Who Will Be the Next Republican “Hitler”? Part Two

Victor Davis Hanson

Why do the Democrats, both the old and new Jacobins, libel Republican presidents as Hitlers, only to laud them in comparison to contemporary Republican presidents?

1) Every president who holds office and exercises power is slandered by the Left as Hitler, period. The point is to weaken his agenda, drive down his polls, and stop any idea of dismantling the 75-year progressive project.

In contrast, ex-presidents are inert and can be praised—when impotent.

2) Again, why do they try to rehabilitate past hated Republican presidents in comparison to the current (powerful) Republican president? The subtext is once upon a time Republicans had good leaders like sunny old nonagenarian Ronnie Reagan and the sober and judicious (retired) aristocrats Bush Sr. and Jr., full of noblesse oblige and so unlike the uncouth Queens Orangeman with his gross comb-over.

So, the current office holders fall short of this “reach across the aisle” fluidity of past presidents. And praising the out-of-office Republican is a good way of diminishing the in-office Republican—by appearing empirical and rational in doling out praise when it is earned (always only in retirement).

3) Democrats are schizophrenic about Republican presidents to ensure they are seen as fair-minded. So rabid Democrats always pose as “judicious” and “fair” and both“reasoned” and “rational.”

They surely don’t act like that when they claimed Reagan would blow up the world by stationing missiles in Europe. Bush in office was trashed as a traitor, a fool, a Nazi, an SS-like officer, etc.

But the Left regained its reputation for “moderation” by assuming no one remembered what they had said in the past about Bush, only in the present when “fair-minded” left-wing journalists visited the “ranch” and chatted with a fun-loving George Bush dabbling at his easel between rides on his mountain bike. Were Bush’s wife and daughters not “moderates” and proof of being de-Nazified?

4) Will the same be true of ex-President Trump? To some degree, yes, Satan incarnate Trump will be revamped and returned to the status of the 1990s Manhattanite good time and jolly Trump who used to rub shoulders with the Clintons. If Vance gets the 2028 nomination, then we will hear of Vance’s “alt-right” and “fascist” tendencies, and his pals Candace and Tucker. We shall also be told that in comparison with the supposed Appalachian alt-Right Vance, “At least Trump was a pragmatist and did not surround himself with bigots.”

5) The Left likes to shower ex-Republican presidents with New York Times profiles, and with network news puff-pieces—usually as a way of showing how awful their successors are. By rehabilitating the once-hated Reagan orBush, the Left hopes they can attack the sitting president in Never Trump style. The goal is to write headlines like“Even George W. Bush thinks Trump is too crazy to be president.”

6) The Left knows that 100 percent/360 degree/24-7 hatred grates on the public. Who wants to hear Rosie O’Donnell’s latest creepy Trump screed or her recycled hatred of the Bushes?

The despised Jasmine Crockett and Maxine Waters loathed all Republicans, past and in office—and were therefore written off as consumed kooks, buffoons, and racists. Again, the refined Democratic creed is “hate and smear when it counts” and then “enhance that venom by showing you are bipartisan by praising a powerless ex-president Republican when such magnanimity can force-multiply your current jihad about the incumbent Republican.”

In sum, as a general rule, do not believe that any left-wing slur of a sitting Republican president is guided by any other motive than destroying him.

The praise from the Left that follows a despised Republican out of office is as phony as the earlier demonization. The common denominator is simply power. The Left says anything to hone its political agenda: praising George Bush is a way of fueling the hatred of Trump, as praising Trump in retirement will be of destroying his successor. (Notice how in the current televised cabinet meetings and in congressional hearings, Rubio and Vance already take more flak than does Trump.)

There will always be a Republican ‘Hitler” president, and he will always be revered when he is powerless and out of office—but only as soon as a new Hitler-Republican takes his place.