Great piece by Thomas Lifson in The American Thinker provides an uplifting vision of what we are fighting for and who is doing the fighting:

'The world’s future lies in the hands of a surprisingly open coalition of countries, regions, cities, and individuals, all of whom are members of the Anglosphere. Anyone, potentially, can join. The Anglosphere is a state of mind, a set of market-centered economic institutions, a philosophical understanding of the role and danger of government power, and a vast, dynamic, and almost universal popular culture, beloved of ordinary people and abhorred by elites.

'More than anything else, the Anglosphere is a set of rules, a paradigm of state and society, which creates freedom for dreamers and strivers to imagine and create the future. It provides property rights and courts, so that innovators can have a reasonable assurance of reaping the benefits of their genius and hard work. It affirms human dignity and certain inalienable rights, although the application of these is often problematic in practice.

'Many great ideas, battles, rulers, warriors, thinkers, doers, artists, and ordinary folk have made the Anglosphere into the dominant force leading the world boldly into a future of increasing human possibilities. The Magna Carta and the American Constitution; Burke and Locke and Adam Smith and the American Founders; Lord Nelson, Wellington, Washington and Eisenhower; Edison, Ford, Matsushita and Toyoda; Shakespeare, the Beatles, J.K. Rowling, Tezuka Osamu and George Lucas. All have had a hand in building and extending the Anglosphere into the world’s dominant system for the production of ideas, culture, and liberty, buttressed by the rule of law.

'Technology, the product of the free exploration and exploitation of ideas, also embodies the Anglosphere, spreading human freedom and human possibilities. The automobile, airplane, movies and television have all transformed, and continue to transform the world. These technologies can be shackled by the hand of the state, of course. But they nevertheless trend toward Anglosphere values, just as water can be damned, but trends toward flowing downstream. Freedom is a force of nature, once unleashed in sufficient quantity.'

These are of course the values of liberal democracy and free societies governed by the rule of law -- values that are now under attack from both within and without the Anglosphere. It's both a poignant celebration -- and a warning.

Posted by melanie at July 1, 2005