Elizabeth May and I have a long history. In the late 1970s, we worked together in a successful campaign to prevent spruce budworm spraying in Cape Breton. Thirty years later, we fought bitterly over her destructive campaign to delay cleanup of the Sydney Tar Ponds. May was the most prominent and media savvy member of a group that demanded a cleanup, but condemned every actual cleanup method. Her reckless exaggeration of environmental and health issues in Sydney did wonders for her profile and career, even as it devastated the working-class Cape Bretoners she purported to champion. It really is an...

01 April, 2011

Filmmaker Tony Comstock goes contrarian on Contrarian: We've had a smattering of inbound links from the Dish going back to his days at Time, and our experience is that a link from Andrew Sullivan doesn't generate the volume of inbound traffic, or the cash, it used to. Not nearly. Whatever Tina paid Andy, I think he was smart to take it. I think he's selling while his stock is high, and with more downside than upside. Business is, after all, business. I'm not sure. One of the highest traffic days in Contrarian's short history came fon an inbound link from the Dish --...

24 March, 2011

My week-long stint guest-blogging for James Fallows at The Atlantic's website is over. It was both daunting and fun—also a great honor for someone who grew up with The Atlantic and admires Jim enormously. I was delighted to discover Halifax native John Gould manning the editorial levers, together with an  all-around able crew. Thanks to all. My last two TheAtlantic.com posts: After the Quake: Will Japan Lose Its Head as the U.S. Did After 9/11? The Interior Lives of Others Previous entries noted here....

22 March, 2011

Andrew Sullivan, who writes the Daily Dish blog on The Atlantic's website, is one of these rare commentators who's fun to read when you agree with him, more so when you don't. If he weren't the sole member of the selection committee, he'd be a perennial shoo-in for his own Yglesias Award, which honors partisans willing to criticize their own side when warranted. In that spirit, I'll register my disappointment at Sullivan's recently announced decision to decamp for Tina Brown's Daily Beast, which itself recently merged with the faded Newsweek. I'm a Dish addict, but following Sullivan to the Beast will...

22 March, 2011

[caption id="attachment_7540" align="alignright" width="200" caption="James Fallows"][/caption] Contrarian regulars know of my admiration for the eclectic James Fallows, who writes and blogs for The Atlantic. James is in China this winter, finishing up a book, and while he does that, rotating squads of unterbloggers are filling in for him. I'm in the rotation this week, and I've posted three items so far: A word about our sponsor Meet Philippus Aureolus Theophrastus Bombastus von Hohenheim. Alexander Graham Bell Defends His Butler. My week of guest-blogging happens to fall amidst a crush of other work, so it's unlikely I'll get much posted here until things settle down. But...

17 March, 2011

I wrote yesterday that only one Canadian news source had taken note of a Robert Kennedy Jr. column on HuffingtonPost slamming Stephen Harper. In fact, the CBC's Kady O'Malley took note in a tweeet (which is what @kady does): So did Jane Tabor in the Globe and Mail. Neither piece turned up in a Google search at the time of my post. O'Malley took umbrage at my post, arguing that RFK's "entire piece was pure crap" and "a kennedy being staggeringly wrong on facts isn't news." This is a strange standard for news selection, especially coming from Canada's Parliamentary press gallery, where...

03 March, 2011

Robert F. Kennedy Jr., son of a famous man, former congressman, president of the Waterkeeper Alliance, and professor at Pace University, used a column in the Huffington Post to laud the CRTC for resisting efforts by the PMO to lift Canada's ban on false news. Kennedy links the PM's efforts to Sun Media's plans for a Canadian version of Fox News. Moneyquote: Harper, often referred to as "George W. Bush's Mini Me," is known for having mounted a Bush like war on government scientists, data collectors, transparency, and enlightenment in general. He is a wizard of all the familiar tools of...

02 March, 2011

In response to my post on the Dexter government's obsessive management of routine government communications, Bruce Wark writes: When I arrived in Nova Scotia in October, 1986 as CBC Radio's National Reporter for the Maritimes, I found that the Nova Scotia government's public relations system was generally third rate. I had just come from six years covering the Ontario legislature and was used to dealing every day with a professional civil service and public relations officers who provided accurate information quickly and efficiently. In fact, I realized  during my years at Queen's Park that the Conservatives' decision to create a professional (and...

27 February, 2011

It's been tried, according to Rick Falkvinge, who begins a seven-part history of copyright today. Moneyquote: The copyright industry has tried the same tricks and rhetoric for well over 500 years, and they are also keen on trying to rewrite history. But the tale of the history books differs sharply from what the copyright industry is trying to paint. When the printing press arrived in 1453, scribe-craft was a profession in high demand. The Black Death had taken a large toll from the monasteries, who were not yet repopulated, so copying books was expensive. Obsoleting scribes was not a popular development with...

20 February, 2011

In 1995, when Jim Nunn left the host chair at what was then called First Edition and moved to Toronto to take over co-hosting duties on the CBC Show Marketplace, some of his chums produced a tribute music video called, "Jim Nunn is in the Smoke Room." There are a few CBC in-jokes, but the piece, starring Jonathan Torrens, Mike Clattenburg, Keith Bradley, and Brian Heighton, never fails to crack me up. Other credits: Producer/Director: Cynthia Kent; Editor: Keith Bradley; Shooters: Steve Lawrence & Doug Carmichael. H/T: Sharlene Woods....

29 January, 2011
Show more
Loading...