Recent American studies have revealed a striking lack of variation in political views among the nation’s university professors. For example, 85% of academics teaching political science rated themselves as left of centre; only 10% considered themselves to be in the...
For centuries, Arab states across North Africa made fortunes from piracy. Raiding the coasts of Spain and Italy, scouring the Mediterranean, and ravaging into the Atlantic as far as Iceland, Barbary corsairs captured over a million Christian prisoners for their slave...
Let’s face it, 2020 sucked. It was one of those years that people will remember their whole lives, the kind to judge all others by. The sort of year that, in the future, when your house burns down, your son flunks out of clown college, and your dog dies, you will be...
Pandemics have a way of changing the world. The Plague of Justinian which hit the Mediterranean area in the 500s not only killed millions but it crucially weakened the Byzantine Empire and helped ruin its plans to reconquer western Europe from the barbarians. The...
Those of you who are tired of my rants about the demise of our once great health system will be pleased to know that this is my last editorial. I am retiring from the BCMJ Editorial Board; currently, I am the longest-serving member (more than 20 years). I have been a...
Back in the lofty, pre-Justin Trudeau government days of 2014, back when oil was booming, pipelines were planned to east and west coasts, and Alberta and Saskatchewan were swimming in money, around $81 billion was spent in capital expenditures (CAPEX) in the Canadian...
In the summer and autumn of 1789, the French National Assembly overturned a thousand years of law and custom to produce a modern constitutional democracy. The Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen spelled out all the new conditions of civil life: the abolition...
Society has become obsessed with identity. I am old enough to remember when there was only one channel on the television and just two sexes. Humans came packaged as either male or female and vive la différence! Now I am told that there are many, many “genders”:...
In the classic comedy Animal House, the authorities deal the protagonists a crushing blow – for their many misbehaviours, our heroes’ fraternity is dissolved and they are expelled from university. As they sit forlornly bemoaning their fate, one of the groups rallies...
It is a fact well known to deeply-learned historians and viewers of the BBC comedy series Yes Minister that the true power in government lies not in the hands of politicians – poor transient creatures of little lasting importance, here one election and gone the next –...
Once upon a time, not too long ago, Quebec was the most intensely Catholic jurisdiction in the whole world. The Church played a huge role in the province’s politics and social life; attendance at Mass was extremely high; and large families (which heeded the religious...
Today, my fellow citizens rise to mark the 152nd anniversary of our independence from Great Britain, a holiday known as Canada Day. This is surely among the planet’s least inspiring names for a national celebration. Americans stand up and salute on Independence Day;...
Not too long ago, governments used to prohibit behaviour that was bad for its citizenry. Gambling was one such activity; it is a practice in which those insufficiently aware of statistical probabilities are induced to lose money to those with a deeper knowledge of the...
Canadians have fought a lot of tough characters over the years. Sudanese warriors of the Mahdi, Boer guerillas, armies of the German, Austrian, and Japanese empires, Nazi SS panzer divisions, Red Chinese, North Koreans, Serbs, Croats, and Taleban all came to rue the...
In 1970, Pierre Eliot Trudeau’s administration decided to cut diplomatic ties with one government claiming to rule China and to recognize another. Out went our acceptance of a long-time ally, the quasi-democratic Republic of China, based on the island of Taiwan, and...