In my latest Epoch Times column I say Canadian authorities’ feeble justifications for cancelling concerts because they don’t like the singer or the lyrics show just how little they understand free speech… or even think about it.
In my latest Epoch Times column I say the chronic resistance to systemic principled thought in Canadian public policy means we have protectionist politicians who think they’re for free trade, as they’re censors who think they favour free speech.
In my latest Loonie Politics column I deplore the Canadian habit of windy high-minded speeches and empty measures in a dangerous world.
“Under a massive and increasing national debt, the economy has stagnated. Taxes have gone up and productivity is stagnant. Resource industries are throttled. There will be more Canadians but poorer. Not referred to in any of these books is the Orwellian censorship legislation recently brought in. Or the taking of the legacy media into wardship with multiple subsidies. All this results from the man nominally in charge being an airhead with no conception of, or interest in, his responsibilities. From all we knew of him from the day of his birth, there was no reason to expect any better of him, but millions were taken in, and media who looked on politics as a game, or even entertainment, encouraged them.”
John Pepall in Dorchester Review #29 (Vol. 14 #3 Autumn 2024)
In my latest Epoch Times column I suggest we could make party platforms less preposterous and ephemeral by insisting that the politicians explain to us what practical obstacles they see to implementing their focus-grouped visions.
“Already, by the time that Anselm died in 1109, Latin Christendom had been set upon a course so distinctive that what today we term ‘the West’ is less its heir than its continuation…. Today, at a time of seismic geopolitical realignment, when our values are proving to be not nearly as universal as some of us had assumed them to be, the need to recognize just how culturally contingent they are is more pressing than ever. To live in a western country is to live in a society still utterly saturated by Christian concepts and assumptions. This is no less true for Jews or Muslims than it is for Catholics or Protestants. Two thousand years on from the birth of Christ, it does not require a belief that he rose from the dead to be stamped by the formidable – indeed the inescapable – influence of Christianity. Whether it be the conviction that the workings of conscience are the surest determinants of good law, or that Church and state exist as distinct entities, or that polygamy is unacceptable, its trace elements are to be found everywhere in the West…. The West, increasingly empty though the pews may be, remains firmly moored to its Christian past.”
Author’s “Preface” in Tom Holland Dominion: How the Christian Revolution Remade the World
In my latest Epoch Times column I say instead of worrying about polls asking whether we think the decline in trust might mysteriously reverse itself, we should concentrate on reversing it by making sure we’re trustworthy. I know it sounds weird but it just might work.
In my latest Loonie Politics column I again protest restrictions on free speech during elections, and Canadians’ willingness to tolerate them.