This is Barack Obama below. And I bet Thomas Pynchon would agree. But I'm only "guessing" since I can't read his work like you do...

[Corbeau Castrum]

I live in Strasbourg, a European capital, which is mostly symbolic—we have one of the two European parliaments (all the politicking is done in Brussels, but they come here to vote ¯\_(ツ)_/¯), the Council of Europe, a pro-democracy organization that includes other countries outside of the EU (they are parallel and intersecting but legally distinct organizations), and the European Court of Human Rights (where one of Assange's cases was tried), which is managed by the Council. I am friends with people who work at the Council and the Court, and they tend to be left-liberal, with varying degrees of lucidity in a highly ideological environment, sinister and subtle, since they are paid bucketloads of money (relatively speaking) but nonetheless have so-called socially progressive values.

Democracy is presented in public advertising as an essentially European value, which helps bring Europe together with a respect for basic human rights and the rule of law. Bla bla...

In The Politics of Friendship (1994), Jacques Derrida deconstructs Democracy into the contradictory operation of respecting individual singularity (via human rights) and doing violence to this singularity by the mere act of counting and quantifying, which is essential to the functioning of the democratic process. He terms this an aporia, i.e. "an irresolvable internal contradiction or logical disjunction in a text, argument, or theory" (New Oxford American Dictionary).

When the war in Ukraine escalated in 2022, there was an internal conflict at the Council about what to do with Russia, which was then a member. Ultimately Russia was kicked out of the Council, which was presented as the ultimate act of solidarity with a threatened Ukraine. Yet people from countries which do not belong to the Council are unable to appeal to the Court for redressement after alleged human rights violations. So the Court is unable to hear cases from Russians experiencing human rights violations at the hands of their government (a lot of them, it would seem), nor can Ukrainians plead their cases, since their government has been given a free pass in another act of solidarity in the war. Sounds kinda cynical, huh?

After October 7th, the city of Strasbourg attempted to put up Israeli and Palestinian flags with a banner calling for peace at city hall. The Zionist contingency protested within the halls of power (of course), and so the city cancelled its plans and put up a generic banner calling for human rights and equality.

As the trove of Epstein files continue to be released, we learned in February that the former Norwegian prime minster, Chairman of the Norwegian Nobel Committee, and  former Secretary General of the Council, Thorbjorn Jagland, was under corruption for his dealings with Epstein. Quote from Politico (https://www.politico.eu/article/former-norway-pm-investigated-corruption-suspicion-over-jeffrey-epstein-files/):  "In one email from 2012, he informs Epstein about 'extraordinary young girls' in Albania, while in another one from 2013, he says 'we have seen pictures of your island and we would be delighted to visit it.'" As Secretary General of the Council, he had diplomatic immunity, but this was quickly removed so the Norwegian police could proscute Jagland, as they are now doing. Huh.

Due to my various friendships, I was able to get into the World Forum for Democracy last November in order to see a Gogol Bordello concert (which was excellent). I only arrived in time to see the last panel, but I managed to hear Michael O'Flaherty, the Human Rights Commissioner. After offering various platitudes about the rise of authoritarianism (a word so conveniently capacious that I have equally heard it from the mouth of a liberal American book publishing executive), he concluded his brief speech by urging, in response to this dangerous rise, "Don't be a dick." I am serious.

Frankly, if this is the best that the human rights commissioner of the "leading" pro-democracy organization at the "World Forum for Democracy" can say, we are fucking screwed.

Anne Applebaum writes of Péter Magyar in The Atlantic, "As a former member of Fidesz himself, he was able to speak with extra conviction about Fidesz’s corruption. He portrayed himself as a part of the European, democratic, law-abiding center-right. He waved a lot of Hungarian flags, as did his supporters." A former member of Fidesz...

Barack Obama, The Atlantic, and all the varying shades of "liberal" Eurocrats seemingly fail to understand that their politics of economic austerity ("Damned Beaver/Jeremy is the War, he is every assertion the fucking War has ever made—that we are meant for work and government, for austerity," 179-80 in penguin) are producing a mass (though not majoritarian, for sure) desire for these so-called "authoritarian" governments. Racism or fascism or sexism or exploitation or whatever are not problems of individual morality or complicity—they are grand social structures that can only be addressed collectively.

It's always hard to say whether they are more stupid or more evil, more innocence or more bad faith. Jesus would say they know not what they do. All I know is that the road to hell is paved with good intentions.

Will all this said, it is extremely interesting that Viktor Orbán could even lose power via a democratic process. Alas, November 2020, you slipped from my hands before I could even kiss you.

On Monday, April 13th, 2026 at 19:01, Mark Kohut <mark.kohut at gmail.com> wrote:

> Your Home Timeline
> 
> 
> 
> <https://x.com/BarackObama>
> Barackr rack arack Obama
> <https://x.com/BarackObama>
> @BarackObama
> <https://x.com/BarackObama>
> ·
> 8h <https://x.com/BarackObama/status/2043507244893982757>
> The victory of the opposition in Hungary yesterday, like the Polish
> election in 2023, is a victory for democracy, not just in Europe but around
> the world. Most of all, it’s a testament to the resilience and
> determination of the Hungarian people – and a reminder to all of us to keep
> striving for fairness, equality and the rule of law.
> 
> 
> 
> https://x.com/Gerashchenko_en/status/2043617976167870801?s=20 and an
> Atlantic gift article from Anne Applebaum below on the importance and some
> meanings of Hungary....
> https://x.com/anneapplebaum/status/2043617630993387898?s=20
> --
> Pynchon-L: https://waste.org/mailman/listinfo/pynchon-l
>