Bruce Bawer says we could use more leaders like Vaclav Havel. I suspect we might do just as well to listen better to the Vaclav Havels that we already have.
[Havel] has also talked about Communism’s psychic legacy, which, though in the main profoundly negative, as it stunted its subjects both morally and spiritually, also had a positive side: for it taught people like him to cherish the freedom they didn’t have. And after they had won it, they knew they must never take it for granted. To stand up for freedom — not only theirs but that of others — was for them a profoundly felt moral obligation. It was worth their vigilance, their sacrifice. In the West, Havel knew, this kind of awareness and commitment were largely absent: “Naturally, all of us continue to pay lip service to democracy, human rights, the order of nature, and responsibility for the world,” he wrote, “but apparently only insofar as it does not require any sacrifice.” The West, he worried, had “lost its ability to sacrifice” — a point also made by Russian dissident Alexander Solzhenitsyn in a 1978 commencement address at Harvard. “A decline in courage,” Solzhenitsyn told the graduates on that day three decades ago,
may be the most striking feature which an outside observer notices in the West in our days. … Such a decline in courage is particularly noticeable among the ruling groups and the intellectual elite, causing an impression of loss of courage by the entire society. Of course, there are many courageous individuals, but they have no determining influence on public life.
Bawer’s article is a very illuminating, well-done bio of Havel — well worth reading in full.
P.J. O’Rourke (PDF link):
After all my time covering politics, I know a lot of politicians. They’re intelligent. They’re diligent. They’re talented. I like them. I count them as friends. But when these friends of mine take their intelligence, their diligence, and their talent and they put these into the service of politics, ladies and gentlemen, when they do that, they turn into leeches upon the commonwealth.
They are dogs chasing the cat of freedom. They are cats tormenting the mouse of responsibility. They are mice gnawing on the insulated wiring of individualism. They are going to hell in a hand basket, and they stole that basket from you. They are the ditch carp in the great river of democracy. And this is what one of their friends says.
Read the whole, hilarious thing!
I’m of a different mind than P.J. when it comes to the Iraq war/GWOT, but he sure hits the nail on the head in other respects.
In response to the most recent of several recommendations over the years, I’ve finally picked up a copy of Atlas Shrugged and dug in for what I’ve been assured will be a well worthwhile 1166 pages of reading. (I’ve only made it up to page 232 so far, so no spoilers, please, as I’m muchly enjoying the story!)
Among my favorite passages thus far, this bit of insight into protagonist Hank Rearden in a moment of crisis (p. 214):
He saw for the first time that he had never known fear because, against any disaster, he had held the omnipotent cure of being able to act. No, he thought, not an assurance of victory — who can ever have that? — only the chance to act, which is all one needs. Now he was contemplating, impersonally and for the first time, the real heart of terror: being delivered to destruction with one’s hands tied behind one’s back.
Well, then, go on with your hands tied, he thought. Go on in chains. Go on. It must not stop you. . . .
The passage definitely struck a chord with me, as the mere opportunity to act of my own accord, even if sometimes in error, is all that I have ever asked, and all that ever seemed truly necessary to me.
I look forward to enjoying more such gems if what I’ve read so far is representative of what’s in store.
Mind-nourishing food for thought and good discussion on the topic over at Bill Whittle’s place.
I’m back from New York, by the way, and hope to soon make time to post pictures and thoughts from my November 23rd visit to the World Trade Center site. Stay tuned…
This recent comment following Dr. Helen’s post “Time for Another Boston Tea Party?”, struck me as aptly put:
There are 24 hours in a day, 7 days in a week. We all get that, rich or poor. What one does with that time is up to that individual. 3% of the population, on average, has a library card. It’s free! The contents of a library are free to borrow! The cumulative knowledge of mankind is at hand, free! There are librarians there to help you, if you don’t understand the Dewey Decimal System. Free!
All men are created equal. After that, it’s up to each and every one of us. The reason one is rich, one is poor, one lives in a huge house, and one lives in an 8×10 cell is what’s between his ears. Always has been, always will be. Emotional IQ as well as intelligence IQ. A fair tax is a killer idea. If it’s fair. That is, as long as fairness is not the same as beauty, being in the eye of the beholder.
I am far and away from being wealthy. I believe in paying the goose that lays the golden eggs. It is good to help those who cannot help themselves. Food, clothing, roof over the head, help to get back on your feet. Then the “training wheels” need to come back off.
I have great sympathy for those who truly struggle, and believe those of us who are better off should do what we can to help others lift themselves up out of debilitating poverty. But if we value this magnificent free society that allows the production of this wealth that we are so fortunate to enjoy, we must do so by means of voluntary good that is consistent with the free society’s principles, rather than by coercive means, and we mustn’t allow the perpetuation of a “victim” mentality, or a soft bigotry of low expectations, to substitute for doing real, practical good.
Bill Whittle eloquently yet succinctly addressed the issue of poverty, what to do about it, and what not to do about it in his 2003 essay “Trinity” — highly recommended, and always worth another reading.
Happy Birthday, old friend. And thank you for the life you’ve made possible.
Cross the fearsome ocean,
brave the rolling seas
Show me to the Frontier,
where Men can scarcely be.
Leave me all the Risks
that go with being Free.
I’ll gladly take the lot,
as the price of Liberty.
