Dissidents Near and Far

HYPOCRISY DEPT.

I note that Russian dissident poet Kirill Medvedev is getting a lot of play in outfits like The New York Times and n+1 magazine. They applaud his attacks on intellectual and political corruption—in Russia.

Intellectual corruption in America isn’t touched by these organs. Political corruption, elitism, and cronyism in the U.S. is scarcely looked at by them. That both candidates in the recent Presidential election were Harvard grads—that every President from 1988 has been a graduate of either Harvard or Yale—isn’t something they want to think about. No. They’re concerned about democracy not here—but in Russia! So much safer.

Neither outfit, n+1 and New York Times, will give American literary dissidents the time of day. The Times recently called such writers, like those in the Underground Literary Alliance, “unpublishables.” Yes, I guess we are. Real democracy and intellectual freedom are in short supply in a lot of places.