Articles by Andrew Coyne

May 14 2022 — Andrew Coyne — Globe and Mail — As we digest the latest in the long-running series of televisual farces known as election debates – sad trombones, anyone? – the thought inevitably arises: Why are we so terrible at organizing debates in this country? Other countries seem capable of mounting televised debates that are halfway dignified, vaguely informative, marginally interesting – or at […]

May 12 2022 — Andrew Coyne — Globe and Mail — Very occasionally a party leadership race will turn on some burning question of policy. More often, they are brute contests of organizational muscle and name recognition, with little in the way of substantive issues at stake. But this Conservative leadership campaign is something else again, one that appears to be about neither the leadership – […]

May 6 2022 — Andrew Coyne — Globe and Mail — A frisson of anticipation ran through the online journalistic community the other day – over a press release, of all things. “Pierre Poilievre, candidate for Prime Minister,” it began, erroneously, “will make an announcement … on policies relating to the Bank of Canada.” The location – outside the bank’s front door – seemed significant. Surely […]

Apr 22 2022 — Andrew Coyne — Globe and Mail — Until about five minutes ago the conventional wisdom on Pierre Poilievre was: can win the party; can’t win the country. Sure, he might thrill the Conservative base, but to Mr. and Mrs. Moderate Voter he was about as appealing as a cold sore. Only a fool would bet on him becoming prime minister. The new […]

Apr 13 2022 — Andrew Coyne — Globe and Mail — That noise you hear is the sound of progressives panicking over Pierre Poilievre. It was all over Twitter this week, in the wake of the Conservative leadership candidate’s latest video production, in which he rants at length about the high cost of housing. Say what you will about him, liberal Twitter nervously told itself, but […]

Apr 9 2022 — Andrew Coyne — Globe and Mail — The Trudeau government plainly intends this budget to be taken as the moment it pivoted from “stimulus” to “investment,” or from boosting demand, the total amount of spending in the economy, to expanding supply – the economy’s ability to produce goods and services in response. In principle this is appropriate, indeed long overdue, and not […]

Mar 16 2022 — Andrew Coyne — Globe and Mail — For most of his long career in politics – even at 42, he has been a politician nearly half his life – Pierre Poilievre has been on offence: as the prime minister’s personal attack dog while in government, as a front-bench critic in opposition. Now, as the front-runner in the race for Conservative leader, he […]

Mar 10 2022 — Andrew Coyne — Globe and Mail — Clowntime is over. For much of the past decade, voters across the democratic world have indulged in the fantasy that they could elect, in essence, a bunch of clowns to lead them: demagogues, dilettantes, billionaire brick-throwers, people with no experience of or fitness for office but only a talent for distraction. Politics was not about […]

Mar 9 2022 — Andrew Coyne — Globe and Mail — As the slaughter in Ukraine continues, the calls have grown for the West to do something to stop it – specifically, to exclude Russian aircraft from the skies over Ukraine, creating, as it is called, “a no-fly zone.” The latest and most remarkable of these is an open letter from a list of American defence […]

Mar 4 2022 — Andrew Coyne — Globe and Mail — By now it is a commonplace that, by invading Ukraine, Vladimir Putin has committed not only a monstrous crime but a calamitous error. And like many commonplaces this is mostly true. There can be no doubt the war is not going as he had planned. Badly trained, poorly led, indisciplined and under-supplied, Russian forces have […]

Feb 23 2022 — Andrew Coyne — Globe and Mail — The blockades that paralyzed Ottawa and various border points have been removed, at least for now. But the blockades are merely the symptom. The disease is disinformation. We are discovering for ourselves what until now we had observed at secondhand: large numbers of our fellow citizens can be made to believe almost anything. This is […]

Feb 15 2022 — Andrew Coyne — Globe and Mail — The Trudeau government’s decision to invoke the Emergencies Act in relief of the siege of Ottawa and associated blockades at various border points is, according to the Toronto Star, “a shocking admission of failure.” It is certainly that. That doesn’t make it wrong. It should never have come to this, but it has. The police […]

Feb 10 2022 — Andrew Coyne — Globe and Mail — Let’s all just take a step back from the abyss, shall we? Let’s get off Twitter, take a break from Facebook, turn off the news. Perhaps in the days to come, the police will move in on the truckers and others encamped around Ottawa, in an attempt to end the siege that has immobilized large […]

Feb 9 2022 — Andrew Coyne — Globe and Mail — For all the mistakes our governments have made in dealing with the COVID pandemic, Canada has one of the developed world’s lowest death rates from the disease: roughly a third of the United States’, per capita; less than 40 per cent of the United Kingdom’s; half of France’s; two-thirds of Germany’s. By the more comprehensive […]

Feb 1 2022 — Andrew Coyne — Globe and Mail — The report of the Conservatives’ internal review on the party’s most recent electoral defeat, presented to caucus last week, blames a number of factors. The leader was too scripted. The party needs to do more to reach out to ethnic communities. The leader spent too much time in the TV studio, not enough on the […]