of the MSM is saying about this:

 

CTV News: “Ottawa bolsters struggling media with $600 million in tax measures.”

 

Or this from the Star: “Ottawa to provide aid to support Canadian journalism.”

 

This from Winnipeg Free Press: “Ottawa extending 565 million in subsidies to Canadian media.”

 

Or this just out from the National Post: “$600 million in federal funding for media ‘a turning point in the plight of newspapers in Canada’.”

 

“The government is pledging nearly $600 million over the next 5 years to help news organizations struggling to adapt to a digital age that is disrupted traditional business models.” Yeah, well, that’s because people now have a very healthy distrust in the MSM and they found alternative sources of information online like Press For Truth and it’s affecting their numbers.

 

The article goes on to say, “The government has been keen to engage in partnerships with tech companies, among them a “culture strategy” announced last year that included a $125 million deal with Facebook to set up a news incubator at Ryerson University. That strategy also included a $500 million investment from Netflix to produce content in Canada over the next five years.”

 

[. . .]

 

So, a huge question is obviously: who decides which companies get bailed out and which media companies don’t?

 

Well the Canadian government says that the specifics are going to be decided on after they consult an independent panel, individuals of which who are—wait for it—picked by them!

 

SOURCE: The Canadian MEDIA $600M BAILOUT Exposed! – What You NEED To Know!

CORBETT: That was genuine independent Canadian journalist Dan Dicks of Press For Truth reporting on the Canadian government’s proposed $600 million mainstream media dinosaur repeater bailout back in 2018.

And, for those who didn’t follow up on that story, we have more reporting about what eventually resulted from that. For example, CTV reporting in 2019 on Canada’s “Canada’s $600 million ‘media bailout’: A guide to federal tax breaks for the news industry,” noting that:

An expected $595-million will be divided between three initiatives. The first, and most costly, will be a labour tax credit to bolster the salaries of working journalists.

 

[…]

 

The second initiative will allow not-for-profit news organizations to apply for charitable status, allowing them to receive donations and issue tax receipts to donors. […And] Canadians who pay for a digital news subscription from a qualified news media outlet will be able to claim a 15 per cent tax credit for a maximum of $75 per year for subscriptions purchased from January 2020 onwards.

…which led, in my own experience, to the interesting request I had from a Canadian subscriber to The Corbett Report recently: “Do you issue those types of receipts for my subscription? Because I’d like to claim it on my taxes.”

But unfortunately, I hate to break it to you, “The budget states that news outlets must be ‘qualified Canadian journalism organizations’ (QCJO) in order to be eligible for the funding — however, the designation of a QCJO is still being determined by the government.”

Well, newsflash, The Corbett Report is not a “qualified Canadian journalism organization,” according to the Canadian government. And no, I can’t issue you receipts that you’ll be able to claim on your taxes because that’s not how this works. It’s not how it’s meant to work. This is meant to bolster the establishment media, of course, not genuine independent media. Hey, I’m in Japan anyway, so why would it apply to me?

But in case people were under the impression that this was last decade’s story, no, it’s still an ongoing issue in Canada. We have this just from last month: “Heritage Minister Opens Door to $6 Billion Media Tax Credit for Big Telecom,” which notes that:

Heritage Minister Marc Miller is floating a major expansion of federal media subsidies that could hand up to $6 billion in tax credits to some of Canada’s largest broadcasters.

 

The plan would extend the existing Journalism Labour Tax Credit to include broadcast giants like Bell Media, Rogers, and Corus. Right now, the credit is limited to print and digital newsrooms, letting them claim a refundable credit of up to 35% on eligible salaries. Under Miller’s proposal, those same benefits would apply to the news divisions of major TV and radio companies.

Yay! Finally! Won’t someone think of the major TV and radio companies? Yeah.

Anyway, you see the state of the media in Canada. Not that it’s that much demonstrably better or worse than in Japan or in the United States or in Germany or England or Timbuktu or anywhere else in the modern westernized world. But unfortunately, it is particularly egregious in Canada.

And yes, the answer is obvious: stop government funding of media! That would be great. But unfortunately, that wrong turn was taken the better part of a century ago, and it is unlikely that the Canadian public is going to be allowed at any point in the near future to back the truck up and go back to that wrong fork in the road and take the right path of not having the government steal money from the public in order to pay off their establishment repeater lapdogs.

So, in the event that pigs don’t suddenly sprout wings and start aerial transportation, and in the event that Satan won’t be holding any snowball fight parties in Hades any time in the near future, I guess we have to make do with the reality as it lies, at least for now, and at least until public opinion can be turned around, so that people realize the importance of this issue. The propagandizement of the public is not some minor peripheral issue, and it is not just some fact of life that’s baked into the cake that you have to accept along with death and taxes. It is something that has been arrived at as a deliberate plan, a century in the making in Canada, to make sure that only government-approved sources of information thrive in the marketplace of ideas in Canada. And as I say, obviously, we’re looking at the CBC in particular today, but I am sure that many of these lessons apply to many of the listeners in many countries.

So, yes, the de-funding should commence right now. Not later. Right now.

But, at the very least, I hope that people will understand and appreciate the importance of independent media like Dan Dicks and other people in Canada who are bringing you truth in the face of these well-funded liars and the government lapdogs. And, of course, outlets like The Corbett Report that hopefully can start to instill an understanding in the greater public about why the CBC might not be that wonderful, venerable institution that you’ve been propagandized to believe it is all your life.

And on that very note, I’ll leave you today with my personal response to that Adrienne Arsenault report that we opened with today. You remember that report. And, hopefully, you remember my response to that report. If not, well, you’re in for a treat. So, enjoy!

And in the meantime, and in between time, thank you for investing your time in today’s exploration. And remember, Corbett Report members are able to log into the website at corbettreport.com/cbc to leave your own feedback, including your own personal experiences with CBC propaganda. I’m looking forward to hearing it, but we’ll leave today’s exploration there for today. I’m James Corbett of corbettreport.com. Looking forward to talking to you again in the near future.

JAMES CORBETT (AS ADRIENNE ARSENAULT): So, what do you do when this happens? A loved one, let’s say it’s your dad, drops into the family group chat with something he thinks is real.

 

It’s something about how everyone in the world will need an experimental mRNA vaccine to protect us from coronavirus. There’s a link to to the CBC with a message calling it “Scary stuff!”

 

So, what do you do with this. Do you ignore it? Do you call him out, saying how ridiculous you think it is?

 

TALKING HEAD: If you do that to your dad, you’ve actually shamed him.

 

My name is Talking Head and I’m the worldwide director of Prestigious Sounding Front Organization, which gives an air of legitimacy to a random person telling you how to think and act.

 

What happens is that your dad doubles down on his view and dismisses what you’re saying.

 

CORBETT (AS ARSENAULT): So, hold back on all that reactive talk. Maybe try something like this: “Yeah, these are scary times. We’re all a bit afraid. But let’s be careful. What you’re sharing is inaccurate, and it feeds into that fear we all feel!”

 

HEAD: Everybody’s anxiety is so heightened right now. People are sharing this stuff not for any malicious reasons but because they’re scared, too.

 

CORBETT (AS ARSENAULT): Sending more context could also be a good move, but don’t drown them in evidence. Maybe try sending an article from a legitimate source including credible scientists on why an mRNA vaccine is experimental, untested, unproven technology that will change you at the genomic level ,and that the only vaccine ever developed against the coronavirus actually made people more susceptible to infection. Mainstream media narratives can be just as infectious, just as dangerous as any coronavirus, so you need to guard against them.

 

HEAD: It’s very easy to just mute your crazy high school friend on TwitBookGram, or to leave a TikSnap group where people are sharing establishment propaganda. But right now I think there’s actually kind of a responsibility to share The Corbett Report’s new documentary, Who Is Bill Gates?, so they will realize how deep the deception goes, and how all of the establishment sources that they believe in are funded by the eugenicists who are admittedly using their wealth to reduce the world’s population.

 

SOURCE: How to Talk to Someone Who’s Spreading COVID-19 Misinformation

Who is Bill Gates? A software developer? A businessman? A philanthropist? A global health expert? This question, once merely academic, is becoming a very real question for those who are beginning to realize that Gates’ unimaginable wealth has been used to gain control over every corner of the fields of public health, medical research and vaccine development.

Full, hyperlinked transcript of this documentary: https://www.corbettreport.com/gates/

Or purchase the DVD at NewWorldNextWeek.com