Category Archives: History

A Warning to America from a British Lover of Freedom

Imagine that your grandfather was one of the greatest tycoons of his day. Through a combination of ingenuity, courage, competitiveness and devotion to principle, he created a new product, which revolutionized an entire industry. Then he proceeded to lead that industry to world-wide prominence. The wealth, prosperity and employment that he created were the envy of the world. His example was emulated and others were able to approximate his success – although never to the degree that characterized your grandfather’s achievements.

But your grandfather’s magnificent success was also the source of bitterness, resentment and contempt among those who believed that the fruits of his endeavors were unevenly distributed among the people in his industry. These malcontents hatched plans to bring down your grandfather’s empire – either overtly by a frontal assault or, if that failed, then covertly by undermining the people’s faith in the soundness of your grandfather’s ideas and methods.

Eventually, your father inherited a thriving business; but he did not inherit the wisdom, tenacity, fidelity and courage of his father. Slowly but surely, the plotters undercut the beliefs – not so much of the rank and file – but rather of the leadership who ran the business, so that by the time your father passed the company to you, it was a mere shadow of what your grandfather had created.

However, your grandfather had another son who left the company to start one of his own. And that son was blessed with all of your grandfather’s salutary traits – perhaps even more so. He founded a company whose success eclipsed even that of your grandfather’s. But alas, eventually, he and his company began to fall prey to the same forces that afflicted your company. Now, as your uncle hands his business off to his son, it is your task to educate your cousin as to what happened to your company, and what is in store for his. It might be too late to rescue your business, but you suspect that there is still time for your cousin – if he will recognize the forces arrayed against him and change course appropriately.

In this allegorical story, you, gentle reader, are Daniel Hannan, a British journalist and writer who achieved notoriety by excoriating his own Prime Minister on the floor of the European Parliament. Your grandfather is 19th century England and your father is 20th century England. The talented son (your uncle) is 20th century America and your cousin is the America of today. Hannan took up the cause of warning his cousin in his recent book The New Road to Serfdom: A Letter of Warning to America. In it he explains the nature of the virus that felled Great Britain, and more generally, Western Europe. He wistfully points out the manifestations of the same virus that are present now in the United States and explains carefully how the virus, if left unchecked, will kill us exactly as it has killed the host across the Atlantic Ocean.

The last chapter of Hannan’s book is entitled Where British Liberties Thrive. By that Hannan is of course referring to America. It is barely taught in school any longer, but there is no question that the American Republic derives virtually all of its founding ideas from the concepts of liberty developed by British and Scottish lovers of freedom in the eighteenth century (and earlier). The idea of a society structured to maximize individual liberty and the rule of law, ensured by a limited government that derives its powers from the consent of the governed was born and nurtured in the British Isles and transported to America with the colonists in the 17th and 18th centuries. The Declaration of Independence and the US Constitution are the fullest expression of the seminal idea of British liberty. The implementation in Britain of those original concepts made that country the freest, most prosperous and civilized nation in the world for 300 years. But about a century ago, the Brits began to lose faith in their own ideals. In many ways they held on for another 40-50 years, but the blatantly socialist experiment upon which they embarked following World War II heralded the death of British liberty and glory. America picked up the torch 235 years ago and has been the leading exponent of British liberty for at least a century. But now, alas, we are threatened with the same malady that brought low our British cousins. Hannan sees this clearly and takes up his pen in order to alert us to what has happened to his beloved country and what is in store for us if we follow the same path.

Hannan follows in a line of eminent British historians and politicians who have sung the praises of British liberty, applauded America’s achievement in bringing said liberty to an even higher level and who have encouraged us to stay the course. I am thinking of Andrew Roberts, Paul Johnson, Margaret Thatcher and of course Winston Churchill. Hannan’s book, whose title channels that of the Austrian philosopher/economist, Friedrich Hayek, is short, powerfully argued and specific in its predictions. The analysis is sharp, incisive and to my thinking absolutely on target. We ignore him at our peril. To illustrate, here are a few quotes from his Introduction:

American self-belief is like a force of nature, awesome and inexorable. It turned a dream of liberty into a functioning nation, and placed that nation’s flag on the moon. It drew settlers across the seas in the tens of millions, and liberated hundreds of millions more from the evils of fascism and communism. If it has occasionally led the United States into errors, they have tended to be errors of exuberance. On the whole, the world has reason to be thankful for it.

      Every visitor is struck, sooner or later, by the confidence that infuses America. It is written in people’s faces. Even the poorest immigrants rarely have the pinched look that dispossessed people wear on other continents. Instead they seem buoyant, energetic, convinced that, when they finish their night classes, they will be sitting where you sit in your suit.

…

The air of the new world can work even on the casual visitor. When I write about my own country’s politics, I am as cynical as the next world-weary Brit. But, whenever I go to Washington, I give in to the guileless enthusiasm that foreigners so often dismiss as naïveté. Like James Stewart’s character in Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, I goggle reverently at the Lincoln and Jefferson memorials, “The Battle Hymn of the Republic” swelling in my mind.

At least I used to. On my most recent visit, as I stood before the statue of your third president, I fancied I heard a clanking noise. Doubtless, it was Jefferson’s shade rattling his chains in protest at what is being done to his country. The ideals for which he had fought, and which he had incorporated into the founding texts of the republic – freedom, self-reliance, limited government, the dispersal of power – are being forgotten. The characteristics that once set America apart are being eliminated. The United States is becoming just another country.

      To put it another way, the self-belief is waning. Americans, or at least their leaders, no longer seem especially proud of their national particularisms. The qualities that make America unique – from federalism to unrestricted capitalism, from jealousy about sovereignty to willingness to maintain a global military presence – now appear to make America’s spokesmen embarrassed.

      One by one, the differences are being ironed out. The United States is Europeanizing its health system its tax take, its day care, its welfare rules, its approach to global warming, its foreign policy, its federal structure, its employment rate.

…

      A hundred years ago, my country was where yours is now: a superpower, admired and resented – sometimes, in a complex way, by the same people. We understand better than most that popularity is not bought through mimicry, but through confidence. You are respected, not when you copy your detractors, but when you outperform them

      Until very recently, the United States did this very well. While it may have drawn sneers from European intellectuals, denunciation from Latin American demagogues, violence from Middle Eastern radicals, the population of all these parts of the world continued to try to migrate to the United States, and to import aspects of American culture to their own villages.

      Now, though, American self-belief is on the wane. No longer are the political structures designed by the heroes of Philadelphia automatically regarded as guarantors of liberty. America is becoming less American, by which I mean less independent, less prosperous, and less free.

      The character of the United States, more than of any country on earth, is bound up with its institutions. The U.S. Constitution was both a product and a protector of American optimism. When one is disregarded, the other dwindles.

      This book is addressed to the people of the United States on behalf of all those in other lands who, convinced patriots as they may be, nonetheless recognize that America stands for something. Your country actualizes an ideal. If you give up on that ideal, all of us will be left poorer.

The logo on the cover of Hannan’s book depicts the Statue of Liberty encased in chains. This is a metaphor for the future that he predicts for us if we are foolhardy enough to continue down the road to Euro-statism. Hannan makes a persuasive case that the Euro model of a social welfare state grounded in egalitarian utopianism, characterized by the appeasement of aggressors, massive central government, multiculturalism and anti-religious, anti-family fervor is leading Europe to ruin; and that if we continue to emulate them, our destination will be the same. This is a cousin whose advice America would be wise to take very seriously.
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This post also appeared in The Land of the Free at

http://www.thelandofthefree.net/conservativeopinion/2011/01/19/a-warning-to-america-from-a-british-lover-of-freedom/

The Monumental Events of a Lifetime: Does Barack Make the List?

The famous ‘Chinese curse,’ May You Live in Interesting Times certainly applies to America’s senior citizens. They have been cursed (or is it blessed?) to have witnessed quite a few monumental events during the past 70 years. Of course, virtually anyone (past or present) might make a similar assertion since, over the course of history, the world has been subjected to (often cataclysmic) events of a monumental nature with surprising frequency. Still, there has been no shortage of such occurrences since the start of World War II.

According to dictionary.com, the adjective monumental means ‘exceptionally great…in quantity, quality, extent or degree; of historical or enduring significance.’ Below is a list of major events that have occurred since 1940, which are of such enduring significance as to warrant the descriptive adjective monumental. The point of the article is to consider whether the election of Barack Obama to the Presidency merits inclusion on the list – and why or why not, especially if one compares its (potentially) enduring significance to that of the others on the list.

Clearly the compilation of a list of the most monumental events of the last three quarters of a century is a highly subjective affair. Nevertheless, the following entries would likely make most lists. Additionally, there will be many other events that could appear on another’s list as the choice of precise criteria for characterizing an event as monumental is also a subjective exercise (despite the definition given). No matter; the central issue of whether Barack makes the list depends more on one’s evaluation of the significance of his Presidency than on the contents of the list – and also more specifically on how one interprets the precise significance of his election.

Here’s the list – a baker’s dozen:

·       The Japanese surprise attack on Pearl Harbor

·       The Wannsee Conference and the consequent Holocaust

·       D-Day

·       The dropping of the atomic bomb and the unconditional surrender of the Axis powers

·       The birth of Israel

·       The launch of Sputnik

·       JFK assassinated

·       The Six Day War

·       The lunar landing of Apollo 11

·       Watergate and the resignation of Richard Nixon

·       The election of Ronald Reagan

·       The fall of the Berlin Wall and the dissolution of the Soviet Union

·       9/11.

One could write an essay for each entry as to why it belongs on the list. Instead, here are a few comments addressed to what some might consider quirks in the list.

1.     The list probably contains more Jewish/Israeli items than many would include. Perhaps the author’s heritage was unduly influential. Nevertheless, it is undoubtedly the case that each of the three such items truly belongs on a list of monumental events in world history over the last century.

2.     In a few places, two (or more) events are conflated and listed as one for obvious reasons.

3.     These are all ‘man-made’ events. There are no tsunamis, earthquakes, hurricanes or epidemics, although some would certainly insist that they belong.

4.     Some of the events were glorious; some horrendous. By the author’s reckoning, there are seven of the former and six of the latter.

5.     There is also a bias toward events that involve the United States. French people might want to include Dien Bien Phu or the ascension of de Gaulle. British folks might clamor for the 1956 Suez affair; Czechs for the quashing of the Prague Spring; Poles for the formation of Solidarity; etc. Given the venue, a focus on the US is appropriate here.

6.     Even so, many items that others would surely insist belong are omitted: e.g., the Inchon landings and the Korean War; the Tet offensive and the Vietnam War; the formation of the UN; Supreme Court decisions like Brown v. Board of Education or Roe v. Wade; economic collapses like the market crash of 1987 or the dot.com implosion or the bursting of the housing bubble; the Civil Rights Act; or the advent of Medicare – and others.

Indeed, a highly subjective affair. Nevertheless, by way of justification for the above list, let us note that every event on the list meets the following criteria:

·       The event was monumental according to the definition specified.

·       It had powerful consequences for the societies directly impacted, and others as well.

·       It influenced the course of history.

·       It lives on vigorously and actively in the minds (and frequently the words) of tens of millions of people.

·       It is marked, celebrated or castigated on a recurring basis by scores of descendants of those originally touched by the event.

Now comes the fundamental question of this piece. Does the election of Barack Obama become the 14th entry on the list? The instinctive answer is ‘yes!’ The 350-year history of slavery, segregation and discrimination perpetrated against black people is the greatest stain on America’s glorious history. One could easily argue that the election of a black man to the Presidency by an electorate that is no more than 13% black marks a historic, consequential, memorable, indeed monumental event in the history of the United States of America. It was an act of great national healing and atonement. It should mark the end of the bleak racial legacy of our country and initiate an age of racial harmony. Thus it obviously meets the criteria and therefore the answer to the question is undoubtedly a resounding ‘yes.’

But there are two critical reasons for qualifying the ‘yes’ with a ‘but.’

1.     Barack Obama was presented with a great opportunity in January 2009. America offered him a position from which he could cement the benign, post-racial destiny that most American envisioned his Presidency would usher in. He spurned the offer. Through actions large and small (failing to prosecute the blatantly racist and manifestly illegal actions of certain Black Panthers on election day; imputing racist motives to a white Boston police officer who was merely doing his job; branding opponents to his economic and political policies as racists; and demeaning small-town, working class Americans with his snide remark about their clinging to their guns and religion), he has continued to stir the pot of racial animosity in this country. Because of his attitudes and actions, and of those he has surrounded himself with, the healing and unifying effect on society that his election was to represent – a prime reason for his election to be considered monumental – apparently will not occur.

2.     Barack Obama is the first President of these United States who is post-American, indeed anti-American. He is not the first to be utterly contemptuous of the Constitution, but he is a hard-core, leftist ideologue who seemingly abhors what America stands for historically, who is ashamed of our country and who is hell bent on transforming it into a society radically at odds with the vision of our Founders. God help us if he succeeds. If he does succeed, then his election will certainly enter the list – but not for the salutary reasons enumerated above. Rather it will be because he destroyed America. Then he would be #14 and there would be seven of each type.

Perhaps he will, in the end, enter the list for the originally stated reasons. But that will require a serious attitude adjustment on his part. There is still time for that to occur, but it is hard to believe that it is forthcoming. The best that we can hope for, I suspect, is that the American people will kick him to the curb like they did Jimmy Carter and 50 years from now he will be remembered sadly as a man who missed a great opportunity.
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This article also appeared in The Intellectual Conservative at

Coolidgizing Reagan

I grew up in the 1950s in a union household where leftist thought was accepted as gospel. I recall three jokes/stories that I heard repeatedly at family events:

1.     ‘Did you know that the President takes two 2-week vacations each month? On the few remaining days, he plays golf.’ This was a not very subtle slap at Eisenhower’s supposed lack of attention to his presidential duties.

2.     My parents bragged that they taught me in 1948 to say ‘Phooey on Dewey’ whenever the name of the Republican Governor and Presidential candidate was mentioned on the radio. I was five years old at the time.

3.     ‘Do you know who was President before the 1929 Stock Market Crash? Neither do I. No one remembers his name or whether he did anything?

The first two barbs manifest at least a modicum of humor. But the third is a mean-spirited and blatantly dishonest characterization of Calvin Coolidge as an inconsequential and eminently forgettable occupant of the White House. Furthermore, it is indicative of a highly successful campaign to, on the one hand, obliterate Coolidge from the political memory of the American public and, on the other hand, guarantee that on the rare occasion when his presidency is considered, it is relegated to the dustbin of marginal, inept and failed presidencies. Eisenhower is still remembered warmly by the elderly – especially as the 50s were a time of prosperity for America. Two-time loser Dewey was an inconsequential national figure and so his banishment to oblivion is not inappropriate. But Coolidge presided over a time of unprecedented growth and prosperity in the United States. Moreover, his policies played a fundamental role in bringing about that success. That his memory should be marginalized is a great injustice perpetrated on the American people by the progressive movement that has been increasingly dominating the national conversation (with precious few exceptions) since Coolidge passed from the scene.

How have the progressives been so successful in erasing the memory of Calvin Coolidge from the national psyche? And are they having a commensurate level of success with Ronald Reagan – to which they surely aspire. The answer to the first question will be fairly straightforward. As many have observed, over the last century, the left has slowly but surely captured control of virtually all of the main opinion-molding organs of American society. The mainstream media, libraries, foundations, legal profession, educational establishment (including academia) and the arts are – with rare exception – completely dominated by leftist thought. With that kind of pervasive cultural control, the left has been able to generate a host of myths that are accepted as truth by substantial majorities of the American public. I will give some of the most prominent of the myths, but I will carefully separate them into three eras – the reason for which I will explain later.

Pre-1950s Myths.

·       The muckrakers and social reformers of the Progressive Era accurately highlighted the economic and social abuses inflicted upon the people of this nation by the Robber Barons of the Industrial Era. In so doing they justified the reigning in of America’s laissez-faire capitalistic system by a benign and enlightened federal government.

·       The Roaring Twenties represented a temporary resurgence of capitalists exploiting labor, which ended – as it was destined to – in an orgy of corporate greed that resulted in the 1929 Stock Market Crash and the ensuing Great Depression.

·       Harding and Coolidge were corrupt and their policies helped to bring on the calamity. Hoover continued those policies even after the onset of the Depression thereby making matters worse.

·       FDR and his New Deal saved the nation from economic and social ruin.

1950s-1980s Myths.

·       The 1950s resembled the 1920s in that the country slid back into some of its former discredited habits. Reactionaries fought futile rear guard battles to: preserve segregation and racial discrimination; deny women and minorities equal rights; retain antiquated sexual and social constraints on the people that were motivated by religious zealotry; maintain control of the economic life of the nation by corporate giants; and generally resist the progressive agenda whose implementation was clearly the wish of the majority of the American people.

·       The US engaged in a morally questionable Cold War with the Soviet Union that risked the annihilation of mankind. In pursuit of that conflict, America betrayed some of its fundamental ideals in its unwarranted and ultimately doomed intervention in Vietnam.

·       A historic and long overdue correction of some of America’s most profound flaws was engineered by an enlightened Supreme Court with such decisions as: Brown vs. Board of Education, Reynolds vs. Sims, Griswold vs. Connecticut, Miranda vs. Arizona and Row vs. Wade. The dramatic infringement of the people’s sovereignty by the federal government inherent in these and other SCOTUS decisions reflected a new understanding of our living Constitution – namely, that it does not provide a blank check of individual liberty; in fact, some limitation on same is a worthwhile sacrifice to be made in the pursuit of equality, fairness and social justice.

·       The stagflation of the 1970s, like the Depression, was caused by corporate greed and could be brought to heel only by further empowerment of the federal government.

Post 1980s Myths.

·       The notion of American exceptionalism is unjustified. America’s history of slavery and segregation, genocide against the Indians, internment of Japanese-American citizens, aggressive wars against Mexico and Spain, suppression of women’s rights and use of the atomic bomb in WWII reveal the country to be deeply flawed, and therefore not entitled to its claim of special status among the nations of the world. It is no more a ‘force for good’ than any other country.

·       Global warming is caused by humans pursuing excessive personal comforts at the expense of the Earth’s natural bounty. The US is the lead violator and must adjust its consumption habits in order to restore balance to the planet’s environment.

·       Islam poses no special threat to the US and Western Civilization. It is the youngest of the three great monotheistic religions and as such should be accorded the same gracious acceptance in our society as is afforded its two elders.

·       The economic malaise of the first decade of the 21st century culminating in the crash of 08 is, like its predecessors in the 30s and 70s, due to corporate greed. Had we not initiated previous palliatives like Social Security, Medicare, Fannie and Freddie and all the critical federal regulatory agencies that keep watch on our volatile economic system, things would be much worse. But the government should do MORE.

The explanation for the division of the myths into three distinct eras is that the level of public acceptance of them differs according to era. That assessment can be summed up in the arithmetic sequence: 90-60-30 in which each figure represents the percentage of the public that believes the myths of the corresponding era. Well, this is a bit overprecise and impossible to justify numerically. My point is that I believe the first set of myths is nearly universally accepted as received wisdom in the US; the second set is accepted unquestioningly by at least half, but perhaps not much more of the population; and the last set’s acceptance is restricted largely to hard core leftists and those completely under their sway. As evidence for this assertion, I would offer these points:

·       I assimilated the first set of myths by osmosis in school and from my family; I never encountered anyone for decades who thought otherwise. Throughout my life the status of these myths has not changed. Those who question them are viewed as members of the lunatic right. Virtually no one in the opinion-molding organs that I cited earlier questions any of it. Indeed, it is remarkable how widely they are accepted as self-evident in the same way that the Earth is round and life is finite. You have to look to ‘extremists’ like Limbaugh or Beck and other members of the ‘vast right wing conspiracy’ to find skeptics.

·       As for the intermediate set of myths, the collection of true believers is less universal. My experience is that my children and my students’ generation – those educated in the 70s and 80s – probably encountered them as gospel. But in the last generation, with the explosion in the number and variety of sources of information available to the public, it has become more difficult for the progressives – despite their continued strangle hold on the main opinion-molding organs of society – to program the thought of the citizenry.

·       Finally, why has the last set of myths hardened only in the hearts of the hardcore left? There are three obvious reasons. First, the myths are relatively recent and have not had time to seep through the porous membrane that protects the people from the left’s craziness. More seriously, the proliferation of alternate sources of information beside the main opinion-forming organs continues to accelerate. And finally, as implied, these myths are indeed far loonier than those in the previous two sets and so the public is less receptive.

Let us therefore answer the original two questions. First, it was very easy to marginalize and vaporize Coolidge because in the mid 20th century milieu, the first set of myths was almost universally accepted. Poor Calvin never had a chance. But it is much harder to do likewise to Reagan – although it is not for lack of trying.  What would the left’s kultursmog (to use Tyrrell’s favorite phrase) have you believe about Reagan? Simply that he was an amiable dunce who fell asleep at Cabinet meetings and was essentially senile in his second term; that his tax cuts and military build up caused the 80s deficits, not the profligate spending of the Democratic Congress; that his supply side economic philosophy was a ‘voodoo’ scheme to benefit the wealthy and not the engine that propelled America to 25 years of economic growth; and that Reagan did not win the Cold War – it was ended voluntarily by Gorbachev. So far, America is not buying it.

I sat in a schoolroom 25 years after Calvin Coolidge left office and absorbed all the false myths that doomed his legacy to oblivion. It is now nearly that long since Reagan left office. The progressives have had nowhere near the same success in marginalizing the Gipper. Maybe there is hope for the country after all.
This article also appeared in the online magazine The Land of the Free at

Heroes — Then and Now

America has experienced the painful downfall of one of its favorite heroes of the last decade — Tiger Woods. I have nothing new to add on l’affaire Tiger; rather I would like to focus on the general nature of the American hero — past and present. I will argue that the nature of the beast has indeed changed over the last half century. Then I will describe the key feature of the change, identify the main culprit responsible for the change and conclude with a speculation on what the change says about American society.

More than 40 years separate the eras in which two catchy slogans captured the American public’s attention: ‘I Like Ike’ (early 1950’s) and ‘Be Like Mike’ (mid 1990’s). The difference in the slogans’ objects represents more than just a time lapse; it highlights a change in our culture in terms of our reference to heroes — who they are, why we admire them and what we expect of them. In previous generations our heroes usually were politicians and soldiers, scientists and philosophers, statesmen and authors. For example, if we hark back to the mid twentieth century, the most common heroes would certainly have included — in addition to Eisenhower — Churchill, Einstein, FDR, MacArthur, Salk, and maybe a writer like Steinbeck or Hemingway. A half century earlier, businessmen and philanthropists like Rockefeller, Vanderbilt and Astor would have supplemented a list that surely included T. Roosevelt, Wilson and Mellon. Today, the most admired lists tend to be dominated by athletes, entertainers, and celebrities — people like Michael Jordan, Tiger Woods, Oprah Winfrey and of course, Elvis. Leaders have been replaced by personalities. Why is that? Perhaps we can discover the answer if, having decided who, we consider why and what.

One of my Websters defines a hero as ‘one who is admired for his achievements and qualities; one that shows great courage.’ In the past we admired those who led heroic lives or accomplished heroic deeds; those whose great achievements were wrought at substantial personal risk and entailed courageous action. Today, we look primarily to those who are absolutely brilliant at what they do — on the court, on the screen, in the public eye, but without any attendant requirement of personal risk or courage. The difference is somewhat subtle. To perform heroic deeds requires courage, selflessness, willingness to take great risk. To be the best at one thing requires dedication, perseverance, raw talent. These are all admirable qualities. But I venture that yesterday’s heroes manifested the latter qualities as well as the former, whereas today’s heroes, while usually exemplary in the latter, are often lacking the former.

Why this subtle change? I think there are numerous reasons, many bound up with the massive culture shift that we experienced over the last fifty years in the country. Here I would like to focus on one specific culprit — the media. I believe the media has played an enormous role in bringing about this change in the perception of heroism — for four reasons.

1. The muckraking, iconoclastic role of the media has escalated beyond bounds. No one is perfect of course, and while years ago the media was often complicit in hiding character flaws of our heroes, today they leave no stone unturned in their attempt to expose every possible wart that a potential hero might have. This applies particularly to politicians, soldiers and statesmen, making it nearly impossible for them to earn the unmitigated admiration of the public. John Kennedy was a womanizer, but the media did not report it. Conversely, every zip of Bill Clinton’s trousers made the evening news. 

2. Politics is a contact sport, but today it is bloodier than ever. The media has helped to drive a wedge through the body politic. The fault lines are clearly drawn and the media inflames the debate. In many ways the citizenry is divided down the middle and the opinions are so sharp that it is inconceivable that a man of the left could be admired by the people of the right — and vice versa. Thus it is hard to be a hero to the people if you start off with 50% of them detesting you. Because of this, political and religious figures don’t have a prayer of garnering widespread public admiration. Reagan was loved by those on the right, despised by the left, and exactly the reverse pertains to Obama.

3. Celebrities sell ink and electrons. The public has a seemingly insatiable appetite for news about pop culture. Celebrities sell magazines, newspapers, books, films, TV shows, DVDs and all other forms of electronic media. Fewer and fewer people pay much attention to hard news, but the popularity of celebrity magazines and web sites, ‘reality’ TV shows and music videos shows no sign of abating. The media encourages this and profits from it. Compared to Michael Phelps or Miley Cyrus, Hillary Clinton is a crashing bore.

4. The media has played a critical role in the vulgarization of the culture. The amount of violence, degeneracy and moral squalor that the media propagates is disgusting. The reputation of a classic hero cannot survive in that swamp; but it is not toxic to a modern celebrity. Moral degeneracy is just another ‘thing’ that a celebrity can excel at.

So, what do we expect of our heroes? In times past, we exacted a high moral standard. Heroes often failed to live up to those standards, but that does not change the fact that that is what we expected of them. They were role models par excellence, people who could inspire our dreams and elevate our spirits. Today’s heroes are merely expected to be the best at what they do. Roger Federer and LeBron James are phenomenal athletes; it is a joy and a pleasure to watch them. But they do not change the course of history; they do not inspire men and women to challenge their ideas about life and society; they do not discover new products or technologies to improve our lives; they do not take great physical or personal risks to achieve their goals. The old heroes did these things, and their and our lives were richer for it. We had inspiration instead of titillation, admiration instead of perspiration.

Finally, what does the change in the nature of our heroes say about American society? I believe it is yet another reflection of our mutation from a society that prized rugged individualism into the nanny state. We are increasingly risk averse. Instead of demanding a level playing field upon which all individuals can compete and rise to heights that their talents and determination might take them, we look to the government and to ‘experts’ to salve our wounds and smooth our path to a safe, but uninspiring destination.

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This article also appeared in The Intellectual Conservative at

The Progressive Assault on America

A Review of ‘We Still Hold These Truths,’ by Matthew Spalding
A small but growing portion of the US population has come to believe that America is at a tipping point. The people with this insight, a group that I shall refer to as the community of believers, see America in 2010 as radically changed from the America they believe existed in the 17th, 18th and 19th centuries. The changes that disturb this community are of course not in the material or technological details of daily life, but in the political, economic and cultural principles that determine how America is governed, how the people achieve and sustain prosperity and the spiritual and philosophical axioms that control their beliefs and behavior.

The community of believers sees a century-long atrophying of individual liberty, property rights, Constitutional rule of law, limited government, free market capitalism, American exceptionalism, moral character and conservative traditions. They also see its gradual; replacement by a progressive, collectivist, egalitarian, secular, anti-family, apologetic nation, which is dominated by an exceedingly powerful, repressive and paternalistic federal government. They believe that the current radical administration has brought the United States of America to a tipping point in that its socialist policies (Obamacare, cap and trade, amnesty for illegals and more) will push the society beyond the point that it could ever recover from the progressive calamity that has befallen us.

An avalanche of books, videos and manifestos has appeared that express the frustrations of those who hold this view. Many are structured to answer one or more of the following three questions:

1.     What exactly is it that we had prior to 1900 that is on the precipice of extinction?

2.     How was it lost and to whom was it lost?

3.     How do we get it back?

Matthew Spalding of the Heritage Foundation is among those who hold this view. His book, ‘We Still Hold These Truths: Rediscovering Our Principles, Reclaiming Our Future’ (Intercollegiate Studies Institute, 2009) addresses the above three questions, albeit in an uneven fashion. In eleven eloquent and edifying chapters he provides answers to the questions. I say uneven because he devotes nine chapters to the first question and only one chapter each to the latter two.

With that kind of division of labor, one would expect the book to stand or fall on the quality of the first nine chapters. Indeed, Mr. Spalding presents a brilliant, if somewhat academic account of the principles on which our Founding Fathers built the American republic. Not surprisingly, the principles he emphasizes include:

·       Individual liberty is the prime right and main objective of the American people.

·       Government derives its powers only from the consent of the governed, whereas the people derive their rights from the Laws of Nature and Nature’s God.

·       A democratic republic can succeed only if the people have moral character grounded in religious faith.

·       Property is sacrosanct; commerce is the foundation of our prosperity.

·       There should be no privileged classes; all stand equal before the law.

·       The rule of law emanates from our Constitution. It is the supreme law of the land and shall remain so forever. It may be altered only by a laborious process that requires the support of an overwhelming majority of the people.

·       Liberty is not the same as license; ours is to be an ordered liberty.

·       Family, community and religious and civic associations form the bedrock of our civil society and it is to them that our citizens look primarily for satisfaction, guidance and succor.

·       The Declaration of Independence put us in command of our fortunes and established that the USA is an exceptional creation in human history. Nations should look to us for guidance, not the other way around.

In fact, I have encapsulated his nine chapters in these nine bullets, which constitute Spalding’s answer to the first question.

I am certain that virtually all in the community of believers would endorse all of these principles. I am just as certain that President Obama believes in none of it. Nor do any of his henchmen who have brought us to the tipping point. But I think that Spalding believes that many Americans – perhaps even most Americans – would subscribe to these principles if they were not so totally blinded by the brainwashing they have endured at the hands of the educational system, the mainstream media, the legal profession, politicians (who are largely lawyers), the professoriate, the librarians and virtually all the opinion-forming organs of American society that have been captured by progressives. Given that, Spalding’s words mean hardly anything at all to the great brainwashed multitude. But I am getting ahead of myself – Question 3 comes later.

As I said, Chapters 1-9 are a nice read. They constitute a wonderful lesson in American history, civics, Constitutionalism and the nature of man. The writing is clear, the research is impeccable and the argumentation is persuasive. It will reinforce the opinions of any in the community of believers. But in fact these nine chapters do not constitute the main worth of the book. That can be found in Chapter 10. In 27 breathtaking pages, Spalding offers up the best explanation I have ever read of the progressive philosophy and methodology designed to destroy our Constitutional republic and replace it with a statist, social welfare state. His chapter title: ‘A New Republic: The Progressive Assault on the Founders’ Principles’ is a perfect description of what he has accomplished in the chapter.

Spalding explains how ‘progressive thinking was profoundly shaped by two revolutionary concepts: relativism and historicism.’ The former is the notion that there are no eternal truths or permanent principles; thus it is wrong to be guided by an ancient document (the Constitution) unless it is reinterpreted continuously in light of modern ideas. The latter concept teaches that not only are ideas relative, but their meaning is determined by their moment in time. ‘The problem with the American Founders, the new thinkers argued, is that they did not understand and account for the lack of permanence and the constant flux and change in all things.’

We know the outcome. A century-long progressive onslaught on our nation has yielded a society that – in direct contradiction of the nine bullets above – increasingly accepts the following alternate principles:

·       Equality of outcome takes precedence over individual liberty.

·       Government discovers new rights all the time and then grants them to the people.

·       Religious faith belongs to the past; it has been superseded by reason and science.

·       Property is ultimately the province of government; business must be subservient to government.

·       The people’s lives are best guided by ‘experts’ – federal bureaucrats whose regulations have the force of law.

·       In addition, law is what the President, Congress and especially the Supreme Court say it is, not what the Founders wrote in the Constitution.

·       Distinguishing liberty from license is not a useful exercise as long as the people get what the government deems is good for them.

·       Government is far more important than family or community. The latter are transient; while a benevolent government is the true bedrock of society.

·       America is one of many nations. Moreover, it has a checkered history. It has no special role to play in the world saga.

Spalding closes the chapter as follows: ‘The result of all this is that America seems to be moving even further away from its original principles and constitutional design. While progressive ideas have not completely won the day…the dominance of these arguments – in our schools, in the public square, and in our politics – has significantly weakened the very foundations of American constitutionalism, making it all the more difficult not only to defend but more importantly to recover the ideas and institutions of America’s Founders. Is it still possible to revitalize our country’s principles and to renew our liberty?’

Unfortunately, the answer he provides in the final chapter is by far the weakest part of the book. The chapter is full of exhortations like: ‘We must return to…’; ‘We must look to the principles of the American Founders…’; ‘We must reverse this course…’; ‘Americans must be familiar with the history of the American Revolution…’; ‘We must continue to teach the principles of liberty…’; ‘We need learned judges who take the Constitution seriously…’ The point is: How? What is the actual recipe for recapturing our Constitutional republic from the hands of the progressives who have decimated the work of our Founders? Of this there is precious little in the chapter.

Perhaps this is an unfair criticism. It is only recently that more than a sliver of the population has come to appreciate the incredible damage done to our nation by progressivism and, amazingly, how far it has succeeded in fundamentally altering the nature of the United States of America. Hopefully, books like Spalding’s will spread the message and increase the size of the community of believers. If the recent Tea Party phenomenon is an indication, that might be happening. But a blueprint for reversing course – if there is even time to do so – is not to be found in Spalding’s book. For that, readers will have to look elsewhere.
This article also appeared in The Intellectual Conservative at