“The Tories are a hollow shell, but at least they have a shell.”

Editorial in National Post June 7, 2001 that arguably overestimated their condition

“Tyler Giles of Wellesley College, Daniel Hungerman of the University of Notre Dame, and Tamar Oostrom of The Ohio State University... noted that many measures of religious adherence began to decline in the late 1980s. They find that the large decline in religious practice was driven by the group experiencing the subsequent increases in mortality: white middle-aged Americans without a college degree. States that experienced larger declines in religious participation in the last 15 years of the 20th century saw larger increases in deaths of despair. The researchers looked at the repeal of blue laws in particular. Blue laws limited commerce, typically on Sunday mornings.... The repeal of blue laws had a 5- to 10-percentage-point impact on weekly attendance of religious services, and increased the rate of deaths of despair by 2 deaths per 100,000 people, they found — accounting for a ‘reasonably large share of the initial rise in the deaths of despair.’ What’s also interesting is that the impact seems to be driven by actual formal religious participation, rather than belief or personal activities like prayer.... They further added that they didn’t know of any cultural phenomenon that matches the mortality patterns, which are seen for both men and women, but not in other countries, and in both rural and urban settings, but mostly middle-aged, less-educated white individuals. ‘The decline in religiosity matches mortality trends in all these characteristics,’ they wrote. The authors also pushed back on the opioid theory. They said OxyContin was first introduced as a prescription drug in 1996, yet already by then deaths of despair for middle-aged white Americans were well above trend.”

MSN story from “Market Watch” January 17, 2023 [why “Market Watch” I do not know]

“To see [Pope John Paul II, Karol] Wojtyla as a ‘Christian radical,’ then, is to try to understand his radicalism as an example of what the American philosopher Alfred North Whitehead once described as the simplicity that lies on the far side of complexity.”

George Weigel Witness to Hope [noting that the etymological root of radical is the Latin radix meaning root].

In my latest Epoch Times column I ponder uneasily what George Washington, or indeed Sir John A. Macdonald or the Duke of Wellington, would make of modern politics.

“Aron Ralson, 27, of Aspen…. climbing Saturday in Blue John Canyon… in far southwestern Utah… a 500-kilogram boulder fell on him, pinning his right arm, authorities said. He ran out of water on Tuesday and yesterday morning... Using his pocketknife, he amputated his arm below the elbow and applied a tourniquet and administered first aid. He then rigged anchors, fixed a rope and rappelled to the canyon floor. He hiked downstream and was spotted at about 3 p.m. by a searchers in a Utah Public Safety helicopter.”

Ottawa Citizen May 2, 2003

“There are only two tragedies in life: one is not getting what one wants, and the other is getting it.”

Oscar Wilde, quoted as standalone “WORDS OF WISDOM” in email teaser from Epoch Times January 1, 2023.

“Why no singer has replaced Lady Gaga... early Gaga blew out the circuits of what pop once was. No superstar singer since her has been as thrillingly, commandingly meaningless.”

Email teaser from The Atlantic December 18, 2022

“Hard pounding, gentlemen. Let’s see who pounds the longest.”

The Duke of Wellington according to AZ Quotes [https://www.azquotes.com/author/15482-Duke_of_Wellington]