Sun Media has recently been hammering away at the old tabloid stalking horse, arts funding. The highlight of the coverage has been Krista Erickson’s hysterical (I mean that in both ways) interview with interpretative dancer Margie Gillis, which is worth watching in its jaw-dropping, 21-minute entirety.
Not mentioned in the hours of airtime devoted to ridiculing government funding for the arts is the fact that Sun Media’s owner, Quebecor Inc., is not shy about taking government hand-outs of its own, viz: money channeled to magazine publishers under the Canadian Periodical Fund.
A list of Quebecor properties and the commensurate amount they received from taxpayers for 2010-11, via the Department of Canadian Heritage.
Chez Soi: $487, 735
Cool: $191.136
7 Jours: $327,160
TV Hebdo: $1,157,100
TV Hebdo Teleromans: $8,480
Les idees de ma maison: $376,943
Clin d’oeil: $480,749
Cote Jardins: $33,678
Derniere Heure: $154,966
Echoes Vedettes: $188,704
Le Lundi: $376,018
Moi & Cie: $7,947
Tout simplement Clodine: $99,489
Clodine Hors serie: $4,366
TOTAL $3.7 million.
a few tasteful snaps 
This is just the tip of the iceberg. Governments spend at least hundreds of billions on advertising that is essentially nothing more than a subsidy for the corporate media.
Hah, considering govt expenditures last year were a mere $280 billion, media companies are doing pretty well for themselves then.
Oops!
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There are provinces, territories, municipalities, transit boards, etc that also invest generous amounts of money in corporate media. Governments need to advertise, we just are obliged to scrutinize the amount and purpose and context of those payments. Sun Media is a farce, and I do not believe it to be in the interest of the country to have them on television. It is the worst side of the showbiz side of media. It is OK for them to sell their news in entertaining ways – life would be very boring if that wasn’t the case – but there is an expectation of honesty even while taking a partisan position. Fox News doesn’t cut it for me. That interview by Krista Erickson was a complete ambush and completely unacceptable for any news organisation.
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The CPPA (Canadian Petroleum Producers Association) spends huge amounts of cash on TV trying to fool people into believing that tar sands development is safe and sustainable and will benefit all Canadians. That money comes from government subsidies and huge corporate tax cuts Harper has given the richest corporations including Big Oil. This consolidation of government and corporate power observed in this anti-social propaganda machine is a manifestation of fascism.
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