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Fifteen years after 9/11 we continue to feel the aftershocks. They are present in the U.S. presidential campaign. They are present in Ottawa, as Canadian politicians begin to grapple, belatedly, with populist nativism. Remembered daily or put out of mind, the attacks on the Twin Towers and the Pentagon resonate everywhere and change everything, still.

It’s unclear at this juncture that world leaders — even the most powerful – have much control of the aftermath even now, or more than a very bleary idea of what to do about it. Like the rest of us they’re hanging on, clinging to the life buoy, praying for calm. Except for the predatory few, the Donald Trumps, Nigel Farages and Marine Le Pens, who’ve tried to catch a wave.

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To understand what connects the murders of 2,996 people on that bright, awful morning to the rise of Trump and the “alt right” 15 years on, or the possible disintegration of a borderless Europe, or indeed Conservative leadership aspirant Kellie Leitch’s plan to screen immigrants for “anti-Canadian” values, we need only review the history. The inflection points are impossible to miss.