The Independent reports that perhaps the most important intellectual battle of our time is being waged in Le Monde: Is Harry Potter a capitalist neo-liberal sellout? Or is he against globalization? Who knew that J.K. Rowling was a grand seer in the tradition of L. Frank Baum?

Next up: Is Spongebob Squarepants a Marxist or a Trotskist? Do the Teletubbies represent a failed 1970s commune more effectively than T.C. Boyle’s Drop City?

(And in a somewhat related matter, Rowling’s fessed that she pulled her character names from phone books.)