PROMETHEAN ANTAGONIST

I'm still quite behind in the leisure self-indulgence of blog posting but have had some time to read commentary from several good sites.

'An interesting essay from March 12th in the American Thinker (yes, that's right, contrary to trendy contemporary belief, Americans can often think):

"...The groundwork for moral equivalence between democracy and murderous tyranny was laid over two generations of willful post-modern obfuscation of the difference between 'the fire and the fire brigade,' as Churchill aptly called it. Unsurprisingly, the intellectual paragons of such ethical primitivism included Nazi admirers like Paul de Man, Martin Heidegger and Francois Mitterand, and Stalin worshippers like Jean-Paul Sartre. Many Sixties radicals in Europe were totalitarians in spirit, taking their cues from fascist as well as Leftist forerunners. Just as before the war, 'les extrêmes se touchent (the extremes converge).' When the violent past of famous Green politician Joschka Fischer was exposed, he simply explained that, yes, 'we (radicals) were drawn to the totalitarian temptation'..."

"... The struggle between enlightenment and the totalitarian temptation has never yet ceased, and it may never cease. Totalitarians are experts in the art of demagogy, sophistry and manipulation, but the bottom line is always destroying free speech, free thoughts and free actions. So it's not that hard to tell the sides from each other, even when the colors change from Black to Red to Green. The question is always: Can you tolerate open debate? If not, as in today's European Union, then you are at bottom a totalitarian. If yes, then you are a classical liberal --- or a modern democratic conservative."

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Yesterday I had the pleasure of seeing the movie, Perfume (I live in Japan so I'm sometimes a bit behind on what people have already seen in recent film productions).

Wow! What a masterpiece! Aside from noting the brilliance of mood and sensory immersion created in the film, I'd like to comment briefly on its quality in depicting a historical era. I was a history major in college and, along with a rather vivid imagination, I've been fortunate to have seen different times and places in my mind's eye without the foggy glasses of idealism -- who knows, I guess lots of people can do that. Anyway, I couldn't help but note the absolute filth portrayed in daily life in the Paris of over two centuries ago. Keep in mind that this was one of the high pinnacles of civilization of the time and yet -- a cesspool of brutish and vulgar living.

The reason I note this is that, as I have often sought to point out, we truly do live in the best of times. For those of us who are simple, average, and unwealthy, we live better than the kings of past eras, decent hygiene being only one manifestation of the contemporary bourgeois living standard. And yet, we are still told by some bitter intellectuals that we live in a terrible time and that every hangnail is directly caused by the free market and it's spawn in golden arches, and global coffee chains.

When I watched the well depicted filth of 18th century France in the movie Perfume I was more than aware that it was the philosophies that bred capitalism that ultimately lifted us from such ruts. The trendy counter-philosophies of today would tell us to return to the age of king and court (in this case autocrat and bureaucracy -- the all-consuming state).

Offended by a few shiny signs advertising products that many others actually want? Fine. Go live in North Korea or Cuba. Or better yet, take a time machine to a "simpler and better" time, and wallow in the muck of 18th century mud for your few miserable years of disease ridden existence.

I'll go with the "evil" and "selfish" capitalist system -- extra lettuce and tomato.