Late one night after attending one of those innumerable democratization conferences, I found myself in a run-down bar in an Eastern European capital along with a group of local intellectuals.
The drinking game we played that night was to replace a supernatural figure in an epic poem with that of a contemporary individual. My own contribution to the evening’s festivities was to recite Allen Ginsberg’s “Howl” – that seminal cri du coeur of late-night soul searching – while replacing every mention of “Moloch” with “George Soros”. The experiment turned out shockingly well:
“Soros! Soros! Nightmare of Soros! Soros the loveless! Mental Soros! Soros the heavy judger of men!
Soros the incomprehensible prison!
Soros the crossbone soulless jailhouse and Congress of sorrows!
Soros whose buildings are judgment! Soros the vast stone of war! Soros the stunned governments!
Soros whose mind is pure machinery!
Soros whose blood is running money! Soros whose fingers are ten armies!
Soros whose breast is a cannibal dynamo! Soros whose ear is a smoking tomb!”
This seemed like a fitting substitution, as the name of the legendary financier has become synonymous in some circles with that of the evil bronze demi-god who demands a steady stream of human sacrifice to appease his infinite lust for power. While some view Soros as a saintly philanthropist who has done a world of good in his efforts to democratize his native Eastern Europe, others view as the avatar incarnate of a monstrous conspiracy to subvert democratic popular will through financial and political manipulation.
