"The Old Order Is Not Coming Back"

"For a while, the US's allies comforted themselves with the belief that Trump was an aberration who would one day be gone, allowing the old ways to resume. That delusion has also been shattered. When Trump still seemed determined to make good on his Greenland threats, there was no sign of anyone or anything inside the US that would stop him. Over these last 12 months, Trump has demonstrated that the formal restraints designed to hold a US president in check are easily swept away. And if it can happen once, it can happen again. Which means it is not just Trump who is an unreliable ally. Sadly, it is the US itself."

Jonathan Freedland at The Guardian proposes "a new constellation of the European Union plus the UK plus Canada."

"Turn Away from Your Own Party's Least Desirable Traits and Policies, Stand Up for Your Country's Basic Values, and Be Sensible and Rational on the Economy—Not Radical"

"For starters, Prime Minister Carney explicitly rejected one of his party's least popular policies on climate and energy while keeping other elements of the government's climate agenda. He also chose to run a campaign explicitly on the economy, patriotism, and national values—not Liberals' cultural priorities which remained in the party platform but did not feature at all in the campaign. Carney and Liberals also leaned heavily on notions of nation building and pro-growth economic models. They did not go 'full socialism' or 'post-neoliberal' falsely believing that thermostatic reactions to Trump and Conservative populism opened the door for kooky and impractical economic ideas. Instead, Liberals featured the calm and successful interventions of their ex-central banker PM as a contrast to the chaotic tariff wars of Trump and politicians like him in Canada."

John Halpin at The Liberal Patriot offers Democrats "Lessons From Canada's Liberals."

"A Broader North American Story"

"These disasters and dreams rippled across the North American continent, rending Mexico apart and stitching Canada together at the same time. The story of the mid-nineteenth century, which we Americans usually think of as a tale of our own country's fracture and eventual rebirth, is better understood as an entire remolding of North America writ large—and one in which the Civil War plays a far more continental, and even global, role than previously understood."

At The Bulwark, Casey Michel reviews Alan Taylor's American Civil Wars: A Continental History, 1850–1873.

"My Little Attempt to Try to Move Things in a More Positive Direction"

"If America has some legitimate claim to being exceptional—and I believe it does, but generally not in the ways that most Americans believe—then the current situation desperately cries out for all of us to calm down and start thinking about how we might be able to improve things by harnessing that exceptionalism, rather than merely wallowing in how exceptionally upsetting things have now become."

Ideas Road Show presents the preface of Howard Burton's Exceptionally Upsetting: How Americans are increasingly confusing knowledge with opinion & what can be done about it.

"Canada Today Is Like Owning an Apartment Above a Meth Lab"

"When American friends ask for an explanation, I encourage them to reflect on the last time they bought groceries at their neighborhood Safeway. In the U.S. there is almost always a racial, economic, cultural, and educational chasm between the consumer and the check-out staff that is difficult if not impossible to bridge. In Canada, the experience is quite different. One interacts if not as peers, certainly as members of a wider community. The reason for this is very simple. The checkout person may not share your level of affluence, but they know that you know that they are getting a living wage because of the unions. And they know that you know that their kids and yours most probably go to the same neighborhood public school. Third, and most essential, they know that you know that if their children get sick, they will get exactly the same level of medical care not only of your children but of those of the prime minister. These three strands woven together become the fabric of Canadian social democracy."

At Rolling Stone, Wade Davis discusses "The Unraveling of America."

"The Mainstream Left Is in Serious Trouble in the West"

"The ethnic change that is transforming western societies makes cultural issues more relevant, benefiting the Right while harming a Left that finds itself hemmed in by progressive norms, unable to adapt to new electoral realities."

Eric Kaufmann at Law & Liberty explains "Why the Left Is Losing."

"One of the Few Successful Irish Campaigns Against the British in Irish Republican History"

"During the Great Starvation of the 1840s, more than one million Irish emigrated from Ireland to America. These immigrants proved to be invaluable resources to the Union during the Civil War. And after the war, there were enough of them that only a foolhardy politician would ignore the causes held dear by such a large constituency.
"In this environment, the American branch of the Fenian movement thrived. Founded primarily to raise funds and obtain weaponry to send back to Ireland for a military rebellion against the English occupiers, the American Fenian organizers adopted a new strategy at the close of the Civil War. They would take the fight for Irish freedom to British Canada."

Dan Murphy at Irish Central recalls the 1866 "Irish Fenian invasion of Canada."

"As One Letter to The Globe Put It the Other Day: 'Revolution Isn't About Justice. It's About Change'"

"What happened is that the Revolution has entered a new phase. Having vanquished the reactionaries, the Jacobins are sending the moderates to the guillotine. The buildings must be razed so that society can begin anew. Everyone who isn't for them is against them. Moderates like Ms. Atwood, with their odious ideas about due process and the presumption of innocence until proven guilty, are traitors to the Revolution."

Margaret Wente at The Globe and Mail reacts to the reaction to Margaret Atwood's opinions on sexual misconduct.

"The Window Into the Past That These Children Provide Is Priceless"

"By analyzing the older infant's genome, Potter and his colleagues, including José Víctor Moreno Mayar and Lasse Vinner, have shown that she belonged to a previously unknown group of ancient people, who are distinct from all known Native Americans, past and present. The team have dubbed them the Ancient Beringians.
"'We'd always suspected that these early genomes would have important stories to tell us about the past, and they certainly didn't disappoint,' says Jennifer Raff from the University of Kansas, who was not involved in the study.'"

Ed Yong at The Atlantic writes about new "clues about when and how the first peoples came to the Americas."

"A Tabernacle Too, but One That Welcomes the Viewer Inside"

"It's easy to think of movie-watching as a passive experience, one in which you sit back and the movie happens to you through the medium of light and sound. Early nitrate film did not live for long, but its fragmentary remains remind us that movies have lived a material life just as vital and animated as painting. I saw a cabinet containing nitrate reels once in the basement of the New York Historical Society, what was left of a collection that had partially burned. It was like looking at an opaque tabernacle."

Josephine Livingstone at The New Republic reviews the documentary Dawson City: Frozen Time.

"Institutions Must Advance"

"As for the pursuit of happiness, Americans are free to do just that—provided that they aren’t rotting in jail. But are they likely to find it? Most Americans work longer hours and have fewer paid vacations and benefits—including health care—than their counterparts in most advanced countries. Consider also that in the CIA World Factbook, the United States ranks 51st in life expectancy at birth. Working oneself into an early grave does not do much for one’s happiness quotient. This year the United States tied for 14th in “life satisfaction” on an annual quality-of-life study by the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. That puts the United States behind Canada (eighth) and Australia (12th). A report co-authored last year by the economist Jeffrey Sachs ranked the United States 10th in the world for happiness—again behind Canada and Australia. The Sachs study found that the United States has made 'striking economic and technological progress over the past half century without gains in the self-reported happiness of the citizenry. Instead, uncertainties and anxieties are high, social and economic inequalities have widened considerably, social trust is in decline, and confidence in government is at an all-time low.'
"Ouch."

Paul Pirie in The Washington Post argues that "the American Revolution was a flop."

Waging Heavy Who

In The New York Times, Howard Hampton reviews Neil Young's Waging Heavy Peace: A Hippie Dream, and Robert Christgau reviews Pete Townshend's Who I Am: A Memoir.

From Dawn to Emmanuelle

The New York Times runs obituaries for exonerated convict George Whitmore, Jr., actress Sylvia Kristel, skier Émile Allais, politician Lincoln Alexander, activist Russell Means, nightclub owner Steve Paul, and historian Jacques Barzun.

Thru the Perilous Fight

"Historians of the period and of the war may resent Hofstadter’s summary dismissal, but it offers some clues as to why neither is the subject of much popular interest. The very things that put Hofstadter off—the bumbling diplomacy, the bitter infighting, the ineptly executed war effort—force us to confront a vision of the United States that doesn’t generally fit our understanding of its origins. The war plays out as a disappointing second act to the Revolution, with the nation suddenly at the whim of Europeans and Indians and riven by internal dissent, and the heroes and heirs of 1776 acting without the pluck and ingenuity that we expect of them. How are we to commemorate that?"

In Slate, James M. Lundberg observes the War of 1812's bicentennial.

"It's a Much Bigger Deal Up Here"

"Britain doesn't seem to be planning much, probably because the War of 1812 was viewed as a distraction for a country focused on defeating Napoleon, historians said. Some Canadians worry that if they make too big a deal about repelling the American invaders, it could offend their southern neighbor.
"Then again, Americans may not notice."

Richard Simon in the Los Angeles Times reports on upcoming commemorations for the bicentennial of the War of 1812.

Worthwhile Canadian Initiative?

"While it will celebrate historical icons such as Isaac Brock and Laura Secord, the government is preparing to play up the relative lack of conflict with the United States since. In more than one news release on remembering the war, the Tories also mention 'two centuries of peaceful co-existence with the United States' that followed.
"Canadian military historian Jack Granatstein predicts anti-American sentiment will nevertheless be stirred up–through no fault of the Harper government.
'I think this is going to turn into an anti-American festival, no matter what the government does.'

Steven Chase in The Globe and Mail reports on the Canadian government's upcoming efforts to mark the War of 1812's two-hundredth anniversary.

Mordecai's Version

"'Its true, I've always been attracted to characters who demonstrate, first and foremost, an appetite for life. People who try to enjoy their life and who realise they are only making one trip . . . I find it much easier to write about con men and I have for a long time. It's much easier than writing about saints, who tend to be very boring.'"

In The Telegraph, Martin Chilton revisits Mordecai Richler’s oeuvre.

"Surely You Can't Be Serious"

"Nielsen played Debbie Reynolds' sweetheart in the 1957 film 'Tammy and the Bachelor,' was the Revolutionary War fighter Francis Marion in the Disney TV adventure series 'The Swamp Fox' and had roles in such TV series as 'The New Breed' and 'Bracken's World.'
"'I just always worked,' he said. 'I played a lot of leaders, autocratic sorts. Perhaps it was my Canadian accent.'"

Keith Thursby in the Los Angeles Times writes an obit for Leslie Nielsen.

"Cinéma Vérité's Forgotten Man"

"On paper 'Warrendale' invites comparison with 'Titicut Follies,' Wiseman's account of life at a mental institution (completed the same year), but King's film is in no way an exposé. Nor is he especially interested in an institutional portrait. His focus instead is on the immediate experience, on life as it is lived by specific individuals at specific moments. In 'Warrendale,' as in all his best work, there is a powerful recognition that the fly-on-the-wall position can be both a privileged and an uncomfortable one."

In the Los Angeles Times, Dennis Lim revisits documentaries made by Canadian director Allan King.

Green Splendor

The Boston Globe publishes obituaries for and environmentalist Jim Bohlen and author Harvey Pekar.