Q and Me

Tomorrow morning I’ll be on Q with Jian Ghomeshi, at 10:30 (eastern time) or so. I’ll be debating with Trish Hennessy of the Centre for Policy Alternatives on the question of whether the application of the techniques of marketing to politics undermines democracy. Apparently Scott Reid is talking from 10-10:30, and Trish and I will be followed by some super secret mega pundit.

No prize for guessing what side of the question I’m defending.

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UPDATE: I thought it went well. Trish made some good points, and had a good comeback to my query about what’s wrong with Big Macs (her reply: “Nutritional value”. Touche.)

Not everyone’s a fan though. Pam from the east coast was moved to write:

I wanted to let you know how unbelievably arrogant and misinformed you sounded this morning on CBC. Putting a marketing spin on politics is not helping us get any closer to electing the best people. I for one want straight discussion around important issues. If I had my way we’d put John Baird in the same room as David Suzuki and let him try to pretend that he gives two hoots about the future of the planet or really knows or cares about issues around the environment; and all without spin or ridiculous and irrelevant accusations aimed at getting off the main issue. And how dare you question the relevance of Noam Chomsky? Who are you but some arrogant little spin-master who thinks he’s too clever to be bothered entertaining any ideas which don’t agree with his own ridiculous ideas about politics, the public, and the world in general. Just what we need in this country – one more misinformed and arrogant jerk.

For the record, and for those who missed it, the Chomsky reference came from a bit at the end where they played a clip from Chomsky, who declared that Obama and McCain were simply “two factions of the Business Party,” and both were far to the right of the American voter. So I called him irrelevant.