Questioning the developer-donation-councillor connection ‘an insult to my integrity’

(This column originally appeared in the Halifax Examiner April 3, 2017) Let us now insult Steve Streatch and impugn his integrity, and while we’re at it, let’s do the same to some of his councillor colleagues. Streatch represents District 1, a sprawling, suburban-rural Waverley-Fall River-Musquodoboit Valley constituency. It is far from central Halifax. Central Halifax is […]

Who has the ear of the finance minister? Hint: not you

(This column originally appeared in the Halifax Examiner March 27, 2017) No need to ask what the Halifax Chamber of Commerce wants to see in next month’s provincial budget. They’ve made their wish list plain enough in their own, well-chosen words: “Taxation: Reduce the tax burden by either reducing the corporate income tax rate, increasing […]

Journalism: Banking on public broadcasting

At this moment — when real journalism is often dismissed as fake news and alternate-reality U.S. president Donald Trump is decimating American public broadcasting in his new budget— there is some comfort living in Canada where our recently refinanced and reinvigorated public broadcaster is not only publishing real news but is also affecting the public […]

The way politics works — and doesn’t — in Nova Scotia

(This column originally appeared in the Halifax Examiner March 13, 2017) I got a call the other evening from an earnest young telemarketer person, urging me to pony up cash so the New Democratic Party could wage glorious, seat-re-gaining war in the coming provincial election, which he suggested — with even greater earnestness and urgency […]

The Lyle Howe case: ‘If you look hard enough…’

(Originally published in the Halifax Examiner, March 6, 2017.) When I was a young CBC reporter back in the 1970s, I got a tip from a source inside the department of health the RCMP was investigating a Shubenacadie doctor named Ross McInnis for MSI fraud. I didn’t realize it at first, but I would later […]

Who is Lyle Howe? And why are so many people saying such nasty things about him? (Part II)

PART II: The un-making of Lyle Howe “I have gained some valuable wisdom from this matter, and all young men should benefit from the things I have learned without going through what I have gone through. Being innocent isn’t enough. Having legal education and a good lawyer is sometimes not enough.” Lyle Howe Post to […]

Laura McCarthy

Laura McCarthy tries to recall the “worst day.” It isn’t easy. “They were all extremely difficult, all very personal,” she tells me. She finally settles on the day her husband Lyle was formally charged with sexual assault in the fall of November 2011. “That,” she understates, “was a difficult day. I’d never wish any of […]

Who is Lyle Howe? And why are so many people saying such nasty things about him? (Part I)

PART I: The Making of Lyle Howe “High school taught me what to think. Philosophy taught me how to think. Law school will teach me why all this thinking is necessary.” Lyle Howe Dalhousie University “Discover the Unexpected” marketing campaign 2006 “The Complaints Investigation Committee of the NOVA SCOTIA BARRISTERS’ SOCIETY gives notice that the practising […]

Education: the Byzantine, bizarre and just plain nonsensical

This column originally appeared in the Halifax Examiner February 27, 2017.) If you’re looking for a flashing-neon-sign example of how Byzantine, bizarre and just plain nonsensical our province’s education bureaucracy can be, you might begin by considering last Wednesday’s non-decision by the South Shore Regional School Board not to revisit its carefully nuanced 2013 plan to […]

Stephen McNeil’s ‘right direction’ and his Chamber of Commerce cheerleaders

(Originally published in the Halifax Examiner February 21, 2017) If you missed it, I’m sure you weren’t alone. Let us first recall The Week that now, thankfully, was. First, of course, there was the emergency session of the legislature scheduled for last Monday night, but which was delayed a day by Snowmageddon #1. Our premier apparently […]