The Israel Double Standard

January 16, 2014 victorhanson

The prejudice against Israel in diplomatic matters is as troubling as more cruse bigotry agains Jews.

by Victor Davis Hanson // National Review Online

An obscure academic organization called the American Studies Association not long ago voted to endorse a resolution calling for a boycott of Israeli universities. The self-appointed moralists were purportedly outraged over the Israeli

government’s treatment of Palestinians.

Given academia’s past obsessions with the Jewish state, the targeting of Israel is not new. Yet why do the professors focus on Israel and not Saudi Arabia, which denies women the right to drive and only recently granted them the right to vote? Why not Russia, which has been accused of suppressing free speech, or Nigeria, which has passed retrograde anti-homosexual legislation?

The hip poet Amiri Baraka (a.k.a. Everett LeRoi Jones) recently died. He was once poet laureate of New Jersey, held prestigious university posts, and was canonized with awards — despite being a hateful anti-Semite.

After 9/11, Baraka wrote a poem that suggested Israel knew about the plan to attack the World Trade Center. One of his poems from the ’60s included this unabashedly anti-Semitic passage: “Smile, jew. Dance, jew. Continue reading “The Israel Double Standard” →

Intelligent Populism vs. Mindless Progressivism

January 7, 2014 victorhanson

by Victor Davis Hanson // PJ Media

New Deal Liberals Transform into the Faux Populist Radical Left

Ronald Searle’s Big Fat Cat Book via Flickr

With elections looming in 2014, it is about time for Barack Obama to gear up another progressive “war” against the rich, the limb loppers, the fat cats, the tonsil pullers, the “enemies” of Latinos, the jet junketers, the women haters, and those who knew neither when to stop profiting nor how the government had really built their businesses. We shall shortly witness some of the wealthiest and most privileged of capitalist America decrying inequality and unfairness from the 18^th hole in Hawaii, the Malibu gated estate, and the Beacon Hill mansion. And the faux populism will probably work, at least if 2008 and 2012 are any indications.

It is easy to chart the evolution of the wealthy progressive elite from the occasional limousine liberal of the 1950s and 1960s to the now dominant hierarchy of the Democratic Party.

The traditional Democratic boilerplate that I grew up with (as much as a ten year old can notice much of anything in 1963) — minimum wage, 40-hour work week, overtime pay, disability insurance, fair housing, civil rights, assistance for the needy Continue reading “Intelligent Populism vs. Mindless Progressivism” →

Resisting Immigration Reform

December 17, 2013 victorhanson

Identity politics rejects ending illegal immigration and reforming legal immigration.

by Victor Davis Hanson // National Review Online

We are fast approaching what promises to be the year of “comprehensive immigration reform.” In the manner of the “Affordable Care Act,” it will not be comprehensive nor will it reform immigration.

All sorts of new trends have emerged in the American Southwest to address the fact that federal immigration law does not really apply to those who arrived here illegally from Mexico or Latin America. In-state tuition discounts at public universities are now customarily extended to those without citizenship — in effect, privileging the foreign national over the U.S.-citizen student from out of state who helps subsidize the cost. Cities establish sanctuary zones that protect illegal immigrants from the enforcement of federal immigration laws — and the taxpayer picks up the additional tab in social services. Imagine what might happen should a city declare in similar fashion that it was exempt from enforcing federal gun-control laws.

Another trend is the effort to end penalties for past use of multiple Social Security numbers. Many who crossed the border illegally adopted various — and thus fraudulent — identities and acquired numerous Social Security numbers. When they later obtained green cards or citizenship, their poly-personas were found out. But isn’t it discriminatory to count such illegal behavior against the job applicant, if such criteria apply disproportionately to a particular ethnic group?

In other words, there is an effort to make the idea of immigration law per se mostly irrelevant, and instead to focus only on the immigrant in terms of his ethnic makeup and place of origin. Continue reading “Resisting Immigration Reform” →

Facing Facts about Race

July 23, 2013 victorhanson

Young black males are at greater risk from their peers than from the police or white civilians.

by Victor Davis Hanson // National Review Online

Last week President Obama weighed in again on the Trayvon Martin episode. Sadly, most of what he said was wrong, both literally and ethically. Continue reading “Facing Facts about Race” →

Race-Industry Leeches

July 18, 2013July 19, 2013 victorhanson

by Bruce S. Thornton // FrontPage Magazine

The trial of George Zimmerman is over, but the persecution of him by the race industry isn’t. The Department of Justice is currently combing through the case to find some pretext, no matter how specious, for charging Zimmerman with a violation of civil-rights laws. No matter that the FBI investigation has eliminated race as a factor in Zimmerman’s actions, or that the prosecutors in Florida studiously ignored race as a motive. Under Attorney General Eric Holder, the DOJ has become the Luca Brasi of the race industry, enforcing the self-serving, racialist narrative that in part propelled Holder’s boss into the White House. So don’t be surprised if the DOJ seizes the opportunity.

Continue reading “Race-Industry Leeches” →

Obama’s Authoritarians

July 16, 2013July 19, 2013 victorhanson

Mouthing Sixties-style anti-Western slogans is the way to win the president’s heart.

by Victor Davis Hanson // National Review Online

There were many paradoxes left after the protests of the 1960s. One of the worst was American elites’ hypocrisy toward authoritarianism abroad.

Most Americans granted that anti-Communist strongmen like Ferdinand Marcos, Augusto Pinochet, Mohammad Reza Shah Pahlavi, and Anastasio Somoza stifled liberty and freedom. Yet they further agreed that during a lose-lose Cold War, in which our enemies the Soviet Union and Red China had collectively murdered perhaps 80 million of their own people, there were no good choices. Thus they were willing to go along with the American government’s support for right-wing thugs who were enlisted in the war against Communism, although the elites, especially in the academy, regularly castigated them. Continue reading “Obama’s Authoritarians” →

Supposed Crimes of the Mind

July 11, 2013July 11, 2013 victorhanson

With hate speech, it’s the perceived ideology of the perpetrator that matters most.

by Victor Davis Hanson // National Review Online

When do insensitive words destroy reputations?

It all depends.

Celebrity chef Paula Deen was dropped by her TV network, her publisher, and Continue reading “Supposed Crimes of the Mind” →

From Affirmative Action to Diversity

March 21, 2013March 25, 2013 victorhanson

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 Tangled Web of Race

February 21, 2013April 10, 2013 victorhanson

by Victor Davis Hanson

National Review Online

A number of commentators have openly sympathized with multi-murderer Christopher Dorner, who shot seven innocent people, killing four of them. Apparently, the late Dorner was a voice in the wilderness crying out against the racist injustice of the “system.” Continue reading “The Tangled Web of Race” →

The Rise of Faux Diversity

December 9, 2012February 6, 2013 victorhanson

by Bruce Thornton

Defining Ideas

In Fisher vs. University of Texas, the Supreme Court heard legal challenges to the University of Texas’s admissions policies, which allow consideration of an applicant’s race in order to promote “diversity” among the school’s students. Such racial preferences are widespread in university admissions. In 80 percent of elite schools, they amount to the equivalent of a 100-point boost in SAT scores, according to research by UCLA law professor Richard Sander and journalist Stuart Taylor. Continue reading “The Rise of Faux Diversity” →

Tag: Identity Politics

The Israel Double Standard

The prejudice against Israel in diplomatic matters is as troubling as more cruse bigotry agains Jews.

Like this:

Intelligent Populism vs. Mindless Progressivism

Like this:

Facing Facts about Race

Young black males are at greater risk from their peers than from the police or white civilians.

Like this:

Race-Industry Leeches

Like this:

Obama’s Authoritarians

Mouthing Sixties-style anti-Western slogans is the way to win the president’s heart.

Like this:

Supposed Crimes of the Mind

With hate speech, it’s the perceived ideology of the perpetrator that matters most.

Like this:

From Affirmative Action to Diversity

Like this:

The Tangled Web of Race

Like this:

The Rise of Faux Diversity

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The prejudice against Israel in diplomatic matters is as troubling as more cruse bigotry agains Jews.

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Like this:

Identity politics rejects ending illegal immigration and reforming legal immigration.

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Like this:

Young black males are at greater risk from their peers than from the police or white civilians.

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Like this:

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Like this:

Mouthing Sixties-style anti-Western slogans is the way to win the president’s heart.

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Like this:

With hate speech, it’s the perceived ideology of the perpetrator that matters most.

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