For some reason, people tend to expect reporters and editors to park as many of their biases - especially partisan ones - at the doorstep.
That's why it was so interesting to see a Telegram editor not only lament the demise of the old federal Progressive Conservative party, but to distort history on an apparently partisan basis.
The Liberals will likely rise again in Canada in the not-too-distant future, once the sponsorship scandal fades far enough into the background. A Liberal administration provides, if nothing else, a sort of comfort-zone governance while the country waits for a broader vision to come along.Ah well, it only seems to fit, though. In the past, the same editor has criticized a Supreme Court judge who dealt with the law and the facts of a case, rather than delivered a decision that conformed to the editor's own misrepresentation of the province's oil and gas history.
But the national unity aspired to by the old Progressive Conservative party — even if it was only fleetingly achieved — is sorely missed.
Then earlier this year, the same editor presented the same - i.e. essentially partisan - interpretation of the current row with the Harper administration that graced the Telegram's pages on Sunday.
Too bad that in formulating his pro-Progressive Conservative editorials, Jackson paid attention to unbiased sources like Jason Churchill's history of efforts to develop the Churchill River's hydro-electric potential.
Then again, the myth of victimization - especially at the hands of "Liberal" bogeymen "is apparently just too comfortable a blankie for some people to dispose of.
-srbp-