{"id":9797,"date":"2017-02-02T10:59:21","date_gmt":"2017-02-02T18:59:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/?p=9797"},"modified":"2017-02-07T06:13:39","modified_gmt":"2017-02-07T14:13:39","slug":"when-normalcy-is-revolution","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/when-normalcy-is-revolution\/","title":{"rendered":"When Normalcy Is Revolution"},"content":{"rendered":"

by Victor Davis Hanson\/\/ National Review<\/em><\/p>\n

Trump\u2019s often unorthodox style shouldn\u2019t be confused with his otherwise practical and mostly centrist agenda.<\/p>\n

By 2008, America was politically split nearly 50\/50 as it had been in 2000 and 2004. The Democrats took a gamble and nominated Barack Obama, who became the first young, Northern, liberal president since John F. Kennedy narrowly won in 1960.<\/p>\n

Democrats had believed that the unique racial heritage, youth, and rhetorical skills of Obama would help him avoid the fate of previous failed Northern liberal candidates Hubert Humphrey, George McGovern, Walter Mondale, Michael Dukakis, and John Kerry. Given 21st-century demography, Democrats rejected the conventional wisdom that only a conservative Democrat with a Southern accent could win the popular vote (e.g., Lyndon Johnson, Jimmy Carter, Bill Clinton, Al Gore).<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Moreover, Obama mostly ran on pretty normal Democratic policies rather than a hard-left agenda. His platform included opposition to gay marriage, promises to balance the budget, and a bipartisan foreign policy.<\/p>\n

Instead, what followed was a veritable \u201chope and change\u201d revolution not seen since the 1930s. Obama pursued a staunchly progressive agenda \u2014 one that went well beyond the relatively centrist policies upon which he had campaigned. The media cheered and signed on.<\/p>\n

Soon, the border effectively was left open. Pen-and-phone executive orders offered immigrant amnesties. The Senate was bypassed on a treaty with Iran and an intervention in Libya.<\/p>\n

Political correctness under the Obama administration led to euphemisms that no longer reflected reality.<\/p>\n

Poorly conceived reset policy with Russia and a pivot to Asia both failed. The Middle East was aflame.<\/p>\n

The Iran deal was sold through an echo chamber of deliberate misrepresentations.<\/p>\n

The national debt nearly doubled during Obama\u2019s two terms. Overregulation, higher taxes, near-zero interest rates, and the scapegoating of big businesses slowed economic recovery. Economic growth never reached 3 percent in any year of the Obama presidency \u2014 the first time that had happened since Herbert Hoover\u2019s presidency.<\/p>\n

A revolutionary federal absorption of health care failed to fulfill Obama\u2019s promises and soon proved unviable.<\/p>\n

Culturally, the iconic symbols of the Obama revolution were the \u201cyou didn\u2019t build that\u201d approach to businesses and an assumption that race\/class\/gender would forever drive American politics, favorably so for the Democrats.<\/p>\n

Then, Hillary Clinton\u2019s unexpected defeat and the election of outsider Donald Trump sealed the fate of the Obama Revolution.<\/p>\n

For all the hysteria over the bluntness of the mercurial Trump, his agenda marks a return to what used to be seen as fairly normal, as the U.S. goes from hard left back to the populist center.<\/p>\n

Trump promises not just to reverse almost immediately all of Obama\u2019s policies, but to do so in a pragmatic fashion that does not seem to be guided by any orthodox or consistently conservative ideology.<\/p>\n

Trade deals and jobs are Trump\u2019s obsessions \u2014 mostly for the benefit of blue-collar America.<\/p>\n

He calls for full-bore gas and oil development, a common culture in lieu of identity politics, secure borders, deregulation, tax reform, a Jacksonian foreign policy, nationalist trade deals in places of globalization, and traditionalist values.<\/p>\n

In normal times, Trumpism \u2014 again, the agenda as opposed to Trump the person \u2014 might be old hat. But after the last eight years, his correction has enraged millions.<\/p>\n

Yet securing national borders seems pretty orthodox. In an age of anti-Western terrorism, placing temporary holds on would-be immigrants from war-torn zones until they can be vetted is hardly radical. Expecting \u201csanctuary cities\u201d to follow federal laws rather than embrace the nullification strategies of the secessionist Old Confederacy is a return to the laws of the Constitution.<\/p>\n

Using the term \u201cradical Islamic terror\u201d in place of \u201cworkplace violence\u201d or \u201cman-caused disasters\u201d is sensible, not subversive.<\/p>\n

Insisting that NATO members meet their long-ignored defense-spending obligations is not provocative but overdue. Assuming that both the European Union and the United Nations are imploding is empirical, not unhinged.<\/p>\n

Questioning the secret side agreements of the Iran deal or failed Russian reset is facing reality. Making the Environmental Protection Agency follow laws rather than make laws is the way it always was supposed to be.<\/p>\n

Unapologetically siding with Israel, the only free and democratic country in the Middle East, used to be standard U.S. policy until Obama was elected.<\/p>\n

Issuing executive orders has not been seen as revolutionary for the past few years \u2014 until now.<\/p>\n

Expecting the media to report the news rather than massage it to fit progressive agendas makes sense. In the past, proclaiming Obama a \u201csort of god\u201d or the smartest man ever to enter the presidency was not normal journalistic practice.<\/p>\n

Freezing federal hiring, clamping down on lobbyists, and auditing big bureaucracies \u2014 after the Obama-era IRS, VA, GSA, EPA, State Department, and Secret Service scandals \u2014 are overdue. Half the country is having a hard time adjusting to Trumpism, confusing Trump\u2019s often unorthodox and grating style with his otherwise practical and mostly centrist agenda.<\/p>\n

In sum, Trump seems a revolutionary, but that is only because he is loudly undoing a revolution.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

by Victor Davis Hanson\/\/ National Review Trump\u2019s often unorthodox style shouldn\u2019t be confused with his otherwise practical and mostly centrist agenda. By 2008, America was politically split nearly 50\/50 as it had been in 2000 and 2004. The Democrats took a gamble and nominated Barack Obama, who became the first young, Northern, liberal president since […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","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":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[1092,111,59,167,846,121,23,187,46,185,1],"tags":[],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p466Sb-2y1","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":2032,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/obama-becomes-the-fall-guy\/","url_meta":{"origin":9797,"position":0},"title":"Obama Becomes the Fall Guy","author":"victorhanson","date":"September 19, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"by Victor Davis Hanson Tribune Media Services Suddenly, liberal op-ed writers are trashing \u2014 even lampooning \u2014 Barack Obama as a one-term president (\u201cone and done\u201d). Centrist Democrats up for reelection in 2012 openly worry about inviting a kindred president into their districts, lest the new pariah lose them votes.\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Campaign 2012"","block_context":{"text":"Campaign 2012","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/obama-administration\/campaign-2012\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":3222,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/the-same-old-change\/","url_meta":{"origin":9797,"position":1},"title":"The Same Old Change","author":"victorhanson","date":"November 17, 2008","format":false,"excerpt":"by Victor Davis Hanson Tribune Media Services We will likely see a lot of political \"readjustments\" come January, once President-elect Barack Obama and many new Democratic congressmen assume office, and the Republican administration leaves. Take the filibuster. For much of the Bush administration, out-of-power Democratic senators defended it as a\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "November 2008"","block_context":{"text":"November 2008","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/archives\/2008\/november-2008\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":2283,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/now-wait-just-one-minute\/","url_meta":{"origin":9797,"position":2},"title":"Now Wait Just One Minute…","author":"victorhanson","date":"September 16, 2009","format":false,"excerpt":"by Victor Davis Hanson NRO's\u00a0The Corner Maureen Dowd wrote another unfortunate, poorly argued, and thinly researched column yesterday. She alleges that racism is behind the growing suspicion of the Obama administration and its initiatives. But almost everything we've seen so far has a parallel with liberal attacks on George W.\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "September 2009"","block_context":{"text":"September 2009","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/archives\/2009\/september-2009\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1134,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/the-obama-fabulists\/","url_meta":{"origin":9797,"position":3},"title":"The Obama Fabulists","author":"victorhanson","date":"November 12, 2010","format":false,"excerpt":"by Victor Davis Hanson National Review Online During the 2008 campaign, Barack Obama was billed as a cool rationalist \u2014 a sober and judicious intellectual so unlike the inattentive and twangy \u201csmoke \u2019em out\u201d George W. Bush, so rational in contrast to the herky-jerky and frenetic John McCain. Like Senator\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "November 2010"","block_context":{"text":"November 2010","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/archives\/2010\/november-2010\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":11786,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/the-progressive-revolution-from-democratic-to-liberal-to-progressive-to-socialist\/","url_meta":{"origin":9797,"position":4},"title":"The Progressive Revolution: From Democratic to Liberal to Progressive to Socialist","author":"victorhanson","date":"April 16, 2019","format":false,"excerpt":"Victor Davis Hanson \/\/ National Review Americans voted for Barack Obama in 2008 despite, not because of, his most partisan voting record in the Senate. They were once willing to look past his earlier dubious associations with abject anti-Semites such as the Reverend Jeremiah Wright, former terrorists like Bill Ayers,\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Progressivism"","block_context":{"text":"Progressivism","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/progressivism\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1211,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/the-obama-rope-a-dope\/","url_meta":{"origin":9797,"position":5},"title":"The Obama Rope-a-dope","author":"victorhanson","date":"October 11, 2010","format":false,"excerpt":"by Victor Davis Hanson Tribune Media Services After 2010, will he be Carter or Clinton? That is the ongoing parlor game now played among pundits over how President Obama will react to a probable shellacking of the Democrats in midterm elections next month. 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