The first was the apology’s patent insincerity. The second was how little notice this drew — as though a meaningless apology, that is to say one that comes without real contrition or any prospect of changed behaviour, is now utterly normal, expected, and acceptable. And really, that’s true. The evidence is everywhere. Or is it?
Having first suggested last week that Levant is not really a Sun News journalist, but rather a mere comment contributor, the network saw fit to broadcast its mea culpa via a voiced segment, in vintage newscaster baritone, that aired just before Levant’s regular Monday evening spot. The host himself did not apologize, or acknowledge the apology in any way. It was as though, as far as he was concerned, it hadn’t happened.
This will seem like Solomonic wisdom on the part of the network, to anyone who admires the art of skilful dodging. Because, by extension, it establishes at last that there are two Sun News networks. There’s the “credible” news organization, which fields real reporters in a real Ottawa bureau, which owns and operates real daily newspapers and websites across Canada, and which cares somewhat about its reputation. And there is the infotainment vehicle, a purveyor of rhetorical roller derby, that relies on Levant and a few other flame-throwers to churn up controversy and generate clicks, almost regardless of the content.
Perhaps Levant threatened to quit rather than personally apologize? Or maybe the network preferred not to force the issue. Either way, it is now a given there will be future Levantist overreach, given this host’s odd, almost fetishistic obsession with the Trudeau family, and the federal election in the offing. No matter what tripe Levant spouts, whether about the Roma or about a federal politician, Sun Media does not withdraw his platform. Clearly, they love the guy.
And why wouldn’t they, from a certain point of view? This kind of dual-universe system, a classic good-cop, bad-cop setup, is golden in some respects. The “apology” and professional reportage from Sun Media journalists simply buy time, or dispensation, for more conflagrations and publicity from the network’s flame-throwers. It’s beautiful, in a way.
The same applies to MP Paul Calandra, whose tearful apology in the House of Commons last Friday, with a repeat performance on CBC Radio’s The House Saturday, set a new standard for insincere sincerity. Like Waterworld, a movie so awful it’s sublime, Calandra’s apology immediately entered the pantheon of the unforgettable.
For even as he sobbed out his contrition, the PMO’s principal Commons enforcer plainly stated that he will continue to spew non-answers in response to opposition questions. Monday in Question Period, even as Foreign Minister John Baird thoroughly answered a series of questions about the Iraq engagement — as if to say, see, we can do it this way when we want to — House Leader Peter Van Loan underlined Calandra’s point: The government will vote down an opposition motion to give the Speaker the explicit authority to insist that answers in Question Period address the question posed. Van Loan reiterated this Tuesday. This week’s little interlude of common sense and respect in the House is therefore temporary. Calandra’s apology, like Sun News’s, was tactical.
The undisputed world champion in the art of the tactical apology is, of course, Toronto mayor Rob Ford, whose most famous foray, involving the Toronto Star and its reporter Daniel Dale, was tantamount to a declaration of undying fealty and eternal self-abasement. That apology was so abject and all-encompassing as to nullify any sliver of a chance that Dale could come back at Ford with legal or political bite. Here again the apology neutralized the attack. But there was no true contrition. The apology in this context becomes one pillar in a dysfunctional cycle, like that between abuser and victim, that only enables further abuse.
If that seems a desperate, dismal state of affairs, it is. Except for this: There is a reason why Levant is not taken seriously by many. There is a reason why Calandra is now a punch line. There is a reason why Rob Ford, before cancer took him out of Toronto’s mayoral race, was on track to get booted from office, and it is simply that most people are not idiots.
Despite every attempt by political professionals to purge a sense of honour from our politics, the majority of individuals still possess an instinct for truth. They still respond viscerally to its obvious presence or absence. They still can spot insincerity for what it is. And they are still predisposed, in a democracy, to punish politicians who routinely play them for fools.
That is why, in response to the Calandra debacle, the Tories took unusual pains Monday and Tuesday to answer the questions asked of them. The puzzle, given how good that made the government look, is that it’s not this way always.
Original Article
Source: canada.com/
Author: Michael Den Tandt
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