Media baron Rupert Murdoch's son James buys huge piece of property in B.C.
Recently, I had a chat with international-affairs columnist Gwynne Dyer about the pernicious effects of publishing baron Rupert Murdoch.
It came while Dyer was in Vancouver to speak at SFU Woodward's about climate change.
I asked Dyer, a long-time resident of London, if there was any chance of Britain reversing its decision to pull out of the European Union.
Dyer replied that tabloids owned by Murdoch's company were some of the most rabidly pro-Brexit publications in the country.
And given their circulation, Dyer doubted that the British government would want to push back in any way.
It reminded me of how Murdoch's editors around the world all supported the U.S.-led attack on Iraq in 2003.
The Murdoch-created Fox News was also a major cheerleader for that war, which was rooted in the false claim that Iraq had stockpiled weapons of mass destruction.
This gave former U.S. president George W. Bush and former British prime minister Tony Blair enough cover to push ahead with a war that caused untold havoc. It also planted the seeds for the Islamic State to arise in Iraq and Syria.
So it's fair to say that Murdoch's media outlets have played a significant role in laying the foundation for a lot of death and destruction.
Today, the Globe and Mail reported that one of Murdoch's sons, James, and James's wife, Kathryn, bought a 450-acre property in a remote area of B.C.'s central coast.
An earlier report in the Financial Times suggested that James Murdoch did this because he wanted to have a safe place to escape to in the event of a "Trumpocalypse".
The Globe story, however, pooh-poohed this idea, citing a source who said that Murdoch was merely looking for a retreat and that he likes B.C.
Oh, really?
Of course, it would be impertinent to suggest that the son of Rupert Murdoch would need a hideaway in B.C. just in case Republican-controlled executive and legislative branches of the U.S. government launched a war. Or if they pursued policies that invited more terrorism.
After all, those Republicans were elected with the full support of the Murdoch media empire.
Back in 2012, James Murdoch stepped down as head of the Murdoch-controlled News Group Newspapers in the U.K. This came in the wake of a phone-hacking scandal involving the company's editorial department.
Yes, these are the same papers that are rabidly in favour of Britain exiting the European Union and for making readers fearful over immigration.
According to a government inqury, James Murdoch "showed wilful ignorance of the extent of phone-hacking" and was "guilty of an astonishing lack of curiosity".
The British Office of Communications stated that he "repeatedly fell short of the conduct to be expected of a chief executive and chairman" and that his failure to address phone hacking was "difficult to comprehend and ill-judged".
Those are not criminal offences, which means he's not barred from entering Canada under the Immigration and Refugee Protection Act.
Under the law, an immigration officer "who is of the opinion that a permanent resident or a foreign national who is in Canada is inadmissible may prepare a report setting out the relevant facts, which report shall be transmitted to the Minister".
There's no word that this was ever done in connection with any member of the Murdoch family.
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