Former Liberal MP and Deputy Prime Minister, Sheila Copps, recently began writing a weekly column for the Toronto Sun. What was somewhat unique about the long time Liberal Party stalwart was that the Sun received several complaints about her columns — before the first one even showed up in print.
To Sheila’s credit, what she has penned so far for the Toronto Sun have been a lot better than those that she wrote during her short stint as a columnist for the National Post. No matter what she seemed to write about in the Post, her columns always seemed to come back to what is undoubtedly her favourite subject — Sheila Copps. She would write about a topic and then revert to what she did or what she would have done when she was a prominent cabinet minister in the government of Jean Chrétien. at least so far in the Toronto Sun, Copps has managed to avoid the dreaded "I".
The Toronto Sun is editorially conservative or as conservative as a major newspaper can get in Canada. although a newspaper should not really have to justify running opinions that are at odds from their editorial viewpoints that was how the Toronto Sun justified running Copps’ columns. Unlike the CBC however, the Toronto Sun cannot be accused of never running an opinion that is contrary to their editorial viewpoint. The paper runs a weekly column by Eric Margolis, who was once described by broadcaster Michael Coren as the most pro-Palestinian journalist outside of Ramallah. With the possible exception of Michael Moore, it’s hard to find anyone who is as far out in left field as Margolis is. and just last week, the Sun ran a column by Rachel Giese who argued that since the Supreme Court of Canada is required to have three justices from Quebec (because the civil law in Quebec is based upon the French civil code, not the British common law), the court should be required to have an aboriginal justice. This can hardly be considered to be a conservative viewpoint. If one Supreme Court justice was required to be an aboriginal, could the necessity that one justice be a lesbian of colour be far behind? No, the problem of having Sheila Copps as a columnist has nothing to do with her small "l" liberal views.
Sheila Copps is nothing more than an apologist for the Liberal Party of Canada and the government. Former head of the Royal Canadian Mint, David Dingwall, resigned after hitting up the taxpayers for expenses totally almost three quarters of a million dollars during the course of one year; expenses that included a package of chewing gum and a doughnut. What David Dingwall did seems indefensible. Still it would be nice to see a columnist; one with no particular ties to either Dingwall or the Liberal Party, defend Dingwall’s actions while chewing his brains out at the Mint. Sheila Copps’ column defending her former colleague was however, practically meaningless. Having Copps, who while she was in cabinet lived high off the hog on the taxpayers’ dime, defend Dingwall, bordered on absurd. It was like having Karla Homolka defend Paul Bernardo.
The Toronto Sun is simply allowing a long time Liberal to put out Liberal Party spin. Isn’t that what press releases are for?