by Victor Davis Hanson<\/p>\n
NRO’s\u00a0The Corner<\/em><\/p>\n A Pyrrhic Passage?<\/strong><\/p>\n At an outdoor rally today, the president described the healthcare debate as a referendum on the \u201ccharacter\u201d of the country, and I do believe he was correct.\u00a0<\/p>\n The president is pushing legislation that a clear majority of the people dislike, and whose details neither he nor his supporters can explain in simple language. Its ends-justify-the-means passage will require legislative gymnastics that border on the unconstitutional, and in Orwellian fashion are designed to reassure its sheepish supporters that they can appear not to be voting for the bill they vote for. And to achieve a House majority, Obama must offer an array of personal favors, political payoffs, federal stipends, and open threats, which, if done in the private sector, would be actionable acts of felonious bribery or racketeering.<\/p>\n So, yes, this is a reflection about character; and so far the president has throughout this entire shameful process been shown to be utterly wanting on that count, as he misrepresents both the bill\u2019s contents and the opposition to it. All of his \u201clet me be perfectly clear\u201d and \u201cmake no mistake about it\u201d and now-tired rhetoric and faux cadences simply cannot change that disturbing reality.<\/p>\n That such chameleon legislation is the work of a supposedly healing, post-partisan, post-ideological politician makes it even more embarrassing. There will be lots of us \u2014 Democrats, Republicans, Independents \u2014 who simply will not vote this fall for any congressional representative who votes for this tawdry DMV-like takeover of healthcare.<\/p>\n ‘Hanks Attacked by Conservatives . . . ‘?<\/strong><\/p>\n Tom Hanks said this to Douglas Brinkley in a\u00a0Time<\/em>\u00a0interview: \u201cBack in World War II, we viewed the Japanese as \u2018yellow, slant-eyed dogs\u2019 that believed in different gods. They were out to kill us because our way of living was different. We, in turn, wanted to annihilate them because they were different. Does that sound familiar, by any chance, to what\u2019s going on today?\u201d<\/p>\n Some of us dissected this nonsense point by point. In subsequent remarks Hanks did not back away from his theses that the Pacific war was predicated on racism (I wonder whether our WWII alliances with China and the Philippines, or our prior alliance in WWI with Japan, were as well?), and thus similar to our attitudes in the current war on terror. (Racism apparently explains the American effort to foster democracy in Afghanistan and Iraq, and save Muslims in Afghanistan, Bosnia, Iraq, Kosovo, Kuwait, and Somalia.)<\/p>\n What was strange is the media\u2019s reaction to the reaction. Why is being appalled by Hanks\u2019s infantile philosophizing a \u201cright-wing\u201d or \u201cconservative\u201d reaction? Would not liberals as well be angry that in blanket fashion, Hanks had reduced veterans\u2019 efforts in the Pacific after the surprise attack at Pearl Harbor (and to be followed by a magnanimous peace that fostered autonomous Japanese democracy) into largely a racist rage to annihilate?<\/p>\n A Little Perspective<\/strong><\/p>\n Some have remarked at the unusually harsh rhetoric accorded to the Israelis over the Jerusalem issue, especially the assumed American loss of face. Perhaps. But this administration has been embarrassed quite a lot, whether Putin\u2019s snub of the missiles-for-Iran-help deal, the pathetic outreach video et al. to the obnoxious Ahmadinejad, Chavez\u2019s various antics, and the more subtle Chinese putdowns. In each of these cases, American outrage seemed muted in comparison to what was accorded the Israelis \u2014 after all, a democracy thinking of building houses in Jerusalem is not quite like autocracies annexing Tibet, absorbing parts of Ossetia, sending agents into Columbia, or building a nuke on the sly. Instead, the American pique I think is intended to signal a rather sizable change in our foreign policy. Whereas in the past we argued with the Israelis privately, and put pressure on them through diplomatic channels, now we have joined the chorus of its public critics. And when the United States echoes the popular chorus of Europe, or even mimics the invective of the Arab world, there simply is no other power around to stop what will soon become a piling-on party.<\/p>\n The message is out \u2014 say or do what you please about Israel, and it will more likely now resonate with the U.S. I wish this administration had at least said something as curt to the Syrians or Iranians for their past support for chronic infiltrations across their borders into Iraq to kill American soldiers, rather than pondering whether to build apartment buildings in Jerusalem endangers American soldiers. Whether Israel and the Palestinians, or the British again in the Falklands, or the Columbians, or the Hondurans, or the Poles and Czechs, there is no particular advantage in being a pro-American democratic ally; attention and outreach instead come from being our antithesis.<\/p>\n \u00a92010 Victor Davis Hanson<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" by Victor Davis Hanson NRO’s\u00a0The Corner A Pyrrhic Passage? At an outdoor rally today, the president described the healthcare debate as a referendum on the \u201ccharacter\u201d of the country, and I do believe he was correct.\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[608],"tags":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p466Sb-sA","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":1374,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/please-no-more-teachable-moments\/","url_meta":{"origin":1772,"position":0},"title":"Please, No More Teachable Moments","author":"victorhanson","date":"August 25, 2010","format":false,"excerpt":"by Victor Davis Hanson Tribune Media Services The president of the United States has it hard enough without needlessly wading into, and fanning, local controversies. The economy is battered by sluggish growth, high unemployment, record annual deficits and near unsustainable national debt. Over 50 percent of the people now disapprove\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "August 2010"","block_context":{"text":"August 2010","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/archives\/2010\/august-2010\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":6194,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/muslim-brotherhood-out-killing-christians-in\/","url_meta":{"origin":1772,"position":1},"title":"Muslim Brotherhood Out, Killing Christians In","author":"victorhanson","date":"July 11, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"by Raymond Ibrahim \/\/ Gatestone Institute \"I tell the Christians one word: We will set you on fire!\" \u2014 Egyptian Muslim lady \"In scattered locations across Egypt, mobs of hard-line Muslims,\" according to\u00a0Morning Star News, \"enraged over the deposing of the country's Islamist president [Muhammad Morsi] this week attacked Christian\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Egypt"","block_context":{"text":"Egypt","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/the-world\/the-middle-east\/egypt\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/07\/The_Great_Umayyed_Mosque_of_Damascus_Syria_-_9.jpg?fit=947%2C1200&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/07\/The_Great_Umayyed_Mosque_of_Damascus_Syria_-_9.jpg?fit=947%2C1200&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/07\/The_Great_Umayyed_Mosque_of_Damascus_Syria_-_9.jpg?fit=947%2C1200&ssl=1&resize=525%2C300 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/07\/The_Great_Umayyed_Mosque_of_Damascus_Syria_-_9.jpg?fit=947%2C1200&ssl=1&resize=700%2C400 2x"},"classes":[]},{"id":6754,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/the-rule-of-law\/","url_meta":{"origin":1772,"position":2},"title":"The Rule of Law?","author":"victorhanson","date":"November 14, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"by Victor Davis Hanson \/\/\u00a0NRO's The Corner\u00a0 When his pet businesses did not like elements of the Affordable Care Act, Obama simply exempted them. 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