Society

The Beginning of the End? Fears for America

I know it’s unfashionable. I’m not American, but I love America. Right now, however, I’m concerned that we are seeing the beginnings of permanent decline in the great American empire. Let’s start positive. Why do I love the US of A? Well I don’t love it in that crazy, flag-waving hand-on-heart, gooey way that Americans [...]

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“Up in the Air” Cracks the Ice

“There’s a law of diminishing returns on preaching”. So said author Kate Grenville in a thought provoking lecture, ‘Writers in a Time of Change’, in 2009*. Yet everyday, in thousands of blog posts and columns all over the world, preaching is exactly what many very earnest writers do. I do it myself – often. There [...]

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How to Survive Complexity

Seven years ago, in the first of almost 100 articles for this newsletter, I wrote of the modern complexities surrounding the once simple task of packing an overnight bag for a business trip. I noted that I often spend “more time making sure I have a full set of batteries and power cords than I [...]