Canadian police refuse to say whether it used malware to spy on lawmakers
By Didi Rankovic | Reclaim The Net | August 11, 2022
Canada’s RCMP and its commissioner Brenda Lucki are fending off requests to reveal if the police force used malware to also spy on members of the country’s parliament (MPs).
The bombshell question was posed in a request filed by the House of Commons Standing Committee on Access to Information, Privacy, and Ethics – but Lucki’s response provided no useful response.
When it comes to wiretapping MPs and other employees of the parliament – “this information will not be provided by the RCMP,” Lucki brushed the question off, according to media reports out of Canada.
Earlier, these reports noted that the RCMP have been using spyware for a decade now (on-device investigation tools, ODITs, that not only record communications, but are installed on the targeted mobile devices) – to access cameras and microphones; and the law enforcement agency confirmed it.
Naturally, those holding public office in Canada, particularly those from the ranks of the opposition, then wanted to know if they, by any chance, had been subjected to this type of surveillance via government-deployed spyware.
Public Safety Minister Marco Mendicino reportedly avoided responding, unlike Lucki who’s now unapologetically suggesting that Canada’s democracy doesn’t stretch quite as far as providing this type of information to its legislators.
Opposition Conservatives are rattled by the whole affair. MP Pat Kelly noted that a parliamentary committee should have unfettered powers to request these documents.
“A blanket refusal to a committee is troubling,” Kelly is quoted as saying.
And a troubling development of this kind in any parliamentary democracy raises so many questions. One came from a Bloc Québécois MP – who asked RCMP commissioner for national security Mark Flynn if the office of the Federal Privacy Commissioner was involved in evaluating if the spyware in question was in compliance with Canada’s Privacy Act.
Flynn’s response was, “No.”
But one of Canada’s former privacy commissioners, Daniel Therrien, was far more forthcoming when he commented on RCMP’s collection of citizens’ personal data via ODITs to call that an extremely intrusive practice.
The authorities’ persistent policy of obscuring the details of the spyware-utilizing surveillance tools is “a crisis of accountability” – that’s how the Canadian Civil Liberties Association non-profit described the situation.
Transparency around such issues in Canada these days apparently goes as far – and no further – than the government stating that it is “not using NSO’s Pegasus.”
Chief Medical Officer of Health was paid record cash bonus during height of lockdowns
By Thomas Lambert | The Counter Signal | August 1, 2022
During the height of lockdowns and mandates, when Albertans were fed daily fear propaganda, Chief Medical Officer of Health for the province of Alberta Deena Hinshaw received hundreds of thousands of dollars as a cash bonus.
Last year, Hinshaw reportedly received $227,911 in “cash benefits,” nearly as much as her base salary of $363,634. This brings Hinshaw’s total annual earnings to over half a million at $591,545.
“The scale of the response to this unprecedented public health emergency required an extraordinary amount of additional work from the Office of the Chief Medical Officer, the Vaccine Task force, the Pandemic Response Team and others, which is reflected in the recent disclosure,” explained Ministry of Health spokesperson Mark Feldbusch in an email.
As previously reported by The Counter Signal, earlier this year, Hinshaw admitted that Alberta Health Services (AHS) reported non-ICU patients as ICU patients throughout the pandemic.
“As we have been doing continual quality assurance work with our data, it was identified over time some units in some hospitals have shifted back and forth between being available for use as an ICU unit or a non-ICU unit,” Hinshaw said.
“In some of our historical data, patients admitted for COVID treatment were categorized as being in ICU when the unit they were on, in fact, had been changed back to a non-ICU unit at that time.”
In other words, the figures were wrong. The entire time that ICU numbers were used as a key point to justify lockdowns, vaccine mandates, and vaccine passports in Alberta, the government intentionally or unintentionally utilized eschewed data, if not outright manipulated data.
Now, it looks like misreporting figures used in a fearmongering campaign apparently made Hinshaw worthy of a taxpayer-funded bonus.
New Democratic Party lawmaker Brian Masse says Canada’s vaccine passport is about tracking, not health
By Ken Macon | Reclaim The Net | July 30, 2022
New Democratic Party member of parliament Brian Masse said that ArriveCAN, which is mandatory for entry into Canada, is not about safety, it is about tracking. Despite pushback from the opposition, the public, and industry experts, the Liberal Trudeau government insists on the continued use of the app.
“I always fight for safety 1st, ArriveCAN is not that. It’s being used as a back door to permanently track all border crossing,” Masse wrote on Twitter.
“MPs need to speak up now or it will destroy our tourism industry, frustrate & create longer line ups when the technology fails.”
Speaking to the Windsor Star, Masse said he had been urging the government to remove the requirement for about a month. He argued that the app delays traffic and does not improve public safety because testing results can be input 72 hours before arrival, which is enough time for someone to get infected.
He further argued that the app is outdated because it only covers the first two doses; it does not cover the boosters.
Masse also said that the app is harming Canada’s tourism.
“Branding is now becoming an issue,” said Masse. “All border MPs know this. We are basically watching the destruction of our tourism industry…People are just going to stay away.”
Despite all these concerns, the government insists on the continued use of the app, saying that the pandemic is not over.
The government also recently announced that the app can be used for customs and immigration declarations, leading to speculations that ArriveCAN might become permanent.
Farmers slam Trudeau over rising fertilizer costs
By Keean Bexte | The Counter Signal | July 27, 2022
Canadian farmers slammed Justin Trudeau over rising fertilizer costs resulting from his decision to put tariffs on Russian fertilizer.
According to Ryan Koeslag, executive director of Ontario Bean Growers, tariffs on Russian fertilizer are wreaking havoc on the Canadian Agriculture Sector and the ability of farmers to merely keep their heads above water.
“Around one-third [of the 2022 shipments] had not been delivered into Ontario yet when that tariff was applied, and some of those ships were even being told that they would have to turn around,” Koeslag told CBC News in an interview. “… It’s hard to be a green farmer when you’re operating in the red.”
He also wonders why Canadian farmers are being forced to flip the bill for the war in Ukraine, despite other G7 countries abstaining from imposing such tariffs as they knew it would hurt their citizens.
“The United States is not applying a tariff. The U.K. and France are not applying a tariff. Why is it that Canada is the one that’s forcing our farmers to pay for the cost of the war in Ukraine?” asked Koeslag.
Indeed, as noted by Atlantic Grains Council chairman Roy Culberson, “The world needs Canadian farmers to produce our best crop this year. You cannot grow crops without fertilizer, and you cannot produce food without crops. An additional tariff paid by farmers on a global product such as fertilizer just penalizes the farmer. We look forward to working on a resolution with government.”
Earlier this year, Deputy PM and Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland acknowledged that the government’s decision to put tariffs on Russian fertilizer would negatively impact the Agriculture Sector but assured Canadian farmers that it wouldn’t be too bad.
“Tariffs and retaliation and sanctions are the most effective when you can devise policies that have the maximum impact on the counterparty whose attention you are seeking to get and do the minimal damage to yourself,” Freeland said a week after the Russia-Ukraine war kicked off.
How could it not cause more than “minimal damage,” though? According to Grain Farmers of Ontario, “Ontario, Quebec, and Atlantic Canada rely heavily on fertilizer imports. Approximately 660,000 – 680,000 tonnes of nitrogen fertilizer is imported from Russia to Eastern Canada annually, which represents between 85-90 per cent of the total nitrogen fertilizer used in the region.”
Trudeau, of course, hasn’t addressed any of the farmer’s concerns regarding tariffs. Moreover, the rising fertilizer costs come at a time when the Trudeau government is pushing forward with a 30% emissions reduction cap on nitrous oxide from fertilizer.
Indeed, as noted by Fertilizer Canada CEO Karen Proud, farmers are already reducing fertilizer use due to rising costs (resulting in less food and rising prices), and the nitrogen policy will only exacerbate the problem.
“We are talking about the food supply,” said Proud. “Canada is already among the top countries that use nitrogen efficiently. We don’t have much room to go before we start affecting yields.”
Agriculture Ministers from several provinces have also voiced their frustrations over the actions of the Trudeau government, explaining that this has already been the most expensive year for farming in recent memory, and Trudeau’s climate fanaticism is only going to make things worse.
“We’re really concerned with this arbitrary goal,” Saskatchewan Minister of Agriculture David Marit said. “The Trudeau government has apparently moved on from their attack on the oil and gas industry and set their sights on Saskatchewan farmers.”
Alberta Agriculture Minister Nate Horner agreed, adding, “This has been the most expensive crop anyone has put in, following a very difficult year on the prairies. The world is looking for Canada to increase production and be a solution to global food shortages. The Federal government needs to display that they understand this. They owe it to our producers.”
With what appears to be a coordinated attack on Canada’s Agriculture Sector and food supply, it’s no surprise that farmer’s groups speaking to Farmers Forum are wondering if he’s intentionally trying to cause a food shortage — which Trudeau previously told Canadians to prepare for.
Children Don’t Need COVID Vaccines, Canadian and Australian Groups Tell Public Health Officials
By Julie Comber, Ph.D. | The Defender | July 25, 2022
Groups in Canada and Australia are urging public health officials to reconsider rolling out COVID-19 vaccines for young children, following the authorization earlier this month in both countries of Moderna’s COVID-19 vaccine for children ages 6 months to 5 years.
The Australian Vaccine-risks Network (AVN) on July 19 sent an open letter to Dr. Brendan Murphy, secretary of Australia’s Department of Health and Aged Care, voting members of the Australian Technical Advisory Group on Immunisation and members of parliament threatening to “move forward with preparations for seeking the intervention of the Federal Court of Australia” if officials don’t respond.
The Canadian COVID Care Alliance (CCCA) on July 14 published an open letter to Canadian health officials stating their members would “be happy to meet you to discuss findings documented in this letter in greater detail.”
Both letters emphasized three arguments against authorizing the mRNA shots in young children and babies:
- Children don’t need COVID-19 vaccination because they are at extremely low risk of COVID-19.
- In any case, the mRNA shots don’t work well.
- The potential harm from the mRNA shots outweighs the benefits for young children.
Both letters also referenced the June 30 open letter to U.K. health officials from more than 70 physicians and scientists warning against vaccinating younger children against COVID-19.
The U.K. letter, written in response to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA) Emergency Use Authorization (EUA) in mid-June of the Moderna and the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 shots for children as young as 6 months, urged U.K. health officials to not “make the same mistake” the FDA made.
All three letters referenced Søren Brostrøm, director of the Danish Health and Medicines Authority, who in June said, “We did not get much out of having children vaccinated against coronavirus last year.”
Australia’s Therapeutic Goods Administration on July 18 provisionally approved a pediatric dose of Moderna’s Spikevax COVID-19 shot for children ages 6 months to 5 years old. Rollout of the vaccines is contingent on input from the Australian Technical Advisory Group on Immunisation.
A few days earlier, on July 14, Health Canada authorized the use of Spikevax for children 6 months to 5 years of age. According to the statement, “As a result of this authorization, approximately 1.7 million children are now eligible for vaccination against COVID-19.”
Risks ‘far outweigh’ benefits for children
The 11-page CCCA letter contains 117 references and six pages of figures and graphs to support the group’s argument that “the data shows that, in the Omicron era, when population-based immunity is widespread, the risks associated with COVID-19 mRNA vaccines far outweigh the benefits in children.”
The authors of the CCCA letter criticized the FDA, stating, “no gold standard, placebo-controlled disease endpoint trials, large enough [with at least 800,000 participants] to categorically establish the clinical safety and long-term efficacy of the Pfizer COVID-19 mRNA vaccinations in children 12- to 15-years-old, 5- to 11-years-old, 2- to 4-years-old, and 6-months-old to 23-months-old have been undertaken.”
Instead, the EUA for Pfizer was “based on the preliminary results of four very small immuno-bridging trials, enrolling fewer than 3,000 participants each.”
The CCCA letter presented data from the Canadian province of Ontario, which “reported a negative dose-response effect for the COVID-19 vaccinations [original emphasis].”
The letter continued:
“In other words, the proportion of cases of COVID-19 were highest among those who had been ‘boosted,’ lower among the ‘fully inoculated’ and least among the ‘not fully inoculated’ (which includes the ‘uninoculated’).”
The authors presented graphs from the Public Health Ontario website, noting a similar pattern was observed in the 12- to 17-year-olds and the 5- to 11-year-old age groups.
“Additionally, a greater proportion of ‘boosted’ Ontarians have died, revealing that the vaccinations may be associated with serious secondary effects.”
The CCCA letter concludes:
“We trust that our research has provided you with evidence needed to adjust Canadian health policy to protect our children from undue harm. We would be happy to meet you to discuss findings documented in this letter in greater detail.”
‘Huge gap’ in Pfizer’s vaccine trial documentation
According to the authors of the AVN letter, the Pfizer documentation presented to the FDA had huge gaps in the evidence provided.
For example, the letter stated:
“The protocol was changed mid-trial. The original two-dose schedule exhibited poor immunogenicity with efficacy far below the required standard. A third dose was added by which time many of the original placebo recipients had been vaccinated.”
The AVN letter argued the Moderna shot for young children fails to meet Australia’s regulatory requirements to be granted “provisional determination” (similar to EUA in the U.S.) under regulation 10L(1)(a) of the Therapeutic Goods Regulations.
To receive provisional determination, there must be “an indication of the medicine is the treatment, prevention or diagnosis of a life-threatening or seriously debilitating condition,” the letter stated.
The authors said Australia’s health department and TGA did not “show any data or science to support a conclusion that COVID-19, and particularly the Omicron variant now widespread across Australia, is ‘life-threatening’ to infants aged 6 months up through 4 years, nor indeed that infants 6 months up through 4 years suffer ‘seriously debilitating’ symptoms when infected with COVID-19.”
The authors also addressed the issue of manipulative strategies used to promote COVID-19 vaccination of children, and said pushing unnecessary and novel mRNA-based vaccines onto young children risks undermining parental confidence in routine immunization programs.
Julie Comber is a freelance science reporter for The Defender.
© 2022 Children’s Health Defense, Inc. This work is reproduced and distributed with the permission of Children’s Health Defense, Inc. Want to learn more from Children’s Health Defense? Sign up for free news and updates from Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. and the Children’s Health Defense. Your donation will help to support us in our efforts.
Trudeau moves forward with fertilizer reduction “climate” policy
By Thomas Lambert | The Counter Signal | July 23, 2022
Trudeau has decided to move forward with his cap on nitrogen emissions by reducing fertilizer use even as provincial Agriculture Ministers beg him to stop.
As per a Government of Saskatchewan news release, both the Alberta and Saskatchewan Ministers of Agriculture have expressed “profound disappointment” in Trudeau’s decision to attempt to reduce nitrogen emissions from fertilizer.
“We’re really concerned with this arbitrary goal,” Saskatchewan Minister of Agriculture David Marit said. “The Trudeau government has apparently moved on from their attack on the oil and gas industry and set their sights on Saskatchewan farmers.”
“This has been the most expensive crop anyone has put in, following a very difficult year on the prairies,” Alberta Minister of Agriculture Nate Horner said. “The world is looking for Canada to increase production and be a solution to global food shortages. The Federal government needs to display that they understand this. They owe it to our producers.”
As previously reported by The Counter Signal, in December 2020, the Trudeau government unveiled their new climate plan, with a focus on reducing nitrous oxide emissions from fertilizer by 30% below 2020 levels by 2030. That plan is now coming into effect — though the government refuses to acknowledge that nitrous oxide emissions can be reduced without reducing fertilizer use.
“Fertilizers play a major role in the agriculture sector’s success and have contributed to record harvests in the last decade. They have helped drive increases in Canadian crop yields, grain sales, and exports,” a news release from Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada reads.
“However, nitrous oxide emissions, particularly those associated with synthetic nitrogen fertilizer use have also grown significantly. That is why the Government of Canada has set the national fertilizer emissions reduction target, which is part of the commitment to reduce total GHG emissions in Canada by 40-45% by 2030…”
This is a tacit admission that any attempt to lower emissions by reducing nitrogen fertilizer will consequently lower crop yields over the next decade, hurting the Agriculture sector and, more importantly, hurting farmers.
And indeed, according to a report from Fertilizer Canada :
Total Emission Reduction puts a cap on the total emissions allowable from fertilizer at 30% below 2020 levels. As the yield of Canadian crops is directly linked to proper fertilizer application this creates a ceiling on Canadian agricultural productivity well below 2020 levels…
It is estimated that a 30% absolute emission reduction for a farmer with 1000 acres of canola and 1000 acres of wheat, stands to have their profit reduced by approximately $38,000 – $40,500/ annually.
In 2020, Western Canadian farmers planted approximately 20.8 million acres of canola. Using these values, cumulatively farm revenues from canola could be reduced by $396M – $441M on an annual basis. Wheat famers could experience a reduction of $400M.
Moreover, Fertilizer Canada doesn’t believe that forcibly decreasing fertilizer use will even lower greenhouse gases but could lead to carbon leakage elsewhere.
Nonetheless, Trudeau’s government is moving forward, with farmer’s groups speaking to Farmers Forum now wondering if he’s intentionally trying to cause a food shortage — which Trudeau previously told Canadians to prepare for.
Canadian company is selling junk food made from crickets
By Keean Bexte | The Counter Signal | July 22, 2022
Entomo Farms, a company based in Canada, is selling junk food made from crickets in stores across the country under their “Actually Foods” brand.
“Actually Foods is on a mission to renew Canadians’ relationship with “healthy” food,” copy on the company’s website reads.
“We’ve ditched so-called “natural” ingredients that are actually not as clean as they claim. Instead, we’re making something you can feel good about, using unexpected ingredients that, although surprising, actually boast the health benefits you’re looking for: like high-protein cricket powders, fava beans, and more.”
Included in Actually Foods’ Cheddar Jalapeno Puffs are the following ingredients: Puff (Organic Corn Meal Flour, Lentil Flour, Fava Bean Flour, Rice Flour, Organic Cricket Flour), Seasoning (Buttermilk Powder, Modified Milk Ingredients, Salt, Dehydrated Vegetables (Jalapeno, Onion, Garlic, Green Bell Pepper), Yeast Extract, Natural Cheddar Cheese Flavoured Powder, Herbs, Spices, Citric Acid), Sunflower Oil.
The food itself appears indistinguishable from other junk foods, and one would have to check the labels and ingredients even to be aware that they were about to eat crickets [indeed, many processed foods contain disgusting ingredients, such as human hair sweepings, disguised with indecipherable names].
“Powered by crickets, 10g protein,” inconspicuous labelling on the package reads.
Moreover, given that the cricket powder has been mixed in with so many other ingredients commonly found in junk food, it’s likely the buggy flavour is entirely masked — though this journalist won’t be picking up a bag for a taste test any time soon.
According to the copyright on the page, the brand is owned by Entomo Farms, which is located in Norwood, Ontario, and claims that it’s “The Future of Food.”
“Through product excellence and education, to make cricket-based foods the first choice for individuals interested in high-quality, sustainable protein,” Entomo Farms’ mission statement reads.
The company’s website also includes several recipes, including their “Top 3 Cricket Powder Smoothie Recipes,” “Salsa with Cricket Powder,” and “Mexican Chopped Salad with Chili Lime Crickets.” Yum.
According to an article on the website, Entomo Farms raised its Series A Funding from Maple Leaf Foods to expand its operation in 2018.
The company was founded in 2014 by brothers Jarrod, Darren, and Ryan Goldin and had grown to 60,000 square feet of production space in just four years, making it “North America’s largest human-grade edible insect farm.”
In 2021, the company closed another round of fundraising, walking off with $3.7 million — primarily from North America and Asia — to grow the company’s operational capacity even further.
“We are thrilled to continue our growth trajectory in the alternative protein and sustainable foods space. We are expanding our facilities to support the exciting growth of our customers and we look forward to launching a new consumer brand later this year,” said Entomo Farms CEO Lauren Keegan. “With this investment, and a planned capital raise in late 2021, we will keep paving the way for crickets as an important food ingredient for people and pets.”
Hate “expert” dismisses free speech as a “rallying call for the far-right”
By Cindy Harper | Reclaim The Net | July 12, 2022
Following the release of a study on Canadians’ beliefs about free speech, an “expert on hate crime and right-wing extremism” dismissed freedom of speech as a “rallying call for the far-right.”
The study, conducted by the University of Saskatchewan, alleged that there is a direct relationship between someone’s views on free speech and their political leaning. Right-leaning Canadians feel there should be no limit on speech, even when the speech could be considered offensive.
Jason Disano, the research director, told CTV News that the purpose of the survey, which involved just 1,000 respondents from all over the country, was to get an idea of where Canadians stood on the issue of free speech “given the prominent role that the phrase ‘freedom’ has been playing in the current Conservative Party of Canada leadership campaign.”
80% of all respondents said that there is, or somewhat is, freedom of speech in Canada. A large percentage of respondents also said that online platforms have a responsibility to censor hate speech and the spread of “misinformation.”
“But when you break that down into one’s political leanings, that’s when you really see differences in Canadian views and opinions in the extent to which that freedom of speech should be [limited],” said Disano.
About 25% of right-leaning respondents said that there is limited to no free speech in Canada. Only 3% of left-leaning respondents gave the same response.
Director of Center for Hate, Bias, and Extremism at Ontario Tech University Barbara Perry, who is an “expert on hate crime and right-wing extremism” chimed in and said that free speech is now “a rallying call for the far-right,” especially for the alt-right.
“If we look at the narrative over the past few years, there has been an emphasis on cancel culture. Free speech has become a rallying call for the far-right. It’s always been there, but I think it was really amplified by the emergence of the alt-right in particular,” she said.
Judge says it’s legally okay to deny unvaccinated an organ transplant
By Thomas Lambert | The Counter Signal | July 13, 2022
Justice Paul Belzil just decided that it was legally okay for doctors to remove Canadians from organ transplant waitlists if they’re unvaccinated.
As reported by the Westphalian Times’s Marie Oakes, Belzil filed his decision on Tuesday in a case concerning Annette Lewis, who was essentially given the choice of ‘comply or die’ after doctors changed the rules surrounding organ transplant waitlists to require being fully vaccinated.
According to Lewis, a doctor “told me if I did not take the COVID-19 vaccine, I would not get the transplant, and if I did not get the transplant, I would die.”
She added, “I ought to have the choice about what goes into my body, and a life-saving treatment cannot be denied to me because I chose not to take an experimental treatment for a condition — COVID-19 — which I do not have and which I may never have.”
But judge Belzil disagreed, arguing that “her beliefs and desire to protect her bodily integrity [do not] entitle her to impact the rights of other patients or the integrity of the [transplant program] generally.”
He ultimately ruled that the charter doesn’t apply to clinical treatment decisions and that Lewis’s rights, therefore, had not been violated.
Lewis isn’t alone in her struggle either. As previously reported by The Counter Signal, hospitals and health networks across the country have chosen to deny the unvaccinated organ transplants even when prospective patients are healthy and have found a donor.
In October 2021, Toronto’s University Health Network (UHN) (the largest health research organization in Canada and Canada’s largest transplant centre) adopted a policy requiring all organ transplant patients to be fully vaccinated against COVID-19 before doctors operate on them.
The decision immediately affected roughly 4,300 Canadians awaiting life-saving care, some of whom have likely passed away by now.
After extending the vaccine passport program, Canada threatens fines for those that don’t use it
By Ken Macon | Reclaim The Net | July 12, 2022
After extending the use of the controversial vaccine passport program, the Canadian government has threatened those who do not have a vaccine passport, which reveals someone’s vaccination status for travel, with fines.
Though the government suspended a Covid travel vaccine mandate last month, it has insisted on keeping the more controversial ArriveCAN in use.
International travelers and returning Canadians have to use the ArriveCAN app to submit their contact and travel information and their COVID vaccination status.
The ArriveCAN website states that all travelers will still be “required to submit their mandatory information in ArriveCAN (free mobile app or website) before their arrival in Canada.”
“If you don’t submit your travel information and proof of vaccination using ArriveCAN you could be fined $5,000.”
“All travelers still need a valid #ArriveCAN receipt within 72 hours before their arrival to Canada and/or before boarding a plane or cruise ship destined for Canada, regardless of vaccination status,” tweeted the Public Health Agency of Canada in the last week.
“Failure to complete your ArriveCAN submission can impact your eligibility exemptions, may result in fines, and creates longer wait times for all arriving at the border.”
The Conservative Party has called for the removal of the app, which has been blamed for delays at Canadian airports and airlines.
“Canadians have dealt with enough chaos at the airports. The Liberals need to listen to the science and end the ArriveCan app,” CPC’s interim leader Candice Bergen wrote on Twitter on Monday.
Despite the complaints from users and the delays, the Canadian government extended the use of ArriveCAN until at least September 30.
CBC whistleblower quit over COVID propaganda
By Mike Campbell | The Counter Signal | July 12, 2022
On the Trish Wood podcast, former CBC reporter Marianne Klowak said the network lost its journalistic integrity in June 2021, when COVID vaccines became widely available and mandates were on the horizon.
“I tried to push through a number of stories that were censored and cancelled. We were no longer committed to truth and honesty,” Klowak told Wood.
Klowak described how she wanted to show both sides of the vaccine debate and let viewers decide for themselves. Moreover, at the time, she was finding concerning data coming out of Israel — a country where vaccines were available months before most others like Canada — and thought it was newsworthy. CBC disagreed.
“This was at the time when Israel was reporting links between the Pfizer vaccine and heart inflammation,” Klowak continued. “And, we were talking about this in the newsroom, about this link, and what could it mean… and how the trials were on for this vaccine until 2023, and I called a meeting with the managing editor and the exec, and I said we have to be really careful on this bandwagon we’re getting on promoting this vaccine because we don’t know what the outcome is going to be in a few years down the road.”
“What if this becomes another Thalidomide?” she asked, referencing the 1950’s drug that was given to pregnant women for nausea before being recalled after birth defects were discovered to be a prevalent side effect.
But her concerns fell on deaf ears.
According to Klowak, all nuance and skepticism were thrown out the door. The CBC was on team vaccine, and that was that.
“At breakneck speed, we were cancelling one whole side of the debate. And it just happened so quickly,” she explains. “You know, I was looking around the newsroom, thinking, ‘am I the only one who’s thinking this way? Am I the only one who’s seeing this?’”
She continues, saying that she had always enjoyed her time at the CBC and thought they gave “a voice to both sides of an issue” and would let the listener “decide what the truth was in that.” But now, she said, the CBC had decided to become “intentionally misleading.”
“All of a sudden, we were eliminating one entire side, and we were saying ‘Here’s the truth,’ and to me that was misleading — and it wasn’t honest.”
Klowak said that this was the turning point for the CBC. They were repressing information the public needed to “make a decision based on informed consent,” and things “started to spiral” into outright censorship at the network.
“It was quickly becoming not safe for people to tell their stories and to have their voices heard because they would be dismissed; they’d be cancelled; they’d be belittled,” Klowak explained.
“There was this huge disconnect between I saw what we were publishing and the stories I was hearing.“
Presenting only one side
Klowak gives an example of a story that didn’t get published because CBC wanted to spin it as pro-vaccine.
She says a group of parents contacted her with vaccine concerns. For example, they thought it was unethical to encourage children to get the vaccine behind their parents’ backs. Moreover, they had vaccine liability questions.
The group referenced expert virologist Byram Bridle from the University of Guelph to show that their concerns were based on science, not mere speculation.
Shocked by the division the vaccine was causing upon families and communities, Klowak pitched the story and was given the go-ahead by her editors.
She proceeded to seek out both sides of the scientific debate regarding COVID vaccines.
In the course of her research, Klowak came across the Candian COVID Care Alliance — a group of medical experts who presented an alternative vaccine perspective supported by scientific insights and data. The group had a petition calling to suspend vaccines in youth until long-term safety trials were completed.
Thinking this was a hard-hitting story that would “punch a hole in the narrative,” her copy-editor instructed her to show a draft to the Toronto Health Unit for feedback.
While none of the data in her draft was questioned by the authorities at the Toronto Health Unit, they attacked the reputation of the COVID Care Alliance.
Klowak was subsequently asked by CBC higher-ups to take the COVID Care Alliance out of the story and to include the two voices from Toronto Health Unit who supported vaccinating young people instead.
“So at that point, I went back to management. I said you know what, ‘I can’t do this. What you’re asking me to do is journalistically unethical. It’s manipulating information. This doesn’t sit well with me,’” Klowak said.
“It was dishonest. It was a dishonest thing for me to do. It was immoral for me as well. Because not only were we cancelling credible voices, we were violating our own principles of balance and fairness.“
“I couldn’t do what they were asking me to do by censoring an entire group of credible professionals just because they had a different viewpoint on this.”
“I’m thinking, this is not right. And it was moving the story towards the narrative, and not allowing dissenting voices to be heard.”
Smearing the unvaccinated
Klowak further noted that the CBC moved from merely disregarding one side to outright smearing them with labels such as “anti-vaxxer.”
In 2021, she notes, the federal government conducted a survey to find the proportion of vaccine-hesitant Canadians, finding that 50% of the Canadian population was hesitant at the time because the vaccine was experimental and unproven.
But instead of focusing on that group of 50%, CBC framed vaccine-hesitant as borderline religious nuts who denied COVID as even being real.
“… I step in and say, what are we doing? Is that the stereotype we are creating that this is the person who is vaccine-hesitant? Why aren’t we doing one on the 50% who are concerned about [the] long-term and short-term side effects… Why aren’t we doing data dives? Why aren’t we holding Pfizer to account?” Klowak recalled.
“We were feeding fear, and anger, and division, and I thought, I just can’t be part of this anymore.“
Here is a brief sample of some of the propaganda articles that the CBC released in the latter half of 2021:
- “Former B.C. anti-vaxxer says COVID-19 pandemic changed her mind about refusing immunizations | CBC News“
- “COVID-19 denier and conspiracy theorist Mak Parhar dead at 48 | CBC News“
- “Husband regrets anti-vaxx stance as wife lies in a coma 800 km from home | CBC News“
- “‘Misinformation can kill people’: Friends and family grieve loss of loved ones who refused COVID vaccines | CBC News“
Klowak and Trish Wood further commented on CBC’s dishonest coverage of the Freedom Convoy.
“The way that group was painted and portrayed was just, you know, I was just left speechless thinking, really? Really? Do you really think these people are criminals and white supremacists? Really? It was just so disturbing to watch,” Klowak told Wood.
Klowak also says she saw videos of the Freedom Convoy that showed the protestors in an entirely better light than what the CBC was reporting.
It didn’t matter, though. The CBC had their agenda, and nothing would get in the way of it.
Ignoring the vaccine injured
More disturbing, however, Klowak says that while at the CBC, stories about vaccine injuries were rejected.
“This was the most profound form of gaslighting. You had a [person with a] vaccine injury, and yet we were hesitant to believe what they were saying was true — that they could have possibly had this experience,” Klowak said.
She then recounted interviewing a woman in her 30s who’d suffered pericarditis within two days of getting vaccinated and is still struggling with daily activities due to her condition.
She pitched the story, but, again, CBC editors wanted to spin the story towards vaccines being a good idea for women her age.
And, again, Klowak refused to run it, eventually quitting.
Klowak isn’t alone in blowing the whistle on the CBC
Klowak isn’t the only CBC whistleblower to come out this past year. In January, Tara Henley also quit and explained in her substack why she left.
“Those of us on the inside know just how swiftly — and how dramatically — the politics of the public broadcaster have shifted,” Henley said. “To work at the CBC in the current climate is to embrace cognitive dissonance and to abandon journalistic integrity.”
“It is to allow sweeping societal changes like lockdowns, vaccine mandates, and school closures to roll out — with little debate. To see billionaires amass extraordinary wealth and bureaucrats amass enormous power — with little scrutiny.”
Indeed, while CBC hosts feign ignorance on the network’s vaccine censorship, editors print corrections nearly every week, and reporters use mannequins in place of patients to make COVID look worse, it’s no surprise to see politicians these days leading “Defund the CBC” chants at their rallies.
The abysmal lack of journalistic integrity described by Klowak and Henley would tank most news organizations, but because the CBC is federally-funded and might as well have a license to mislead, it can’t fail as a company.
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‘Conspiracy Theory’ Now Fact: Greater Israel Has Arrived
By Kit Klarenberg | Mint Press News | January 28, 2025
Ever since Tel Aviv’s 1948 creation, much has been said and written about ‘Greater Israel’ – the notion Zionism’s ultimate end goal is the forcible annexation and ethnic cleansing of vast swaths of Arab and Muslim lands for Jewish settlement, based on Biblical claims this territory was promised to Jews by God. The mainstream media typically dismisses this concept as antisemitic conspiracy theory, or at most the fringe fantasy of a minuscule handful of extremist Israelis.
In reality … continue
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