In actuality, the headline comes from the Canadian National Post and really reads, To survive life after hockey, the CBC must change — if it can. In this case, however, it is the rights to broadcast the hockey (I don’t have to tell you which kind, do I?) which is why they discuss “life after hockey”. But with some luck we will be saying the same in a few months’ time except with the capital “H”. And from Small Dead Animals there is this assessment from The Friends of the CBC which I hope to see the Friends of our local media commune repeating in the near future:

From the Friends of the CBC

The full brunt of Stephen Harper’s hostility to our CBC is now in full view.

Today is a very bad day for those of us – and that includes the vast majority of Canadians — who believe in and support public broadcasting.

Please stand with me now in support of public broadcasting and to hold Harper accountable for what he has done.

Earlier today, the CBC announced it faces a $130 million shortfall. This is largely the consequence of Harper’s punitive cuts to the CBC’s budget which as of April 1st are now fully phased in.

As a result, the creative energy of 657 CBC people who make programs will be lost to our national public broadcaster and the damage to every program CBC audiences see and hear will be obvious. Sadly, the layoffs will be concentrated among CBC’s younger, digitally savvy staff with less seniority.

Harper is attacking our CBC from the outside. But he also has an insidious strategy to undermine our national public broadcaster from within.

Seven years ago, Harper handed the reins to our most important cultural institution to someone with no senior level broadcasting or management experience whatsoever.

That lack of experience is now painfully clear to see as the CBC – knowing this day would come – has failed to prepare.

CBC’s President Hubert Lacroix owes his job to Harper and, as Harper’s man inside the CBC, appears to us to be doing the Prime Minister’s bidding.

Public broadcasting in Canada desperately needs your help right now.

Please help FRIENDS mount a major campaign to hold Harper accountable and to deter the next attack, which is looming on the horizon.

Harper’s fingerprints can also been seen [sic] in a Senate Committee study of “challenges facing the CBC” that has turned into a campaign to strip all public funding from the CBC and give that money to the private broadcasters.

This is nothing less than a trial balloon straight from Harper that must be shot down immediately. We need your help now to expose this chicanery to public scrutiny.

Just days ago, Senator Leo Housakos, the Conservative Vice-Chair of the Senate Standing Committee on Transport and Communications – a man with close ties to Prime Minister Harper – placed this agenda firmly on the Committee’s plate.

Here is the question Housakos asked at the Committee’s hearing on last Tuesday:

“Is there a way to take the money we spend right now on a broadcaster (the CBC) and re-route that money to give that $1 billion-plus dollars to filmmakers and producers of Canadian content so they can make quality content and films? Once they make that quality Canadian content, wouldn’t there be an easier appeal made to the private broadcasters to start running it more.”

That last suggestion, by the way, seems like a good one that should really be looked at.