"The fallacy is to believe that under a dictatorial government you can be free inside. Quite a number of people console themselves with this thought, now that totalitarianism in one form or another is visibly on the up-grade in every part of the world. Out in the street the loudspeakers bellow, the flags flutter from the rooftops, the police with their tommy-guns prowl to and fro, the face of the Leader, four feet wide, glares from every hoarding; but up in the attics the secret enemies of the regime can record their thoughts in perfect freedom -- that is the idea, more or less. And many people are under the impression that this is going on now in Germany and other dictatorial countries."


--From my favorite writer, the indispensible George Orwell. I think most of the artistic, or "Hollywood" left, suffers from this fantasy. Does Susan Sarandon really think she could practice her art in Iran or Iraq? Does Rage Against the Machine think that Castro would tolerate their whole ethos of rebellion and revolution for its own sake were it directed against his regime? If they do, they are greatly naive. My guess is that such thoughts are inconveniant to their calculations, and therefore ignored.