Tag: The Left

Why Liberals Think What They Do

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by Victor Davis Hanson

PJ Media

Note that Barack Obama is running not on his liberal record, but as a challenger against incumbent Mitt Romney who has done all sorts of terrible things like causing the 2008 meltdown and outsourcing jobs to China. In Obama’s view, given the supposedly tranquil world abroad, we must try nation building at home, and thus concentrate on bold new initiatives like stimulus, infrastructure, green jobs, and federalized healthcare — none of which have been envisioned before, much less funded. And to the extent Obama has a concrete example, he points to efforts of the private oil sector to find more gas and oil despite, rather than because of, his own efforts. Conclusion? Continue reading “Why Liberals Think What They Do” →

The Abortion Question: Vice Presidential Responses Fall Short

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by Craig Bernthal

Private Papers

Martha Raddatz: “This debate is, indeed, historic. We have two Catholic candidates, first time, on a stage such as this. And I would like to ask you both to tell me what role religion has played in your own personal views on abortion.” Continue reading “The Abortion Question: Vice Presidential Responses Fall Short” →

The New Reactionaries

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by Victor Davis Hanson

National Review Online

Starting in the 1930s and continuing after the war, the Democrats offered a liberal critique of, or perhaps enhancement to, the Republican vision of rugged individualism. A modern American state now had the capital and the moral ambition to smooth the rougher edges of capitalism by insisting on unemployment and disability insurance, a 40-hour week, overtime pay, and what we now associate with the social safety net. Such entitlements, along with a rapidly growing economy, redefined poverty — so much so that whereas in 1930 malnourishment was endemic among the poor, by 2000 obesity was far more injurious to the nation’s collective health. Continue reading “The New Reactionaries” →

Who Gets a Pass?

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by Victor Davis Hanson

Tribune Media Services

Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel recently said of the Chick-fil-A fast-food franchise that “Chick-fil-A’s values are not Chicago’s values.” Why? Because Chick-fil-A CEO Dan Cathy is on record as being opposed to gay marriage — as is close to half the US population, according to polls. The mayors of Boston and San Francisco also suggested that the company isn’t welcome in their cities. Continue reading “Who Gets a Pass?” →

Egypt’s Presidential Elections: What’s at Stake

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by Raymond Ibrahim

FrontPage Magazine

Egypt’s long awaited and much anticipated presidential elections — the first of their kind to take place in the nation’s 7,000 year history — are here. As we await the final results — and as the Western mainstream media fixate on images of purple-stained fingers — it is well to remember that there is much more at stake in Egypt’s elections than the mere “right” to vote. Continue reading “Egypt’s Presidential Elections: What’s at Stake” →

The Stupid Party

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by Bruce S. Thronton

FrontPage Magazine

The presidency of Barack Obama has established once and for all that modern liberalism is now the stupid party. Very little of liberal thought these days represents anything fresh or new, but rather comprises what Lionel Trilling once reduced conservatism to: “irritable mental gestures which seek to resemble ideas.” Continue reading “The Stupid Party” →

The New Reactionaries

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by Victor Davis Hanson

PJ Media

Our New Regressivism

About fifteen years ago, many liberals began to self-identify as progressives — partly because of the implosion of the Great Society and the Reagan reaction that had tarnished the liberal brand and left it as something akin to “permissive” or “naïve,” partly because “progressive” was supposedly an ideological rather than a political identification, and had included some early twentieth-century Republicans like Teddy Roosevelt and Herbert Hoover [1]. Continue reading “The New Reactionaries” →

All Fall Down

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by Victor Davis Hanson

PJ Media

The temple of postmodern liberalism was rocked these last few weeks, as a number of supporting columns and buttresses simply crashed, leaving the entire edifice wobbling. Continue reading “All Fall Down” →

Why Not Pay Higher Taxes?

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by Victor Davis Hanson

PJ Media

The usual liberal complaint against the conservative opposition to higher income taxes is greed and the better-offs’ self-serving reluctance to pay their “fair share.” Continue reading “Why Not Pay Higher Taxes?” →

The Fannie and Freddie University

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by Victor Davis Hanson

PJ Media

It’s More than Just PC

The traditionalist critique of the university — I made it myself over thirteen years ago in the co-authored Who Killed Homer? — was that somewhere around the time of the Vietnam War, higher education changed radically for the worse. Continue reading “The Fannie and Freddie University” →