Victor Davis Hanson: Nazi Tattoos Used to Be Taboo—Now They’re in the Democratic Party

Summary

Victor Davis Hanson: Nazi Tattoos Used to Be Taboo—Now They’re in the Democratic Party
Podcast: Victor Davis Hanson: In His Own Words | The Daily Signal
Date: May 7, 2026
Host: Jack Fowler
Guest: Victor Davis Hanson

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Episode Overview

In this episode, Victor Davis Hanson (VDH) delivers pointed commentary on the current state of political and cultural issues in America, focusing in particular on the controversy surrounding Maine’s Democratic Senate candidate Graham Platner. Hanson discusses a wide array of related topics, including corruption in Democratic states, antisemitism on the left, generational cultural shifts, disruptive academic activism, and troubling judicial decisions. Throughout, he draws connections between present-day politics and deeper historical trends.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Graham Platner and the Transformation of the Democratic Party

Timestamps: 00:00–05:27, 21:48–26:13

• Background:

  • Graham Platner, Democratic Senate candidate in Maine, is embroiled in scandal due to a history of Nazi tattoos and inflammatory social media posts.
  • Previously, such a past would have been completely disqualifying for a Democrat.

• VDH’s Analysis:

  • The Democratic Party is shifting: “Thirty years ago, if you were a Democrat and you wore a Nazi tattoo for 20 years and people knew about it, that would exclude you from being nominated today in the Democratic Party. The fact that he had a Nazi tattoo and he removed it will mean… the grandees will explain it away or wink nod. It will be something that will be of value because of the rising anti Semitism. It sends a message.” (Victor Davis Hanson, 00:09; 10:23)
  • Platner’s “elite” background contrasts sharply with his working-class persona.
  • The broader left increasingly tolerates or rationalizes extremist behavior and symbols if they serve current ideological purposes.
  • “He’s deliberately trying to manufacture the fact he didn’t go to the Hotchkiss prep school and he’s not the son of very affluent people with privilege. And he does that by saying rural people are stupid and lazy, that kind of stuff.” (VDH, 13:35)

• VDH on Tucker Carlson’s Praise:

  • Tucker Carlson expressed intrigue about Platner, which Hanson critiques as misplaced: “How is he different than anybody else? He's representative of the Democratic Party, isn't he?” (VDH, 21:48)
  • Suggests Platner fits the now “Jacobin” character of the Party rather than being an outlier.
  • Hanson questions Tucker’s standards for supporting or interviewing certain candidates, and critiques a tendency to judge Trump on a single issue rather than the whole record.

2. Corruption and Electoral Manipulation in Maine

Timestamps: 03:44–05:27

• Host Jack Fowler introduces:

  • Charges that Maine Democrats are recruiting non-residents and noncitizens to vote and that officials are withholding voter files from federal scrutiny.
  • Secretary of State Shanna Bellows previously attempted to remove Trump from ballots.

• VDH’s Framing:

  • Accuses Democrats of having “no confidence” in their actual message and relying on changing the rules: “So when they do that, they either open the border or, or they try to say that felons can vote or they try to change the system.” (VDH, 08:24)
  • Draws parallels to previous institutional power plays (court packing, removing filibuster, etc.)

3. Rising Left-Wing Antisemitism and the New Party Base

Timestamps: 10:23–13:35, 15:41–18:25

• VDH’s Key Point:
  • The Democratic Party is becoming increasingly tolerant or even supportive of antisemitic elements for the sake of political power.
  • Draws direct comparison between fringe right and left figures (Nick Fuentes vs. Hasan Piker) but observes left-wing radicals are now platformed with impunity at elite institutions.
• On Platner’s Nazi imagery:
  • The party’s reaction is to minimize or rationalize even explicit Nazi associations if the person fits “the message.”
• Quote:
  • “It sends a message to the new Democratic Jacobin Party. And it’s not the Democratic Party anyway. It’s a Jacobin party, a French revolutionary party. And they have institutionalized antisemitism.” (VDH, 10:59)

4. The Shift of Political Elites; Populist Performances

Timestamps: 12:35–16:17

• Many on the left now posture as working-class, while coming from privileged backgrounds.
• Platner, like others (Tom Steyer, Mondame), is from wealth but denounces wealth and plays up populist themes.
• VDH sees this as both elitist hypocrisy and a calculated effort to appeal to disaffected younger voters.

5. Generational Change and “Prolonged Adolescence”

Timestamps: 28:45–33:51

• Notable cultural difference between generations:
  • Young adults now behaving like children, lacking responsibility, engaging in “prolonged adolescence.”
  • Contemporary college-age and young adults, often well-off, are restive and directionless due to societal excess, not poverty.
• Quote:
  • “What destroys societies is not dearth. It’s excess. Excess spending, excess government, excess everything. It takes away the human desire for struggle and to perform and to get active.” (VDH, 32:36)
• Draws on classical literature (Juvenal, Livy, Catullus) for historical precedent.

6. American Internal Migration and Growing Division

Timestamps: 33:51–39:40

• Blue states losing millions; red states growing and becoming more dynamic.
• “We are really getting into an 1850s situation where we're creating two entirely antithetical cultures. But the problem is it's flipped from the Civil War.” (VDH, 33:57)
• Political and demographic polarization is creating an echo of the pre-Civil War sectional divide, but with reversed geographies and social meanings.

7. Tech Exodus and Tax Policy

Timestamps: 38:39–41:37

• Tech entrepreneurs and wealthy individuals fleeing blue states (e.g., Seattle, California) for tax-friendly, business-friendly red states.
• Leftist leaders’ disdain (“if they want to leave, go ahead and leave”) is accelerating decline.

8. Hypocrisy Among Progressives Regarding Wealth

Timestamps: 41:37–43:08

• Leftist billionaires like Steyer and Bezos now targets of the very rhetoric they sponsored.
• VDH: “The only thing that works is just to say, oh, they're deplorables. Oh, they're irredeemables... They don't realize that they're sinking.”

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On the acceptance of former taboos:
  “Thirty years ago, if you were a Democrat and you wore a Nazi tattoo for 20 years and people knew about it, that would exclude you from being nominated today in the Democratic Party. The fact that he had a Nazi tattoo and he removed it will mean...the grandees will explain it away.” (VDH, 10:23)

• On D.C. Democrats:
  “They are terrified of this new base... the power, the power, the power, that's the most important asset for them, that they will never give it up. That's why all these guys die in the saddle, so to speak.” (VDH, 12:05)

• On generational change:
  “The history of this country is one of people 17, 18, 19, 20, 25 being uproot from their homes and farms... And they died because they believed in this country would be... Each generation would have it easier and not have to do that. And they were right. We're a time of relative peace. We have deterrence, we have affluence. And yet this generation feels just like we were warned by... classical authors... hunger is not the problem in this country. The left keeps saying it is. But I live in one of the poorest zip codes... and I can tell you... 65 to 70% of the people are obese. I have never seen one person who looked undernourished.” (VDH, 29:53 & 32:36)

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Significant Segments & Timestamps

• Introduction and Platner Background:
  00:00–05:27

• “Nazi Tattoos Used to Be Taboo” – VDH’s Core Argument:
  10:23–13:35

• Tucker Carlson and the Platner Endorsement Discussion:
  21:48–26:13

• Prolonged Adolescence and Cultural Decline:
  28:45–33:51

• American Internal Migration/Polarization:
  33:51–39:40

• Tech and Billionaire Exodus from Blue States:
  38:39–43:08

• UCLA Law Protest and Academic Activism:
  44:44–54:03

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Additional Topics

Disruptions at UCLA Law and Free Speech in Academia

Timestamps: 44:44–54:03

• UCLA assistant dean threatened disciplinary action against Federalist Society students for outing protestors; later walked the comments back.
• VDH: “These are going to be your personal attorneys, your district attorneys, your public defenders, the Judge Brosberg's of the future. Right... It's Orwellian.”
• Calls out academic standards decline due to activism and grade inflation: “If 80% of the people are getting A's and 20% of the people flunk the bar on their first attempt... the quality of the graduation grading class is not what it was.” (VDH, 49:03)

Judicial “Insanity” and Lax Enforcement of Immigration Law

Timestamps: 60:20–64:02

• A Rhode Island federal judge ordered the release of a Dominican illegal alien with an Interpol warrant for murder, citing “continuous unlawful detention,” overruling ICE.
• VDH: “Mr. Gomez is not going to turn up in her neighborhood... she always wants to be a federal circuit court judge... That will be a recommendation to be promoted.”

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Reflections on History, Civil War, and Reconciliation

Timestamps: 67:59–78:13

• VDH and Fowler discuss the difference between earlier American attitudes of post-Civil War reconciliation and today’s left, which prefers “reliving every single wound and widening it.”
• Warm, personal family anecdotes bring the discussion full circle, connecting historical themes to lived experience and ideas of forgiveness and national unity.

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Tone & Style

• VDH speaks with the authority of a classicist and historian, drawing heavily on historical parallels, literature, and personal anecdotes.
• Tone is critical, erudite, yet also anecdotal and occasionally philosophical.
• Host Jack Fowler provides directions and often interjects personal observations and questions, keeping the conversation lively.

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Summary for New Listeners

This episode is an incisive exploration of how left-wing politics in America, especially within the Democratic Party, has transformed in recent decades—becoming more radical, more tolerant of previously intolerable behavior, and less anchored in principle or tradition. Victor Davis Hanson situates current controversies—like Graham Platner’s candidacy and the normalization of antisemitism—within longer cycles of American and Western history. He also ranges into cultural decay, generational changes, academic disruptions, and the weaknesses of the current legal system, offering an unvarnished, historically grounded analysis for anyone seeking to understand the deeper dynamics at play in today’s turbulent politics.

Transcript

[Jack Fowler]

We have to talk about Tucker Carlson. Now. Here's a headline. Tucker praises Maine Democrat Senate candidate Graham Platner.

[Victor Davis Hansen]

If he says that he would prefer Graham Platner, and I guess he does because he didn't say. At the same time, he's an interesting person, I want to interview him. But of course, I'll also interview Susan Collins because her record, even though I don't embrace it all, has been more representative of my entire life in the conservative movement. He didn't say that 30 years ago. If you were a Democrat and you wore a Nazi tattoo for 20 years and people knew about it, that would exclude you from being nominated today in the Democratic Party. The fact that he had a Nazi tattoo and he removed it will mean a. The grandees will explain it away or wink nod. It will be something that will be of value because of the rising anti Semitism. It sends a message. It sends a message. And he's reiterated again and again and again about Gaza, Gaza, Gaza, genocide, Israel, Israel, Israel. So that sends a message to the new Democratic Jacobin Party.

[Jack Fowler]

Well, hello, ladies, and hello, gentlemen, and welcome to Victor Davis Hansen in his own Words. We're here on the Daily Signal Network. Victor is the Martin and Eli Anderson Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution. He's a senior contributor at the Daily Signal Signal. He's a man with a website, the blade of Perseus. VictorHansen.com is the address. You should subscribe later on. I'll tell you why. And he's the author of the Fourth, coming out in September, but orderable now on Amazon. Book Counter Revolution, the Fall and Rise of Donald Trump and the maga. What's the last word? I'm missing the last word. Movement. Sorry, sorry.

[Victor Davis Hansen]

You're a movement conservative. You didn't know that?

[Jack Fowler]

I am. I am a movement conservative.

[Victor Davis Hansen]

I know you are.

[Jack Fowler]

Thank you. Once upon time, publisher, what was. Well, anyway, we got so much to talk. We're talking on Monday, May 4, 2026, and this particular episode will be up on Thursday, May 7. And then following that, Victor, of course there's two. I'm sure it'll be two fantastic discussions with the great Sammy Wink. Victor, let's talk Maine and Plat, Platner and Tucker and corruption in various Democratic joints. And we also have joints also known as states. And we have follow up to the craziness at the UCLA Federal Society gathering and the reaction, the terrible reaction by the UCLA administration. And then we have a Justice Department report out on how the Biden Justice Department was going after Christians and pro lifers. So we've got lots and lots to get Victor's take on. And we'll do all that when we come back from these initial messages.

[Victor Davis Hansen]

Since the founding of America 250 years ago, many things have changed, but some things never do. The commitment of husband and wife, the importance of passing along our values to our children.

[Jack Fowler]

The faithfulness of God.

[Victor Davis Hansen]

Some wonder how we can ensure America will continue to thrive as long as we keep first things first. We've only just begun. America the Beautiful.

[Jack Fowler]

Hey, folks, we're back with Victor Davis Hansen in his own words. You're looking good today, Victor. I hope you're peppy and bursting with wisdom. You always are. We had recorded yesterday Sunday and there was just a trove of things, so many corruption things I wanted to get to. And we're going to get to some of these today. So let's start off with corruption in Maine. And here's this. Steve Robinson posted this on X the other day. Maine Democrats are actively recruiting voters who have never lived in Maine and never paid taxes in Maine. Maine Secretary of State Shanna Bellows, who previously tried to disenfranchise Maine voters by removing Donald Trump from the ballot, has publicly admitted that noncitizens are registered to vote in Maine. She's refusing to give Harmeet Dhillon from the Justice Department Maine's voter file so that the Department of Justice can prevent noncitizens from raiding our elections. And Bellows has partnered with the Community Organizing Alliance. This is a quote unquote migrant run, acorn style group created by the alleged Medicaid fraudsters, Gateway Community Services, et cetera, et cetera, etcetera. Maine was once a bastion of Republicanism. It has important elections coming up, Victor, and we're going to talk about that separately with Platner. But this is that infamous woman who tried to keep Donald Trump off the ballot. And she is a pure ideologue and in a position of power. Your thoughts?

[Victor Davis Hansen]

Well, I think there's two issues here. One is Platner and the worry about him. The rumors are, and these are alleged rumors, but I think Mark Halpern mentioned them. Is that his long social media history, which is pretty crazy. Women need to wear Kevlar pants if they don't want to be raped. White people, rural people are stupid and lazy. He's a communist.

[Jack Fowler]

All cops are bastards.

[Victor Davis Hansen]

All cops are. Yeah. And I don't know how you can be on 100% disability for post traumatic stress syndrome and then say you're going to run for Senate because you're disabled, but he's doing that. And of course no one has called him on it. The other thing is if you have a candidate like that and you won't, you. You're going to nominate him over. She's not very moderate, the governor. But you. He was going to. He was going to win. And then once he's in the general. Susan Collins. I know that a lot of the true blue conservatives like us, Jack, get irritated with her, but she has to operate in the confines of a Maine. And I would say I haven't looked at her voting record, but I imagine. Don't you think it's 75 or 80% with the administration on key votes, the SAVE act and things like that? She disappoints, but she gets elected and she's smart and there's no comparison between the two. So the point I'm making is that he's out of the ordinary. He also represents this new strain of elite, very wealthy here in California. Tom Steyer is really off the scale, hard left, but a billionaire. We saw Mondame. His two parents are millionaires. I mean, they're not multimillionaires, but they're very affluent. They're from a very exclusive family in Uganda. And then we go to Platner, went to Hotzkiss School. He's the son of a famous architect. His father was a lawyer, his mother is a restaurateur. So he's among the elite. And yet he keeps yelling and screaming about billionaires and millionaires. His parents are millionaires. No doubt he grew up as a millionaire, so there's a problem with him. And when you're a Democrat and your heart says I love this guy, but your brain says he's not going to be elected electable under normal circumstances, then you opt for the change the system. And the change the system is what they always do. James Carville outlined it. He said, when the Democrats come in, no more filibuster, no more electoral college with a voting, national voting compact solution to that. Four more Democratic senators under the Washington D.C. and Puerto Rico entrance and pack the court. What does that show? He doesn't have confidence in the Democratic message appealing to 51%. They don't have confidence that this guy can win. So when they do that, they either open the border or, or they try to say that felons can vote or they try to change the system. And that's what they're doing, whether it's off the radar or transparently in Maine because they have a problem. And as I Said Mark Halpern reviewed his problems and apparently, allegedly there's a lot more to come Jack about him, his record. And it's very ironic. Well, not ironic. I should apologize for that. But the Democratic Party made such a fuss about. About Elon Musk's Nazi salute. It wasn't a Nazi salute. He saluted like we've seen everybody do that. Cory Booker, I think, Elizabeth Warren, they all do it. And they've said nothing about this. Totenkop Death Head, 3rd Panzer Division and also used as the Eisen Groupen people at the death camps. And he knew. People have said that were in his cohort. He knew what it was. He bragged about it. He's changed his story twice. He said, well, you know, I didn't really know what it was until just I ran for Congress and then I mean for Senate and they told me what it was. And then he's also said, well, you know, I was brainwashed. I imbued or absorbed this toxic Marine culture and that made me do it. So he can't tell the truth and he thinks he's going to win. And he's a very. Put it this way, 30 years ago, if you were a Democrat and you wore a Nazi tattoo for 20 years and people knew about it, that would exclude you from being nominated today in the Democratic Party. The fact that he had a Nazi tattoo and he removed it will mean a. The grandees will explain it away or wink nod. It will be something that will be of value because of the rising anti Semitism. It sends a message. It sends a message. And he's reiterated again and again and again about Gaza, Gaza, Gaza, genocide. Israel, Israel, Israel cut off. So that sends a message to the new Democratic Jacobin Party. And it's not the Democratic Party anyway. It's a Jacobin party, a French revolutionary party. And they have institutionalized antisemitism. So when a candidate sends those signals and we think they're disqualifying, we're in a time warp. That was 20, 30 years ago. It's not now.

[Jack Fowler]

Why isn't Dick Blumenthal, by the way? Victor, I don't think anyone should not

[Victor Davis Hansen]

be

[Jack Fowler]

disturbed by these tattoos. More than disturbed, but I would believe a Jewish United States senator would have a little more outrage than Catholic Jack Fowler might. I have complete outrage, by the way, but Dick Blumenthal and other income. Where's Chuck Schumer decrying this guy?

[Victor Davis Hansen]

They are terrified of this new base. They've become so acculturated to having that title and the Special exemptions and honors that go with being a senator and the privileges and the esteem that the office, not necessarily the person who holds the office, but the office insurers and the power, the power, the power. That's the most important asset for them, that they will never give it up. That's why all these guys die in the saddle, so to speak. And they'll never give it up. So in that case, whether it's a question of being elected again and having a nice 75 years to 85 years and 10 more years as this power broker or going home and, you know, reading a novel and nobody knows who you are in a year, principles can be easily sold. But it is interesting that both parties were faced with the same phenomena. On the one hand, the, the Republicans had this nut, Nick Fuentes, who is a admirer of Adolf Hitler and is a self avowed anti Semite and so did the left Hassan Piker. Only I don't think as bad as Nick Fuentes is, I don't know if he endorsed murder, social murder in the way that Piker did with Luigi man. He may have, I don't know he's capable of it. But the point I mean is, I'm trying to make is they're roughly comparable. For all practical purposes, no one is going to invite Nick Fuentes. He went to the White House and apparently Trump wasn't aware of who he was. He came with Kanye West. Neither one of them wouldn't be invited now. But Hassan Pike, Hasan Piker, he just spoke at Stanford University, he's touring all the elite universities. He had a glowing interview with a New York Times reporter. He's, and he's. I read about him in Politico the first time. I remember the article. They said he's kind of the he man, the he man, leftist because he works out and he's big and he's tough. That's the image everybody that they're trying to manufacture with Graham Platner and these working class, because they've lost the white working class. And they look at this cohort of young people who are disaffected. They can't buy a house, they have prolonged adolescence, they're not getting married, if at all until their 30s or 40s or not having children. They often are financially encumbered by student loans and they take three units, one year, six and it just goes on forever. And a lot of them are dependent on their parents and they're frustrated. And Nick Fuentes has a certain message that appeals to some of them. But this Guy feels that he, the party feels that people like Piker and Graham Platner can win that white working class back. He's an oyster farmer. He worked for an oyster farmer and then he had outside capital. I don't know where it came from, but he bought the company. But he hasn't been an oyster farmer very long. So he's deliberately trying to manufacture the fact he didn't go to the Hotchkiss prep school and he's not the son of very affluent people with privilege. And he does that by saying rural people are stupid and lazy, that kind of stuff. And then he does the he man stuff with the tattoo. And I have post traumatic stress. Post traumatic stress is real. It's a terrible thing. But if you're a veteran and you're classified as 100% disability, and that means you're not able to earn a living, then we in America, as a generous people, want to compensate you for your sacrifice to us. But that would preclude the idea that you would then go out and get a normal job that would pay $180,000 a year.

[Jack Fowler]

Maybe.

[Victor Davis Hansen]

Yeah. Yeah. I mean, that's strange because she's surely

[Jack Fowler]

getting benefits as 100%.

[Victor Davis Hansen]

Well, I don't know if he's still on it, but the last I read, he was. He would have to make the argument to a. A board of psychiatrists that he's not able to function in the manner that most Americans are because of the traumatic injuries to his experience and his mental state. He. He suffered while in Iraq, if that. And that can be abso. True, but if it is absolutely true, then you don't know whether he would have a problem as a U.S. senator representing an entire state. But again, the left, everybody has to remember the left, it doesn't have principles, it has an agenda, but it's mostly about power. It's mandated equality of result and using a huge government as a mechanism to achieve that sort of Marxist socialist equality. And almost anything, anything is necessary to achieve those goals that other people, most people, the majority of people, don't want. So they have a bad message that, no, it's oppositional, antithetical to human nature. That's why they do these strange things. Victor.

[Jack Fowler]

He sounds unelectable, but given the number of oddities and disturbing factors. But so did Jay Jones, who's the Attorney General now elected in Virginia.

[Victor Davis Hansen]

That's a hard call. Keith said he wanted to kill his opponent in the Virginia legislature, didn't he? And kill his wife and children. Right?

[Jack Fowler]

And kids, yeah. And still he was elected. So, you know, you wonder, could Platner really end up being a United States senator?

[Victor Davis Hansen]

Oh, no, I think he could. I think he could very easily. And he's very slick. I saw, you know that tape he's circulating, that Susan Collins, when you say Susan Collins name, she doesn't fit the idea that she's created by main billionaire. You know what I mean?

[Jack Fowler]

Right.

[Victor Davis Hansen]

She just doesn't. She's, she doesn't. She's a decent, gracious person. And the criticism of her by the Republicans is she's not conservative enough. She is basically a traditionalist. And she has done a good job for the Republican Party given the circumstances of the constituencies she has to represent. But he gets on there and he just calls her all the billionaire, billionaire, billionaire, I'm going to destroy Susan, all this stuff. And then he says, and unlike her, our campaign is grassroots. But, but, but we will take some money. We will take some money. And everybody knows that the billionaire class is predominantly now on the left. We saw that with Barack Obama. He's the one that enacted that transition.

[Jack Fowler]

Yeah. Well, we have a little more about Platner to get to. But first, Victor, for our viewers and our listeners, if you've studied enough history, you start to see a pattern. Nations don't lose their way over. They drift through debt and division until one day you realize the foundations you thought were permanent were never permanent at all. Today, America is spending at levels once reserved for wartime. We've normalized deficits that would have stunned earlier generations. And policymakers now debate whether the only path forward is more intervention, more printing, more distortion. But here's the historical truth. Every society that pushed its currency beyond discipline eventually paid a price. The wise never waited for collapse. They prepared for a correction. And that's why so many thoughtful Americans, especially those nearing retirement or in retirement, are reallocating part of their wealth into something that has outlasted every paper experiment in recorded human history. Physical gold, not as speculation, but as insulation. Our reputation matters here at Victor Davis Hansen, in his own words. Which is why we're partnering with Allegiance Gold, a company distinguished by integrity, reliability, and an A rating for the Better Business Bureau. For years, they've guided Americans through transparent education and long standing relationships built on trust. And right now, they're extending, I should say, a special liberty offer for our listeners and viewers to help you get started with real gold, whether your funds are in a retirement account or sitting in the bank. If you believe as we do, that the best time to reinforce your position is before the storm becomes obvious. Call 844-7991-9184-4790-9191 or visit protectwithvictor.com that's 844-790-9191844 7909191 or visit ProtectWithVictor.com History rewards those who take the long view. And we thank the good people from Allegiance Gold for sponsoring Victor Davis Hansen in his own words. Victor, I want to. We have to talk about Tucker Carlson. Here's a headline. Tucker praises Maine Democrat Senate candidate Graham Platner. Quote, I certainly appreciate his forging policy views and I appreciate how different they are from everybody else in his party. I haven't met him yet and I plan.

[Victor Davis Hansen]

Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. How is he different than anybody else? He's representative of the Democratic Party, isn't he?

[Jack Fowler]

Other than Fetterman. I guess so, yeah.

[Victor Davis Hansen]

I mean, everything. He's, he's right with Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders and the, the older guard that has flipped like Nancy Pelosi and Schumer. They, they're for that stuff now. He basically wants open borders, doesn't care about illegal immigration, critical race theory, DEI transgender, all of that stuff. He can't get elected if he didn't. Wasn't. He's a green guy. No Fossil, all of that stuff and the whole he man white working guy, all in the tough talk and often laced with profanities, all of that is just superficial pablum for, you know, this, this mythical white working class that'll vote for him because he's tough. It's kind of insulting to the white working class because the people that I see in my neighborhood that are white working class are pretty well informed, but I don't know.

[Jack Fowler]

Oh, you said f. I'm gonna vote for you in the House.

[Victor Davis Hansen]

Yeah. I don't know what Tucker means, but if he says that he would prefer Graham Platner, and I guess he does. Cause he didn't say. At the same time, he's an interesting person, I want to interview him. But of course I'll also interview Susan Collins because her record, even though I don't embrace at all, has been more representative of my entire life in the conservative movement. He didn't say that. So I assume that he likes Graham Platner not because his views are at odds. I'm giving him the benefit of the doubt with the new hard left Democratic party. Unless Tucker's gone the whole Bill Kristol route. I don't know if he has or Not. Or max boot route. I don't think he has. But he must like him because Graham Platner has been outspoken in his hatred of Israel, Gaza, genocide, all this stuff. And that. It seems to me that that's. And he said he's had people on. He has appeared with people who have endorsed. And correct me if I'm wrong, I think he's appeared with or he's talked with people who have been classified as pro neo Nazis. Really, you know, there's kind of the. Darrell Cooper, I don't know how you. Revisionist. So is that why Tucker is attracted to this new face in the Democratic Party? Because if you look at the totality of what he said, it's no different than the squad or aoc. It really isn't. Yeah. And I thought Tucker's criticism of Donald Trump was. I am a principled conservative and I voted for Donald Trump in campaign form and frequented Air Force One and Campaign One. And I was at Mar A Lago, habituate a lot. And I did this because I agreed with 90% of his platform. I thought that's the reason why I still haven't been enlightened by anybody, Candace, any of them. Why? If you disagree with him on a particular issue, like you classify the 60 day, and it hasn't been 60 days of kinetic activity, it's been 40 days, maybe less, against Iran. You want to classify that as a forever or endless war that he campaigned against. Okay, that's a legitimate opinion. But why would you take one particular issue and then say, well, I thought it over and I don't like that wall that's growing on the border. I don't like the idea there's no illegal immigration. I don't like the IDEA we're deporting 500,000 criminals. I don't like the deregulation, the tax cuts, they're all an abomination. No, it's just one. You cross me on one issue and I'm done with you. Unless they can cite others. You know that you don't like Trump's language or you feel that his impulsiveness, or when he wasn't respectful of the dead with Rob Reiner's passing, or he uses the F word on his. Something like that. But you have to come forward with something that would nullify your whole life's conservatism.

[Jack Fowler]

It's interesting because one of the criticisms from Tucker was recent criticisms was that Trump was the Antichrist. And then he was interviewed by the New York Times this past weekend, and he denied saying it and they showed the video.

[Victor Davis Hansen]

I saw that. And he said he didn't know what the Antichrist was. So how could he say that? That would suggest that somebody always says things he knows. Tucker gave an interview with the mayor of Bethlehem who flat out said that Christians have been fleeing his city because of Jewish pressure, when in fact, one of the destinations they go is to Israel and they're fleeing Muslim intolerance. So you don't need to know everything to say something. He did say that the Antichrist, he said he didn't know what the Antichrist was. And as I remember in the Bible, I'm just doing this. It's in John. I think it's in Revelations, too. The Greek word for it is pseudo Christos. Pseudo just means false, the false Christ. And I have a feeling, isn't he referred to in Acts or letters as the person who, as the end of days come, he's going to be popular and work miracles, but he's not Satan or Lucifer. He's some type of. He's not referred to very much in the Bible. He's some person who's going to emulate Christ and try to deliberately fool people and then rob them of eternity through his sin. And they're following his sin as deluded people. And so if he meant that, I don't believe he's very religious. So when he says, I don't know what the Antichrist is, when he's talking about Trump as the Antichrist, and he said that Trump had used foul language on Easter and that Trump was a very magnetic person, you get the impression he did know because he was trying to, I think, say that Donald Trump led us in what I thought was a moral crusade, but it was a pseudo crusade. Maybe that's what he meant. I think he did. I just don't believe that someone that aware and well read and familiar with Christian exegesis does not know what the Antichrist is.

[Jack Fowler]

Yeah. Layer on top of that, that he said it and then said he didn't say it.

[Victor Davis Hansen]

Yes. That's a better point. That's a much more succinct and better point. You don't lie to people.

[Jack Fowler]

Yeah. By the way, Victor, before we take a break, and then we're going to talk about some judicial insanities you mentioned before prolonged adolescence would. You mentioned it on many occasions. I didn't tell you to bring this up ahead of time, but there was this article in today's New York Post about this, about it seemed like 40 or so New Yorkers, kids, they're not kids, they're adults, 20s and 30s. Invaded. There's some TikTok craze invaded this Church of Scientology building in New York City. And they went in there, they broke in, they disrupted things, they broke things, they hurt a security guard, then they left. And this, it gets me because I told you I was visiting Gettysburg last week. And you just see all these graves of all these men that gave their lives. And these are 20 and 30 year olds and they're acting like they're 5 year olds. And it's just disturbing.

[Victor Davis Hansen]

It is. And it has so many different manifestations. A month ago we talked about that group in LA that just ran into a jeweler's store. Remember, they crashed in and they just looted everything. And then they went away. And that's happening more and more. And it's really disturbing because the history of this country is one of people 17, 18, 19, 20, 25 being uproot from their homes and farms in 19th, 20th century and being sent some Minnesota farmer minding his own business. Never seen a black person in his life, according to a lot of the diaries, on the Sherman march to the sea. And the next thing he knows, he's marching toward Savannah. And then he's on his way up from Savannah through the Carolinas to come behind Lee's army. He didn't. He never had a slave, but he sacrificed his life. Same thing in the wilderness campaign, Antietam. All those horrific places are Guadalcanal or Okinawa, Iwo Jima or the Bulge or the Tuttenberg Wall for all of that stuff. And they died because they believed in this country would be. Each generation would have it easier and not have to do that. And they were right. We're a time of relative peace. We have deterrence, we have affluence. And yet this generation feels just like we were warned by a whole host of classical authors, juvenile Livy, you know, the more who are affluent. Remember that. There's a line in Catullus, a poem. He talks to himself, Catullus, and he says, ctuli, you know that leisure, what leisure has done to you, it has destroyed empires and kings, and look what it's done to you. He's talking to himself. And that's. Poverty is not the problem. Hunger is not the problem in this country. The left keeps saying it is. But I live in one of the poorest zip codes in the Tri county area of Kings County, Tulare county in southwestern Fresno County. And I can tell you when I go into a local supermarket, I would say 75% of the people are on EBT cards, electric banking, transfer cards. And I can tell you that I would make a very conservative guess that 65 to 70% of the people are obese. I have never seen one person who looked undernourished.

[Jack Fowler]

They missed the food. Desert.

[Victor Davis Hansen]

Yeah. So my. And what I'm getting at is we. It's a bu. What destroys societies is not dearth. It's excess. Excess spending, excess, government, excess, everything. It takes away the human desire for struggle and to perform and to get active. And so all of these young, prolonged adolescents have found ways to survive. And they have some type of support, a shelter, money, a car so that they can go into the Scientology building or going to a jewelry store during working hours. Or when you see these ICE protesters, you keep saying, don't you have a job? The society only has a 62% labor participation rate. So 40% of the country who's able bodied is not working. Right.

[Jack Fowler]

Well, that ICE there was again, New York Post, which I lived by yesterday, which would have been Sunday, May 3, someone was arrested in Brooklyn. All of a sudden, in a very short period of time, there were 200 people show up to protest and to block the streets, et cetera.

[Victor Davis Hansen]

You know what my worry is about all these things that we've talked about this morning and on other shows is that There is about 3 to 4 million people leaving these blue states, and they're leaving for the reasons we just talked about, and they're going to red states. And the red states are booming. They're getting more affluent. And not all of them have the attractions of some beautiful New England states or California in particular, or Washington, Oregon. But nonetheless, people want to go there, and it's not going to stop. So we are really getting into an 1850s situation where we're creating two entirely antithetical cultures. But the problem is it's flipped from the Civil War. In the Civil War, we did that with the Mason Dixon line. For the first 50 years of the. Well, actually the first 70 years, these two societies, the south slave owning, and they just bifurcated. And so they were unrecognizable. And that's why they went to war. And I think we're getting to the same geographical divide now. You go to. It's even within a state when I leave and go to Stanford and I look at the milieu and the people and how they sound and the cars and the titles and the money, Silicon Valley, Stanford, Bay Area. And then I come out here, they're just antithetical to each other. And if they're not, and when you and I talked about the redistricting last time, and if that's true, that. But you might get somewhere around if we have a redistricting war and the Republicans have the majority of the House legislators and they get mobilized, maybe not this election completely, but they could theoretically get 40 seats and they could pick up another 10 or 15 if there's no more racial gerrymandering, and they could pick up another 10 or so on the 2030 census. And you're talking about a minority party in the wilderness. And you can see where that's going to lead and the Electoral College as well. And you're going to see because it's based on congressional representation as electoral, your allotment of electoral votes. So you can see where that's going to lead. The more that the blue model fails, turns people off, the more they leave, the more they double down and it gets worse and worse. So when this Katie Wilson, the mayor of Seattle, said when she heard the Star Buck Capital was going to leave and she said bye bye, and Mondami just basically said, well, if they want to leave, go ahead and leave. And Kathy Hochul said, we don't want you. Didn't she say, we don't want you. Go down to Palm beach or wherever and I think, please come back.

[Jack Fowler]

I think bring your wallets with you.

[Victor Davis Hansen]

I think Andrew Cuomo said that, too, essentially. He did, yeah. He did, yeah. So they have that attitude, and then when they leave and it doesn't work, where are they going to get the money? The Republican administration is not going to give them the money. And these are dysfunctional cities. They're beautiful cities that were built by generations that didn't believe this nonsense. And they're not being rebuilt. I mean, when you go to these blue cities, I don't see a lot of dynamic new development. The last 10 or 15 years, I can remember in the 1990s and 2010, all of a sudden I noticed that everybody who was living in the Bay Area suburbs, say from San Jose up to San Mateo, who worked at Stanford, was moving to the. They were moving to San Francisco, Jack. That was where it was at. And I once went to San Francisco for a National Review. And I walked around that day. I think I counted 25 cranes in the sky. You know what I. Building new buildings. It was booming. And then I walked out of those National Review regional meetings. I think they ended at 10. And our hotel was about half a mile away. It was lit up. I walked by restaurants that were packed. I remember going into one, I think it was 10:30 at night and I got a decaf. Everybody was that's dead, dead gone. So it is. And they're stagnant. And this is a very dynamic country. And so all of that agenda, green, subsidized solar, subsidized wind, high speed rail, homelessness, open borders, illegal aliens with full benefit. It's not sustainable. And people say, yeah, they don't.

[Jack Fowler]

I'm glad you raised that Seattle thing because there was an article that Fox News had today. A Seattle AI startup founder says he's preparing to leave the city as taxes rise, warning that many entrepreneurs are already heading for the exits. We're out looking for an alternative, Jess Proudman, president and CTO of Venice AI, a privacy focused, unrestricted generative AI platform, he told Fox News. So we're looking in Nevada, we're looking in Texas and Austin, we're looking at Nashville and Florida, proudman said. And these are climates where the business community is vibrant. They're climates where the government is encouraging entrepreneurship, where they're welcoming people and they're not villainizing those who have built something. So the mayor's flippant comment, and I don't think it was flippant, I think it was truly what she meant about Starbucks has these people already. These people, the entrepreneurial class, they've already been heading for the exits.

[Victor Davis Hansen]

They are, and they're following the earlier upper middle class, professional, small business entrepreneur that couldn't do business in these states. Now it's the billionaires always told us, well, we have so much money that we don't mind California's 13.3 tax because we just want to live a long time and enjoy it. So we want clean air, clean water. We don't really care about whether it's affordable. We don't care about people in Fresno or Bakersfield. But then it's kind of that old adage. First they came to me and I said, no problem. And then everybody said to them, well, if they're going to go after the doctor and they're going to go after the contractor, they're going to go after you too. No, no, I'm Mark Zuckerberg. I gave $417 million to Joe Biden's campaign. No, I'm the Google bunch. No, I'm, you know, I can. And now they're going after you because they're broke. Once your professional classes and the upper middle class leave, you're getting down to 1% pay 50% of the California income tax and they're leaving. And so you've got to get the billionaires. And they're leaving. So they turned on the billionaires as everybody knew they would.

[Jack Fowler]

Another example of that. And we are going to take a break after this. Victor is again, New York, New York Post. They had that famous Met dinner, you know, the Met Gala, older fashion, where AOC wore that tax the rich dress a few years ago. Well, the prime sponsor of this is Jeff Bezos and his wife. I think they dumped 10 million bucks on it, which is like couch change for them. But they are now, like over the last two or three days, just terribly vilified about low class, et cetera. And I think it's just really because they are. He is a billionaire. And you cannot say something nice about an event which is being funded by a billionaire today.

[Victor Davis Hansen]

Well, if it's George Soros, you can Southern probably Law center. You can say something. If they're a. A racist organization funded by Soros. Yeah, you can say all the nice things about that billionaire. Or Tom Steyer here, he's running and he's talking about the billionaires. And every night there's an ad for him. Now, Jack in California. Yeah, this is a guy who made his fortune. He started by funding Indonesian coal plants and then he offshored a lot of his profits in the Cayman Islands and he tried to avoid all of the taxes he could, which everybody tries to do. As long as it's legal. Right? But don't tell us that we have to tax billionaires more. Now that you're in the twilight of your life, you sure didn't act that way. When you're on the ascendance and trying to get money, money, money and profits, which is okay, but I don't see a cure for it because these people don't seem to think that. They think the only thing that works is just to say, oh, they're deplorables. Oh, they're irredeemables. Oh, they. Oh, we're going to. I'm glad they shot. They don't realize that they're sinking. And when you add the other element to this whole matrix that all of these studies show that red state fertility and demographics is about 1.7 to 1.9 and Blue State is about 1.4 to 1.0. So the left is not having children. They're not.

[Jack Fowler]

Count our blessings. Sorry, Victor. We're going to talk about some disturbing judicial matters or legal matters, UCLA FedSoc incident, and then a federal judge in Rhode island doing the crazy ice thing. We'll get your thoughts on this, Victor, when we come back from these important messages.

[Radley Devlin]

Hey, I'm Bradley Devlin and just like you, I'm a huge fan of Victor Davis Hansen, whether it's his long form podcast, Victor Davis Hansen in his own words or his short form content for the Daily Signal. Victor Davis Hansen in a few words. I always leave an episode learning something new.

[Victor Davis Hansen]

I think they forgot the 1982 Falklands War.

[Radley Devlin]

And in the age of clickbait and rage bait, that's a really good feeling, right?

[Jack Fowler]

The media. Thank you. You can leave now.

[Radley Devlin]

Well, if you agree, you might like my show, the Daily Signals long form interview podcast called the Signal. Sit down. Every week we take you behind the scenes of the biggest battles in Washington, D.C. as they happen, with some of the biggest names in politics. We explore big ideas and we analyze the policy making process from an unabashedly and unapologetically conservative perspective. And that's important now more than ever with the Trump administration back in office. Because in 2024 you sent Washington a message it couldn't ignore. It's your government and together we're taking it back. So check us out on YouTube, Spotify, Apple Podcasts, wherever you enjoy. Victor Davis Hansen. Or there too. And drop me a follow on X radleydevlin to stay updated with what's happening on the Signal.

[Victor Davis Hansen]

Sit down.

[Jack Fowler]

We are back with Victor Davis Hansen in his own words. Victor's website, the Blade of Perseus. You'll find [e-mail] do subscribe. It's $65 a year. Well, you just want to try it out. $6.50 a month do that. Why would you do it? Because twice a week Victor writes an exclusive piece for the Blade of Perseus and once a week he does an exclusive video. There's tons of free stuff there also. So if you're a fan of Victor's writings, I do heartily recommend you subscribe. And I think it makes a great gift too. Mother's Day is a couple of days. Father's Day coming up. Think about that. VictorHansen.com is the address. Okay, Victor, let's start with the UCLA thing and just bear with me, folks. I'm reading from the College Fix, the great website that our friend John Miller has founded. An assistant dean at the UCLA School of Law walked back comments this week suggesting the Federalist Society students could be punished for publicly identifying protesters who disrupted their event earlier this month, according to emails obtained by the college folks. However, an attorney with the foundation for Individual Rights and expression fire described the university's response as unacceptable, et cetera. I'm not going to read the rest of this. Of course, the law professor out there, the retired law professor, Eugene Volok, he

[Victor Davis Hansen]

was, he's a colleague of mine at Hoover. He's a very bright guy.

[Jack Fowler]

Right. Well, they had this disrupted speech. We talked about it on previous episode. Disrupted and vulgarly, if that's a word, disrupted and oh, now we have to protect the students who are on video being shown a sign Suck Trump's blank, you know, et cetera.

[Victor Davis Hansen]

Yeah.

[Jack Fowler]

Why shouldn't a name be put to the face?

[Victor Davis Hansen]

These are going to be your personal attorneys, your district attorneys, your public defenders, the Judge Brosberg's of the future. Right. The Judge Merchand, the Judge Kaplan, all the people we saw in the law fair. These are the next generation of them in these law schools. Same thing happened at Stanford Federalist Society judge came, wonderful guy, tried to give a talk. Same type of people, disrupted the entire stock. He had to be stormed out. They shouted obscenities to him. The DEI law representative hijacked the lecture and she knew what she was going to say in advance. She read it off and there was no repercussions except the dean of the law school did discipline her and I guess she was left and that made her. That fact alone gave her the provost of the university because people were so frustrated that if anybody showed even a modicum of normality then they were needed or the alumni were going to walk in droves, many of them Orwellian. When you think that a person comes to speak on campus, and these are campuses, as I said, that host Hasan Piker, who has justified the murder and he has said everybody knows it has to be done in reference to killing Donald Trump. But just to say it, everybody knows what I mean. So. So you have somebody like that on campus, then you get respected lawyers, judges, legal out of the community and they speak at a law school and you have these obscene outbursts that try to destroy the lecture and the attitude of the university in the form of the dean of the law school is you're worried about the people who trampled on the guests first amendment rights and disrupted because some of the other law students that were so appalled said this, this is now in the public sphere. There was videos, it's on the Internet. We're going to tell everybody who these people are and they should be accountable. And then they were being threatened by the law school. The whole world is upside down. And this is not Stanford or private institution. This is our taxpayer supported university. And somebody's going to say to me, yes, Victor, and 60% of the population in a democracy voted for that and they approve of that. They don't believe in free speech, think these people are fascist and racist. So more power to the people who shouted them down. And you're going to see. I don't know, I just. You're going to. This whole idea. There's one factor that we all forget, that these people are 360 degrees, 24 hours a day, you name it. They're enthused, they're activists, they're dei and they're not doing their job. You can't do that. I went to graduate school and got a Ph.D. and I had to study 10 hours a day, whether four hours in class and six hours at home. And I could barely. You know, you can't get these types of degrees and achieve a modicum of excellence and spend your time going to lectures and shouting people down and being activists. It just, it doesn't work. It does work. It does work. Pause, pause. If 80% of the people are getting A's and 20% of the people flunk the bar on their first attempt. So if you lower the standards, yeah, you can do this. And that's what's happened. It's a self fulfilling prophecy. You bring people into these universities that are not qualified and then they get angry and they get activist and then you have to do something so you give them A's and then the quality of the graduation grading class is not what it was. And people understand that.

[Jack Fowler]

Well, they nasty, violent. But when they're held to accountability, maybe we'll put a name to your face.

[Victor Davis Hansen]

Yeah, they're like adults.

[Jack Fowler]

They get into the fetal, yeah, the fetal position. Immediately starts sucking their thumb. Mommy, help me protect me. And mommy, it's like the administrator does.

[Victor Davis Hansen]

People have sent me all these videos I didn't even know existed. I mentioned to last year that this, I guess YouTube phenomenon of police pulling a person over.

[Jack Fowler]

Yeah, sure.

[Victor Davis Hansen]

And sometimes they're black women, sometimes they're white Karens. They're all different. But they all have one thing in common. They feel entitled. And when the police officer's awfully polite because you never know who's going to be crazy, they either roll up the window and throw a tantrum or they won't get out of the car or they push them or they shout obscenities,

[Jack Fowler]

want to talk to your supervisor.

[Victor Davis Hansen]

Y And they've all been taught that all. I mean it's not just women Too. It's males too. And it's like a little adolescent that has never been disciplined. And then when they get disciplined. I was at UC Santa Cruz a long time ago, and this is when it started. And one girl ahead of me had been writing checks that she found on a checkbook. And they knew she came in there and did it. And so they knew who she. This is before surveillance. And they just, they said, just a minute. And I was in behind her. And then the security came. And the first thing she said, I can't believe this is happening to me. This can't be happening to me. Yeah, it was happening to her. And that's the attitude that we have. And I think everybody recognizes it, that it's a mediocre cohort of people that have been so coddled and they think the rules don't and they're so victimized. And they're always looking for a vanishing number of oppressors for their oppressed caste that they can't find enough.

[Jack Fowler]

So a first cousin of those traffic stop videos are the caught shoplifting videos in Walmarts or targets where they're detained. And then of course, they deny that they've taken anything. Or some people say, I'll just pay for it now and let me go. Like, no, it's too late.

[Victor Davis Hansen]

What would they do? Just as a thought experiment, if, say, you, UCLA and Stanford said the following. We stand behind our students to express themselves under the protections of the First Amendment. However, when we have invited guests and we have formal lecture organizations, if a law student who's dedicated to learning and enforcing the law disrupts that speech or that visit and we will have a hearing and he's found guilty of doing that, he's going to be expelled for one year, one year he's out and forfeit all of his tenure monies that have been paid, etc. Do you think that would have a deterrent? I do. I think the first thing they do is try to find a federal district judge like Boasberg and say they were victimized. But if they enforced it, I think you'd stop it in two seconds.

[Jack Fowler]

Yeah, well, we're going to talk about a federal district judge in a second. But first, to our listeners and viewers, everything we carry today is broadcasting a signal. Your phone, your laptop, even your car key fob. Most people don't realize it, but these devices are constantly sharing location data identifiers and wireless handshakes with networks all around you. That signal can be tracked, collected, or intercepted, making you and your data data vulnerable. That's just the reality of the world we live in now. That's why you should start using Silent. You don't want big tech, the government or anyone else knowing your every move. You want control over when you're connected and what you share. When you place your phone, laptop or key fob in a silent Faraday bag, the signal instantly stops. No cellular, no WiFi, no Bluetooth, no GPS. Your device is disconnected from the grid. And here's the part that really got our attention. Silent has been awarded nine military contracts. This is the same type of signal blocking gear used to help protect our soldiers from GPS detection and electronic threats. And now that same technology is available for everyday people, including listeners and watchers of Victor Davis Hansen, in his own words, almost said the old show's name, though I should get punished for that. If you want to check it out, Sorry, Rob Louie, if you want to check it out, out go to silent.comvdh now let me spell that. That's silent S L N T. I'll respell it S L N- dot com VDH to save 15% plus free shipping on qualifying orders. Again, that's silent. S L-N-T.com VDH and we thank the good people from Silent for sponsoring Victor Davis Hansen in his own words. By the way, Victor, do you think a. Who would be more apt to. To yell at a. Or mistreat a lecturer? Would it be a law student at a college or would it be an engineering student? Can you imagine engineering students hectoring a lecturer?

[Victor Davis Hansen]

No. And who would be. Let me ask you another thought question. I think all of our listeners who have children are thinking of going to a university next year or in the years forthcoming. If you brought a leftist speaker, let's say Elizabeth Warren, to the following campuses. The Pepperdine School of Public Policy under our friend Pete Peterson. Hillsdale College under our friend Larry Arndt, or I'm not going to say St. Thomas Aquinas College. And would they be trans. Treat it better than if you brought, I don't know, Ben Shapiro to Stanford or you brought Jordan Peterson.

[Jack Fowler]

Victor Davis Hansen.

[Victor Davis Hansen]

Yeah, I've had problems. I don't go to universities, not out of timidity, but it's just a futile. It's either they try to stop you from speaking. My worst was at University of Oregon when they tried to disrupt the entire lecture and they had all these reserve things that said reserved. That was really smart what they did. The first two rows were reserved, reserved, reserved, reserved, reserved. And then I got up to speak on a little illegal immigration. And then the La Raza department walked in down the middle of the hallway and everybody had a reserved. And then they flipped over the reserve and it was a picture of my book and me with a cross out, you know, like this. And then they got up and they did this like, you know, when people shoot free shots, you can't see the audience. So I couldn't see the audience at all. And so I saw the assistant provost who had walked me over there. And I said to him, are you going to stop this, this harassment? And then he said, he didn't say anything. I said, well, I did get my check, so I'll be leaving after this. And I didn't go to the dinner or anything. But as I remember. And something about a college administrator on the left, not right. You have to be very brave to be a conservative college administrator. And I've known some really great ones. We talk about Max Nikias, Larry Arndt, Pete Peterson. They're just superb people, but they have to be. That's because they're courageous. If you don't have courage, I think, you know, Aristotle said none of the other ethical virtues matter. And so when that's that dean, he made a complete. That dean at UCLA made a calculated cost of benefit analysis. He put his hand up like this and he said, now let me think about this. The virtuous, legal and right thing to do is to expel or punish the people who were so insulting and try to disrupt a visitor. However, the smart thing to do that would make me more popular and ensure either a promotion at another university or within the UCLA hierarchy would come out with a statement that the people complaining that their guest was harassed are now doxers and they may face punishment. When I do that, that will ensure me, even though the right wing and the garbage people, as Biden put it, will get angry. And that's what he did. He made that choice. And then he being a college administrator on the left, he's completely timid and vertebrate. Then he backed a second time down by saying, well, now the Federalists, the college fix, they might want to bring, you know, legal or something. Well, I didn't really say that. You know how they are. They got to where they are because they don't believe in anything other than their own advancement.

[Jack Fowler]

Well, we believe in. What is the motto of some of the colleges, famous colleges? Veritas Truth. And they believe in Saul Alinsky tactics to dispute disrupt the pursuit of such.

[Victor Davis Hansen]

They believe in Veritas Mea my truth. Remember they use that term, my truth. My truth. Yeah, well, my truth.

[Jack Fowler]

My truth is the earth is flat.

[Victor Davis Hansen]

Yes.

[Jack Fowler]

Well, Victor, let me mention a local federal judge. Here's a headline of a story. Well, here's. It's from an ex post from a Bill Mulligan. I'm told by federal sources that a Dominican illegal alien, the deportation order, an Interpol red notice arrest warrant for murder in his home country, was ordered released from ICE custody on Tuesday. That would be one of the last days in April by Rhode Island Federal Judge Melissa DeBose, who was a Biden appointee, told the international fugitive his name is Brian Rafael Gomez was arrested by ICE in Worcester, Massachusetts on April 4th. Fourth had been detained in a facility in Rhode island where he was issued a deportation order on April 28 by an immigration judge. On Tuesday, DeBose ordered Gomez to be released from ICE custody on the grounds of, quote, continuous unlawful detention, end quote, while ICE argued that Gomez was subject to a mandatory detention due to having an international arrest warrant for homicide. Last thing here, I'm told Gomez was released, is now roaming freely again, and ICE can't rearrest him due to Judge DeBose's order. Victor, I think Judge DeBose is the kind of. You eventually become a judge, but at some point, Judge Debose may have been akin to the students at the UCLA Law School.

[Victor Davis Hansen]

Yeah. There's two things that guide her decision. Number one, Mr. Gomez is not going to turn up in her neighborhood. Neighborhood not going to do it. She's got a nice zip code and probably a nice wall around her home, or she's with a neighborhood watch group. That's. And number two, if she's a federal district court judge, then she always wants to be a federal circuit court judge, an appellate court judge. So what she will probably do when the next Democratic administration comes in and there's appeals, she'll say, I let out a person of color, illegal, a person who was an undocumented migrant who was fighting for his freedom against ice. And that will be a recommendation to be promoted. So it was a smart move on her part in her way of bankrupt, amoral thinking. There's always a logic to all the things that these people do. It's just an inverted log logic. And, well, I have one other little

[Jack Fowler]

ICE fact, and this is just like, who are they actually taking off the streets? And again, this is the same Bill Mulligan on X who's reporting on a Fox News story. They got a list of some of the most egregious criminal aliens who have been picked up in the infamous sanctuary state of Minnesota. And it's a very long list, but here's just a few of them. Chang Vu, a Laotian illegal alien convicted of a strong arm rape of a 12 year old girl, kidnapping a child with intent to sexually assault her with a deportation order since 2004. That's over 20 years. Ji Yang, a Laotian illegal alien convicted strong arm rape, aggravated assault with a weapon, et cetera, et cetera. Deportation order since 2012. Pao Zhang, a Laotian convicted of rape and child filing deportation order since 2003. These people have, this just goes on and on and on and on. And these are the people that ICE is taking off the streets. So these are the people that the protesters and Governor Tim Walls and the attorney general there, et cetera, are trying

[Victor Davis Hansen]

and think about this, that the federal court system is so overburdened with normal jurisprudence that people, you know, they're in civil suits, they're in trials, they're in divorce, all of these things, and yet they're spending all of their time trying to get headlines by letting out people who should have been deported years ago. And that's the. When we use it. I don't think I'll ask my audience. Did any of you know, did you hear the term federal district judge very often? Say five years ago? I didn't. Federal Circuit. No, I didn't either. I only heard it in conjunction with two contexts. They were heroic, heroic iconic figures because Judge Kaplan in the E. Jean Carroll case, Judge Merchand, I think it was a Letita. Oh, Judge Mershon was the Alvin Bragg judge. And then there was Judge, our favorite engoron. He was a ladd with the real estate and all of them. We learned about the federal district judges and the state's judges, but we didn't hear much about. We heard about it in lawfare and we heard about it in illegal immigration. And all of a sudden that's what they wanted. Now their iconic figures are everywhere in the news. I didn't realize that. Judge Brosberg, is that the pronoun? Yes, he was the one. I think I just thought of this. But I didn't realize this when Kevin Klein Smith, the FBI lawyer during Andrew McCabe's internship, applied. When Andrew McCabe applied for the FISA warrant based on the bogus Steele dossier information. And they had emails about Carter Page, I think maybe from Carter Page as well. He forged them, you remember, and made them the opposite. So here you have an FBI lawyer who tried to destroy an innocent man by forging a court document. And he came before for Judge Boasberg. And Justice Boasberg said, these are very serious penalties. These could be 10 years of incarceration. Mr. Kleinsmith has never given any evidence that he would do this again. And it may have been a miscalculation, but we're going to give him probation, no jail time, nothing. So he goes way back.

[Jack Fowler]

Judge Roseberg, it's kind of Southern judges in the, you know, 20s, 30s, 40s, if you're a white guy, you were not going to jail.

[Victor Davis Hansen]

Yeah, yeah. Judge Boasberg should ask himself which is more deleterious to the Republic, the person who walked around the Rotunda committing a misdemeanor when he walked in on January 6th and the doors were open, so he walked. He didn't take anything, he didn't do anything. Once he saw what people were doing, he walked out. And he got what, two years, three years, four years or maybe five if he had not been pardoned. Or what a man did by destroying the reputation of the FBI and harassing an innocent US citizen and trying to destroy that person's life. He got nothing.

[Jack Fowler]

Well, Victor, we've come to about the end here. I do want to say on a personal note, if it's okay I mentioned before, I just visited Gettysburg and I did it with my sons, my three sons and my son in law. And I want to recommend to anyone who kind of proximate. I live in Connecticut, so I mean, it's five hour, six hour car. Right. I know if you're living in New Mexico or Pennsylvania is not, not all that close.

[Victor Davis Hansen]

But I heartily recommend every time you go there, I've been there, I think three times. When you look at Cemetery Ridge and you think that, my God, what were they thinking? You know, it's. I mean, Lee had tactical, not strategic, but he had supposedly tactical brilliance. Even the last siege of Richmond, the Union army couldn't take it. They surrendered before they took Richmond. But when you look at that hill and you see where the Northern troops were assembling there, what was in his mind when Longstreet suggested maybe you can go around and come in the back of an undefended Washington and have you between the Northern army and the capital of the North. So it was a bloodbath.

[Jack Fowler]

Yeah, it's a tremendous place. Truly inspiring. And it reminded me while I was there also thinking, okay, the new Confederacy as you've written about it, like, we're not supposed to. We're taking the names of General Hood and Lee and we're taking down their statues and removing their names from forts and Bragg, et cetera. But we are ourselves the left. We are the new Confederates.

[Victor Davis Hansen]

You know what's weird about that? Just to add in the 1940s and 50s and 60s and even into the 70s and 80s, very left wing people. And I'm talking about almost all the directors in Hollywood, even John Ford, who. He was a leftist. He started that way. He was, yeah, he was. And you know, when he did Henry Fonda as Tom Joad, that was a pretty leftist movie. So my point is, when you look at all of those Westerns, whether it's Shane or the Searchers, the Confederate person is always what? Sympathetically treated as kind of a.

[Jack Fowler]

Sergeant Tyree.

[Victor Davis Hansen]

Sergeant Tyree. He's kind of. Yeah, he's kind of a tragic figure that he's fought for the wrong side. But the whole point I'm getting at is reconciliation because of this horrible wound you have to reconcile and say that these outlaw Josey Wales, remember that hymn? Clint Eastwood, you couldn't make that movie today. Ken Burns, that brilliant movie he did, the Civil War, he could not make that today. You wouldn't.

[Jack Fowler]

He couldn't make it and he wouldn't make it.

[Victor Davis Hansen]

Well, he wouldn't make it because he couldn't make it. Nobody would show it. But the point I'm trying to make is you're right that the point was that 100 years after the Civil War, for all of the sins of slavery in the south, people realized there had to be some forgiveness. And they were trying to show that the Southern. There were a lot of Southern. 95% of the south didn't own slaves. And they looked at the war in a different way than the slave owner class. Maybe they benefited from it, but I think economically they were hurt by it and not today. There's no sense of forgiveness or reconciliation. It's just the opposite. They want to relive every single wound and widen it, insult it.

[Jack Fowler]

There's a beautiful scene in. I'll say it's beautiful, it's touching. She Wore a Yellow Ribbon where John Wayne and the regiment released that group of guys, men who had been faced a standoff with some of the Indians. And a former Confederate general is a private in the Union army and he's dying and they have a funeral service for him and they sew stars and bars for him, et cetera. And no one thought of it. As you watch it, you're not thinking of it as glorifying the South. You think of it as that as reconciliation.

[Victor Davis Hansen]

The same thing with the horse shoulders. Horse Soldiers, another John Ford movie. Remember when William Holden sees this Southern guy he went to the medical school or academy with, and he sees him there before the war. They were intimate friends, and he's dying and he's. And the guy's. You know, he's an unapologetic Confederate. And Bill Holden knows that. But he's. He's trying to be. You know, he's trying to offer medical assistance. And that was the whole idea that you try to forgive people. But not this generation, man. It's just hardcore Marxism. Let's take every possible wound and put salt in it and reopen it and use it for more divisiveness and acquisition of power and everything.

[Jack Fowler]

Yeah. I just have to add John Houston in the Red Badge of Courage at the end there with the battle scene and the battle's over and it kind of begins immediately. The forgiving or the sense of brotherhood. Not. Brotherhood's the wrong word, I think. And also Audie Murphy holding the. As the flag is blowing in the wind over the dead Southern flag bearer, there's just something again about forgiveness and. And trying to restate America as a Union.

[Victor Davis Hansen]

I grew up with it. My father's family were from Sweden, but my maternal grandmother, she was from New Mexico. She met my grandfather in this house in which I'm speaking right now. But in 1911, they got married, but her family came from Alabama and moved to New Mexico. And her family, her grandfather, excuse me, her father was in the Confederacy. But when she came to California, my grandfather, their family had come from northern Missouri and had been involved in the Border War, bleeding Missouri. And that's why they came to California after the war, because they were Northerners. Very strong Union. So I grew up with the majority in this house were people who were very strong Union, especially my mother and everybody. You know, when we saw the blue gray football game or the north south football game or if Alabama played Michigan in 1962, we were always for the North. But my grandmother would see, and she'd always. When she had a moment, she had kind of a weird accent. It wasn't quite Southern, but it was a mixture of Southern and New Mexican from New Mexico. And she would. She say, well, you know, Sidney Johnson died at Shiloh. And my family is spelled with a T. And he was. Albert. Sidney Johnson was a beautiful man. I said, well, he was. And I knew. I was reading a lot about this. Well, he got killed. He lost the Battle of Shiloh. And that was her hero. And I Was supposedly a distant cousin of her family. But there was always kind of a reconciliation, kidding about it. And she was on the wrong side. But don't make fun of her, you know what I mean? Don't make fun of her family. She had 11 brothers and sisters and I don't think one of them was over 5 5. And my father, who was 6 4, said, I, I said, what was the first thing you saw when you saw Uncle Bill? And he said, I walked up to him, victor, and I said, you're the smallest man with the biggest gun I've ever seen. He said, you've got a long barrel.45 revolver. He carried it. He was the sheriff of Magdalena, New Mexico, Bill Johnston. And they were all that way. They were all horse riders, but they were.

[Jack Fowler]

Was grandma's brother, famous Uncle Tango.

[Victor Davis Hansen]

Tango, yes, that was a little bit, yeah, Tango. And he didn't get along with the family, but my father was always a really good guy. I mentioned this in a thing on Rod Serling. I have a piece on the Ultra that he came and my father said, you know, he kind of. He went off topic on a rant on Vietnam when we wanted to hear about Twilight Zone. But he was a decorated veteran. And he said that, something like that about Tango when we were all making fun of him. You know, he was 54 and he had these big cowboy boots and big cowboy hat and it made him look like five, eight. And you know, he'd come in and he had this attitude, this cigarette out of his mouth. You lived to be 98 by the way. Cigarettes and whiskey. I thought about. He drank whiskey and cigarettes and I thought about that when they asked me at Stanford, have you ever smoked? And I said, I wish I. Because I might not have got lung cancer. But anyway, just to finish, I said, you know, he really gets. I was about 15 and my dad said, stop just a minute. That man's family went broke and they moved here with nothing. And they came out and Your grandmother was 20 and she met your grandfather and they married. And then the whole bunch of them lived in the barn on the water tower. They hadn't nothing. And they sent Tango to go get their horses and they didn't have money to ship them, so he took the train all the way to New Mexico when he was 13 years old. And he rode with three or four horses all the way back to California by himself. Yeah, in about 1913. I couldn't do that when I'm.

[Jack Fowler]

Yeah, that's.

[Victor Davis Hansen]

I couldn't do that in a car. Are the way I feel. So my dad was always looking for a redeeming feature and it was usually something about courage or service.

[Jack Fowler]

Yeah, well, deservedly so.

[Victor Davis Hansen]

Absolutely. Anyway, I got off topic. Sorry everybody.

[Jack Fowler]

No, no, that's perfect, Victor. You've been terrific. And I want to encourage folks again to check out Victor's website, the Blade of Perseus, go to the Daily Signal. Also our sponsor, Happy Home here. And for me, Jack Fowler. I write Civil Thoughts free weekly email newsletter for the center for Civil Society. And you can go to civilthoughts.com sign up. Easy peasy. It comes out every Friday, 14 or 15 recommended readings. And we're not selling your name. We are not doing anything, just being nice. So I know you'll love it. So do subscribe. Victor, thanks for all the wisdom you shared and we will be back soon soon with another episode of Victor Davis Hansen in his own words. Thanks folks and bye bye.

[Victor Davis Hansen]

Thank you everybody for listening and viewing. We'll see you next time. Thank you for tuning in to the Daily Signal. Please like share and subscribe to be notified for more content like this and also check out my own [e-mail] and subscribe for exclusive features. In addition, Ryan Reynolds here from Mint

[Radley Devlin]

Mobile with a message for everyone paying

[Victor Davis Hansen]

Big Wireless way too much.

[Radley Devlin]

Please, for the love of everything good in this world, stop with Mint. You can get premium wireless for just $15 a month. Of course, if you enjoy overpaying. No judgments.

[Victor Davis Hansen]

But that's weird.

[Radley Devlin]

Okay, one judgment anyway. Give it a [e-mail] Switch upfront payment

[Victor Davis Hansen]

of $45 for 3 month plan equivalent to $15 per month required intro rate first 3 months only, then full price plan options available, taxes and fees extra. See full [e-mail].