Stop the molly-coddling and have a real debate

FOURTH UPDATE:
Mark Steyn writes:

UPDATE! Sock Puppet pantywaists wimp out! Three Sock Puppets against one Islamophobe is apparently unfair odds as "they would not have the time to prepare for the debate." More developments to come. But for the moment the Socks are refusing to go mano a mano a mano a mano with Steyn.

Maybe Faisel Joseph should step up
to the plate.


UPDATE!!!!!! Mark Steyn writes:

UPDATE: It's on! It looks as if the producers of The Agenda have agreed to let me go head to heads with all three of the Sock Puppet Three. We indicated we'd rather debate the real plaintiffs, but interestingly in his most recent email the producer is now describing them not as "the complainants", but as "authors of a paper enumerating examples of "Islamophobia" in the pages of Maclean's." Which in terms of media accuracy is, I suppose, a modest improvement. See you on the air at 8pm Eastern.

Kudos to the producers and host of The Agenda.

FURTHER UPDATE:

Mark Steyn writes:

One final note. As I understand it, the Socks have agreed to Round One: Me first; Round Two: All of us together; Round Three: The Sock Puppet Three alone. That still's upside down: They're the accusers, I'm the accused - and in civilized societies the accuser states his accusation and the accused responds. We'll see whether TVO's producers manage to straighten up and fly right (as the Gipper would say) between now and air time.

They should go first. Then all three together. Then Mark Steyn.

But I confess, as a former television producer, I would hesitate to start with the Sock's boring, "agitprop" confusion-fest off the top. It's like having a crappy lead in a news story that'll guarantee no one will bother to read the rest. Steyn makes for a far better opening act. But that's still not fair to Steyn, unless they have a part four, in which Steyn rebuts their rebuttal.

Yeah, wearing my producer hat, I'd say "book-end" the hour by opening and closing with Mark Steyn.

Let Steyn warm up the audience. Then put everyone on for a good free for all. Then the sock puppets have their time to restate the agitprop that I am sure we have already read over a hundred times in myriad repetitive and dull op eds in newspapers across the country. That gives us time to go make popcorn. Then Steyn to close to make sure the audience goes away entertained and stimulated. Sounds like an award-winning, top-rated show to me.

Here's my earlier rant.

One of the things that has bugged me for a long time about the direction of modern journalism is how postmodern the attitude towards truth has become.

Instead of old-fashioned notions of objectivity--the idea that facts exist out there to be proven-- we now have "your truth" and "my truth" and "one man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter."

A doctrine of fairness and equal time has infected my profession and replaced the demands of finding the truth "out there" because, well, everyone has their side of the story to tell and there is no real truth to get at. Why we even have Western journalists embedded with the Mahdi Army in Iraq!!!!! How impressive. Gee, I wonder how well it would have gone over if say the Washington Post embedded reporters with the SS during World War II, and if newcasts back then gave Hitler and Churchill equal time, as if the Fuhrer's rantings had some legitimacy. Afterall, the Germans needed their "elbow room," no?

Words like extremist or militant or insurgent have replaced terrorist in editorial desk lexicons because "terrorist" has a moral judgment attached to it. No, no, no, journalists are never supposed to make moral judgments in this postmodern universe because there is no truth, only a range of perspectives that all deserve equal airing. There is no right and wrong, only differing power relationships and subjective Eurocentrism. We can't only have history written by the victors, now can we?

Which gets me to the behind the scene machinations on Steve Paikin's The Agenda tonight on whether Mark Steyn will get a chance to debate the so-called Sock Puppets, the law students who originally went to Maclean's Magazine to demand equal space and control over the cover art and a donation to a charity of their choice.

I am reminded of the time Paikin practically hauled Ezra Levant across the carpet for republishing the Danish cartoons. I believe Paikin has already had the Sock Puppets on, has he not? Has Mark Steyn ever been on his program? Why does he feel the need to give them a separate but equal forum on tonight's program. I think it is time for some producer to tell the Sock Puppets (and their puppet masters, the real complainants from the Canadian Islamic Congress) that they have to stop ducking behind the power of state censors and actually have a debate face to face with the man they are accusing.

When the Sock Puppets were on previously, did Paikin give them the same tough ride he gave Ezra? Or did he just give them a forum to whine and air their propaganda? I hope not.

I dunno. There are a lot of people who will tune into The Agenda tonight just to see Mark Steyn.
Those same people have heard so much of the Sock Puppets that they will turn off the set rather than listen to their array of misconstrued paraphrases and claims of victimhood again, especially if Paikin is not well-enough armed to challenge them about their ever-shifting versions of what happened in the editorial offices of Maclean's.

I find it especiallyannoying that The Agenda plans to give the Sock Puppets the right of rebuttal. In other words, the way it is set up now, they get the last word, as if they are the accused and not the accusers. I think at the VERY least, Steyn should follow them. Steyn is the victim here, not these people.

Here's my advice for the story meeting, Wodek, if you are still producing the show: if no face to face debate with Steyn; then no air time for the Sock Puppets or their puppet masters. Mark has the right to face his accusers and challenge their version of events.

Frankly, most mainstream journalists are just not up to speed on this file. So either out of laziness or postmodern views of truth, they say "whatever" and lapse into the fairness and equal time routine. Either they don't have the time to ascertain the facts, or they don't believe such things as facts exist. I don't watch The Agenda enough to say whether this is true of Steve Paikin. I hope not, because he really has tried in this show to have real debate and intellectually challenging programs in some of the ones I have seen. I have been of the opinion he is generally better than most. I hope he lives up to that tonight.