The most pressing issue in the West at the present time relates to culture and not the economy....

At the core of this culture is the affirmation that an individual irrespective of gender and colour represents the centre of the liberal world's ethical foundation. This was a radically altered vision of humanity rejecting the view that an individual is an appendage of the collective -- tribe, caste or class -- into which he or she is born.

The triumph of the West as the second millennium ended was a confirmation of this liberal idea, however incomplete and with distance still to go, of freedom and democracy. ...

But the worm inside the multicultural apple was the mistaken view that the West could extend equal treatment to other cultures based on group identity without concomitant erosion of its own cultural value of individual freedom.

Multiculturalism weakened the argument that newcomers should adjust to the cultural values of the West by adopting the guilt-ridden notion that any such demand smacks of imperialism....

It became a one-way concession in which the West did the conceding and non-Westerners made rising demands....

The West is now exposed to the paradox of how self-generated loss of cultural identity is politically weakening in a global village, and the task ahead is for its recovery from multicultural delusion by reasserting once again values that made it strong and appealing to the rest.

On my modest side last August, when I started to forecast a recession in the US in 2007 by Q2 that would be triggered by the housing bust, I also argued that this housing bust would soon also lead to serious risks and distress in the financial system. I pointed out that such stress and vulnerabilities would first be noticed in the subprime segment of the mortgage market as many (but not all of) of the excesses of the last few years in mortgage finance were concentrated in this market. I pointed out that the housing bubble and the credit bubble associated with it reckless lending practices and with regulator being asleep at the wheel while this unregulated gambling was taking place. I argued that the result would be financial distress and bankruptcy for many lenders and a systemic banking crisis similar to - or most likely worse than - the S&L crisis.

I can readily imagine US GDP growth rates of less than an annualized rate of 1% a year from now, and I just hope the Fed has enough foresight and control to keep them from turning negative.

• How much would a rescue of an injured snowboarder cost?
• Are rescued heli-skiers/snowboarders required to indemnify their rescuers for all the costs?
• How are these costs determined?
• Are just direct/marginal costs calculated, or are rescuees expect to contribute toward the overhead costs as well?

In the Harry Potteresque Great Hall at the University of Toronto this week, two security men were poised for a confrontation, and with good reason.

Christopher Hitchens was explaining why he hates religion: Islam, because it exhibits a “horrible trio of self-hatred, self-righteousness and self-pity” while making a “cult of death, suicide and murder,” and Judaism, because it leads to Christianity. “I am absolutely convinced that the main source of hatred in the world is religion,” the famously contrarian journalist and author told an appreciative crowd of undergraduates gathered to hear him explain why freedom of speech should include the freedom to hate.

“Look anywhere you like, to slavery, to the subjugation of women as chattel, to the burning and flogging of homosexuals, to ethnic cleansing, to anti-Semitism, for all of this look no further than a famous book that is on every pulpit in this city, and in every synagogue and every mosque. And then you’ll see whether you can square this circle: that the force that is the main source of hatred is also the main caller for censorship,” he said.

Use the strong arm of the government to prevent foreign suppliers from rushing in when domestic supplies are disrupted.

Who loses? The consumer.