Biiiiink

"Family visiting from England gets the royal treatment".

No kidding, this is the *headline* on today's paper. A family are visiting from England. They've listed what time their flight lands, they will be welcomed by RCMP officers in ceremonial uniform. Their stay on the Gold Floor at the Fairmont is gratis. They'll meet the mayor and premier, toss the first ball at the baseball game, have a free spa day for the mum etc etc. Their daily activities will be featured in the paper.

WHAT ON EARTH??? How desperate is Winnipeg for tourists?! It's not as if there aren't any, we bumped into a family visiting from Burnley at Wal-Mart the other day. I sat next to Londoners at the beach a few weeks back. The guy filling up his rental at the petrol station was visiting from Scotland, the family we chatted to at the Morris Stampede were on holiday from Munich. Foreign tourists are here, why are the 'Peggers going nuts over this random family's visit?

When I stop laughing I'll see if I can find a link to this online. What a waste of my tax money. And aren't newspapers in Canada awful?



Biiiiink

zebedee

hey i want that!!! who do i tell about my impending landing?

i can see it now

"random british hippy arrives in winnipeg" ... then again i dunno about the rcmp greeting , id be scared of getting busted for something

willmore

LOL...that would only happen if you were landing in BC!

hot wasabi peas

For the most part, yes.

scimdarren

We we're given a 'right royal welcome' but it was not us!!

Darren

crazydaisy

Hopefully they'll get bitten by a mosquito and go back with West Nile River Disease!! Only kidding - I just wish my bites wouldn't swell up to the size of a rugby ball!!

gtrvox1

I second that! The worst newspapers in the English speaking world (with the exception of USA Today) I used to like the National Post but no longer. The Globe & Mail is an excellent sleeping aid. The Toronto Star is a sort of colourful socialist rag - but at least they have decent graphics and I buy them on Sundays because there isn't anything else. The Sun...what can I say? Well, lots of useful automobile ads if you're in the market for cars. They're all just crap! Thank god for the internet and online editions

GTR

(sorry - mentioning all the Toronto papers, not familiar with other markets but can't imagine it's much better)

Judy in Calgary

The biggest problem, in my opinion, is the concentration of ownership. CanWest Global Communications Corp. owns many minor newspapers plus the following major ones:

• National Post

• Montreal Gazette

• Ottawa Citizen

• Windsor Star

• Regina Leader-Post

• Saskatoon StarPhoenix

• Calgary Herald

• Edmonton Journal

• Vancouver Sun

• Vancouver Province

• Victoria Times-Colonist

It also owns television stations in:

• Calgary

• Edmonton

• Hamilton

• Kelowna

• Lethbridge

• Maritimes (I'm aware that the Maritimes consist of several provinces. However, CanWest Global's own web site refers to the station as Global Maritimes.)

• Montreal

• Red Deer

• Regina

• Saskatoon

• Toronto

• Vancouver

• Victoria

• Winnipeg

CanWest Global Communications Corp. also owns a number of radio stations.

I consider to be a disgrace that the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) has permitted such concentration of ownership across different media.

While I agree that Canadian newspapers are truly awful, there are many American newspapers that are nothing to write home about either. There is a distressing concentration of ownership in the United States as well, although there are a few notable exceptions south of the border.