Hanson’s Hubris
Over at NRO, Victor Davis Hanson is denouncing "messianic delusions of grandeur, hubris, and a strange naivete." NRO was so pleased with Hanson's denunciation that it prominently displayed it on the cover page of the website. You might think that Hanson finally got around to reading Bush's Second Inaugural, in which the Decider declared that the United States would eliminate "tyranny" from the face of the earth, or the neocon propaganda that preceded the invasion of Iraq, in which we were assured that the invasion of Iraq would be a "cakewalk," that our soldiers would be welcomed as "liberators," and that the invasion of Iraq would cause the Mideast to be transformed from a snakepit of conflict to a garden of democracy.
But you would be wrong. Hanson never saw anything wrong with Bush, and Bush in turn looked to Hanson for intellectual guidance, inviting him to the White House and praising Hanson's work. Hanson's target is Barack Obama, who was able to turn the many blunders, missteps, and follies of Bush into a decisive Democratic victory. According to Hanson, "We are quite literally after two weeks teetering on an Obama implosion." What's more, "Obama is becoming laughable and laying the groundwork for the greatest conservative populist reaction since the Reagan Revolution."
Obama may well fail politically, but the evidence that we are "teetering on an Obama implosion" and that Obama "is becoming laughable" is quite thin. Before confidently predicting that the electorate will return to the GOP, Hanson might want to consider why the Republicans were so decisively rejected at the polls in 2006 and 2008. And before predicting another Reagan Revolution, Hanson might want to ponder more deeply the demographic changes that have put Reagan's California out of reach for Republicans since the elder Bush carried the state in 1988, and that are putting more and more parts of the country safely in the Democratic column. Underestimating your opponents and assuming that victory will be yours is the very definition of hubris, as Hanson and the other Bush apologists should have learned by now.
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Yes, one would think Hanson might have leaned some hubris from our own bankrupting Sicilian Expedition in the Middle East.
Never has such a shallow intellect as Hanson gained so much fame and fortune.
#3 Good work Tom. I always enjoy your notes about these people. after reeading the article I wanted to quote Chesterton and say," Never have I known a man who knew so much and understood so little." Dr. Wilson beat me to it with a more definite turn of phrase. It is said by economists about interests rates that there are people who think they know, people who think they know but won't say they know, and people who know they don't know and will say they don't know. Hanson is a special type, he lies, he spreads lies and doesn't seem to give a damn about spreading lies even when the honest truth would serve him better. Strange, very strange.
"Never has such a shallow intellect as Hanson gained so much fame and fortune."
Oh VDH is bad but I think Doris Kearns Goodwin, Eric Foner and Prof. Pendulum the Kennedy bootlicker all gained more fame and fortune then VDH and they certainly keep up with him in terms of shallow intellects!
What Professor Hanson seems to ignore is that both the Republican Party and neo-conservatism as a political philosophy are discredited by the fiasco in Iraq, the collapse of Wall Street, the tidal wave of government debt and the rapid decline of the economy . That is why the neo-conservatives(David Frum, Jennifer Rubin) are busy pointing fingers at other culprits(the Religious Right, Southerners, social conservatives, "nativists") for the decline of both. As all readers of CHRONICLES know, the neo-conservatives are skilled at self-preservation, even if surviving requires dishonest and dishonorable methods.
Before Hanson gets too gleeful over Barack Obama's miscues in what is largely political inside baseball- Tom Daschle will be forgotten in a week, if not a day- he should realize that the position of the Democrats is roughly as strong as it was in 1933. The Republicans of 2009 are nearly as repudiated as the Republicans of 1933. A majority of Americans understand that the current economic turmoil began during the presidency of George W. Bush.
In the end, the good profesor better get used to President Obama, including the half-dozen justices he will pick to pack the Supreme Court. There'a a lot of things a two-term president can accomplish, even a withdrawal from Iraq and a reduction of America's military forces to a scale that fits a national virtually bankrupt. After all, one should always look for the positive in even the bleakest situation.
"A majority of Americans understand that the current economic turmoil began during the presidency of George W. Bush." If the majority of Americans had ANY understanding, they could just as easily pin our present woes on the Carter Administration's push for unqualified mortgage lending.
@6: "...they could just as easily pin our present woes on the Carter Administration’s push for unqualified mortgage lending."
For tracing the source(s) of our "present woes," why don't we go back at least as far as the establishment of the Fed, if not much further. Maybe the War of Lincoln's Aggression against Seccession?
I see you,and I raise.Lets go back further.Back say,to the Virginia Junto.Goe Vidal,the leftist homosexual who is becoming awfully popular around here,had some rather interesting things to say about the Junto in his novel BURR.Not very nice things I'm afraid.
Alcibiades at least was a soldier.And his strategy behind the attack on Syracuse was not without some merit;to intercept Sparta's food supply,and starve the enemy out.But for his recall,he would have led the expedition and shared in its dangers.
Hanson by contrast is simply a seedy two bit academic tomboy.A rather revealing contrast between the ancient Mediterranean and contemporary America.
Wait, Gore Vidal is a leftist?
If you do a little googling, you'd learn the "neocons" have had a problem with Vidal sympathies and Chronicles for 20 years, this May.
It is not outside a gambler's abilities to predict an election,even two or four years out.It ain't hubris;its handicapping. Hubris is something I rake up with the leaves.The demographics DO NOT preclude Republican victories in 2010 or 2012.I am fully aware of the changing compositions but the next two elections will not be at all out of reach.In fact 2008 may be a temporary highwater for the minority vote,specifically the black vote.Obama won his maiden in a very weak field and I predict with little hesitation he will be a lousy President.Does the leopard change his spots.Professor Wilson?That being said will it make a difference if the Republicans win it back in 2010 and if currently not what do we do to make it so?Beating the 'Bama will be a lot easier than taking back the GOP.Challenge for the GOP or third party?We look forward to your future articles.
Robert your post reminded me of a saying by the humourist Jerry Clower. To paraphrase, Hanson would rather climb a tree and tell a lie than stand on the ground and tell the truth. Something he shares with the rest of that neo-conservative trash.
@11 Leo
I predicted on Super Wedensday that Obama would be the next president because Virginia would not go for McCain. It was not difficult to do. However, my disappointment rose after election day to see that less than 1% voted Third Party. I had hoped for ten percent of voters to choose alternatives. Obama would still have won, and a few hundred thousand Virginia voters would have sent a message to the Big Two.
When 10% won't vote Stupid or Evil, we can again begin to hope.
10% will never, ever not vote Stupid or Evil. The only thing a third party can ever do is marginalie true conservatism further and further.
There is simply no other option. To be politically relevant, traditional conservatism *must* retake (or "take," if you prefer), the GOP. The neocons were smart -- to gain power, they took over a party. This lesson is well learned. And it's doable, more doable now than ever, with neoconservatism discredited, and at a time when a valid economic case can be made for what is actually a socio-cultural imperative -- curbing minority immigration.
#12 Mr Crews writes to prarphrase Jerry Clower, "Hanson would rather climb a tree and tell a lie than stand on the ground and tell the truth."
Thank you Mr. Crews. As an old Okie, being compared to humorists of the likes of Jerry Clower or Will Rogers is a real compliment. Another favorite of mine when talking about men like Mr. Hanson is "It is the most obvious things that they do not see. They are like the distracted professor who stands gazing at an old fossil while the live elephant sticking his head through the sky-light goes completly unnoticed."
Karsten writes,"10% will never, ever not vote Stupid or Evil." Well Karsten as Stonewall Jackson said to one of his soldiers at the first battle of Bull Run who thiught the Yankees were going to win it, "If you think so Sir, you had better not mention it."
EG and colleagues,losing Virginia was heartbreaking(to me as a former Richmonder) and was as EG notes a mortal wound.But times were pretty bad post-1865,and the South was redeemed.Of course,I know we are in a very different climate,but a determined minority has a fighting chance.I really don't think Obama will succeed--there are so many stress points and "internal contradictions"--and he comes to the post with little success except in writing autobiographies and making speeches.Salesman without a real product?We now have at least a few elections to "sell" our real product.I'm just trying to get the marching orders that work because I'm just a soldier with my rifle above the fireplace for now.(Any liberal reading this please understand the author is not advocating using that rifle except in self-defense).
Re: #16
"first battle of Bull Run. . . ."
Now, now: "First Manassas."
battle of Bull Run. . . .”
Now, now: “First Manassas.”
Yikes!!!!! Pace Dr. Wilson, Dr. Fleming, et al..Mea culpa, Mea Culpa,
Hanson is a chickenhawk, so draft him and send him to Afghanistan to personally implement his fanatical interventionism.
@14 karsten
I see no good reason why conservatives should shun the party of acid, amnesty, abortion, rum, romanism and rebellion. The effort expended in trying to take over the GOP was an unmitigated disaster to say the least.
And in Minnesota Jesse Ventura proved to be better than adequate. I disagree with your 10% theory. I used to be GOP but will always vote third party because somebody needs to do it.
@20 John
Oyez! Oyez! Hanson needs to put his bollocks where his mouth is. Don Rickles used to joke back in the 60s about the Jewish philospohy of war: tell the Christians, "here's $500 -- keep attacking!" Enough with the chicken hawks already.
My only regret concerning Hanson is that I bought several of his books back when I had less sense, because I thought he was a serious scholar of ancient history and warfare. Then I saw a TV interview of Hanson which convinced me that I had just wasted my money. The books remain unread.
“We are quite literally after two weeks teetering on an Obama implosion.”
I've stopped reading him or NRO now, but toward the end, I concluded that he had crossed the line into full-fledged derangement. Seems to be an occupational hazard of certain rightwing writers.
#24. I agree with you about the derangement, but Hanson is a "rightwing writer" only by the distorted definition of the Right that is perpetrated today. Like all, neoconservatives, he is a revolutionary leftist.
Mr Piatak has it spot on. Limbaugh and co are salivating at Obama failing with the stimulus package and the GOP picking up seats in both House and Senate in 2010. Bush was such a failure I do not see that happening. As Mr Piatak, has stated pure demographics has doomed the GOP to second fiddle from here on out. Why would anyone who wants to feed from the federal govts trough ever vote for the GOP? The GOP is trying to rememdy this reality by moving towards the left, but again, why would anybody want to vote for some johnny come latelys, when they can have the real deal(socialists) and never swerving Democrats. Conservatives as a whole are totally delusional, but then again most high profile "conservatives" are faux conservatives at best and closet Marxists at the worst. When the defenders of the faith are Trotskyites or their useful idiots like Hannity, Limbaugh, and Coulter, you know your movement is screwed.
If I could add another characteristic about Professor Hanson that I find dislikeable is the way he dragged the private lives of his daughters in his otherwise interesting MEXIFORNIA. He hinted that he, unlike Pat Buchanan, could never have racist feelings towards Mexicans because his daughters were romantically involved with Mexicans. What kind of father would expose his daughters' private lives in order to gain political correctness points with the Left?