(Note to literalists: the Watched column presently contains only a smattering of 'warblogs' because the facilitator of the template-change--Dr. Menlo--is not very familiar with them, and will be adding more as they are sent to him. Also, this blog may contain areas of allusion, satire, subtext, context and possibly even a dash of the surreal: wannabe lit-crits beware.)
Control
[Watch this space for: Pentagon and Petroleum, The Media is only as Liberal as the Corporations Who Own Them, Wash Down With, and Recalcify]
WARBLOGGER WATCH
Wednesday, March 12, 2003
Allow me to presage what Matt Welch, tireless and breathless proponent of the Czech Republic and its democratic and independent neighbors, will make of the Zdenek Adamec case: "Just as Enron was a company-specific failure in no way demonstrative of market inefficiency and instability, Zdenek Adamec's sad act was merely another manifestation of his mania and not a suggestion that the Czechs are disillusioned with the fantastic liberties we know so well."
Such a narrative, while facile and wholly predictable, allows one to dismiss what was going through the young man's head before setting light to himself. One needn't contemplate why Adamec considered himself "another victim of the democratic system, where it is not people who decide, but power and money." Obviously the words of a madman. And while a know-nothing Czech teen can scribble on - "We didn't get any better even after the Velvet Revolution. The so-called Democracy we gained is not a Democracy. It is about the rule of officials, money and treading on people." - only a one-time expat can really appraise matters reliably. Also trust Welch to accurately reckon the infant body count of the Iraqi sanctions without ever having been there.
For us sane folks who enjoy the freedom to choose between, say, the DLC and the RNC, we can take a smug, self-satisfied peek at a patently deranged mind here.