The Star – standing on guard for Obama!
Nearly three-quarters of Canadians think the U.S. president is doing an “excellent” or “good” job, according to The Canadian Press Harris-Decima survey. Only 4 per cent thought he was performing poorly.
The Star omits mention of his current popularity in America.
Who are those people? Are they putting something in their bottled water?
What was the question?
95% of the MSM – Canada and U.S. – want to fellate Obama.
What is really astounding is the fact that Bush’s rating at a similar time was better than Obama’s .
In the Bush case virtually the entire MSM was lined up against him … in Obama’s case virtually the entire slobbering MSM is constantly giving him a pass.
If the MSM was negatively reporting Obama to the extent it was with Bush , Obama’s rating would probably be much lower.
All this lovely positive news spin for the O, and yet their stock price is in the dumper and continuing its decline.
Alas poor Torstar, we know thee well. Ye bastiges!
The problem in Canada is that our information systems, like those in China, N. Korea and the old Soviet Union are heavily biased. They misinform and manipulate the public within a socialist, leftist political perspective. This has been going on for years.
Then, the Liberals made anti-Americanism, and in particular, anti-Bush, a basic component of their party platform. Years of the Liberal tactic of diverting attention to anti-Americanism, have worked.
We don’t have a FOX news in Canada, we don’t have many political pundits in various newspapers who write from a non-partisan and informationally honest perspective.
Then, we are living within an economy managed, carefully, by Harper and the Conservatives. We haven’t been subject to the disastrous consequences of the mortgage policies of the Obama Democrats, the trillion dollar debt ‘stimulus’, and so on. Therefore, we, ourselves, do not ‘feel’ as economically affected as do people in the US.
So- those polls are not relevant as fact but sadly, show how Canadians are out of touch with reality.
the more people know about him, the more they oppose what he is trying to do. (delaying his agenda is a winning strategy.) Canadians know jack-squat about obama thus the friendlier rating north of the 49th.
“Are we learning yet?”
— The Terminator
Wait for some sort of massive crisis, created of course. That will bring the numbers up.
ET,
You are quite partisan to conservatism though. It seems that you would see what I call right wing news as centrist. I agree in this case that the Canadian media is in the bag for a teleprompter, but when your “unbiased” news comes from LifeSite or SDA you might be setting your yardstick a little too far to the right.
O’Reiley, Hannity, Limbaugh et al are no more centrist than Jeff Simpson or the Toronto Star.
Jon:
The problem is that in CDA we have almost nil centre right or conservative media news sources, whereas in the US there is much more balance.
Brian said: What is really astounding is the fact that Bush’s rating at a similar time was better than Obama’s .
In the Bush case virtually the entire MSM was lined up against him … in Obama’s case virtually the entire slobbering MSM is constantly giving him a pass.
If the MSM was negatively reporting Obama to the extent it was with Bush , Obama’s rating would probably be much lower.
Brian, bad logic: a more accurate conclusion is that MSM opinion/coverage doesn’t matter. The people will make up their own minds, given time.
Fred and brian:
and don’t forget it was after a huge battle over an alleged stolen election that went all the way to the SC and it voted down party lines.
Well yeah! It must be the attitude of if we suffer then they should suffer too, and Obama’s just the man for the job!
Well of course we can’t trust evil Americans to give the proper opinion on our choice of their president, only correct-thinking Canadians can give the proper assessment of their president, – Even though we are damaged by his continued Bush regime military policies and hostility to Canadian trade.
Ya, wees’es thinks good we is.
Does anyone believe the Star poll results ?
I have asked Chantal Hebert, whom I greatly respect, if she has ever seen raw polling data and the list of those chosen to be polled. I have asked her this many times. She either answers with deflection or not at all. She mentioned that there is a requirement for polled people to remain confidential. Independent auditor ? No comeback. Whose requirement ? No comeback.
Media polls are a tool to sway public opinion. Period. Published poll results are pulled from thin air in the hope they can drive the real number to it. Until they show us the numbers, I call BS.
One commenter in the Star praised Obama’s transparency not seen in our Prime Minister…nuff said. Even Helen Thomas has criticized the Obama administration for its lack of transparency…doubt if 99% of people polled even know who Helen Thomas is!
Canadians get their new from CTV and CBC – nuff said!
Most Canucks are still clueless about what Ogabe is trying to do to the USSA economy. They have no idea his policies are an EPIC FAIL. Everything is still sunshine and Unicorn farts on the slobbering MSM outlets.
Wait a few more months as Ogabe’s policies cannot succeed – it’s impossible to defy certain laws and Ogabe is trying to do just that. A gigantic economic crash is on it’s way and Ogabe’s popularity will never recover. Unfortunately, at that point, the USSA economy may never recover either.
Well of course everything that is “known” about Obama is only that which is fed to gullible Canadians by an Obama-worshipping media. So what this survey really (and only) shows is the extent to which Canadians are prone to the absorption of propaganda. It’s like taking a class of Grade 2 students and then have a David Suzuki or some such flake come in and spew his propaganda around the room and then surveying the Grade 2 students about the subject. It is nothing more than a “propaganda absorption survey”.
jon, no, I don’t see a conservative perspective as ‘centrist’. I don’t even know what a ‘centrist’ perspective actually means, in terms of policy and agenda.
I don’t get my news from LifeSite (never heard of them) or from SDA. I get the news from all the MSM sites, as well as smaller information sites. I don’t watch the Canadian News or read the Star.
As for opinions, I read a great variety, from such places as National Review, WP (Krauthammer), Victor Davis Hanson…on and on and on.
It happens to be a fact that we in Canada don’t have a television channel akin to Fox News, which doesn’t hide its conservative perspective, and supports that, with facts and logical analysis (not emotional opinions).
“The problem in Canada is that our information systems, like those in China, N. Korea and the old Soviet Union are heavily biased. They misinform and manipulate the public within a socialist, leftist political perspective. This has been going on for years.”
I agree in principle ET but I do not wish by any means to excuse the mass of sheeple who align their lives and political positions solely because of our MSM. Unlike China, N. Korea, Iran etc… where one might really struggle or even put his/her own life in jeopardy by just seeking the truth, North Americans can easily access other voices. This is why we are here right now at SDA…
When I was talking stupid as a kid my old man use to slap me behind the head. “Smarten up!” was the opener to a lecture of right and wrong usually. Now it’s a criminal offence to “smarten up” ‘grasshoppers’ who will someday take over.
In the animal kingdom, the weak are not protected. ‘Nuff said.
“Wait a few more months as Ogabe’s policies cannot succeed – it’s impossible to defy certain laws and Ogabe is trying to do just that. A gigantic economic crash is on it’s way and Ogabe’s popularity will never recover. Unfortunately, at that point, the USSA economy may never recover either.”
Slim
Texas will seceed the Republic before it happens…One of the very last bastions of sanity in the majority range.
All you need to know about Obama’s popularity is contained in the US 2008 election results. His Electoral College victory – 365 v. 175 – does tend to make it look like a wave of pro-Obama sentiment swept the US.
BUT, even though faced with a Republican opponent hobbled by the political legacy of the outgoing Bush administration, Obama barely managed to garner 53% of the popular vote. Not much better than Bush’s 51% in the 2004 election.
The blindingly obvious reality is that, like Bush, Obama’s margin of popularity is thin, and could easily go either way at any time.
Also, these consistent voting results with miniscule margins between victors and losers mean only one thing: the US is pretty well divided 50-50 politically.
If only 51% of Canucks believed that Obama is doing a good job–he’d most likely be doing a good job–given the fact that most people in this country hate politicians. 75% is a powerful expression!!
I’m Conservative, and I think Obama is doing a good job. He’s doing what the Democrats who voted for him want him to do. It’s called democracy.
I’ve been voting Conservative since Joe Clark came around. (1978??) In the last election, I voted for Stephen Harper. Is Stephen Harper doing what I expect from a Conservative gov?? I’ll let you people answer that!
I can tell from the fine people here that not all Canadians are duped by Obama-mania.
All that “poll” proves is that those who read the Toronto Star are dinks.
Actually Joe citizen BO is not doing a good job if your metric is that he is doing what he was elected predominantly by dems to do. The polling has consistently shown that Americans including a sizable majority of registered dems are for smaller government and are worried about the debt and other issues that the agenda of BO clearly intends to go against. IOW he is not doing what he was democratically elected to do. The congress and senate are deepy unpopular and BO is heading there as more and more people realize that BO is in on all of this big government stuff too.
Gord Tulk:
The headline says that 51 % of Canadians beleive that Obama is doing a good job. I don’t keep track of Obama any more than I have to. However, I do know this.A lot of people thought Michael Jackson was a hero. I thought he was an asshole!!
In contrast, perhaps 2% of Americans even know who the Prime Minister of Canada is.
A percentage rounding to zero have any basis at all for judging his job performance.
Oddly, nearly the same thing is true of Canadians judging President Obama’s job performance.
Jon
“O’Reiley, Hannity, Limbaugh et al are no more centrist than Jeff Simpson or the Toronto Star.”
Hannity and Limbaugh are “right-wingers” but O’Reilly is not. People from the left try to define Bill as a con, but he is far from it. He’s liberal on some issues and conservative on others. That my friend defines centrist.
The more you say Bill O’Reilly is a conservative/right-winger exposes you as not a conservative/right-winger. Why? Because as a conservative/right-winger you’d know Bill O’Reilly is a centrist, or as he says “an independent”, but does he know?
Joe C.
You are oversimplifying the situation.
“Is Stephen Harper doing what I expect from a Conservative gov?? I’ll let you people answer that!””
Yes he is. PMSH is being pragmatic, prudent and conservative by not letting BO and the Americans hurt our economy with oppressive trade tariffs. You are simply micro-analyzing certain aspects of his policy while purposely ignoring what the results of those policies will be. It is very conservative to error on the side of caution with respect to the economy.
Voting Progressive Conservative up until PMSH merged the CA and the PC makes you a “c”onservative NOT!!! If you were a “c”onservative as you infer; you’d have been voting Reform then CA, not PC during those years.
There is nothing conservative about PROGRESSIVES!!!
I suspect you are a Canadian version of what Americans call RINOs.
Sorry, fixed:
Why? Because as a conservative/right-winger you’d know Bill O’Reilly is a centrist, or as he says “an independent”; but, what does he know?
Indiana Homez at 2:56, very well said.
As for the TStar poll, I guess they found 690 of their readers who rely solely on old-media (MSM) for the latest news.
“He’s doing what the Democrats who voted for him want him to do. ”
I think you should take a trip back in the wayback machine to the comment threads before the election. Obama ran as a centrist. He is governing somewhere between socialism and fascism, excuse me, “progressive corporatism” as they like to call it. Which, incidentially, is the same thing Mussolini called fascism.
He has also shredded the constitution viz GM and Chrysler seizure of private assets by the govt, err I mean ‘bankruptcy’, and used hundreds of billions in borrowed money to reward his friends. Twice as much stimulus money per capita is going to areas that supported Obama. This is how banana republics are run. And how America is run.
Oh yeah, and he told California that he would cut off their stimulus money if they laid off employees. That is real constitutional, considering our constitution forbids the president from ordering governors around.
Jon, your comments to ET at 11:35am are made all the more funny by appearing on this thread.
FOX News, Limbaugh and etc. are considered Right Wing Kooks with a capital “K” because all they do, all day long, is point at the DIS-information in the mainstream big media. They point, they laugh. That’s all they do. They’re off-side with the MSM message. They aren’t running all-Michael-Jackson this week. They’re busy mocking the MSM for the wall-to-wall MJ show, and maybe mentioning some other stuff that noboy else is. Like that Barry O’s poll numbers are in the toilet.
The Left Wing media, AKA Torstar, CTV, CBC, NBCABCCBSCNNMSNBC, plus the big newspapers etc, cannot do that. They can’t point at the alleged Right Wing Kooks and laugh at the spin, the doctored photos, the omitted facts, the outright lies. There -aren’t any-. If there were that would be all you’d hear about for a week.
So there is no “centrist” media at this time. There is information (right wing kooks) and there is disinformation, propaganda and concealment (MSM).
“Centrist” in this context would be only half bullsh1t.
Joe C:
perhaps I misunderstood your comment. You said that you were a conservative. And that you thought obama was doing a good job. You then said that the dems elected him and that the us was a democracy. So please explain the reasons and evidence that Barack is doing a good job.
From my conservative perspective he is the bigges threat to me and my families well being than anyone else in the democratic world. And as I argued above he is also failing to deliver on the promises he made to those who voted for him.
With all this talk about political leanings wnd who happens to be what, maybe it’s time to take the test again:
http://www.politicalcompass.org/
Your political compass
Economic Left/Right: 1.62
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: 1.59
I usually hit pretty close to the center…exactly where depends on my mood for the day.
I have a dear friend who carries a picture of Obama in her wallet.
Her sole source of information is local Radio and the CBC.
Dear sweet lady she is … and not one clue about the world.
O’Reilly considers himself out of step with conservative orthodoxy, but he is a traditionalist. He’s defined by who he’s against, progressive-secularists. That’s why he is groaned at by progressive-secular-conservatives like myself. What is someone who is against progress anyways? A regressive? And not wanting to start a religious debate… but what’s wrong with being secular, so long as you’re not an idiot egalitarian? Shouldn’t these “fact-based decision-making” conservatives consider the origin and root of their beliefs if they are non-secular (or religious or whatever)?
I know it’s funny on this site to point out Canada’s lack of media choice. That’s why I wrote it. Kate is becoming a medium unto herself and it creates a bit of hope.
Fox news is only considered to be for Kooks by the people who lack the cognitive ability to watch (or read), compare and decide. Murdoch has helped save TV news by NOT requiring his channel to report both sides, but rather the side they think is right. The problem with most media is that they report both sides and then write “but most people agree” with their editorial slant.
“Until this moment
I have been forced
to listen while media
and politicians alike
have told me
“what Canadians think”.
In all that time they
never once asked.”
Jon
I forgot to mention that we don’t get the news from SDA. SDA provides links to news, Kate’s analysis and comments. Conservatives, moderates and liberals alike can come here and link to news articles. A bunch of likeminded people commenting on said stories in not news.
With respect to the terms “progressive” and “conservative”, the dictionary definition and the generally accepted political definition of these words are not the same. Politically speaking “progressive” means following leftwing dogma, not the definition you’ve provided. I would argue that by dictionary definition conservatives are more progressive than liberals. Some other words that have a different political meaning than the dictionary meaning are:
elite, woman, minority ect…
JMO
didn’t o’reilly start out with one of those early gossip video rags?
ya, here it is: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0166442/
now there’s a way to earn your stripes. catering to sensationalism.
c_george
“It ain’t where you from, kid, it’s where you at”-Kool G Rap(#1 rap lyricist)
Just ask Barak Obama.
Maybe if they had framed the “Do you like Obama” question by saying.
President Obama has broken his promise and massively increased the US debt to a size that is between 300 & 400% higher than the debt left him by George Bush. To put this in a Canadian perspective, it would be like PM Harper running a debt of $175 Billion instead of the forecast $50 billion.
So, based on these facts, do you think Obama is doing a good job ?
He really brings truth to power of the phrase
Worst
President
Evah!
It’s the Star, polling their friends in Toronto. You could get pretty well any result you want if you pick the right area to phone. However, as mentioned earlier by Ron in Kelowna, it is the Star. I would not be surprised if it is all just made up numbers anyway.
OMMAG:
I have a friend who carried a picture of Marilyn Monroe in his wallet. I don’t think I need to tell you what most guys would like from Marilyn Monroe. Now you know why your friend has a photo of Obama
Re: “Nearly three-quarters of Canadians think the U.S. president is doing an “excellent” or “good” job, ”
Nearly 3/4 of Canadians think Michael Moore makes DOCUMENTARIES.
Think about it!
I am reasonably convinced that 3/4 of Canadians could not care less……
It is certainly fiction…the poll that is.
Homez,
In that same vein of logic then most of the news from TorStar comes from CP, AP, and reuters.
You go to a medium, find a link and read a story. I don’t see how this blog is any different from a newspaper in that respect.
I don’t participate in using the doubletalk of political rhetoric because it gives our leaders a chance to redefine words every time they misspeak.
three quarters of canadians are really stupid.
“I don’t participate in using the doubletalk of political rhetoric because it gives our leaders a chance to redefine words every time they misspeak.”
Fair enough Jon, it’s just difficult to have a proper discussion for the reason you say. That being said though, I’d argue that most “conservatives” would say that the political classification “secular progressive conservative” is an oxymoron, so even though you’re correct by the book, communication wise you’re not communicating clearly for the reasons I stated. That being said, using your definition, I too am a “secular progressive conservative”.
I’m Conservative, and I think Obama is doing a good job. He’s doing what the Democrats who voted for him want him to do. It’s called democracy.
Then you haven’t really been watching what this man is doing to his country. He is so far off the mark of his constitutional authority it boggles the mind. That the media are completely in the tank for him is one thing, but the speed at which the US public is catching on is disturbing. If he rams Kill & Tax (cap/trade) through the senate, and implements nationalized health care, the US is finished. They will never undo the taxation and control implemented by this thug and his cronies.
Suggest you do a bit more reading than what’s available at the pathetic Star/Globe and CBC
mhb23re
at gmail d0t calm