Fraters Libertas

Future Shock

I’ve been googling all morning in an attempt to find the identity of the curious British reporter asking those impertinent questions of the President yesterday. Thus far my attempts to expose the ink stained wanker have proven fruitless.

But on the positive side, now that I’ve associated the phrase “expose the ink stained wanker” with Fraters Libertas, we’re sure to be getting bizarre newsprint fetishists arriving at our site via their own sad google searches for centuries to come.

(And if any of you sick freaks are reading this in the year 2103, I say welcome. We may not agree with the intent of what you googled, but we’ll fight to the death your right to artificially inflate our traffic numbers. No doubt the Elder’s heirs appreciate the support you’re providing to their unique visitor claims in their banner advertising media kit. And I must say, you are truly among the most unique visitors we have. Now, click over and buy some of that delicious and nutritious Vitaganza.)

In my search, I did run across some British media criticism from Denis Boyle in National Review Online that was interesting. Besides a run down on the BBC’s portrayal of the anti-Bush protestors, he also excerpted a statement from a British columnist regarding an anti-capitalism conference recently held in Paris. And it’s the most concise, articulate comment I’ve read yet about why socialism is inherently flawed:

In the truest, most practical sense, the Left is reactionary. Sometimes, that causes problems for leftwing columnists like the Guardian's George Monbiot, who went to the FSE gathering — only to suffer a blinding, forehead-slapping epiphany:

"In Paris, some of us tried to tackle this question [of the evils of capitalism] in a session called 'life after capitalism.' By the end of it, I was as unconvinced by my own answers as I was by everyone else's. While I was speaking, the words died in my mouth, as it struck me with horrible clarity that as long as incentives to cheat exist (and they always will) none of our alternatives could be applied universally without totalitarianism."

At least this observer, George Monbiot, is honest and historically aware enough to recognize that totalitarianism of any variety is a bad idea. I honestly get the sense that many of my socialist admiring friends in Mac-Groveland and South Minneapolis would think that as long as it’s their philosophy being imposed on everyone else, then what’s the problem? Since they’re more intelligent and compassionate than anyone else, the world would have to be a better place, despite all the reeducation camps and mass graves.