May 30, 2016 • $5.99

weeklystandard.com May 30, 2016 • $5.99

weeklystandard.com

May 30, 2016 • $5.99

weeklystandard.com Contents May 30, 2016 • Volume 21, Number 36

2 The Scrapbook Looking back, blond on blonde, & more 1,000th ISSUE 7 Casual Joseph Bottum, memory man 9 Editorials A Choice Not an Echo by William Kristol

Runaway Train by Stephen F. Hayes Articles

13 Unheralded Triumph by Fred Barnes 13 Mitch McConnell wins one

14 The Truth About Trump by David Gelernter It’s the personality, not the ideas

18 The Insider by Jay Cost Trump’s success is less populist than you think

20 The Gig Is Up by Ike Brannon A salutary development for the U.S. economy

by C. J. Ciaramella 20 22 Guilty Mind Did Hillary know the rules? Features

24 The First Thousand Issues by Matthew Continetti . . . and beyond

28 The Deal with the Art by Philip Chalk Kudos, complaints, and threats

30 The Art of Aging Gracefully by P. J. O’Rourke Advice on the occasion of The Weekly Standard’s 1,000th issue

33 High Peaks and Splendid Walks by Geoffrey Norman The pleasures of Rocky Mountain National Park

30 Books & Arts

38 The Spartan Example by J. E. Lendon As always, Greece has something to teach us

40 Homage to Poe by Michael Dirda The works and life of the Great American Man of Letters

45 Conservative Minder by James Seaton Russell Kirk’s political and cultural legacy

47 Manners Makyth Stillman by John Podhoretz Movies at the intersection of morality and hilarity

38 48 Parodies A selection of greatest hits COVER IMAGES BY DANIEL ADEL (GEORGE W. BUSH); THOMAS FLUHARTY (BILL CLINTON, PAT BUCHANAN, SARAH PALIN, & DONALD TRUMP); JOHN KASCHT (BOB DOLE & ROSS PEROT); GARY LOCKE (BARACK OBAMA, AL GORE, LAUGHING MULLAH, MITT ROMNEY, ERIC HOLDER, PAUL RYAN ET AL., DICK CHENEY, & JOHN MCCAIN); AND DAVE MALAN (HILLARY CLINTON) THE SCRAPBOOK Looking Back

he Scrapbook fondly remembers So we have reprinted elsewhere in awaits . . . treasure amid lots of dross, if T the birth of this magazine in the this issue some of our favorite cari- we’re being honest. long ago summer of 1995. We had catures and parodies from those 999 Journalism is notoriously perish- previously worked at four small mag- issues, which we hope our loyal long- able—the “first rough draft of his- azines and considered it tory” is how figures in the something of a vocation. trade put it in their self- Those who share the important moments (i.e., vocation, or who know all the time). And we all something of the maga- know where rough drafts zine business, will un- belong: in the recycling derstand our smirk when bin. Or, these days, ef- a colleague at the think faced immediately by tank where we were then the delete key. At rough- marking time said that ly 25,000 words per this was a great oppor- issue, a lot of what we tunity (true) and that by published is now dated getting in on the ground and sometimes spec- floor of a new publica- tacularly wrong. People tion, we would be “set for (you know who you are) life” (laughably, hilari- ­occasionally like to point ously optimistic). this out to us, to which And yet here we are, The Scrapbook always if not quite “set for life,” replies, “Yes, but it was which nobody ever is in true when published!” the notoriously unsettled The firstS crapbook, September 18, 1995 The work of our art- world of periodical pub- ists and parodists, on the lishing, nonetheless about to watch time readers will enjoy seeing again, other hand, seems to retain all its the 1,000th issue of The Weekly like a good friend from days gone charm and vibrancy. We’re not sure Standard roll off the presses. A by. And perhaps new readers will be why, but we hope you agree. A suit- small celebration therefore seemed ­enticed by them into our archives at able topic to revisit, perhaps on the in order. weeklystandard.com, where treasure occasion of our 2,000th issue. ♦

Chikin-Hearted Mayors the cheery fast-food outlet whose temptuous of Chick-fil-A—“I’m cer- president once expressed his opposi- tainly not going to patronize them, he Scrapbook is well aware that tion to gay marriage. Boston, said and I wouldn’t urge any other New T politics sometimes informs con- its current mayor, one Marty Walsh, Yorker to patronize them”—but those sumer choices. Good progressives doesn’t “need a company . . . that dis- “other” New Yorkers have put him in used to avoid Welch’s candies ­because criminates against anyone.” a quandary: Chick-fil-A already has its owner was the founder of the John As it happens, Chick-fil-A doesn’t several outlets in New York, and their Birch Society. And The Scrapbook do business in Boston, and may immense popularity seems to increase admits to resisting the temptation not even intend to do so. But Mayor with every de Blasio blast. of Ben & Jerry’s ice cream when it Walsh has hinted that, if Chick-fil-A The Scrapbook makes no par- thinks of Ben and Jerry and their does seek a permit to open a franchise ticular claim for Chick-fil-A. As with brand of granola socialism. in Boston, he may raise procedural anything of its kind, Chick-fil-A is a So a recent trend among progres- roadblocks. He has the power to do matter of taste, and if your taste runs sive mayors is not exactly news, but so, of course, and may even succeed, to savory fast-food chicken delivered startling nonetheless: The mayors but His Honor would do well to con- with ostentatious politeness, then of Chicago, Boston, New York, and sider the predicament of his fellow Chick-fil-A might be to your taste. other metropolises have urged their left-wing mayor, Bill de Blasio, in What is not a matter of taste, howev- constituents to boycott Chick-fil-A, New York. De Blasio is equally con- er, is the fact that Chick-fil-A is very

2 / The Weekly Standard May 30, 2016 popular with consumers, including consumers in New York, and its out- lets employ a number of New Yorkers as well. No matter what you may think of its president’s views on mar- riage equality—views expressed, incidentally, at a time when Barack Obama opposed gay marriage as well—Chick-fil-A has a reputation as a generous employer, serves loyal customers of all sexual orientations, and, most important, fills an evident need for Bill de Blasio’s constituents. Is it really appropriate for elected ­officials—armed with the power to harass and destroy—to take sides among products, to attack law-abid- ing businesses, and to threaten the employment of industrious constitu- ents? Unlike Mayor de Blasio, after all, Chick-fil-A has a proven knack for pleasing New Yorkers. ♦

Souring on Sanders ince the GOP primary has already S produced a harrowing result, The Scrapbook has turned its attention to the ongoing Democratic primary and begun rooting for chaos. ­Despite the fact that Bernie Sanders has ­approximately zero chance of win- ning, he persists in staying in the race both to call attention to the fact that the Democratic primary process is more or less rigged and to build more support for his socialist agenda. we were previously led to believe was may have picked the wrong year for This persistence has started to an ontological impossibility for mem- a revolution”—arguing that Sand- cause unrest: Senator Barbara Boxer bers of the Enlightened Party. ers is too radical in his demands for rather amusingly scolded a hall full However, since Sanders isn’t going socialized medicine to be elected. of Democrats at the recent Nevada to win, most of the Democratic estab- And news broke last week that Bur- Democratic convention for booing lishment, along with liberal media lington College is closing, because her, and actor Wendell Pierce—who institutions such as the Washington the college’s former president—Ber- played Bunk on The Wire and has Post, has started berating Sanders for nie’s wife Jane Sanders—burdened lately been signing his name to DNC staying in the race and destroying the institution with millions in fundraising appeals—was recently party cohesion. And herein, we detect loans it couldn’t pay off. More than arrested for battery after he allegedly a silver lining. Sanders may have suc- a few people noted the high degree tried to force his way into the hotel ceeded in pushing Clinton to the left of irony, given Sanders’s enthusiastic room of a Sanders supporter follow- on a number of issues, but increasing- support from college students and ing a political argument. Both the ly it seems many of her supporters are his radical rhetoric on student loans. Hillary and Bernie camps are claim- souring on Sanders’s socialist policies Sanders has made it a standard ing they have been the target of a as they sour on his campaign. line in his stump speech that it is barrage of intra-Democratic harass- The Washington Post, for instance, unfair that student loans require ment and threats. This includes many ran a heavily promoted piece of pol- higher interest rates than auto loans charges of sexism and racism, which icy analysis—“Why Bernie Sanders and mortgages, and he promises to

May 30, 2016 The Weekly Standard / 3 fix this disparity. Of course, default phone all the time.” Simmons then And they sounded exactly like Moon rates on student debt are much high- suggested throwing the phone away Unit Zappa in that song ‘Valley er than on mortgages or car loans in nearby Flathead Lake while Girl.’ . . . And one of them was say- because of the difference between ­enjoying a sunset in pure solitude. ing to the other . . . and I quote, ‘And I secured and unsecured loans. Banks “I’m having an aural fantasy now of couldn’t believe it. I, literally, I died.’ ” can’t repossess college degrees—but the ‘sploosh’ that that phone would Simmons also repeated part of his they can, to pick an apropos exam- make when it hits the lake.” In Oscar acceptance speech: “Call your ple, repossess a bunch of ivy-cov- ­addition, he advised the class to pay mom. Call your dad. . . . If you’re ered classrooms in Vermont used to “attention to the moment, connect- lucky enough to have one or more ­secure millions in ill-advised loans. ing with other humans, and I urge parents alive on this planet, call them. The closure of liberal arts colleges Don’t text. Don’t email. Call them on run by avowed socialists—is there the phone. Tell them you love them any other kind?—is illustrative of and listen to them for as long as they exactly the sort of economic lessons want to talk to you. . . . Do you know colleges no longer teach. ♦ how much it means to them to hear from you? . . . We all come into this life 100 percent dependent on our par- ents. . . . We would literally have died Class Dismissed! without our parents’ nurturing.” here are no two words in the There was one other pearl of wis- ‘TEnglish language more harm- dom Simmons dispensed: “If you ful than ‘good job.’ ” So said Terence only do what you can, you will never Fletcher, the terrifying jazz conductor be more than you are.” Simmons played by J. K. Simmons in Whiplash. then confessed this line comes from Sure, Fletcher mentally and physi- J. K. Simmons in Missoula the movie Kung Fu Panda 3—he cally abused his students—and the was the voice of Kai, a lumbering drummer protagonist in particular— you not to spend—or more correctly yak. (For all the fearsome characters but what he said is undeniably true. waste—too much of your time play- Simmons has portrayed, it’s worth Participant trophies, anyone? ing videos on your iPhone.” remembering he’s also the tweed- So when Simmons, who won an Simmons then went on a tear about wearing professor in those Farmers Academy Award for his role in Whip- a pet peeve shared by The Scrapbook: Insurance commercials and is the lash, was asked to deliver the com- voice of the yellow M&M.) mencement address at his alma mater, Dear God, please only use that word The commencement speech in its the University of Montana, The “literally” when it actually makes entirety can be seen on YouTube, post- sense. Seriously, if you take nothing Scrapbook was curious: What other ed by the University of Montana under else away from my remarks today, nuggets of wisdom might Simmons only use that word correctly. I’m the title “J. K. Simmons’ University of throw out? Or would he throw a cym- guessing that many of you in the Montana Commencement Address.” ♦ bal at a student’s head? graduating class of 2016, if you exam- Although Simmons is not anything ine your own speech patterns, you like the sadistic Fletcher (or, for that will find that you at least occasionally matter, the neo-Nazi Vern Schillinger are guilty of using that word incor- Blond on Blonde he played in Oz), he does come off as rectly or at least unnecessarily. So lthough Thomas Jefferson was please, allow me to dissuade you from a charming curmudgeon. “The world the misuse or overuse of the word A famous for his bright red hair, is full of bastards,” he started off by “literally.” The decline and fall of the most presidents have been brunets, saying (quoting from A River Runs English language is proceeding along who rapidly begin to gray at the Through It). “The number increasing just fine without so many of us con- temples as the stresses of the job rapidly the further one gets from Mis- tributing in that one small way. The take their toll. That seems poised soula, Montana.” vast majority of the time that word is to change. ­Despite their policy dif- used these days by, yes, I will say it, by Simmons urged the class of 2016 your generation . . . it’s at best unnec- ferences, even a cursory look at this to “appreciate the moment, to live essary and at worst completely wrong. year’s presumptive candidates shows life as it is happening, not dwell on that they have at least one thing in the past, not be too anxious about the As an example, he related his own common: their hair color. From future, but to do one’s best to be here experience in line at a café in Los a wide field of stolid dark-haired, now . . . to also be mentally, emo- ­Angeles. “Standing right in front of slightly graying, and fully white- tionally, spiritually present. And by me were two people, who happened to haired candidates, American voters ‘present’ I mean fully en­ gaged and be college age. They happened to be went for the gold (locks). not staring at your damn smart- female. They happened to be blonde. So barring a truly unforeseen

4 / The Weekly Standard May 30, 2016 event, the 45th president of the Unit- hair remained at the time of his elec- ed States of America will be blond (or tion, and prior to that he is generally blonde). Leaving aside the identity of depicted with a short military hair- the candidates, this was statistically cut. However, when he still had hair, unlikely. To put it in perspective, less it was blond. www.weeklystandard.com than 5 percent of the population is The most recent blond president ­genetically fair-haired. It’s harder to was Gerald Ford, whose football pic- William Kristol, Editor Fred Barnes, Terry Eastland, Executive Editors put a specific percentage on it, since tures from the University of Michigan Richard Starr, Deputy Editor most of those who enhance their hair verify his status. Which means that Eric Felten, Managing Editor Christopher Caldwell, Andrew Ferguson, color are loath to admit it. it has been 39 years since America’s Victorino Matus, Lee Smith, Senior Editors How long has it been since Ameri- head of state has been a golden one. ♦ Philip Terzian, Literary Editor Kelly Jane Torrance, Deputy Managing Editor ca had a blond president? The Scrap- Stephen F. Hayes, Mark Hemingway, book conducted its own investigation Matt Labash, Jonathan V. Last, on the subject. It’s a question made John McCormack, Senior Writers Sentences Jay Cost, Michael Warren, Staff Writers more difficult by the range of colors Daniel Halper, Online Editor considered “blond,” by black and We Didn’t Finish Ethan Epstein, Associate Editor Chris Deaton, Jim Swift, Deputy Online Editors white photography, and by the num- hen he had his period, he David Bahr, Assistant Literary Editor ber of presidents who had gone gray ‘W wondered if he should revert Priscilla M. Jensen, Assistant Editor Erin Mundahl, Editorial Assistant or bald by the time they were elected. to the girls’ bathroom, because there Jenna Lifhits, Alice B. Lloyd, Still, the general consensus is that was no place to throw away his used Shoshana Weissmann, Web Producers Philip Chalk, Design Director America has had five blonds in chief. tampons. But he had started feeling Barbara Kyttle, Design Assistant Martin Van Buren was noted for his like an intruder . . .” (“Transgender Teri Perry, Executive Assistant Claudia Anderson, Max Boot, Joseph Bottum, reddish-blond hair, though it had Bathroom Debate Turns Personal at Tucker Carlson, Matthew Continetti, turned white and largely receded by a Vermont High School,” New York Noemie Emery, Joseph Epstein, David Frum, David Gelernter, Reuel Marc Gerecht, the time he was elected our eighth Times, May 17, 2016). ♦ Michael Goldfarb, Mary Katharine Ham, Brit Hume, president. It would be another 36 Frederick W. Kagan, Charles Krauthammer, Yuval Levin, Tod Lindberg, Micah Mattix, years before another blond took the Robert Messenger, P. J. O’Rourke, oath of office: Rutherford B. Hayes John Podhoretz, Irwin M. Stelzer, More Sentences Contributing Editors in 1877. Following him would come Benjamin Harrison, of golden hair We Didn’t Finish MediaDC Ryan McKibben, Chairman and beard, elected a mere 12 years es, the thought of male genitalia Stephen R. Sparks, President & Chief Operating Officer later. (This really was America’s ‘Y in girls’ locker rooms—and vice Kathy Schaffhauser, Chief Financial Officer David Lindsey, Chief Digital Officer gilded age.) versa—might be distressing to some. Catherine Lowe, Integrated Marketing Director After that, things returned to But the battle for equality has always Alex Rosenwald, Director, Public Relations & Branding Mark Walters, Chief Revenue Officer their brown- and white-haired norm been in part about overcoming dis- Nicholas H. B. Swezey, Vice President, Advertising until after the Second World War, comfort . . .” (“Taking the fear out of T. Barry Davis, Senior Director, Advertising Jason Roberts, Digital Director, Advertising when Dwight D. Eisenhower was bathrooms,” an editorial in the Char- Rich Counts, National Account Director elected. Very little of Eisenhower’s lotte Observer, May 13, 2016). ♦ Andrew Kaumeier, Advertising Operations Manager Brooke McIngvale, Manager, Marketing Services Advertising inquiries: 202-293-4900 Subscriptions: 1-800-274-7293

The Weekly Standard (ISSN 1083-3013), a division of Clarity Media Group, is published weekly (except the first week in January, third week in March, fourth week in June, and third week in August) at 1152 15th St., NW, Suite 200, Washington, DC 20005. Periodicals postage paid at Washington, In Memory of DC, and additional mailing offices. Postmaster: Send address changes to The Weekly Standard, P.O. Box 421203, Palm Coast, FL 32142-1203. For subscription customer service in the United States, call 1-800- 274-7293. For new subscription orders, please call 1-800-274-7293. Denise Ferguson Subscribers: Please send new subscription orders and changes of address to The Weekly Standard, P.O. Box 421203, Palm Coast, FL 32142-1203. Please include your latest magazine mailing label. Allow 3 to 5 weeks for arrival of first copy and address changes. Canadian/foreign orders require Beloved wife of our colleague Andrew Ferguson, additional postage and must be paid in full prior to commencement of service. Canadian/foreign subscribers may call 1-386-597-4378 for subscription inquiries. American Express, Visa/MasterCard payments mother of Gillum and Emily, accepted. Cover price, $4.95. Back issues, $4.95 (includes postage and handling). Send letters to the editor to The Weekly Standard, 1152 15th Street, NW, Suite 200, Washington, DC 20005-4617. For a copy of The and devoted friend to all of us Weekly Standard Privacy Policy, visit www.weeklystandard.com or write to Customer Service, The Weekly Standard, 1152 15th St., NW, Suite 200, Washington, DC 20005. Copyright 2016, Clarity Media Group. All rights at The Weekly Standard reserved. No material in The Weekly Standard may be reprinted without permission of the copyright owner. The Weekly Standard is a registered trademark of Clarity Media Group.

6 / The Weekly Standard May 30, 2016 CASUAL

ory last before they fade entirely away? Generation Gap I know innumerable stories about my own generation. As far as that goes, I know a lot about my parents’ genera- tion and plenty about their parents’ enry Clay Bottum was born gotten state legislators, Great-grand­ generation. But the memory chain in January 1826, in the town father Joe now rates a brief page in the clearly starts to rust after 80 or 90 years. H of Orwell, Vermont. As a online encyclopedia, as well. “He was a And the attempt to reach back as far as young man, he moved west, first to Republican,” the entry laconically ends. my great-great-grandfather Henry— upstate New York and then to Wis- For Joe, I have photographs of born 190 years ago—falters and dwin- consin, farming in Fond du Lac family gatherings at the old house dles to nothing. County. An abolitionist, he abandoned in Faulkton, a portrait of him in his Some of my genealogically inclined the Whig party of his namesake and judge’s robes, and a business card from cousins have explored the available became a Radical Republican, serving his law practice (“Wills a specialty,” it records: old birth and death certifi- in the state legislature after the Civil notes in a copperplate cates in the county seats, War. He died in 1913, his remains bur- script). Stories handed old church registries, ied in Rosendale Cemetery, 10 miles down to my genera- the markings on crum- outside the small Wisconsin city of tion include tales of his bling gravestones. And Ripon. And since February 2016, he fierce determination in they surely know more has had a Wikipedia page. court, his sentimentality about Henry than I There’s something both very about his grandchildren, do. They surely know charming and very odd in the fact that and his love for the new more about his parents Wikipedia has now reached down to state of South Dakota. and grandparents, for people whose fame rests on nothing But I have no pic- that matter. But I’ve more than a few terms as state legisla- tures of Henry and his never been bitten by tors in the 19th century. But there he wife Helen. No keep- the family-tree bug (at is, my great-great-grandfather, along sakes, old letters, or even least, not till prompted with many other politicians from the family lore. Perhaps recently by Wikipe- long years of Wisconsin state elections. that’s because the fam- dia). Besides, however They’ve apparently all been added by ily’s migration westward detailed it becomes, the a prolific Wikipedia editor who posts after the Revolution- hobby of genealogy can under the online name “Packerfansam” ary War more or less never quite make a liv- (a Wisconsinite, one presumes Sam is, ended in South Dakota, ing connection. given that he’s a fan of the Green Bay at which point memen- Maybe I’m wrong. Packers and writes up items from Wis- tos could be handed on. Maybe there’s great consin history). But, in fact, this sort satisfaction in the I might have beaten Packerfansam of knowledge gap may careful compilation of to the punch, posting the entry on be fairly common: We family trees. So many Great-great-grandfather Henry myself. tend to know at least Americans pursue the But Wikipedia says it frowns on contri- something about our great-grandpar- hobby that there must surely be a joy butions from family members, and, the ents. And often nothing about our in it that I don’t grasp. Still, genea- truth is, I don’t actually know much great-great-grandparents. logical research has always seemed about my great-great-grandfather. It makes sense, I suppose, sim- to me the opposite of family: It’s His son, now—Joseph Bottum, my ply as a matter of generations. Our what we need to do when we lack great-grandfather—I do have a sense parents would be likely to have liv- actual memories. Actual stories. of. Joe attended Ripon College before ing knowledge, childhood memories, Those are the memories and sto- moving to the Dakota Territory in 1880 of their grandparents but not of the ries I have for Joe and don’t have for to homestead and practice law. He generation before that. And while I Henry. My connection to my South would end up serving as circuit judge remember my grandfather telling sto- Dakota great-grandfather is familial, in the town of Faulkton from 1911 to ries of his father—because his son, my in other words, even though he died 1942—but, more to Wikipedia’s inter- father, had known the man—I can’t before I was born. My connection to est, he also served two terms in the recall his having any stories about his his Wisconsin father is only genea- South Dakota state senate. And so, own grandfather. logical. Only Wikipedian. thanks to the indefatigable compilers How long do the dead remain with

JORI BOLTON of small Wikipedia entries about for- us? How long do the ghosts of mem- Joseph Bottum

May 30, 2016 The Weekly Standard / 7 EDITORIALS A Choice Not an Echo

among the worst presidential candidates ever to be pre­ sented to the American people by their respective parties. Yet our politicians are paralyzed, the donors are uncer­ tain, and the smart set in general looks on with world- weary gaze and looks down with disdainful aspect at those who would like to provide the American people with a better alternative. The American people know better. A high-quality national poll conducted recently by Data Targeting finds n an interview with the Wall Street Journal last week, an astonishing 58 percent of the public very dissatisfied Speaker of the House Paul Ryan argued that young (34 percent) or somewhat dissatisfied (24 percent) with I Americans in particular should appreciate the power the current Republican and Democratic presidential can­ of choice: didates. By contrast, only 9 percent of respondents say they’re very satisfied and 21 percent are somewhat satis­ Think of all the things you get to do in your life, whether it’s fied. If you add the 11 percent who are neither satisfied buying something, whether it’s ordering movie tickets, sign­ nor dissatisfied or who are unsure to the 58 percent who ing up for classes. You name what you can do on this thing, are dissatisfied, you get 69 percent of the public as a pool and you want to subscribe to a political philosophy that from which an independent candidate can prospect. And denies you choices, that denies you the ability to customize indeed that’s why 65 percent of respondents say in answer­ your life in things like health care, education, and retire­ ment? So why on earth would a young person, who enjoys ing another question they are very willing (22 percent), the liberty and freedom of today’s society and technology, pretty willing (10 percent), or somewhat willing (33 per­ subscribe to a political philosophy that says: “There are cent) to support someone who’s neither the Republican nor smarter people than you who can lord over us in bureauc­ the Democratic party’s nominee. Furthermore, in a ballot racies in Washington and make decisions for us on how our test, when given a choice between Trump, Clinton, and an economy is run and how our communities are organized”? independent candidate, the independent gets 21 percent support, within hailing range of Trump’s 34 percent and Well said. Why would anyone, young or middle-aged or Clinton’s 31 percent—which makes it very likely the inde­ old, yield to those who seek to circumscribe rightful choices pendent candidate could get into the fall debates with the that would improve Americans’ lives? two major-party nominees. And possible that he or she So why is Paul Ryan unwilling to step up to provide could go on to win the presidency. us a third choice to the unpalatable alternatives of Donald It’s unclear whether a credible independent candidate Trump and Hillary Clinton? He ran for vice president in will choose to step forward. But there are many more such 2012. He could quickly assemble the resources and organiza­ candidates than are dreamt of by conventional commenta­ tion to compete as an independent in 2016, on behalf of the tors and operatives. Recent attempts to write obituaries for principles and standards he fought for only four years ago. the Never Trump/Never Clinton effort are wildly prema­ And if Paul Ryan finds it too burdensome to run, why ture. Something new and different can be difficult to imag­ has he, in concert with so many other “leaders,” gone out ine for the old and tired. And our political class and pundit of his way to discourage others from offering the Ameri­ elites are nothing if not old and tired. can people another choice? Because it’s admirable to chal­ So we who refuse to acquiesce in this horrible choice, lenge taxi oligopolies but not the oligopoly of the ossified we renegade citizens who put country and not party first . . . political parties and their eccentric nominating processes? in this respect, and only in this respect, we echo an earlier Because it’s important to take on the teachers’ unions but renegade: We disdain to conceal our views and aims. Let not the party structures? Because it’s praiseworthy to fight the ruling parties tremble at a popular revolution. We have against the duopoly of Fannie and Freddie but not against nothing to lose but our partisan chains. We have a nation that of Hillary and Donald? to win.

IMAGES: NEWSCOM Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump are manifestly —William Kristol

May 30, 2016 The Weekly Standard / 9 to remain immune to the influence of political money. “I will tell you this,” Trump said last fall. “Nobody’s put­ ting up millions of dollars for me. I’m putting up my own money.” When donors contribute to a political campaign, Runaway Train Trump argued, they buy the candidates who accept their money. “Remember this: They have total control over Jeb and Hillary and everybody else that takes that money.” Trump maintained that he alone among the candidates was incorruptible because he was “self-funding.” It simply wasn’t possible to put national interests above special inter­ ests when you’re accepting major contributions from the representatives of those same interests. Trump claimed that his many years as a donor to Republicans and Democrats gave him unique insight into the problem and that he alone, an outsider who swore off political money, could solve it. This wasn’t a small issue. Trump gave it prominence in virtually all of his speeches and mentioned it fre­ quently in primary-season debates. In an interview last fall, Trump’s campaign manager, Corey Lewandowski, es, it’s a con. In the three weeks since Donald cited it as the most important distinction between Trump Trump became the presumptive Republican nom­ and other candidates in the race. Y inee the remains of modern American conserva­ tism have decayed at an alarming rate. The first thing is obviously the inside-the-Beltway guys Three months ago, most GOP officeholders and conserv­ have no control over Donald Trump, and I mean that in a ative opinion leaders understood Trump to be an ignoramus good way. Most of those people are bought and paid for by and a boor, a vain reality-television star and a longtime donor special interests, by lobbyists, by major donors. Since Mr. to Democrats who had built his candidacy on the kind of Trump is funding his campaign on his own, and he’s not taking donor money, he isn’t beholden to those people and progressive populism most of them had spent their careers can’t be accountable to those people who want special inter­ fighting. Today, many of those same Republican elected offi­ ests out of the government. He’s going to do what’s right for cials and prominent conservatives are hailing Trump as the the country. future of their party and the ideological movement it houses and excoriating anti-Trump conservatives who hold to the That was then. Last week, Trump announced two same position they took just a few weeks ago. joint fundraising accounts with the Republican National What’s changed? Not Trump. Committee—the Trump Victory fund and the Trump In the time since he effectively captured the GOP nom­ Make America Great Again Committee—that allow him ination, Trump has doubled down on his slanderous claim, to raise millions of dollars for his campaign and the party. borrowed from the National Enquirer, that Ted Cruz’s father The maximum contribution of nearly $450,000 will be the helped Lee Harvey Oswald months before the JFK assas­ highest amount ever solicited by such joint committees. sination; refused to apologize for attacking Heidi Cruz’s In addition to the main super-PAC already spending on looks, once again calling her “fair game”; picked a fight Trump’s behalf—Great America PAC, run by Ed Ro­ llins— with David Cameron, leader of America’s longest-standing Trump allies have created others. Politico’s Ken Vogel ally; distanced himself from his own tax plan; recommit­ and Ben Schreckinger report that senior Trump cam­ ted himself to releasing his tax returns and then declared paign adviser and longtime D.C. lobbyist Paul Manafort defiantly that those returns are his private business and has given his blessing to a yet-to-be-named super-PAC to would not be released; backed off his proposal to ban tem­ be established by Thomas Barrack, a Manafort client and porarily entry to the United States for Muslims and then California billionaire. Doug Watts, a former aide to Trump reiterated his support for such a ban; and, finally, lied on backer Ben Carson and a recent donor to top California national television about a 1991 audio recording in which Democrats (including Barbara Boxer and Jerry Brown), is he created a fake persona—“John Miller,” a made-up up and running with the Committee for American Sover­ spokesman played by Trump himself—for an interview eignty PAC. And Politico reports that Ann Stone, ex-wife with a gossip magazine, in order to boast about his virility of Trump confidant Roger Stone, is in talks to create yet and his virtue. another super-PAC that will target women voters. Most striking, perhaps, was Trump’s decision last week Last fall, Trump mocked GOP mega-donor Sheldon to abandon the promise at the heart of his unorthodox can­ Adelson on Twitter. “Sheldon Adelson is looking to give

didacy: that he would forgo political contributions in order big dollars to Rubio because he feels he can mold him into TOM WILLIAMS / CQ ROLL CALL

10 / The Weekly Standard May 30, 2016 his perfect little puppet. I agree!” Last week, Trump cel­ tives who won’t support Trump, despite having written, ebrated Adelson’s commitment to support his candidacy just a month ago, that Trump, preoccupied with subjects with up to $100 million. “small, petty, [and] unworthy,” was “nutty.” She begins her So the candidate who won the Republican nomina­ most recent column with a plea for Republicans to exhibit tion as an “outsider” and who claimed to be self-funding “a kind of heroic fairness” in times like these and, reject­ to avoid the taint of political money is setting up a sophis­ ing her own advice, concludes by sharing her suspicion ticated finance operation that will allow him to raise hun­ that some conservatives who continue to oppose Trump for dreds of millions of dollars from the very special interests, reasons of conscience don’t really mean it. (Noonan might lobbyists, and major donors he used as foils in the primary. have noted that she’s held some of the policy positions that Yes, of course it’s a con. she imagines her anti-Trump villains all share.) It’s possible, likely even, that this aggressive hypocrisy Senator Bob Corker, who praised Trump’s incoherent will have a negligible short-term effect on Trump. As he’s foreign policy speech and is now reportedly under strong said about his own supporters, they’ll back him regardless consideration to be his running mate, wants Trump skep­ of what he says or does. But what about the long term? And tics “to chill.” what about elected Republicans and prominent conserva­ With respect, Corker and Noonan and Abbott are con­ tives, many of them previously skeptical of Trump, who fused. There’s no reason to chill when a con man turns his are willing to set aside their concerns and climb aboard the marks, particularly people who know better, into accom­ Trump train in the interest of winning? plices. There’s no obligation in the name of fairness, heroic Texas governor Greg Abbott, who as that state’s attorney or otherwise, to normalize a crazy man because he’s won general in 2010 opened an investigation of Trump University the support of 5 percent of the voting-eligible public. And, for fraud and criticized Trump’s proposed ban on Muslims, finally, while Abbott is right that the 2016 race has caused is not only supporting Trump but criticizing conservatives many conservatives to abandon their principles in support who don’t. Republicans who won’t back Trump, he said, “are of a favored candidate, he’s wrong about which conserva­ aligning their principles with Hillary Clinton.” tives have been willing to do so and wrong about which Peggy Noonan, the Wall Street Journal columnist, has candidate they’re supporting. twice used her column in recent days to scold conserva­ —Stephen F. Hayes

Infrastructure Matters—So Let’s Act Like It

By Thomas J. Donohue will lose $3,400 annually. We also know private capital available for infrastructure President and CEO that poor road conditions contribute to 30% investment. We must remove the barriers U.S. Chamber of Commerce of all highway fatalities, so investing in that keep this money from being spent. infrastructure will make Americans safer. Finally, we must beat back simplistic Last week more than 150 organizations Second, we need to convince the solutions that won’t work. Some think participated in five dozen events across public that infrastructure dollars will that Washington can just send money the country to highlight a single issue: be well spent. Much of the anger with back to the states and be done with it. infrastructure. Representatives from Washington started with pork barrel That’s wrong. We have a national system industry, labor, and government came projects. While Washington can always operating in a global economy. We need a together to make it clear that we can’t do more to eliminate waste, we need comprehensive approach, or we’ll end up wait—we must invest now in our highways to remind Americans that Congress has with a patchwork of problems. and bridges, our air traffic control system, largely eliminated earmarks and is doing Infrastructure matters. And the longer and our waterways and ports. If we don’t, a better job of getting money to where it we wait to address these problems, the our economy and incomes will suffer. is needed most and will have the greatest more expensive they will be—and the Here are four arguments that national impact. more our economy, incomes, and safety infrastructure proponents should use to Third, we simply need more money— will suffer. make the case for more investment: public and private. Raising the gas tax is While other nations have increased First, we must convince Americans that not a popular idea in Washington, but a infrastructure investment as a percentage our needs are real and pressing. This should modest, phased-in increase makes a lot of GDP, that figure is dropping in the be easy. A recent study by the American of sense. The federal government hasn’t United States. We can’t fall behind. We Society of Civil Engineers found that there raised the gas tax since 1993. Think must act now. will be a $1.44 trillion infrastructure funding about inflation. Think about increased fuel gap over the next decade. And if we don’t efficiency. We’re not keeping up. Not all address it, exports and productivity will the money must come from government, decline, and the average American family however. There’s $250 billion in global www.uschamber.com/abovethefold

12 / The Weekly Standard May 30, 2016 minority leader Harry Reid attacked Charles Grassley, the chairman of Unheralded the judiciary committee, more than a dozen times for not scheduling hear- ings for Obama’s nominee, Merrick Triumph Garland. The speeches were rants, typical for Reid. Democrats tried to embarrass vul- nerable Republican senators with what Mitch McConnell wins one. they called a “9-9-9” plan: nine sena- by Fred Barnes tors in nine states to confirm a ninth Supreme Court justice. It bombed. n February 13, Justice Anto- says. “I had to convince my colleagues.” Now Obama is insisting the Senate nin Scalia died at a hunting At the lunch, only two Republican sen- has a mandate to vote on his nominee. O lodge in Texas. That same ators said they favor hearings. Today, Actually, there is no such mandate. day, Senate majority leader Mitch those two are still the only dissenters. Oddly enough, two scholars at the McConnell made this announcement: Three months after his announce- center-left Brookings Institution, John “The American people should have a ment, McConnell is vindicated. He Hudak and Molly E. Reynolds, have voice in the selection of their studied McConnell’s options next Supreme Court justice. and given him high marks. Therefore, this vacancy should “Mitch McConnell didn’t make not be filled until we have a a mistake,” they wrote. new president.” “The charges that he blun- McConnell’s statement was dered . . . are foolish. In fact, not quite off the cuff but close. McConnell’s strategy, and the The Senate had just begun a speed with which he worked weeklong recess, making it impos- through the possibilities to come sible to get in touch with the other to the ‘right’ conclusion, was not Republican senators and to listen, in a political misstep. Instead, it is the McConnell’s words, to their “53 dif- mark of a political master.” ferent opinions.” He acted. That’s not all. “With an oppor- His decision was lambasted by tunity to maintain or even enhance Democrats and the mainstream media conservative enthusiasm—particu- as rash and a political mistake. He was larly in a year in which the Republi- accused of disobeying his constitu- can Party appears to be on a confusing tional duty to hold Senate hearings and soul-searching mission—McConnell then a vote on whomever President jumped at it,” Hudak and Reynolds Obama nominated to fill the vacancy. said. Republicans of all ideological By refusing, McConnell was told he stripes are on board. would hurt Republican prospects in His blockade of Obama’s nomi- the 2016 election. There would be a nee “will keep safe [Republican] seats public backlash. And so on. safe . . . ensure that At-Risk Senators The next week, McConnell took remain safe . . . [and] provide McCon­ his case to his Senate GOP col- nell a chance to stem some of the leagues at their weekly lunch. By almost certain losses among Vulner- then, he and his staff had boned not only thwarted the president and able Senators,” the scholars wrote. up on the history of nominees in Democrats, he averted a potential McConnell has long been regarded the final year of a president’s term. catastrophe for Republicans if a popu- as a clever politician who skillfully “The precedents were on our side,” lar Obama nomination had gone for- keeps Senate Republicans in agree- McConnell says. Even Democrats— ward, splitting the party in an already ment. This time, he also showed Joe Biden, Harry Reid, Chuck divisive election year. Instead, “it’s remarkable foresight. He saved Schumer—had dismissed lame-duck been a completely unifying process,” Republicans from having to deal nominations as unacceptable. McConnell told me. with an attractive nominee, possibly “I’m not a dictator,” McConnell The success of McConnell’s strat- a gay or an African-American or a egy hasn’t been widely acknowledged. Hispanic. McConnell’s decision was Fred Barnes is an executive editor Senate Democrats are reeling from based on the principle that a president

at The Weekly Standard. a series of tactical blunders. Senate on the way out the door shouldn’t put GARY LOCKE

May 30, 2016 The Weekly Standard / 13 a new justice on the Supreme Court. “It doesn’t make any difference how qualified the nominee is,” McConnell The Truth says. His motto is “it’s about the prin- ciple, not the person.” Once the confirmation process About Trump began, it would be difficult to control. And Obama and Democrats would attack opposition by Republicans as meanspirited, cynical, mindlessly It’s the personality, not the ideas. partisan, and bigoted. That’s the nor- by David Gelernter mal pitch of Democrats. McConnell spared Republicans these attacks. Democrats cite polls in their demand that the Senate take up Gar- land. But polls don’t help their case much. They show three things: A majority favor hearings and a vote, the nominee issue ranks low in the minds of most voters, and only a dis- tinct minority thinks of it as an issue on which to base their vote. McConnell’s reputation as a firm leader played a part in the success of his strategy. He may have scared off stronger nominees who figured McConnell wouldn’t flinch. They didn’t want to jeopardize their chance of being nominated by Hillary Clin- Signs of the times in Indiana ton if she’s elected president. True, Garland was backed by liberal interest any intellectuals misunder- ashes. It’s Obama’s arrogance, not his groups, but he didn’t stir mass enthu- stand Donald Trump. Intel- mere ineptitude, that drives people siasm on the left—far from it. Any M lectuals often forget that crazy. It’s his venomous contempt for hope of his being confirmed is gone. Americans vote for a man, not a white his opposition and the very idea of Democrats bet that Grassley would paper, and that Trump passed the very opposition​—​and the growing sense be the GOP’s weak link. They were first test for Republican candidates in that he dislikes America. Americans wrong. Last week, they brought five 2016 while the rest of the field flunked. treat their president with great respect Iowans and supposed Grassley back- He was angry and seemed capable of and expect to be treated respectfully in ers to Washington to express their acting on his anger. Trump voters’ turn. That is the first law of democracy. dismay with him. But two were anger has nothing to do with vague A president who breaks it is dangerous. Democratic donors and only one said white-male resentments. It is anger Many primary voters clearly Grassley’s refusal to hold hearings against Obama and the free pass he gets believed that if Obama doesn’t make might prompt a vote against him. even from many Republicans who are you angry, you are too far removed The stunt flopped. Though he’s run- scared to rip into this smug, arrogant from normal human emotion to make ning for his seventh term, Grassley incompetent lest they be called racist. a decent president. Cruz finished sec- was unfazed by a harsh (but silly) edi- It’s not just that Obama has smoth- ond not because he was second in the torial in the Des Moines Register. ered the economic recovery and left it antiestablishment sweepstakes (he In March, McConnell and Grass- gasping in a ditch, and brought Amer- was not), but because he came second ley met at the White House with ica lower in power and prestige than closest to displaying actual human Obama, Biden, and Reid. McConnell at any point since Jimmy Carter and outrage at the worst president in mod- needled them about their hypocrisy in Cyrus Vance paced the D.C. streets ern history. insisting on a vote on Garland. “Only preaching penitence in sackcloth and I’ll admit that Trump-the-man lost two of us here never filibustered a me when he lost so many others, when Supreme Court nomination,” McCon­ David Gelernter, a professor of computer he attacked Senator John McCain’s nell noted. Obama, Biden, and Reid science at Yale, is a contributing editor to The war record and refused to apologize. filibustered the nomination of Sam Weekly Standard. His latest book is Tides In many ways Trump is a perfect pic-

Alito in 2006. They lost then too. ♦ of Mind (Liveright), published this spring. ture of the vanity culture (aka the / GETTY SHARRETTLUKE / BLOOMBERG

14 / The Weekly Standard May 30, 2016 kindergarten culture, the Internet cul- president of modern times. But look at of unique circumstances. The country ture) that has replaced the old Cold the GOP’s presidential candidates since is full of people who regret not voting War society​—​in which, at least, adult- Reagan: Of George H. W. Bush, Bob for Romney last time, and remorse hood was a virtue. It’s as hard to respect Dole, George W. Bush, John McCain, is one of the most pressing of human Trump as it was to respect Bill Clinton. and Mitt Romney, only W was a serious emotions. More important, Romney’s But there was more to Clintonism than conservative. Granted, W won twice. strongest attribute is gentlemanly the sex-predator, and there is far more But he’s the only one, also, whose per- decency​—​usually a lukewarm attrac- to Trumponianism than a vain, loud- sonality approximated the sunniness of tion; but this year he’d be running mouthed vulgarian who talks like a Reagan’s and (in a lesser way) Bill Clin- against two of the most obnoxious, 6-year-old. Trump is a vessel in which ton’s. Americans are optimists and like unlovable politicians in modern his- some part of a nation’s outrage has col- voting for optimists. But this year, they tory. No backdrop could bring out lected​—​and it’s the outrage, not the wanted an angry optimist. (And didn’t Romney’s virtues better than Hillary vessel, that deserves respect. Respect get one.) and Trump. He would shine in a way the wine, not the glass. For all the GOP’s anguish, Trump he never has before. Furthermore, Trump is right and could turn things around tomorrow Although it won’t happen, credible the intellectuals wrong about the if he chose. A Trump presidency will rumors to the contrary would be good Republican party, and American poli- come down to the people around him. for the country. They’d force Trump to tics in general. It is indeed the Repub- Trump ought to tell us, now, who will become less irritating. Assuming he’s lican and not the conservative party, be his close advisers and inner cabinet. not going to run, Romney could still for a reason. The striking thing about Unless he does that, there is no telling do an important patriotic deed just American parties is that, tradition- how he will govern. But if he made the by telling people he’s reconsidering. ally, they are not ideological. They are announcement and did it right (having Although I have no inside line to the groups of broadly like-minded people convinced his chosen advisers to work third-party advocates, my guess is that who share an (admittedly) unfocused, with him for the good of the country), this is just where they are going. They shifting worldview—​ ​in which politics he could win over nearly all Republi- can’t win and would never conspire is just one element and rarely the most cans by the next day. to elect Hillary. But if they work hard important. In return for our ideologi- Suppose he were to announce that and get Trump worried, they could cal laxness, for the tendency of our two John McCain would be his secretary make him a far stronger candidate and major parties to equilibrate—​ ​like tanks of state or defense, that other top peo- better president. of two different liquids separated by a ple would be drawn from (say) John There is a last point that transcends thin wall, reaching the same tempera- Bolton, Lindsey Graham, and Elliott this election. Intellectuals have under- ture eventually—​ ​we have a remarkably Abrams, and Rubio, Cruz, Jindal, estimated the importance of emotion stable political culture. Walker, Fiorina​—​with Giuliani or versus reason for a long, long time. We have avoided the bitterness and Mukasey for attorney general and Bill After all, they are reason specialists, the constant itch to invent new parties Bennett (history’s only useful secretary supposedly; and often they have the that afflicts such ideologically charged of education) returning there, or taking wrong idea that reason is a better, democracies as France, Italy, or Israel. over HHS or Homeland Security​—​ steadier guide than emotion to the You can see our traditional refusal he’d go far towards unifying the party average human life. But emotion and to ideologize our politics in the very at a stroke. You might say that these reason are parallel routes through the names “Democrat” and “Republican,” politicians don’t think like Trump. But mind to the same destination. Reason which are impossible for children and Trump is guided by personality, not does no better than emotion on aver- foreigners to understand​—​and make doctrines. He has no doctrines. He will age; and emotion, not reason, runs no sense anyway. bring his personality to bear on any the mind. Reasoning is transparent Look at history: Truman was no thoughts that catch his eye. and usually easy to explain. Emotion ideologue, just a hardworking pol. Ike Will Trump do anything like this? is faster, unmethodical, and usually was so nonideological Democrats and Name his advisers and run as a grown opaque; we are often unable to explain Republicans both wanted to nominate up? Everything about him says no, our emotions. But that doesn’t make him. Nixon and JFK were famously except this: He wants desperately to them wrong. close on the issues. (In the ’50s, JFK win. And this announcement would be Understanding emotion better is made a donation to Nixon’s campaign the sort of dramatic, unexpected ges- a good way to know the mind bet- fund.) When Republicans tried to turn ture he loves. So don’t put it past him. ter, society better, and politics better. the GOP ideological by nominating It could happen, and this season could Trump is no populist, nationalist, or Goldwater in ’64, they lost in a land- have a happy ending (happyish, any- anything else-ist; his personality is slide. When Democrats tried the same way) after all. fixed but his ideas (obviously) wander. maneuver in ’72, McGovern lost big. There’s just one other possibility: The sooner conservatives accept the Reagan was a huge event in many Mitt Romney is the only third-party fact, the sooner they can see its good ways; he was the first ideological candidate who makes sense, because points and use them. ♦

16 / The Weekly Standard May 30, 2016 when the last ballots are cast. That is the same number of major contenders The Insider as in 2012 and 2008. Three candidates scored at least 5 percent in 1980, 1988, 1996, and 2000—which did not stop Trump’s success is less populist than you think. Reagan, Bush 41, Dole, or Bush 43 from winning overwhelming majori- by Jay Cost ties in those cycles. While Trump’s support from aver- ow that Donald Trump is Trump is likely to achieve. In 2008 age Republicans is unimpressive by the Republican party’s pre- John McCain won 47 percent of the historical margins, his champions N sumptive nominee, there Republican primary vote; in 2012 at the apex of American society have is pressure on conservatives to sup- Mitt Romney won 52 percent. Gerald been decisive. As political scientist port him. The people have rendered Ford won 53 percent in 1976, Ronald E. E. Schattschneider once argued, their verdict, and elitist Republicans Reagan 61 percent in 1980, George “the definition of the alternatives is should respect the will of the voters, H.W. Bush 68 percent in 1988, and the supreme instrument of power.” or so goes the much-repeated refrain. George W. Bush 63 percent in 2000. Before a plurality of Republicans But have the people really could vote for Trump, spoken? Trump is hardly he first had to be the consensus candidate defined as a viable alter- of the Republican every- native—a decision made man. In fact, his victory is not by the grassroots of as much a product of elit- the party, but by media ism as anything: Cable and executives. According broadcast news showered to an analysis by the unprecedented coverage New York Times from on him, and the insider- mid-March, Trump had friendly rules of the GOP already received about nomination process turned $2 billion worth of cov- a mere plurality of votes erage from the broad- into an overwhelming cast and cable networks. share of the delegates. As a former numbers- Watching Trump ral- cruncher for Right to lies on cable television, Rise, Luke Thompson, with thousands of diehard Actual Republicans, not so much has shown, the net- fans cheering lustily at the works began bestowing rantings of their hero, it’s easy to con- Trump could still eke out a slightly this largess on Trump before his rise in clude he is a tribune for the average larger share of primary votes than the polls—and his share of television American’s grievances. His legion of McCain did, but only if there is large coverage consistently outstripped his aggressive Twitter minions reinforces turnout in the handful of remain- share of support in the national polls. the impression that his campaign ing contests. In all likelihood, he will What drove this partiality? Money, truly is a populist revolt. However, be the least-popular nominee in the of course. Garrulous and quick-wit- this mistakes intensity of devotion modern era. ted, Trump has always been good for for breadth of support: Trump voters But, it may be asked, what about ratings, making him a godsend in this may be loyal, but they are not particu- the large field of candidates? There era of stagnating or declining view- larly numerous. were 17 major Republican hopefuls in ership. As Les Moonves, president In fact, Trump has won 41 percent the race, which made it nearly impos- of CBS, told the Hollywood Reporter, of the primary votes cast to date. His sible for Trump to do any better. Not “The money’s rolling in and this is share of the total primary vote will true—the majority of the candidates fun … I’ve never seen anything like increase now that he is unopposed, dropped out early, so by the time this, and this [is] going to be a very but most—if not all—previous GOP most Republicans cast their votes, the good year for us. Sorry. It’s a terrible nominees won a larger share than field of active contenders was about thing to say. But, bring it on, Donald. the same size as it had been in prior Keep going.” Jay Cost is a staff writer at The Weekly cycles. In fact, just four candidates What a boon it has been for Trump. Standard and the author of A Republic this year—Trump, Ted Cruz, John Sure, his critics were usually included No More: Big Government and the Rise Kasich, and Marco Rubio—will have in the cable news roundtables, and a

of American Political Corruption. scored more than 5 percent of the vote handful of television journalists like MCNEW / AFP GETTY DAVID

18 / The Weekly Standard May 30, 2016 Bret Baier and Jake Tapper dug into Trump was also helped by the rules Bush or Romney was supposed to get his questionable business practices of the Republican nominating proc­ the most attention, jump out to first and dubious public pronouncements. ess. To date, he has received a slightly place in the polls, win the early prima- But this was a drop in the bucket smaller share of GOP votes than Ber- ries by narrow margins, winnow the compared with the hours spent cover- nie Sanders has won of Democratic field, and eventually build an insur- ing his rallies, the puffball interviews, votes. However, the Democrats allocate mountable delegate lead. and the obsequious jibber-jabber from their delegates through a proportional The plan backfired: Yes, the big a brigade of pro-Trump hosts. If one system, while the Republicans give donors swung to Bush, but his public were ever looking for an example of bonuses to candidates who finish in appeal was limited. Trump barely spent media bias, here it is. first place—even if they win less than a dime, but used his media advantage To borrow a phrase from Schatt- half the vote. If the GOP rules resem- to become the frontrunner. Still, in schneider, the flaw in Trump’s pop- bled what the Democrats employ, its own peculiar way, the nomination ulist heaven is that “the heavenly Cruz and Kasich—and for that matter process actually functioned properly. choir sings with a strong upper- Rubio—would all still be in the race, Its purpose is to elevate the establish- class accent.” Before average voters and the party would be headed toward ment’s candidate—the difference latched on to Trump to express their a contested convention in Cleveland. this time is that it boosted the media frustration with the political elite in Far from being a bug in the Repub- establishment’s choice, not that of the Washington, D.C., the media elite lican process, this is its key feature. Republican political establishment. in New York City designated him The product of insider calculations, Trump has effectively won the a legitimate vehicle for those griev- the party rules are intended to dis- nomination despite nearly three-fifths ances. His march to victory began in patch insurgents quickly and hand of Republicans preferring somebody the executive suites at News Corp., the nomination to the frontrunner. Of else. This victory is hardly the stuff of Time Warner, NBCUniversal, Dis- course, the party elite intended a can- a populist movement seizing author- ney, and CBS, all of which boosted didate such as Jeb Bush or Mitt Rom- ity from the establishment. Instead, him, not because he is good for the ney to take advantage of the system. it represents the power of the elites country but because he is good for As the ones who can raise the most to dominate our political process for the bottom line. money and hire the best consultants, their own purposes. ♦

CongratulationsCongratulations to to the the Weekly Weekly Standard Standard on on its its 1,000 1,000thth issue! issue!

ForFor even even more more writing writing from from your your favorite favorite Weekly Weekly Standard Standard authors—Andrew authors—Andrew Ferguson, Ferguson, MattMatt Labash, Labash, Christopher Christopher Caldwell, Caldwell, P. P. J. J. O’Rourke, O’Rourke, Stephen Stephen F. F. Hayes, Hayes, Joseph Joseph Epstein, Epstein, and and JonathanJonathan V. V. Last—pick Last—pick up up a a copy copy of of e e Dadly Dadly Virtues Virtues or or e e Seven Seven Deadly Deadly Virtues Virtues!!

“Fatherhood“Fatherhood makes makes men men proud. proud. Proud Proud “A“A neurosurgeon neurosurgeon at at UCLA UCLA has has even even dis- dis- ofof everything everything your your kids kids do do and and say. say. coveredcovered the the ‘Jennifer ‘Jennifer Anniston Anniston neuron,’ neuron,’ RecentlyRecently I Iwas was deploring deploring the the exceed- exceed- whichwhich controls controls a aman’s man’s reaction reaction to to the the inglyingly messy messy state state of of my my children’s children’s agingaging starlet. starlet. Jealous Jealous colleagues colleagues are are now now bedroomsbedrooms and and gently gently urging urging them them to to inin pursuit pursuit of of the the Julia Julia Roberts Roberts neuron neuron and and ‘PUT‘PUT EVERYTHING EVERYTHING BACK BACK WHERE WHERE thethe Halle Halle Berry Berry neuron.” neuron.” ITIT CAME CAME FROM!!!’” FROM!!!’” —Andrew—Andrew Ferguson, Ferguson, discussing discussing “‘What “‘What if if it it came came from from the the oor?’ oor?’ prudenceprudence and and the the lack lack waswas my my ten-year-old ten-year-old son’s son’s rejoinder. rejoinder. thereofthereof in in “New “New Science” Science” He’llHe’ll be be chief chief justice justice of of the the Supreme Supreme CourtCourt someday.” someday.” —P.—P. J. J.O’Rourke O’Rourke 978-1-59947-508-0978-1-59947-508-0 | $16.95| $16.95 | pbk| pbk 978-1-59947-507-3978-1-59947-507-3 | $16.95| $16.95 | pbk| pbk

paperbackpaperback editions editions JustJust in in time time for for Father’s Father’s Day! Day! 2/$202/$20May 30, 2016 The Weekly Standard / 19 +free+free shipping shipping OrderOrder at at www.templetonpress.org www.templetonpress.org and and use use the the code code FD2016 FD2016

DV&SDVDV&SDV WS WS Ad.indd Ad.indd 1 1 5/16/165/16/16 1:39 1:39 PM PM unskilled whose careers bear the brunt of the long-term costs of any recession, The Gig Is Up this should be hailed as a welcome evolution in the economy rather than something that needs to be fixed. A salutary development for the U.S. economy. Foes of the gig economy would argue their unsteady income in a reces- by Ike Brannon sion is precisely what is wrong with the gig economy, but I would argue alifornia and Massachusetts should be shorter and cause less unem- that it’s much better for the pain of a regulators have decided to ployment if the economy has more recession to be spread out among mil- C allow Uber drivers to be con- independent contractors. lions of workers whose livelihoods are sidered independent contractors rather In a recession triggered by a decline modestly dented than for it to be con- than employees, a distinction crucial in demand—which is the ultimate centrated on a few who lose their jobs to the success of the ride-sharing app. cause of most recessions—the ini- altogether. As long as there’s a business But it’s hardly the last word on the mat- tial decline in sales that most compa- cycle, hours, employment, or compen- ter. The left has been vilifying Uber as nies experience forces them to make a sation will have to fluctuate to match the villain of the new “gig economy,” in determination: Is the decline a short- demand. We should want employment which more and more workers—espe- term phenomenon or something to be last on that list, but so much in cially younger ones— more significant? It’s our labor market causes employment to support themselves as an impossible task, at fall first. For instance, union contracts self-employed contrac- least at first, so com- can make it very difficult for companies tors, stitching together panies typically hedge to save money by reducing the hours a variety of app-enabled their bets by keeping each employee works. tasks. Liberals con- idle or underemployed Corporate profits already fluctu- sider such arrangements workers on the payroll, ate more than labor market variables largely exploitative— since it can be costly over a business cycle, so Bernie-sian with companies such as to reacquire and train suggestions that corporations should Uber getting fabulously new workers when they somehow bear the brunt of the busi- rich while the contrac- need them back. When ness-cycle downturns neglect the fact tors doing the work hus- companies do lay off that this already occurs. tle, scrape, and scuffle for Protesting Uber in New York workers, they would When health care costs are some crumbs. Uber corporate rather not rehire them 30 to 40 percent of a worker’s compen- employees, after all, enjoy fringe ben- until they are nearly 100 percent sure sation, labor markets aren’t flexible. For efits, unemployment insurance, and job they will need them for an extended all its faults, the Affordable Care Act security; the drivers do not. period of time. This is because so much did make it less expensive for most peo- “Uber Is Not the Future of Work,” of the cost of a worker—especially ple to acquire health insurance on their proclaimed Lawrence Mishel of the expensive, skilled workers—is in the own, freeing millions of Americans to left-wing Economic Policy Institute in form of fixed fringe benefits that can’t work for themselves without worrying the pages of the Atlantic. Bernie Sand- be scaled back. That is why many com- about access to health insurance. ers posted Mishel’s article on his cam- panies respond to a nascent economic Nancy Pelosi crowed in 2010 that paign website and has declared he has expansion by having existing work- the Affordable Care Act would help “serious problems” with “unregulated” ers work months or more of overtime people escape their jobs and do more businesses like Uber. Last year Hillary before they finally hire reinforcements. fulfilling things. That these new, self- Clinton got in the mix, saying the gig When workers are independent directed gigs don’t look precisely like economy raises “hard questions about contractors, as they are with Uber, a Democrats thought they would— workplace protection and what a good recession doesn’t necessitate that the apparently the left wanted more busk- job will look like in the future.” costs be fully borne by the relatively ers and community activists, not These arguments distract from few people who lose their jobs. In an cabbies—should be irrelevant. some of the key benefits of a gig econ- economy with more independent con- The gig economy is no disaster. It omy. An economy with a greater pro- tractors, a reduction in demand gets not only empowers more people to be portion of independent contractors is spread out. While incomes do fall, their own bosses, it has benefits for one that is less susceptible to the vaga- there are fewer people without jobs the rest of the economy too. Before the ries of the business cycle. Recessions than in a non-gig economy. Gig econo- Democratic party makes the end of gig- mies dampen the employment swings ging a party-platform plank, it might Ike Brannon is a visiting fellow at within a business cycle—a good want to look at those benefits and

the Cato Institute. thing. Given that it’s the young and recalibrate its rhetoric. ♦ / GETTYSPENCER PLATT

20 / The Weekly Standard May 30, 2016 hefty tome of finance regulation passed in the wake of the Enron scandal. Guilty Mind Yates’s crime? Destroying evidence and impeding a federal investigation for throwing three undersized fish from Did Hillary know the rules? his boat. Under laws originally created to criminalize by C. J. Ciaramella the destruction of financial records, he ews outlets reported ear- federal crimes. served 30 days in jail lier this month that federal As I reported in and lost his livelihood. N investigators have uncov- 2014 for the Wash- Yates appealed his ered scant evidence that Hillary Clin- ington Free Beacon, case all the way to the ton willfully violated federal record law that number has only Supreme Court. The when her subordinates set up a private increased, as has the Court threw out his email server at her Chappaqua manse rate at which the fed- conviction and ruled, to handle State Department business. eral government is in its august wisdom, As the Washington Post reported, creating new crimes. that red grouper are not “One official said prosecutors are For example, it is now a federal the same as financial documents. wrestling with the question of whether crime to conduct “high seas naviga- However, liberal groups like the Clinton intended to violate the rules, tion of an unflagged submersible or Center for American Progress argue and so far, the evidence seemed to semi-submersible vessel.” (Sorry, ama- that expanding mens rea protections indicate she did not.” teur submarine pirates.) It is a federal will shield deep-pocketed, white-collar Wrestling with intent, especially crime to make an obscene gesture at criminals from prosecution. A corpo- when it concerns anything a Clinton the Pentagon in order to alarm peo- rate executive, say, whose company may or may not have known, is a her- ple. It is a federal crime to use the 4-H wantonly pollutes. Or for that matter, a culean labor. Oddly enough, though, Club emblem without approval. powerful politician and her fiefdom of the very thing that may save Clin- And many of those crimes do not bootlickers who set up a secret, unse- ton from an indictment is a criminal have mens rea protections. In other cured email server to send sensitive justice principle that conservatives words, not knowing that it’s illegal government information. want to strengthen and liberal groups to write a letter to a pirate won’t keep The American Civil Liberties Union oppose expanding. the feds off your back. (Sorry, pirate came out against the mens rea proposal For the past several years, a bipar- pen pals.) in a letter to the New York Times earlier tisan constellation of conservative The Heritage Foundation and sev- this year: “Republican lawmakers who and progressive groups has come to a eral other conservative think-tanks insist on making this issue a quid pro rare consensus on a series of criminal support strengthening mens rea protec- quo are likely doing so not out of con- justice reforms. The sole exception, tions. The GOP-led House Judiciary cern for the lives, families and commu- which threatens to blow up their frag- Committee approved legislation ear- nities torn apart by our broken system, ile alliance, has been mens rea reform. lier this year that would require pros- but rather to please white-collar and Latin for “guilty mind,” mens rea is a ecutors to prove defendants “knew, or corporate polluter interests who stand common-law principle that requires had reason to believe, the conduct was to gain the most.” prosecutors to prove a defendant unlawful” when federal criminal law If Clinton avoids charges—as she intended to break the law. fails to provide a standard of intent. probably will, guilty mind or not— If one were in an extremely chari- “The idea that the hard left of the and goes on to gain the most powerful table mood, the Clinton email fiasco Democratic Party likes to threaten political office in the world, she will could be spun as a well-meaning and businesspeople with jail for not com- likely be quite pleased indeed. Some- very busy public servant running afoul plying with regulations that they’ve thing tells me, though, that the ACLU of the mountain of federal regulations written in some cubbyhole some- and CAP will not hold up Clinton as an on the books. where is ridiculous,” Americans for Tax example of two-tiered justice for white- And it is not as if there is any lack Reform president and reliable quote- collar scofflaws, and conservatives will of federal laws to break, wittingly or machine Grover Norquist told the not applaud the prosecutorial restraint unwittingly. A 2008 analysis by law Washington Post. displayed by the Justice Department. scholar John S. Baker for the Heritage The poster child for overcriminal- In the meantime, the rest of us mere Foundation identified at least 4,450 ization and mens rea reform is John mortals will just have to watch our step, Yates, a Florida fisherman who was sure in the knowledge that somehow, C.J. Ciaramella is a writer convicted of violating “anti-shredding” someway, somewhere, we’re probably

in Washington, D.C. provisions in the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, a breaking the law. ♦ GARY LOCKE

22 / The Weekly Standard May 30, 2016 The First Thousand Issues . . . and beyond

By Matthew Continetti editors. A large constitutional democracy cannot function, the argument runs, if its elected officials do not adhere to ’ve spent the last few weeks rummaging through common standards of decency and honesty and ethical The Weekly Standard’s archive. It’s a musty cob- conduct. As David Tell put it in an October 1996 editorial: webbed place where back issues are strewn among “It’s the veracity, stupid.” copies of the Starr report, hanging chads from the The presidency of Bill Clinton brought morality to the Florida recount, and Saddam’s brain. And as I fore both domestically and internationally. There is a line Ilooked through the dusty magazines, that connects the magazine’s support I made some observations. for Clinton’s impeachment with its

What struck me first is the mag- INSIDECLINTON THE opposition to a fawning engagement WHITE HOUSE azine’s consistency. Many of the with China. Some practices—perjury

same writers and editors who were $2.95 and obstruction of justice on the one FEBRUARY 9, 1998 there in 1995 continue to put out the hand and political oppression and magazine today. The format of each authoritarianism on the other—can- issue—Scrapbook, Casual, short arti- YOW!YOW!YOW! not be countenanced. America and cles, feature articles, book reviews, her people, this thinking goes, have Parody—hasn’t changed in 20 years. a responsibility to support, stand up, Nor have the quality of the writing, and fight for what is right. Failure to the witty caricatures, and the general do so not only endangers the U.S.-led point of view. international system that has brought If I had to sum up that editorial phi- freedom and prosperity to billions of losophy, I would say it’s a belief in the people. It also dishonors our heritage difference between right and wrong, as a democratic republic. truth and lies, nobility and baseness, Conserving America’s global posi- and in the corollary idea that domes- tion requires intervention overseas. tic and foreign policy are not exempt “Americans could save themselves from these moral categories. “Politics—real politics, not and the world a great deal of trouble if they developed a bit Bill Clinton’s politics—is about pursuing justice and more confidence in the prudent and timely use of force, a deterring and punishing injustice,” wrote William Kris- confidence commensurate with their nation’s capabilities,” tol in a February 1997 article. That’s enough to keep you Robert Kagan wrote in the first issue. “Military missions busy for decades. will always be fraught with risks, but the leadership role It is striking how often the so-called social issues— that politicians in both parties claim for the United States abortion, affirmative action, drug use, gambling, public cannot be won without some risk.” This unflinching atti- corruption, euthanasia, predation of minors, cloning, sex- tude toward foreign intervention is probably the maga- ual norms—grab the attention of The Weekly Standard’s zine’s most famous characteristic. When the United States commits soldiers to battle, the Matthew Continetti is editor in chief of the Washington integrity of the office of the president is also at stake. “Any Free Beacon and a contributing editor to The major rejection of the man also, unavoidably, impeaches Weekly Standard. He worked at the magazine his office—the institution against which foreign gov- in a variety of editorial jobs from 2003-2011. ernments judge American resolve,” wrote David Tell in

24 / The Weekly Standard May 30, 2016 AmericaWar.upc 5/4/01 10:35 PM Page 1

December 1995. “If the president As we wrote a month ago, “there is no THE REAL BUSH must make his way overseas against ENVIRONMENTAL RECORD middle ground between a decline in CHRISTOPHER DEMUTH & STEVEN HAYWARD furious opposition, or fails to make U.S. power, a rise in world chaos, and a $3.95 OCTOBER 30, 2000 dangerous twenty-first century, on the his way at all, then U.S. international one hand, and a Reaganite reassertion credibility and influence are dam- of American power and moral leader- aged, at least in the short run.” And ship, on the other.” Iraq is the test of because the defense against threats whether we can reverse our current failed foreign policy and establish a to the liberal democratic order is a policy of American leadership and, REUELEUEL MARCARC GERECHTERECHT • TOMOM DONNELLYONNELLY bipartisan responsibility, The Stan- yes, mastery. dard has supported presidents of both parties when they have inter- AmericaAmerica During Bill Clinton’s presidency, vened in Bosnia, Kosovo, Afghani- the cover stories and editorials of The stan, Iraq, Libya, and Syria. Weekly Standard were about evenly The interesting thing about view- atatWhat the attack WaronWar the USS Cole tells us divided between domestic and foreign ing history through the lens of The Ballot Bingo REVISE UPC 5/3/01 2:27 PM Page 1 policy. After 9/11, however, the maga- Weekly Standard is how you can see zine was focused on the global the dominant concerns of one presi- war on terror and its fronts in AN AMERICANIN PARIS dential administration emerge in the clos- DAVID BROOKS Afghanistan and Iraq. “If we are ing years of another. The Balkans, Haiti, going to defeat bin Laden, his NOVEMBER 27, 2000 Somalia, China, and the larger question $3.95 allied holy warriors, and others of America’s post-Cold War foreign pol- who have supported them,” Reuel icy were all waiting for Bill Clinton when PALM BEACH BINGO Marc Gerecht wrote after the MATT LABASH • THE DITORS he moved into the White House in 1993, E attacks on the World Trade Cen- and for The Weekly Standard when it ter and Pentagon, “we are going to was founded in 1995. Similarly, Clinton have to understand that friend- spent the final months of his second term ship for and partnership with failing to confront the overriding chal- the United States in the Middle lenges of George W. Bush’s presidency: East primarily hinges on Ameri- Islamic terrorism and the despotism of can power.” Saddam Hussein. The Weekly Standard cam- PLUS: The bombing of the USS Cole in Octo- Gore’s Closing Surge paigned for the widespread appli- ber 2000 was a premonition. “As long as JEFFREY BELL AND FRANK CANNON cation of this power—in pursuit the unipolar moment lasts, then, uncon- of terrorists inside the United ventional attacks like that on the Cole or PODHORETZ’SPROPHETS States and without, in Afghanistan, GARY A. ANDERSON on the Khobar Towers or the ambush of in Iraq, in Iran, and in all the other

$3.95 the Rangers in Mogadishu will continue NOVEMBER 11, 2002 branches of what Bibi Netanyahu to punctuate the headlines,” Tom Don- has described as the “poisonous nelly wrote at the time. “The American tree” of Islamic radicalism, resent- response to these acts of war should be ment, and violence. to use the instruments of war—intelli- It would be an evasion to deny gence gathering and military force—not or ignore the ambiguous outcomes only to avenge them and deter similar of some of these policies. Need- acts, but also to frustrate the political less to say, the present attitude of aims of our enemies.” Saddam’s the public toward George W. Bush As for Saddam, a 1998 editorial by Brain and the wars he commenced in William Kristol and Robert Kagan The ideology Afghanistan and Iraq is hostile. behind stated the matter succinctly: thethe thuggerythuggery But a careful reader of The Weekly by DAVID BROOKS Standard would acknowledge that Failure to act decisively on Iraq would its editors called for additional stand as a dramatic abdication of Ameri- troops to be sent to Iraq as early as the summer of 2003. can responsibility to prevent aggressive dictators from acquiring weapons of mass destruction. Either Saddam is It was also in these pages that Frederick W. Kagan and allowed to acquire weapons of mass destruction or he isn’t. Kimberly Kagan outlined, explained, and advocated the

May 30, 2016 The Weekly Standard / 25 “surge” strategy of reinforcements and counterinsur- positive view of Palin and the Tea Party, its editors some- gency that succeeded against all odds in quelling the vio- what differ on the latest iteration of conservative populism lence in Iraq. in the person of Donald Trump. Nor has the opposite approach increased U.S. power Meanwhile, The Weekly Standard has become a or made the world any safer. Barack Obama campaigned home for so-called reform conservatism. In 2005 the on a platform of retrenchment. He pledged to restart magazine published Ross Douthat and Reihan Salam on U.S.-Russian relations, withdraw troops from Iraq and the party of Sam’s Club. Yuval Levin’s “Putting Fami- Afghanistan, and negotiate with Iran over its nuclear pro- lies First” ran the following year. Salam, Levin, Adam gram. The Standard has catalogued the perverse conse- White, and other scholars and journalists associated with quences of these policies since Obama assumed office in this movement continue to publish here. The Standard 2009. American withdrawal from also identified a rising generation of Iraq was followed by renewed sec- Republican leaders, from its “Young MIDDLE EAST MACHTPOLITIK tarian war. The lack of American REUEL MARC GERECHT Guns” cover of Paul Ryan, Kevin follow-through in Libya fractured its McCarthy, and Eric Cantor in 2007 society and opened a safe haven for NOVEMBER 14, 2005 • $3.95 (well, two out of three ain’t bad), to its terrorist cells. trendsetting profiles of Palin, Marco The Party of American ambivalence in Syria SamSam’s’s ClubClub Rubio, Tom Cotton, and Joni Ernst. led to the formation of a terrorist Shouldn’t the GOP These new faces underscore the state ruled by ISIS and a humani- consider doing fact that in recent years the magazine something for its voters? tarian disaster of biblical propor- ROSS DOUTHAT witnessed a generational change. Start- & REIHAN SALAM tions. Iran has been empowered and ing around 2008, major figures in the enriched by the nuclear deal. Presi- history of American conservatism and dent Obama’s desire not to behave neoconservatism began to leave the like George W. Bush contributed scene. More contemporary intellectu- to this metastasizing violence and als and writers, such as Christopher also weakened America’s position Hitchens, Dean Barnett, Andrew in Europe and the Pacific vis-à-vis Breitbart, and other dear friends,

Russia and China. GET A departed ahead of their time. The

(SECOND) LIFE! Just as the waning days of Bill JONATHAN V. LAST last decade has been a period of Clinton’s presidency offered a vision transition, not only politically but $3.95 of George W. Bush’s time in the Oval OCTOBER 1, 2007 also demographically. Office, Bush’s final months presaged What comes next? As Fred the Obama years. Russia invaded Barnes has written many times, Georgia in the summer of 2008, a the future is never a straight-line sort of preview of coming attrac- YYoungoung GunsGuns projection of the present. But it is tions for the annexation of Crimea OF THE clear nevertheless that President six years later. The debut of Sarah Palin House GOP Obama’s successor will have to on the national stage was, in retrospect, respond to the wars in Syria and the first tremor of the populist earth- Iraq as well as to Iranian, Russian, quake that would only gather force. Chinese, and North Korean bel- And the financial crisis that ended ligerence. Those problems are not „ DUNCAN CURRIE on Paul Ryan Bush’s presidency was the beginning „ FRED BARNES on Eric Cantor going to disappear. Nor will the „ SAMANTHA SAULT on Kevin McCarthy of a renegotiation of the American rising murder rate in some of our social contract, in which the federal major cities, nor the opioid and government played a larger role in the life of the nation. heroin addiction spread throughout the country, nor the shambolic welfare state. his liberal Democratic resurgence is one of the No doubt The Weekly Standard will spend its next most important stories of recent years. The 1,000 issues applying its rigorous moral code to all of these T Weekly Standard has spent much of the Obama dilemmas. No doubt, too, those issues will include the administration on the defensive, opposing the president’s same political and cultural reportage, commentary, and stimulus, health care, and immigration bills, and the bulk humor that readers have come to expect—along with an of his foreign policy. And though the magazine took a anagram of Leo Strauss hidden in every article. ♦

26 / The Weekly Standard May 30, 2016 The Deal with the Art Kudos, complaints, and threats

By Philip Chalk eginning with its debut issue in Sep- tember 1995, The Weekly Standard has featured on its pages the work of a small army of top-notch artists, among them John Kascht, who produced many Bearly covers—including that original cover like- ness of Newt Gingrich—and who now has some 19 pieces of art in the collection of the National Portrait Gallery in Washington, D.C. These two decades of artwork have given the magazine a reputation for lively illustration and inspired a steady response from readers—a mix of curiosity, praise, disgust, delight, and outrage. Practically inclined readers sometimes ask about the nuts and bolts of pulling imagery together every week, a process that has changed utterly since 1995. When the magazine was young, all its artists worked in real ink or paint, rendering on board or canvas and usually shipping the final product to us in the mail, where it would be photographed and scanned. Today, almost all of our illustra- tors leave their pencils and brushes gathering cobwebs in the corner, instead using a stylus on one or another variety of touch-responsive com- puter screen. When done, they zip the digital file to us online within minutes. As readers now and then discern, we do sometimes indulge an inside joke, as when we echoed Thomas Fluharty’s grim GOP-disaster cover from November 2008 (“Wipeout”) with a celebratory variation following the GOP triumph in the 2014 midterms (“Cowabunga!”). While there is no “Greatest Hits” list, some covers are hard to forget, given the response they inspired. Gary Locke’s March 2010 cover show- ing an unclothed and freezing Al Gore (“The

Philip Chalk is the design director of The Weekly Standard.

28 / The Weekly Standard May 30, 2016 global warming campaign enters its emperor’s- new-clothes phase”) was enlarged to several feet tall and displayed on the floor of the Senate. It also generated considerable revulsion and glee among readers, a typical case of the former com- ing from a reader in Kentucky: “I love The Weekly Standard. However, I am bothered by the March 15 cover. It is simply childish. I have no fondness of Al Gore. Yet, there is a level of dignity and respect that should be maintained by this great publication.” The very next email message announced, “I love the Al Gore . . . cover & would love to have it on a T-shirt!” With great regularity, we are convicted of impugning the high and mighty. A Virginia reader in 2009 objected, “Your cover picture of Caroline Kennedy is outrageously offensive—as cruel and bigoted as the liberal press’ treatment of Sarah Palin. You guys don’t like uppity women, do you? For shame!” Similarly, Jason Seiler’s Donald Trump cover last September, showing the candidate in profile (opposite page), split the audience, with some readers writing in to vent their dismay at his ascent and others threatening to cancel their subscriptions if we contin- ued our visual assaults. The most requested print (behind the “Cow- abunga” number) is quite possibly Fluharty’s Rem- brandt parody, “Obama Contemplating a Bust of Jimmy Carter,” which illustrated Charles Krautham- mer’s October 2009 essay, “Decline Is a Choice.” Does politics rear its head in the world of illustra- tion? How could it not? A couple of artists have refused to work for us on principle. Illustrators sometimes end up in the bull’s-eye, as Seiler discovered from a flurry of online criticism after putting Bruce/Caitlyn Jenner on a box of Wheaties. When it came time to represent the crushing political correctness of the LGBT blacklist­ ers, the artist who finally agreed to render our sym- bolic steamroller insisted that a pseudonym be used as a credit, for fear of professional reprisal. Of all Weekly Standard art, the most anticipated may be the cover work of our biannual “reading” issues (at right). Since 2003, virtually all of these have been created by Mark Summers, featuring lit- erary figures in seasonal poses, usually with some groan-inducing pun implied. Even now, this year’s “Summer Reading” cover is underway, and if history is any guide, a handful of readers will likely email to ask just what it is that Rudyard Kipling is doing and why it’s supposed to be funny. ♦

May 30, 2016 The Weekly Standard / 29 The Art of Aging Gracefully Advice on the occasion of The Weekly Standard’s 1,000th issue

By P. J. O’Rourke national liberator to sponge off the locals. He’s the Mikhail Gorbachev of Athens, except with more hair and a personal ie young! The counsel is harsh, but the rea- life too scandalous for a Nobel Peace Prize. sons are clear. Imagine portly, blustering, Do we really wish there were more Byron poems? red-faced Romeo, burgher of a provincial “Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage,” “The Bride of Abydos,” and Italian town, and frumpy, shrewish Juliet. “The Corsair” aren’t enough for you? “Don Juan” was still “A dog, a rat, a mouse, a cat, to scratch a unfinished after 17 big, honking cantos. Are you on pins Dman to death!” versus “a braggart, a rogue, a villain, that and needles about how it ends? fights by the book of arithmetic!” The two of them perpetu- In Byron’s last bit of doggerel, “On This Day I Complete ating the Montague-Capulet feud, which is now about who My Thirty-Sixth Year,” he’s already complaining about the left his dirty doublet, hose, and codpiece need for fiber in his diet. on the bathroom floor. My days are in the yellow leaf; King Philip of Macedon’s boy The point that The flowers and fruits of love are gone would be known as Alexander the Not- Mick Jagger, And he’s whining, in typical solipsistic So-Hotso if he’d lived past age 32 and retirement-home fashion, about his other actually tried to rule a geographical Keith Richards, aches and pains. region so much in the news today. Johnny Rotten, The worm, the canker, and the grief The poor, dumb kid conquered the and I are making Are mine alone! worst empire ever—Greece well past its is: If you must Byron, like fellow Romantic Movement Periclean 5th century b.c. sell-by date, age, do not do it twerps Shelley and Keats, was a political stupid Turkey, snakepit Levant, horrid crackpot. Bad ideological vintages can’t be Egypt, awful Libya, vile Syria, fiendish gracefully. Don’t improved by aging, pace Bernie Sanders. Stri- Iran, the horror show that is Afghani- just get old, get dent senility begins to spoil the humor of stan, and some troublemaking denizens old and scary. “Don Juan” in Canto VIII: of the Punjab. If I had not perceived that revolution Or jump ahead 2,100 years to the Alone can save the earth from hell’s pollution. same neck of the woods in 1824, and consider a Lord Percy Bysshe Shelley also checked out on time, Byron who failed to expire of diarrhea and lived to see at 29. “Poets are the unacknowledged legislators of the “The Glory That Was Greece, Part II”—a goat rodeo fea- world,” indeed. Passing bills against prosaic things like turing corruption, revolt, assassination, and getting bitch- private property. slapped by the Turks. Shelley might have lived to be an all-too-well-known Greece ended up—when Byron would have been 45— member of Parliament, filibustering for Lake District with a sovereign bearing the singularly un-Hellenic name Home Rule by reciting his poetry until Queen Victoria’s “Otto of Bavaria.” head exploded midst his “England in 1819” description of Meanwhile there’s George Gordon, 6th Baron Byron her grandpa, dad, and uncles, An old, mad, blind, despis’d, and 1st “No-Account Count” of Missolonghi, getting and dying king, / Princes, the dregs of their dull race . . . fat and using his fading reputation as buttinski part-time A divider, not a uniter was our Percy Bysshe. John Keats would have been an old pest too. As it was, P. J. O’Rourke is a contributing editor to The Weekly Standard. he did enough damage. Myriads of young dolts in school His most recent book is Thrown Under the Omnibus: A Reader. are dosed with—

30 / The Weekly Standard May 30, 2016 Beauty is truth, truth beauty,—that is all “It’s better to be feared than loved if you cannot be Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know. both,” said the Roger Stone of his day. And at our age What if you get a flat? Try changing a tire with truth. nobody’s going to love Roger or me. Try changing a tire with beauty. What ye need to know is Lloyd Bentsen pulled the scary old man trick on Dan where the spare is. Quayle in the 1988 vice presidential debate. Dan defended But it’s not just budding lovers, world conquerors, himself against accusations of immaturity by noting that poetic prodigies, and people who Feel the Bern who need to John F. Kennedy was his age in 1960. And Bentsen said, “I die young. Callow geniuses of every type owe it to the world knew Jack Kennedy. . . . Senator, you’re no Jack Kennedy.” to kick the bucket promptly. I’m talking to you, Mark Zuck- Never mind that Bentsen was a hack and Quayle erberg. Which dreadful thing comes after Facebook? was full of principle and promise. Lloyd was old enough Even we of middling talents probably shouldn’t hang to get away with it. And Dan was too young to reply, around too long. Yes, we have insights and understandings “You bet I’m not! I don’t cheat on my wife, lie about my to impart to our juniors and can health, or buy elections with show them how to change a tire. my father’s money.” But we’ll make our points with I pull the same stunt on obscure, antique examples and greenhorns claiming I’m to references to dead white males. the right of Attila the Hun. I What if Jack and Bobby say, “I interviewed Attila the hadn’t been cut down in their Hun. He was a social demo- prime? What if they had lived crat who instituted large-scale to fulfill their potential as career looting, pillage, and rape enti- politicians the way their brother tlement programs.” Ted did? We would have had Physiognomy helps make Larry, Moe, and Curly Kennedy. the brats tremble. Time sup- What if James Dean hadn’t plies the human visage with a driven his Porsche 550 Spyder panoply of terrifying wrinkles, with such youthful abandon? creases, furrows, wens, warts, Did you see Marlon Brando as and moles with a hair grow- Jor-El in Superman? ing out of them. Provide your What if the Rolling Stones own gin blossoms. And main- were still alive and touring— tain a stern facial expression. Mick Jagger looking like some- “Patience on a monument look- body’s crazy great aunt and ing down on folly.” If tempted Keith Richards resembling to smile, mentally review the Ovid’s Cumaean Sibyl who 2016 presidential primaries. asked Apollo for eternal life but forgot to ask him for eternal Speaking of which, making faces has worked won- youth, except dressed like Johnny Depp playing a pirate? ders for Hillary Clinton, once a young lady of anodyne They are? They do? appearance and now doing such a good job of looking “It’s better to burn out than to fade away,” as the Neil like the sum of all fears about Republicans that she’ll Young lyric has it. Although the same song—“My My, probably be elected president. Hey Hey (Out of the Blue)”—also contains the lyric “This I myself—with no small thanks to the prospect of a is the story of a Johnny Rotten.” Clinton administration redux—have a grimace to make To which the Johnny Rotten (real name John Lydon, Medusa seem as if she just emerged from the beauty par- age 60) responded, “Oh, hilarious.” Because, as it happens, lor with her snakes in a French twist. Stick me in one of Johnny Rotten is not the dead Sex Pistol, that’s Sid Vicious. Hil ­lary’s Susanna Beverly Hills pantsuit numbers and we’ll put an end to this transgender fad. bviously, it’s too late for me and what’s left of my Not that that is my particular sartorial strategy for generation to take my first and best advice about scary. I favor pinstripes. O aging. But the point that Mick, Keith, Johnny There’s something about a man in a suit and tie Rotten (who still looks a fright and has been voted one of the that triggers visceral terror. Perhaps because the Amer- “100 Greatest Britons”), and I are making is: If you must age, ican people are now dressed as if they’re 9-years-

DAVE CLEGG DAVE do not do it gracefully. Don’t just get old, get old and scary. old-for-life. Adults go to work in playground shoes,

May 30, 2016 The Weekly Standard / 31 you’ll-grow-into-them shorts, and shirts in the clashing facility. But call the 2016 presidential hopefuls “Whatsher- plaid tartan of Clan MacColorblind. face,” “Whosit,” “Whachamacallit,” and “that contract When confronted with a man in a suit, instinct tells bridge dummy No Trumps or whatever his name is,” and them they’re in trouble. Plainclothes detective? Banker you’ll be regarded as possessing the sagacious wisdom of a come to repossess the house? John Kasich still going door- seasoned observer of the human comedy. to-door? Did the NSA intercept the email joke they for- The sagacious wisdom of a seasoned observer (along warded? (“Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump are running for with an inability to hear anyone who argues to the con- president and you’ve only got one bullet . . .”) Secret Service? trary) allows me to say what I damn well please. (“Use it on yourself.”) I suppose this is what Donald Trump and Bernie Sand- Bernie Sanders proves my point. He scares even me. ers think they’re doing. Also the people who bog or slog He isn’t dressed like a left-wing crank. He’s dressed like a or chirp or squeak or whatever it is they do on something mortician. Maybe capitalism is dead. they call “social media” and I call “What?” My grandmother knew how to say what she damn well man in a suit wears the authority of adulthood. pleased, not that she ever would have said “damn.” As a Adults are mythical creatures in modern life. We boy I asked her what the difference was between Demo- A don’t exist anymore. But like bedtime story hob- crats and Republicans. She said, “Democrats rent.” goblins we retain the power to cause nightmares. Once, when I remarked on slum conditions as we I enhance the effect with tortoiseshell half-glasses. drove through a bad part of town, my grandmother said, Stare coldly over the top of these and the surliest baristas, “No one’s ever so poor he can’t pick up his yard.” the most otiose DMV bureaucrats, the airline ticket coun- And when I came home from college declaring that ter representatives least inclined to upgrade me to business Lyndon Johnson and Richard Nixon were both fascist pigs class suddenly feel . . . “Oh, no, Dad is home! God only and I was a Communist, she said—take heed, Bernie—“at knows how long he’ll ground me for!” (And it doesn’t hurt least you’re not a Democrat.” that God is always depicted as a guy who’s at least my age.) Going through family photographs I realize that my Looking old is effective. Acting old is more so. But grandmother cultivated old age. By the time she was 40 her it takes practice. I’m practicing being deaf. “What?” My affect was Margaret Dumont opposite Groucho Marx in goal is to take people who are saying dumb things and A Night at the Opera—if Groucho had been the straight man. make them louder and dumber. In 1966, when the Post Office issued its 6-cent FDR “I’m with Her!” commemorative, my grandmother said, “My friends and I “What?” are having trouble using that new Roosevelt stamp.” “I’m with Her!” “Why?” I asked. “What?” “We keep spitting on the wrong side.” “I’M WITH HER!” I’m following Grandmother’s example, cultivating old “Then what are you doing here?” age. Although—after trying on that pantsuit—I’m doing Besides, it’s been 28 years since anyone told me any- so in more of a Groucho way. I smoke cigars. thing I wanted to hear. And even then presidential candi- You’d be amazed how cigars drive away annoyances date George H. W. Bush was telling me to read his lips. such as men in sandals, women who make their own What? is the fit response to all that’s said by my doctor, jewelry, NPR tote-bag carriers, people who use the word lawyer, accountant, stockbroker, friends who have resigned “mindfulness,” Prius drivers promoting social justice themselves to voting for Donald Trump, importunate through bumper stickers, givers of TED Talks, listeners children, and spouse suggesting I consume more of Lord to TED Talks, and vegans who know whether produce is Byron’s yellow leaves and fewer steaks and martinis. locally grown, organic, GMO-free, and fair-traded but who Yet it is a subtle art to hear nothing that’s said to me but can’t tell hay from straw. still discern, from the country club bar, my college fresh- I favor Havanas. But I’m told that a good cigar pro- man daughter on the tennis courts 200 yards away whisper- duces merely the odor of a smoldering compost heap. So ing to her friend about where tonight’s kegger will be held. I smoke cheap El Rope-O Grandes. They smell like I’ve set a wet dog on fire. A single deep exhalation works better practice being forgetful too. It has to be done exactly than a trigger warning in a Berkeley gender studies class. right. Forget where you parked your car or your own The young and silly head for the hills (or the Hillary). I phone number (why the hell would I want to call In the matter of aging gracefully, maybe I should myself?) or which day of the week it is, and your heirs have the grace to leave the world. But, failing that, I can and assigns will have you committed to the memory care make the world leave me. ♦

32 / The Weekly Standard May 30, 2016 1916

2016

CELEBRATING 100 YEARS OF THE NATIONAL PARK SERVICE SPONSORED BY XANTERRA & PRODUCED BY THE WEEKLY STANDARD

Longs Peak

High Peaks and Splendid Walks

The pleasures of Rocky Mountain National Park

By Geoffrey Norman The woman found that reassuring. The odds of her coming around a bend in the trail, face to face with a bear, he ranger had organized a little briefing suddenly seemed pretty small. after a woman asked him, nervously, about The ranger went on with his briefing, which was thor- the chances that she and her companion, ough and informative. But my mind was stuck on that fig- while on the hike they had planned, might, ure: 400 square miles. Hard to believe that such a small you know, run into . . . a bear. package could contain so much country. And such singu- TSo seven or eight of us stood outside the Beaver larly magnificent country at that. Seemed like it should Meadows visitor center while he conducted a helpful lit- have been 4,000, at least. tle course on bears in general and, specifically, the black But, then, a lot of that country runs up and down. bears of Rocky Mountain National Park. “The black bear This is a mountain park. There are 78 of them that exceed is a territorial animal and each one needs a fairly large 12,000 feet. Longs Peak, the tallest, reaches 14,259 feet, and territory. There is enough territory in this park—about that is a big mountain anywhere in the world outside of the 400 square miles—to support about 30 bears.” Himalayas. The tallest mountain in Europe, Russia’s Mount “That’s all?” the woman said. She meant the number Elbrus, is 18,510 feet. The Matterhorn is 14,692 feet. of bears, not the size of the territory. Any reasonably fit and energetic visitor to Rocky “Yes,” the ranger said. Mountain National Park can take a day during the short climbing season and reach the summit of Longs Peak. He Geoffrey Norman, a writer in Vermont, is a frequent contributor will, thus, have climbed a mountain that is almost as tall as

to The Weekly Standard. the Matterhorn. It isn’t what is called a “technical” climb, OSOLINSKI / GETTY STAN

May 30, 2016 The Weekly Standard / 33 1916

2016

CELEBRATING 100 YEARS OF THE NATIONAL PARK SERVICE SPONSORED BY XANTERRA & PRODUCED BY THE WEEKLY STANDARD

Hikers pause in the ‘Keyhole’ on Longs Peak, en route to the top. but it is a strenuous and demanding walk-up, a challenge band of scraggly conifers—Engelmann spruce, I believe— and an accomplishment. In the summer, the parking lot at began after that. Down lower came lodgepole and then the trailhead where the climb begins will start filling up ponderosa pine. In a few weeks, the snow would be gone at one or two in the morning. It is a long climb and you and wildflowers—fireweed, lupine, alpine sunflowers, and want to have made the summit, turned around, and got- more than 1,000 other species—would begin blooming ten yourself back down below the treeline before the after- and turn the meadows gaudy with color. noon thunderstorms begin ominously accumulating and Spectacular and unique country tends to stimulate a discharging electricity all over the high country. kind of brooding awe. On the eastern side of the Conti- That climb wasn’t possible in early May when I visited nental Divide where I stood, the water from the snow melt the park. There was still snow, and lots of it, in the high would soon run off to the Mississippi River and the Gulf country. But the hard, angular shape of the mountain drew of Mexico. On the western side, the snow melt would find my eyes and made me want to return in the height of sum- its way to the beginnings of the Colorado River and, ulti- mer and give it a shot. mately, the Gulf of California. There is something fasci- You don’t have to climb, technically or otherwise, to nating, in an imponderable way, about this. get up into the alpine zone. As formidable as this park is, Back down at more familiar altitudes, you will find its wonders can be experienced by car on the Trail Ridge your eyes drawn away from the road ahead. Not, perhaps, Road, which connects the eastern and western sides of dangerously so. Not as if you were texting. But the vistas the park and traverses the Continental Divide at a place are irresistible and, then, there are the animals. called Milner Pass. The road works its sinuous way, higher There is no hunting in the park; there are signs and and higher, and eventually reaches an altitude of 12,183 notices that make the point emphatically. Elk are so abun- feet. You can—and should—stop at the Alpine Visitors’ dant in the park that you wonder whether they might have Center near the top and take in the views, which are . . . learned how to read. You see them out in the meadows, well, they are stunning. No other word for it. When I was looking very scruffy at this time of year. They forage so there, almost a month into spring, the ground below for ravenously that in some areas of the park, aspen stands

the first thousand feet or so was still covered with snow. A have been fenced off to keep the elk from destroying them. / GETTY WELTY EHTAN

34 / The Weekly Standard May 30, 2016 1916

2016

CELEBRATING 100 YEARS OF THE NATIONAL PARK SERVICE SPONSORED BY XANTERRA & PRODUCED BY THE WEEKLY STANDARD

The preservation of wildlife was1916 one of the trailhead. There was snow on the ground the motivations behind the establishment around the lake and a lot of it on the slopes of the park. Most of the iconic species—elk, above that, all the way to the pinnacle of bear, wolves, moose, etc.—were gone, or reduced Longs Peak, which towered over things in a to very small numbers, by the time Woodrow brooding sort of way. Wilson officially established the park in 1915. The trail was not crowded. But I didn’t Now, the elk are everywhere. At one point in my have it to myself, either. I would stop, occasion- visit, I stopped to take some pictures 2016 ally, to let hikers coming out go by. and wandered down off the road, Traffic thinned out after a while, looking for the best angle. On the way and that is another quality of this back to my vehicle, I found myself park. It is small in that previously face-to-face with a bull elk, his antlers mentioned sense of encompass- draped with velvet, and his hide look- ing “only” 400 square miles. And, ing like an unmade bed. He looked with its eastern perimeter only a at me complacently for a few seconds couple of miles outside of Den- and then wandered off. ver, it is heavily visited. You could In the fall, his antlers would be build in an extra day at the end of clean and polished and gleaming like your business conference in Denver the barrel of a rifle, his hide would be or Boulder and spend it here. And, smooth and oily, and he would be on probably, many do. the move through country of flam- But crowds tend to be in the ing aspen, bugling to let the world crowded places, and if you hit the trail know he was there. you can find all the solitude you need You can also expect to see bighorn or crave. The back country is wild sheep in the park. I didn’t and that At top, a Continental Divide marker; and splendid, and with a park permit was a disappointment and another below, one of innumerable elk you can push back in deep and camp. reason to return. That, and climbing If you want to build a fire, you’ll need Longs Peak. to use a designated site but otherwise, There were, however, other you are on your own. opportunities. I took the most pop- I had flashes of that kind of soli- ular of them, which was to drive to tude on my two-mile walk to Bier- the Bear Lake trailhead and hike a stadt Lake, named for the great little ways up into the back coun- landscape painter of the American try. The parking lot was nearly full, West. Albert Bierstadt visited the and there were all manner of people area in 1876, painting large pros- coming in or going out. Some with pects of Estes Park and Longs infants that they carried on their Peak. Like his contemporaries in backs. Many who looked to have the romantic Hudson River School, gotten a head start of at least seven Bierstadt conveyed the sublime in decades on those babies. nature—powerful, brooding explo- It was midweek in May. I don’t rations of the vastness and awe- suppose there could be a more inspiring qualities of wilderness. If graphic testament to the value and Bierstadt had been a poet, he would success of the park system than have been Byron, probably. this scene. The parks are meant to protect the grand- I like his paintings—I have a couple of prints on my est of the country’s landscapes. But also to make them office walls—and he could have painted the view of Longs accessible to the citizenry. They speak to the wonders of Peak, towering and austere and epic, that I saw on my way the American land and also the democratic conviction back out of the park. that it is “our land.” I exchanged cheerful greetings with people in the park- With that little civics lesson out of the way, I slipped ing lot and headed out. Two hours to Denver? It seemed some steel cleats over my boots and started down the trail. infinitely farther than that. Just as the park seems infi- The lake was still frozen except for one small segment near nitely larger than 400 square miles. ♦

36 / The Weekly Standard May 30, 2016 Books&Arts

‘Leonidas at Thermopylae’ (1814) by Jacques-Louis David The Spartan Example

As always, Greece has something to teach us. by J. E. Lendon

he Ancient Greeks won the driven cruelty. Nor did it hurt that the Cold War. The Grand Strategy historian Thucydides could justly be Parallels were irresist- of Classical Sparta claimed as the progenitor of realism, ible: the parallels between The Persian Challenge the leading Cold War theory of inter- by Paul A. Rahe Tthe rivalry of the United States national relations. Yale, 424 pp., $38 and the Soviet Union and classical The quarter-century since the end Greece’s three great struggles—the of the Cold War has found less use triumph over the Persians, the long Philip II, father of Alexander the for the Greek paradigm. If anyone, Peloponnesian War between Sparta Great. These were contests of freedom it is to the Romans we should now and Athens, and the Greeks’ defeat against tyranny, of naval against land look for clues to America’s interna- by the drab, muddy Macedonia of power, and of the cheerful confusion tional perplexities; but we can’t, for of democracy against glum authoritar- that would be to admit responsibility J. E. Lendon, professor of history at the ianism. Some found resonance even for the order of the world and to hear University of Virginia, is the author of in the irony that imperial Athens was in the wind the whisper of the forbid- Song of Wrath: The Peloponnesian governed democratically within its den word “empire.” At the same time War Begins and Soldiers and Ghosts: A borders but ruled its far-flung subjects the fad for “cultural history”—the

History of Battle in Classical Antiquity. with a mix of indifference and panic- mass intellectual history of those too / EVERETTASHMOLEAN MUSEUM / MARY EVANS COLLECTION

38 / The Weekly Standard May 30, 2016 humble or stupid to possess, or act on, years, when no historian of Greece was climactic war between Xerxes and the actual ideas—sloshed into Classics looking, students of the Near East have Greeks (480–479 b.c.), it necessarily from history departments. come to understand the Zoroastrian- becomes a more conventional narra- Until 1990, most Greek historians ism of the Achaemenid Persians as a tive, a historical story, and can prop- studied the fifth centuryb .c., the era of militant and aggressive creed. With erly be judged on the quality of the Herodotus and Thucydides, the Per- justice does Rahe liken Persia’s moves storytelling. Rahe is a clear writer, not sian wars and the Peloponnesian War. west to a jihad. And Rahe’s Sparta is incapable of the occasional elegant epi- Now they visit, instead, the freak show far more aware of the Persian threat— gram, and he builds up a fine head of of the sixth century b.c. (weird prac- and aware earlier, and systematic suspense. But he faces stern competi- tices dimly seen woven together with in opposition—than earlier scholars tion: not only from Herodotus, the fragments from mad poets: perfect fod- had grasped. In Rahe’s book, for the first teller of these events and a master der for cultural history); or they settle first time, the badly reported treaties of prose, but more recently from Peter themselves plumply in the fourth cen- and wars between 520 and 480 b.c. in Green, one of the best pens in Classics tury b.c. From that era, a sheaf today, who took on this tale in a of boring Athenian speeches book where hardly a paragraph survives, written for law court fails to give pleasure (Xerxes at or popular assembly, which can Salamis, 1970, lightly updated all too easily entice a scholar dis- as The Greco-Persian Wars, 1996). contented with today’s America And alas, despite his sound to formulate his own private prose, Paul Rahe has no ear for theory of democracy. And pri- poetry, and what with oracles vate his theory is apt to remain. in verse and Aeschylus’ tragedy So to announce a trilogy of The Persians as evidence, there is books recounting the rise and necessarily quite a lot of poetry fall of classical Sparta (this is the in any study of the Persian wars. first of them, about the Persian With elegant concision, Peter wars)—a trilogy to be accom- Green, himself a poet, borrows panied by a fourth volume on an old, handsome translation of Spartan ways and institutions— the famous epigram of Simon­ seems the act of a scholar who ides about the 300 Spartans who has been suspended for 35 years Statue of Leonidas, Thermopylae fell at Thermopylae: in aspic. And such indeed, or close to it, has been the fate of the Greece and the Greek cities across the Tell them in Lacedaemon, passer-by conservative thinker Paul Rahe. He Aegean actually make sense. Only now, That here obedient to their word we lie earned his Ph.D. in ancient history at in Rahe, do these events have an expli- Yale in the school of the great Donald cable pattern: As the Persians strive to Rahe, by contrast, makes Simon­ Kagan, but political philosophy long increase their power and influence, the ides sound as if he were paid by the trapped him, like Odysseus on Calyp- Spartans contrive to thwart them. word and desperate to cram in as so’s isle: He toiled over Machiavelli and We think of Sparta as exercising an many as possible: Montesquieu, as well as his Republics easy mastery over southern Greece, but Ancient and Modern—which, at more the power of a nation—however con- Stranger! Convey to the men of Lacedae- mon this message: than 1,200 pages of astonishing erudi- sistently successful in battle close to That in this place we lie—obedient to tion, might easily be mistaken for the home—cannot easily be exerted across their commands summa contra mundum with which a even a narrow and island-speckled sea scholar closed his career, rather than if it refuses to commit its own troops. Peter Green’s book is sadly out of the book that began it. Paul Rahe, So the story of Spartan strategy on the date, so the reader seeking the best his- finally returning to Greek history after eastern coast of the Aegean is one of torical account of the Persian wars in so many years, has been far too busy to unsatisfactory alliances, weak coali- English should now read Paul Rahe. notice that the interests and methods tions, divided leadership, and repeated But that reader will do so with much of 1977, when he finished his disser- betrayal, as cities saw their wisest policy greater pleasure if he spends five min- tation, are no longer those of the cool as being the first to defect to the enemy. utes beforehand taping the translations kids at Cambridge and Stanford. There is much here for today’s of poetry from Green’s Greco-Persian And that is no bad thing. For lo! statesmen to ponder, and The Grand Wars over those in Rahe’s Grand Strat- it turns out that, in Rahe’s hands, the Strategy of Classical Sparta is written in egy of Classical Sparta. With historical grand narrative of Greek history is a style accessible even to statesmen, to acumen and poetic sensibility thus a key that still fits the puzzle-box of say nothing of the wider public. combined, the story becomes a mod-

ASSOCIATED PRESS ASSOCIATED today’s much-changed world. In recent As the book marches towards the ern masterwork. ♦

May 30, 2016 The Weekly Standard / 39 impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth. B&A “The Purloined Letter” also charmed me with its central conceit that people will invariably overlook the obvious, Homage to Poe even if the maxim’s application in this instance seemed distinctly unrealistic: The works and life of the Great American Man of Letters. The police would surely have exam- by Michael Dirda ined every scrap of paper in the min- ister’s apartment, no matter where its hiding place. utside the afternoon had My initial puzzlement about Edgar already grown sunless and The Annotated Poe Allan Poe (1809-49) was hardly surpris- gray as we settled into our edited by Kevin J. Hayes ing. His fiction can seem too rhetorical, Harvard, 440 pp., $39.95 seats in eighth-grade Eng- too thickly textured, too literary for Olish class. Our teacher, without pream- most young people. Still, Basil Rath- ble, carefully lowered the tone arm on bone’s recording did persuade me to a rackety portable record player. There give the writer another try—sometime. was a scratchy pause, and then, unfor- The opportunity finally arose in high gettably, we heard a low and sonorous, school when I opened my new English but slightly manic, voice whispering: textbook and discovered the revenge “True!—nervous—very, very dread- story “The Cask of Amontillado.” In fully nervous I had been and am; but class, our teacher emphasized Poe’s use why will you say that I am mad?” of irony and guessed, like many other It was Basil Rathbone, reading “The readers and critics, that the narrator Tell-Tale Heart” and other stories by Montresor was speaking to a priest. Edgar Allan Poe. We sat mesmerized, The phrase “You, who so well know until the actor produced his final, the nature of my soul” could obviously blood-curdling shriek: “Here, here—it be addressed to one’s confessor. But I is the beating of his hideous heart!” wasn’t quite convinced of this. At the time, I failed to recognize What were the “injuries” and the that the voice on the record was the “insult” that Montresor had suffered same as that of Sherlock Holmes, from the doomed Fortunato? I soon but I already knew a little about Poe. Edgar Allan Poe (1849) had my own ideas. When the two men My steelworker father used to recite: repair to the damp underground vaults It was many and many a year ago / In sentences and sometimes couldn’t to sample the much-anticipated Amon- a kingdom by the sea / That a maiden figure out what was happening. “A tillado, Montresor says to his tipsy there lived whom you may know / By the Descent into the Maelstrom” dragged companion: “You are rich, respected, name of Annabel Lee. That was about at the beginning, and its account of admired, beloved; you are happy, as all he could remember. As a child, I being caught in the vortex of a whirl- once I was.” I had read enough fiction loved the wistful sound of the words, pool went tediously on and on. “The by then to know that lost happiness just as I would later be taken by the Masque of the Red Death” was hardly usually meant lost love. Obviously, tintinnabulation of “The Bells” and a story at all, just a series of symbolic this rich, rather stupid aristocrat had the mournful repetition of “never- tableaux. Even “The Murders in the somehow stolen Montresor’s girl, mar- more” in “The Raven.” But when, in Rue Morgue” opened with pages of ried her, and then, through neglect and sixth grade, I had finally borrowed a dry theorizing: “The mental features drunkenness, made her life miserable. friend’s copy of the Signet Classics discoursed of as the analytical, are, Just look at the sodden fool: He is out paperback of The Fall of the House of in themselves, but little susceptible carousing by himself on the street, Usher and Other Tales, I found Poe dis- of analysis.” Though I was suitably decked out in jingle bells and clown concerting, even disappointing. delighted when C. Auguste Dupin regalia, while Lady Fortunato, we later Mostly, this was because I could deduced that the savage murders learn, sits at home waiting for him. barely understand his complicated could only have been committed by So I boldly contended that Mon- an orangutan, I nonetheless regarded tresor could no longer bear the Michael Dirda is a weekly book columnist for this solution as farfetched, despite the repeated disrespect, probably coupled the Washington Post and the author, most usual caveat (frequently enunciated by with physical abuse, endured by the recently, of Browsings: A Year of Reading, my hero, the sleuth of Baker Street) woman he adored. He walls up For- Collecting, and Living with Books. that when you have eliminated the tunato and, after a suitable period of

40 / The Weekly Standard May 30, 2016 mourning, weds his widow. As he lays the blood-bedewed halls of their It was hard by the dim lake of Auber dying, Montresor­ finally tells the whole revel, and died each in the despair- In the misty mid region of Weir— story to the person who really knows ing posture of his fall. And the life It was down by the dank tarn of Auber, of the ebony clock went out with his soul—his wife, the former Mrs. In the ghoul-haunted woodland that of the last of the gay. And the of Weir. Fortunato. My teacher was somewhat flames of the tripods expired. And nonplussed by my argument—espe- Darkness and Decay and the Red In a French class I learned that cially when I extrapolated the future Death held illimitable dominion Poe wasn’t only a genius himself, he wedding—but I cling to it even now. over all. was also the cause of genius in others. From that time on, I grasped that The alliterative Ds and the repeated France’s three greatest poets of the textual ambiguity could contribute to use of “and” generated a suitably omi- 19th and early-20th centuries revered a poem or story’s power and appeal. nous cadence, but the real triumph lay him: Baudelaire translated his stories; Like Shakespeare’s plays, Poe’s tales in that phrase “illimitable dominion.” Mallarmé composed one of his best of the grotesque and arabesque are poems, “Le Tombeau d’Edgar Poe,” for tantalizing, open-ended, susceptible Poe’s admirers were the dedication of the writer’s memorial to multiple interpretations. When in Baltimore; and Valéry insisted that you finish “Ligeia”—in which a dark- legion. Many scholars the American was “the only impec- haired beauty of indomitable will- speculate that cable writer.” Poe’s Narrative of Arthur power returns from the dead and takes Gordon Pym—a combination of nauti- over the body of the fair Rowena— Pym influenced cal adventure story, racial allegory, and you are left with some interesting fictionalized speculations about the questions: Is Ligeia truly alive again? Moby-Dick. Antarctic, as well as his only novel— Will she and her husband take up Abraham Lincoln, so impressed Jules Verne that he pro- their marriage from where it left off? duced a sequel to it: The Sphinx of the What will Lady Rowena’s relatives it was once reported, Ice Fields. say about her disappearance? Could ‘suffers no year In fact, Poe’s admirers were legion. everything be just a hallucination of Many scholars speculate that Pym the opium-addled narrator? to pass without a influenced Moby-Dick. Abraham Lin- Though Poe himself thought perusal of this author.’ coln, it was once reported, “suffers no “Ligeia” his best story, many of today’s year to pass without a perusal of this readers would probably award that Dostoyevsky himself author.” Dostoyevsky himself intro- honor to the somber “Fall of the House duced Russian translations of “The of Usher.” Everyone recalls its opening: introduced Russian Tell-Tale Heart,” “The Black Cat,” and translations of Poe, “The Devil in the Belfry”—and surely, During the whole of a dull, dark, his Underground Man is a cousin to and soundless day in the autumn and to the creator of of the year, when the clouds hung Poe’s soul-baring monomaniacs. To the oppressively low in the heavens, I Sherlock Holmes, creator of Sherlock Holmes, Poe was had been passing alone, on horse- nothing less than “the supreme origi- back, through a singularly dreary Poe was ‘the supreme nal short story writer of all time.” The tract of country; and at length found usually prickly Bernard Shaw agreed myself, as the shades of the evening original short story drew on, within view of the melan- with Conan Doyle, adding, “The story choly House of Usher. writer of all time.’ of the Lady Ligeia is not merely one of the wonders of literature; it is unpar- How had I failed, even at age 12, to There was majesty as well as doom in alleled and unapproached. There is appreciate the splendor of such dic- those syllables. Halfway through col- really nothing to be said about it: we tion or the careful syntax of this beau- lege, I even decided that Poe’s verse others simply take off our hats and let tifully balanced sentence? As I slowly occasionally surpassed Swinburne’s Mr. Poe go first.” Tennyson, Hardy, began to reread stories I had originally and Verlaine’s in its intricate interlac- and Yeats regarded that same Mr. Poe disliked, I soon discovered more and ings of sound. Consider the lugubri- as the finest of American poets. more to admire in Poe, especially his ous melody and tocsin-like repetitions By the same token, H. P. Lovecraft use of language. The last paragraph of of “Ulalume”: deemed Poe the premier exponent of “The Masque of the Red Death,” for the modern weird tale, the first writer example, resounds with biblical gran- The skies they were ashen and sober; to understand perfectly “the very deur and finality: The leaves they were crispèd mechanics and physiology of fear and and sere— strangeness.” Reconfiguring the trap- And now was acknowledged the The leaves they were withering presence of the Red Death. He had and sere; pings of the Gothic romance—the come like a thief in the night. And It was night, in the lonesome October crumbling Bavarian castle, the insidi- one by one dropped the revelers in Of my most immemorial year: ous villain, the frightened heroine—

May 30, 2016 The Weekly Standard / 41 Poe asserted that “terror is not of Ger- Saturday Courier of Philadelphia. (He (which may sound trivial until you many but of the soul.” In their turn, came in second: The award went to remember how much the breathless his five “tales of ratiocination”—the Delia Bacon, now faintly remembered pace of his stories relies on the dash). three investigations featuring Dupin because she championed Francis The scholar Burton Pollin even esti- but also, to some extent, the crypto- Bacon as the author of Shakespeare’s mated that Poe coined, or first used in graphic treasure story “The Gold Bug” plays.) In another competition, print, nearly a thousand words. and the ballistics-oriented “Thou Art underwritten by Baltimore’s Saturday Poe was also given to puns and the Man”—established virtually all the Visiter, Poe’s account of a castaway, humorous coinages, though these are elements of the classic detective story. “Manuscript Found in a Bottle,” now likely to elicit groans: Aries Tottle, As Howard Haycraft observed in earned him $50. Soon thereafter, he a German named “Kroutaplenttey,” Murder for Pleasure, Poe more or less adopted journalism as his career, tak- the Snook Farm Phalanx (for the Tran- invented “the transcendent and eccen- ing up a position as assistant editor of scendentalists’ Brook Farm). Poe may tric detective; the admiring and slightly also be viewed as the Martin Gardner stupid foil; the well-intentioned blun- of his age, fascinated by contempo- dering and unimaginativeness of Poe could turn his rary science and pseudoscience (such the official guardians of the law; the hand to any topic, as phrenology), fond of deciphering locked-room convention; the pointing codes, and adept at exposing frauds. finger of unjust suspicion; the solution once producing an With uncharacteristic modesty, by surprise”—and much else. In effect, Edmund Wilson contended that Poe’s he turned reasoning into a source of article on the proper was “the most remarkable body of narrative excitement. use of the dash criticism ever produced in the United If, in the weird tale and the detec- States.” Wilson added that, with his tive story, Poe is both pioneering and (which may sound knowledge of Latin, Greek, Span- exemplary, he is only slightly less so trivial until you ish, Italian, French, and German, and in science fiction. His sense of wonder possibly a smattering of Hebrew, Poe led him to extrapolate (some would say remember how much stood intellectually “on higher ground fool the public) with “The Balloon- the breathless pace of than any other American writer of Hoax,” a proto-Verne voyage extraor- his time.” Nonetheless, his notori- dinaire about the supposed crossing his stories relies on the ously snarky, sometimes ad hominem of the Atlantic, and “The Unparal- reviews earned him the nickname “the leled Adventure of One Hans Pfaall,” dash). The scholar Tomahawk Man.” a significant contribution to the long Burton Pollin even Poe did write appreciatively, how- literature of journeys to the moon. In ever, about the young Dickens, dedi- “The Man That Was Used Up,” Poe estimated that Poe cate The Raven and Other Poems to describes a steampunk version of a coined, or first used Elizabeth Barrett Browning, publish cyborg, half-human, half-machine, an essay entitled “Art-Singing and while “The Facts in the Case of M. in print, nearly a Heart-Singing” by the then-little- Valdemar” focuses on a corpse pre- thousand words. known “Walter” Whitman, and praise served and kept sentient through the Hazlitt as “brilliant, epigrammatic, power of mesmerism. Even the innoc- startling, paradoxical, and suggestive.” uous-sounding “Conversation of Eiros Richmond’s Southern Literary Messen- Most important, in celebrating Twice- and Charmion” relates Earth’s collision ger, where he remained for two years. Told Tales by his near-contemporary with a comet, leading to fiery global He would eventually quit that job Nathaniel Hawthorne, Poe used his apocalypse: “For a moment there was a over a salary dispute, but Poe—despite review to lay out the modern theory of wild lurid light alone, visiting and pen- the occasional drinking binge—was the short story: etrating all things. Then . . . the whole too exceptional a writer and editor not incumbent mass of ether in which we to land another job right away. Over A skillful literary artist has construct- existed, burst at once into a species of the years, he would grind out scores of ed a tale. If wise, he has not fash- intense flame. . . . Thus ended all.” book reviews, humorous squibs, essays, ioned his thoughts to accommodate Though “The Raven” did make his incidents, but having conceived, poems, and stories. As time went on, with deliberate care, a certain unique him famous—the poem was quickly Poe even preferred to write his attrac- or single effect to be wrought out, he reprinted in 11 different periodicals— tively legible script on narrow strips of then invents such incidents—he then Poe was best known in his lifetime as a paper that had been pasted into long combines such events as may best aid literary journalist. He began his career rolls—almost certainly to emulate him in establishing this preconceived effect. If his very initial sentence tend by submitting “Metzengerstein”—a newspaper columns. He could turn his not to the outbringing of this effect, gothicky revenge tale, featuring a spec- hand to any topic, once producing an then he has failed in his first step. In tral horse—for a prize awarded by the article on the proper use of the dash the whole composition there should

42 / The Weekly Standard May 30, 2016 be no word written, of which the wholly truthful about one’s inner life: University of Virginia. Poe was thus tendency, direct or indirect, is not to forced to make his own way in the the one pre-established design. And If any ambitious man have a fancy world. For a while, it seemed he might by such means, with such care and to revolutionize, at one effort, the skill, a picture is at length painted pursue a military career: He enlisted universal world of human thought, which leaves in the mind of him who and proved a model soldier, rising to human opinion, and human senti- contemplates it with a kindred art, a ment, the opportunity is his own— the rank of sergeant-major. Later, he sense of the fullest satisfaction. the road to immortal renown lies enrolled as a cadet at West Point, but straight, open, and unencumbered eventually dropped out to pursue his Poe consistently emphasized art’s before him. All that he has to do literary ambitions. need for unity or totality of effect. is to write and publish a very little Poe exhibited the usual prejudices of book. Its title should be simple—a Through careful verbal engineering few plain words—“My Heart Laid white Southern gentility, as can be seen alone, one produces fiction’s “intoxi- Bare.” . . . But to write it—there is in his characterization (or, perhaps, cation of the heart” or the “excite- the rub. No man dare write it. No caricaturization) of the devoted black ment” that is poetry’s “province, its essentiality.” To believe “The Philoso- phy of Composition”—which is a bit tongue-in-cheek—no “fine frenzy” or “ecstatic intuition” was required to generate “The Raven.” It was a mat- ter of method and doggedness. In that essay, Poe sounds as coolly calculating as Nabokov, which may explain the air of factitiousness and theatricality com- mon to both writers. And like the creator of Lolita (ini- tially called The Kingdom by the Sea), the author of the Nabokovian “Wil- liam Wilson” and “Annabel Lee” was a perfectionist. Poe speaks of an ini- tial draft’s “vacillating crudities of thought,” of “true purposes seized only at the last moment,” and “fully matured fancies discarded in despair as unmanageable,” and of all “the painful erasures and interpolations.” Even after a piece was published, Poe would keep tinkering with it, com- pletely revising certain early poems Vincent Price in ‘The Raven’ (1963) for later book appearances. In truth, Poe was astonishingly hardworking: “I man ever will dare write it. No man retainer Jupiter in “The Gold-Bug.” have not suffered a day to pass without could write it, even if he dared. The (Still, Poe did describe his African- writing from a page to three pages.” In paper would shrivel and blaze at American friend Armistead Gordon as every touch of the fiery pen. spite of poverty, drink, and multiple the most interesting man he had ever sorrows, this industrious writer man- talked to.) Even more notoriously, Poe aged to publish 10 volumes in his short In his life, as in his writing, Poe married his cousin Virginia Clemm lifetime—the last being Eureka, a dense was clearly obsessed with death, and in 1836 when she was not yet 14. He philosophical essay on cosmology, with according to the Freudian critic Marie cared tenderly for his child-bride and speculations about an expanding uni- Bonaparte, the symbolic presence of her mother, who, together, provided a verse. Most impressive of all, with the his dying mother, the talented young measure of stability to his sometimes- partial exception of the Dupin myster- actress Elizabeth Arnold Poe, suf- disordered life. Alas, in a repetition ies, he almost never repeated himself. fuses his whole oeuvre. Adopted by of Elizabeth Poe’s premature death, Some of the legends about Poe— the well-off John and Frances Allan Virginia succumbed to tuberculosis in as the saddest, loneliest figure in of Richmond, the infant Edgar was 1847 while still in her early twenties. American literature—almost certainly subsequently doted-on by his step- Poe never recovered from the loss. arose because he avoided the overtly mother but eventually disowned by His own final days in Baltimore autobiographical and once famously his stepfather because of gambling have elicited the kind of speculation emphasized the impossibility of being debts incurred while a student at the we associate with the disappearance of

May 30, 2016 The Weekly Standard / 43 Ambrose Bierce or the assassination depicted that singular urban vampire, Giraldi is a respected novelist. None- of John F. Kennedy. Odds are that the “The Man of the Crowd.” My own theless, the latter’s otherwise smart 40-year-old Poe was plied with drink by small Poe collection includes volumes and insightful introduction is slightly local politicos and moved around the illustrated by Harry Clarke, Arthur marred by overwriting. (On one page city to multiple polling stations to stuff Rackham, William Sharp, and Gahan we read about “the rips and rasps of a ballot boxes. Eventually found weak Wilson; but many other artists— psyche” and “the strafings and strain- and delusional in a bar, he was taken ings of the soul.”) Unfortunately, Har- to a hospital, where he died a few days vard University Press has fumbled later. Some have speculated that Poe Melancholy, prone design and layout: The footnote num- might have been murdered because he to drink, slightly bers in the text are hard to see; the mar- was going to marry a certain Mrs. Shel- ginal annotations are printed in faint ton, which could have cost members of morbid, always red ink, in flyspeck-sized type. Only her family a substantial legacy. dressed in black—to fighter pilots and eagles could possibly There is even a flourishing sub- read the commentary with ease. genre of fiction in which Poe didn’t later generations, Poe Hayes’s annotations follow the die in Baltimore. In one early exam- became an archetypal usual guidelines for such volumes: ple, “My Adventure with Edgar As he writes, “I supply in addition to Allan Poe,” Julian Hawthorne (son of voyager into the dark literary contexts a range of other help- Nathaniel) encounters Poe in 1891 at ful contexts (biographical, historical, an out-of-the-way Philadelphia res- places of the heart political, philosophical), and gloss taurant. It turns out that Poe had suf- and even darker places allusions and sources, topical refer- fered a premature burial, and when ences, obscure words and phrases, he finally awoke from his suspended of the soul. and words whose connotations may animation—unchanged in appearance not be clear to modern readers.” To despite the passage of many years—he my mind, however, the notes don’t decided to put his literary life behind always give enough critical or bib- him. Initially mistaking Julian for his liographical information. Discussing father, Poe explains that he now goes “The Masque of the Red Death,” for by the name of Arnold and is employed example, Hayes produces this tan- as secretary to a local banker. talizingly inadequate comment: “In Melancholy, prone to drink, slightly any case, the motley-colored suite of morbid, always dressed in black— rooms offers numerous possible inter- to later generations, Poe became an pretations and critics have been happy archetypal voyager into the dark places to supply them.” An example or two of the heart and even darker places of would have been helpful. the soul. In famous late photographs, the While reprinting virtually all the slightly down-at-the-heels gentleman major stories and poems, Hayes does of letters bears the tragic features of leave out some key texts, notably “The his own Roderick Usher: “To be thor- Imp of the Perverse,” the prose-poem oughly conversant with Man’s heart,” “Silence,” and Poe’s romantic tale of Poe once said, “is to take our final a Venetian Liebestod, “The Assigna- lesson in the iron-clasped volume tion.” None of the essays or margina- of Despair.” lia is included. So while The Annotated Today you can buy Poe T-shirts, Poe—because of the marginal com- action figures, and refrigerator mag- mentary and many illustrations—is nets, as well as Raven Special Lager worth owning, it isn’t a clear standout Beer and a children’s book, Edgar in the crowded field of Poe collections. and the Tattle-Tale Heart. “Nevermore” Poe’s tomb, Baltimore Online, moreover, one can rewardingly must be the most famous single word visit the superb website maintained in all American poetry. Poe’s stories— Gustave Doré, John Tenniel, Edward by the Edgar Allan Poe Society of or sometimes just their titles—survive Hopper, D. G. Rossetti, Manet, and Baltimore. It makes available digital in numerous B-movie adaptations. Whistler—have been inspired by texts of the standard Arthur Hob- More happily, some of our finest art- Poe’s stories and poems, as well as his son Quinn biography, a great deal of ists and illustrators have evoked the own haunted face. important scholarship, and the two horrors of “The Pit and the Pendu- Which brings us to The Annotated best editions of Poe’s complete works, lum” and “Hop-Frog,” pictured Wil- Poe. Editor Kevin J. Hayes is certainly those by James A. Harrison and liam Wilson and his doppelgänger, or a respected Poe scholar, just as William Thomas Ollive Mabbott. ♦

44 / The Weekly Standard May 30, 2016 case, Kirk’s own political views never B A conformed to those of any party or & movement, despite his friendships with politicians like Michigan gov- ernor John Engler and President Conservative Minder Ronald Reagan. Birzer points out that Kirk, though not a pacifist, found him- Russell Kirk’s political and cultural legacy. self unable to support any war in which by James Seaton the United States had been involved, from the American Revolution up to the Gulf war, including the Civil War and the war in which Kirk himself served, World War II. Kirk made what Birzer calls “a nearly fatal error” when, criticizing what he saw as the bellicosity of neo- conservative foreign policy, he com- mented: “And not seldom it has seemed as if some eminent Neoconservatives­ mistook Tel Aviv for the capital of the United States.” Midge Decter and Norman Podhoretz, among others, understandably took offense at the remark, regarding it as evidence of antisemitism. Birzer offers no brief for the comment but defends Kirk him- self against the charge of antisemitism, noting that “not a single person has left an account of any negative com- ments Kirk ever made in conversation, casual or otherwise, about Judaism or Jews,” adding that the same is true of his letters. Kirk, Birzer documents, “founded Modern Age to defend the views of famed scholar Leo Strauss, Russell Kirk (1984) and he departed the journal because of the rampant anti-Semitism and anti- n this impressive intellectual Catholicism there.” Birzer concludes biography of one of the founders Russell Kirk that, although Kirk “might very well of modern conservatism, Brad- American Conservative have chosen poor words when fearing by Bradley J. Birzer ley Birzer makes the case for the Kentucky, 608 pp., $34.95 that American national interests were Iimportance of Russell Kirk (1918-94) succumbing to Israeli interests, that today, in large part by making clear the the voice of conservatism as under- this one comment—very much taken extent to which Kirk’s philosophical stood by the American public. . . . out of context by his opponents— but nonideological kind of conserva- Kirk’s conservatism in 1959 has should or even could brand Kirk an tism differs from what is most often almost nothing in common with the anti-Semite is simply untenable.” presented as conservatism on televi- populist, popular conservatism of Birzer contends that Kirk’s impor- today’s modern media. sion, radio, and other media. tance lies not in his political interven- Birzer could easily have omitted the tions but in his success in articulating As of the writing of this book, loud, obnoxious, and plastic radio and date, and his point would have been just an American conservatism that might television personalities dominate as valid. The Kirk of the 1980s and ’90s serve “as a means, a mood, and an atti- was just as much out of tune as the Kirk tude to conserve, to preserve, and to James Seaton, professor of English of the 1950s with the populist or pseudo- pass on to future generations the best at Michigan State, is the author, populist political conservatism of 2016. of the humane tradition rather than to most recently, of Literary Criticism Kirk’s influence, from the start, advocate a particular political philoso- from Plato to Postmodernism: has always been more cultural than phy, party, or agenda.” Kirk’s first, and

The Humanistic Alternative. political, as Birzer recognizes. In any probably most influential, book was / AP MCNALLY JAY

May 30, 2016 The Weekly Standard / 45 The Conservative Mind (1953), which and More. Kirk accurately paraphrased embodied some timeless truth made Birzer calls his magnum opus. The Santayana’s prescient verdict: sacramentally incarnate.” importance of The Conservative Mind If the answer is vague, his question can be measured by the comment of Liberalism, once professing to advo- is also misleading: Calhoun is treated so thoughtful a critic as Lionel Tril­ cate liberty, now is a movement for as a real, though flawed, conservative control over property, trade, work, ling in The Liberal Imagination (1950) amusements, education, and reli- in The Conservative Mind, while Lin- that, in the United States, there were no gion; only the marriage bond is coln is mentioned only incidentally. conservative ideas in circulation, only relaxed by modern liberals. Better to defend Kirk by noting “irritable mental gestures which seek that The Conservative Mind, despite its to resemble ideas.” The Conservative Mind was vulner- historic importance, was written while The Conservative Mind refuted able to criticism because of its inclusion he was still a young man and recogniz- the notion—conventional wisdom ing that Kirk’s thought evolved and in the 1950s—that liberalism stood For the later Kirk, deepened through the decades. In The alone as the sole intellectual tradition Roots of American Order (1974), which, alive in the United States by pointing to the example of pace Birzer, may be considered Kirk’s figures such as John Adams, whom Kirk true magnum opus, Kirk offered a considered “the founder of true conserv­ Abraham Lincoln learned and thoughtful assessment of atism in America.” Adams’s influence ‘proved that a Western civilization from its begin- remained alive, Kirk contended, “in the nings in Jerusalem, Athens, and Rome middle of the twentieth century” when, democracy of elevation to the American present. In Roots he despite the inroads of progressives and can uphold resolutely barely mentions Calhoun but pays liberals, the United States was still “the his respects to Lincoln: “In Abraham most conservative power remaining the public order and Lincoln, the American democracy in the world, still standing for Adams’ the moral order.’ would find, at its sternest crisis of principle of political balance, liberty disorder, its most capable and self- under law,” and still maintaining the sacrificing man of order.” For the federal form of government Adams saw later Kirk, the example of Lincoln as a bulwark against radicalism. “proved that a democracy of elevation Kirk ended the first edition of The can uphold resolutely the public order Conservative Mind with tributes to three and the moral order.” thinkers who had been especially impor- Bradley Birzer makes a strong case tant to him: Irving Babbitt, Paul Elmer for the continuing importance of Russell More, and George Santayana. None Kirk as thinker, writer, and all-round engaged in partisan politics, though “man of letters.” Kirk wrote novels all three reflected on the danger of tak- such as Old House of Fear (a bestseller ing democratic political ideas about the in the early ’60s) and short stories, his equality of all individuals to an extreme works in both genres usually involv- that ends, paradoxically, by empowering ing ghostly or supernatural events and not the individual but the state. all illustrating the power of what Kirk, Babbitt, Kirk wrote, saw “the Fed- following Edmund Burke, called “the eral Constitution and the Supreme moral imagination.” The title of his Court and other checks upon immedi- autobiography, The Sword of Imagina- ate popular impulse are to the nation tion: Memoirs of a Half-Century of Liter- what the higher will is to the indi- ary Conflict, emphasizes his identity as a vidual.” Unlike the agnostic Babbitt, man of letters rather than the leader of More believed that religion, specifically of John C. Calhoun among its roster of a political movement. Kirk’s Eliot and Christianity, was not only true but nec- American conservatives and its omis- His Age: T. S. Eliot’s Moral Imagination essary for human life. Kirk quotes More sion of Abraham Lincoln. Birzer in the Twentieth Century is recognized as affirming that religious belief “is a nec- poses the question: “What could the a masterwork of literary criticism, even essary counterpoise to the mutual aid slave-autocrat Calhoun have in com- by those who do not share Kirk’s (and and materialistic greed of the natural mon with the plain Abraham Lincoln, Eliot’s) conservatism. man, and the conservatism­ it inculcates promoter and defender of the aboli- The short-run future of political con- is not the ally of sullen and predatory tionist Thirteenth Amendment?” He servatism in the United States seems privilege but of orderly amelioration.” fails, however, to provide any answer dire; but in the long run, the work of Santayana was a philosophical materi- beyond the enigmatic assertion that Russell Kirk, with its always-relevant alist, but he shared the critique of pop- “Kirk found much to like in each reminders of what he called the “perma- ular liberalism articulated by Babbitt man, for each, from his perspective, nent things,” seems likely to endure. ♦

46 / The Weekly Standard May 30, 2016 can quite catch her out in her deviltry because she is such a master of hewing B&A to the forms. Lady Susan sounds very dark, in the manner of the Marquise de Mer- Manners Makyth Stillman teuil, the antiheroine of Choderlos de Laclos’s great 1782 novel Les Liai- Movies at the intersection of morality and hilarity. sons dangereuses. Like Lady Susan, By John Podhoretz Laclos’s book is an epistolary novel and, indeed, might have served as an inspiration for Austen’s jape. But hit Stillman’s peer- where Laclos sees tragedy in the way less comedies of the Love and Friendship his aristocrats knowingly subvert the Directed by Whit Stillman 1990s—Metropolitan, established social order by using its Barcelona, The Last rules as a weapon against the innocent, DaysW of Disco—feature Americans who Austen finds high, rich, and unsenti- are living in their time but are not really mental comedy. of their time. They are all young people, feel bad while making herself feel very So does Stillman. Love and Friendship but they are not interested in the things good indeed. (After getting caught out in is the funniest movie he has ever made young people were interested in when some misbehavior, Charlotte responds and the most breezily confident. Clock- the movies were made (or, in the case angrily, “Anything I did that was wrong, ing in at a mere 92 minutes, Love and of Disco, in the early 1980s, the time I apologize for. But anything I did Friendship does not dwell on the mag- in which it is set). Their lives revolve that was not wrong, I don’t apologize nificence of its surroundings and its cos- around good breeding, propriety, and for!”) Indeed, the same actress—Kate tuming, like other period pieces. It gets how to behave morally at a time when Beckinsale—plays both parts, and she a move on. there are no agreed-upon moral stric- is as casually magnificent in this pic- Stillman’s brilliance with dialogue tures. Their conversations are variations ture as she was in the earlier one. is demonstrated by the way he fleshes on these themes. Stillman’s heroes want Lady Susan, a newly minted widow out the character of Sir James Martin, to do what’s right, and in each film they whose husband has left her penniless, a rich man whom Lady Susan wishes find themselves outmatched by others wreaks havoc on three households as to pair off with her horrified teenage who are nakedly and unashamedly pur- she wanders about England imposing daughter Frederica. In the book, all suing their own self-interests. on other people while she tries to find a we learn of him is that he is “silly” and Stillman’s movies are so original new financial path for herself. Her great says the same thing many times. Still- because the comedy in them derives joy is in seducing men for sport, through man has written two monologues for a from the dynamic he establishes both her great beauty and her extreme transcendently funny actor named Tom between these two: the earnest and self- cleverness. She disturbs the marriage Bennett laden with ignorance, sole- conscious moralists who are tied up in of the Manwarings at Langford. She cisms, and boneheaded infelicities that knots by their concern for others and moves on to her brother-in-law’s house constitute a high-water mark in the the trickier and more dynamic solipsists at Churchill and sets her cap on his comic portrayal of stupidity on screen. who simply apply themselves to getting brother-in-law, 12 years her junior. I haven’t laughed this hard during a what they want. These are such univer- And in London, Lady Susan’s associa- movie in years. sal concerns that Stillman’s movies have tion with a fellow conniver named Mrs. Stillman also takes a few minutes to not dated at all. They are the only genu- Johnson threatens the latter’s marriage include a peroration by a local curate ine comedies of manners of our age, and of convenience to a gouty, elderly gentle- on the meaning of the commandment that is why they are so beloved. man who refuses to die conveniently, to honor thy father and thy mother—a In his latest film,Love and Friendship, as both Lady Susan and Mrs. Johnson key moment in the film because it is the Stillman reaches back two centuries and most heartily desire. only time in which Lady Susan’s usu- finds in Jane Austen’s little-known Aside from Mrs. Johnson (and the ally successful efforts to twist the mean- and unfinished novellaLady Susan an adulterous Mr. Manwaring), everyone ing of things to her own advantage is eerily perfect piece of source material. in the proceedings is meticulous about countered by true and heartfelt words Austen’s titular character is a Regency behaving properly and with scrupulous of wisdom. Like all his films, Love and version of Charlotte, the gorgeous fidelity to the well-established code of Friendship is, in the end, the work of a underminer who sits at the center of The conduct of the day. It is the particular genuine moralist—but a moralist unsul- Last Days of Disco making other people genius of Lady Susan herself that she lied by didacticism or preachiness and walks the walk and talks the talk while genuinely amused rather than horrified John Podhoretz, editor of Commentary, bending both to her own ends. That she by how difficult people find it simply to is The Weekly Standard’s movie critic. is a devil, there is no doubt; but no one be good. ♦

May 30, 2016 The Weekly Standard / 47 Iss2/Sept27parody 11/12/01 4:45 PM Page 1

“Everybody wants me to run for president.” Parody –Donald Trump, September 14, 1999

REPRINTED FROM OUR ISSUE OF September 27, 1999 1,000th ISSUE

Donald Trump Inaugurated Unveils Plans for New Presidential Mansion shaped,heart-shaped, or in the form or of in a dollar the form of ofseries the Fabulous, of 40-foot a series of 40-footstatues cele- ATLANTICATLANTIC CITY, CITY, Jan. Jan. 20—20— a dollar sign—will rotate, so brating individuals who havesign—will rotate, so that no matter Donald Trump was sworn instatues as celebrating individuals that no matter which way the Donald Trump was sworn in as contributed to American life,which way the guest sleeps, he will president today and immedi-who have contributed to American guest sleeps, he will never be president today and immediately including Siegfried and Roy,never be out of easy visual contact ately unveiled plans to tearlife, including Siegfried and Roy, out of easy visual contact with unveiled plans to tear down the Evander Holyfield, and Charo,with a LeRoy Neiman painting. down the White House and Evander Holyfield, and Charo, the a Leroy Neeman painting. White House and replace it with the spunky Latin nightclub Mr. Clinton will stay on in replace it with somethingspunky Latin nightclub singer. M r. Clinton will stay on in something “classier.” Mr. Trump, singer. “classier.” Mr. Trump, who “Nohad offense, but who ever thethe new new facility facility as greeter as greeterand and who had campaigned for the “No offense, but who ever campaigned for the presidency floorshowfloorshow manager. As a As sign a of sign - heard heardf running of orunning a hotela hotel where - presidencyunder the under misapprehension the misappre respectof respect for the forformer the chief former ex chief youyou havehave only only one onebedroom bedroom to to hensionthat thethat thechief chief executive executive lives in ecutive,executive, President President Trump will not Trump rentrent out out a night?” a night?” Mr. Trump Mr. de - Trump livesthe inU.S. the U.S. Capitol Capitol building,building, was will not force his predecessor clareddeclared in his ininaugural his inauguraladdress, force his predecessor to wear the wasvisibly visibly shaken after after his tour his tour of to wear the new presidential- address, referring to the- new Clin- presidential mansion uni 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue referringlast to the Clintons’ Lin mansion uniforms, which were of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue last tons’ Lincoln Bedroom Bedforms, & which were inspired by week. “He’s going throughcoln Bedroom Bed & Breakfast inspir edy Presidentb Nixon’s week. “He’s going through leop- Breakfast operation. “TherePresident Nixon’s designs for his leopard-skin wallpaper with-operation. “There wasn’t even designs for his White House ard-skin wallpaper withdrawal,” wasn’t even a phone in theWhite House Guards, except with drawal,” a worried Trump aaide phone in the bathroom!” His Guards, except with a rhine- a worried Trump aide revealed at bathroom!” His Donaldness revealed at the time. Donaldness continued. astone-studded rhinestone-studded bustier bustier inin place the Thetime. new presidential home,continued. place of the tunic. AsAs partpart of hisof effort his to effort create a toof create the tunic. whichThe newwill presidential be known home, as the PresidentPresident Trump Trump did interruptdid inter- “kinder,a “kinder, more hospitablemore hospitable nation, na- whichTrump will Presidential be known as the Trump Palace & - hisrupt speech his to speech threaten toa nuclear threaten a withtion, frequent with guest frequent bonus pack guest bonus PresidentialCasino, Palacewill &be Casino, 89 stories will high, nuclear strike on anyone who ages,”packages,” the Trump the PresidentialTrump Presi- strike on anyone who opposed his bebut 89 storiesin the high, shape but in theof shape the Roman opposed his scheme, but he dential Palace will have scheme,897 but he quickly shifted to a Coliseum and covered all- Palacethe will have 897 donor suites, quickly shifted to a more con- of the Roman Coliseum and cov donor suites, each with amore 16- conciliatory mode, offering way around with gold and eachsil- with a 16- foot bathtub placed ciliatory mode, offering all ered all the way around with gold foot bathtub placed strategical-all Americans free vanity license ver mirrors. The crown ofstrategically the under a proscenium Americans free vanity license and silver mirrors. The crown of ly under a proscenium arch building will feature what- arch Pres- and flattering track lighting. the building will feature what Pres and flattering track lighting.DONALDMOBILE, A6, Col. 1 ident Trump has called the SeeSee DONALDMOBILE ,A6, Col. 1 TheThe king-size king-size beds—round, beds—round, heart- identArcade Trump of has the called Fabulous, the Arcade a

SEPTEMBER 27, 1999 “During a question and answer session [at Columbia University], Ahmadinejad appeared tense and unsmiling, in contrast to more Parody relaxed interviews and appearances earlier in the day.” —Associated Press, September 24, 2007

REPRINTED FROM OUR ISSUE OF October 8, 2007 1,000th ISSUE

October 8, 2007 They proclaimed George W. Bush Day in Benin, thronged streets by the tens of thousands in Tanzania and christened the George Bush Parody Motorway in Ghana. As he wrapped up his Africa trip in Liberia on Thursday, they sang about him on the radio, crooning his name and warbling, “Thank you for the peace process.” —Washington Post, February 22, 2008

REPRINTED FROM OUR ISSUE OF 1,000th ISSUE March 10, 2008

March 10, 2008 “The global financial crisis has laid waste to some major banks and other financial institutions in the United States and Europe, but Iceland may be Parody the first country to face the prospect of going bust along with them.” —New York Times, October 8, 2008

REPRINTED FROM OUR ISSUE OF October 20, 2008 1,000th ISSUE

October 20, 2008 “Google Inc. said Chinese hackers targeted the email accounts of senior U.S. officials and hundreds of other prominent people in a PARODY fresh computer attack certain to intensify growing concern about the security of the Internet.” —Wall Street Journal, June 2, 2011

REPRINTED FROM OUR ISSUE OF June 13, 2011 1,000th ISSUE

June 13, 2011 “Suddenly, you find yourself confronting yourself: Gee, I’ve run out of money. I can’t take the money out of my 401(k) that I had before. PARODY What am I gonna do? Am I gonna eat cat food? Am I gonna move in with my kids? Am I gonna commit suicide?”

—Donald G. McNeil Jr., New York Times reporter, on the proposed1,000th Times pensionISSUE freeze

REPRINTED FROM OUR ISSUE OF May 7, 2012

May 7, 2012 “Pope Benedict XVI’s resignation opens the door to an array of possible successors, from the conservative cardinal of Milan to PARODY a contender from Ghana and several Latin Americans.” —Associated Press, February 11, 2013

REPRINTED FROM OUR ISSUE OF February 25, 2013 1,000th ISSUE

February 25, 2013 “Obama Finds He Can’t Put Iraq War Behind Him” —New York Times headline, June 13, 2014 PARODY

1,000th ISSUE REPRINTED FROM OUR ISSUE OF June 30 / July 7, 2014

June 30 / July 7, 2014 “Donald Trump is scheduled to meet here Wednesday with former secretary of state Henry Kissinger. . . . The face-to-face session PARODY comes after weeks of phone conversations between Trump and Kissinger, who was a top adviser to presidents Richard Nixon and Gerald Ford.” —Washington Post, May 16, 2016

May 30, 2016