Diane Francis is an American who is Editor at Large with the National Post, blogs there, holds corporate directorships, is Distinguished Visiting Professor at the Ted Rogers Management School, Ryerson University, Canada's largest.

She lives in Manhattan, Toronto and on airplanes.

She has written nine best-selling books and is author of "Who Owns Canada Now" which documents the transformation of Canada's economy from protectionist to globally-competitive and profiles its 75 billionaires with business interests around the world, available now (HarperCollins).

Blog Entries by Diane Francis

America: get your financial act together

Posted November 18, 2008 | 01:24 PM (EST)



America must smarten up. The global economy has crashed and the cause must be determined to prevent another. My concern is that the big problem facing the world's leaders, who are trying to fix the global economy, will be America's denial of its responsibility for this mess and...

Read Post

Is Mexico the Next Crisis?

2 Comments | Posted November 11, 2008 | 11:49 AM (EST)


NAFTA's weakest member, Mexico, is fighting a desperate battle against narcos. The cartels have murdered 4,000 mayors, police, army and others in the past year and on Nov. 4 election day they sent a terrible warning to the country.

This may become President-elect Barack Obama's first test and crisis. The...

Read Post

Top Priority: Keep Obama safe

6 Comments | Posted November 6, 2008 | 07:17 AM (EST)


There is no greater priority now that Barack Obama has won the Presidency than his personal safety.

Much ink will be spilled in the media as to who he should appoint to what cabinet or other positions, where and when. More ink will be devoted to determining and arguing which...

Read Post

Obama: Globalization of Joy

2 Comments | Posted November 5, 2008 | 08:48 AM (EST)


Chicago is my home town and President-elect Barack Obama delivered his knock-out punch acceptance speech in a setting that was emotionally charged. He chose a fitting venue.

He spoke in Chicago's sprawling downtown Grant Park. To many around the world this was just another open-air, grand venue punctuated by pillars....

Read Post

Detroit Has to be Saved

23 Comments | Posted October 30, 2008 | 06:45 AM (EST)


The cost of bailing out Detroit, which will end up being one automaker not three shortly, is cheap compared to the enormous cost of bankruptcy.

It is also critical to retain a domestic car manufacturing sector because of its importance to the economy as an engine of growth, to the...

Read Post

Buffett's Wrong: Stay Out of Stocks

15 Comments | Posted October 27, 2008 | 07:52 AM (EST)


Smart money people like Warren Buffett are cherrypicking stock markets and the brilliant businessman from Omaha last week wrote that American investors should be doing the same.
Wrong and here's why:

The Omaha Oracle is wrong for you and me Warren Buffett's recent op-ed piece in the New...
Read Post

World Needs Global Financial and Securities Bodies

10 Comments | Posted October 21, 2008 | 02:57 PM (EST)


The world economy nearly failed and a global effort by governments and central banks has pulled the system back from the proverbial brink. That's why only a global solution going forward will save the day. Whether Obama or McCain succeed, the next President and his team must manage the creation...

Read Post

McCain Will be Crushed

9 Comments | Posted October 16, 2008 | 10:07 AM (EST)


The third debate cinched Obama's landslide. Here's what I wrote in the Financial Post:

It's all over but the crying
The only "victory" the Republican spinmeisters could muster after last night's final Presidential debate was that John McCain was able to explain, concisely, that he is not George...

Read Post

How to Save the Global Financial System

3 Comments | Posted October 13, 2008 | 10:40 AM (EST)


In the last century, America and its complicated political system resulted in procrastination and delays in joining the two most important threats in the 20th Century: The first and second world wars. Once in, a year or two after the need really arose, America made all the difference.
...

Read Post

How to Keep Americans in Their Homes

14 Comments | Posted October 11, 2008 | 10:14 AM (EST)


Washington should undertake a massive, temporary buyout of residential real estate in order to save its economy from years of turmoil and credit crisis, said an expert who helped bail out Canada from similar turmoil in the 1980s and early 1990s.

Here's is a scheme I wrote about in the...

Read Post

Better Solutions to Fix the Mess

2 Comments | Posted October 8, 2008 | 02:29 PM (EST)


Canada's in good shape, relatively speaking, because investment banks have been part of commercial banks and both are properly regulated. Now it's cherry picking time for the Canadians.

But besides selling off huge chunks of the American financial sector, and economy, here are a few more fixes that must be...

Read Post

Don't touch the stock market

2 Comments | Posted October 1, 2008 | 08:23 AM (EST)


Here's my latest warning:

Do not be lulled into buying equities because there was a bounce in markets, where some losses were recouped. Or buying because there are stories of billionaires like Warren Buffett going in and cherrypicking opportunities. This is no stock market for investors. Period. This is...
Read Post

America's Blown it, Bring in a Global System

9 Comments | Posted September 30, 2008 | 11:49 AM (EST)


My take on the situation:

America's political dysfunction and its economic crisis intersected catastrophically yesterday in the House of Representatives which failed to pass a bailout for Wall Street's mess.
At issue was politics but mostly President Bush's lack of credibility. As commander in chief he exaggerated the threats...

Read Post

U.S. is Great, But Its Government System Stinks

5 Comments | Posted September 29, 2008 | 12:58 PM (EST)


The system of financial contribution corruption and excessive checks-and-balances has brought the U.S. economy to its knees, along with the rest of the world.


It may be business as usual for Americans, but believe me there is nothing usual about the world any longer and the U.S. political structure...

Read Post

McCain: send your VP Palin to debate Obama

5 Comments | Posted September 25, 2008 | 04:16 PM (EST)


If John McCain is too busy saving America to debate Obama tomorrow, why not send Sarah Palin to take him on? After all, he handpicked her and insists that she is qualified enough to assume the Presidency at any time.

This is an obvious move for a Presidential candidate or...

Read Post

Karl Rove: Palin's aptitude is a questionmark

10 Comments | Posted September 25, 2008 | 10:51 AM (EST)


At a dinner in Toronto this week, Karl Rove, gave a glimpse into McCain recklessness.
A Canadian businessman asked him if he thought Sarah Palin would make a good President.
"I don't know," said Rove.

If Rove doesn't know, we should all be worried. Rove is not running...

Read Post

U.S. Monkeys Guard Financial Bananas

Posted September 23, 2008 | 02:26 PM (EST)


America's financial 9/11 was self-inflicted as a result of by a stupid regime which believes in the dogma of the jungle. Other capitalist countries have very stable, well organized financial sectors and growing economies. This nightmare happened because in the United States the monkeys guard the bananas.

Here is my...

Read Post

Wall Street greed and contributions should be illegal

Posted September 18, 2008 | 06:51 PM (EST)


In 2006, the big five Wall Street firms handed out bonuses to their worldwide employees equivalent to the GDP of Vietnam or about $70 billion.
Now to fix the mess, the big five helped create, will cost probably US$1 trillion, or an amount equivalent to the GDP of India....

Read Post

A plague on the Wall Street casinos

Posted September 16, 2008 | 08:40 AM (EST)


America's biggest substance abuse problem is money. Like a crack addict in charge of the drug squad, Washington did little to nothing to control the artificial creation of credit. That is because the Wall Street casinos enabled, with their recklessness, the ability for the Republicans to finance massive budget deficits,...

Read Post

Obama Better be Ruthless

Posted September 12, 2008 | 12:41 PM (EST)


It's clear that the McCain campaign has lost any moral compass it may have had. When asked about the dreadful tone of the contest in his 9/11 interview, McCain shifted blame to Obama for not agreeing to a series of town hall meetings. The tone "would have been completely different",...

Read Post

Bloggers Index›