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Sunday, January 22, 2006
Jeffrey Simpson, enigma
You'd think one of Canada's best-known pundits would have something interesting to say on the eve of the first Conservative government in 13 years. But instead, Jeffrey Simpson, the Globe and Mail's "national affairs" columnist, devoted his Saturday column to the national affairs of ... Turkey.
Then, in today's La Presse, he has a column in French basically endorsing Frank McKenna for Liberal leader.
Also recall that Simpson took off to the UK in April and May 2005 to cover the ins-and-outs of Tony Blair's third successive massive landslide majority at the same time as the Gomery Inquiry heard from witnesses like Chuck Guité and Paul Coffin. Then, upon his return, the day after Beryl Wajsman's fascinating testimony Simpson penned this pertinent column.
I'm just sayin'.
Posted by Adam Daifallah on January 22, 2006 in Media | Permalink
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Comments
Jeffrey Simpson is encased, sealed, entombed, in the old mindset of Canada as consisting of Upper and Lower Canada, i.e., Ontario and Quebec. He is unable to move outside of this myopic gaze. Then, he is further hampered by his view that the Liberals are the guardians of Canada, and the concomitant view that Canadian citizens must be led and ruled.
He doesn't understand the new democracy, which has effectively demolished the old top-down political style and moved decision-making back into the hands of citizens. He is alarmed by these 'voices of the people', who are supposed to be meek and governed.
Therefore - he flees to the periphery. He should have been retired long, long ago.
Something else to note - the new CPC is a new generation; they are, for the most part, young and part of this new Internet, interactive and dynamic generation. The Liberals, who operate in the same style as Simpson, haven't arrived at that stage.
Posted by: ET | 2006-01-22 10:09:50 AM
You know the Libs are doomed when even their "dyed in the wool" journalists have abandoned the ship. PMPM must be feeling very lonely!
Posted by: Old Mother | 2006-01-22 10:21:12 AM
The only value of a pundit is in their ability to predict. If they pontificate endlessly, then are disproved often, they aren't worth a pinch of coon's shit. Jeffrey, I'm afraid, like so many pundits is not worth a pinch of coon shit.
Compare Simpson to Steyn. Sure, Steyn's been wrong occasionally, but again and again he nails it. That's what makes him so powerful a read, and that's what makes what he sees geopolitically so scary.
Jeff is just another one of the self important blowhards who elbow for room in the dailies or mags, and who are never called to account when they predict inaccurately. If we kept track of their squawking, and scored them, not too many would be around within a couple a years; they'd be left with nothing but blogging... and they'd have nothing to ad there either.
Posted by: Debris Trail | 2006-01-22 10:33:36 AM
PS: George Bernard Shaw wrote: "Newspapers are unable, seemingly, to discriminate between a bicycle accident and the collapse of civilization."
Posted by: Debris Trail | 2006-01-22 10:57:36 AM
Why is the left-wing Globe and Wail keeping their extreme self-Righteous High Priests like Simpson muzzled?
Posted by: nomdenet | 2006-01-22 11:37:53 AM
Simpson long ago joined the list of hacks who have a column but have nothing new to add. In a more competitive media environment they would have been put out to pasture long ago.
Others:
Craig Oliver
Doug Fisher
Allan Fotheringham
Posted by: Gord Tulk | 2006-01-22 11:50:35 AM
Jeffrey Simpson, enema
Enough said!
Posted by: John Chittick | 2006-01-22 11:51:38 AM
I think Simpson has come to the conclusion that Canada is a hopeless case (he has been warning about the health care crash for yonks, concedes that Quebec no longer really considers itself part of "Canada", and is repelled by our self-congratulatory view of our international role) but just doesn't want--or dare--to say so.
Though almost all the time he simply repeats the great and the good's received wisdom of the day.
Mark
Ottawa
Posted by: Mark Collins | 2006-01-22 12:30:59 PM
I've wrapped many fish and chips with the emanations of Canadian columnists. I am proud to say that Jeffrey Simpson is Captain of the Sea.
Perhaps he has a Shania Twain style Swiss mansion to which he can retire and produce his "memoirs de poisson".
Posted by: Plato's Stepchild | 2006-01-22 12:42:46 PM
Friend in England asked me about Canadian MSM about six months ago - pointed out that the Post
el al, is not the daily founded by Lord Black
but along with the Citizen, the best of the lot.
Also pointed out the dynamics of the Sun Group,
the Red Star, and then the G&M. I simply said,
with the exception of the all Canadian girl
Journalist, Ms. Blatchford, the G&M should not be
taken seriously. Living in NB, the local dailies
are Irving papers. Editors tell me that the Irvings do not "control" the newspapers but of course they do.
Posted by: Jack Macleod | 2006-01-22 1:50:05 PM
Hey I liked the guy when he played for the Oilers, but haven't really followed him since ! :)
Posted by: MarkAlta | 2006-01-22 2:01:14 PM
He's written few correct words about the mid-east, that's for sure. Remember the invasion of Iraq "inflaming the Arab street" Apparently, Jeffrey, they are soothing the burn with a purple balm on their finger these days. Not a bad days work eh.
Posted by: matt | 2006-01-22 3:46:57 PM
Jeffrey Simpson was once the template for Liberal journalists, but his entire style is increasinly a more memento mori for the party. His columns around the time of the minority vote last year in particular were exemplary. The House was full of angry shouting at the time, not only over Martin's unapproved multi-billion dollar spending spree, but also over the contents of the Murphy/Dosanjh tape on which Murphy could clearly be heard asking for Grewal's complicity in ensuring that hypothetically, should any deal ever be made, it should never appear to be a deal.
Jeffrey Simpson wrote "Yes, manners deteriorated rather sharply around Parliament in this minority situation...and the generally raucous behaviour undoubtedly turned off plenty of Canadians. But secret taping of conversations by an MP in order to damage the other side? Are there no limits?"
Why yes, lots of them, apparently. The Liberal media fastidiously avoiding raising the topic of the elephant in the room: serious institutional malfeasance in the Liberal party. And at a time when Murphy and Dosanjh could be clearly heard attempting to gut our most important parliamentary principles, this is what Jeffrey Simpson had to say:
"The circumstantial evidence suggests Mr. Grewal has a few questions to answer."
Get that? The fellow who pushed REC had questions to answer, not the people caught on tape. Andrew Coyne separated himself from the national media pack by writing honestly not only about the contents of the tape as they related to the vote in parliament, but also about the non-performance of his fellow journalists. Simpson wrote: "Some of the right-wing punditocracy might not survive...a few of the pundits hyperventilated so severely last week that they came dangerously close to cardiac arrest over the Liberal's parliamentary survival."
To the Jeffrey Simpsons of the world, sticking your nose in Liberal business is as rude as dancing in the bebe during mass. The subtext to everything he writes is that very important people are already keeping an eye on things, and he'd like those very important people to know that he is someone of stature, someone discrete, someone who will defend their privacy from the intrusions of interlopers.
His approach is best expressed in these words, which aptly describe that whole era. Referring to the Grewal tapes, he wrote: "Sometimes the accuser has more questions to answer than the accused, and this is one of those times."
Yep, it sho 'nuff was.
Posted by: EBD | 2006-01-22 4:21:45 PM
Simpson is surely the dullest, most predictable purveyor of conventional wisdom that has ever graced a newspaper's pages.
Posted by: chip | 2006-01-22 5:02:06 PM
To me, the best thing about Mark Steyn is that he calls it when he's wrong, as well as when he's right (which is far, far more often). Someone like Jeffrey Simpson, who isn't even willing to use his analysis to go on and make predictions (i.e., doesn't have the courage of his analysis), really isn't worth reading.
Posted by: Meg Q | 2006-01-22 6:04:15 PM
>> "You'd think one of Canada's best-known pundits would have something interesting to say on the eve of the first Conservative government in 13 years. But instead, Jeffrey Simpson, the Globe and Mail's "national affairs" columnist, devoted his Saturday column to the national affairs of ... Turkey."
He was probably working on his 5000 word, front page, full inside spread essay on Paul Martin and how he lost the election. And how he is a deeply flawed leader. Saturday's Globe. Good read, actually. Damn left-wing biases.
Just sayin'.
Of course.
TB
Cerberus
canadiancerberus.blogspot.com
Posted by: TB | 2006-01-22 7:46:17 PM
EBD (very good comment), TB: Any thoughts on my comment? Simpson bothers me sometimes as he seems almost to try and protect his occasional insights by being steadfastly conventional the rest of the time.
Mark
Ottawa
Posted by: Mark Collins | 2006-01-22 8:12:37 PM
Thanks TB. I was beginning to think I was the only one who reads the other sections of the paper. Nevertheless, his observations on Martin might have been more prescient had they been offered in November 2003, not January 2006.
My complaints about Simpson are not his biases (because even with them its usually well-researched and literate), but rather his propensity to excuse behaviour because "that's the way its done". Sometimes he's right, and sometimes he's premature. Case in point, Judy Sgro.
Last spring, after Sgro released an edited document from the Ethics Commissioner which seemed to absolve her, Simpson admonished her critics (esp. Diane Ablonsay) for not apologising to Sgro (he also stated she should be readmitted to cabinet). When the report came out, it turned out that Sgro had been issuing visas to people working in her campaign office. Ed Broadbent went after Shapiro for his poor judgement in editing his letter, but Simpson never apologised to Ablonsay. All he could manage was a half-hearted mea culpa at the end of the year.
Posted by: herringchoker | 2006-01-22 8:39:38 PM
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