Ezra Levant
Ezra Levant ordered to pay $25,000 for libel
A judge has ordered controversial blogger Ezra Levant to pay $25,000 to Giacomo Vigna for libel, citing his "reckless indifference" to the truth while writing blog posts about the Canadian Human Rights Commission lawyer.
Levant accused Vigna of lying to the Canadian Human Rights Tribunal, tampering with evidence, and suggested he'd been fired, the National Post reports. Justice Robert Smith ruled that Levant "spoke in reckless disregard of the truth and for an ulterior purpose of denormalizing the Human Rights Commission across Canada which makes his statements malicious in that sense."
2.jpg "David Climenhaga, author of the Alberta Diary blog, is a journalist, author, journalism teacher, poet and trade union communicator who has worked in senior writing and editing positions with the Toronto Globe and Mail and the Calgary Herald. His 1995 book, A Poke in the Public Eye, explores the relationships among Canadian journalists, public relations people and politicians. He left journalism after the strike at the Calgary Herald in 1999 and 2000 to work as Communications Director of the Alberta Union of Provincial Employees, which with more than 73,000 members is Alberta’s largest union and Canada’s 10th largest. Alberta Diary focuses on Alberta politics and social issues. Contact: albertadiary @ gmail.com")
Ethical oil and the right-wing echo chamber
On Sept. 1, 2010, the term "ethical oil" didn't exist except as the title of a soon-to-be-released book by conservative political activist Ezra Levant. Four months later, ethical oil was Harper government policy, or at least an official government talking point. On January 5, his first day on the job, newly-minted environment minister Peter Kent called the Alberta oilsands a source of ethical oil.
The story of how this happened is extraordinary, given that ideas often take years to percolate through public opinion filters before they end up on policy agendas. And more importantly, ethical oil is a defective idea that was roundly criticized not just by environmentalists but by the industry itself.
