Francis Berger, the international writer, philosopher, and blogger who lives in Hungary is a friend of mine. I have never met the man, never spoken with him on the phone, and he has never (yet) bailed me out of jail. But he is my friend, and I say this because he fulfills the criteria for that term, and because I have considerable respect and even affection for this distant man. I have no idea whether Francis considers me a friend or not, and even if he showed up at my farm and told me that he does not consider me his friend, it wouldn’t change a blankety-blank thing. That’s the…