Courtesy of Jason Cherniak, this example of Stephane Dion showing off his acting skills.
During an interview, Stephane Dion is faced with a "tough" question:
DB: If you could have dinner with any 5 people, dead or alive, who would they be?
Stephane Dion: This is a very tough one
[pauses for a second]
I would go with the 5 Jewish thinkers who gave strong contributions to humanity
Moses, who said that everything is law
Jesus, who said that everything is love
Marx, who said that everything is struggle
Freud, who said that everything is sex
And Einstein, who said, “you know, all this is very relative.”DB: That’s awesome. Wow.
Oh man, these people are so gullible.
Tough? In June 1998, Stephane Dion addressed the Israel Association for Canadian Studies at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem in Israel:
Being both a Quebecer and a Canadian is a wonderful opportunity. Every Quebecer must be able to say: "I am a Quebecer and a Canadian, and I refuse to choose between the two identities." In the same way that Jewish families in my constituency tell me they feel deeply that they are Jews, Quebecers and Canadians. They feel both rooted in Montreal and close, in spirit, to Israel.
I'm sure you can answer this question: What contribution have Jewish thinkers made to humanity? First there was Moses, who said that everything is law. Then Jesus preached that everything is love. Then Marx roared that everything is struggle. Freud diagnosed that everything is sex. Finally, there was Einstein, who commented: Well, you know, everything's relative.
Allow me to transpose those premises to the debate on Canadian unity.
That's awesome! Wow! Stephane Dion can remember a bit from a speech he's given. And he makes it sound like he's thinking it up all on his own, off the top of his head!
Amazing!
Look how Jason Cherniak thinks Stephane Dion is so clever:
It is an interview with Stephane that asks him some tough, personal questions.
Well, it can't be all that personal an answer if it is the one given to you by a speechwriter eight years ago, quoting an old joke that's been floating around the internet for years.
But there's Stephane Dion, brow furrowed, digging deep into his soul to name these five people who influenced him so.
Right.
Let the Dion groupies call it amazing. Me, I'm less impressed by Stephane Dion recycling his old speeches in response to a "tough" question.
Now here's what I really think. Note that the question was not about which person Dion would like to dine with. It was which five people -- not two or three or four, but five. This was a setup, a softball pitch pre-planned to hand to Dion so that he could hit one out of the park, and have people like Cherniak get all gushy. Dion was in on it. I'm certain.
I can't prove it, but I know it's true.
Cherniak, you're being played the fool. Or you're in on it. But either way, it doesn't reflect good on you.
Amusing Addendum: By the way, the "five people" question was what triggered it for me. On the weekend I was watching an episode of Law & Order: Criminal Intent on Mystery. In it, Detective Goren immediately realized a witness was lying when she insisted that the person she was setting up to take the fall for a crime had seven drinks at the club. She says it twice -- first when she relates her story, and a second time when Goren tests her by noting that the fellow had several drinks. She immediately corrects him so that he would write down seven drinks in his notebook. Goren's suspicion that her story was a fabrication was confirmed. Her information was too precise. Just like here -- the question was too perfectly answered by Dion's little bit of humour.
Serious Addendum: From the Wikipedia entry on propaganda:
Propaganda is a specific type of message presentation directly aimed at influencing the opinions or behavior of people, rather than impartially providing information. An appeal to one's emotions is, perhaps, the more obvious propaganda method, but there are varied other more subtle and insidious forms.
An appeal to one's emotions is, perhaps, a more obvious propaganda method than those utilized by some other more subtle and insidious forms. For instance, propaganda may be transmitted indirectly or implicitly, through an ostensibly fair and balanced debate or argument.
Fake news stories holds a special place in the pantheon of techniques used by propagandists. Scripted interviews? It's wrong -- I don't care if its George W Bush or Stephane Dion.
And "tongue in cheek"? Recall Cherniak's words:
This is an excellent post on Dionline, the official blog of the Dion Youth Campaign. It is an interview with Stephane that asks him some tough, personal questions.
Gee, sure sounds like Cherniak was playing this up as a serious interview that is going to reveal the "real" Stephane Dion with tough questions.
In fact, it is not an interview, nor were the questions tough, or even real questions. Given that this appeared on a Liberal blog, most likely read by other Liberals, particularly pro-Dion Liberals, you have to wonder just how cynically Stephane Dion and the other top people in the Liberal Party view the party membership. Just keep feeding 'em the happy lies. They'll clap like trained seals, and beg for more.
What's worse is that these are bloggers, members of the "new media", happy to play along. I thought the new media was all about honesty, about being beyond the influence of the old power structures that have undermined, even corrupted, the old media.
How can anyone, especially bloggers, want to help these people?
I know that this is not a high falutin' interview:
I’m tired of all these hard-hitting blog interviews. It’s high time we stopped asking candidates about their opinions and ideas in favour of the goofy, the mundane, and the completely random.
Mundane and random, even goofy, but still a legitimate interview. That's what they want us to think. No one suggests that it was scripted, and the "five people to dine with" question was so clearly scripted that the whole thing is suspect:
Thanks to Young Liberals from all the camps for submitting such great questions.
Really, submitted questions? Light-hearted is not the same as tongue in cheek -- one is honest and the other is not.
Maybe this is the problem with the Liberal Party. Why be honest when a lie will do?
