Historian’s Corner

Victor Davis Hanson We lost two entire crops to unseasonable tropical storms and saved one from a deluge by “rolling all night long” with a crew of ten. (Even my 60-year-old dad was on his operated knees and my mom too.) When rain came in those days, health or age was no exemption from rolling. […]

Victor Davis Hanson The trays after picking then sat cooking for 8-12 days, depending on the heat and humidity, the quality of the picker, the height of the vine rows, and the nature of the soil (sandy meant quick drying, heavy loam not so much). Some perfectionist farmers then sent a crew to “turn” or

Victor Davis Hanson Raisins are dried grapes. For 100 years, Sun-Maid Raisins, the local co-op, insisted on dried Thompson seedless grapes, the green, seedless grapes you saw once in the store fresh (though in their natural smaller state, without being pumped up from the effects of gibberellic acid, stump and cane girdling, and weekly irrigation

Victor Davis Hanson A final postscript to why the rich Left does the damage it does. Having money gives one rule over a family, lots of money over a community, lots more over a state, lots, lots more over a nation. The leftwing multibillionaire feels his life’s lucre was not an advertisement for capitalism, much

Victor Davis Hanson But if we know how globalized wealth enriched sections of our economy, fueled the leftist takeover, and created would be philanthropic Napoleons intent on remaking the map, why did they use such wealth for such hard-core socialist agendas, so antithetical to how they earned their piles? Lots of reasons explain why cutthroat

Victor Davis Hanson In sum, when thousands of atheists and agnostics have access to all the world’s delights with unchecked riches, they both indulge and yet feel terrible about their excess and indulgence. And so, they find causes to redeem their psyches that must satisfy just two criteria: one, the hard, rough consequences of their

Victor Davis Hanson First, tell the Chinese that Pelosi is flying to China and will be escorted there militarily. Two, inform the Chinese that there is a new policy of reciprocity. Anything China outlaws in relation to America, America will outlaw to China. Farmland? If Americans cannot buy it in China, Chinese will not buy

Victor Davis Hanson Historian’s Corner Five. The Ukrainian war further whetted the Chinese beak. Our oil sanctions, thanks to huge Russian fuel purchases by India and China, are not working. Russia is now mercilessly grinding down the Ukrainians in a war of attrition. Europe is insidiously losing its enthusiasm for the war, as its winter

Victor Davis Hanson “Gentlemen. If you’re going to take Vienna, take Vienna.” Attributed to Napoleon So supposedly Napoleon reminded his generals of the need to go full bore to finish any planned campaign—or suffer the wages of perceived weakness despite the ambition of the agenda. Speaker Nancy Pelosi was unclear whether she should have gone