Note: Transcripts may contain errors. If you wish to re-use all, or part of, a transcript, please contact CBC for permission. Please check the corresponding audio before quoting in print. Copyright © CBC 2022

The Current Transcript for February 9, 2022

Host: Matt Galloway

STORIES FROM THIS EPISODE

Prologue

[Music: Theme]

SOUNDCLIP

So effective at midnight this Sunday, February the 13th, all provincial proof of vaccination requirements will end.

MATT GALLOWAY: Saskatchewan is not alone. Premiers and public health officials in many jurisdictions are announcing an ending to certain public health restrictions. Of course, these moves come at the same time as protests across the country are blocking border crossings and taking over parts of downtown Ottawa in 30 minutes. Whether now is really the best time to ease restrictions and what's really driving these decisions. Also this morning, Carl Bernstein has had an extraordinary journalism career. His work with Bob Woodward, of course, led to the resignation of Richard Nixon. Those headlines, though, had humble roots.

SOUNDCLIP

There was a constant, frenetic activity and very purposeful. Went through it all. It would be punctuated by reporters and editors yelling, Coffee.

MG: Carl Bernstein has written a new memoir about his start in the newsroom in an hour. He's here to talk about his love of newspapers, why obituaries matter, and the incredible story of where he was on November 22nd, 1963. We start, though, with the worldwide influence of the Ottawa protests. Good morning. I'm Matt Galloway. This is The Current.

[Music: Theme]

Back To Top »

The people involved in the Ottawa protest, and its global impact

Guests: Stephanie Carvin, Ruth Ben-Ghiat

MG: The protest blocking downtown Ottawa streets is into its 13th day. Organisers have blamed Prime Minister Justin Trudeau for the stalemate. And on Monday, one of the people speaking for organisers offered to meet with opposition parties instead.

SOUNDCLIP

We're here to talk. Let's find a peaceful, peaceful resolution to this. We got sent here to send a message. The message isn't getting through. He's not getting it. Let's get on the table, for God's sakes. Enough hiding. I'm willing to sit at a table with the Conservatives and the NDP and the bloc. As a coalition. I'll sit with the governor general. You put me in, somebody put us at the table with somebody that actually cares about Canada.

MG: It is unclear what kind of coalition Tom Marazzo is referring to there. But on Tuesday, an organising group, Canada Unity withdrew a memorandum of understanding that had been posted on its website that McHugh was calling on governments to end pandemic mandates or resign. The page now says the memorandum quote does not reflect the spirit and intent of the Freedom Convoy Movement 2022. We requested to speak with James Bauder of that group. He declined. Stephanie Carvin is an associate professor at the Norman Paterson School of International Affairs at Carleton University in Ottawa and a former national security analyst. Stephanie, good morning.

STEPHANIE CARVIN: Good morning.

MG: Let's start with the menu. What do you make of the fact that Canada Unity withdrew their memorandum of understanding? What does that say about the goal of the organisers of this protest right now?

STEPHANIE CARVIN: That's really interesting because as you noted at just 12 hours earlier, they had basically kind of been offering talking points along those lines that they kind of wanted to meet with the opposition, looking to forming an alternative government and things like that. So it may be an indication of dissent within the movement that people feel it's a distraction. And you know this, they want it to be about the mandates. It may be just the fact that it was garnering a lot of attention and was being used to it well has been and is still is being used to kind of legitimate the actual movement itself. So it is interesting that they may have realised they have a public perception problem other than, you know, taking a city hostage.

MG: You have been looking into the origins of this protest at this point. Thirteen days into this, what can you tell us about who is taking part?

STEPHANIE CARVIN: Well, we have the original set of organisers. These are people. I think it's well-established now that have conspiratorial worldviews. You know, in 2019, some of them were involved in it in a much less successful protest that was nominally about oil and gas. But in reality, was about a U.N. conspiracy theory that basically there was a cabal that was trying to organise white genocide in Canada through Muslim migration. You know, a lot of these people have then moved on to [unintelligible] has is part of the Maverick Party, which is a Western separatist party. [unintelligible]. There is someone who has expressed definitely Islamophobic remarks suggesting that it is, you know, political parties have been infiltrated and had King, who was someone who is very much involved with Yellow Vest Canada, has talked about white genocide and solving problems with bullets. These are the actual organisers of the convoy, right? And I think that this is why, you know, they're effectively extremists and they've turned to extremist tactics as a result. Now, importantly, I'm not saying that everyone in this convoy is an extremist. I think a lot of people saw this movement as it's awesome when expressing their frustration with the lockdown, but I think the vast majority of us really don't like at all, and this movement kind of was the spark that caught fire amongst the wider population. So I'm not saying that, but as time has gone on, it's again it's become clear who you know what this convoy is really about. We have seen politicians knowing this and still going in and supporting it. And along with that, we've seen other extremist groups show up as well. We've seen, of course, the Confederate flags, the Nazi flags. We have seen extremist groups like Canada first. The Plaid Army, we've seen three percenter flags over three percent. Her group is, of course, now a listed terrorist entity. They've joined onto this movement as well. Probably not so much to end the mandate, but to kind of engage in mayhem. I think.

MG: What about the protests in Winnipeg, at the border crossings in Windsor and in Cootes, Alberta are the groups that are involved in those protests the same as what's happening in Ottawa?

STEPHANIE CARVIN: They're definitely being encouraged, and there's definitely coordination between those two groups. The extent to which these were actively well-planned- you know, the idea that this was something planned in conjunction, it doesn't seem to be the case. I mean, we saw the first go fund me start in on January 14th, the idea that this was a well planned and executed. You know, it's been well executed. But the fact the idea that this is a well-planned nationwide movement, I think, is wrong. I think there is a heavy level of spontaneity here. And what we are seeing is that people are realising there's maybe a weakness in our democratic system, which is that if enough people with industrial or construction equipment or heavy trucks decide to block off cities or border checkpoints, there's doesn't seem to be a lot that either policing authorities or government authorities can do. So I think this is why we're seeing this spread. In some ways, the failure in Ottawa to contain this and to to end it has encouraged others to try and do the same.

MG: Somebody described it earlier this week, or maybe at the end of last week as a failure of imagination that that that officials perhaps didn't imagine that something like this could happen in Canada. Do you see that?

STEPHANIE CARVIN: Yeah. I mean, it's tough, right? I mean, like, hindsight's always 2020. But at the same time, I think we can be realistic and say that, you know, any kind of analysis in this area always suffers from hindsight bias, right? You're always looking at prior events. And you know, what's interesting is that after 2014, when we had the attacks on Parliament Hill, you know, people were expecting more lone actor attacks and bomb attacks and terrorist attacks. After January 6th, there was a real difference. People recognise that, oh, you know, attacks on parliament may not be with bombs. They could be just mobs armed with with hockey sticks, you know, marching on to the hill and how do you actually protect against that? And what I think we're seeing now is not a Jan. six moment where there's a sudden surge. It's kind of a a January six in slow motion. And I think to be fair to maybe the National Security Intelligence Service is this what we're seeing now doesn't fit neatly into any one category of threat. There is extremist elements in some ways, you know, they're subversive elements. The MOU that you mentioned earlier was literally about overthrowing the government. So there may also be foreign interference aspects that you know, are still pretty murky and we don't know yet. So I think this is why we maybe had trouble imagining what this was, but we will definitely need to have an investigation as to as to why there may have been this failure.

MG: Can I just briefly go back to the organisers versus who might be taking part in this? We have heard and we will hear again after this conversation from people who say that they don't all want to be painted with the same brush, that there are a lot of people in this country who are frustrated with the pandemic that's gone on for two years and the restrictions that we're starting to see eased. How do you distinguish between the organisers versus who's taking part more broadly?

STEPHANIE CARVIN: You know, that's a really interesting question. I like I said, I do believe that there is kind of this extremist element which was responsible for this and is responsible for the tactics we're being seen. I think there may just be a general populist movement generally and by populist, I mean a sentiment in which, you know, people perceive a corrupt and out-of-touch elite and then kind of a true core people that are not being well represented by that elite. And I think that there may be more of that sentiment in Canada that's not necessarily extremist, but is just frustrated with government. And as we have seen, you know, I mean, we had a big discussion yesterday when a Liberal MP came out and said, You know, we actually need leadership here. And I agree with him. I mean, the fact is, I'm tired of this. I think my dog is tired of this. And honestly, I think we need to get to a point where, you know, we do have some kind of plan, some kind of hope. So we shouldn't be surprised that when you have the more extremist groups offer some kind of plan, people might just look at that and say, Oh, look, at least they have a plan. Maybe that's something I can get behind. So I do think it's important for our leaders to at least explain to Canadians where we are, where we're going so that, you know, maybe that might help take some oxygen out of the unit. Now that being said yesterday, when Jason Kenney announced the easing of restrictions in Alberta, that doesn't seem to have really calmed any of the situation at the border in Alberta or in Calgary or Edmonton. So yeah, I mean, I think leaders are going to be very careful with how they engage. But yeah, it is important not to paint everyone with the same brush.

MG: Well, the engagement part just finally is really interesting because you've seen members of the Conservative Caucus meet with protesters and voice their support for a right to protest. We had the mayor of Ottawa on this programme yesterday who said that he's been calling for some sort of mediation in some ways to try to figure out common ground, and he's been criticised for that, but he said that there needs to be some way to try to figure out how to end the siege. What he's calling a siege in his city. What does that say about the mainstream support that this group or this movement, if we can call it that is getting?

STEPHANIE CARVIN: Well, it does seem that what I've seen in the polls is that over the last week, there are about somewhere between 20 and 30 percent of Canadians support this movement. Now, I'm not sure it's this movement specifically or the actual tactics being used. And I think it is important to differentiate between the two, right? Jim Watson. I mean, the mayor, we have to be able to speak to Canadians who are frustrated without legitimating a movement that is effectively directed by extremists and have openly talked of of removing the government. I don't think there's any indication that even if all the mandates were dropped tomorrow that the convoy would leave, especially when they have talked about further goals about forcing Trudeau to resign and things like this. And you know, when you appease extremist movement, I think it emboldens them. I don't think it gets rid of them. So I mean, to talk about, you know, I think it's important for for leaders to talk to the broader Canadian public, but to negotiate with an extremist movement to me just seems extremely counterproductive at best.

MG: We're just about out of time. But given the fact that there is a lot still going on, not just in Ottawa but in other jurisdictions, where do you see this going?

STEPHANIE CARVIN: You know, we do seem to be at a state of paralysis. You know, law enforcement agencies have not really kind of taken any kind of aggressive actions at the Cootes border, at the Windsor border or indefinitely, not in Ottawa. In other jurisdictions we have seen that right, where police have actually just done their jobs. Quebec City and Toronto being good examples. You know, the convoy hasn't been able to take root. And I think there is a certain level of frustration here. I mean, when we did see the the first kind of real actions taken against the convoy on Sunday night, they took some of the oil, started issuing tickets or the fuel. We we saw some energy being taken from that movement. They were in shock that the police actually did something. When the injunction came, they actually seem to have listened to it. So why aren't we just doing more basic policing? I mean, this was needs to be done. I think these extremist groups would love nothing better for the military to be called in because this will fuel their propaganda for years. We just need our police forces to step up and we need our cities to step up. And I'm not seeing that happened, and I think that portends another very rough week ahead.

MG: Stephanie, good to speak with you, as always. Thank you very much.

STEPHANIE CARVIN: Thanks for having me on.

MG: Stephanie Carvin, associate professor at the Norman Paterson School of International Affairs at Carleton University in Ottawa. Former national security analyst and the author of Stand on Guard Reassessing Threats to Canada's National Security, Ruth Ben-Ghiat has been watching events unfold from south of the border. She's a professor of history and Italian studies at New York University and an expert on far right movements. Good morning to you.

RUTH BEN-GHIAT: Good morning.

MG: How are these events in Canada being viewed in other countries?

RUTH BEN-GHIAT: Well, you know, far right and extremist movements and their backers are opportunists, and they will use whatever course suits their purpose, which is ultimately to destabilise democracy. So we've seen how every type of far right person in the United States, for example, has jumped on to support from evangelical leaders like Franklin Graham to GOP lawmakers, which call lawbreakers like Marjorie Taylor Greene to who, you know, people who have huge followings and suppose legitimacy because they see this as a kind of insurgency against democracy that they can profit from.

MG: Using copycat events elsewhere. I mean, people have pointed to what's happening in the streets of New Zealand and and Australia are those directly influenced by what people have seen broadcast from Ottawa.

RUTH BEN-GHIAT: Likely, I think that, you know, there is this kind of it's not. It's as your previous commentator said, it's not that there are, you know, high level coordination. These things are spontaneous, but because things travel so quickly with social media and you've seen how the hashtags and on telegraph people are really these things go on fire. So if people are already wanting some form of direct action, we've seen many individual protests against, you know, vaccine mandates. And so it's very easy for this idea to take root. And what's very dangerous is I, you know, I'm hearing about and reading about planned copycat actions in the United States, which is very ready because of the strength of the GOP, which has become a far right party, an authoritarian party. You could easily see how there would be actions that would be replicated here with truckers and this kind of thing.

MG: And you're seeing media in the United States like Fox promoting the people who are trying to, you know, bring down the government in Canada that that are involved in helping to orchestrate these protests. What would the repercussions of that be in the United States? Do you think if Fox and other broadcasters are saying, see what's happening here?

RUTH BEN-GHIAT: I think they've already become very open in the United States about the desire to take down democracy in the United States and Canada around the world. And, you know, when Tucker Carlson, who has the highest rated show in the highest rated network, broadcast for a whole week from Budapest, Viktor Orban's autocratic regime, saying how great it is, we're in big trouble. And so it's very interesting that every possible kind of huge influencer Ben Shapiro and Glenn Beck and Fox, they've all jumped on on this as a way of striking at democracy, and I agree with the previous commentator the more that there isn't adequate policing to shut this down, the more people are encouraged because we're always overly fearful of striking against extremists because it might cause more unrest. But they want unrest, and the ultimate goal is a kind of low level, even violence and disruption. This is what the truck convoys do. They disrupt and to cause people to be despairing and lead them to have an appetite for someone who's going to do something and that could be an autocrat.

MG: Researchers have said in terms of trying to follow the money that a lot of money from the United States has gone into what we're seeing here in Canada. What would those American donors be trying to get involved and what would they hope to see happen, in donating money?

RUTH BEN-GHIAT: They're trying to they're trying to let these people know that there is a powerful, their powerful backing and there's a kind of legitimacy from the highest levels of big money and dark money for this kind of action. And and, you know, the anti-vax movement has gotten backing, you know, around the world from people who have very deep pockets who want to destabilise democracy. So I keep coming back to this point about this is a kind of global insurgency. It's a far right insurgency. What is insurgency? It's when you create this. It's not one event we had January six, but it's ongoing series of events which disrupt life, bring despair, use low level violence and other kinds of harassment, and bring democracy to a state of paralysis. And so people say, Oh, the system isn't working, and it's the same when people were saying, Well, Joe Biden, there's terrible inflation, there's no food on the shelves. And this is an old playbook that was used in Chile before the coup in 1973. And in fact, truck strikes and convoys, which were instigated partly by the CIA and partly by the far right were part of this.

MG: So just finally, we only have about a minute or so left. There was a lot of attention in the United States around the health of democracy after January 6th. Are you suggesting that that this this could be a template for for other actions around the world and that that people should be concerned about that health of democracy broadly?

RUTH BEN-GHIAT: Very much. And it's so important to, in fact, have policing not agree, not the military that would because these people want violence. And I also agree that appeasing them with mandates is not going to make them go away and not going to stop this because it is an opportunistic thing and whatever is going to work to have their ultimate goal of paralysing democracy. And now it's this is what they're coming on to. So we have to strike back right now, not appease them, because this has huge consequences for the far right around the world.

MG: Ruth Ben-Ghait, we'll leave that there. Thank you very much. Sure. Thank you. Ruth Benguet is a professor of history and Italian studies at New York University, an expert on far right movements. Her latest book is Strongman Mussolini to the Present. The CBC News is up next and then.

SOUNDCLIP

Going forwards, we do need to have more longer term sustained approaches so that we're not in crisis mode all the time.

MG: Canada is talking about leaving crisis mode behind. In six minutes. We'll break down this country's plan for coping with COVID in the months and years ahead. Some provinces moving quicker than others. We'll talk about whether now is the right time for those moves and what's driving those decisions. That's coming up. I'm Matt Galloway. You're listening to The Current on CBC Radio One. Stay with us.

Back To Top »

Provinces begin lifting COVID-19 restrictions

Guests: Dr. Alex Wong, Dr. Isaac Bogoch

MG: Good morning, I'm Matt Galloway and you're listening to The Current.

[Music: Theme]

MG: Still to come, Carl Bernstein is a giant of journalism. He's one half of the Woodward and Bernstein duo that broke Watergate and drove a president to resignation. But like all of us, he started somewhere and that's somewhere for him was the newsroom of The Washington Star. Our conversation about what it means to report the best obtainable version of the truth in just under 30 minutes. But first key pandemic exit strategy.

[Music: Theme]

SOUNDCLIP

This is not a declaration that COVID is over or that COVID will disappear or that we are standing here and saying mission accomplished, we will begin likely to talk about it less on a daily basis. We might have less direct daily focus on it from an individual or family perspective. But COVID will continue to be here. Our province will deal with it through our health system. We will monitor it like we monitor all communicable viruses and infectious diseases. And if and when we need to act, we will.

MG: Will may not mission accomplished. But P.E.I. Premier Dennis King said yesterday that most of his province's COVID 19 restrictions will come to an end by early April. And he wasn't alone yesterday, one premier after another laid out a roadmap for leaving some, if not all, pandemic measures behind Quebec will do away with limits on gatherings this month, starting on Monday. Saskatchewan will no longer require proof of vaccination, and Alberta unveiled what Premier Jason Kenney called a path back to normal. Shachi Kurl is president of the Angus Reid Institute. It's been tracking Canadians views on the pandemic. She's in Vancouver, she good morning.

SHACHI KURL: Good morning.

MG: We kept talking about light at the end of the tunnel, and now we're being told that that tunnel end is actually here in front of us. How comfortable do you think Canadians will be to see COVID restrictions begin to lift over the course of the next few weeks, if not earlier?

SHACHI KURL: Well, you know, there's no doubt that for a very significant, significant segment of the population, Matt, this is going to freak them out. This is going to be something that they are perhaps not mentally quite prepared for after two plus years of this, or what will be two plus years by the time some of these restrictions start to end or sunset. Less than that, given that some of these are happening very quickly. But you know, you still have more than half in this country who in the last six weeks since the beginning of the year have really started to shift in terms of wanting to see restrictions end and and are at a place now where they're saying, Yeah, we're we're ready to have a conversation about ending restrictions. We are in a place where we don't necessarily see that to be necessary anymore. I've, you know, as you mentioned at the top of this segment, we have been watching and tracking public opinion around this pandemic for, you know, the better part of two years. It's been a long journey and there tre were some warning signs, I think, around Canadians shift in mindset. We've seen a couple of developments, if you will, a couple of key data points that have taken us. I think to this point where people are ready to say, you know what, we'd like to live without restrictions or many are saying that.

MG: What have you seen?

SHACHI KURL: Well, one of the first things we saw was that there was a sense of inevitability around catching Omicron. So earlier this year in January, we saw that 55 percent, just over half said it really doesn't matter what I do, it doesn't matter if I am vaccinated. And an important reminder that, you know, 80 percent of Canadians are vaccinated, about 50 percent are boosted. But even then, you had a significant number saying, I can keep social distance, I can mask, I can boost, but I don't think I can outrun this particular variant. It is a matter of time before I am infected with Omicron. We also saw fatigue when it came to COVID and the pandemic writ large. We looked at Canadians mental health. That's something we've been tracking over time. You know, one in three Canadians telling us at the beginning of this month that they are struggling daily with mental health that number way higher with young people who are really having a rough time and that, you know, one in four saying that they feel depressed. So you've got anxiety, you've got fatigue. You've got a sense of inevitability. You've also got a sense that from Canadians that they did not believe this particular variant in terms of medical outcomes was going to be as severe. And of course, that's very much based in what we've been seeing and hearing from public health officials as well. So a belief, whether it be the case or not amongst Canadians, that if they got sick, their symptoms would either be mild or manageable, i.e. not having to go to the hospital. So all of that feeds into a place, combined with the fact that so many households have had and been touched by Omicron infection in the last six weeks. You know, we estimate that to be about one in five in the absence of any official numbers because in so many provinces, testing has just kind of gone away or fallen apart due to capacity issues. All of that feeds into where we are today.

MG: There are two pieces of context that I want to ask about. One is we saw yesterday Joel Lightbound, who is a Liberal MP break with his own party. On this, he said that not everyone can earn a living on a Mac book at the cottage. He felt that some of the restrictions imposed have been and the way that the government has handled this have been divisive. Are you surprised by that? What is what is his speaking at?

SHACHI KURL: You know, it's it is notable because it it's a pretty rare thing for a member of the Liberal caucus, a senior member, a ranking member of the of the Liberal Caucus to speak out. We've seen what happens in the case of a previous Liberal caucus members who have said things are perhaps gone against party lines, so to speak. I'm thinking, of course, of of Jane Philpott and Jody Wilson-Raybould.

MG: They've been shown the door.

SHACHI KURL: Exactly, precisely. So for the gentleman to not only come out and very forcefully say, Look, I don't think the Prime Minister's comments and approach on this have been helpful. Don't think his stance has been helpful. It's been divisive. I don't agree with the direction he's going. It was certainly perhaps a pressure valve or a lever that that needed to be pulled. Perhaps I don't know what's going on within the ranks of of the Liberal caucus, but for him to come out and say that and stay within the caucus, to me, I think was a pretty significant sign that not everybody lined up with what the prime minister has been saying on this issue.

MG: The other context point, of course, is the protests in Ottawa and elsewhere across this country against a number of things, including public health restrictions. What should we take into that? Do we need to differentiate between the protest versus how people feel about the restrictions themselves and what you've been hearing from Canadians?

SHACHI KURL: I think we absolutely do, because the protests have have jarred and jangled and shocked and outraged so many Canadians because of the actions of some of the protesters. So, you know, if you're if you're living in Ottawa and I've been, I'm not, I'm speaking to you from Vancouver, but speaking to people in Ottawa, often the noise, the roadblocks I've heard it described as a siege or an occupation, or the fact that these protesters have seemed so organised or dug in is just not something we're used to seeing in this country. It was definitely been home in the past to really raucous protests and raucous protest movements, ones that even include, you know, damage or violence or property damage. But this is something that is very different, and Canadians have been very upset by this. But I think that it's also important to point out that a significant minority really support these protesters, whether it's over the issue of ending vaccine mandates or whether it's because they are tapping into a deeper frustration. And we saw data at the end of last week map that shows that a lot of Canadians again, and this is nothing new. I've been seeing these trends for four years now are feeling very much like they're on the outside looking in like they're not being heard by their leaders. I'm not excusing that behaviour or condoning that behaviour, but that conversation and that protest now appears to sort of being more- it's morphing into something that's more about the frustration and anger Canadians are feeling towards Ottawa. And of course, not all Canadians are feeling that way. But you've got about 30 percent who are saying, Yeah, I stand with these folks and I identify with these folks and they're tapping into something that I'm feeling.

MG: This is important to talk about as we talk further about restrictions being lifted across the country. We're going to do that right now. In the meantime, Shachi agreed to speak with you as always, thank you.

SHACHI KURL: Thanks for having me.

MG: Shachi Kurl Coryell, president of the Angus Reid Institute she was in Vancouver. Saskatchewan, is going both further and faster than most provinces when it comes to lifting those restrictions.

SOUNDCLIP

in Saskatchewan, businesses and venues and provincially regulated workplaces, proof of vaccination or the negative test option that we provided will no longer be a provincial requirement. This will leave one remaining COVID measure in place, and that is indoor masking. That measure remains in effect until the end of February.

MG: Premier Scott Moe speaking yesterday and that means life in Saskatchewan might look a lot like it did before COVID 19. By the end of the month, and of course, Saskatchewan not the only province to make those moves. For more on navigating that transition, I'm joined by Dr. Isaac Bogoch, infectious disease specialist at Toronto's University Health Network, and Dr. Alex Wong, an infectious disease physician in Regina. Good morning to you, both.

GUESTS: Good morning.

MG: Dr. Wong, we'll start with you. You said that in some ways you feel saddened and embarrassed by the actions of your elected officials in the wake of that announcement. What tell me more about this? What were you thinking as you learnt that Saskatchewan is getting ready to lift some mandates as early as this weekend, including proof of vaccination?

DR. ALEX WONG: Yeah, things have moved really quickly here and when over the last couple of weeks, Matt, and you know, I mean, it's been fuelled largely by ideology and political motivation as opposed to sort of the public health piece. So that's really the only reason why, you know, I just was disappointed with how quickly everything had had moved along. I mean, we know that this is not the public health guidance that's being provided to our elected officials. We're still not clearly sort of on the downswing of our Omicron surge. Our hospitals and ICU use are still packed to the brim. There may be signals that we peaked and we're starting to come down, but this it almost feels like just this huge rush to sort of get to this point so quickly, just in the last week and a half. It's not been fuelled by a public health motivation or a desire, quite frankly, to minimise death or minimise suffering or control COVID in some safe and responsible way. It's been about essentially ideology and about trying to appeal to a certain group of individuals. And that to me, you know, after all, we've tried to accomplish, you know, not only here in Saskatchewan but across Canada over the last couple of years is disappointing.

MG: Let me come back to that in a moment. Dr. Bogoch, she tweeted that COVID related public health measures will be lifted, but lifting these measures is best driven by local data rather than ideology. Do you worry that ideology has been overtaken by by, uh, or is overtaking local data that that that the data is being put to the side?

DR. ISAAC BOGOCH: I think, you know, obviously Canada is a massive place, and maybe it's to that extent in some areas, more than others, it's always going to blend it its way into policy regardless of where we are. I think this is more of a to what extent is this ideological versus data driven, taking a step back for a second. Most provinces have clearly outlined a reopening path and have done so weeks ago or have telegraphed this or have discussed it. And just to be clear, I think it's smart, right? Like, we're not going to be living with masking or vaccine certificates or some of these restrictions for forever. Nor should we be. The policy has to align with the current threat on the ground, the policy, the current threat on the ground and the current risk of the population changes with time. And that means the policy has to change with time. I think you've got to telegraph uncertainty. You have to telegraph that this is a moving target. And and, you know, once the policy no longer really aligns with the current public health threat, you've got to change the policy. Currently not saying, I'm not talking about Saskatchewan sitting here in Ontario, but things are getting better in Ontario. They absolutely are, by every metric hospitalisations going down, ICU user admissions are declining. The modelled case numbers are declining. It's fantastic news, and it makes sense to adapt the policy to adjust with the current risk to the population, which the government has stated they're going to do. And you know, that's I find it difficult to disagree with that. Now, listen, we can debate, is it too fast or is it too slow? Is it too much? Sure. But in general, I think that's the right move.

MG: Dr. Wong, where is Saskatchewan right now in this wave?

DR. ALEX WONG: You know, so I completely agree with Isaac. You know, it's all about sort of, you know, doing the right thing at the right time, and we all know that mandates and measures are not sustainable forever, and so that is the challenging piece here is is that, you know, in our province, we've essentially set February 14th vaccine mandate goes every. February 28th masking mandate goes and we don't know right now and answer your question exactly where we are with Omicron. You know, PCR testing is basically nonexistent now for the general public. So our case data is very hard to interpret and our government is actually no longer actually providing data on a daily basis with regards to hospitalisations, ICUs and other COVID measures. So it's hard for the general public to know. We're hoping that we get in the larger cities. That's what we hope to be seeing, I think, and what we see with the wastewater. And we know that typically with hospitalisations and ICU admissions, that tends to lag by a couple of weeks. So we're hoping to see that downswing certainly before the end of the month. But it doesn't sound again as though you know what we do and what policy we choose to take is going to be driven again by that. It's set in stone and you know, it's going to be what it's going to be regardless of what's happening on the ground.

MG: Let me ask about a couple of specific restrictions that are going to be eased in various parts of the country at various levels. One is the issue of vaccine passports. We've seen people like Dr. Theresa Tam say that those passports need to be reassessed in the coming weeks. Most of them fully vaccinated means two doses, not three. Dr. Bogoch How useful are vaccine passports at this point in the pandemic given the spread of the al-Muqrin variant?

DR. ISAAC BOGOCH: I think, well, it's a tough one, and there's a couple of points here that I think the details are really important if we consider two doses of a vaccine is fully vaccinated. We know that two doses of a vaccine really is helpful, protective protecting against severe illness. But but in fact, it doesn't do nearly as much in protecting people from getting or transmitting the infection to others versus prior variants. So if you're going to keep the definition of fully vaccinated as two doses, the vaccine passport system or vaccine certificate system does very, very little, and there's no point in keeping it around other than it's a tool to maybe encourage people to get vaccinated, which if it is that if we're are using it for that tool, it's already run its course. So you either say we're doing this as a three dose vaccine series to be considered fully vaccinated or you scrap it. One other point, I know we're running short on time, but if you say it's a three dose vaccine, that means you have to bend over backwards to get people vaccinated. And that means you have to really address the extreme inequities in vaccination. We have very low rates of third doses in marginalised communities, racialized communities, lower income communities, and you can't have a vaccine certificate programme that allows access to non-essential services if only high income communities have are considered as, as, you know, third dose as as fully vaccinated. Like you can't just say, you know, sorry, Brampton, you can't go to a restaurant, but it makes no sense whatsoever. There's a tremendous degree of inequity in some of these policies. So. I think the writing's on the wall and I don't have a crystal ball. I truly don't have a crystal ball. But my guess is that we are probably a lot closer to lifting vaccine certificate programmes than at any other point during during this pandemic since they were initiated.

MG: Dr. Wong two vaccine passports still hold water at this point in the pandemic, given what you've just heard from Isaac Bogoch?

DR. ALEX WONG: No, I agree with Isaac. And in the end, you know, again, if we're not going to change, we're not going to change that definition of fully vaccinated to three doses like, for example, certain Western European countries have like France and really, really kind of pushed that that that third dose and that booster, which is going to give you significant protection against Omicron infection and transmission, then yeah, I mean, the value of it is going to be limited. And I think depending on where we are in the country, obviously the political sentiment and the overall sort of dynamic of the politics is different. I think if you look at the prairies, for example, Manitoba, Saskatchewan, Alberta versus, for example, the Maritimes, you're going to see a very different appetite for a vaccine passport or proof of vaccine programme. We obviously saw Alberta last night signal, and we probably will see Manitoba Signal in the coming days. Basically, that are proof of vaccine will be removed as well. So, you know, I think the writing's on the wall for the Prairies, for sure.

MG: What about masks, Dr. Wong? Is given what we know about how COVID spreads the transmissibility of Omicron, but also what's already been telegraphed from some leaders. Should we reassess mask mandates, indoor mask mandates?

DR. ALEX WONG: You know, again, I think the writing's on the wall here, we can see what's happening with your jurisdictions, you know, across North America, in the United States, as well as as well as Western Europe. I mean, you know, indoor mask mandates are sort of falling by the wayside. I think that's done most safely when vaccine uptake is high and when booster uptake is high, you know. So I mean, it does hurt a little bit to feel and think that that's going to go. But I think in certain settings, which honestly are high risk, like, for example, hospitals, acute care settings, you know, long term care setting congregated settings like, you know, shelters and correctional facilities. Those are types of the settings. And frankly, you know, schools again is a very contentious thing. And there's going to be a lot of debate about what to do in schools. But, you know, choosing to have masking in those types of settings, I think does still make a lot of sense, especially when you're surging with Omicron and when things settle down, maybe you re-evaluate and look at it again.

MG: Isaac has it time to reassess whether we need to wear masks indoors, whether it's, you know, in large settings congregate settings, in schools, in malls, at workplaces?

DR. ISAAC BOGOCH: So just taking a step back, we have to constantly reassess all of these policies. You can't. These are not forever policies. There will be a day where we don't have to show a vaccine certificate where we don't have to, you know, mask in indoor settings and you have to constantly reassess the policy to see if it makes sense. And I think it's hard to make a policy for 38 million people. This is a massive country and of course, we know the epidemic is different in different parts of the country. If you look at where we are this second in Ontario, I would say that indoor masking continues to make sense. But will that be true in, you know, fast forward a couple of months from now or a month from now? It might not be. It might not. And there will be a time where you know, we can we can start to lift those policies. The other thing, though, I think Dr. Wong pointed out that I completely agree with it. You know, this is dynamic. This changes with time and different settings or a different risk. I mean, come fall or winter, you don't need a crystal ball to recognise that this pandemic isn't over. Right. We're treating this like a regional issue in Canada when it's truly a global issue. There's going to be more variants, there's going to be more waves. We know that. Like, how many times do we have to rinse, wash and repeat? There might be a time where you say, You know what? There's a high rate of COVID, and we're going to say you need to put on a mask in particular settings. I think the hospital environment is the lowest hanging fruit. There's tremendous sense in a in a health care setting, but of course, that might make a lot of sense in other settings as well. Let's just be driven by data, not by ideology and what we'll be doing the right thing.

MG: Well, let me just in the last few minutes that we have asked you about that, we have protests that are happening across the country. Ottawa is under siege, according to the mayor. You have border crossings that are blocked. How are Canadians supposed to know that these decisions, and I'll start with you, Dr. Bogoch, are being driven by science, not being driven in reaction to those protests and being driven by by politicians who might be spooked by what they're seeing in their province when it come to those protests?

DR. ISAAC BOGOCH: I mean, I can speak a little bit for Ontario, less so for the rest of the country. But I mean, Ontario had a reopening plan that predated all of these protests. I mean, it's very clearly available on the website. You can see the dates that were listed and the policies that were supposed to be assessed and the measures that we're going to be lifted on what they mean. So I don't know how else to frame it. Most places had a reopening plan prior to this or some semblance of reopening strategy or had discussed the reopening strategy that predated this. So I mean, I find it a very unusual time to say like we demand reopening while places are in various stages of reopening. What are you going to cheer? Hey, we did it, when in fact, this was the plan all along, the pace might have picked up in some places, in reaction to these protesters and others, but I think many places had a reopening strategy long before.

MG: Dr. Wong, just briefly from you.

DR. ALEX WONG: Yeah, I mean, it's been a bit challenging, I think especially in the prairies, I mean, there's been increasing sort of a divide, I think between what we're hearing from elected officials in terms of policy measures and justification for those policy measures. You know, in terms of removing vaccine passports and mask mandates relative to what guidance we had previously received, just, you know, just a matter of a few weeks ago from our leading public health officials, you know, across the three provinces. And so when you see that kind of divide happen and when you see all of the messaging coming from elected officials and you don't hear our public health leaders any longer at the table, it does certainly signal that ideology is driving things. But at the end of the day, you know, we have to deal with the reality of what we have and what we're faced with. And as frontline health care workers, we need to figure out the best way to move forward and how to serve our patients day to day. And that's what we'll continue to try to do.

MG: Glad to talk to you both, as always and appreciate the work that you're doing. Thank you so much.

DR. ISAAC BOGOCH: My pleasure.

DR. ALEX WONG: Thanks, Matt.

GUESTS: Take care. Dr. Isaac Bogoch, an infectious disease specialist at Toronto's University Health Network. He was in Toronto. Dr. Alex Wong, an infectious disease physician. He was in Regina coming up after your regional update.

SOUNDCLIP

He got the results of the typing test. They said, Boy, you didn't tell me you could type like that. I could type ninety words a minute. So that's what had got me hired.

GUESTS: Carl Bernstein hired for his typing skills, he is now more renowned for breaking Watergate. Never mind that. In 90 seconds, he'll take us back to his first job as a copy boy at the Washington star. I'm Matt Galloway. You're listening to The Current. Stay with us.

Back To Top »

Legendary journalist Carl Bernstein on his days as a newspaper copy boy

Guests: Carl Bernstein

MG: Hi, I'm Matt Galloway, you're listening to The Current

SOUNDCLIP

VOICE 1: Unbiased and fair. Jack, we're here taking orders for the Washington star, the only Washington paper with a daily source of local happening. [Phone rings] Star. Only the star covers local high school sports daily. Hello Larkin, Virginia.

VOICE 2: I need a fast car and the exact date of the policeman's ball.

VOICE 1: Freddy. His wheels section is the best automotive shoving place in town and any ball was listed in our local news section when you need to know what's happening locally. Fortunately, there's the Washington star. Subscribe now. Someone standing by to take your calls. Star hotline.

MG: Our hotline that was an ad for the Washington star from 1981, the same year that paper stopped printing. It was a sad ending for a journalistic institution that had been around for 130 years. At its height, the star had some of the best reporters in the business on its payroll. One of them was a young man named Carl Bernstein. He started at 16 years old as a copy boy and of course went on to break Watergate with Bob Woodward for The Washington Post. Later in his career and in his new book, Carl Bernstein tells the story of learning journalism at the Star. The book is called Chasing History A Kid in the NEWSROOM. Carl Bernstein Good morning!

CARL BERNSTEIN: Good morning. Good to be with you.

MG: You really were a kid in the newsroom when you got started at the Washington star. What kind of kid were you before you walked into that newsroom?

CARL BERNSTEIN: I was 16 years old when I walked into that newsroom and I had one foot in the pool hall, one foot in the juvenile court about a toe in the classroom. I was misdirected, I would say, and my father had a notion that perhaps I had some writing ability and that I had taken a journalism course in the 10th grade that he got me an interview there for an entry level job as a copy boy, the lowest rung of the ladder. And then the rest was history.

MG: Describe the newsroom that you walked into. What did it sound like?

CARL BERNSTEIN: It was the first time I'd ever seen a newsroom in my life, and I was like a puppy on a leash, straining because there was it was the most glorious commotion I had ever heard or seen. This clanging and changing and changing of typewriters and people yelling copy and smoke plumes of smoke all over this great room into a big desk toward the end, which was the the news desk with national news, state news, local news, looking like a river in the distance. And everybody looked like they were on the most urgent errands in the nation. And a copy boy, I didn't know that to me was came up to us with a daily newspaper stacked on us fresh off the presses. And this production editor handed one to me and it was still warm. And in that instant, I knew I wanted to be a newspaper man.

MG: The presses would have been downstairs in the building

CARL BERNSTEIN: and the presses. I could feel the rumble of the presses right below my feet.

MG: What was it about that glorious chaos that, as you said in that moment, got you thinking, this is what I want to do, this is where I want to be.

CARL BERNSTEIN: Well, I knew what a newspaper was. I delivered the Washington star actually door to door as a kid, and I read certainly as an adolescent, I'd read the front page of the sports pages of The Washington Post, and I was interested in what was going on in the world. I came from a family that was very interested in news. A left wing activist family in an era where my parents and others were fighting segregation and racial segregation. I grew up in a Jim Crow town that happened to be the capital of the United States. I went to segregated by law public schools in the capital of the United States until the brown decision by the Supreme Court in 1954 that ended segregation. I was fascinated by the city I lived in and the community that I knew that newspapers covered that city in that community, and it seemed to me, oh, especially after I'd seen the newsroom, this could change my life.

MG: Having got your way into the door, tell us about your first job there.

CARL BERNSTEIN: I became a copy boy. The way I became a copy boy was, I took typing with the girls in 10th grade because I was tired of shop classes and making little wooden trays with toothpick holes in them that my mother had accumulated a pile of. And this typing class really is what enabled me to get hired because the production editor clearly thought I was too short or too young or too young looking to to even be an entry level copy boy. But I kept going back and knocking on his door, and I took this typing test in the same production editor. He got the results of the typing test. They said, What? You didn't tell me you could type like that. I could type 90 words a minute. And so that's what had got me here. And what a copy boy did was everything. As a link between the reporters who wrote the stories and the desk to edit it hit a link between the words and the mechanical functions of the newspaper. I would, as a copy boy, I would run up to the composing room where all of those words went from the age of typewritten copy to [unintelligible] lit, in which the paper was actually set in typed from huge linotype machines that look like giant looms in a in a textile mill. After the type was set, there would be big sheets of paper put over the type and a reader would go over and produce actually the printed page that would be in the newspaper, and I would run that printed page back through a hole in the floor that went back down to the newsroom with some shredded metal steps and give it to the respective editors. There were five editions a day of this paper, so there was a constant motion, constant frenetic activity and very purposeful went through it all. It would be punctuated by reporters and editors yelling 'Copy' and you would run up to the reporters or the editors. You would grab the piece of copy that they would hand you. You would literally run it. You know, you weren't walking, you would run it up to the respective desk or do a rewrite man or wherever it was intended to go. You also fetch coffee in the cafeteria upstairs, which is how I came originally to know my great mentor named Sid Epstein. And so what I did there was I had the greatest seat in the country at age 16, and this city editor Sid Epstein gave me these incredible opportunity. So you can see the link between Watergate and Woodward. And I did in Watergate the kind of methodology we used to cover this story. You can see the link between Sid Epstein and Ben Bradlee, our editor at The Post. I was blessed to have probably the greatest two editors that you could ever have before I was 30 years old.

MG: and that link is like knocking on doors and making calls and being out and talking to people.

CARL BERNSTEIN: But what Woodward and I have called the best obtainable version of the truth being what real reporting is, is about and the goal of it. There's a strong quote on the back jacket of the book from Bob Woodward saying, Our methodology of perpetual engagement that led us to Watergate watching, looking, questing and overwhelming the moment is rules, meaning mine Bob is saying here where were our rules go anywhere. Listen hard. Push and push some more art to this day. The touchstone in investigative reporting. What I learnt at the star was it was about getting out of the office, knocking on doors, going from one person to another. So you had as we had a two week two source rule in Watergate that you had to have the story from which two people to nail it down. We have the same thing at The Star and we just call it multiple sourcing. This idea of common sense not to go see people, for instance, in their jobs where they might be under pressure or intimidated, you went to their homes. All these basics. I was taught by these amazing people that I worked with and who saw me at age 16. Perhaps some things I didn't see in myself.

MG: Are those techniques still possible? Do you think newsrooms - and I don't want to jump too far ahead. But newsrooms have been under incredible pressure financially, and reporters have to do so many more things than they did in past. Is it still possible to get out and and do that doorknocking do that kind of on the ground work, do you think?

CARL BERNSTEIN: If you're if you're doing to have it, have a real news report, it's absolutely essential if you're going to just skim over things and try to manufacture a controversy or be sensational or do uninformed and perhaps incorrect and the stories that missed their mark, which we have too much of. But I don't think- I think the problem is not too many reporters and too many news organisations are lazy. I don't think it's about finances. Getting out of the office. Look, how many reporters today really believe that the way to cover a story is to get on a cell phone, call somebody Google. Some information that's not reporting that those are great tools which we would rely on or had Google at the time of Watergate, and we would have saved ourselves a lot of time looking for background information on people. And then instead of having to spend hours in the morgue as it was called in the library in the back of the newsroom, going through clippings and trying to get information on people. These are great tools, but the basics remain, if you're going to really be a reporter and really get the story, you do this methodology that Bob and I write about in All President's Men. But you see it perhaps even more vividly in some ways in chasing history, a kid in the newsroom because you see it integrated with this whole immense news operation. But all of it intended to funnel through this thing. So what comes out of the funnel is the best obtainable version of truth. And that includes context. Literal facts strung together are not the truth. It needs context as well.

MG: Let me ask you about one of my favourite parts of the newspaper at the Star, you were involved in writing obituaries and you say that obituaries were in many ways kind of a proving ground. What do you love about obituaries and why are obituaries so important in the stories that we tell and how we tell those stories?

CARL BERNSTEIN: Well, first of all, you would learn about a person's life, you would be talking to their relatives usually or other people who knew them and there was a humanity and a sensitivity. You knew that to people you were talking to unfold, amongst other things were probably grieving, were probably going through a rough time. And I think I've learnt you learn to be a real listener. Reporters are also lousy listeners. You know, they come in with a note of shut up question in your face. They get an answer and they run out the door as if they've gotten the story. Too often the object of reporting as it practised, as opposed to what it should be used to manufacture or prolong controversy. It's I get a good point from this Republican that a better quote from this Republican. I'm going to have a great story because they're yelling at each other instead of getting to the issue that they're yelling at each other about. That's not real reporting, but I learnt listening to these people. Oh, there are stories to tell that I would never get if I didn't ask the question and then listen to someone tell me whatever their truth was. If they tried to sneak something by you, I could always check it out elsewhere, which I would do. The other thing is, I made a mistake one day, you know, before I got spelling of a middle name wrong. I think it was. And Sid Epstein, this great editor, called me over and pointed out this error I had done in the spelling of this middle name someone who had died. And he said, Kid, look, when you're doing and obit, you know, but this is the only time that these people are ever going to be in contact with the newspaper in their life, probably. And this is a matter of great importance to them in their lives and always remember that. And I took from that. It's funny. I get all emotional thinking about it. The town extends to everything you do is that it might not be the biggest moment of your life, but something is going on with the people that you're covering. Whether you disagree with them, don't agree with them, think they're lying, think they're telling you the truth. You can always follow up. And pursue further knock on more more doors, but at that moment, the one we're in on really did this in Watergate. Our respect for the people that we were visiting at their homes at night, they were Nixon people. We we wrote two hundred stories in the first year of Watergate. We never had a source who was a Democrat the whole time. We were all people who worked or supported Richard Nixon. Some became dismayed, obviously. But let somebody tell their story. Push them toward more and more information, but respect them and a that lesson from Sid Epstein that's stuck with me forever. Still does.

MG: You talked about that chaos in the newsroom. Describe what it was like being there on the 22nd of November 1963.

CARL BERNSTEIN: Well, let me start off by saying it was the beginning of this swelling civil rights movement in the United States, people in the South, particularly, but also in Maryland, right across the line from the District of Columbia. People were getting beaten up for picketing in the South. People were getting murdered. One of my first days as a reporter when I was 19, I was sent to to be with this young woman, not much older than I, who was married to someone named Mickey Schwerner, who with two other people had disappeared in Mississippi while trying to register black voters. And she wanted, she was coming to see Lyndon Johnson, president of the United States, with whom she had an appointment to try and urge more federal help to search for her husband and these three missing civil rights workers and force. Two weeks later, the civil rights leaders were found burried, shot in the head under a levee in Mississippi. Burning churches. It was almost a daily occurrence in the South at this time. So you have to understand what's going on in America to also understand what's going on in this book, The Beatles. It was a time of kind of American bedlam and not only civil rights, but to the Vietnam War was beginning and then the antiwar movement started to develop. And one of the first stories I did for The Washington Post was to come to Toronto and go through town and find American young men of my age who had gone to Canada to avoid the draught.

MG: Amongst them, my father.

CARL BERNSTEIN: And so I got to do all of these amazing things in starting as a 16 year old kid Sid Epstein sent me to cover the inauguration of John Kennedy, just as a kind of almost whimsical saying. He sent this kid to just be one of the people who would watch the parade and called in notes to the rewrite man about what I would see.

MG: As a high school student.

CARL BERNSTEIN: Now, also before that, John Kennedy had come to my high school, and it was about two weeks before the election between John Kennedy and Richard Nixon. And it was neck and neck. And our top political reporter was at the star was coming with the candidate with John Kennedy to my high school. And the state editor had this notion. All of a sudden, Bernstein, you go to school there, why don't you cover the arrival and watch everything that happens with the crowd? There were 12000 people there. And give your notes to this top political reporter, which I did, and it was an amazing, mesmerising scene and how Kennedy was adored by this crowd. And I also attended most of Kennedy's press conferences. So I've seen a good deal with Kennedy. So then on November 22nd, 1963, I was in class at University of Maryland and I heard a kind of commotion and some students were around the radio and I could hear Walter Cronkite, the great broadcaster, say there's been confusion, mention of a hospital. At first, I thought maybe some hospital would have an explosion or something. And then, he said it appeared that the president had been shot dead. At that point, I ran for my car race to The Stars. And as I got there and a great reporter named Roberta Horning was running out the door and a notebook in her hand, and she said to me, he's dead. I said I'm listening to Walter Cronkite. How could he be dead? And she said Gerry O'Leary, rewrite man, had been told that by his brother, who worked at the CIA. I got up to the newsroom and the national leader saw me and said, Bernstein, put on your headset, because I was a dictationist at the time, and take Broder from Dallas. David Broder was the top political reporter at the star, and Broder took a deep breath. And he said two priests walked out of Dallas Memorial Parkland Hospital 1:34 p.m. today and announced, coma quote, the president is dead, period end quote. My hands were shaking so badly that I misspelled the word hospital and the head copy boy came over. It was right next to me and ripped that first paragraph from my typewriter and ran with it over to the national books. And then I was told to go to Lafayette Square across from the White House or to the White House outside the gates and cover the crowd. While I was talking to people in the crowd, listening to them and making notes on the television, I could see the hearse arriving at Andrews Air Force Base and the sobbing of the crowd. And one of the things that. That I learnt from the police reporters early on my first weeks at the paper is you have to carry rolls of nickels and dimes and quarters in your pocket because you use payphones. And so I. Ran up to the Hay Adams Hotel on the other side of Lafayette Square. Went to the payphone, dictated some notes, and then about four a.m. the the hearse carrying the president's body arrived at the White House and I could see through that window this grey hearse. The casket was an American flag over it and continued to cover the funeral through the weekend.

MG: It's a day that you'll remember every detail of still.

CARL BERNSTEIN: Yeah, indelible, but there are also days I remember every detail of the dinner. You know, one things about being reporters and the great thing is you're covering people who have attained the heights as well as people who, you know, one of the things that I say in the book is about a legless vendor of pencils downtown who I met on my way to buy a suit for my interview with The Star. And his name was Bernstein, which I didn't believe at first was Eddie Bernstein. And over the years, I kept going to Eddie Bernstein. He had no legs. He'd been run over by a streetcar as a kid, and I would go and interview him periodically. It turned out he died a millionaire. He had a secret life back in Florida, where he owned a bar. I mean, all kinds of things.

MG: Let me ask you just finally, before I let you go, I mean, The Star closed in '81. We have seen a hollowing out of newspapers across your country, across our country, and there's a lot that's been lost and people relied on those papers and we have more information in our fingertips now than ever before. But at the same time, something is not there. What have we lost, do you thin?k

CARL BERNSTEIN: this papers in towns and cities across North America represented something at the core of the civic fabric of our towns and cities of a social compact that we have had in our country's, yours as well as the United State,s in which people knew about their neighbours. How did they know about their papers? How did they know about their communities, primarily through newspapers, and they depended on it. The local high school football results, where did they come from? It came from newspapers. Gradually, and it's not the internet. It really was the beginning of this decimation of so many newspapers. It was actually it, certainly in the United States, as change newspaper chains like Gannett, which was rapacious Knight Ridder, others came into towns and cities across America, bought up local newspapers from local families for the most part, and then started to strip these newspapers of their reportorial excellence because it was costly. They really wanted advertising vehicles. And then often there were two newspapers in the town and they were entering the operating agreements with the other paper. And then by that close one of them down and eventually all you had were these single newspapers that were a shadow of their former selves with very little real news and paper reporters, staffs, reporters, editors cut to next to nothing. And that went on through the 1990s at the turn of the century in the United States. The average newspaper was earning a profit of 20 percent. The internet existed rather than although in a nascent form. Then, of course, the second thing that really was the death knell for many papers was once the internet, because people no longer were interested in the printed edition that affected advertising and the internet in its early days was not an advertising vehicle. So, so we lost an awful lot of newspapers. And the result has been the tearing away, the civic fabric, this social contract, I think, in so many cities and towns. It was the public square, the newspaper, and that no longer exists to offer.

MG: This is, as you said, this is not kind of a look back at a glory day, but in many ways it does feel like a snapshot of something we lost through the eyes of a kid who was lucky enough to be right there in the front seat as history kind of went right by him. It's a really fun book to read. I think it probably was a really fun book to write as well.

CARL BERNSTEIN: I went to interview those who are still alive to I worked with. And so to see them again was a wonderful experience. It was hard to write. So I'm fine writing books work. It's not the same as just churning out a story on deadline. It's really maybe because emotionally this was so close in the prose I chose to do in the view and almost voice of the kid. It transported me, and I'm really grateful, grateful for the experience and as a reporter. You know, this was the most joyous time of my life, its use and without a lot of the complications of what happens later in your lives.

MG: It's a great pleasure to talk to you about this. It was so much fun to read and had a real pleasure. Thank you very much.

CARL BERNSTEIN: Good to be with you. Thanks. All right.

MG: Carl Bernstein's new book Chasing History A Kid in the Newsroom. He has stories to tell, and the book is filled with many, many, many of those great stories. That is The Current for this Wednesday. Coming up next on CBC Radio One, it's q. You remember the filmmaker, Kevin Smith? He made the film Clerks back in the 90s. It seems way back when he'll be by to talk to Tom Power about his career and a new documentary that charts his rise from DIY director to a one man pop culture industry. Kevin Smith coming up in just a few moments on CBC Radio One. My name is Matt Galloway. Thanks for listening to The Current. We'll talk to you tomorrow.

Back To Top »

Provide Transcript Feedback

CBC would like to acknowledge the support of the Broadcasting Accessibility Fund.

Wednesday February 9, 2022 Full Transcript

More Stories Like This