In Trump’s America, George Orwell’s Animal Farm, New Commandments | National Review
8 years ago
His 1945 novella Animal Farm — initially difficult for Orwell to publish and deeply hated by Western leftists — was an allegorical warning to liberals of the dangers of left-wing propaganda. Words and phrases changed their meanings — again and again — to serve a tyrannical agenda. The assorted creatures of Orwell’s fictional barnyard frequently wake up to new commandments posted on the barn wall by their Stalinesque pig leaders, with yesterday’s edicts crossed out or modified — and soon to be forgotten.
Rich people were suddenly not all bad blue-stocking Republicans, but also hip, valuable Silicon Valley progressives in flip-flops who, with some reluctance, outsourced and off-shored. In our past eight years of historical revisionism, huge political contributions — like the hundreds of millions of dollars in subsidies given by multi-billionaire financial speculator George Soros — were now helpful for democracy if only they were given to left-wing causes. Once-liberal public campaign-financing laws and limits on fund-raising applied to all candidates except Barack Obama, who became the largest recipient of campaign cash in election history.
Executive orders
are critical presidential prerogatives when Congress won’t actundermine the Constitution’s separation of powers.
In another classic Orwellian moment, the on-air fabulist and serial prevaricator, newsreader Brian Williams, jumped on the bandwagon to loudly editorialize about the dangers of not telling the truth and passing it off as news. Left unsaid was Williams’s subtext: Believe me about the dangers of fake news, because I was the biggest news faker in network anchor history.
- The Senate filibuster is
an archaic and disruptive obstacle to governmentan essential tool of legislative democracy. - The Senate’s “nuclear option” of approving nominees by majority votes is a
legitimate tool to restore legislative balancecrackpot idea to erode Senate traditions. - Pen-and-phone executive orders
are critical presidential prerogatives when Congress won’t actundermine the Constitution’s separation of powers. - Past Supreme Court decisions
are always fluid rulings and hold no real sway over present court prerogativesestablished judicial precedents that should not be tampered with by current politicized justices. - Pressuring private companies
like Boeing or Chrysler for political purposeslike Carrier to keep jobs in the U.S. is unwise presidential intrusion into the marketplace. - Edgy, out-of-the-box foreign-policy outreach to
democracies like Taiwandictatorships like Cuba and Iran is proof of presidential leadership and imagination. - Presidential informality
like inviting rappers with rap sheets to the White House or doing interviews with GloZelllike tweeting and videos are ominous signs of presidential frivolity and immaturity. - States-rights nullification of federal law
has been traditionally racist, and subversive to the idea of the United States, leading to crisis or waris a legitimate expression of progressive cultural exceptionalism. - Running up huge deficits
in Keynesian fashionprimes the economyis a dangerous sign of presidential laxity. - Regular press conferences with vigorous cross-examinations of the president are
noisy anachronisms from the bygone age of print journalisma must for a functioning democracy. - Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Ohio voting
twice for Barack Obama over John McCain and Mitt Romney was at last proof that the white working class was tolerant and enlightenedfor Trump shows that these deplorable voters are still irredeemable white clingers and supremacists. - Worries that registration and voting can be rigged
Rioting, demanding superfluous recounts, damning the legitimacy of the Electoral College, and threatening Electorsare efforts to subvert American democracy. - Criticizing a former president
allots proper blame where it belongsfor current messesis bad sportsmanship, cheap, and unbecoming. - Former presidents making business deals and earning exorbitant speaking and consulting fees as they cash in and globe-trot
demeans the officeis an acceptable right and welcome duty of an ex-president. - Weighing in on contemporary news stories such as
the Skip Gates psychodrama or the Trayvon Martin murder casea flag-burning incident is symptomatic of presidential puerility. - Vladimir Putin
was unfairly alienated by George W. Bush, sophomorically hyped into an existential threat by Mitt Romney, and deserving of resetis dangerous, a Trump fan, and an inveterate enemy of the U.S.
All the above have a shelf-life of about four years and may be recalibrated according to the results of the 2020 election. — NRO contributor Victor Davis Hanson is a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution and the author, most recently, of The Savior Generals.
Source: In Trump’s America, George Orwell’s Animal Farm, New Commandments | National Review