Victor Davis Hanson: This Is Who Really Deserves Reparations

Summary

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Podcast Summary: "Victor Davis Hanson: This Is Who Really Deserves Reparations"

Podcast: Victor Davis Hanson: In His Own Words
Host: Victor Davis Hanson (with Jack Fowler) | The Daily Signal
Date: May 14, 2026

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Overview

In this episode, Victor Davis Hanson, renowned historian and classicist, provides sharp commentary on recent events in American politics and culture, especially focused on rising antisemitism, the state of U.S. immigration, institutional decline in higher education, and the growing chaos in American cities. With reference to history, demography, and ideological movements, the episode dissects the underlying causes and consequences of today’s most contentious issues—from antisemitic protests in New York to debates about reparations and erosion of law and order. The episode’s title reflects a caustic look at modern reparation movements and broader questions of societal debt.

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Key Discussion Points, Insights & Timestamps

1. Pro-Palestinian Protests in NYC

[04:29 – 10:44]

• Protests Targeting Jewish Neighborhoods:

  • Recent pro-Palestinian marches with Hamas and Hezbollah flags through Jewish areas required a massive police response.
  • Hanson argues the situation is a result of purposeful political choices: “He said he was going to go after white neighborhoods. This is a white neighborhood. So I guess he’s fulfilling his pledge.” ([05:19])

• Political Climate:

  • Hanson criticizes city and state leadership for tolerating or enabling antisemitic and anti-Israel sentiments, both overt and through institutional appointments with anti-Israel histories.
  • References to historical patterns, linking back to past incidents in Crown Heights and contemporary left-right divides over Israel.

• Immigration Concerns:

  • Growing frustration with both illegal and legal immigration’s effects on assimilation and public safety.
  • “We give licenses to Indian truck drivers, they can’t read… it’s pretty scary.” ([08:11])
  • A call for stricter voting ID laws and reducing federal financial support unless states take full responsibility for sanctuary policies.

• Failed Assimilation:

  • Hanson recalls prior successful integration (Greeks, Armenians, Hungarians, Polish) versus modern failings due to incentives and victimhood politics.

2. Political and Demographic Shifts in Antisemitism

[13:23 – 24:17]

• New Antisemitism:

  • Hanson identifies four main drivers ("four horsemen") of rising antisemitism:
    1. Demographic Shifts: Increased Muslim immigration, declining Jewish birthrates and assimilation, influx of foreign money promoting anti-Israel views on campus.
    2. DEI (Diversity, Equity, Inclusion) Regimes: Jews now categorized as oppressors, open season for antisemitic statements under victimhood protection.
    3. Progressive Democratic Institutionalization: Democratic Party has internalized anti-Israel and antisemitic attitudes.
    4. Rightward Drift: Elements of the right engaging in antisemitic or conspiratorial rhetoric.

• Notable Quote:

  • "The only people now in the United States who will stand up and say no more ... is who? It’s Donald Trump and the MAGA base, the irredeemables, the clingers." ([23:57])
  • Hanson laments collapse of bipartisan defense of American Jews and Israel.

• Society at a Crossroads:

  • Recounting past alliances and comparing today's landscape to an “Invasion of the Body Snatchers” scenario where moral inversion reigns.

3. Mayorkas, Immigration Policy Failures, and Vigilantism

[29:46 – 36:03]

• Alejandro Mayorkas Critiqued:

  • Hanson blasts Mayorkas (former DHS Secretary) for his role in enabling mass illegal immigration and failing to take responsibility for abuses, such as losing thousands of migrant children.
  • “There wasn’t one ray of daylight between him and Biden. He just mouthed everything Biden said.” ([29:46])
  • Labels Mayorkas’s tenure as “the worst Homeland Security person in history.”

• Rise in Civic Frustration:

  • Cites the Daniel Penny NYC subway case and others as an example of emerging vigilantism from citizens feeling abandoned by the state.

• On the Left’s Strategy:

  • Suggests current progressive nihilism has no agenda beyond destroying traditions and fueling chaos, hoping to profit from a crisis they manufacture.

4. The Barbarity of October 7 and Competing Victim Narratives

[43:44 – 51:43]

• Report on October 7 Atrocities:

  • Firsthand recounting of sexual violence and grotesque mutilation by Hamas attackers, with perpetrators openly recording their crimes for propaganda.
  • “They wanted the world to see that... even the Nazis tried to blow up the death camps… But these people feel they’re so confident that world opinion is on their side.” ([45:41])

• Media Manipulation:

  • Highlights the New York Times publishing anonymous, unsourced accusations against Israel just as these true atrocities are coming to light, creating false equivalence through “competing narratives.”

• Deepening Societal Rifts:

  • Predicts lasting consequences for the Jewish community, as victimhood and radical politics increasingly combine to embolden overt violence and antisemitism.

5. Institutional Decline: Harvard Reparations and Higher Ed Dysfunction

[54:23 – 60:56]

• Harvard ‘Reparations’ Hypocrisy:

  • Pulitzer-winning investigation to track slave descendants runs aground when Harvard realizes the pool is too large to compensate.
  • “If we found too many descendants, it would bankrupt the university.” ([54:23])
  • Hanson: “Shows that the left believes in virtue signaling.… they gave all this publicity… then looked at their budget and told the guy to stop.”

• A Problem With No End:

  • Criticizes endless retroactive justice: “Once you announce you're going to do something, there's no controlling it.”
  • Contrasts token reparations to direct victims (e.g. Japanese Americans) with the limitless logic of contemporary movements.

• Consequences for Jewish Academics:

  • Predicts Jewish students and faculty to self-select out of elite institutions as discrimination and anti-Jewish climate worsen.

• Quote:

  • “We’re all Americans, we’re all imperfect people, and we’re going to ensure people have equality of opportunity, but we’re not going to have equality of results. Sorry.” ([56:31])

6. Urban Policy Madness: San Francisco and Civilizational Erosion

[38:32 – 43:44]

• Trivializing Crime in SF:

  • Hanson lampoons San Francisco’s focus on misdemeanors (banning beer/cigarettes on patios) while ignoring widespread felonies: "You can shoot up in the streets, you can steal, you can do 'poopy and tinkles' on the street… but having a beer is targeted."
  • Critiques generational inheritance squandered by current leadership, unable to build or maintain functional infrastructure.

• Educational and Practical Decline:

  • Drawing a straight line from DEI-focused admissions to lack of skills in America’s workforce, infrastructure failures, and general social decay.

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Notable Quotes & Moments

• On Chaos in American Cities:

  “The streets of San Francisco are not like what I watch when I see Vertigo… People are fornicating, they’re defecating, urinating, injecting and they seem to not be able to stop it. So they come up with an idea: outlaw beer on patios.” (Victor Davis Hanson, [38:32])

• On the Failure of Assimilation:

  “We are not assimilating. We are not acculturating. We are not integrating legal immigrants. … There wasn’t a sense you were going to come to the United States and then you’re going to be supported like the Somalis or the Afghan community.” (VDH, [08:11])

• On Left and Right Failing Jews:

  “There’s no party that says how dare you. They’re both in on it… The only people now… who will stand up [for Jews] is Donald Trump and the MAGA base, the irredeemables.” (VDH, [23:57])

• On Virtue Signaling and Reparations:

  “The left believes in virtue signaling… they gave all this publicity that Harvard wants to make it right… and then they looked at their budget… they told the guy to stop.” (VDH, [54:23])

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Additional Highlights

• Growing Public Anger:
  Hanson warns that a tolerant majority will eventually push back if “revolutionary” activism spills out of urban enclaves into mainstream America.

• Hypocrisy and Selective Outrage:
  Double standards in elite politics and media are repeatedly called out—whether in attitudes to crime, antisemitism, or supposed social justice measures.

• Cultural and Institutional Decay:
  Hanson links eroding public education, criminal justice failures, and academic double standards to a wider loss of “the ability to run a sophisticated civilization.”

• Personal Health Disclosure:
  Victor candidly shares ongoing health issues post-surgery, exemplifying his frenetic work pace and perseverance despite setbacks. ([68:04])

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Concluding Thoughts

Victor Davis Hanson delivers a stark, unfiltered diagnosis of an America drifting toward social fragmentation, institutional hypocrisy, and political myopia. His critique is both historical and impassioned, with consistent sarcasm and urgency about reclaiming national cohesion, enforcing laws, and rejecting the expansion of reparation politics and radical identity movements. The episode is rich with historical comparisons, demography, and cultural criticism—offering plenty for those seeking deeper context behind today's headline-grabbing controversies.

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Navigate the Episode

• Pro-Palestinian NYC Protests: [04:29–10:44]
• Antisemitism & “Four Horsemen”: [13:23–24:17]
• Mayorkas & Immigration Issues: [29:46–36:03]
• Society’s Response to Barbarity: [43:44–51:43]
• Harvard Reparations Scandal: [54:23–60:56]
• San Francisco Urban Dysfunction: [38:32–43:44]

(Sections condensed for clarity—many themes recur and interconnect across the episode.)

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For further reading or exclusive content:
Visit victorhanson.com.

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Transcript

[Jack Fowler]

On Monday, pro Palestinian protesters marched through the streets of a Jewish neighborhood in the city. 500 police officers had to be called. This is the new New York City.

[Victor Davis Hanson]

It's going according to Mondame's plan. He said that he would arrest Netanyahu when he got there. Most of the people that he has appointed, they have a social media history of being anti Israel or anti Semitic. He's played race. He said he was going to go after white neighborhoods. This is a white neighborhood. So I guess he's fulfilling his pledge and that's what the people wanted. I'm gonna be there by Zoom, but I'm not ready to fly quite yet. Right, right.

[Jack Fowler]

Those of you with private jets.

[Victor Davis Hanson]

Private jets, yeah.

[Jack Fowler]

Avail yourself. Your favorite person. One of your favorite people. I know your favorite person is probably Anthony Fauci, but second place maybe is Alejandro Mayorkas, who's back in the news. The ex chief of the Department of Homeland Security.

[Victor Davis Hanson]

There wasn't one ray of daylight between him and B. He just mouthed everything Biden said. I mean, that was one of the most mediocre cabinets of all time. It's very ironic because they're always after Pete Hexseth and Rubio, but compared to the prior people, geez.

[Jack Fowler]

Okay, we're ready. You ready, Victor? There we go. Hello, ladies. Hello, gentlemen, and welcome to Victor Davis Hansen in His Own Words on the Daily Signal Network. I'm Jack Fowler, the host. You're here to listen to the great Victor Davis Hansen, who is the Martin and Neely Anderson Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institution and the Wayne and Marsha Buskey Distinguished Fellow in History at Hillsdale College. And Victor's also a senior contributor at the Daily Signal. Check out The Daily Signal, dailysignal.com, brand new website, very groovy. Speaking of websites, Victor has one. The blade of Perseus. VictorHansen.com is the address. Be subscribing later on. I'll tell you why, Victor. This show, we shot the show every day. There's so many disturbing headlines to get your take on. And last night in New York City, there were these very disturbing protests, rallies through a Jewish neighborhood. We're going to get your take on that, Victor. You have a piece, important piece, on the Four Horsemen of antisemitism. There is a. A really troubling October 7th comprehensive report on the barbarity of what happened that day. Mayorkas is in the spotlight.

[Victor Davis Hanson]

Or the head.

[Jack Fowler]

I'll just say spotlight if we have

[Victor Davis Hanson]

time for it, Victor.

[Jack Fowler]

Harvard is in trouble for its reparations or alleged reparations. Please don't find too many things to be reparatory about. That's Harvard's position. We'll get to all that when we come back from these important messages.

[Victor Davis Hanson]

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[Jack Fowler]

We are back with Victor Davis Hanson in his own words. We're recording on Tuesday, May 12th. This episode will be up on Thursday, May 14th, which, by the way, is the day that the Bradley Prizes are celebrated in Washington. Victor is a member of the board of the Bradley foundation that makes those selections. It's a great day. I happen I'm going to be there.

[Victor Davis Hanson]

I'm going to be there by zoom, but I'm not ready to fly quite yet. Right, right.

[Jack Fowler]

Those of you with private jets.

[Victor Davis Hanson]

Private jets, yeah.

[Jack Fowler]

Avail yourself. All right, Victor, I'm going to just, I'll just give a drop here on what happened and please comment. And then I have a very, it's a little long of a read of the councilwoman from New York City who's explaining, in her view, she's Republican Councilwoman Vicki Paladino. Like, what is this really all about? So yesterday on Monday, pro Palestinian protesters marched through the streets of a Jewish neighborhood in the city, of course, carrying the banners, flag signs, Hamas, Hezbollah posters, River to the sea, etc. 500 police officers had to be called. This is the new New York City. Victor, what's your take on this?

[Victor Davis Hanson]

Well, I mean, it's going according to Mondame's plan. I mean, he has Islamists come into the White House and he said that he would arrest Netanyahu when he got there. Most of the people that he has appointed, they have a social media history of being anti Israel or anti Semitic. He's, he's played race. He said he was going to go after white neighborhoods. This is a white neighborhood. So I guess he's fulfilling his pledge. And that's what the People wanted. And he's unapologetic about it. When he tapped on that, Ken Griffith, you know, got his camera close. He was basically drawing the line and said, we don't want you here. Get out. And then if you're one of the protesters, say, if you're here on a green card, a lot of them look like they were immigrants or students from the Middle East. Not all, but you would say, well, this is Madame Simi. That's what he wants me to do. And the police are not allowed to even touch a person that ISIS is going for. So the New York pd, which is the best police department in the world, is now forbidden by Mondami even to help the federal government. So they get the general impression that New York is on their side. And they look at the wider atmosphere of the United States and say, well, what is the left doing? Well, there's this guy in Maine with a Nazi tattoo and he's just a nominee. That's great. And then you've got the Benjamin Baby, you know, Ilyan Omar, and you've got Rashida Tlaib yelling and screaming about Jews all the time. And then you've got pretty much an anti Semitic campus in the United States. And then you look on the right and you've got Candace saying the Mossad killed Charlie Kirk. You've got Tucker saying he wants ground Platner on his show and that he's got a World War II revisionist that says, you know, who started the war and pushed Churchill and Roosevelt into it. So they get the impression that it's not going to be. There won't be culpable, there'll be no consequences to go into a Jewish neighborhood and rough up. Wasn't that, you know, New York so well? Wasn't that where Al Sharpton said, we have diamond merchants in Crown Heights or something? He said that a long time ago. Crown something.

[Jack Fowler]

Crown Heights is a neighborhood. I'm not sure that. That this may have been in Crown Heights last night. I'm a little confused.

[Victor Davis Hanson]

That's separate, isn't it?

[Jack Fowler]

That's separate. Well, there's another. I mean, we're talking on Tuesday, but I saw something on X about there's expected to be another protest in another largely Jewish neighborhood, Midwood in Queens. So this is very targeting.

[Victor Davis Hanson]

And I think people, Americans, they're all united. They do not want illegal immigration. That poll is 70%. But I think there's a lot of people who say, you know, something's wrong with legal immigration. We are not assimilating. We are not Acculturating. We are not integrating legal immigrants. And we have 16% of the population was not born in the United States and we have 27% of California, we don't ask anything of them. So we give licenses to Indian truck drivers, they can't read. I just got off of a four hour drive from Pow Alto here to the farm and I can tell you, driving behind, you know, my wife was driving, but driving and watching some big truck with 20 tons on it just fishtail going 70 miles an hour in front of you, it's pretty scary. And you go by and I mean they're just out of control. And then we have, in my neighborhood we have cartels and they're from people who are not citizens and they're from people who are citizens. So I think it's gonna, I think American people, they're going to want people to have an ID to vote. And the SAVE act that should have been passed, I hope it does. And then they're going to say we want, you know, we don't want a million people anymore, we want 100 or 150,000 or 200 and we want to audit them, we want to make sure they know English, we want to know that they're self supporting, we want to know that they won't be on federal entitlements, state entitlements, because it's, you know, if the blue states doesn't want that, then they should just handle, they should just under the system of federalism they should say we want all the immigrants in our state but don't take federal funds for it, you pay for it. And it's so different than the, you know, people who came, the Greek American community, the Armenian American community, all these early, the Hungarian, the Polish, they were all integrated. There wasn't a system that you were going to, there wasn't a sense you're going to come to the United States and then you're going to be supported like the Somalis or the Afghan community and then you're going to be canonized as on the 30% ledger of the victimized and you're going to get exemptions and then you're going to immediately delve into politics and you know, it doesn't make any sense. I think people are going to demand a change, I really do.

[Jack Fowler]

The concept of, you know, I pledge allegiance, which at the, the absence of the necessity of allegiance in many of these communities is just, it is deeply troubling.

[Victor Davis Hanson]

You saw that with that El said, running for the Michigan Democratic senatorial primary when he said, I guess it was a hot mic recording. He said, no, we have to be very careful about announcing any happiness with the death of Khamenei and my district, you know, my constituency, they were going to be very sensitive. But basically he was saying, I'm going to be elected in Michigan on a close vote and I need every vote of a Muslim American who's eligible to vote. And they are very strongly in favor of the Iranians beating the American. That's what I got out of it.

[Jack Fowler]

Victor, let me read here and please bear with me, you and to our listeners and viewers, this is a statement on X by Councilwoman Vicki Palladino, who is a Republican on the New York City Council. By the way, this last night was in Brooklyn, in Midwood, in Brooklyn. Tonight, in a Queens neighborhood, there's expected to be another such action where there's ranting about globalizing the intifada, et cetera. So here's what she wrote. What's going on across New York tonight is a disgrace, a sickening display that should embarrass every leader in our city government. A phalanx of 500 police officers should not be needed to protect a synagogue from a violent mob of masked jihadis carrying the flags of designated terror organizations. Make no mistake, this is exactly what Mandami was elected to facilitate. It had nothing to do with free buses or public services or the working class or anything else lied about during his campaign. It was always about a revolutionary vanguard led by the Islamist Marxist alliance to bring chaos to their political enemies in naked power plays that are meant to clearly announce who's now in charge here. When they say every issue is Palestine, this is what they mean. When they say globalized the intifada, this is what they mean. This is it. This is what New York now has to look forward to. And it's not going. And it's going to get much worse for Jews, for homeowners, for businesses, for executives and banks and restaurants and everyone who isn't part of their radical nexus. Nobody is safe, everyone is targeted. And they will continue to escalate like likely until they start killing people all as the mayor looks on and smiles. Very powerful and well known.

[Victor Davis Hanson]

I don't think they're going to. They have majorities in these local blue state enclaves. Seattle, Portland, Minneapolis, New York, Boston. But the great majority of Americans don't agree with what they're doing. And as long as they keep in their enclaves, the people live and let live. But once they go into other neighborhoods and try to terrorize people or once they block as they have stormed into airports, then you're going to get a lot of angry people. And that angry group of people is the majority. And how it works out to the midterms, if the war will end in two or three weeks, whether there has to be kinetic to end it, I don't know. And he pivots to the economy and there's the redistricting fight and these victories are in play. I'm not sure they're going to win the midterms. And I just think that there's. The counter revolution of the MAGA people has not even ended yet. I know there's been defections, but people are getting. There's no alternative, you see, there's no alternative to it because one party says wind and solar, we don't need to drill oil or gas crime. All these people have been getting out. They go down the street in Boston, they shoot, he's been out. Somebody cuts the throat of a poor immigrant girl, he's been out. All of them have been out. And the prisons are half full in some states. So it's not going. That agenda does not work and people are not going to support it. And we hear the loud supporters, they make the news, but they're not the majority.

[Jack Fowler]

Well, Victor, I just want to jump off on something to get your take. Well, for you to talk about this important essay you've written because what we saw last night in New York City, this is directed at a Jewish neighborhood, but I agree with Councilwoman Paladino here. It's about all of us. They hate all of us. But George Washington famously wrote to the stock of Abraham about living in peace under the fig tree and none shall make you afraid. It was a very powerful description of what America was supposed to be about. And, and this was dealing with the Jewish community in Rhode island back in 17, whenever it was 93, I believe.

[Victor Davis Hanson]

But

[Jack Fowler]

our Jewish brothers and sisters are clearly in the target and the scope of the left. And you've written a piece for American greatness and people can find it on that site or on your website. The Blade of Perseus about the four horsemen of the new antisemitism. Would you tell us, Victor, what are these four horsemen?

[Victor Davis Hanson]

Well, the first is demography and it's entirely due to immigration. The Jewish population was traditionally 6 or 7 million people. It was almost the same. I always thought, given Israel was 9 to 10 million and 2 million were Arabs, that the number of Jews in the United States was almost comparable to those in Israel. So you never really thought that there would be that flagrant antisemitism. But two or three things are happening coterminously. One is migration from students coming over here from the Arab and Muslim worlds is enormous. And the birth rate for people who self identify as Muslim is about 2.6. For most other ethnicities it's about 1.7 to 1.8. And then the Jewish community is in their third or fourth generation for the most part, and they are experiencing the same integration, assimilation, as they should as every minority as the Greek community. When I was a kid, 20 years old, and there was a Cyprus war, the Greek lobby was very adamant. They had about eight or nine representatives, a couple of senators, but they're gone. They're intermarried is what I'm saying. There's still really good Greek communities, but it's very. They haven't been infused with continued immigration. And this is what's happened to the Jewish community. About a quarter to a half of the Jewish community does not identify with Israel. They're secular, they're intermarried, so they're shrinking and their birth rate is not as great and they're not being infused by people from Eastern Europe as in the past, etc. Etc. So the Muslims are growing and the Jews are shrinking. And then added into that matrix, if you look at the top 10 donor countries, Israel's about that spend money on lobbying or gifting, Israel's about six. It's China, uae, Kuwait, Qatar, you name it. And these Arab countries are sending billions of dollars into universities so they can train the next generation of Americans to be sympathetic to the Palestinians and etc. And they've been very successful. So the demographics and the Middle east presence is much different than it was 30 years ago. And then there's DEI, the Obama legacy that the countries bifurcated, as we've said, 70, 30. And in this matrix, Jews are white oppressors, just like other groups that are identified as white. And Israelis abroad are, in the settler colonial rubric, they are white people. Even though when I go to Israel, I can't tell a difference from sometimes Israelis or Arabs, but that doesn't matter. And so that's been very deleterious to Jews and dei. I've said this before, all of these minority groups feel not all of them. There's members of these groups who feel that they can be anti Semitic openly and there will be no consequences because they pled victimhood. So when Ilya and Omar said it's, it's the Benjamins, baby, it's all about the Benjamins. There was nothing down When Al Sharpton said, get on your yarmocks and come over to my house, nothing. When Jesse Jackson said, oh, I guess we're going to go to Hymie Town, nothing. When Reverend Wright said, dim Jews won't let me see nothing. When Malcolm X said, they're termites, nothing. Farrakhan said there were insects and gutter. I could go on and on. Lionel Jeffries, the uncle of Hikem Jeffries, was a professor who wrote a book called Ice People and Sun People. It was the most racist track there was that people who were in the sun, that is Blacks, were genetically superior. And when he was a student, he used to espouse the same stuff, more or less. So all the groups who identify as DEI feel they can be anti Semitic without consequences. So when you add up the demography and you add up dei, and then there's the new Jacobin Party, it's part of a. If you're a member of the Democratic Party and you say you're a strong supporter of Israel and you want to investigate anti Semitism, that is like saying, I want to build a pipeline or I want mandatory bail or I want the Wall bill. That's a package of this Jacobin progressive new Democratic Party. You can't do that. It is institutionalized in the Democratic Party that you don't like Israel. And anti Semitism is okay if it was. And that's why a Chuck Schumer or Nancy Pelosi or any of these old John Kerry, any of these old totems, they won't say a word because they're either retired and they want honorific positions or they're still in the limelight. But why hasn't Bill Clinton come out and said, what are we doing in the Democratic Party? We're nominating a person with a Nazi tattoo. Why are we doing this? Why is a democratic socialist mayor and allowing this to happen? They don't do it because it's part of the progressive agenda. And that is very important. And the other thing is there is the popular culture is left wing, and left wing is now anti Semitic. And so both people on the left and right want to come in out of the hailstorm, so to speak. They're tired. So all of a sudden, if you look at what people said about Tucker Carlson, they're not saying that on the left anymore. They're saying he's kooky, but he's got some interesting ideas and they're laying off him. And when you lose the two party system, as I said earlier, when the left was more or less the defenders of Jews and it was a country club Republican right that was stealthily discriminating. They made movies, Gentlemen's Agreement. They did all this stuff. And then during the 70s and 80s and 90s and DEI, they became anti Semitic. It was the Republican Party that stood up for Israel. And now there's people on the base of the Republican Party that, I mean, we like Megyn Kelly, but Megyn Kelly gave a pretty much a mea culpa and said, I think I've been mistaken. I might have been affected too much by people who were pro Israel. And now I think we've been a little bit too hard on Islam. And Netanyahu did this and Netanyahu did this. And then we had Steve Bannon and we've had, you name it, Candace, and Tucker Carlson. Tucker Carlson says that Iran should. He's very informed, he's very bright. He knows that Roth and Johnny said that Israel was a one bomb state. One bomb could kill all the Jews. He knows what Ahmad Jannat and Ahmainejad said he wanted to wipe. Why would he say it would be helpful if Iran had a bomb? So there's no party that says how dare you. They're both in on it, Their bases. The only thing that's ironic, Jack, is the only people now in the United States who will stand up and say no more. We're not going to let you demonize a whole people and push them around and rough them up on campus and call them all these names. Is who. It's Donald Trump and the MAGA base, the irredeemables, the clingers. They're the people who are still supporting Israel. They still support Jews and evangelicals. Yeah, evangelicals, exactly. But it's not the Democratic Party. It is not the podcaster. Right base. It is not the DEI people. It's not the bi coastal left wing

[Jack Fowler]

elite teachers unions, you know.

[Victor Davis Hanson]

You know what I. It reminds me of? It reminds me of all of these movies like the Invasion of the Body Snatchers or the the Last of Us or the Walking Dead that certain people, you know, get infected and now they're lost and they're zombies. And the other people, you never really know who's a zombie until they turn. Well, now they're all turning and they're, They've lost their mind. They've lost their mind. When you have people. And I'll go back to that debate I did with Piers. When you have people who say on the air as Piers Morgan and this professor did that. Israel is not a consensual society, and it's no different. And it's not as liberal as the other societies. When it's the only place in the Middle east that has regularly scheduled elections, free speech, an independent judiciary, tolerance for women, gay equality among the sex. And they don't see that. They know it's true.

[Jack Fowler]

What would you think would happen if you were on social media in Israel and attacked Netanyahu? Or if you're on social media in Britain and made fun of Keir Starmer, who'd be more likely to have a

[Victor Davis Hanson]

door knocked on Keir Starmer's England is a lot less free. That's what's really funny. And put it this way. If I had to fight, if the United States had to fight 100 combat aircraft, would you rather fight the German Air force, Luftwaffe or the French Air Force, or the British or the Israeli? I would rather fight any of those three than the Israeli. If I wanted to criticize the government or say something that was politically incorrect, I'd rather be in Israel doing it than in those three countries. Absolutely. If I wanted to walk down the street at midnight, I would rather be in Israel than those three countries. And here too, by the way. And that is empirical. So they know that and yet they deny it. When you have Piers Morgan saying that he's been all over the Middle east and he's been afforded all this courtesy to say what he wants, and you know, that is based on two things. He's a celebrity and he voices pro Arab views. And he will never put on in any of these countries, he broadcasts from an internal dissident that would attack the government. Nor would he put on an apostate who says, I'm done with Islam, because if he did, he wouldn't be there. He might be in jail. He knows that I said that to him and he said, yeah, you may have a point. A big one.

[Jack Fowler]

Well, Victor, we're going to bring up a few more topics. But first for our listeners and our viewers, if you've studied enough history, you start to see a pattern. Nations don't lose their way overnight. 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 Every society that pushed its currency beyond discipline eventually paid a price the wise never waited for collapse. They prepared for the correction. And that's why so many thoughtful Americans, especially those nearing retirement or in retirement or reallocating part of their wealth into something that has outlasted every paper experiment in 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 are partnering with Allegiance Gold, a company distinguished by integrity, reliability and an A rating with 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 a special liberty offer to 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 844-7909-191844-79091 or visit protectwithvictor.com that's 844-7909-1918-4470-9191 or 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, your favorite person, one of your favorite people, I know your favorite person is probably Anthony Fauci. But second place maybe is Alejandro Mayorkas, who's back in the news. The ex chief of Department of Homeland Security. He was being interviewed at some forum sponsored by Politico and he says he regrets the delayed Biden immigration crackdown. And this is the man who for years was saying everything was fine, the border was secure, what was delayed. I thought everything was going fine throughout the entire four years of that presidency. Any thoughts about Alejandro?

[Victor Davis Hanson]

Yeah, I mean, there wasn't one ray of daylight between him and Biden. He just mouthed everything Biden said. He said he was famous, that he would get down to the border and he'd say the border was secure. And you'd look over his shoulder and 10,000 people were coming through. He was the one. He didn't need much of a prompt that summer to say that the Border Patrol was whipping Haitians right when they were trying to keep their horses in control because the Haitians were storming across the Rio Grande. So he was knee deep in it. And now he looks back and he says he comes in and he and Joe Biden allowed somewhere between 9 in, but more people think 10 to 12 million. And Donald Trump comes in and there's nobody and he told us chapter and verse that you couldn't do anything unless you had comprehensive immigration reform, which was a euphemism for mass amnesty and 4,000 guaranteed entries a day. And so Trump and everybody would say, if you ask American people now, what changed the border from 2024 to 2025, was it comprehensive immigration form or a new president? Bingo. So he knows that, and he's out of power now. And he was the worst Homeland Security person in history. Sort of like Javier Becerra. He was terrible, too, in his job. But both of them, I mean, that was one of the most mediocre cabinets of all time. It's very ironic because they're always after, you know, Pete Hexseth and Rubio, but compared to the prior people, Geez. Yeah.

[Jack Fowler]

Victor, you mentioned Becerra and Mayorkas and Becerra tag teamed on this program that lost all these kids. So he was asked about that. And it says, I think I'm reading from New York Post article elsewhere. Mayorkas also dodged responsibility for losing track of tens of thousands of migrant kids that Biden administration let into the country through the Department of Home, HHS's Office of Refugee Resettlement, et cetera. I mean, still, that is a dark stain on America that these kids were just like.

[Victor Davis Hanson]

And that was despicable because when he was Homeland Security, he was blaming Trump for them that were coming in under Biden, and he was acting as if the Homeland Security person had absolute responsibility to make sure there was not unintended minors who were being trafficked. So he knew that that was happening, and he was blaming Trump. And now he says he doesn't want to criticize HHS or whatever. He doesn't want to do this because he's despicable. He really is. And he's another fauci of these people who were lifelong functionaries in the bureaucracy, and they felt that they were judged, jury and executioner, they could do whatever they wanted, and he destroyed the border. And for all those out there who think ICE is a little excessive, what do you. When you let in 10 to 12 million people during a COVID epidemic and you send them all over the United States and then they're hid by states that are sanctuary cities, and then you have to find among them 500,000 criminals. And when you get up to a magic number of 250,000, then magically the crime rate starts to go down, as it has. But there, you know, what is I supposed to do? The thing about the left is they always create this mess and then when you want to correct it, they say that you're using incorrect methods to clean up the mess. Same thing with homeless. They created the homeless mess. And then when you try to deal with, oh, you're mean, October 7th created the whole Middle East. We wouldn't even be in Iran right now if it wasn't October 7th. And then you say to yourself, okay, they came over, they raped, they mutilated, they killed and then they went into a billion dollar labyrinth where the trapdoors, entry and exits were under homes, schools, mosques, hospitals, and they wouldn't come out and the Gazans wouldn't give them up and they wouldn't release the. What are you going to do? Well, you're going to do what the Israelis did because if you don't do it, they're going to say, see, they didn't do anything because they knew they had it coming. So that's what the left does.

[Jack Fowler]

It kind of makes me think back here domestically, what we were talking at the beginning of the show. I wonder if it's going to come to vigilantism at some point. I mean, what do you do? You just sit there and watch, watch it happen. Watch happen in your neighborhood and it's happening in New York City. But why wouldn't it be happening sooner or later? Well, you're seeing Selma or Milford, Connecticut or wherever.

[Victor Davis Hanson]

Well, you've seen Daniel Penny. I mean there's a whole genre now of people on the subway and they're in normal life and they're in a liquor store and somebody tries to hold up, they take action, they're on a train, they take action, they're on an airplane and there's a disruptive past. They help the. There's people who are saying, you're not going to take away my civilization. I'm sorry, I'm going to get active. So that's going to increase too. And I don't know, it's. I don't see, I'm trying to. The Democratic Party at one point, 40 hour work week, disability insurance, unemployment insurance, childhood labor law. I understood that it was good, but there was an agenda. It was misguided in many ways, but there was an agenda. I don't see what the agenda is. The agenda is hate Donald Trump, trash the United States and destroy all traditions, whether it's boys and girls, sports, or thugs that are let out to prey on women or open the border and destroy the idea of immigration law. It's all nihilistic and it's to create a chaos and then they want to I think they want some kind of mass riot or something and then they come in and take over. But it's not going to happen, not in this country. It's never been a left wing country.

[Jack Fowler]

Well, Victor, you mentioned October 7th and there's a report out today about the barbarity of that and we're going to get your take on that on some Harvard reparation, lunacy and some wokeness and of all places San Francisco.

[Victor Davis Hanson]

It's hard to believe that that could happen there.

[Jack Fowler]

And we'll do all that. We'll get your take on all these things when we come back from these important mess Messages if you enjoy Victor Davis Hansen, you might enjoy the Daily Signals flagship show, the Tony Kenneth cast, the same common sense perspectives you love. Weekdays at 7pm Eastern and unlike some of the other evening shows, we work up until showtime to bring you the latest breaking news, analysis and good old American sarcasm. Thom Tillis I'm pretty sure might have been useful at one time as a doorstop. Find the Tony Kennett cast on YouTube, X Radio TV or wherever you get your podcasts. We are back with Victor Davis Hansen in His Own Words, recording on Tuesday, May 12th, 2026. This episode will be up on Thursday, May 14th. Victor's website the Blade of Perseus is a treasure chest of free things and links and all kinds of goodies. But if you want to subscribe, and I do think you should subscribe if you're a fan of Victor's writings, twice a week he writes an exclusive article ultra article for the Blade of Perseus. And once a week he does an exclusive video about 10 minute video. So it's $6.50 a month or discounted $65 for the full year. The Blade of Perseus. The address is victorhansen.com and I argued Victor, it made a great Mother's Day present and forthcoming Father's Day. It will make a great Father's Day present. So give it a gift to yourself or give it a gift to dad. So Victor, I'll start off with this woke thing out of San Francisco. It's a Daily Mail headline Woke San Francisco plans to ban enjoying a cold beer and cigarette on bar patios, leaving business owners furious. So you can shoot up in the streets, you can do poopy and tinkles in the street, you can steal shoplift from stores galore. But if you're running a if you're one of the last few real businesses operating in San Francisco, the government there is going to make it even more

[Victor Davis Hanson]

Difficult for you too, I think. I wrote a column 10 years ago and I called that the Bloomberg Effect. Your whole city is shut down with impenetrable ice. New York can't get your driveway or sidewalk clean and the mayor gets on TV and talks about super size software drinks. So when you have the felony that's oppressing people and you can't handle it, you turn to the misdemeanor. So the streets of San Francisco are not like, as I say too often, perhaps in this, they're not like what I watch when I see Vertigo or even in the 70s, bullet. Yeah, bullet. They're not, it's not dirty, hairy streets. Even. So people are fornicating, they're defecating, they're urinating, they're injecting and they seem to not be able to stop it. So they come up with an idea. Well, we can't stop that, it would be too hurtful, too controversial. But there's a bunch of guys that are kind of middle class and they have their beer and cigarettes and some people smell that thing waft over four tables and let's just be dynamic and outlawed. How's that? And that's what they do.

[Jack Fowler]

If you were smoking dope, it would be okay, I guess.

[Victor Davis Hanson]

Oh yeah. And they don't have any. The existential, that's beyond them, so they don't address it, but they do the trivial and they go after that and they keep doing that in every aspect, you know, and they take these wonderful inheritances that they get and then they destroy it. I mean, they didn't make San Francisco, believe me, the people who are making these laws, they wouldn't have a clue how to build the Golden Gate Bridge or the Oakland Bay Bridge or the palace of Fine Arts or Coit Tower. They just took it and then they inherited it and then they destroyed as much as they could of it and they didn't add anything new that was of value. So they're kind of parasitical. Same with la. And it's a redistributionist society now. They just get the money and they say, you were a victim, you were a victim, you were a victim. Here's money, money, money, money. And these are repertory payments for all the oppression you've suffered. And we're not going to build, we're going to say we're going to build a high speed rail, but we can't do it. There's no money just going to sit there for 20 years.

[Jack Fowler]

And I saw a new cost estimate on that 170 sip.

[Victor Davis Hanson]

Oh, I think it's 240 now for the rail. Yeah, I just went over 20 minutes ago or 30 minutes ago coming. We went over it, and it's on my avenue. And we went over it and. And they're kind of grading. You know, they got the gravel mound and they're grading it, and it looks really nice, but there's not one foot of track on it. And, well, it's. I don't know what to put it. They couldn't do it. Everybody says, well, part of it is our society is so contentious. So when they tried to buy out all the businesses in the right of ways, that took a long time and it was incompetent. There was accusations of corruption and sweetheart deals and all that. But I don't think they have the ability to do it anymore. I don't think they have the engineers. I don't think they have the welders. I don't think because of the educational system or the workers or the work ethos that make people want to work because it's just not happening. When you go by there, you just see five truckers standing around their trucks waiting to dump the gravel, or there's just a guy out here sitting down. It doesn't look like there's a busy beach. And you start to get that impression that when you have the educational system where people are graduating functionally illiterate and half the students in the Florida schools are not in the public schools, they're now in charter schools because they've written off the public schools. And you know that Stanford and Yale and Harvard are giving 70 or 80% A's. And until recently, their emissions policies were based on race or gender or sexual orientation more than mere cross. That's just not an abstraction that has consequences. That shows up in the guy driving a truck, that shows up in the airplane pilot, that shows up in the air traffic controller, that shows up on the guy driving the. And that's what's happening. The whole system is. The whole system inherited a very sophisticated civilization, but it didn't inherit the behavior, the attitude, the skills, the competency to run that, much less to expand on it. Unless we can retrain Americans to not defecate on the street and maybe just say if you come into the country illegally, you've got to go home. I'm sorry, that's a law. We enforce our law laws. Sorry, but we don't do that.

[Jack Fowler]

Well, John Ratzenberger, my old friend. I know you know John and Mike Rowe. They've been preaching that the, the. The trades for Decades now, decades. And it's coming a cropper. VICTOR Speaking of civilizational disasters, so the Civil Commission in England issued a report on October 7, sexual violence. This was based on thousands of interviews and there was a lot of videotape, a lot of it taken by the terrorists. And here's from the Daily Mail. I just want to read a couple of little passages. So what happened on October 7? There was a recurring pattern of rape and gang rape, sexual torture, mutilation, targeted shooting to the face, head injury, congenital area, forced nudity, binding and restraint, genital burning, objects inserted into intimate areas, post mortem, sexual humiliation, execution during or after sexual assault. The sadism was widespread with first responders finding aluminum cans, grenades, nails, blunt objects, rods, household tools and spike like instruments inserted into genitals and other parts of the body. Finally, in one house, Mr. There's a gentleman, Mr. Grindman came across the body of a woman. He said, quote, in the room were knives, scalpels, a hammer, an axe, screwdrivers, tools, tools from the household. All of those were embedded in the body. The body was completely mutilated. And these are the people being, being

[Victor Davis Hanson]

who could, who committed this.

[Jack Fowler]

These barbarities are being praised on college campuses. Victor. Very, very disturbing, usually disturbing report.

[Victor Davis Hanson]

Any, any take? Yeah. And the most disturbing thing was that the evidence just wasn't postmortem. I mean, they put those little pro camera, whatever you call them, on their helmets, right? And they wanted to film it. And when they took them prisoner, they confiscated the films. They were happy about it. They wanted the world to see that, that, I mean, even the Nazis tried to blow up the death camps. They didn't want anybody to see what they did because they were scared. Not that they were humane, they could care less. They would have liked the world to see it, but they thought it might hurt them. But these people feel that they're so confident that world opinion on their side, that they're going to broadcast the death and mutilation and wounding and these horrific crimes against these 1200 dead that they committed and the others that were wounded. And they were betting that people would interpret that not just in the Middle east, but outside the Middle east as well as Israel's weakness. And if they were weak, they would have contempt for them. So when Israel was in that 28 day period before they went on the ground, people remember that is when the really anti Semitism really exploded. That was when you started to see the posters of the glide hangers celebrating the death. I think that was at Chicago campus blm. Chicago campus blm yes. That's where you started to see the Stanford professor, the lecturer put the Jews on one side. That was glee. That was like they are weak. And if Israel had not done that, it would have been even worse. They would have said, see? And there were people saying that, that they had waited, waited, waited because they deep down inside were scared of the Palestinians. And, and they knew that they'd got it. They had it coming. And that was part of the effect of those cameras. They were told to wear those and film it. So it would be so horrific that it would shock the Israelis into stasis that they wouldn't do anything. These people are so. And they didn't understand the Israelis. And then the weirdest thing is just like a day before this came out, the New York Times with entirely Gaza Hamas sources claims that Gaza male prisoners, and I think one case a woman are being sexually tortured in Israeli prisoners. And in one case a person was raped by an Israeli dog that was taught to rape. And then Nicholas Kristof puts that in his column and the whole purpose of that was it's completely un source, completely unsubstantiated. Anonymous Nobody comes forward and said here, I saw this. Here is where it happened. But it's only because they're anticipating this story which was sourced. So now you have two competing. Well, then you Israelis do it too, Jack. That's the whole purpose. And you know, people have been criticizing Netanyahu because he's been trying to explain what happened to the United States and people are very angry at him for offering advice, I guess Tucker would say interfering in our internal affairs, but he's trying to find a way out of this inexplicable hatred toward his country. And I think he said we don't take any more aid. The people who were really behind going into Iran, more even than Israel were the Gulf states. They have 600 of the best combat aircraft in the world. They have an left. They haven't gone one mission into Iran. Israel's got 300 half. They have worn out their air force doing that. And yet we're told that they are culpable and they're a terrible ally and that the people who fund us with all this lavish quid pro quo money who want us to defang their chief rival Iran, and they're right across the Gulf and they have this huge air force which now is 600 planes more than Iran and they won't lift a fine and we're told those are the ideal ally. It's just crazy. And so all of these stories we've been talking about have this common denominator that in the year of our Lord 2026, people got the message from left, right, popular culture, politicians, that it's open season on Jews. That's simple. And then a lot of people will say, don't say anything. That was my friend. He didn't mean what he said. Graham Platner, if you look at his too, it's been changed. One time he said that just a bunch of guys got drunk. He didn't know what it was. Another guy said he was laughing, that it was a Totenkov. Another time he said, well, I was brainwashed into doing it by toxic military culture. Nobody cares. What he should have said is, I did it because I'm going to be elected. That's going to get me elected in Maine because that's going to show everybody that I hate Jews. And I'm a kind of a Daryl Cooper historian. I feel that we were wrong and I'm siding with the Totenkopf people. That's pretty much the message. And he'll get a lot of young people in Maine. That might make the difference. He'll get a lot of people in Maine. And then the second half of his message, I hate Trump, will appeal to the old fossilized Democrat that you see on the sidewalk spitting at ice. That's his stress. They're even going after Susan Collins's tremor, you know, benign tremor she's had for years. It's not Parkinson's disease, but they're going after that. She shakes too much. I think one of their operators said the other day, she's like a Chihuahua in the snow. She's shivering. So I thought when they accused Donald Trump of making a gesture that might have made fun of a disabled. There's evidence that he is. He didn't mean that, but if he did, they were outraged. And now I haven't heard one person say anything.

[Jack Fowler]

Yeah, she should have been a crazy person out on the streets and she would be praised. Well, Victor, we're going to take a quick little break here and come back with two stories about Boston. One is about Harvard, one's about Cambridge. And we'll do that after these final, important messages.

[Victor Davis Hanson]

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 Hanson]

Some wonder how we can ensure America will continue to thrive as long as we keep first things first and foremost, we've Only just begun.

[Jack Fowler]

America the Beautiful. We are back with Victor Davis Hansen in his own words. Victor, the Harvard story has to do with a $100 million reparation program that Harvard set up in 2022 after the reporting had showed that in Harvard's early years, it's slave money. Slavery was involved. Of course, America was. There was slaves in America in the 1600s and 1700s and Harvard's. I forget what year was founded was in the 1600s. Anyway, it hired this guy, Richard Salini, who had done the investigation into Georgetown University about 10 years ago. So I think folks might remember that Georgetown, in order to stay afloat, this is back in 18 whatever, sold several hundred slaves. And then it set up a program to find the descendants of these slaves and to find some reparation program of some sort. Free tuition, I think. Anyways, the Cellini guy was the one doing it. So Harvard hired him. And then now Harvard is telling him, don't find too many. Yeah, what does it say? Harvard realized how invested Cellini, a former Wall street lawyer, was to his work. Because I'll get to this quickly. Of the 272 slaves from Georgetown, he found 10,000 descendants of them. So now he's applying his skills to Harvard and his work was. They told him not to identify too many descendants. If we found too many descendants, it would bankrupt the university.

[Victor Davis Hanson]

You mean Jeffrey Epstein and George Charles didn't give him enough money for it? Yeah, I guess so. I mean, remember the Pigsforth thing about black farmers? I think it was Obama gave them 4 billion and it was very hard to find people. People. It's, you know, all of the Native American casinos in this area periodically have these big fights where somebody comes in and says he's 1 16th and then he wants a share of the revenues but.

[Jack Fowler]

Or they become a senator from Massachusetts.

[Victor Davis Hanson]

They all cite the Japanese American. But that was directly to people. People. It wasn't to their ancestors. It was saying to people, if we took you and removed you from your property illegally without habeas corpus under martial law, and we imprisoned you and there was no evidence that you were engaged in espionage, but there was a lot of evidence that your children fought heroically in Italy. We owe you a period for your two or three lost year, $20,000, I think it was. But that was directly to people. It wasn't to their. We didn't say the Chinese, now that we're dealing with Asian reparations. A lot of your great great grandparents were involved in the Union Pacific Railroad and they were ill treated. So it's endless what you can do. And as soon as you announce you're going to do something, there's no controlling it. So what it also shows is that the left believes in virtue signaling. So they gave all this publicity that Harvard wants to make it right. Right. And then they looked at their budget and then they said, there's going to be a lot of scammers that come in here, but we can't say that, so we'll just tell the guy who's supposed to find them to stop. And that's how they do it.

[Jack Fowler]

And well, the senator who represents the state is a scammer. She's one at best. One 1024th Cherokee Indian.

[Victor Davis Hanson]

So how about all the people who, if you want to give reparations, how about all the people who died fighting in World War I, World War II, Vietnam and Korea? What did they get? They were the ones that really suffered. They were all young and they lost their entire lives for us. And they had children and they didn't have fathers, but we never talk about them. In this case, it's going to be a very hard argument to say that seven generations ago, my great, great great grandmother was a slave. And I have calls on my fellow citizens to pay me money because you're going to say the Irish there was, oh well, I'm seven generations Irish from the boats landing. And they had the famous op EDS saying our Irish human, remember those things? They were arguing they were leprechauns and stuff. So we go down that road, there's no ending it. And we might as well just say, we're all Americans, we're all imperfect people and we're going to ensure people have equality of opportunity, but we're not going to have equality of results. Sorry. It's really scary how they're mainlining this communist line. I mean, when AOC said basically you couldn't be a billionaire, we talked about that without being a criminal. And then she said there were billionaire founders. The founders were a bunch of billionaires and just invents this stuff. And they're open about it. And now have you noticed that the socialists are open about their agenda and their communist agenda? Yeah, Mandami's open about it.

[Jack Fowler]

It's a full view. And this is back to what we were talking about earlier. This is coming for all of us. Some of us might see it on the news at night or on an X post, but I'm sorry, if you, wherever you live, eventually this kind of crap's to going, going to be on your street unless somebody does something about people.

[Victor Davis Hanson]

The thing that's going to be mystifying is I don't know what the breakdown of people who identify themselves as Jewish and as supporters in the entire 7 million population of Jews in America, but I would imagine it's at least 50 or 60%. And out of that 50, 60%, I would say 70% are left wing wing or liberal. If you're a liberal Jew and you are pretty successful and you give money, what do you do? Do you get out of that party? Do you still give them money? Do you back Gavin? Gavin's been attacking Israel all of a sudden. So it's going to be interesting to see what happens because if you're a Jewish Democrat and you've been prominent in Democratic Party, they don't want you there. They want your money, but they don't want you. They don't like you. I don't know if they're able to absorb that because it's been such a bastion of Jewish alliance and allegiance. The Democratic Party. Well, that's the point.

[Jack Fowler]

That's the political side. Apply that to the scholar and academic community also.

[Victor Davis Hanson]

You know, I think you're going to see because they're not merocratic and the Jewish enrollment at Harvard or Yale or Stanford, they were all about 20 to 30% and they're down to about 8 or 9. I think you're going to see not just the institutionalized discrimination against Jews, but they're going to self select and they're not going to want their children to go to those places. So you're going to see things like Vanderbilt universities in the south and they're going to get a lot better. I think we're in the transition right now that these big names, Stanford, Harvard, Yale, Princeton, it's really based on fumes. Once we saw the performance of somebody how easily Jeffrey Epstein ingratiated himself into Harvard or the conduct of Claudine Gray or our president who had to resign for appropriating material that wasn't factual or presented in papers. So it. I just think they're losing their sheen with all the scandals. But more importantly, they're not turning out because of their curriculum and their admittance policy. They're not turning out exceptional graduates, at least at the standard they used to.

[Jack Fowler]

And the employers, they're offering remedial math and remedial English to entrance and then

[Victor Davis Hanson]

people who are still trapped in the matrix. Well, I want my son to graduate and say he went and went to Stanford or Harvard. They're still going to have to send them to a campus. I mean not long ago Hassan Piker was very visible at Stanford, Big greeting forum, very friendly. It's a very hostile place for Jewish students. And they're trying now to bar the Hillel, you know, the Jewish advocacy fraternities, they want to get rid of them. A lot of groups do that are Muslim and Palestinian orientated. So it's not going to stop until somebody stops it. And they have to lose. They have to lose the midterms, they have to lose the presidency. And then if it happens long enough. It took a long time from the period of George McGovern to Bill Clinton, 20 years. Yeah, but they did learn their lesson for eight years and they got a lot of governance out of that.

[Jack Fowler]

Well, they passed a lot of terrible laws when they took over Congress in 1974. Well, they had Congress anyway. But when they supersized. Hey Victor, let's get one last quick thing here about this crazed gunman in Cambridge, Massachusetts out on the street. Tyler Brown, 46, he was arrested, he shot two men in and as we talk there life threatening injuries, just 50, 60 shots this guy had. Already there's so many of these stories, Victor, what was he doing running around Cambridge, Massachusetts shooting a gun when he had been arrested in 2020 for shooting at police officers? He pled guilty to attempted murder in 2021. He was supposed to be in jail for at least 16 years. He was let some sweetheart deal in five years and immediately he's out on the street trying to kill random just shooting away, trying to kill people. This is America today.

[Victor Davis Hanson]

So any less there's a public defender, there's a district attorney and there's a judge and they are involved in it in all these cases and they want a performance art or virtue signal that they're empathetic and they're left wing and they feel that society has been unjust to the particular person and that he's no more guilty than a corporate raider. And therefore they're going to minimally follow the law and make sure that he's out again. And that's the one side of the matrix. The other is it's not going to affect them. They don't take the subway, they don't. They're usually when behind guards or they have have a driver if they're a politician. The people they let out on the wolves, they let out to kill sheep. They're the shepherd that are up on the mountain with a gun. They don't care. They're not the sheep, we're the sheep. And they know that if somebody you pick up the paper and Mr. X and Ms. Y were walking down the street and somebody jumped out of the bushes and did the knockout game and hit one out and slashed the other's throat or threw them into the subway, we would say, that's terrible. It's crime is getting out of hand. And we'd go on, on. And we say, I'm glad it's not me. But people are not yet outraged enough to do anything about it.

[Jack Fowler]

They're not. They ought to be. Well, Victor, I'm going to read a few comments that of the thousands that appear every week on YouTube and rumble and Apple and thank people for taking the time to leave their commentary. Some of it's pointed, some of it's very critical about your concern, your co host here, but let me read a few here, Victor. One's from R. Tamir, I'm watching you from Israel and I know you're saying the simple truth because I live here and I see what is going on here. I am amazed with the lies that I hear on social media regarding Israel. One doesn't know how to start explaining how Israel is with all these haters. Thank you, Art Tamir. Then we have nodak721 who writes, ah, when Victor talks about his true love, he is in his element. His eyes light up, his demeanor brightens, and he's truly victorious. I love it. He is a man for all seasons with true love for the classics. Very thankful for this brilliant man. I thought your true love was Mrs. Hansen, but it is.

[Victor Davis Hanson]

But it is. But I do love. I'm very fortunate. I was introduced at 17 in college to the class.

[Jack Fowler]

Yeah. And finally, Randy Santoro writes. Thank you vdh, for another spectacular podcast. Very happy with the positive blood work news. The Jacobins have completely destroyed this country. They haven't missed anything. And if one reads Whitaker Chambers, witness, this revolution has its roots with the beginning of socialism. Trump, by the grace of God, has saved the country. His counter revolution is the mechanism standing between the country going down the tubes. I'm 66, lived my life and all of it sickens me to no end. But civilizations change and come and go, like you amply demonstrated in the End of Everything. As you pointed out in classical thought, when a society has too much leisure and unlimited wealth, it implodes. Well, Randy says a lot of things in there, but thank Randy for saying them and for many others who do the same. And, and I want to thank folks who've written me and I get these emails Every week. Thanks for Civil Thoughts. That's the free weekly email newsletter I write for the center for Civil Society. You can go to civilthoughts.com and sign up. And Friday in your inbox, email with 1415 recommended readings. It's totally free. We're not selling your name. I know you're going to like it. So also remember, go to Victor's website, the blade of Perseus. Victorhansen.com and what else? Victor, if you're on X, D. Hansen, that is his handle on Facebook.

[Victor Davis Hanson]

I'm going to start posting on X. I haven't been doing it because I've been doing the. Try to come back with the two columns and the podcast. But as a victim, I can say I'm a victim now.

[Jack Fowler]

Victim, you write. I have to go through this litany every once in a while. This is Victor part time. Four podcasts a week, four video short videos for the Daily Signal. Victor Davis Hanson in his own words. One video for your website. Two articles for your website. An essay for American greatness. A syndicated column. God knows what else you do.

[Victor Davis Hanson]

You know, I had an incident this week yesterday. Wrote a book, hard incident. It's a technician was trying to explain to me me if you lose 40% of your lung, your heart doesn't have enough oxygen yet. And then if you continue your pace as if it does, it naturally beats faster. And then if you have an assault on it like in my case, I was prescribed a lot of steroids for a test. Then it goes crazy. And that's my problem. I don't know. It's like an ied. I don't know. When I'm doing things, all of a sudden you get an episodic tachycardia.

[Jack Fowler]

Yeah, well, it's kind of two steps forward. Yeah, it is three steps forward, one back, kind of.

[Victor Davis Hanson]

It's very strange. It is. It's funny about healing from the two operations is. I would say the best day I had was Sunday. And I walked about 9,000 and then my wife and I drove all the way over. She drove cove all the way over to Palo Alto. We went out to dinner. I haven't rarely do that early dinner. And then we went home and we watched a couple of hours of tv. I wrote an article and then I started this regimen. 50 milligrams of predisone they wanted before the test. And I the next day I was dysfunctional. I couldn't walk without 120 beats. So you're right. It's three steps forward, two back. Back. You Never know what's going to be each day. And I'm kind of getting frustrated with it. But people say it's only four months, but four months is a long time.

[Jack Fowler]

Well, Victor is very attentive to his whereabouts and I noticed that he has positioned a book behind him. You don't have to turn around, Victor. But it is this book. Yes, it is American Trojan by Max Nikias. So a beautiful book. So folks, if you're thinking about, about. Yeah, it's lovely.

[Victor Davis Hanson]

I think if everybody bought it, they would see that it concerns about five or six topics that have been really important to us. One of them is higher education. As president of usc, he saw what was going on. Another one is the hysterias. He describes a Me too. Another is what legal immigrants of the old school used to be like and what their version of America was. Another is why an engineer and a technician can operate a university in a way different than an English major, you know what I mean? As he did at usc. And then it's just an interesting book of the people he's met. So it's a fascinating book and I think it's gaining a very good readership. Yeah.

[Jack Fowler]

Well, if you go on Amazon, you can buy it and you can also order Counter Revolution, Arise the Fall and Rise of Donald Trump and the Maga Movement.

[Victor Davis Hanson]

That's a good book too. I think we'll see whether it holds up in the next because I just did the afterword. I just, I'm finishing it. The little postscript.

[Jack Fowler]

I can't wait to read it. I can't wait.

[Victor Davis Hanson]

I think people will like it. Good.

[Jack Fowler]

Well, Victor, you've been terrific. Even though you're under the duress from yesterday. Appreciate all the wisdom you shared. Oh, Donald Trump today, the day this comes out, out Thursday, will be in China. I just have to add, I hope to heck. Well, he said he was going to try and do something about Jimmy Lai, the great freedom fighter. So I hope he is able to help get him sprung from the terrible imprisonment he's in Hong Kong.

[Victor Davis Hanson]

If he was able to do that with Jimmy Lai and stop the Ukraine war and stop win the Iran war in the next six weeks, that would be a historic achievement. Yeah, would be.

[Jack Fowler]

Well, Victor, you've been terrific. Thanks very much for all the wisdom you shared, folks. We'll be back soon with another episode of Victor Davis Hanson in his own words. Bye bye.

[Victor Davis Hanson]

Thank you for tuning in to the Daily Signal. Please like share and subscribe subscribe to be notified for more content like this, you can also check out my own [e-mail] and subscribe for exclusive features. In addition.