Stop the Presses! Website changes!

Today’s non-story from the breathless Ottawa press comes from Bruce Cheadle of Canadian Press who writes this National Newswatch headlining story,

“Harper photos removed from government website”

The background from this story is that the opposition has been complaining about the nature of the government’s advertising of their “Economic Action Plan” and have described the website of the plan as overtly partisan describing “Harper’s government” and taglines allegedly promoting the longevity of the government, “we can’t stop now”.

In this frame, Mr. Cheadle determines that the Economic Action Plan website is missing 20 photos of the Prime Minister. The Action Plan website contains about 34,500 pages. And, the significance of 20 “removed” photos? According to Cheadle, this may show a reaction to criticism and an acknowledgement of a guilty “Harper government” partisan conscience.

This website here at stephentaylor.ca, and many websites created after 2003 change on a regular basis. When I write a new post on this blog, content appears on the top and then drops off the bottom and is archived. I do not remove the content, but the website changes.

But goodness, 20 photos are suddenly not visible in the same way as the day before? This must be indicative of a vast conspiratorial government cover-up.

On the main homepage of the Economic Action Plan there is a timeline of “real actions” which features a series of photos that link to news stories about the government’s economic stimulus under the plan. One presumes Cheadle is talking about this timeline slideshow because the Prime Minister is still visible in 75% of the photos under the “Action plan highlights” section which dominates the top third of the homepage. Further, photos on press releases and other pages seem to remain in place.

As for the timeline, these photos link to news releases describing the stimulus underway. This timeline updates, ahem, over time and when new content becomes available — or is highlighted — old content is archived. In fact, a Google search shows 421 news releases available on the Action Plan website. Since a showcase of 421 news releases wouldn’t in fact be a “showcase”, a select number is highlighted. The controversy here is that this timeline has changed over time. Does the showcase timeline today reflect less of Stephen Harper’s happy face? Possibly. But fret not, tomorrow we may see more of it!

And to top it all off, a late breaking update of the wire story shows us that the bureaucrats (non-political staff) at PCO deny that the PM’s pictures were removed! (The conspiracy goes deep…)

Monday evening, the same PCO spokeswoman called The Canadian Press with a single talking point that can in no way be reconciled with the altered appearance of the site:

“We have not removed any pictures of the PM,” said Myriam Massabki.

“Single talking point” and “can in no way be reconciled”? Sounds like it’s the government of Canada’s word against Bruce Cheadle, amateur web surfer. In fairness, I’m glad Cheadle updated the story to include the quote even though he shows us that he doesn’t believe a word of it.

The point? The site changed because that’s what sites do over time. Content was not removed, it is still available on the government’s server. In fact, all of the non-removed Action Plan news releases (with pictures) can be viewed here.

You can judge for yourself:
Here is Economic Action plan as it appears today
Here is the same site as cached by Google on September 16th

Finally, let’s consider what this is all about. The criticism is that Prime Minister is a partisan advertisement for the implementation of government policy. Isn’t this argument absurd?

ASIDE: Another criticism highlighted in the CP story is that the latest round of Economic Action Plan ads cost the government $5 million compared to $2 million spent on H1N1 ads.

Here are two issues that have a psychological component.

For economic stimulus, a large part of its purpose and success is affecting consumer confidence. As for H1N1, handwashing and vaccine readiness helps but fueling hysteria does not.

UPDATE 7:43pm: The Prime Minister’s office has just put out the following,

ACTION PLAN WEBSITE: CORRECTING THE RECORD

Canadian Press reporter Bruce Cheadle has falsely reported that photographs of the Prime Minister have been removed from www.actionplan.gc.ca .

These reports are not true. Here are the facts:

* No photographs of the Prime Minister have been removed from the Action Plan website;

* Canadians have a right to know where and how the Government’s stimulus is being spent, and the Action Plan website helps provide this accountability;

* In addition, the website contains important information for Canadians on certain stimulus measures like the Home Renovation Tax Credit that are only available for a limited time.

Stop the presses! PM snubbed by Barack Obama!

Yesterday, I reported on a desperate Liberal attempt to downplay, and the Canadian media’s attempt to diminish Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s visit to the White House. Because Mr. Harper was greeted by someone other than Barack Obama, this was seen to be a snub.

Today, on the LA Times blog, there’s an interesting account of the meeting between Harper and Obama,

[The] U.S. chief executive granted Canada’s Prime Minister Stephen Harper a coveted media availability in the Oval Office, a privilege not granted to someone as lowly as Britain’s Prime Minister Gordon Brown not so long ago.

That doesn’t sound like the Prime Minister was snubbed.

Let’s look at other world leaders “snubbed” by the White House!


President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo of the Philippines snubbed!


Diplomacy bajanxed! Irish PM Brian Cowen was right feckin snubbed!


Iraqi PM Nouri al Maliki snubbed! Shukran for nothing Obama!


Afghanistan President Hamid Karzai snubbed from White House shura!


Oy vey! Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu snubbed!

and as I mentioned yesterday…


Obama is such a prat! British Prime Minister Gordon Brown witnesses the piss poor diplomacy at the White House as he was snubbed!

Of course, these world leaders including Stephen Harper weren’t snubbed at the White House.

The Canadian embassy in Washington DC, when contacted for comment explained:

“The White House Chief of Protocol just called the Ambassador (proactively) to say, essentially, ‘this is nonsense’. It’s not the White House practice, under this Administration, for the President to go outside to greet his guests. That’s done by the Protocol Office.”

PM snubbed? Not so fast, bub

David Akin is reporting a conversation he saw on CTV News Channel between anchor Dan Matheson and a DC radio host who characterized Prime Minister Harper’s welcoming at the White House today by some “[unknown] woman”

Here is UK Prime Minister Gordon Brown greeted at the White House by Acting US Chief of Protocol Gladys Boluda on March 3rd of this year.

Was this an “unbelievable insult and snub” or a radio host less familiar with protocol than say, the acting US chief of protocol?

I can’t mesh these two statements together because they must not relate to the same:
“unbelievable insult and snub” and “I must be fair, when it came to Gordon Brown, they did the same thing”

So is it a snub, or is it standard operating procedure?

To the Liberals and media making a story out of this… you can do better.

Here’s the CTV News Channel conversation reporter by Akin:

Matheson: Mr. Plotkin, I take it that it matters who greets you at the White House. I didn’t see Barack Obama there as Stephen Harper was being ushered in.

Plotkin: I’m not being hyperbolic or inflammatory but I thought it was an unbelievable insult and snub. If you are – quote – important, the president comes out and greets you as you depart from the car and ushers you in.

I am supposed to know something about American politics, and believe me, I do not know who the woman was who greeted [your prime minister].

I tried to find out and I was told by the national security press advisor that supposedly that was the deputy chief of protocol, not the chief of protocol of the state department.

… I don’t know if it was deliberate or accidental, but it surely was not a symbolic gesture of friendship and it was really, in my mind, demeaning.

Matheson: Does this go hand in glove with the way [UK Prime Minister] Gordon Brown was treated? At one time, the Brits were called the greatest friend America has in the world, and that was a couple years ago, and we, of course, are American’s greatest trading partner. What’s going on here? What do you make of this?

Plotkin: Well, what I think of it — I scoured the Washington Post which every – quote – opinion maker reads and there were two scintillas of mention – very, very brief about this visit.

One just said [Harper] was meeting with [Obama], and then there was some other passing reference that had nothing to do with the visit, but just with Canada, and how you’re our good neighbor. You don’t cause any trouble. You don’t have drug wars that we know about. You don’t plan to invade … and you’re taken for granted. You’re the neighbor who we can count on and we can rely on and is really our very nice neighbor but we really don’t invite them in for holiday parties or when there are serious things. So this, to me, is a very pro forma visit. I must be fair, when it came to Gordon Brown, they did the same thing. I’ve been told here that Canadian reporters are getting one question [of Harper and Obama] and an American reporter is getting one question and that’s it. If you are really significant, important, big, huge, you get something in the east room which is a joint press conference where the prime minister and the president would stand there with their flags and they would receive inquiries and questions. To call this downplayed visit is an overstatement.