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Being an imperial power doesn’t impress people the way it used to.  A century ago, countries strived to be a dominating world power and were willing to fight wars to either acquire an Empire, or hold on to the one they already had.  Nowadays, of course, in this “kinder, gentler” world, imperialism is considered politically [...]

America is not a perfect country.  Like all nations, it is a collection of human beings, and human beings are notorious for occasionally making bad decisions, being selfish, or otherwise simply blowing it.  However, there is a lot right about this country, though often we get so caught up in the rhetoric, that we miss [...]

I grew up as a kid watching Abbott and Costello movies which, though terribly corny by modern standards, were hilarious to me at the time.  I especially enjoyed the interplay between straight man and comic, and marveled at how they could keep up such an amusing banter so effortlessly. Of course, I later learned it [...]

Standing in the frigid shadows of a superpower is never easy, but Canadians make it look so.  Of course, part of the reason may be because they’re bigger than we are (barely) and consider themselves part of a worldwide commonwealth, but who knows.  In any case, and despite our miniscule population (about a tenth of [...]

While literally millions of ships of all shapes and sizes have been built over the centuries, only a handful have achieved anything approaching fame. Most of those that have done so, however, were warships or vessels that displayed such a degree of innovation that they were considered prototypes in the evolution of ships. Other ships, [...]

While it’s true that beauty is often in the eye of the beholder, it’s also true that there can be a consensus where beauty is concerned. Few people, for instance, consider a Rembrandt or Michelangelo’s David to be eyesores, so judging beauty is not nearly as subjective as one might imagine. This is as true [...]

Say the year 2012 to most people and chances are they will think of doomsday, which is remarkable considering that just ten years ago few people would have assigned any special significance to the date at all. Today, however, all one has to do is type the year into a search engine and they will [...]

Of course, coincidences happen all the time: we were just thinking of someone when they call us on the phone, or we have this song in mind when it suddenly plays on the radio. Most of the time they don’t mean much, but every once in awhile there is a coincidence that’s outright spooky, or [...]

Ever since mankind first began building structures out of wood rather than stone, fire has been a part of the learning process. In fact, so common have these infernos been throughout history that nearly every major city in the world has been largely burnt to the ground at one time or another in its history. [...]

The dictionary defines propaganda as the deliberate spreading of information, ideas, or rumors in an effort to either help or harm a person, group, movement, institution, or nation. Most commonly propaganda is used in the political arena. However, it can take used to convince others to embrace a particular scientific, environmental, religious or even moral [...]