BRIAN BRENNAN: BRIEF ENCOUNTERS June, 2015 At age 18, Debbie Lori Kaye became the youngest performer in history to have her own variety special on CBC TV. A tiny singer with a big voice, her star had been rising steadily
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JONATHAN MANTHORPE July 30, 2014 The ripples set in motion by Russia’s annexation of Crimea and Moscow’s ever more blatant involvement in fighting in eastern Ukraine have reached the other side of the world, and are lapping on the shores of the hermit
JONATHAN MANTHORPE July 25, 2014 A renegade Libyan general, reputedly with links to Washington’s Central Intelligence Agency, is well on his way to filling the political vacuum left by the ouster and killing of dictator Muammar Qaddafi in 2011. Since late May, Khalifa
“Life and death are one thread, the same line viewed from different sides.” — Lao Tau CHRIS WOOD: NATURAL SECURITY July 18, 2014 More than on most days, the handcart in which we are all riding toward a very unpleasant destination feels like we’re
JONATHAN MANTHORPE July 18, 2014 It is not just fanatical believers in an intolerant, violent, evangelical and racist brand of Islam that are spreading a shameful stain on the pages of human history in the 21st century. All major religions have in recent
JONATHAN MANTHORPE July 16, 2014 Half a dozen so-called Islamic states have been created out of countries in crisis in the last 20 years, and each new one is more brutal and bloodthirsty than the last. The latest is the “caliphate” created by
JONATHAN MANTHORPE July 11, 2014 The name “Intelligence Agency” often seems to be an oxymoron because spies frequently do incredibly dumb things. But before labelling the entire profession a collection of buffoons, it’s as well to remember that most intelligence agency work is
JONATHAN MANTHORPEJuly 9, 2014 Quite rightly, the wall-to-wall media coverage of every aspect of Brazilian life that has accompanied the global fixation on the football World Cup has paid little attention to the country’s history as a Portuguese colony. Quite rightly because
JONATHAN MANTHORPEJuly 4, 2014 The question is not whether there will be an independent Kurdistan. It’s been lurking in the underbrush since 1991. The question is how big the country will get. The 40 million Kurds are the world’s most numerous distinct
JONATHAN MANTHORPE July 2, 2014. Thailand’s military regime appears intent on purging the country of all traces of former Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra and his family, and preventing a come-back by the man who has dominated national politics for 15 years. But the
CHRIS WOOD: NATURAL SECURITY June 27, 2014 A common line of attack for the propagandists, and the misled who imagine we are not altering Earth’s climate, is that climate projections rely on models. Models! Not the real thing. Why, they could be