In my latest National Post column I say we need a mature and courteous response to the American retreat into isolationism, not emotionally gratifying childish outbursts of petulant fantasy.
In my latest Epoch Times column I say that now that Trump has somehow forced our chattering classes to realize we should promote prosperity and resilience through markets not impoverish and divide ourselves with trendy schemes for yet more state intervention, the easy first steps are sweeping away interprovincial trade barriers, agricultural marketing schemes and protectionism in the banking, airline and telecommunications sector, and radically simplifying the tax code.
In my latest Loonie Politics column I deplored the fact that the uniform Canadian response to Trump’s tariff threats has been to plunge with bellicose stupidity to his intellectual and policy level and embrace the very protectionism we claim to despise.
In my latest Epoch Times column I say the persistent interest of federal authorities in requiring us to show identity papers on demand reveals that whatever it is that our politicians claim to love out Canada it certainly isn’t our true legacy of liberty.
“This rock [Plymouth Rock] has become an object of veneration in the United States. I have seen fragments carefully preserved in several American cities. Does not that clearly prove that man’s power and greatness resides entirely in his soul? A few poor souls trod for an instant on this rock, and it has become famous; it is prized by a great nation; fragments are venerated, and tiny pieces distributed far and wide. What has become of the doorsteps of a thousand palaces? Who cares about them?”
Alexis de Tocqueville Democracy in America (Lawrence’s translation) [though giving I think a bit too much credit to the Pilgrims in his talk of Puritans]
In my latest Epoch Times column I say one reason Canadian politicians are struggling to respond to Trump’s tariff threats is that most of them are closet mercantilists who just say they favour and understand free trade.
In my latest Loonie Politics column I complain that provincial conservative first minister Doug Ford is just as contemptuous of the legislature as federal liberal first minister Justin Trudeau… and legislators and we citizens let him get away with it.
James “Madison was the Father of the Constitution, Architect of the Bill of Rights, and the only Secretary of State never to have left the country. The oldest of 12 children, he could read and write in seven languages. He attended the College of New Jersey (which became Princeton) instead of William and Mary – where Jefferson went and got all those Scottish Enlightenment Ideas.”
Dale Ahlquist in Gilbert: The Magazine of the Society of G.K. Chesterton Vol. 27 #3 (Jan.-Feb. 2024)