ROGER KIMBALL: Unmerrie England.

Edgar Vincent, the first (and, as it happens, the last) Viscount D’Abernon, once remarked that “An Englishman’s mind works best when it is almost too late.” He died in the dark days of 1941 and so did not live to observe how events seemed to corroborate his maxim.

For anyone contemplating the fate of Great Britain today, the primary question would be whether that “almost” is still justified. There are, we think, two interrelated set of problems. One is the rapid Islamification of Great Britain. The other is the triumph of political correctness, the intolerant ideology of “wokeness.” The two are interrelated because the wokeness thrives in part as an excuse for, distraction from, or lubricant of Islamification.

Currently, Muslims account for about 6.5 percent of Britain’s population. That may seem like a small number. But there are two things worth noting. First, the Muslim population is likely to double within decades, in part because of untrammeled immigration from Muslim countries, in part because of the high birth rate of Muslims in Britain.

Second, even at 6.5 percent the Muslim presence reverberates everywhere in British society. In London and many other cities Muslim women parade through the streets in burkas. There are more than 1,800 mosques across Britain. There are also more than eighty Sharia courts operating in the shadow of British law courts. “Muhammad” is far and away the most popular name for boys. More than a quarter of Muslims live in government housing. Ramadan prayers echo not only in mosques but also in such traditionally British institutions as Windsor Castle. The mayor of London is a Muslim, as is the lord mayor of Sheffield and the deputy mayor of Luton. The newly appointed British Home Secretary, in charge of immigration, policing, and national security, is Shabana Mahmood, a Muslim of Pakistani descent. Last year, J. D. Vance speculated that the United Kingdom might well be the “first Islamist country with nuclear weapons,” a contingency, he noted, that would present America with a serious national-security issue.

Meanwhile, back in the States:

If you had lost a war and lived in a conquered country how would you know? https://t.co/Y7DfA3kmAk

— Auron MacIntyre (@AuronMacintyre) September 21, 2025