Liberals: Exempt from Scrutiny

It doesn’t matter if you belong to the 0.1 percent as long as you say the right things.

by Victor Davis Hanson // National Review Online 

The qualifications of a Tommy “Dude” Vietor or Ben Rhodes that placed them in the Situation Room during Obama-administration crises were not years of distinguished public service, military service, prior elected office, a string of impressive publications, an academic career, previous diplomatic postings, or any of the usual criteria that have placed others at the nerve center of America in times of crisis. Their trajectory was based on yeoman partisan PR work, and largely on being young, hip, and well connected politically. I don’t think either of these operatives has a particular worldview or competency that would promote the interests of the United States. But they do talk well, know the right people, and are hip. Again, they have no real expertise or even ideology other than that. Continue reading “Liberals: Exempt from Scrutiny”

Medieval Liberals

Unlike classical liberals, the liberals of today hew to doctrine in the face of the evidence.

by Victor Davis Hanson // National Review Online 

A classical liberal was characteristically guided by disinterested logic and reason. He was open to gradual changes in society that were frowned upon by traditionalists in lockstep adherence to custom and protocol. The eight-hour work day, civil rights, and food- and drug-safety laws all grew out of classically liberal views. Government could press for moderate changes in the way society worked, within a conservative framework of revering the past, in order to pave the way for equality of opportunity in a safe and sane environment. Continue reading “Medieval Liberals”

A Man for the Times

by Victor Davis Hanson // NRO’s the Corner 

Al Gore is at it again, recently charging that “American democracy has been hacked” by 8655627250_bc8235032cspecial interests and accusing his political opponents of “political terrorism.”

This comes from a big-government, high-tax advocate who raced to unload his share of a hyped, but failed cable station to avoid newly enacted higher capital-gains taxes. Gore sold his wares to an anti-Semitic and often anti-American Continue reading “A Man for the Times”

Liberal Apartheid

The elite mostly lead a reactionary existence of talking one way and living another.

by Victor Davis Hanson

National Review Online

One of the strangest things about the modern progression in liberal thought is its increasing comfort with elitism and high style. Over the last 30 years, the enjoyment of refined tastes, both material and psychological, has become a hallmark of liberalism — hand in glove with the art of professional altruism, so necessary to the guilt-free enjoyment of the good life. Take most any contemporary issue, and the theme of elite progressivism predominates. Continue reading “Liberal Apartheid”

Flat-Earth Democrats

by Bruce S. Thornton

FrontPage Magazine

The victims of the tornado that hit Moore Oklahoma had not even been counted when Democrat politicians made fools of themselves by trying to link the disaster to global warming and Republicans. Continue reading “Flat-Earth Democrats”

Confessions of a Counter-Revolutionary

by Victor Davis Hanson

PJ Media

“Counter-revolutionary” is an apt term for these days: President Obama has promised to make a fundamental transformation, a veritable revolution in American society and culture. Continue reading “Confessions of a Counter-Revolutionary”

From Affirmative Action to Diversity

by Victor Davis Hanson

Tribune Media Services

Sometime in the new millennium, “global warming” evolved into “climate change.” Continue reading “From Affirmative Action to Diversity”

The Hipster Façade

by Victor Davis Hanson

PJ Media

What Is Hip?

America has always been a country of self-invention. Yet there used to be some correlation between the life that one lived and the life that one professed. It was hard to be a phony in the grimy reality of the coal mine, the steel mill, the south 40 acres, or atop a girder over Manhattan. Continue reading “The Hipster Façade”

Obama’s Presidency and the Pathologies of Progressivism

by Bruce S. Thornton

FrontPage Magazine

Obama’s presidency has failed miserably, but it has accomplished one thing: it has revealed for all to see the lethal pathologies of progressive ideology. This doesn’t mean progressivism will go away. Continue reading “Obama’s Presidency and the Pathologies of Progressivism”

Liberal Illiberalism: The Liberal Assault on Liberalism

by Victor Davis Hanson

PJ Media

Conservatives are put into awkward positions of critiquing liberal ideas on grounds that they are impractical, unworkable, or counterproductive. Yet rarely, at least outside the religious sphere, do they identify the progressive as often immoral [1]. Continue reading “Liberal Illiberalism: The Liberal Assault on Liberalism”