Amanda Lang is a Canadian journalist who has covered business news in North America for 20 years. She played a key role in launching ROBTV in 1999, which ended up being the predecessor of BNN Bloomberg – one of Canada’s most trusted business news outlets. At this time, Lang was the anchor of BNN Bloomberg’s flagship morning show. She then moved on to create and co-host SQUEEZEPLAY, an issue-driven debate show. In 2009, Lang joined CBC as a senior business correspondent and stayed there for 7 years. In early 2016, she rejoined Bloomberg and became the host of Bloomberg North. Lang is also the author of two books, The Power of Why and The Beauty of Discomfort.
In 2015, Lang came under fire from Canadaland, specifically from Jesse Brown, who published several allegations against her, claiming that she was sabotaging her CBC colleague’s coverage of a story related to temporary foreign workers. In his attempted character assassination of Lang, Brown claimed that she had taken inappropriate speaking fees and was romantically involved with a board member. The Canadaland story was quickly picked up by other media outlets, even though most of the “facts” didn’t hold up against reality. Lang was ultimately exonerated after a full investigation by the CBC, but her reputation was damaged considerably. Amanda Lang’s story is only one of many in which Jesse Brown and Canadaland have shown utter disregard for responsible reporting and a complete breach of the most basic journalistic standards.
An overview: The Government of Canada’s proposed $600 million media tax credit has dominated news blogs and chatrooms.[1] At the heart of the criticism is whether the temptation of dollars will influence coverage of the government.[2] I’ve taught journalism and media studies at Concordia University and the history of media propaganda at Carleton University. I … Read more
I was in Toronto in early May for the 2019 Toronto Watchdog Workshop on investigative journalism. The weekend event included several excellent panel discussions including Julian Sheer on Mastering the Investigate Interview, and Writing the Investigative Narrative with Susanne Craig from The New York Times. A draw for me was the final session of the … Read more
This is the first of a three-part assessment of Canadaland Jesse Brown, in his March 17, 2019, podcast of Canadaland spent much of the hour pressing the NewsMedia Council to remove a member paper for irresponsible reporting. Brown was right: the Toronto Sun’s reporting on migrants living in a Toronto hotel was biased and full … Read more