Dr. Seuss Monetizes the Culture Wars

On March 2 — the late Theodor Seuss Geisel’s 117th birthday — Dr. Seuss Enterprises announced that, some time last year, it ceased publishing/licensing six of the popular author’s children’s books which “portray people in ways that are hurtful and wrong.” Cue woke approval, deplorable outrage, investor interest, and low-information reader fear, all of which are good for business.

Orwell for Socialism

In a reflective moment, George Orwell wrote, “Every line of serious work that I have written since 1936 has been written, directly or indirectly, against totalitarianism and for democratic socialism, as I understand it.”  Yet if you actually read his oeuvre, you’ll find a striking disparity: Orwell’s anti-totalitarian writing is massive, but his pro-socialist writing is wafer thin.