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Blog of Adam Daifallah -- author, journalist, law student. Lover of politics, writing, golf, curling, fitness, fashion, bacon and maple products -- not necessarily (but probably) in that order. Partisan of the Anglosphere. Contact me via email at adam@daifallah.com. This summer I am joined by Keir Wilmut and Omar Soliman.
Friday, January 30, 2004
Terry McAuliffe: what an embarassment!
This is unbelievable: My friend Tim Carney, who works for Bob Novak in Washington, has found himself in a high-profile dust-up. It all started when Tim published this piece on NRO, where he likened Sen. Orrin Hatch (R) to Neville Chamberlain because of his eagerness to appease Democrats on the fight over the Bush judicial nominees. That article somehow earned the ire of DNC potentate Terry McAuliffe, who fired off this pathetic press release demanding that RNC bigwig Ed Gillespie repudiate Carney's remarks. McAullife writes:
National Review writer Timothy Carney in a column on Friday, compared Democrats on the Senate Judiciary Committee to Nazis and Senator Orrin Hatch to Neville Chamberlain.
Except, uh, Tim never called anyone a Nazi. I've looked through the piece a couple of times, and it just isn't there. (McAuliffe was obviously trying way too hard to one-up Gillespie after the number Gillespie did on the Dems for the recent MoveOn.org ads comparing Bush to Hitler. Nice try, Mr. McAuliffe, but it just doens't work.)
So, anyway, Tim is just lapping this up. Today he has a half-serious reply to McAuliffe up, which you can check out here.
# posted by Adam Daifallah : 11:08 PM
Wednesday, January 28, 2004
Belinda: Better than Viagra
According to one of her supporters at least. (Yes, that is the geezer who sings karaoke at the corner of Yonge and Bloor).
# posted by Adam Daifallah : 11:10 PM
Why social conservatives should support the merger
I have a piece that is now online in the December issue of The Interim, arguing that social conservatives should line up behind the new merged Conservative Party of Canada. The piece was included in a symposium of sorts on the subject, with other articles written by journalist Michael Taube, John Hof of Campaign Life Coalition and political consultant Peter Stock. Links to the other pieces are available at the top of page where mine appears.
# posted by Adam Daifallah : 10:47 PM
Monday, January 26, 2004
Actually, that's not true!
I have deep respect for Dominic Lawson, the former editor of London's indispensible Spectator magazine. But he has made what I believe to be a total exaggeration in his otherwise fascinating Daily Telegraph piece of Saturday about Conrad Black.
Discussing Lord Black's support for Michael Portillo over Iain Duncan Smith for leader of the British Conservatives in 2001, Lawson writes:
Indeed I recall Conrad harrumphing about [supporting Duncan Smith] to me at the time, saying of IDS, "Mais, il n'est pas un chef." (Like many Canadians Conrad had the disconcerting habit of breaking into French without the slightest excuse.)
It is a pretty far stretch to suggest that "many Canadians" break into French in the midst of a discussion. Indeed, I cannot think of a single person at the moment I know who does, except for maybe a few of my Quebec-born friends who spoke French as their first language.
I quite like the last paragraph of this piece:
Last week I called Conrad, to thank him for delivering the titles into safe hands, and to say what a pleasure it had been working for him. Conrad clearly thought the conversation was beginning to sound altogether too obituarial. "Look, don't rule out that you might work for me again." In other words: you haven't heard the last of Conrad Moffat Black.
UPDATE (Jan 28, 10:53 PM): I take back my line that "I cannot think of a single person" who breaks into French in the middle of a discussion. One person who does is my boss at the National Post, Jonathan Kay, who hails from Montreal and likes using fancy terms like bien pensant.
# posted by Adam Daifallah : 12:39 AM
Media stoops to new low on Conrad Black saga
I found this article on Barbara Amiel in The Observer (the Sunday version of London's leftwing Guardian newspaper) totally outrageous. The last line really goes overboard:
An acquaintance says: 'She inhabits a world where only money talks.' Now Amiel may have lost that money, along with the lifestyle and status it brings. Will the Blacks survive as a couple?
To even suggest that the business difficulties of Conrad Black in the last few weeks might lead to the dissolution of their marriage is really unclassy, and even unworthy of such a lousy paper as The Guardian.
# posted by Adam Daifallah : 12:36 AM
Thursday, January 22, 2004
Where the Conservative leadership race is headed
Given the embarassment suffered by those who tried to predict ahead of time the outcome of this week's Iowa caucuses, I'm hesitant to make political predictions on anything. So I won't. I will instead assess where the leaderhip is at, with all candidates now officially declared, and where it might be going in the next 8 weeks.
Right now, this race is Stephen Harper's to lose. He's been organizing and planning for weeks, he has support in every region of the country (except maybe Quebec) and he is well-funded. He is also the person who really pushed this merger through, and deserves a lot of credit for that.
So, what to make of Clement and Stronach? They are both very far behind. Stronach appears to be spending a lot of money, buying up most of the country's top political consultants and organizers. Clement has a lot less money, but solid grassroots support in Ontario. The question is: can these two sell enough membership in the next 40-odd days to catch up to Harper?
Yes, but it's going to be rather difficult. The way the leadership voting system works is that party members will vote only once, ranking their choice of candidates preferentially, from 1 to 3. If any candidate gets more than 50% of first choice picks, they become the new leader right there. But if not, second picks are taken into account. So the trick is keeping Stephen Harper under 50, thus forcing the second choice votes to be used.
I think that if Stephen gets anything over 40% on first choice picks, he'll win. As we saw with Ernie Eves in the Ontario Tory leadership vote of 2001, more than 40% on a first ballot virtually ensures victory on a second ballot simply due to momentum and inertia. (ie. at least 10% of other candidates' supporters will go to the frontrunner on a second ballot if they have more than 40%). Therefore, Clement and Stronach essentially have to split at least 50%, but more likely 60%, of the first choice votes between them.
That will be very, very difficult. But if they ever did do that, there's a strong chance Harper could lose, because, presumably, the second choice of Clement supporters would be overwhelmingly Stronach, and vice versa. Seeing who finishes second will be quite interesting.
# posted by Adam Daifallah : 11:06 PM
I called Joe Clark a socialist on TV and I'm proud of it
On Tuesday night on TV, show host Michael Coren tried to dispute a point I made that Belinda Stronach's entry into the Conservative Party leadership race is positive because it gives centrists and Red Tories a candidate to support. Michael said I was wrong, claiming that Belinda is an economic conservative (like the two other candidates, Tony Clement and Stephen Harper) and that that there were no real Red Tory candidates like Joe Clark in the race.
I said to Michael that Joe is not a conservative, but rather a socialist. I think he tought I was nuts. I stand by the line. The Red Tory faction of the new party is economically conservative and socially liberal. That is the definition of a modern Red Tory. Joe Clark was a fiscal liberal and an extreme social liberal. Throughout his career, and especially in his second incarnation as leader from 1998 -- 2003, Joe found common cause with the Liberals more than the Canadian Alliance, and perhaps even the NDP (although I'd have to check on that).
# posted by Adam Daifallah : 11:02 PM
Tuesday, January 20, 2004
Belinda Stronach's launch...
...was today. Definitely a lot of glitz and glamour (money is not an object in this campaign). Stronach has jumped on the bandwagon of political candidates penning their own blogs. I look forward to reading Ms. Stronach's thoughts as she criss-crosses the country. More on the campaign later.
PS -- I will be appearing on the TV program Michael Coren Live tonght at 10:00 PM ET, debating the Conservative Party leadership race.
# posted by Adam Daifallah : 5:02 PM
Wednesday, January 14, 2004
A little self-promotion
An article I wrote at The New York Sun a few months ago was cited in the lead paragraphs of a front page Washington Post story the other day on bias in Middle East studies on campus.
The article in question is called "Hauser Helped Fund Professor of Hate" and it exposed some of the anonymous donors to the Edward Said Chair in Middle East studies which Rashid Khalidi, an extremist professor, currently sits in at Columbia U.
# posted by Adam Daifallah : 10:30 PM
Congratulations Peter...I think
My Gritlock co-author, Peter White, has just been named the co-COO of Hollinger Inc. I think Peter is going to be really busy for the next little while, but if anyone can get things done, it's him. Good luck Peter.
# posted by Adam Daifallah : 10:17 PM
Friday, January 09, 2004
"The debate is over: Tax cuts create jobs."
Mike Harris used to recite that line constantly when he was Premier of Ontario in the mid-1990s. Of course I agreed, given his record of job creation, which was in the hundreds of thousands.
But is this mantra always true?
I'm having a little, well, crisis of faith. If this axiom were foolproof, why is it that in tax-cutting America, a net 1,000 new jobs were created in December, while in Canada, where virtually no one is cutting taxes, 54,000 new jobs appeared in the same month? And the U.S.'s population is 10x that of Canada's. I don't get it.
# posted by Adam Daifallah : 11:05 PM
I was wondering when some enterprising reporters would do this.
As a kid I remember watching Governor Howard Dean as a panellist on the cheezy public television program "The Editors." I can't remember anything he said on that show (wasn't too memorable) but, I thought to myself, I'll bet he said some really damaging stuff.
Well, some crackerjack NBC folks have listened to the tapes of the show and found some doozies. Just some of the examples:
-- On the Iowa Caucuses set to start in just over a week: "If you look at the caucuses system, they are dominated by the special interests in both parties. [And] the special interests don't represent the centrist tendencies of the American people. They represent the extremes. And then you get a president who is beholden to either one extreme or the other, and where the average person is in the middle.”
-- On his recent endorser, Al Gore: "He has a lot of attributes, but … there are some things that I am concerned about. One of them is being quick on your feet. He is not.”
-- On Yasser Arafat and Hamas in January 1998: Arafat “is going to leave the scene. ... When that happens, I think Hamas will probably take over. There will probably be good and bad out of that. The bad, of course, is that Hamas is a terrorist organization. However, if they have to run a quasi-state they may actually have to be more responsible and start negotiations. So who knows what will happen.”
-- On President George W. Bush. “George Bush, I believe, is in his soul a moderate.”
# posted by Adam Daifallah : 1:16 AM
Thursday, January 08, 2004
Bully for Belinda
The news of the past two days that auto parts maven Belinda Stronach is seriously contemplating entering the race to lead the new Conservative Party has been, to put it mildly, surprising. When rumours of her interest starting surfacing I dismissed it as little more than a brilliant PR ploy by her various advisers (you know who you are!) but I was wrong. She is apparently quite serious about this.
Belinda Stronach would bring a lot of credibility to the race. She would no doubt run as a socially liberal candidate, thus giving more moderate types a candidate to support. She would bring a lot of Bay St. cash, too. While I have no clue what her positions are on virtually any issue, I hope she takes the plunge. She's beautiful, high profile, runs a great company and will bring new people into the party and the race. The more candidates the better.
# posted by Adam Daifallah : 12:08 AM
Sunday, January 04, 2004
Post-mortem on 2003 Christmas, oh sorry, "holiday" cards
Just taking down all the "festive season" cards we received this year, and the worst card of the year award definitely goes to Conservative Party of Canada leadership pretender Jim Prentice (the card was sent to roommate Dan, not me). Prentice sent the cliché "family portrait" card, and gets three x's for:
1. Whoring out his children: The Prentice girls (there seems to be three) are standing in goofy poses and the blonde one at the front is sporting a low-cut pink shirt with cleavage showing;
2. Not a single mention of Christmas: Actually this is a problem with many cards this year, but I would have expected better for a Conservative Party leadership candidate; and
3. It's not even a card!: It's a one-dimensional flat postcard. This made it impossible to stand up on the mantle or anything like that. Really annoying.
# posted by Adam Daifallah : 1:58 AM
Thursday, January 01, 2004
One of the funnier lines I've read in a long time
From an interview with Michael Ledeen in Front Page Magazine:
FP: If you were asked to describe Yasser Arafat in one sentence, what would you say?
Ledeen: Really, really ugly.
# posted by Adam Daifallah : 8:29 PM
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