“Maybe [Paul] Martin should also adopt the slogan on a pin offered to [Kim] Campbell at the 1993 leadership rally: ‘I don’t know what I’m doing but I’m good at it.’”
John Ivison in National Post June 19, 2004
In my latest Loonie Politics column I argue that most politicians and voters across the spectrum seem dangerously complacent in practice even on topics where their rhetoric is shrill and panicky.
After noting that French Canadians put up passively with the Stamp Act “Carlton had to deal with the problem of the law: the French liked the swiftness and low cost of court access under the French system, but it was a different law, governed by French precedent, which was irritating in itself and practically incomprehensible to the administration in Quebec and difficult to obtain. The substitution of English criminal law had been popular with the public, as it instituted habeas corpus and put an end to the rack and interrogation under torture. London sent legal officers to go back to make a recommendation, and this issue dragged on for a few years, but Carlton became convinced that Quebec needed to devise its own Civil Code, to keep what was familiar, incite pride, and emancipate the province from recourse to French precedents.”
Conrad Black Rise to Greatness: The History of Canada from the Vikings to the Present
“In 1870, the Prussian army had captured the French emperor, Napoleon III, who followed Charles X, Metternich, and Louis-Philippe into exile in London.”
Conrad Black Rise to Greatness: The History of Canada from the Vikings to the Present [but he does not take what I consider to be the obvious point that all these continentals who sneer at the English-speaking world flee to it when in trouble, knowing it is the true and only home of liberty]
In my latest Epoch Times column I argue that you have to understand why Canada, the UK, Australia and France recognized a non-existent Palestinian state to grasp just what a disastrous decision it was.
In my latest National Post column I say the routinely grandiose rhetoric emanating from Prime Minister Mark Carney is a warning sign about the routinely grandiose way he thinks.
In my latest Epoch Times column I suggest in the wake of the Charlie Kirk assassination that we all ask ourselves whether our own interventions in public debate are designed to lead people back to the light or drive them further into the darkness.
“Nigel Farage stood up in the House of Commons yesterday to ask how many British troops will be promised to Ukraine. A reasonable question. He was dismissed as being a ‘Putin apologist’ by both Conservatives and Labour. The uniparty are still two cheeks of the same ugly old arse.”
A post on X from someone I am not familiar with on March 4, 2025 [https://x.com/darrengrimes_/status/1896864773389869349] and yes, it bends my rule about vulgarity in public discourse but it’s funny and apposite enough to deserve it.