Michael Atkins

I’ve never really been involved in raising money before—well, let’s clarify. I’ve raised lots of money over the years to start new businesses or help others get started. What I mean is raising money as in, “Hi, Bob.

One of the more agreeable drawbacks of being in the media business for these many years (nearly 40) is that we are frequently celebrating an anniversary of one kind or another.

Yesterday, while sitting in the front seat of the car consulting her BlackBerry my daughter made the following observation on the state of the Canadian economy. I used to have 170 contacts on my BBM directory. I now have 37.

Notwithstanding Stephen Harper’s habit of going for the jugular (i.e.

I can hear the gnashing of teeth from Sparks Street in Ottawa to Ouellette Avenue in downtown Windsor. Yes, that would be the MPPs for the Liberal Party of Ontario. The cabinet ministers would add genuine fear to the grinding of teeth.

We are in an odd position in Ontario. The current government is nominally in charge but has no authority to do anything. There is a lame-duck premier and no parliament.

The province of Ontario is broke. The Canadian government, while certainly not broke, is cutting back substantially on program spending. It wants less government for financial and ideological reasons. Northern Ontario is going to get hammered.

I have been recommending the establishment of something like a Northern Policy Institute (NPI) since I was a little boy in short pants.

I’ve been driving by the Tantramar Marshes for 64 years. In the early years, we moved through the marsh at about 35 miles per hour in a Morris Minor (an actual English car that worked). The best feature of that car was the smell of real leather.

With nothing better to do a few weekends ago I made a quick calculation of how many hours I’ve worked since launching Northern Life newspaper in Sudbury in the fall of 1973.