The Current Scene
Disconnect
The idea that democratization can help the stagnant Middle East is now moribund and slurred as a neo-con conspiracy or worse. Yet, when one surveys the region—the hard-working Karzai government, the efforts to calm Iraq, the return of Bhutto to Pakistan, the brave Lebanese efforts to stave off Syrian agents and Hezbollah, the debates in the Turkish Parliament—I see a lot more hope for constitutional rule there than in so-called “stable” Russia (Putin now trying to ensure that Iran gets the bomb, and that Europe is perennially to live in fear) or China (furious that the Dalai Lama would dare meet with an American President.)
Turkish Holocaust
Of course, in waves of horrific violence, the Ottomans had hoped that large numbers of Christian Armenians in 1915, as well as later Greeks in Smyrna, would perish in mass. There were special extermination gangs, camps of death, and forced starvation—the means (the Ottomans did not have gas chambers, good rails, and sophisticated crematoria at their disposal), not the intent, were what differed mostly from Nazi Germany. California’s Central Valley is home to a large part of the Armenian Diaspora, and I grew up hearing chilling tales of Turkish butchery and ethnic cleansing, especially among neighboring raisin farmers (the industry was built by Armenian refugees at the turn of the century.)
But all that said, why after nearly 100 years, should the US House of Representatives prepare to vote to condemn a defunct Ottoman state, at a time when we are trying to keep Turkey in touch with the West, out of democratic Kurdistan, and willing to let us use facilities there to keep the effort in Iraq well supplied?
It makes no sense to condemn Turkey for its forefathers’ crimes, but then do nothing about ongoing slaughter from the Congo to Rwanda—much less unilaterally to withdraw abruptly from Iraq, when we know our departure would unleash massive violence against civilians worse than we have seen heretofore in the war.
Either the Pelosi gambit is to be seen as a way to stop the Iraqi war by cutting off our supplies through Turkey, or simply a ‘all politics are local’ pandering to domestic constituencies, or both, or proof (if proof were needed after her visit to the assassination-mind Bashar Assad) of her inexperience and ineptitude.
HR McMaster
I spent some time in Iraq accompanying Col. HR McMaster who was on an inspection tour of the forward operating bases. He is a UNC PhD, former Hoover Security fellow, and author of an acclaimed book, Dereliction of Duty, on (the lack of) military leadership during Vietnam, as well as one of Gen. Petraeus’s top counter-insurgency thinkers.
I could not imagine a tour (some 30-40 days I think he is on) that would pose more risks—humveeing and coptering into all sorts of places, regardless of the recent 24-hour conditions. Over the years, in Gulf War I, and Operation Iraqi Freedom, he has seen a number of close calls, and walks with a limp from an injured hip (probably will have to be replaced). Full body armor, pistol, and M-16 to lug around can’t help the pain.
I would watch him negotiate with Sunni governors, police chiefs, and generals, then be debriefed by Marine and Army officers, then go on tour in Humvees or foot patrols. This would start at 7 am and end at 8pm. Then after the long helicopter trip back to Camp Victory, HR would eat and join discussion with fellow Colonels until after 11 PM.
We often talk loosely of the idea of a renaissance man, but colonels like McMaster come closest—I would add another Colonel Chris Gibson—to the idea that I have ever come across.
Something is going on in Iraq entirely missed by media. It’s not just that things are turning around, but rather Gen. Petraeus has assembled perhaps the most gifted group of Army officers seen in a generation—who feel they are going to snatch victory from the jaws of political defeat. I think they will pull it off and the entire political landscape here at home will have to readjust to it by early next year. The smarter Democrats will take credit by claiming their anti-Bush efforts forced needed change, the denser ones will just continue to deny, like Sens. Reid and Schumer, that any good is occurring at all.
Democrats
By habit I remain a registered Democrat, largely because my parents and grandparents were agrarian populists in outlook. I also try to vote and support (even as our district boundaries keep changing) one Democrat, Jim Costa, our local Democratic congressman, who is cut from the Scoop Jackson mold. Central Valley Democrats used to be considered mainstream center-right people in a way unimaginable now. We forget that a long time ago, Democrats were considered sort of tough, practical minded, a world away from the blueblood golf course crowd, receptacles of conservative values in a way the elite Republicans were not. That’s ancient history now.
I throat clear like that because of the steady insanity shown by the Democratic political class. Now Congressman Stark accuses President Bush of enjoying the deaths of our soldiers in Iraq; this follows Harry Reid’s letter trying to intimidate and silence Rush Limbaugh. And, of course, we witnessed a litany of insanity voiced by Sens. Kerry, Durbin, and Kennedy about Iraq and our soldiers, who were libeled as everything from terrorists to Saddamites to Nazis by those three. Congressman Murtha pronounced Marines guilty of war-crimes before they were tried. Sen. Obama asserted our troops killed innocent civilians, while Sen. Reid and Clinton essentially called Gen. Petraeus a fabricator (“suspension of belief”).
When we factor in the “Betray-us” ad, the Hollywood antics, and the university embarrassments, whether denying Larry Summers a right to speak at UC Davis or welcoming in Ahmadinejad at Columbia, one is forced to ask, “What happened to liberal thinking and the Democratic Party?” Why do dissent and criticism almost immediately devolve into elemental rage, whether Durbin screaming that our soldiers are Nazis or Moveon.org that their leader is a traitor? Why do deans, media heads, and politicians show such bad taste?
Plenty of explanations come to mind: the Democrats were out of power and frustrated with their impotence, and show a furor at being out of the loop for years. There is also something to the changing demographics of the party, which now includes a number of rich and mega-rich supporters, who apparently feel, that unlike a hardware store owner, or an accountant, they have made it, are exempt from mundane worries, and have enough money not to care about taxes and climbing entitlements.
Among this very elite, liberalism is now a sort of entrée for business, entertainment and leisure, a social requisite, like being a petty Christian official in the Medieval World, always taken for granted and not often examined.
Among this new influential class, clustered in universities towns, and progressive cities like Seattle, the Bay Area, the southern California Coast, Boulder, New England, and the suburbs of Washington, hating George Bush, or assuming that Western industrial rapacity is heating up the planet for profits, or that Iraq is a war for Halliburton is all akin to having oak floors, leather furniture, a stainless steel, granite kitchen, a glass of white wine after work at a fern bar, or driving a Prius to campus—manifest symbols of taste, erudition, and culture. Championing social causes at a distance also provides the upscale a sort of psychological penance: e.g., something like ‘I wouldn’t dare live or tutor in East Palo Alto, but will play the radical at Stanford’s picturesque campus as spiritual recompense.’
NB: the Kerry and Gore and Michael Moore lifestyles at odds with their professed rhetoric. I doubt should the obese Moore need heart surgery that he will go to Havana, or that Gore will plug his mansion into wind turbines or fly commercial, or that Kennedy will allow a windmill on his vacation home horizon.
Other factors that explain why Democratic leaders appear so ill-mannered are the legacies of the general uncouthness of the 1960s. One sees that in Cindy Sheen talking about her womb, or Moveon.orgs tasteless ads, or the language of a Bill Maher, or the sort of placards you see at campus protests, or the web postings on the leftwing sites.
In the 1960s, there was a general assault on manners, language, habit, protocol—anything deemed “plastic” or part of the “establishment” responsible for classism, imperialism, racism, and sexism. We forget that those who embraced it an early age (I saw the very tail-end of that dying movement as a freshman at UC Santa Cruz in 1972), did not just fly off to Mars.
Instead their coarseness was imprinted deeply upon their souls and the culture at large. And as we watch that generation age, whether in Congress or in films or at our universities, we see people inherit great positions of power—deans, bureau chiefs, senators—even as their small 1960s essences remain trapped in aging bodies. So just rent the DVD Woodstock, add 40 some years to those bodies, and, presto, imagine them all with suits and ties running universities, newspapers, foundations, and government, torn between the enjoyment of the lavishness that democratic capitalism provides them and their very abstract disdain for it.
Thanks,
I want to thank readers for expressions of concern. I’m feeling better and hope to be normal again in a few more days. I learned that there is a small number of us who seem to have these constant stone- and gravel-making propensities that call for intervention from time to time; your letters reminded what an accursed group we are. I hope never to see another stint in this lifetime.
Professor Hanson-
I know exactly what you speak to relative to the 60′s madness as I was raised in (and still live near) marvy Marin, the bounty County (CA), the world’s disconnect epicenter. Great post. Thanks.
http://www.greensrealworld.blogspot.com
I have just received an anonymous e-mail with a link to a site, I Call BS, that purports to have a secret recording of Harry Reid’s Secretary from Friday morning. You can listen to the mp3 and judge for yourself. It seems authentic to me.
Some one should tell Rush.
Professor,
The next time I have an argument with a DEM I’m just going to boot up your sight and demand they read your stories. Hopefully their minds will be opened. Thanks
The Woodstock generation’s last gasp is Hillary. If she’s defeated, that’s it for them.
And my take about the Children of the 60′s? It was always about THEM.
And the Clintons were the prime example.
–
thank you, sir, for the excellent read and thought provocation.
The selective hypocrisy and the assumed moral superiority is what the 60′s Leftists must be challenged on.
Over and over.
70′s Vietnam anti-war meant acceptance, if not support, for evil commie victory & Killing Fields genocide. Until the actual moral question is honestly addressed, War or Genocide, Western Civ will decline.
Supporting the not-so-good Shah, or accepting the unknown-evil Ayotollah.
War against Hutus or accpeting Tutsi genoicide. War against Sudan or accpeting genocide in Darfur … today.
The acceptance of ‘F**k speak’ other common potty-mouth expressions has degraded the bounds of common curtesy. But worse, without ‘dirty words’ being forbidden, there is no relief from slight anger in using them. So worse expressions of anger against “them” become common. F**k speak as acceptable has helped foster increased polarization.
I know, not merely believe, that everything you say in this post about the Democratic Party is true. I was born and raised as a Democrat until, rather late in life I am ashamed to say, realized that they are the nexus of anti-semitism in this country. As a Jew who lived through a lot of anti-semitism from the right in my youth this shocked me into listening, unbiased for the first time, to what the other side represents. I started by re-reading Hayek.
I am sorely disappointed that you remain a Democrat.
From one perspective, it seems like the 60s era products came to a fork in the road and took it.
The larger portion appeared to become reabsorbed into more or less traditional American life. They were the people who went to work, earning livings, producing goods, providing services, and generally recognizing the nature of their connections with others.
They steadily became at least “de-radicalized.”
A significant group, of lesser size, but strategically positioned, did not go to those kinds of work, but became largely wordsmiths (Nozick’s “Intellectuals” who hate Capitalism [inter alia]), denizens of the institutions – academe, foundations, “interest” groups – basically waging influence not advancing learning; producing nothing; adding nothing.
That is a perception of one in his 80′s, who saw action in WW II, with a son in Dr. Hanson’s age bracket (who works).
Our prayers are with you. As for the crazy left, I believe that their anger comes from the fact that their entire view of the world was attacked on 9-11-2001. It is all fine to judge yourself to be morally superior by supporting negotiated settlements, the UN, the EU, multiculturalism, etc., but then along come the happy-head-choppers who personify evil. If Bush is right, and we are in a global struggle for the survival of western society, then the 1960′s radicals have been wrong this whole time. It is easier for them to believe that Bush, or America, created these Islam-o-fascists than to believe that culture really does matter. And, surprise, that Western Society really is superior to the alternatives.
“What happened to liberal thinking and the Democratic Party?” Why do dissent and criticism almost immediately devolve into elemental rage, whether Durbin screaming that our soldiers are Nazis or Moveon.org that their leader is a traitor? Why do deans, media heads, and politicians show such bad taste?
So true. I mean, when you have Glenn Beck making political hay over Californians’ homes burning, Michelle Malkin and Mark Steyn publicly attacking a child as “fair game” over SCHIP, Rush Limbaugh calling soldiers who protest the war “phony” — then scrubbing his transcripts — then comparing a soldier who responded to his smear to a suicide bomber, Cliff May calling Hillary Clinton a “Vaginal American,” Ann Coulter suggesting Jews are “imperfect” unless they convert, Bill O’Reilly expressing shock and surprise at the lack of vulgarity at an upscale black restaurant, Tucker Carlson linking the Obama campaign with the Khmer Rouge, Jean Schmidt calling John Murtha a coward on the House floor, Ann Coulter calling John Edwards a “faggot” at CPAC, Rush Limbaugh calling an Iraqi war vet who criticized the war a “staff puke”…
Victor–thanks for covering Irag in a non-partisan way. Our “professional” media should read your site and learn how to report.
I have never been cursed with stones, but have dealt with an appendix. If anyone deserves a break from pain it is you…take care.
Funny, you should mention being a registered Dem. I was just planning to call my local board of elections to find out about switching in time for voting in the presidential primaries. I come from a Dem. family also and registered Independant first but switched to Dem because in NY Independant’s can’t vote in primaries. Since the Dems haven’t produced anyone I care to vote for –and haven’t for a long time– I’m thinking about switching. I just don’t want my father to know,he still hasn’t got over that I voted for Bush in ’04.
he still hasn’t got over that I voted for Bush in ’04.
He’s in good company with the 75% of Americans who don’t approve of the job Bush is doing.
thanks actor212, once again I am shown evidence as to why my mugging of reality after 9/11/2001 convinced me that the once classical liberal Democrat Party is today the illiberal Plantation Party I had no choice but to leave.
The decline and fall of the old Democratic Party began before the 1960s when members of the American Communist Party realised they would never win elections and decided to infilterate the DP. I heard this from a top ACP member in 1954. Remember Henry Wallace, secretary of agriculture? One of his cronies told me about the plan.
By joining the DP they knew they could influence others, who could be elected, to make social changes they wanted. The 1960s revolution played into their hands perfectly.
My prediction for the future is that IF Hillary is elected the first U.S. American president — she will in the first term — be the first president assasinated in the 21st Century. The important question is not will she be elected – it’s WHOM will be her vice president?
“By habit I remain a registeredDemocrat”. WHAT? What are you saying?. How can you associate with a political party with which you so clearly disagree by your own publuished statements? Because you support Rep. Costa? What a cop out. If Rep. Costa is such an estimable representative, shouldn’t your position be that HE should disassociate himself from affiliation with a party which so positions itself in opposition to what you so eloquently proclaim as your touchstones of belief? I’m not stating that you should proclaim alligience to the Republican Party or any other alternative poltical party. But I don’t understand at all why you can admit any affiliation with a party that so represents beliefs so antagnostic to your publically stated values and positions. You might be loyal to the party of FDR or to the party of Hubert Humphrey. How can that possibly justify identification with the party of senators such as Teddy Kennedy or Chuck Schumer? Unfortunately, at this tme the Democratic Party is the party of Harry Reid and of Hillary Clinton.
Ever notice how when a Leftist chimes in, he adds nothing to the discussion other than his piss and vinager?
The Actor may have some telling points about folks who occasionally go near the deep end (I’ll have to take his word about Beck – I don’t listen to him). But here’s the thing: all those people are commentators, are mostly entertainers, whose job it is to engage in controversy.
But for every name on that list, we can cite two or more from the liberal side. Pete Stark (as in stark raving mad) is a Congressman, someone whose job is to pass laws, help determine public policy, and in general help run the country. Is this the kind of guy we want to be among those in charge?
Look at most of the other leading Democrats. Howard Dean, who was abandoned by his party for some sort of irrepressible behavior. Dennis Kucinich, who dreams of a Department of Peace. Harry Reid, who seems to believe that the California fires were the result of global warming (though he denies saying it, it’s on tape). Hillary Clinton, who tells her supporters that “we’re going to take it away from you for the common good”.
I would not trust any of these people to run a small village, let alone a country.
While one may well make the case that the airwaves are in the hands of conservative egotistical extroverts, I make the case that the Democratic party and Congress are in the hands of small-minded opportunists whose main aim is to make a buck – most often by raising taxes (after all, there are people out there who have way too much money. It’s simply not fair. And we have the experience to decide who has too much and who doesn’t). And whose other main aim is to micro-manage everybody’s lives.
Unfortunately, the current crop of Republican candidates is nothing to crow about. At least here in California, independents can vote in primaries. A long time ago, the Democratic party left me (I voted for JFK); more recently, it looks like the Republican Party has left as well.
I’m glad to hear that Dr Hanson is doing better. Martin Luther also suffered from “the stone”, and managed to write 55 volumes explaining his concept of “sola scriptura”. I’ve been there, too, as as fun goes, that isn’t it.
Thank you, Dr. Hanson, for prime wisdom as usual. Apparently you and I are the same age or close (I entered UCLA in 1972).
I was a loyal Democrat for over 30 years. The devolution of the entire party into coarse, narcissistic hate and vitriol finally chased me out. I agree with your analysis but also strongly agree with Fast Phil. My husband and I were in NYC on 9/11, our first trip together there in 4 years (took the train down from the Hudson Valley on a gorgeous day), and I remember thinking as the world turned to utter chaos that every single belief and worldview that Democrats in general and the Left in particular cherished had literally gone up in smoke. From a belief decades ago in a robust foreign policy and defense, the party was now in the clutches of the “can’t we all just get along” children and idiots. A whole house of ideological cards fell that day, they can’t admit it, it has them screaming in the wilderness now, and the fallout from their inability to grow up and see the world and humanity as it really is will most likely cause the next, worse event.
As a boomer, I have to say that the boomer generation is a sore disappointment on so many levels. We might be the very opposite of our parents, the Greatest Generation.