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This isn’t much of a distinction.

Remember last summer how the Liberals refused to give grants for student summer jobs to any organization that wouldn’t affirm the government’s position on abortion and reproductive rights? The government wasn’t picking winning and losing organizations. It merely wrote the rules so groups it disliked wouldn’t qualify.

So if the expert panel on which Unifor sits can come up with equally “clever” eligibility criteria for the media bailout, the union will be helping pick the news outlets that receive tax money without actually having to pick them.

Claims that Unifor’s bias will have no impact on which outlets get money are entirely unbelievable.

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During the 2015 election, Unifor helped pay for ads against then-prime minister Stephen Harper that, among other things, made the ludicrous claim that under the Conservatives income for the wealthiest 5% of Canadians was “increasing 12 times faster than for the rest of Canadians.”

That was “true” only because the union excluded all transfers from federal and provincial governments to individuals — pensions, EI, old age security, welfare and refundable tax credits such as GST rebates and child benefits.

I can’t imagine any organization that was so willing to twist the truth to further its political goals could be trusted with any role at all in the media bailout.

I object to the bailout, period. If print media is dying, there is a reason for that, and taxpayers shouldn’t be forced to contribute a nickel to forestalling the trend. Just as I oppose bailouts for passenger rail in an era of jet travel, I oppose trying artificially to keep newspapers alive as if there were some sort of magical superiority to receiving info on newsprint.