While the U.S. has its economic problems, the runaway government debt being an ominous example, its unending reliance on domestic spending for domestic prosperity is a winning recipe over time.

Only by rediscovering a vision of the good life that reckons with the suffering inherent in human experience and conceives of individuals as social animals bound by duty to one another—Edmund Burke’s “partnership of the dead, the living and the unborn”—do we stand a chance of bending the rising generation’s egotism and make them want to grace their communities and nations with new human beings.

I have thought since her first run that Dr. Leslyn Lewis is a breath of fresh air—the outsider candidate that the Ottawa bubble and the Conservative Party needs. The Harper-clones have been at the top for a long time, but it is past time for a facelift.

The legacy of 20th century history has left the Right in Central Europe questioning what we are meant to conserve after 40 years of communism. Our task is not so much to preserve traditions, but to reawaken them and to establish new ones. This approach is more reactionary; Central European conservatism is combative, because it has to be.

The Orbán cabinet has put in place the means for Hungary to be independent from Russian natural gas. In the course of 12 years, it built links to all possible alternative energy sources; the fact that a number of them are inoperable is due to other countries.

Over time, as artificial intelligence gets more entrenched in the realm of moral decision-making, it is entirely possible that the AI’s used for those decisions become standardized. But is this desirable? The answer has less to do with the form under which the decision is made—an algorithm or a human brain—and more with what moral values the decision maker applies to the problem.

There are a few things that the West can do. One is to follow the Latin motto “Si vis pacem, para bellum,” or “If you want peace, prepare for war.” This certainly applies to the Benelux, Germany, and Sweden, whose armed forces have been severely weakened over the past three decades.

While short-term adjustments in spending can boost government efficiency and eliminate wasteful programs, a permanent solution to economic stagnation and unending budget deficits must focus on the ideological core of the welfare state.

The near-total elimination of independent media has emboldened the pro-Beijing press to be even more aggressive in hounding the regime’s critics. Next week, on May 3rd, we will mark World Press Freedom Day. Let’s ensure it means something.

Following these elections, the horizon of French political life appears very dark. The next deadline is in about a month and a half with the legislative elections. President Macron is almost certain to win a majority, if not an absolute majority. From then on, he will have no counter-power—for five long years.

Matt Hancock’s performance as Britain’s Health Secretary exhibited all the wisdom of a man trying to prevent a burglary by welding the cat flap shut, but leaving the front door open.

In Western Europe, meanwhile, our globalized, post-national era of peace and prosperity has wrought decadence and complacency. It has erased from the national consciousness the blood and tears needed to get independence and to keep it.