Avengers! I'm thrilled and honored to learn that "The Raft of the Medusa" and I will share a page on the good ship jollyroger.com. And it warms my heart that the officers of The Mighty Roger are pleased with "The Raft of the Medusa" poster. It is an inspiring piece of work. As for The Roger, it is a formidable craft and you have a steady wind behind you. And a Jolly Roger HQ sounds great!

As for me, though I still do some campaign consulting, much of my energy is devoted to the United Republican Fund of whose board of directors I'm proud to be a member. The URF, a political action committee based in Chicago, sees itself as the conscience of the Republican party; it's mission is to make sure that the hands at the wheel of the party faithfully steer a rightward course.

But as important as winning elections is to America's future, winning elections alone will not save Western culture from the barbarians at the gate. As you know, the false prophets of the postmodern fog and the sophists of PC are everywhere. And wherever they are, they must be confronted; those who desert their heritage and culture are guilty of mutiny against Truth itself. They mutiny because deep down in their dark souls it pains them to know they have nothing of value to leave for future generations; their only legacy is darkness. So they destroy. They rend. They "deconstruct". Not only literature, but art and history as well. And once the Permanent Things have lost all meaning then, and only then, can these "new gods" rebuild society in their own image.

Fortunately, Great Literature is to the postmodern "scholar" what a mirror is to the vampire; it exposes them for the empty, withered husks they are. Great Literature affirms what they deny: that wisdom is the distilled knowledge of the human experience, the experience the PC crowd intensely reviles. That's why the Jolly Roger is so important. Those drawn to its beacon understand the treasures that could be lost forever. Anyone who ever stood misty-eyed before chiseled stone or oil on canvas; anyone who ever felt a shiver run the length of their spine and penetrate their soul upon reading the words of a poet, playwright or author; and anyone who ever felt their chest tighten and heart stop at the sound of musical instruments in communion with one another knows that they have been touched by Truth and by God. And that is something worth fighting for.

It is clear to me that there is no front line in the culture war between the left and the right. The battle, I learned, is wherever you happen to be: In the hallowed halls of America's best private colleges and in the student unions of state-run public universities; in the classroom and in the courtroom; on school boards and county boards; in popular culture and in high culture; on radio talk shows, on television and in the press; in churches and in temples; within the digital battlefields of America Online, Compuserve and Prodigy; in Usenet newsgroups and now on the pages of the World Wide Web.

So sail on, Jolly Roger, and seek out others who hold the Permanent Things dear. Rally 'round the skull and bones. Inspire the launching of a thousand ships on campuses across the murky seas of postmodern academia. Confront the Great Lie and its Deathwish wherever it drops anchor. Look it in the eye and with a blast from the Western Canon send it to the muddy bottom where even the scavengers won't touch it.

Give no quarter.

As ever,

Captain Blood

THE CAPTAIN RESPONDS: Avast Captain Blood! Your words say it better than I could, so let me thanks be simple and short, so as to not to decrease the content/word ratio of this page.