Warren Kinsella

For the Canadian author, see W. P. Kinsella.

Warren James Douglas Kinsella (born August 1960 in Montreal, Quebec), is a Toronto-based lawyer, author, musician, political consultant, commentator on the Sun News Network, blogger and columnist for Quebecor newspapers. He is the president and co-founder of The Daisy Consulting Group.

Personal life

He is the son of physician and medical ethicist Douglas Kinsella, C.M., founder of the National Council on Ethics in Human Research (NCEHR).

He and his wife have four children. In late 2000, he established a blog.

Politics

Campaign strategist

Kinsella served as a strategist in the Canadian federal Liberal Party's 1993 election campaign "task force", as a staffer in opposition leader Jean Chrétien's office. After the Liberals won the election to form the government, Kinsella became chief of staff to federal Public Works minister David Dingwall. He also worked in the party's war room in the 2000 federal election, where he gained national exposure by appearing on CTV's Canada AM brandishing a purple Barney dinosaur to mock Stockwell Day's creationist beliefs, which saw the Liberals win a third mandate. While he promotes himself on his website as a "top Canadian spin doctor," journalist Paul Wells, in a 2001 article, questioned whether his role has been significantly exaggerated.

Liberal candidate

Kinsella ran as a Liberal candidate in the 1997 federal election in the riding of North Vancouver but was defeated by Reform incumbent Ted White.

Chrétien supporter

A vocal supporter of Prime Minister Jean Chrétien, Kinsella criticized the campaign of Chrétien's rival and successor, Paul Martin, several times in the 2004 federal election, and 2006 election. In these elections, the Liberals were reduced from a majority to a minority government and then defeated in favor of a Conservative minority government, respectively.

In December 2006, he revealed on his National Post blog that his firm had been actively supporting the candidacy of new Liberal leader Stéphane Dion.

McGuinty supporter

Kinsella also was involved in the 2007 re-election campaign of Ontario premier Dalton McGuinty and his Ontario Liberal Party. In the 2007 campaign, he wrote a blog post suggesting that Progressive Conservative MPP Lisa MacLeod would rather bake cookies than be seen on a stage with farm activist Randy Hillier, who later ran successfully for the Conservatives. Several candidates from opposition parties denounced the post as offensive to women, and Kinsella issued an apology. The incident prompted MacLeod to write the cookbook I'd Rather Be Baking Cookies: A Collection of Recipes from Lisa MacLeod and Friends.

Ignatieff supporter

In November 2008, Kinsella announced that he had returned to active involvement in the Liberal Party of Canada, and that he was working for leadership candidate Michael Ignatieff. In January 2009, Kinsella was revealed as the head of the Liberal Party's election war room.

Sponsorship Program and Gomery Commission

During the Gomery Commission's inquiry into the Sponsorship scandal heard testimony that Kinsella, in his capacity as chief of staff to Minister of Public Works David Dingwall and at Dingwall's request, wrote a letter to the department's Deputy Minister, Ran Quail, requesting that bureaucrat Chuck Guité be appointed to review the government's advertising and communications strategy. Quail testified that he viewed the letter as political interference into civil service affairs though both Dingwall and Kinsella characterized this letter as a request rather than a directive.

Involvement in punk rock

In his youth, Kinsella was the bassist of the Canadian punk band, "The Hot Nasties". In 2005, Kinsella wrote Fury's Hour: A (sort-of) Punk-Rock Manifesto (Random House, 2005), a history of the early days of punk.

In 2005, Kinsella founded a punk rock band named "Shit From Hell", which released a self-titled album later that year on Kicking Ass Records. The band consists of Kinsella (Bass, Vocals), Derek Raymaker (Guitar, Backing Vocals), Rolf Dinsdale (Guitar, Backing Vocals) and David Shiller (Drums). The band performed at Hamilton's Festival of Friends in August 2008 with Frankie Venom, the lead singer of legendary Canadian punk band Teenage Head. It was to be Venom's last public performance, as he died six weeks later, of cancer.

Kinsella wrote the song, Barney Rubble is My Double, featured on the Hot Nasties long play cassette tape and the Shit From Hell CD. It was also covered by The Evaporator's on their Ripple Rock album.

Writing

• Unholy Alliances (Lester, 1992)
• Web of Hate: Inside Canada's Far Right Network ISBN 0-00-638051-4 (HarperCollins, 1997)
• Party Favours (HarperCollins, 1997)
• Kicking Ass in Canadian Politics (Random House, 2001)
• Fury's Hour: A (sort-of) Punk-Rock Manifesto (Random House, 2005)
• The War Room: Political Strategies for Business, NGOs, and Anyone Who Wants to Win (Dundurn Press, 2007)

Kinsella has also written commentary in most of Canada's major newspapers, including the Globe and Mail and the Ottawa Citizen. He was recently media columnist for the National Post and is now a columnist for the Toronto Sun and smaller Quebecor newspapers.

External links

• Warren Kinsella's website
• Daisy Consulting Group, Team
• Official website of Kinsella's punk rock band