Christie Blatchford
Born	May 20, 1951 (1951-05-20) (age 58) Rouyn-Noranda, Quebec
Occupation	newspaper columnist and broadcaster
Notable credit(s)	Toronto Sun, National Post, Globe and Mail

Christie Blatchford (born May 20, 1951^[1]) is a Canadian newspaper columnist and broadcaster.

Blatchford was born in Rouyn-Noranda, Quebec, and attended North Toronto Collegiate Institute^[2]. She went on to study journalism at Ryerson University in Toronto, and wrote for the campus newspaper, The Eyeopener. She subsequently worked as a sports reporter for the Globe and Mail, and as a columnist at the Toronto Star, before moving to the Toronto Sun. She remained at the Sun for almost 20 years, first as a lifestyle columnist, and then as a city columnist featured on Page 5 of the paper. She was hired away by the National Post when it was launched. She later moved to take up a columnist's job at The Globe and Mail.

Blatchford is known as a conservative columnist. Many of her columns focus on crime, human suffering and coverage of court proceedings, most notably the trial and subsequent legal hearings of Paul Bernardo and Karla Homolka. She has been accused of having an uncritical attitude towards the police, particularly in her days at the Sun.

A Globe and Mail column published on 6 May 2006 immediately following the 2006 Toronto terrorism arrests garnered particular attention in the Canadian press; the column alleged that Canadian authorities were going out of their way to dispel any suggestion of a link between the suspects and Islam. ^[1] This article sparked a considerable media response, including an article by Robert Fisk entitled "How racism has invaded Canada" and a column by Toronto Star Antonia Zerbisias which initially referred to Blatchford's column as "a Christie-nacht screed against a single community."

For the second half of 2006, Blatchford spent most of her time covering Canada's military operations in Afghanistan. During two trips to the country's Kandahar district, she reported on the experiences of Canadian soldiers. Based on these experiences, she wrote a book, Fifteen Days: Stories of Bravery, Friendship, Life and Death from Inside the New Canadian Army (ISBN 978-0385664660), published by Doubleday Canada in 2007. The book went on to garner the 2008 Governor General's Literary Award in Non-fiction.

While she is best known as a columnist for the Globe and Mail, she regularly contributes commentary to Toronto's CFRB and Montreal's CJAD radio stations.

[edit] References

• ^  Ignoring the biggest elephant in the room, Globe and Mail, 5 June 2006

[edit] External links

• The Eyeopener
• Blatchford Interview on The Hour with George Stroumboulopoulos