← The Victor Davis Hanson Show
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- [00:03]
Victor Davis Hanson
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- [01:51]
Jack Fowler
Hello ladies. Hello gentlemen. This is the Victor Davis Hansen Show. I'm Jack Fowler, the host. We are recording on Saturday, November 23. The Star of the show, as you know, is Victor Davis Hansen who is the Martin and Ely Anderson Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution and the Wayne and Marshbusky Distinguished Fellow in History at Hillsdale College. He has a website, the Blade of Perseus. Its address is victorhanson.com later in this podcast I will tell you why I think you should be subscribing to that Victor. Copy nothing. Copy nothing. This show. What are we going to be start off with? We're going to. We're going to talk about this. Copy nothing, break molds, create exuberant and delete ordinary. I hope you're ready for it, Victor.
- [02:43]
Victor Davis Hanson
I am. I am ready for anything.
- [02:45]
Jack Fowler
Good. We're going to get to it.
- [02:47]
Victor Davis Hanson
You're talking, Jack. You're talking to somebody who laid down 105,000 trays on September 21st of 1983. And nice beautiful grape trays. 23 pounds and 24 hours later there was a hurricane that rained two inches on them.
- [03:07]
Jack Fowler
Oh yeah, you talked about that once. That's.
- [03:10]
Victor Davis Hanson
Yeah, great. Raising catastrophe. So I've done. You're talking to somebody. I thin fertilized, put about $10,000 and 4 acres of Santa Rosa plums. It was. They were. They were the most beautiful plums I'd ever seen. Who. When does it ever hail in California? In late May. Hail came that I swear, swear to the Almighty. The cloud came right over our, our farm. It was clear everywhere around. And I hail for 10 minutes and ruined the whole crop.
- [03:40]
Jack Fowler
It's kind of hard to.
- [03:42]
Victor Davis Hanson
So I'm ready for anything.
- [03:45]
Jack Fowler
I remember. Well, let me tell the second podcast we ever did. You did it, I think with 104 fever after you came out from under your house.
- [03:54]
Victor Davis Hanson
I was really ill. Yeah, I had some kind of histamine problem. I didn't know I had been going to the emergency room. I didn't know what it was. And then I got it diagnosed and went on a diet and medication. It's fine.
- [04:07]
Jack Fowler
Well, you're indestructible, Victor.
- [04:10]
Victor Davis Hanson
No, I'm not indestructible. We all know who is indestructible. Donald J. Trump. You cannot, you cannot give him a heart attack. You cannot McDonald's him to death. You cannot haagendoss him to death. You cannot shoot him. You cannot bankrupt him, you cannot lawfare him. You cannot impeach him. You cannot convict. You can't do anything to them.
- [04:33]
Jack Fowler
And he will.
- [04:34]
Victor Davis Hanson
He will.
- [04:35]
Jack Fowler
He is the agent of returning normalcy and sanity.
- [04:38]
Victor Davis Hanson
He's our agent of. He's our guardian angel of normality.
- [04:42]
Jack Fowler
Oh, mamma mia. Well, we're going to get to the. We will talk about that later in the show, but we're going to talk about cars when we come back from these important messages.
- [04:56]
Victor Davis Hanson
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- [07:39]
Jack Fowler
We'Re back with the Victor Davis Hansen Show. Victor, before I stumble into the next the first topic I have to say this last night. So it's Saturday the 23rd of November and I'm in Connecticut and Hillsdale College has a place upstate Connecticut. It's called the Blake Center. The founder of the restaurant chain Northeast restaurant chain Friendlies. I think there's only one or two left. But the guy made him made a lot of dough. He also created a replica of Monticello and then his estate left it to Hillsdale. And Hillsdale has used it for this center where professors come and gathers a crowd from New England and they talk about interesting topics. I've gone there several times. So anyway, I was there last night and a couple people approached me kind of sheepishly and just huge fans of yours and the podcast. Are you that you're that Jack?
- [08:37]
Victor Davis Hanson
You can tell that you don't have to be false, falsely modest. They went up to you and said, Jack, you are a rock star hero.
- [08:44]
Jack Fowler
Yeah, right. Maybe a Pebble star. Anyway, I told Cheryl and Paul Elmore, who are just they, they worship vdh. That I would give them kudos. So that is done. And was grateful to them.
- [08:59]
Victor Davis Hanson
There's something about the Hillsdale people because I give an annual lecture there every year. They are the supporters of Hillsdale College from the Midwest especially.
- [09:10]
Jack Fowler
Right.
- [09:10]
Victor Davis Hanson
They are the soul of the earth. They're the most hardworking, patriotic, law abiding, smart, creative people I've ever met. And the other type of people who I was in Home Depot yesterday, Jack.
- [09:24]
Jack Fowler
Yeah.
- [09:24]
Victor Davis Hanson
And I've been.
- [09:26]
Jack Fowler
You're always there.
- [09:27]
Victor Davis Hanson
I know. Well, I live in a 150 year old house, so give me a break, okay? But I have fixing a doorknob and a latch, right. And I needed some screws that didn't. And I went in and a Mexican American woman about 60 came up to me and said, you know what she said? She said, she said, fellow, fellow. Fellow Trumper. Fellow Trumper. She yelled out, fellow Trumper. And I turned around, she goes, oh my gosh. And I said, you know, I have another person who said he voted for El Trompo. A friend of mine called me up and he had been drinking. He said, I'm for El Trompo. And we had a good conversation about the Mexican American community in the San Joaquin Valley. And she went on a tirade about the coastal representation of Mexican American. Just what we've been talking about and how everybody she knows voted for Trump. Which begs the question, how is the left going to readdress that? It's going to be very strange because I know the left, I know them, I spent my life working with them. They're not going to reach out to the Hispanic community, Mexican American, whatever term we use, they're not going to say, look, we understand that abortion to the moment of birth is bad and we're not going to support that anymore. We understand that when, you know, 12 million people come in illegally, they end up in your communities, they affect your schools, your health, and we're sorry about that. It's not going to happen. We understand that when we bring in gangs in Venezuela, they end up in your community. We're not going to do. They're not going to do that. They're going to keep doing. You people don't know what's good for you. You people, right. We are sophisticated. We understand, you know, what's the matter with Kansas mentality and you better get right. And if you don't get right, we're going to shut that border down. That's what they're probably going to say.
- [11:28]
Jack Fowler
Well, let's talk, let's, let's Talk about one of the topics we were going to bring up. That's since you brought this up, the doubling down essentially. And they'll triple down. Denver Mayor Mike Johnson. Denver has 40,000 illegal aliens there. The elections have happened. What is Johnson's reaction? He's calling on the citizens of Denver to help block.
- [11:52]
Victor Davis Hanson
Yeah, that's insurrection. That's insurrection. That is exactly what South Carolina did in 1832. They said we are not going to obey federal tariffs, we're not going to level them and we want our people. It's exactly what they did in 1859 and 60s. In many of the right before the Civil War, they began announcing that federal armories post op were not the federal government's property. So these people. And didn't they compared themselves at Tiananmen Square?
- [12:22]
Jack Fowler
Yeah, he wants them out in force on the boundaries to prevent what? Yeah, think about that from coming in.
- [12:30]
Victor Davis Hanson
Yeah. Donald Trump is a mass murdering, Mao Zedong type of government and all of these people are dissidents. And the irony is that the only way that the city of Denver can feed and house these immigrants is to get federal funds. And all he should do is any jurisdiction, there's 600,000 of them. Who says we're going to nullify, just like our Confederate ancestors, we're going to nullify federal law because we are morally superior to the federal government. So we're going to not enforce federal immigration law. And he should say everybody has a choice. If that's your choice, Mr. Mayor, Mr. Johnson, I admire your integrity and your courage. And here's what's going to happen. You're not going to get one penny of federal funds to house your immigrants. And if you continue to do it each week, we're going to have another federal program you're not going to get because you don't like the federal government, you don't expect it. So you're not going to get federal highway funds the next week, federal education. Just keep going and tell me how when you want to stop. And that's what he should do. And there's these people don't understand that. You know, they keep saying Trump didn't get a mandate, he didn't get 51% of the vote. Obama in 2012 got more electoral votes. No, it's 2008. Excuse me. But every one of his issues, every one of his issues, border crime, economy, foreign policy, got overwhelming 65%. He was on the right side. It was a mandate. They wanted a dispopular disruptor. And you wrote that, Jack, in your column about National Review and William Buckley, which we'll get to. But they wanted somebody even if he was unpopular. And Donald Trump could be unpopular, but he was riding a crest of a massive mandate based on issues. And they didn't understand that they had no constituency, nothing for the transgender excesses. They had no. Nothing for the open border. They had nothing for Afghanistan or the Chinese balloon type of foreign policy. They have no support for their criminal. The critical legal theory, critical racial theory dei. Nothing. And so they don't get that. And this mayor is an insurrectionist. It's very funny because they say they're. They were out against insurrectionists. They are the party of insurrection. And we saw that with Senator Casey. He finally threw in the towel. But when, even when it was mathematically impossible that the recount could get him elected, he was still trying to fix ballots and only in pre selected counties, though jurisdictions that were blue. In other words, he didn't care about ballots that he might. That have. Might have to be fixed according to his interpretation of how to warp the law if they resulted in McCormick ballots.
- [15:40]
Jack Fowler
You know, I've. I have to always bring up my embarrassing high school and college affiliations. And he was a classmate of mine at Holy Cross. I really didn't know him. I mean, I knew of him. Yeah. And his wife.
- [15:58]
Victor Davis Hanson
No offense, but how come every time you bring up Holy Cross I just. The world's.
- [16:04]
Jack Fowler
Yeah.
- [16:05]
Victor Davis Hanson
Dregs. I mean, every person, whether it's Comey or Patrick Fitzgerald.
- [16:09]
Jack Fowler
All. Where did you.
- [16:10]
Victor Davis Hanson
What is this? All this.
- [16:12]
Jack Fowler
Cheryl was my high school.
- [16:13]
Victor Davis Hanson
They're either incompetent or criminals. Yeah. What. How do you associate. And this is a Catholic high school and college. How did you end up with so many people?
- [16:24]
Jack Fowler
I'm just staying. I'm a magnet for this. Anyway, Victor, his father was as Democrat governor of Pennsylvania.
- [16:37]
Victor Davis Hanson
I remember him.
- [16:37]
Jack Fowler
And a much more noble man of a party that no longer exists. And his son lived off his father's reputation, I think, pretty well the first two terms and then there's nothing left but gas fumes in the engine. And then when he finally conceded the other day, I don't know if you saw his talk. It was. He looked like he was talking to Sesame street or recording for Sesame Street. It was embarrassing that. That this is the caliber of one of the 100 members of the world's greatest deliberative bodies is Bob Casey. Get out of here. Don't let the door hit you on the way.
- [17:24]
Victor Davis Hanson
The tragedy of the Senate elections were one more week and Mike Rogers would have won in Michigan. Sam Brown would have won in Nevada. And I even think that Carrie, like might have won.
- [17:40]
Jack Fowler
Yeah.
- [17:40]
Victor Davis Hanson
Because that was all trending that way.
- [17:42]
Jack Fowler
And, and Wisconsin was also.
- [17:44]
Victor Davis Hanson
Yes.
- [17:46]
Jack Fowler
Yeah, yeah.
- [17:47]
Victor Davis Hanson
He was hove deer. He was, he was going to win. He, in fact, he was the closest. And the reason that they lost was if you look at all of their candid, their opponents, those opponents flipped and start just like Casey did and they started mouthing MAGA issues and policies and they were populous just for this little interregnum, just for a little bit. We know that they were insincere, but they sounded almost indistinguishable from the Republican candidate.
- [18:17]
Jack Fowler
Right. Well, I mean, Casey was running ads right. In his case signing him, affiliating himself with Trump. By the way, Victor, back on the Denver stuff, Tom Holman, the forthcoming border czar. And he's been on TV a lot. Everywhere. He's everywhere. And warning about these kind of, as you say, confederate actions that it is a crime to, to, to prevent the ICE agents from doing what they have to do. And that could be, that could be officials of Denver or whatever city, you know, if they're really, you know, in state and maybe even, you know what's.
- [19:02]
Victor Davis Hanson
So funny about this? This guy thinks he's, he thinks he's the federal government removing George Wallace from the doors of the University of Alabama in what, 1963 or something. 62. He's actually George Wallace standing in the door trying to obstruct the federal government.
- [19:22]
Jack Fowler
We're talking about the mayor of, the mayor of.
- [19:23]
Victor Davis Hanson
Yes.
- [19:24]
Jack Fowler
Yeah.
- [19:24]
Victor Davis Hanson
He is an insurrectionist. And he is saying to the rest of the country, the city of Denver picks and choose which federal statutes we follow. And as I said before, if somebody in Utah said, you know what, we have a shopping center and we are not going to follow the federal endangered species list. Sorry, it's crazy. Or if somebody in Montana says, I'm not picking on those places, or the Dakotas say, I'm going to go in our jurisdiction, you can go in and you can buy a Glock, just buy it, fill out the form, state form, and go take it. We're not going to have any federal waiting list or any of this federal gun registration stuff. No. What would he say? He would say these are fascists. These are going to destroy the United States. Of course he would. And that's what's so weird about the left. They, they really do believe that they are morally superior to such an extent that they have a right to pick and choose which laws they're going to follow. So we all heard that the filibuster was a, to quote a Barack Obama, a racist relic. We were told by Elizabeth Warren and Chuck Schumer the first thing they were going to do when Kamala Harris, remember the honeymoon when they said that she had this bump and she was ahead of Trump. And it looked like suddenly the Republicans, it didn't look. This was all fake. But they said that, that they were going to hold on to the Senate. They said, we are going to let in Puerto RICO and Washington, D.C. and we are going to get rid of the filibuster. And the National Voter Compact's almost there. I haven't heard any of it lately. Why don't they say, well, Donald Trump, can you finish our agenda and get rid of the filibuster now that you're in the majority in the Senate? No. And they, and why don't they say, you know what? Eastern Oregon and eastern Washington are distinct. So is Northern California above Chico. They are very distinct areas. They're the reddest places in the United, United States. They need to be separate states with two senators, I. E, Six red senators. Is that what they want? Is that what they want? But they're like little adolescents. Yeah, they're just like kids. They remind me this new progressive whatever's whoever has hijacked the Democratic Party that, you know, one day Donald Trump is Hitler, and the next day we got to go over to the Fuhrer bunker and see him. And it's just one AOC is one day lecturing about pronouns, and then in Trotskyite fashion, they disappear from her website. They're just like little kids, you know, fads.
- [22:09]
Jack Fowler
Well, as much, you know, they, they, as you just said, that they feel superior. That on the flip side of that is they do detest the people that they feel they're superior to.
- [22:20]
Victor Davis Hanson
Yeah, you know, it's, it's, it was really weird. I, it came to me when I was like, I don't know, 29 or 30. I reentered academia and I went to this department meeting, first department meeting at Cal State Fresno. And I was in this meeting and I had just left talking to three farmers about this Massey Ferguson we had that had a crack vowel, cracked head on it. And they were all explaining the different ways you could take the head out quickly and all of this. And then we got onto another topic of strategies for. And these guys were all brilliant. And then I went up 38, mile 34, whatever it was, and I got sat there that afternoon and it was the most banal. And you know what the topic was that some professors were lingering, talking to students when it was no longer their turn to be in the classroom. And what was the protocol for the next professor to come in when this professor and but it wasn't even that.
- [23:24]
Jack Fowler
Elevated real life problem, Victor.
- [23:26]
Victor Davis Hanson
Yes, it was like this. Wow. You know that if you're going to talk to students, that's on my time. And I have some very important free things, free class things to announce in my class. And I deeply resent the fact that you are hogging my class space. And then it was just shouting and stuff. I thought wow, man, these are children. These people are. They're not talking about the content of their class. They're not talking about. Maybe you can take the students and put them in the hallway. They're just envy and petty. And it's that whole left wing. I'm smarter and more moral. And then these other guys out here with no salary, no tenure, they had to survive on their wits and their muscularity. And they're out here talking about how to break down a sophisticated engine or how to get labor at the right time and the seasons and the odds about rain and the real world. And that was what this is election is about. It really was. It was the people who have to deal with the real world versus all of these people who are wealthy or they're in, you know, they, they're teachers, they got tenure or they're whatever they are, they, they are not as vulnerable to the consequences of left wing ideology that is basically destructive.
- [24:48]
Jack Fowler
Well, we have. We should go down. This is not a rabbit hole, this is a tunnel. We should continue to go down it. And for sticking a little bit with with the confederacy idea. But first I just want to give a nod to our friends atbesthotgrill.com and as our listeners know football is back. So is tailgating. And whether it's Friday night lights Saturday, college or pro Sundays, Solaire tailgate infrared grills set up fast, heat up quickly, only three minutes to searing hot temperatures. Just like the big backyard Solaires, which Victor owns one of a Solaire grill will make you the master of the tailgater with the juiciest, most flavorful food in the parking lot. And the fast grilling times leave you more time to enjoy the pre game festivities. They also cool down fast so you won't miss a minute of the game. The USA made Solair anywhere, everywhere and all about infrared grills are portable and perfect for any grilling on the go. From picnics to camping RVs to boating, but especially tailgating. Amaze your tailgating friends with the great food you grill with your Solair infrared grill. Learn more about these fantastic grills and learn about Solairs. Try before you buy demo rental program at best hot grill.com that's best hot grill.com best hot grill.com and we thank the good people from Solaire for sponsoring the Victor Davis Hansen show. Victor even in California, even in Los Angeles people are increasingly getting red religion and I don't know that that's come to the attention of some of the leadership there. Los Angeles city has declared itself a sanctuary city. This despite the voters showing their disdain for some of the insanity bouncing the whatever the I forget the DA's name.
- [26:42]
Victor Davis Hanson
Gascon.
- [26:43]
Jack Fowler
Gascon. Yeah, yeah. But now in the face of the elections. But back to your point of doubling down that they just don't get it. Los Angeles will be. Los Angeles will become a sanctuary city. Is a sanctuary.
- [26:57]
Victor Davis Hanson
Yeah, it is. And they've got a million illegal aliens there in the city at least. And then 10 million have come. So when people look at California, I mean that was a massive Marshall plan ambition to take 10 million people from the poorest places in the world and integrate them when they came without English legality and limit without limited numbers to a host that had no longer any belief in civic education or the exceptionalism of the United States. And the result was what they are talking about. But they are neo confederates. You know a long time ago, Jack, I wrote an article about this, the new a couple of them and if you think about it, the left, they have the same racial essentialism as the old conf. The one drop rule. That was what Elizabeth Warren was claiming, you know, that she had one drop of Indian blood, one 1024th something. And I'm not. Yeah, I'm not being. I remember Haley Hollyberry, the actress was in a divor contested divorce and she was said on the record that the child that she'd married somebody was white. Is mine because of the old, the old South's one drop. And she invoked it. So they were really racial essentialist. They are today.
- [28:16]
Jack Fowler
Right.
- [28:17]
Victor Davis Hanson
And that is confederate. The other thing is they, they create confederate economies. Big cotton. Remember there was no middle class in the old Confederacy. It was big cotton. And there was the people who took care of the slaves and the slaves but there was whole entrepreneurial autonomous middle class and that's kind of like what California is now. I guess you wouldn't call big tech big cotton but it's $9 trillion and it runs the state.
- [28:44]
Jack Fowler
Right.
- [28:45]
Victor Davis Hanson
And we mentioned nullification. That's a Confederate landmark. But it just strikes me that the left has adopted that neoconfederate model economically, socially, politically, a small little pyramidal right on the top of the pyramid, the little capstone. And then everybody else is the, the underclass. And then they, and among this rarefied group they want to check everybody's genealogy and racial pedigree and then they want to pick and choose which laws they. They follow. And it's really a dysfunctional worldview and this is, it's so exciting right now to be alive to tell you the truth. David, Mamma, you know the great playwright.
- [29:33]
Jack Fowler
Oh yeah.
- [29:34]
Victor Davis Hanson
He's one favorite people and I, I know him a little bit. He know.
- [29:38]
Jack Fowler
Do you.
- [29:38]
Victor Davis Hanson
Oh yeah, we, I love him. I, I like him. I had, he was, I, I was introduced to him by another great American, Shelby Steel. One of my favorite people.
- [29:48]
Jack Fowler
Yeah.
- [29:49]
Victor Davis Hanson
Colleague of mine for almost 20 years. But David sends me things once in a while and he wrote a, a work of genius and he had a line that, you know, America's not over. America is not over yet. Not yet. America's in Christ. It's not. It may fall, but not yet. It reminds me of that line I think I mentioned in Das Boot. When they think they're doomed and then they pop up in the Mediterranean, they fix it. And he said we're not dead yet. And it's really, it's. The idea of the article is that we don't really appreciate how close we got to this revolutionary destructive impulse until this unlikely. Trump and his supporters saved us. And if you think it was very. We were right on a tipping point where we were be this country because of three events. The George Floyd riots that made everybody go crazy. The COVID lockdown, national quarantine we never had before which allowed everybody to go crazy and the Trump victory and then the 2020 election. This country was just about on the. And then they brought in a left wing under Joe Biden's demented veneer. A left wing cadre we have never seen before. And this revolution that we just survived Everybody, it was 360 degrees. It was redefining sex, so it was redefining abortion. I mean this, this menu says every woman should have the abortion pill without a doctor's prescription or anything.
- [31:33]
Jack Fowler
Right.
- [31:33]
Victor Davis Hanson
Forget iver medicine they thought was dangerous. Iver medicine is like candy compared to some of the anti abortion pills. The ramifications and side effects and four.
- [31:45]
Jack Fowler
Year old boy can declare himself A girl. Yes.
- [31:47]
Victor Davis Hanson
And then the racial thing that we were going to re tribalize the entire country. We were going to spend billions of dollars to essentialize people by their color and their gender and they were going to adjudicate who could be hired and who couldn't. We were going to wreck the Pentagon or redefine the Pentagon. So it was a social organization where social change could be fast tracked without adjudication. It was a revolution that we.
- [32:15]
Jack Fowler
Contract law, you know.
- [32:16]
Victor Davis Hanson
Yes. Contracts.
- [32:18]
Jack Fowler
We're going to forgive you. We're going to forgive your loan. Yeah.
- [32:22]
Victor Davis Hanson
Everything was going to be nullified. There was going to be no rule of law. There was no rule of law in the city. And think about it. And it was a rev. It was we're going to topple statues, we're going to rename things. We're going to flash our pronoun. It was an effort to reinvent the human condition in the United States. And they thought we're going to. And then they thought we only have one threat to it. And you mentioned the Ethan Edwards and I've mentioned that kind of tragic figure before on this podcast.
- [32:53]
Jack Fowler
Right.
- [32:54]
Victor Davis Hanson
And they looked at that guy Donald Trump and they said he's a flawed individual but he's a disruptor and he's got a message that's a counter revolutionary message that polls better than our message. And we have to destroy him. We're going to impeach him twice. We're going to try him as a private citizen. We're going to try to get him off the ballot. We're going to try to shoot him. We're going to try to use Lawfare, we're going to get Eugene Carroll, we're going to give her millions of dollars and sue him for something that probably never happened. We're going to Stormy Daniels, we're going to char bootstrap a federal charge that the federal prosecutors do not want to look at under Alvin Bragg. We're going to get lead attitude James to cook up some real estate charges. She's never and never will be charged against anybody. We're going to get this dagger eyed Jack Smith to be asymmetrical on archival matters I. E. Joe Biden's okay. Donald Trump's a felony and we're going to destroy him. And that he. We came very close. We being very close.
- [33:56]
Jack Fowler
Yeah.
- [33:57]
Victor Davis Hanson
And, and it was a revolutionary attempt. We're so lucky to survive it. We still have to fight it. It's still there. I mean I was thinking of that just now. I know we were going to get to it. But we had the Daniel Penny trial. Every remember he was the ex Marine. Everybody who was in the New York subway when people were fleeing a deranged homeless person that was spouting threats to kill people had I don't know what 20 or 30 or 40 former arrest, many of them felony convictions, trying to threaten people, they were terrified of them. So he put him in a chokehold and apparently his defense made a convincing argument that that did not kill him. Allah, George Floyd, same kind of issue. And they're going to try and Alvin Bragg tried to prosecute him for saving people on a subway.
- [34:49]
Jack Fowler
Right.
- [34:49]
Victor Davis Hanson
And I thought about that. What, what is revolutionary justice? Just keep that in mind everybody. And then think of Officer Byrd. He was the African American capital policeman who had a checkered record with a gun. Yes, he'd been cited three or four times. And he shot Ashley Babbitt, a 14 year old military veteran for committing a misdemeanor of going through an already broken window into the Capitol with no prior convictions. And she was facing armed Capitol policemen who were much in a much better position with automatic, semi automatic weapons to take care of. And they didn't think she was a threat. And then he shot her in the neck and killed her. They immediately rallied around him. They said he was a hero, they wouldn't release his name. He played victim on 60 Minutes. Well, just my point is, just contrast that with Penny and tell me, does anybody think, I guess it was the man's name Neely, or the, the guy that the African American homeless person that Penny apprehended and choked. But my point is, does anybody think that Ashley Babbitt was as much a threat as that guy was? And given that guy's record, no. And does anybody think that Daniel Penney deliberately tried to kill or to maim that person in the way that Officer Byrd did and then asked themselves why is Daniel Penney in danger of going to prison for murder or involuntary mad slider and Officer Byrd was declared a hero because the cases are analogous in some ways. And the answer is that in this revolutionary movement, skin color is predicated on it triumphs truth. So in one case, put it this way, let's just reverse the whole thing. So Ashley Babbitt is an African American young woman who has a 14 year old record and she's going through a window in the Capitol that's already broken. And a white police officer with a checkered record of being sloppy in the position on the handling and the possession of his weapon shoots her and kills her Right, Stop. Take a deep breath. On the subway, there is a lunatic white homeless person that has a huge rap sheet and he's threatening to kill people. And a very brave African American ex Marine tries to subdue him. The person he's subduing has been on cannabis and he's not in good health. Does everybody, anybody think that the subway African American ex Marine would be facing Alvin Bragg would have charged him? I don't think so. I can guarantee you that if Ashley Babbitt had been a young black woman going through the window in this revolutionary system of justice and that officer had had a checkered record with his own firearm and shot her, he would be facing what now Daniel Petty is facing.
- [38:09]
Jack Fowler
Right, Absolutely.
- [38:10]
Victor Davis Hanson
I hate to say that, but it's true.
- [38:12]
Jack Fowler
Yeah.
- [38:12]
Victor Davis Hanson
And that's not nothing to do with race or anything. It's revolutionary justice. And that's what it is that you, you take a political ideology and you superimpose legal code and what you get is chaos. And that's where we were. And that they did that to Donald Trump.
- [38:31]
Jack Fowler
Yeah. If you're, if you're kulak, you're guilty.
- [38:33]
Victor Davis Hanson
Because you're a kulak under revolutionary justice. If you're Joe Biden and you take documents out for 30 years that are classified, you put them in four unsecure locations and then you talk about their classified nature to someone, a ghost rider who does not have a security clearance, and that is on tape. And then that person, in fear of being indicted, just destroys evidence. Then two things happened. The special prosecutor says, well, I think he's too demented to convince the jury that he's culpable, so I'm not going to charge him. And then I think the ghostwriter was afraid that he might be hacked, so he destroyed subpoena evidence. And then you fast forward under revolutionary justice to Donald Trump, he took those documents out. Yes, they were under dispute. And we have a right with. Take a SWAT team, break into Margo, go through millennias wear drawer and then rearrange them on the ground as if they're all a mess. Take a picture and say, see, look, with the condition, how they were being stored, that's revolutionary justice.
- [39:39]
Jack Fowler
Well, Victor, we've got to. What are we gonna. Well, we gotta take a break here. And I think maybe we have a.
- [39:48]
Victor Davis Hanson
Lot of stuff to talk about.
- [39:49]
Jack Fowler
We do, but when we. I wanna make note before we go to break that we are recording On Saturday the 23rd and yesterday, Friday the 22nd, the penny defense rested. So I assume I can't. Shouldn't assume anything, but it's quite possible when this podcast actually comes out, which will be On Tuesday the 26th, there may be a verdict. So just keep that in mind, dear listeners. Now we're going to get back to a bunch of stuff.
- [40:17]
Victor Davis Hanson
Are you going to talk about Joe, Tarzan, Biden?
- [40:24]
Jack Fowler
Who's Jane in that?
- [40:26]
Victor Davis Hanson
He was venturing. He was venturing into the jungle to save somebody.
- [40:29]
Jack Fowler
Well, let's. We could. We'll do. We got other things that we got to talk about. The the Jaguar.
- [40:34]
Victor Davis Hanson
So speaking of jungles, Jaguar and Tarzan Tarzan meets Jaguar.
- [40:38]
Jack Fowler
We'll do this when we come back from these important messages.
- [40:45]
Victor Davis Hanson
Time is our most precious commodity and we've heard from so many listeners who have asked for advice about how they can spend it wisely to improve themselves and the people around them. That's why we're so excited that Hillsdale College is offering more than 40 free online courses in the most important and enduring subjects. You can learn about the works of C.S. lewis, the stories in the Book of Genesis, the meaning of the US Constitution, the rise and fall of the Roman Republic, or the history of the ancient Christian Church with Hillsdale College's online courses all available for free. That's right, for free. We recommend you sign up for Athens and Sparta. In this course you'll hear from Victor Davis Hansen and Paul A. Wray, distinguished professors of history, as they discuss the history, culture and government of each city, the ill fated Peloponnesian War and its consequences, and examine what is necessary in order for a democracy to flourish and endure, how best to form free and self governing citizens and how to resist tyranny from without and from within. Start your free course Athens and Sparta Today. Go right now to Hillsdale Edu VDH to enroll. There's no cost and it's easy to get started. That's Hillsdale Edu VDH to register Hillsdale Edu.
- [42:14]
N/A
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- [42:42]
Jack Fowler
We are back with the Victor Davis Hansen Show. So when when this particular episode started in my ham handed way I mentioned some of the ad points in this now infamous Jaguar. I say Jaguar in the Bronx but of course if you're it's J Jaguar. If you're saying it on a television commercial. Victor, I'm assuming you and. And the great Sammy Wink did not talk about this advertisement. But the points were. Folks. I'm sure most folks have seen the ad with a bunch of freaks. Not a car ad without a car in it. Sorry, freaks is a technical term. Some copy points that came up on the screen. Copy nothing. Break molds. Create exuberant. Delete, ordinary. This ad has been mocked wildly, but that. Now the head of J. Guar. Excuse me. Someday I'll get this name here. What is his name? Oh, Rodin Glover is counterattacking the critics of this insane ad for being guilty of vile hatred and intolerance. Victor, you would have thunk after Bud Light and other things that the advertising community and we get away from this insanity. By the way, I heard that like 800 people worked on this ad.
- [44:04]
Victor Davis Hanson
800 did, yes.
- [44:06]
Jack Fowler
Yeah. So anyway, Victor, this is a. Another touch point in our culture wars. Your thoughts on.
- [44:13]
Victor Davis Hanson
Well, we're right back to the. I don't know if Talleyrand actually said that, but he was famously quoted. Napoleon. Remember, he was the foreign minister for the Bourbons and then the Jacobin people and then Napoleon. Then he ended up in the Bourbons. He was very adoptable. But Talleyrand supposedly said they learned nothing and forgotten nothing. We're right back to Dylan Mulvaney territory. You think after Dylan Mulvaney's crazy ad destroyed Bud Light's brand that no one would be stupid enough to do something like that again? So they take this gold plated standard Jaguar and I. I saw the commercial three times. Were they trans people? Were they punk? I. I don't know. Was it surrealistic? I don't know what they were doing.
- [45:04]
Jack Fowler
Yeah.
- [45:05]
Victor Davis Hanson
But there was no picture of any Jaguar. There was nothing. And you know, Jaguar. When I was a freshman in 1967, I had a wonderful freshman football coach. I think his name was Denny Ad. I worshiped him. He was such a great guy. And he was very handsome. He was like 27 or so. All the girls liked him. The teachers. And he came to school one with school one day with an XKE. Remember those Jaguars? XKEs? That was the most beautifully designed car that was ever made. I could not believe it. It was like out of a science fiction movie. And he came up to me and he said, this thing is leaking oil. They all leaked oil. Jaguars. So I called my dad and he called. My dad was a really good mechanic. And my dad had gone around and found a XK150, 1953. Jaguar the Pro, the precursor for the XKE2 seat, right? I mean, God, that thing was like 350 horsepower. And he bought it. It didn't run. Nobody wanted it. And so he towed it back to our farm and he. He worked on it. And we got it running and my brother took it to campus. And then it leaked oil and was. It was so complicated. And one day, my other. My twin brother drove it and the wheel flew off. The wheel flew off when he was. He almost killed himself. And then we got the wheel back on, and my brother and I were trying to fix it it. And I was driving it to downtown Selma, and I hit the brakes, and there were no brakes. The hydraulic. The brake fluid had all leaked out. I went up on the sidewalk, I tried to do the emergency brake, and I was, you know, missing people. And then I hit one of these big pots. And the guy came out and he was really good. I didn't crack it or anything, but it was a concrete pot. And I said, oh, my God. So any you think I'd learned? So I took the Jaguar back. My dad was one of the most wonderful, wonderful people in the world. He said, well, you know, don't worry about it. We'll fix it. He got it all fixed. So then I was working at a packing house, and my little old Volvo was broken down. So my dad said, oh, you can take that thing. Be careful with it. So I drove it. And somebody. I said, this guy there, I won't mention his name, wanted to drive it. And he was like a hot rodder. And he was a mechanic. He was in high school. So he said. I said, it's really tricky to shift, and it's got an overdrive. Don't worry. There's this road out in rural California. Nobody's on it. So we went in and I was in the passenger side, and he started going 80, 90. I said, stop. Was screaming at the top. He got it up to 110 miles an hour, and it was not even redlining. And I said, I was. I've never been more scared. Well, I have been, but it was amazing. But my point is, those were really unique cars. They really were. And they had a lot of problems with mechanics in the 60s and 70s. They were kind of too intricate. They weren't that reliable, but they were beautifully crafted. And the idea that that company with that name would make a commercial like the commercial they did, that was just pandering to what? Sexual ambiguity? Pandering to trans. Pandering to punk, Pandering to postmodernism pandering to this is so bewildering. Only a small cadre. When they had one of the most beautiful products in the world, all they had to do was show it.
- [48:57]
Jack Fowler
They're lecturing us in these. It's one to add like you were like buy my chocolate bar. I get that, you know, but. But these ads that lecture, why wouldn't.
- [49:06]
Victor Davis Hanson
They just make a. Just drive up. A guy drive up in a 1950 XK120 and then write parker, another guy looks little different and he drives it and parks it with a beautiful XK 150, 1953 or 4. Then another. And then he. Another guy comes up with that beautiful xke and then the net. The. The successor and say this is the Jaguar family and here's the. The birth of, you know, the progeny of all of this. Yeah, why not do something like that? It's just, you know what it is? It's just the same old tired narrative that we have these people in the western world that became fabulously powerful, wealthy, titled, credentialed with their 8 billion marketplace person. 8 billion person marketplace. And they think they're just beyond reproach. They talk to one another. The celebrities, the athletes, the politicians, the media people. And they don't get out. And they can. Yeah, yeah. It's just stop seeing what they do.
- [50:14]
Jack Fowler
Well, Victor, I have to make note. You mentioned earlier Halle Berry and I, I wasn't sure if she was doing something good or bad, but I don't care. She can do whatever she wants as far as I'm concerned. I just want to play that out there. And I also want to take a moment for our sponsor, Quince. Are you looking for the perfect gift this year? Well, I found the perfect spot for timeless gifts made from premium materials. You gotta check out Quince. Quince lets you treat your loved ones and yourself to true quality at an affordable price, no matter what you're looking for. All Quint Items are priced 50 to 80% less than similar brands. Did you hear that? 50 to 80% less than similar brands. They only work with factories that are safe, ethical and responsible manufacturing practices. And they use premium fabrics and finishes for that luxury feel in every piece. Gift luxury this holiday season without the luxury price tag. Go to quince.com victor for 365 day returns plus free shipping on your order. That's Quince Q U I n c e.com Victor to get free shipping and 365 day returns. Quince.com/Victor and I love my Quince Blue Sherpa. Thank you, Quince, for sponsoring the Victor Davis Hansen Show.
- [51:39]
Victor Davis Hanson
Victor, you know, I was just going to say what you were saying. I wasn't criticizing Holly Berry. I was just trying to show that the left.
- [51:48]
Jack Fowler
Yeah.
- [51:49]
Victor Davis Hanson
In all of its manifestations is really adopting the methodology of the Confederates. And as you were reading the commercial, I just looked it up that happened in I and I did it by memory, but I was pretty accurate. It was 2011 and she was in a custody suit with her two year old girl, Nala. And she was claiming that Nala should be her child because Nala, even though she was of mixed racial ancestry, because Halle Berry herself was the daughter of a white mother.
- [52:19]
Jack Fowler
Right.
- [52:20]
Victor Davis Hanson
So she was half. And she married somebody who was white. So according to her racial, her own racial calculus, Halle berry's child was 25% black and 75% white. But to get custody, she said it was very important culturally that the girl grew up as being black. And she said at one point, I feel, I'm quoting now, I feel she's black, I'm black and I'm her mother and I believe in the one drop theory. So I'm just quoting what I was.
- [52:59]
Jack Fowler
Just childish and kind of making a thought about that. She's a terribly beautiful woman. And actually Howard, remember Howard Moses that ran the national cruises and he had an agency out of Marietta, Georgia, and she was married to David justice once who played for the Atlanta Braves and then eventually the Yankees, but he said they came in to buy a cruise. She's just the most stunning woman you could ever, ever meet. Anyway, we're here.
- [53:28]
Victor Davis Hanson
She was very attractive. She was a very good actress too. But. Yeah, why anybody would want to quote the one drop rule, I don't. And the reason she's quoting the one drop rule is because that is what universities use. Because one thing that the affirmative action people never told us was when they started to adjudicate admissions and hiring by race in a multiracial society, they never told us what was the threshold. So if you were half black, you look black or you look Hispanic. And they never told us that because to tell us that would incriminate themselves as racial obsessive, chauvinistic, essentialist. And they would eventually, yes, you, eventually, once you go down that deplorable road, Right. You eventually end up up right where you don't think you will end up. And that is Neo Confederacy One drop rule. And that's what they practice. They do.
- [54:26]
Jack Fowler
Let me, let me check this box. You're A quadroon. You're an octoroon. Well, this is the same, right? It's just ugly, ugly thoughts.
- [54:33]
Victor Davis Hanson
Yeah, they had a whole classification for it. So did Hitler. Hitler hired genealogists. So if you were a member of the Third Reich elite and your grandmother was Jewish and somebody wanted to take your job, they would whisper that, oh, some they wish whispered a grain or somebody, this person's grandmother was Jewish. And then they'd bring in the genealogist and they would try to find out if that were true, even though the person didn't, you know, there was no, there was no evidence that they were Jewish. So not that that would be a problem anyway. But the point is, when you go down there, it's really. It gets, it gets dirty and nasty and awful.
- [55:17]
Jack Fowler
Yeah, well, only thing that trumps all of this is meritocracy now, Victor, because we are again, we're recording on the 23rd and time marches on. I think maybe we should bring up. And we talked about it last week and you talked about with Sammy, but Pete Hegseth, who's nominee for the secretary of defense, and some recent news has come out about the truth of what happened to him or didn't happen to him. And maybe be good to get your thoughts on that now. Who knows what could happen between when this broadcast airs and the next episode. But I know you've talked about this with Megan Kelly. You were on her show yesterday, I believe. You want to give us some.
- [56:06]
Victor Davis Hanson
Yeah, Megan. I was on with Megan yesterday and she was. She started her show with a 10 minute. You could say she was angry in a rant, but she was so analytical. It wasn't a rant. She just went through the timeline and she pointed out that the woman in question was kind of a Sherpa with the Republican Party group that had asked him. He was the keynote. They went to a Monterey hotel. He was, I think, separated from his wife, headed for a divorce. He gave the speech. It's a very handsome, dynamic, nice guy. There were a lot of people afterwards at the reception. They went to a bar. This woman in question was trying to keep women away from him or Pete away from women. And in the manner that this happened, he had not hard liquor, but beer. And he went back to his room. She said that she was worried about him. There were people and he was saying, I'm all right. Yelling. People had reported them. They were on tape. No one who was later interviewed thought she was at all intoxicated. She brought him back to the room, his room now as Megan noted, her husband and two little children were right down the hallway in a room. And her husband, at this point, before they even had any congress at all, was texting her, where are you? It's late. He was very worried. He went out and looked at the bar and couldn't find her. So then she went into Pete's room to make sure that he got there okay. So so far as Megan pointed out, everything is fine. He's there. He might have made a pass at another woman. This woman said, I think you're a little bit too drunk. It's time for you to go to your room. So she, they have video of him and she could clearly not intoxicated. He may or may not be tipsy, I don't know. But she draw and then it's he said, she said. And they have two police reports, she says, and she was in the room for about two hours. She says that he came on tour, they had sexual relations. He practiced coitus interruptus. She wanted to leave, he blocked the door. And she then went out back. She had to come up and she told him not to worry, she was going to tell her husband. She fell asleep somewhere. Okay, he says, he said, why are you hanging around here? And flirting started. They had a mutually. A mutually assented sexual act. They discussed whether they should continue without a prophylactic. And then at one point she assumed the superior position in coitus. And after it was over, they parted it. He was very worried about her. He found out, you know, that she was married with two kids. I'm not going to get into the morality of this. I think anybody goes on a speaking circuit knows that one thing you don't do. I don't have that problem. I'm 71 now, but when I was in my 40s and 50s and did not look like Skeletor, I, I was told by a friend of mine, when you go out and you give speeches to groups, you do not go have drinks at the bar afterwards. You just don't do it. So that was something I, I never did. So anyway, this happens. There's no problem. He asked if there's any problem. No, they leave, fine. And then somewhere around three or four days later, I think this was on a Saturday, Monday, she has a sexual act congress with her husband. What's blocked out in the report. But apparently it's her husband that triggers a post traumatic stress realization that it wasn't just a mutual. So calls the Monterey county now we're in a liberal state and one of the Very liberal places is Monterey, right near Santa Cruz. And the investigators come out and they talk to her and they note that it's been some time since the act and that she hasn't reported a rape and that they go and talk to Pete. They talk to her, they ask if she wants to have a conversation with him that they can monitor. She, she doesn't. And then a little bit later she goes to a hospital maybe six days later to see if she was had evidence of this is after she's already had sex with someone else. Okay. So that's the whole thing. And then she says that she is going to go public. So Pete is now with Fox and this is some time later and he asked her what does she want? And she wants money. So they do a non disclosure. Case closed, right? No. And by the way, why this is all going on. The Monterey police investigators have listen to him, listen to her. Understand they're very acquainted with the sexual assault team and they have adjudicated as no sexual assault took place. She then decides to give this information to someone and to railroad his nomination. And there you have it.
- [61:58]
Jack Fowler
Yeah. So we've seen this before.
- [62:02]
Victor Davis Hanson
We've seen this before. It's very similar to the Kavanaugh thing. The. That a person, you know that. Well, there was, that was even further in time. But it's. I don't want to, I want to be controversial, but I will say something. If you are a public figure or people know of you and you go give a lecture or you go to a party or you're in any public situation and you meet somebody of the, you know, who's attracted to you or you're attracted to. If you have a fling, sexual. You are absolutely insane. You are absolutely. If you're male, you're absolutely insane because you are asking for big trouble. And I don't, I'm not even getting into the amorality or immorality of it. I'm just saying that no matter what the conditions were, and he says very clearly that he was appreciative but even though he was tipsy, that she brought him back. That was her job. He, she was the one that was I guess the meet and greeter with, with Pete. She brings. I read the whole thing, the both reports and so he thinks it's all over with that the girl that he put his hand on her leg and might have wanted to pick up on was not interested or she wasn't. And so this woman said, that woman is not interested. It. And she said, okay, I'm going To go back. So, so then he said to her, why are you still in my room? And the talk escalated to a physical. Yeah, but you're, you're absolutely crazy to ever put yourself in that situation. I think.
- [63:46]
Jack Fowler
Yeah, these, this trend of non disclosure agreements having.
- [63:50]
Victor Davis Hanson
They mean nothing. You're stupid to do a non disclosure. They're never honored. They are, they're only valid to the degree that you cannot be hurt in the sense that you're obscure or you're broke. But if you're somebody in the public eye or you have means at some point down the line, the person that you had sex with, if it was consenting and if she thought she could embarrass you, if you ever reach a point where that then you're, you're going to be in trouble. So what's the purpose of that?
- [64:26]
Jack Fowler
Actually, that's why we have Obama as president. Right. Well, he won that Senate race because of a non disclosure agreement and a divorce trial.
- [64:35]
Victor Davis Hanson
It was worse than. It was worse than that. He did that in the general and he did that in the primary and eliminated a candidate who would have won. He got someone in the Chicago court system to leak the divorce trial. And then in the general, the person, all he had done is, has gone to. He took his wife to a risque bar. Porn. I don't know what it was. And maybe. Yeah. And then they had a divorce and she for a while tried to use that as a reason he shouldn't get custody. Then they kind of reconciled not to get remarried, but to close it. It was sealed. And then somebody leaked that. And Obama once quipped is, I don't think I'd ever be a senator if I hadn't leaked that divorce. Somebody hadn't leaked that divorce thing in my primary and got rid of him. And then I got the other one over there and the election. Take those two away and he would have never been elected. Gosh, David Oxbot, you know, was his Sherpa at that time.
- [65:36]
Jack Fowler
Well, Victor, we have time for one more. We have lots of things we could talk about and we're going to record another episode and so we'll, we'll move some of those things there. But you've written a column on, I mentioned a little earlier on Return to Sanity. And we'll get to that when we come back from these final important messages.
- [65:58]
N/A
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- [66:31]
Jack Fowler
He came by my school for career day and said he was a big roas man. Then he told everyone how much he loved calculating his return on ad spend. My friends still laugh at me to this day.
- [66:43]
Victor Davis Hanson
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- [66:53]
Jack Fowler
That's LinkedIn.com results. Terms and conditions apply. LinkedIn the place to be to be. We're back with the Victor Davis Hansen Show. Victor's got a website, the Blade of Perseus. The web address is Victor Hansen dot com. Go there early and often like they vote in Chicago and you will find the links to Victor's American Greatness essay where he writes one every week, his weekly syndicated column him, the archives of these podcasts and the current episodes, his books and ultra articles which Victor writes two or three a week for the Blade of Perseus exclusively. You can read them if you're a subscriber. $5 a month, $50 discounted for the full year. Some other Victor information. If you're on X, his handle is @vdhanson on Facebook. VDH's Morning Cup. Go search for that. That. Not formally affiliated, but friendly as heck. The Victor Davis Hansen Fan Club is also to be found on Facebook.
- [68:01]
Victor Davis Hanson
You know, Jack, before we, before we go on, I. I don't mean. I didn't mean to say that if Pete was separated, he shouldn't be dating. I'm talking about one night stands as a public figure. It's. And I, I meant, you know, especially men. But it applies to a lesser degree of women too. If you are a public figure or you have means you. Anytime you hook up with somebody you've never met and you think and whatever the circumstances of consensuality and you know it's consensual. That's not the end of the story. Right? That's all I'm saying. Well, you're the beginning of bad things.
- [68:41]
Jack Fowler
Your prophylactic recommendation. Now you like it or not even you call yourself Skeletor. You have A great following. I am confident. I've seen you on cruises. I mean, there are people that just worship you and would like to carry on the conversation, I'm sure. And the only way to preclude what others go through is, as the prayer goes, avoid the near occasion of sin. So you have to take those. You're right, Victor.
- [69:11]
Victor Davis Hanson
Well, I don't go to the links. That was it Billy Graham, that said when he gave those really magnetic performances all over the world, you know, those come to Jesus things.
- [69:21]
Jack Fowler
Right.
- [69:21]
Victor Davis Hanson
He was a very handsome guy.
- [69:23]
Jack Fowler
Yeah.
- [69:24]
Victor Davis Hanson
And he would, said he would lock himself in his room from the outside, yet somebody locked the outside because he didn't want to be tempted by Satan. But I don't want to give advice. I didn't want to sound like I was sanctimoniously giving advice to Pete. Pete. But if he had just said to himself, I'm drunk, or he had the old adage. I think my father told me, never have relations with somebody crazier than yourself.
- [69:51]
Jack Fowler
Well, I, I don't think, unless you're, I think none of this precludes his, his ability to be a successful Secretary of defense.
- [70:01]
Victor Davis Hanson
Absolutely. No, it doesn't. And I think he's, everybody matures or evolves and I think, think he's happily married now. And I, and he was going through a period where he was in combat, some horrific conditions in Iraq and Afghanistan. And so I, and I don't think he would do that at all now.
- [70:22]
Jack Fowler
And yeah, I, I, I love Pete. I've, I met, I, I spent some time with him.
- [70:28]
Victor Davis Hanson
He's good. He came out here and he was one of the most humble, informed, sincere people. And, and Donald Trump, as we said before, has kind of a dilemma because he really does want to avoid the mistakes he made in 2007 of trusting establishment figures in state, in defense. Oh my gosh.
- [70:53]
Jack Fowler
Who was the Secretary of State?
- [70:55]
Victor Davis Hanson
Rex Tillerson.
- [70:56]
Jack Fowler
What a disaster.
- [70:57]
Victor Davis Hanson
Yeah, I mean, they got. He said that Donald Trump was stupid. Remember in Trump said, what's your iq? And so Trump was really wasting precious.
- [71:06]
Jack Fowler
Right.
- [71:07]
Victor Davis Hanson
Capital having to reply to members that he brought. And then there was the anonymous. And then, gosh, all of these people. Omarosa. And then what's her name, the Hutchinson or whoever. Cassie. Melania's a. That turned on her. John Bolton wrote a memoir and timed he. If he's going to avoid that and get people who are not part of the swamp and are loyal to him, then almost de facto he's going to have to get people who do not have the same type of experiences, education, credentials, because they're going to be compromised and they're going to find a thousand ways not to do what Donald Trump says.
- [71:50]
Jack Fowler
Right, right.
- [71:51]
Victor Davis Hanson
But Donald Trump has a mandate, as I said, based on the issue. So except for the Gates thing that you and I just expressed reservations about, and I. In that regard, I don't understand. Well, I do understand. We talked about our conspiracy theories, why he picked Gates, as if he would draw all of the fire away from the other candidates. He would resign his seat so he would not be a disruptor in the House anymore. He would never get out of committee. And he didn't because. So that nobody would have to go on record voting for him. And then he would be replaced by somebody much more palatable. Pan Bond. He's got a lot of experience, chance she'll get confirmed, although they will go after her for something. They're going to go after all of them, but I think they're going to get confirmed now. And I think that might have worked. I don't know if it was intended or not, but they, the left spent a lot of political capital and energy going after Gates.
- [72:48]
Jack Fowler
Yeah.
- [72:48]
Victor Davis Hanson
And took the country's attention toward them. And maybe Tulsi Gabbard and RFK and Pete Hexap will go through.
- [72:56]
Jack Fowler
Well, Victor, the point you're making about the pool of trustworthy sources, if we take that the 100 Republicans mostly seem to have been Bush administration people who signed that document. They were endorsing Kamala Harris. I bet there were a thousand more, many thousand more who didn't have the courage to sign that but would have wanted to because they were hedging their bets because maybe they would have a role in the next administration if it was Republican. And so from that, that kind of pool, the broader pool of there's this trouble to be had, but there is no.
- [73:33]
Victor Davis Hanson
Yeah. There's no Never Trump movement now. It doesn't exist. If you look at the bulwark or you go, I wouldn't recommend going on it, but it's straight left wing. All those people, some of who were friends of ours. Jack.
- [73:47]
Jack Fowler
Yeah. Yeah.
- [73:48]
Victor Davis Hanson
All of them are riding complete. I, I don't, I don't want to say a boilerplate Democrat. They're hard left. Yeah. And so they have completely flipped over and they're strategizing how not just to destroy Donald Trump, but destroy the whole Republican Party and resistance.
- [74:04]
Jack Fowler
They are going to be the.
- [74:05]
Victor Davis Hanson
They are the resistance. And they're getting more and more shrill, shriller. And they're getting more irrelevant. And I don't think there is a Never Trump movement. I think Donald Trump extinguished it.
- [74:16]
Jack Fowler
Yeah, well, well, but speaking of which, you have written a column, Victor, and we'll run out, turn around, head to the head for the finish line here with your column on a return to sanity. And it begins. We are witnessing a historic counter revolution after Trump's victory, far different from his first election in 2016. The Orthodox and the supposed scripted future are now suspect and they are likely to be dethroned from the trivial to the existential. Would you take us out, Victor, by discussing this? This is your syndicated column from this week.
- [74:53]
Victor Davis Hanson
Well, this is not a revolution. It's a counter revolution. It's an attempt by Trump to stop the cultural, economic and political social insanity. And he's trying to it to reform all of the weaponized agencies. He's trying to go back to normalcy. So when people say he's radical or he's doing no, he's not, the FBI is radical. Three out of the last four FBI directors did not tell the truth under oath. The CIA, as John Brennan lied twice under oath. The DOJ was entirely weaponized. Whether it was fixing the sentence for Hunter or trying to or it was spying on groups that were politically opposed to Joe Biden or committing lawfare. That was the orthodox and it was a revolutionary movement. And if you think Donald Trump is a revolutionary, then you've got to think that we're normal. We are in revolutionary times. They are the revolutionary. There is $37 trillion in debt and they are adding $2 trillion. The counter revolutionary effort is to try to cut spending and get back. If you think that Pete Hexeth is going to disrupt the Pentagon, he's going to bring it back to normalcy. He's going to say that if you're a four star general, please do out of Lockheed or General and go back to it after your tenure and use the contacts for procurement that might not be in our national interest. He's going to try to tell people if you had natural immunity from COVID you don't need a booster. And we're surely not going to kick you out and lose 85 of our 100 of our best people. And he's trying to say there's something wrong with the Pentagon. You don't win our wars. What was the bombing of Libya or the bombing of Syria or Afghanistan or Iraq? And why are you losing all of these recruits? Is it gangs? Is it obesity, as you say? Is it drug use? Or is it because you went after a particular demographic and so on the border, Trump is saying, you think I'm a revolutionary. What's revolutionary is you destroyed the border. It doesn't exist. You let in 12 million people. You've got 16,000 people staying in hotel rooms in New York at your expense. We have never seen anything. You are empowering the cartels with sex trafficking and fentanyl importation. I am going back to what everybody wanted before this revolution, and that is a secure border and legal only immigration. And so this Trump revolution is really a counter revolution. And, you know, he's saying, for 5,000 years, we did not have a separate sex. We had something called gender dysphoria. It was a rare physical and mental phenomenon, but it's not a mainstream civil rights matter that involves 20% of the population. And so I think I ended that column by saying, you know, the age of flashing your pronouns and taking down statues and renaming icons. Trashing the dead. We trash the dead all the time. And vandalizing the campus library or going after Jew. It's passing. It's passing. It's. It's fading. We're not going to put up with it anymore. But don't say that Donald Trump is a revolutionary. He's a counter revolutionary. He's trying to bring the country back to where it was. I think the madness started with the election of Obama. I really did. Everybody thought they were voting for a moderate racial healer, half black, half white. They did not want a Marshall Davis, ideological out right, Bill Ayres type of revolutionary. And they did not want a first lady who was always going on the racial victimization harangue. And I think that continued through Joe Biden. They voted for old Joe Biden from Scranton, who was going to be uniter and a moderate, not an enfeebled vessel for a third Obama term. And that's what they got.
- [79:43]
Jack Fowler
Maybe we should end with that Victor, because we mentioned it before, him wandering off into the jungle, which is in a sense kind of laughable. But on the other hand, it's like why they cut on the verge of a war.
- [79:56]
Victor Davis Hanson
What I didn't understand about that. So he's at the G20 in Brazil. I guess he was near Brasilia, that the interior capital or something. So he finished and like he always does, he looks around and I don't understand why they don't have handlers. It's like the laptop thing where, you know, he said that everybody was garbage and. And it looked like he was in outer space on the angle of a laptop.
- [80:17]
Jack Fowler
Yeah.
- [80:17]
Victor Davis Hanson
Why didn't they have professionals? Why don't they have little markers, you know, like little spray paint steps that he follows? But there was nobody there, so he always looks around. Sometimes he goes in the wrong way of the stage, but he wanders off into the jungle. But what happened to him? They cut the stream, the video. Did he ever come back? Did they go fetch him? Is he still out there? I don't know. I haven't seen him since. Yeah, they don't tell us. So yeah, he's got a little Tarzan. Maybe Tarzan saved him. I don't know.
- [80:50]
Jack Fowler
Okay, well, maybe me. Jill Utah. Hey Victor, you've been terrific as ever. I want to thank again the folks, you know that I met personally last night, Cheryl and Paul Elmore and their relatives and the great fans of Victor. I want to thank the folks who sign up for Civil Thoughts, the free weekly email newsletter I write for the center for Civil Society. Comes out every Friday. Gives you 14 recommended readings. Great articles I've come across the previous week totally free. Go to sybilthoughts.com and do sign up. I want to make note of two things, Victor, because we read the comments that people leave on Apple and on your website. People rate the show on Apple 0 to 5 stars. Thanks everyone who takes the time to do that. And Victor's rating is 4.9 plus one person kindly Jim in LG wrote. Love the show. I listen to every episode from the November 19th program. It was quarterback Drew Brees. Brees name you were looking for, not Drew Bledsoe. So we were talking about that terrible moment where Drew Brees pulled back on his stand for patriotism. I thought it was a low point of the whole canceled culture war early on. But take one other comment here from HJB man who writes titles this national treasure writes. This podcast is superb. VDH is absolutely brilliant and he presents a very intellectual and well reasoned argument to his beliefs. BDH knows more about military history and the classics than anyone alive today. He used, I hope you know that Victor. He uses his extensive knowledge of the past past to show us that what we are going through now is not anything unique or special. Plus he is very calm and even keeled. He is the best conservative commentator HJB man. Thank you.
- [83:10]
Victor Davis Hanson
Very nice, very nice of him. But I just want to leave today.
- [83:17]
Jack Fowler
Yeah.
- [83:18]
Victor Davis Hanson
To kind of encourage everybody. These are really exciting. Sammy, the our last one, she wrote something like so good time to be alive or something. Everybody wrote me about that, the title of that podcast and it is really an exciting time. We dodged a bullet and there's going to be fundamental changes and reforms and everybody's. I've never seen everybody said we're disunited. I never thought people who took the knee would now be doing ymca. I never thought, I never thought that would happen. And I never thought that Joe and Mika would go to the Fuhrer bunker and I never thought that would happen. And I never thought you would see a Republican cabinet and it's going to be problems with it. I'll warn everybody because there's a lot of irreconcilable sireable positions. But I never thought when I saw that cut when I see them march into world rest, I mean a all mixed martial arts events and I see Dana White and Joe Rogan, Tulsi rfk, Speaker Johnson. Yeah, I know it's the most. The left talks about diversity. This administration is diverse.
- [84:37]
Jack Fowler
Yeah. Reminds me a little of that HBO show Entourage also. But it's, it's certainly different and exciting. Thanks Victoria, Victor, for everything. Thanks folks for listening and we will, we will be back soon with another episode of the Victor Davis Hansen Show. Bye Bye.
- [84:56]
Victor Davis Hanson
Thank you everybody.