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The New Kid Takes on A.J. Walling |
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Written by D.L. McCracken
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Thursday, 19 January 2006 |
Alex J. Walling is a man of some repute in this part of the country and beyond and has established himself rightly so as a respected journalist and sports analyst. In many circles when AJ talks, people listen. He could even be described as being on the brink of becoming an icon of sorts especially within the sports commentary genre.
Mr. Walling today published an article on HalifaxLive titled, "Hotline Howe Callers Paranoid and Sparks Out of Line", Howe being Rick Howe, the host of CJCH's Hotline Show. The article however was not about the political proclivities of Howe himself but those of a few of his dedicated callers. Walling went so far as to publish these caller's first names and then proceeded to cut them and their opinions to ribbons.
Walling then proceeded into an essay describing his political expertise going as far back in the past as 1957. The overall point of Walling's article was to point out to his readers that certain more senior callers to Howe's program are of late spewing paranoid "malarkey" after imbibing one too many shots of rum or toking one to many blunts because what else in a sane world would compel these people to call a radio talk show and kvetch about Stephen Harper and his Conservatives?
Walling ponders that perhaps many members of the "over 50 crowd" had been "brainwashed" as far back in their lives as pre-birth to adopt the political orientation of their great-great-great-great-great-great grandparents and have been conditioned to honour that legacy by insisting upon staunchly and blindly defending their party of birth. Apparently, these "diehard fanatics" (Wallings' words, not mine) vote for their genetically predisposed political preferences as a matter of tradition more than any intelligent knowledge of the consequences of their actions.
This has been a particularly long and arduous campaign and only days before the Big One, tempers are flaring and people are speaking out with more passion then they have at any other time since the campaign began. The polls and the pundits along with well respected national news providers are declaring one party as the winner and subsequently throwing their support behind that party and we all know of which party I speak.
To A.J. Walling I ask - why is it perfectly acceptable for you to express your opinion on the outcome of this election and the repercussions of that outcome in a public forum such as HalifaxLive, but if other people express an opposing opinion, those same people are fair game for ridicule and public denigration?
Actually Mr. Walling you are far from unique in your position that those who oppose a Conservative government are somehow less intelligent than the masses and at the same time basically they're a bunch of nutcase alarmists.
Look what this campaign has unleashed - Liberal supporters are diehard traditionalists who fear change and care little for their country; Conservative supporters are intellectually superior forward-thinkers; NDP supporters are....well, I'm not sure what they are but it's definitely something I could describe with sarcasm. The thing is that anyone who takes the time to express their opinion in a public forum about this election and our various candidates is at least actively participating in the democratic process which is one Canadian freedom that we all embrace.
So why don't we all just opine without fear of being called nasty names? Mr. Walling admits that he doesn't "believe the Liberals deserve another run at it" and that's fine, that's his opinion. Conversely Barry, Emma, Alice, Amber, Pat and Patricia disagree with you and that's fine because it's their opinion.
We enjoy so many freedoms in this country but unfortunately lately, one's freedom to personal expression has become fair game for the opposing team. How very sad.
One final thought - my father who died many years ago and who was a staunch Liberal always said, "the country will always prosper under a Liberal rule but then suddenly the Conservatives are voted in and at that point the country heads straight to hell."
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