Spectator

White men cheer for Mark Steyn at Bay and Bloor

You can’t swing a cat in his town without hitting Heather Reisman interviewing some author. Such events usually go down at Indigo Books (where lately it seems she’s the CEO, picks the books, arranges the floor displays, sweeps the floor, changes the light bulbs and sews the employee smocks), and last night, at the Bay and Bloor location, the author in question was the ubiquitous Mark Steyn. He was there to plug his much discussed book America Alone, and held forth in front of a jam-packed audience of mostly white men on his general discomfort with and disdain for the Muslim world and multiculturalism. He espoused what he called a “natalist” policy for Canada—i.e. Canadians should produce more babies, thereby vitiating the need for immigration—and something about “telescoping” our educable years, presumably so as to free up time for more babymaking.   More


Signs of the times


For some years now, on a wall beside the back entrance to Toronto’s Hospital for Sick Children (what used to be the emergency entrance), near the corner of Gerrard and University, steps from the Children’s Healing Garden, have hung three fast food logos: one for Tim Hortons, one for Soup It Up and one for Burger King. These signs serve two purposes. They signal that those three franchises have outlets inside the hospital and act as de facto promotions for the products served therein. Now, I can live with Soup It Up and Tim Hortons. Soup is generally thought to be both nourishing and comforting; Tim Hortons is Tim Hortons, a wellspring of coffee and doughnuts. Double-doubles and sprinkles are bad for you, sure, yet so elementally native that Tim Hortons might as well serve up portions of the Canadian Shield. That leaves Burger King. Let me put this as plainly as I can: much of what Burger King serves is unhealthy. So why do they have a franchise serving food inside a hospital aimed at promoting and propagating health among children? (The fact that Burger King supported the endowment of a chair in critical care at the hospital only raises my eyebrow all the more.)   More


New York’s newspaper war shifts its battleground from Manhattan to Myanmar

In keeping a weather eye on the ongoing newspaper war over New York, today’s front pages of the Wall Street Journal and the New York Times are instructive. The Journal, given its earlier deadlines, led with the Myanmar cyclone and, for cover art, used a map to illustrate the extent of the damage. The Times split its headlines between last night’s primaries and the cyclone, giving more coverage to the former and devoting its art to Obama and Clinton. Initially, it bothered me that the Times would give more prime real estate to a parochial political story. Then I got into their coverage and my head turned round.   More


Conrad Black’s legal tormentor gets new job, salary bump

The Chicago Tribune notes today that Conrad Black’s tormentor-in-chief, Eric Sussman, has moved on to head up the regulatory enforcement and white-collar litigation practice at Chicago firm Kaye Scholer, a top-tier U.S. litigation shop. Sussman is all atwitter at his new prospects and considerable salary bump:   More


Theatre puns running low among journos at Drabinsky-Gottlieb trial

This country’s most famous and fabulous theatre impresario and his long-time partner went on trial for fraud yesterday morning in a large, airy courtroom (under an enormous coat of arms featuring a lion and a unicorn and the words Dieu et mon droit) on the fourth floor at 361 University Avenue—a mere driver and a wedge from the theatres that made Garth Drabinsky famous. The setting was likely a little dull for Garth’s taste. He did look good: tan and fit in a snappy check suit, with that insane shag carpet still growing out the top of his head. There were the usual oyeh, oyeh, oyehs, followed by the introduction of the Crown and its opponents, the Greenspan brothers.

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Cue the madness—Drabinsky and Gottlieb are now on trial

After a mere decade of delays and distractions, former theatre impresario and alleged fraudster Garth Drabinsky will finally see the inside of a Canadian courtroom. He and his Livent Inc. partner Myron Gottlieb are facing criminal charges before Ontario Superior Court Judge Mary Lou Benotto—she of the tainted blood trial. Reporting on CBC Radio this morning, Mike Hornbrook pointed out that it’s considered “Canada’s largest ever prosecution of corporate fraud”—a good thing, too, considering the Americans were ready to prosecute these two as long ago as 1999. Unlike their former board member Conrad Black, Gottlieb and Drabinsky had the good sense to hole up in Canada and wait for the RCMP to conduct its investigation (an indictment took three years). As for the subsequent delay in the case coming to trial, Drabinsky can thank (in part) a certain aforementioned peer of the realm: the Crown was only too happy to accommodate Eddie Greenspan’s crowded calendar as he flew about the continent defending Black.   More


Miller vs. Johnson in Spectator’s first blond-off

It works for Fox News; why can’t it work for us? We report, you decide. Whose hair is more—how to put it?—blindingly blond? The nearly minted mayor of London, Boris Johnson, or Hogtown’s own two-term pasha, David Miller? Either one would put Marilyn Monroe to shame, so we leave it to you. Who among these peroxide twins is likely to have more fun?   More


Conrad Black’s spirits downgraded from ‘happy’ to ‘healthy’ despite attending prison seminars on American politics

A smattering of news on the Conrad Black front this morning. Last evening, Patrick Fitzgerald et al. responded to Andrew Frey’s pleading that the Hollinger four’s conviction be set aside in a 127-page brief. June 5 has been set as the date for oral arguments before the 7th Circuit with a final decision expected in the fall.   More


The selective sympathies of Christie Blatchford

Christie Blatchford’s selective sympathies and predilection for men in uniform is fodder for much water cooler criticism both in and out of the scribbling trades. But in all my time observing the Globe scribe’s commentary—and particularly in view of my interest in her on-again, off-again empathy/sympathy for Conrad Black—I’ve never seen anything quite as brazen as her recent columns on Robert Baltovich (April 24) and Paul Croutch (May 1).   More


Requiem for a newspaper: The Wall Street Journal falls into the Murdoch trap

Flipping the Rolodex of descriptors this morning, I pause at P for “plus ça change” and W for “waddya think was going to happen?” Rupert Murdoch has pulled the wool yet again. The Times and the Journal have been full of stories this week suggesting that the WSJ’s new owner is interfering with his newspaper’s editorial independence—first by foisting changes so that it might compete more directly with The New York Times (more politics, shorter stories), then by firing the ancien régime editor Marcus Brauchli, who wasn’t moving fast enough to make those changes. And this time, Rupe’s chinless, coupon-clipping victims (the Bancroft family) are so thoroughly bumfuzzled that it barely merits the usual blah blah blah about history repeating itself first as tragedy, then…oh, you know the drill.   More


 
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