Victor Davis Hanson
American Greatness
As Joe Biden’s polls stagnate and the midterms approach, we are now serially treated to yet another progressive melodrama about the dangers of a supposed impending radical right-wing violent takeover.
This time the alleged threat is a Neanderthal desire for a “civil war.”
The FBI raid on Donald Trump’s Florida home, the dubious rationale for such a historic swoop, and the popular pushback at the FBI and Department of Justice from roughly half the country have further fueled these giddy “civil war” conjectures.
Recently “presidential historian” Michael Beschloss speculated about the parameters of such an envisioned civil war.
Beschloss is an ironic source. Just days earlier, he had tweeted references to the executions of Julius and Ethel Rosenberg, who passed U.S. nuclear secrets to the Soviet Union in the 1950s, in connection with the FBI raid on Mar-a-Lago.
That was a lunatic insinuation that Trump might justly suffer the same lethal fate due to supposedly mishandling of “nuclear secrets.” Unhinged former CIA Director Michael Hayden picked up on Beschloss death-penalty prompt, adding that it “sounds about right.”
Hayden had gained recent notoriety for comparing Trump’s continuance of the Obama Administration’s border detention facilities to Hitler’s death camps. And he had assured the public that Hunter Biden’s lost and incriminating laptop was likely “Russian disinformation”.
So, like the earlier “Russian collusion” hoax, and the January 6 “insurrection,” the supposed right-wing inspired civil war is the latest shrill warning from the Left about how “democracy dies in darkness” and the impending end of progressive control of Congress in a few months.
On cue, Hollywood now joins the civil war bandwagon. It has issued a few bad, grade-C movies. They focus on deranged white “insurrectionists” who seek to take over the United States in hopes of driving out or killing off various “marginalized” peoples.
Pentagon grandees promise to learn about “white rage” in the military and to root it out. But never do they offer any hard data to suggest white males express any greater degree of racial or ethnic chauvinism than any other demographic.
When we do hear of an insurrectionary plan—to kidnap the Michigan governor—we discover a concocted mess. Twelve FBI informants outnumbered the supposed four “conspirators.” And two of them were acquitted by a jury and the other two so far found not guilty due to a mistrial.
The buffoonish January 6 riot at the Capitol is often cited as proof of the insurrectionary right-wing movement. But the one-day riotous embarrassment never turned up any armed revolutionaries or plots to overthrow the government.
What it did do was give the Left an excuse to weaponize the nation’s capital with barbed wire and thousands of federal troops, in the greatest militarization of Washington D.C. since the Civil War.
In contrast, Antifa and BLM rioters were no one-day buffoons. They systematically organized a series of destructive and deadly riots across the country for over four months in summer 2020. The lethal toll of their work was over 35 dead, $2 billion in property losses, and hundreds of police officers injured.
Such violent protestors torched the ironic St. John’s Episcopal church and attempted to fight their way into the White House grounds. Their violent agenda prompted the Secret Service to evacuate the president of the United States to a secure bunker.
The New York Times gleefully applauded the rioting near the White House grounds with the snarky headline “Trump Shrinks Back.”
As far as secession talk, it mostly now comes from the Left, not the Right. Indeed, a parlor game has sprung up among elites in venues such as The Nation and The New Republic imaging secession from the United States. Blue-staters brag secession would free them from the burden of the red-state conservative population.
Over the last five years, it was the Left who talked openly of tearing apart the American system of governance—from packing the Supreme Court and junking the Electoral College to ending the ancient filibuster and nullifying immigration law.
Time essayist Molly Ball in early 2021 gushed about a brilliant “conspiracy” of wealthy tech lords, Democratic Party activists, and Biden operators.
Ball bragged how they had systematically poured hundreds of millions of dark money into changing voting laws, and absorbing the role of government registrars in key precincts.
What was revolutionary were new progressive precedents of impeaching a president twice, trying him as a private citizen, barring minority congressional representatives from House committee memberships, and tearing up the state of the union address on national television.
In contrast, decrying the weaponization of a once-professional FBI, and the scandals among its wayward Washington hierarchy is not insurrectionary. Nor is being appalled at the FBI raiding a former president’s and possible presidential candidate’s home, when historically disputes over presidential papers were the business of lawyers not armed agents.
Historic overreach is insurrectionary, not objecting to it. And those who warn most of some mythical civil war are those most likely to incite one.
Yet half the country still believes the Russian collusion hoax, that Hunter’s laptop is Russian disinformation, that abortion is illegal in red states, that President Trump attempted to overthrow the government and that women earn only 77% of what men earn.
Republicans are weak.
Indeed. And the professor forgets that the J6 “buffoonish” protest was an FBI/Cap police set up to MAKE an excuse for tyranny. We must stop pretending that J6 was an organic protest.
So right and so sad in a nutshell
Agree 100%. I read that Val Demings is polling ahead of Marco Rubio in Florida. Pollsters lie about as often as Democrats do, but what part of Val Demings=Joe Biden do Florida voters not understand? The same with Murkowski in oil-rich Alaska, a state punished severely by Biden, but she got more votes than Tshibaka. Combined with Democrats votes it looks like we will have to put up with Murky’s ugly mug and her RINO bs for another 6 years. The AK Democrat is leading Palin too. All Republicans need to do is produce ads with footage of life in S.F. among the feces, needles, crime and criminals. Or Philiadelphia, NYC, Portland, Seattle, L.A. Instead they will prattle on with some idiotic, obsure political message that no one gives a toss about. While the economy collapses and the Southern border is swarmed with God knows who or what. How many people want the FBI acting as the DNC secret police? Russia, Iran and China can’t believe their good fortune, watching as the U.S. implodes.
Amen.
I agree that the republicans are weak. Is mostly a one man show. The senior hierarchy that should support him is lethargic. I love America but is a nation in decline, I pray they recover themselves before is too late.
The derangement of the left seems to have started when Hillary was defeated, was replaced with triumphalism at the defeat of Trump and is now turned up to maximum outrage at the prospect of his return even though in November he will not even be on the ballot. Nothing is off limits. What they do not pause to consider is how appallingly Biden has failed the country. They can do this because for the most part they are the Brahmin left, not subject to to consequences of these failings. It requires a unique contempt for your fellow citizens and is shocking to behold from abroad. It must really suck for people in the US because if you lose trust in the integrity of the electoral system what have you got left?
I am rooting hard for a republic sweep in November because the rot must be stopped before it infects all western democracies .
No, Republicans aren’t weak. The other half of the country has its own vested interests that color its views. Republicans getting more “aggressive” will not force people to change their beliefs.
Not only are republicans weak, they’re stupid.
All this mess and loss of the country can go back to the two-party system.
You see,
“However [political parties] may now and then answer popular ends, they are likely in the course of time and things, to become potent engines, by which cunning, ambitious, and unprincipled men will be enabled to subvert the power of the people and to usurp for themselves the reins of government, destroying afterwards the very engines which have lifted them to unjust dominion.”
And that’s what has happened. Both parties are the same, save a couple of outliers. However, the bulk of republicans will only vote ‘r’ and democrats only vote ‘d’.
I didn’t know about the quote back in 1986 when I left the republican party after the “Reagan” amnesty because I knew that the parties had both been usurped.
Define “stupid”. Do you mean “lacking in intelligence in a given area” or “having views that I intensely dislike”. The quote is welcome, but attacking the two party system seems like a non sequitur. Would a four party system automatically create “not-stupid” parties? In what ways are the two parties indistinguishable? Can you cite a couple examples to support this point? Who usurped the two party system. If it was a “stupid” system in the first place, did it really need to be “usurped” to become “stupid”.
But they can do more. Democrats are very strategic. The republican couldn’t survive it in 2020, is doubtful they will flip the house even in this midterms. The talking points are changing already.
Responding to “republicans are weak”
It seems as though the republicans have been caught in a sneak attack and are scrambling to reform and counter, but too late. Moreover, where the individual Republican, or right leaning person, is stronger than the individual on the opposite, aggregately, they seem weaker because the qualities that make the person on the right strong are obsolete on the battle grounds of the left. The left attacks with theories and future hypotheticals while the right counters with the products of their hands. It seems to me that the right is perpetually at a disadvantage because part of its defense is the concrete and settled past where the lefts weapon is the wide open and fluid future. The right is firing their guns at small, moving drones which makes them not weak but ineffective.
Sneak attack? I’m 64 and do not remember a time when the left was not demonizing the right.
Every Republican President I can remember has been called hitler and stupid. They all rolled over an took it until President Trump, and do they/we defend Trump? No. They/we join the attack.
where is all the money from wealthy conservatives,i.e.millionaires,going to show up in fierce attacks on the demogogues now in control.the public need to be at least minimally exposed to the direness of our situation.radio,t.v. other media not censored needs to be saturated with messaging.I dont think my lawn signs will do the job.
This analysis spot-on, accurate to the best of my knowledge. Amazing and distressing, isn’t it? Does one sense an element of desperation? Fortunately, our country remains dynamic. Parental awakening and the new Supreme Court have helped–as might November.
I think the country will largely be saved by parents. I think they/we’ve had enough.
P.S. By the way, one apparent typo ( instead of re St. Paul’s Episcopal Church?).
Harry Reid deconstructed Senate tradition, which facilitated the current SCOTUS roster. House investigative committees can just as easily be convened by conservatives, as by woke folk. You might think the left would be more careful about establishing changes they don’t want to come back to haunt them, but they won’t. Oh well.
No, Republicans are not weak, just because they choose a more logical path than spewing lies, corruption, yelling at the top of their voice and threatening those who don’t think their way? The left is demonstrating insecurity and the way they try to show they are strong is destruction and violence just to get attention and try to throw good people that care about this Country off on what the important issues really are. Republicans are confident in what they do and say, and I would rather follow someone who exhibits truth and justice and tends to shine above the rest. The radical Left has abused their power so they can be more powerful and rich. They don’t care about “WE THE PEOPLE” only about their daily fix to destroy and abuse and fill their already gold lined pocket with more of our money. Republicans plan the next path they will take, and it may take them a little longer to produce their thoughts and strike back in a professional, productive and kind way. Followers are very critical to their leader’s success, if we turn our backs on those who are out there fighting for our Constitutional rights and get America turned back around the way she was we have to stand strong beside them even when we can’t see or feel that there is anything positive happening. Republicans are a force to be reckon with and an example of what America stands for. They are proud of America and want to take care of her and heal her wounds so she can carry on for many more years.
Seems to me there is a parallel to the time leading up to the Civil War. And that is, the ones who fantasize about it are completely unprepared to deal with it, should it come to that.
The fire eaters of the preCivil War and the coastal elite ideologists will have one main thing in common, they will be far removed from the fighting.