Author: Owen Gray

In the wake of Mitt Romney’s eight vote win in Iowa, Maureen Dowd offers a column on the volatile relationship between fathers and sons: “American politics,” she writes,”bristles with Oedipal drama:” Sons struggling to live up to fathers. Sons striving to outdo fathers. Sons scheming to avenge fathers. Sons burning

Kelly McParland recently nominated the Occupy Movement for The National Post’s “brain half full award.”  He scornfully described the movement as: People lying around in tents in downtown parks because somehow that will combat “corporate greed”, or solve one of the two dozen other complaints they had, which essentially boiled

No doubt the folks at the Heritage Foundation will pillory Paul Krugman for his column in this morning’s New York Times. Their disrespect for him matches his own disrespect for them. On the subject of the national debt, Krugman writes: Perhaps most obviously, the economic “experts” on whom much of

When the Harper government was found in contempt of parliament, the prime minister defined the problem as a not having enough votes. It was, he said, “simply a case of the other three parties outvoting us.”   With a majority, he now argues, there can be no such thing as contempt.

It has been remarkable how sanguine political commentators have been about the place of Quebec in Stephen Harper’s Canada. Back in August, in the Globe and Mail, John Ibbitson wrote: The fading of Quebec in federal politics is not a temporary event. It has been going on for years and

In his review of the year which has almost ended, Lawrence Martin writes: In 2011, Canada took its sharpest turn right in its history. It will go down as the year of transformation in Canadian politics, the year when the political right gained unprecedented control, when the traditionally dominant centre

Conservatism, like Dr. Jekyll, has undergone an ugly transformation. Those who claim that mantle these days say they stand for liberty. However, they have long forgotten Edmund Burke’s caveat:: “But what is liberty without wisdom, and without virtue? It is the greatest of all possible evils; for it is folly,

Every year, as Christmas approaches, I think again of A Christmas Carol. The world has always been opposed to the idea of Christmas — unless it can be turned into a money making proposition. If Christmas can serve the ends of business, by all means, it should be celebrated. But,

When Helena Geurgis melted down almost two years ago at the Charlottetown Airport, she received little sympathy. When she was asked to take off her boots for a security screening, she exploded. According to The Toronto Star: Guergis “slammed her boots into the bin” provided by security personnel and then,

The Harper Conservatives refused to admit that they were spreading misinformation when they told the constituents of Mount Royal that Irwin Cotler’s retirement was imminent. But the prime minister claims that opponents of the Tar Sands are spreading misinformation about Canada’s gold producing tar pit. As Michael Harris writes at

Anyone who has followed Stephen Harper’s political career should not be surprised by Jim Flaherty’s take it or leave it offer to the provinces. And those who fear for the future of medicare should recall what Stephen Harper has said in the past. Back in 1997, as President of the

Robert Samuelson asks that question — and gives his answer — in this morning’s Washington Post: Governments have ceded power to bond markets by decades of shortsighted behavior. The political bias is to favor short-term stimulus (by lowering taxes and raising spending), which is popular, and to ignore long-term deficits

At Durban two weeks ago, a young woman rose and addressed the delegates: I speak for more than half the world’s population,” declared Anjali Appadurai of Maine’s College of the Atlantic. “We are the silent majority. You’ve given us a seat in this hall, but our interests are not at

Jeffrey Simpson writes this morning that: Those who thought the Harper government would ease up a bit after winning a majority were wrong. Noblesse oblige is out, or, rather, was never in. If anything, the Harper government is more bullying, scornful of dissent, intent on controlling every utterance, contemptuous of

Stephen Harper claimed that, with a majority, his government could focus — laser like — on the Canadian economy. But since their return to Parliament Hill, the Conservatives have paid no attention to the economy. Instead, they have passed legislation to abolish the Canadian Wheat Board; they passed their omnibus

Andrew Cohen writes that Stephen Harper has had Irwin Cotler in his sights for some time. Two months ago, the Conservatives spread the rumour that Cotler –three and a half years before the next election — was about to resign. It wasn’t the first time they had been so underhanded.