The French nobility, observed Tocqueville in The Ancien Regime and The Revolution, supported many of the writers whose essays and observations ended up threatening their own rights and even their existence. Today we see much the same farce repeated, as the world's richest people line up behind causes that, in the end, could relieve them of their fortunes, if not their heads. In this sense, they could end up serving, in Lenin's words, as useful idiots in their own destruction. Although they themselves have benefited enormously from the rise of free markets, liberal protection of property...
