Victor Hanson has over the last year become one of my favorite commentators. His articles exhibit a strong commitment to logic and reason – wherever that leads. That is precisely why since 2008 I have been deeply concerned for the future sanity and well-being of this nation. Not merely that we elected Barack Obama as president. Hanson explains well how and why that happened. But that our ability to think clearly and speak honestly appears to be in decline.
Let me put it this way. If the Obama Administration were up front and honest about its ideology and agenda – I would still oppose it. If people supported this administration but did so knowing full well and acknowledging openly its agenda and methodology – I would still disagree with them.
But I would do so with vastly more respect.
Witness this administration’s recent Nixonian attempts to marginalize and demonize anyone who questions or challenges it. “Fox is not a news organization”. But MSNBC and CNN are? And yet to their significant credit when the White House attempted to exclude Fox News from interviewing its “corporate pay czar” they said “we refuse to participate unless you include Fox”. Well done.
But there is hope. America is beginning to return to rationality. Victor Hanson begins:
For 30 months the nation has been in the grip of a certain Obama obsession, immune to countervailing facts, unwilling to face reality, and loath to break the spell. But like all trances, the fit is passing, and we the patient are beginning to appreciate how the stupor came upon us, why it lifted, and what its consequences have been.
Read the whole thing at National Review Online.
Hanson concludes his piece with a choice – and a prophecy:
He could imitate Bill Clinton’s 1995 Dick Morris remake. In Obama’s case, that would mean, abroad, cutting out the now laughable apologies for his country, ceasing to court thugs like Ahmadinejad, Chávez, and Putin, keeping some distance from the U.N., and paying closer attention to our allies like Britain and Israel. At home, he could declare victory on his sidetracked agenda and then start over by holding spending in line, curbing the deficit, stopping the lunatic Van Jones–style czar appointments, courting the opposition, and tabling cap-and-trade
. I think there is very little chance of any of the above, whatever voters may have thought during the campaign.
Or, instead, Obama could hold the pedal to the floor on the theory that, as a proven ideologue, he must move the country far left before the voters catch on and stop him in his tracks in November 2010. That would mean more of the “gorge the beast” effort to spend and borrow so much that taxes have to soar, and thus redistribution of income will be institutionalized for a generation. He would push liberal proposals no matter how narrow the margin in the Senate. He would keep demonizing Fox News
If he chooses the former, he might well be a more successful version of Bill Clinton given that his appetites are far more in check.
But if, as is likely, he chooses the latter, he will polarize the country in a way not seen since 1968, set back racial relations to the 1960s, do to the reputation of big government what LBJ did from 1964 to 1968, and, in the manner of what Jimmy Carter
I am not optimistic about President Obama. But I am cautiously hopeful about the American electorate.
