Reading Time: 3 minutes It’s now 500 years since Luther threw down the gauntlet, taking on the power of the papacy in an era predating the separation of church and state
Category: Books
Democratic angst and independence turmoil
Reading Time: 3 minutes In Hillary Clinton’s mind, it’s everyone else’s fault. So she’ll continue to hog centre stage and suck up the political oxygen
John F. Kennedy: an anglophile for all seasons
Reading Time: 4 minutes The storied president was more English than Irish, despite being seen as the ultimate symbol of Irish-American success and social acceptance
Was the Ukrainian Red Famine genocide or incompetence?
Reading Time: 3 minutes Historians are divided on Josef Stalin’s intent in the Ukraine that resulted in millions of deaths. Anne Applebaum’s new book has revived the dispute
Hasty conclusions about the past can result in lost opportunities
Reading Time: 3 minutes Monuments often reveal important stories, but can gloss over details. Unless we examine the facts closely, we can end up with a sanitized view of history
Dunkirk and the maligned Belgians
Reading Time: 4 minutes When disaster comes calling, shifting the blame is generally not too far behind, and war is the perfect setting for laying blame
Feuding ideologies the second American civil war?
Reading Time: 3 minutes Conservative Arthur Brooks argues people can head off a cultural and political implosion by celebrating the perspective of the other
Crossroads: the growing Republican divide
Reading Time: 3 minutes Rather than a positive endorsement of their world view, Republican electoral success comes down to a simple rejection of the Democrats
Political “wobbles” prove politics really is a blood sport
Reading Time: 3 minutes Theresa May’s recent political “wobble” brings to mind Margaret Thatcher and the 1987 British election, which she won in spite of herself
A summer reading list to challenge your perspectives
Reading Time: 3 minutes These authors examine death and dying, love and romance, the immigrant experience and cultural chasms, and the heavy burdens family members must often carry