Leftist Physiognomy?

In Spiked, James Dixon “correlates” the emptiness of progressivism with Millennials’ and Gen Zs’ gathering quest for something spiritual to defy the nihilism and alleviate the loneliness of tech-driven 21st century society. And, he finds, they increasingly appear to be filling the void through Christianity. Dixon also observes a correlation in those generations between Christian belief and conservatism.

Long a cliché of comprehensive civic failure, New Orleans is emerging as an improbable guiding light for restoring a broken school system and raising kids to nation-leading performance. How? As Paul Vallas explains in City Journal, by emphasizing charter schools and opening the system to parental choice, sending kids flooding to the best schools and forcing the rest to compete. As Vallas quips, “New Orleans demonstrates that children benefit most when adults lose the power to preserve failure.”

Mario Laghos in The European Conservative describes a terrifying phenomenon straight out of sci-fi: the UK government’s “National Risk Unit” that, following violent crimes, terrorist attacks or other atrocities, deploys ready-made “recovery programmes” that channel victims’ responses into formless mourning and stage seemingly spontaneous “inter-faith vigils” – complete with pre-written signs and fake mourners. It’s all aimed at suppressing genuine human feelings like righteous anger and minimizing punishment of actual criminals.