George Case's Blog, page 12

Here’s a hypothetical that may turn into an actual before too long.  In April 2022, the Canadian federal government announced a plan to make illegal the denial or downplaying of the Holocaust, the Nazis’ murder of six million Jews and others in Europe between 1933 and 1945.  Irwin Cotler, the Prime Minister’s Special Envoy on […]

In a culture increasingly sensitive to the use of certain inflammatory words, one word is still often used in everyday conversation and political discourse – despite being arguably the most inflammatory four-letter term in the language. That word is hate. All of us, it’s safe to assume, have casually invoked this epithet in many contexts. […]

Reposted from February 2022 / A public inquiry into the government’s use of the federal Emergencies Act to disperse the truck blockaders is ongoing Yesterday afternoon (Saturday) I journeyed from my suburban home to downtown Ottawa, where, as much of the world knows, an anti-vaccine-mandate protest gathering has settled in for over two weeks. Up […]

ʼTis the season for The Exorcist. What better time than late October to appreciate William Peter Blattyʼs landmark 1971 horror novel or William Friedkinʼs blockbuster 1973 cinematic adaptation of it? Much of The Exorcistʼs enduring power lies in its supposed basis in fact: just as the historic actuality of Vlad the Impaler gives Bram Stokerʼs […]

There will never be another Exorcist, but not for lack of trying.  By now it’s fair to say William Peter Blatty’s 1971 novel and William Friedkin’s 1973 film version have become folk archetypes, spawning numerous sequels and prequels of the book (Legion, 1983) and movie (Exorcist II:  The Heretic, 1977; Exorcist III, 1990; Exorcist IV: […]

Autumn is my favorite of the seasons, for its natural elements and, inextricably, for the human responses we have projected on to them.  It is the time of John Keats’ “Ode to Autumn” (O season of mists and mellow fruitfulness...), of Guns n’ Roses’ “November Rain,” the jazz standard “The Falling Leaves,” and the iconic […]

There are many ongoing, unwinnable rivalries for a top tier of historical significance: Genghis Khan or Atilla the Hun? The Vikings or Columbus? Hemingway or Fitzgerald? Kennedy or Nixon? Bush or Gore? Beatles or Stones? But within one highly specialized field of scholarship, no debate is more emotional, more subjective, or more awesome than the […]

A recent news item, before the death of Queen Elizabeth II, quoted the celebrity royal Meghan Markle’s observation from her podcast, “I don’t remember ever personally feeling the negative connotation behind the word ‘ambitious’ until I started dating my now-husband, and apparently ambition is a terrible, terrible thing, for a woman, that is – according […]

Whenever you see a cartoon of a sorcerer or a wizard, what is his main accessory?  A book.  Where do the wicked witches of fairy tales find the recipes for their magic potions?  In books.  How do Harry Potter and his classmates at Hogwarts Academy study spells and incantations?  With books.  What very old medium […]

It’s poignant to recall today that, after the election of Barack Obama to the US presidency in 2008, some commentators wrote hopefully of an impending “post-racial” American society, wherein historic divisions between Black and white citizens would at last be surmounted. A less-remembered footnote to the story, however, was the observation of conservative pundit William […]