A Complaint Against Liberal Modernity, and a Solution: Faith
Credit.Chris Gash
By Edmund Fawcett
THE UNBROKEN THREAD
By Sohrab Ahmari
“The Unbroken Thread” is a partisan
cri de coeur about the liberal West’s moral bewilderment from which, Sohrab Ahmari tells us, conservative Catholicism offers safe rescue. It merits attention not for diagnostic sharpness or strong argument, of which more in a moment, but because Ahmari is a notable combatant in the fight on the American right for the future of conservatism. Is conservatism to be socially liberal or, as he prefers, a moral crusade against secular misunderstandings and misuses of freedom?
Anxieties about the present, psychologists and social scientists have long ascertained, lead to a fixation with the past. A nostalgic yearning for how things used to be is hence one way through which our minds, even our bodies, put up with what they are today: a defence mechanism, in its simplest sense, to cordon us from the past.
When we channel the past, we prefer to black out what was considered bad then. This is so that we can procure from it a favourable comparison with the present. Hence, for instance, in the aftermath of Vietnam, with Watergate pummelling public confidence in the government, Americans turned to the memory of the Kennedy years. Donald Trump triggered a somewhat similar response: at the peak (or nadir) of his presidency, it wasn’t unusual for commentators, even liberals, to contrast it unfavourably with the Bush II years. The perceived failures of the Gotabaya Rajapaksa regime have similarly led the economist, the political commentator, and the Average Joe to
Laura Edgar A DENTAL infection control business has recently undergone a management buyout that has seen Laura Edgar take total ownership of the business. Barnard Castle-based Aura Infection Control is the market leaders in dental infection control products and solutions, as well as a leading UK infection control supplier. In addition to supplying its traditional hand hygiene, surface disinfection, aspirator and hand-piece cleaners, PPE and many other infection control product solutions, Aura has developed an online training platform. Future plans for the business include taking its infection control expertise, innovation and personal customer service to new sectors. Aura is keen to continue to develop its support and services whilst ensuring they stay engaged within its core dental market. The coronavirus pandemic has highlighted the brand’s potential to deliver infection control to other businesses and organisations.
12 hours ago
April 24-25th saw the 2021 installment of the Kern US Open, one of the year’s premier elite powerlifting meets. Many big names attended the meet, from world record holders John Haack and Dan Bell on the men’s side to Marianna Gasparyan and Hunter Henderson among the women competing. The stacked lineup didn’t disappoint, either, as several records fell on both sides. What follows is a comprehensive review of these records and the overall results of the Kern US Open:
Hunter Henderson: 75 kg squat and total world records
A relative novice in the sport compared to top competitors like Marianna Gasparyan (one of her opponents at the meet), the Kern US Open was only Henderson’s 5th ever meet. However, this didn’t seem to phase her as she now holds two of four possible records in the 75 kg weight class. Henderson completed a squat of 295 kilograms raw with wraps, bench pressed 147.5 kilograms and deadlifted 260 kilograms (roughly 650, 325, and 573 pound
Our inability to truly conspire is why so many people are struggling today.
Illustration by Kelsey Niziolek
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“It’s as natural as breathing” is a cliché because, when all is going well, nothing else is more effortless than inhaling and exhaling, something we do approximately twenty thousand times a day. Typically, most of us don’t think much about it. We breathe as we sleep, breathe as we eat, breathe as we move, and breathe as we talk. But that changed in 2020. We worried about our lungs and gasped for air. A novel illness sickened millions and tanked the global economy, thousands ingested tear gas protesting police violence, and cities were smothered by plumes of dark, noxious smoke from nearby forest fires.