Source : Globe & Mail

Down the street from where I'm writing this, some locked-out CBC workers are walking outside the CBC building in the pouring rain. They traipse around and around. They're not exactly doing it with enthusiasm. There's no conga line dancing merrily around old Fort Dork.

The workers look stoic, contained, determined. The thing is, they might as well have a conga line going because, after thirtysomething days, they're winning. It's CBC management who look like twerps, not them.

In the public-relations and psychological war that is the CBC lockout, the locked-out workers are winning, hands-down.

The CBC situation is now a farce of epic proportions. In the last week, there was the ludicrous attempt to film a CBC-TV special about the anniversary of Terry Fox's Marathon of Hope and the bizarre management plan to attempt to broadcast the investiture of the new Governor-General. In the latter farce, it finally dawned on the dopes in Fort Dork that the new Governor-General is, actually, a former CBC journalist. She might not, you know, be amenable to crossing a picket line of locked-out CBC employees. Then, of course, Prime Minister Paul Martin, in a rare moment of decisiveness, announced he wasn't crossing a picket line. A squall of knowledge struck the CBC managers and now CBC is not going to cover the investiture.

In all coverage of the lockout, the talking points now focus on the ineptitude of management. Further, the locked-out workers can be seen and heard doing their jobs in any way they can - on campus radio, through podcasts and blogs. All anyone has to do is read Shelagh Rogers's blog about her cross-country caravan and they'll know that many of CBC's on-air stars are devoted to doing their jobs, even in the most difficult circumstances.

The lockout has also had one unexpected result. Far from being fatigued by the lockout or engaging in in-fighting, the workers have been galvanized. For some, it's matter of rediscovering their backbone. There is authentic rage at management. On-line, investigative work is being done about the shenanigans surrounding the training of an army of managers at the Niagara Institute, a sort of boot camp for Fort Dork bosses. And it has been realized that what CBC management is offering as news programming during the lockout is pathetic and a disgrace. News reporters and producers have been reminded that what they do, in normal circumstances, is important to Canadians. Now they are watching CBC stumble and crumble before their eyes, and they're angry.

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