Unlike most of the anti-war, anti-globalization, anti-trade, anti-science wool-heads who clutter our Leftish press these days with their inane polemics, Bob Geldof manages to combine a passion for improving life in Africa with the complete absence of ideology. He also does something real about his passion. In comparison with Geldof, the Naomi Kleins, George Monbiots and Arundhati Roys of this planet seem to do as much good for the poor of the south as David Hasselhoff. Actually, I must correct myself; there are lot of people in Africa who enjoy Baywatch immensely (which is more than can be said for Roy’s over-written books).

Following his clear-headed analysis of George W. Bush’s contribution to the problems of the African continent

“Whatever one thinks about what else this Administration is doing, and we all have our opinions, on AIDS in Africa they are transforming the agenda against all expectations. The President is to be congratulated on his boldness. But now Bush needs to ensure that the cheque gets signed.”

(shockingly making the front page of The Guardian), Geldof published another piece in its sister paper The Observer this weekend.

In accounting for Africa’s woes, he has attacked the EU and Stalinist African regimes, scarily obvious corporate monsters the wool-heads prefer to ignore in favour of truly evil players, like, er, Starbucks and, that old favourite, The Military Industrial Complex. The MIC, no doubt, provided the Hutus of Rwanda with the “smart machetes” they used to slaughter hundreds of thousands of their fellow human beings, and Starbucks the refreshments during their breaks from genocide. (Cheap shot, I know, but that never bothered Arundhati Roy who claimed before the war that someone—she wasn’t exact about who—was planning to “bomb Afghanistan back to the Stone Age”. Looks like the old MIC missed out out big time there.) Geldof also, rightly, puts the boot into corrupt European leaders, again usually ignored by those on the Left, too eager to see the motes in American eyes, rather than the beams in their own.