Circa 1973 the movie “Roller Ball” was in the theaters. In this dystopian world, corporations ruled the world and they were simply extensions of the nation states and in control. They were the nation state.
It was a great movie but a warning just as 1984 was a warning. The leftist corporate states of today, such as Google, Microsoft, Facebook, the vast majority of the media etc. are an existential threat to our republic. Oddly the corporate states in the movie were portrayed as neither right or left but just corporate tyranny. Corporate tyranny can be either left or right.
They are the face of tyranny. George Orwell was right.
Orwell completed his greatest novel living alone on the Isle of Jura off the Scotish coast. Summers there are wonderful. The winter is brutal. His warmth in his cottage was by oil fired stoves and his light at night was by lantern. It was a most fitting place for him to complete his greatest novel. He was dying from Tuberculosis.
After completion of his great work he returned to London and it was published. In his few years left his family cared for him. He was a brilliant man.
He went to Spain during the revolution and fought for the communists as a Republican. In Spain he found the evilness of Marxism. Oddly he was wounded not by Franco’s troops but by fights between Marxist forces.
He returned to England as a libertarian and light socialist. He abhorred Marxism on his return. If he had of lived longer he would have been a hard core conservative if he had seen what the socialism brought to his nation.
ps
Franco saved Spain from the communists. Juan Carlos his appointed heir saved Spain from Franco after Franco’s death.
Juan Carlos was to be the king of Spain with absolute dictatorial powers of a king. Upon Franco’s death Juan Carlos did assume these powers and then lead Spain to immediate democracy (he should have made it a republic but that is a different conversation).
The military revolted against Juan Carlos. Juan Carlos had no army as the army was his foe. Juan Carlos walked into parliament and demanded the military step down. They did. Those at the top of the military were old men and did remember the horror of the Spanish Civil War in their youth. They had no stomach to repeat this.
Juan Carlos saved Spain.
Forgot to add this, if one wants to know the transformation of a communist to a libertarian read Orwell’s “Letters from Catalonia.” In reality this was actually an intellectual preface to his great novel 1984. Orwell gained much wisdom in Spain. In Spain he saw the belly of the beast. It changed him.
great account that made me hearken back because I once lived in a place with cold winters that had an oil fired stove to warm it up.
More accurately this was a natural gas fired kitchen cook stove. You cooked meals w natural gas...... that ... HOLD ON...... In a separate burner built in compartment burned kerosene (aka fuel oil) sucked upward from a tank in the basement. What excellent design! And the kerosene burned very cleanly so I got no complaints.
The kerosene fueled kitchen heat heated the house. Not very well but it was there to gather around.