THE CAUTIONARY TALE OF SAMANTHA POWER BY SETH MANDEL FEBRUARY 2017 Commentary HOW DEMOCRATS WILL TRY TO STOP TRUMP NOAH C. TEVI ROTHMAN TROY on the sudden on bureaucratic rediscovery resistance to of checks and the new Commentary balances president FEBRUARY 2017 FEBRUARY $5.95 US : $7.00 CANADA : VOLUME 143 NUMBER 2 143 : VOLUME ABE GREENWALD on the convenient new disapproval of a make-nice-with-the-bad-guys foreign policy FEBRUARY 2017 COVER.indd 1 1/12/17 2:31 PM At Magen David Adom, we’re often saving lives before our ambulances even arrive. At Magen David Adom, Israel’s national EMS service, help begins the moment the phone is answered. Because we use EMTs to handle calls, they can provide lifesaving instructions while dispatching ambulances and first-responders on Medicycles. And now, with 15,000 CPR-certified civilian Life Guardians joining our team, help can be just seconds away. Your support makes Israel’s premier lifesaving organization even better. Make a gift today. 352 Seventh Avenue, Suite 400 New York, NY 10001 Toll-Free 866.632.2763 • [email protected] www.afmda.org FEBRUARY 2017 COVER.indd 2 1/12/17 2:36 PM ‘Tough Love’—The First and Last Obama Lie WROTE AN ARTICLE in this space six months complete. And, as he had when he began it, in farewell into the Obama presidency entitled “The Turn interview after farewell interview, he characterized his I Against Israel.” It appeared in the July 2009 issue. assault on the legitimacy of the Jewish presence in the These were its concluding paragraphs: Holy Land as an act of tough love. “Friends need to tell “The goal of American foreign policy in the each other the hard truths,” said Secretary of State John Middle East is now the creation of a Palestinian state. Kerry in a speech defending the abstention. Very little will be expected of the Palestinians in the Which raises the key question: Why abstain? creation of that state; Hamas should renounce terror If “hard truths” define friendship, then by all means and recognize Israel, but a failure to do so will not kill they should have made the truths as hard as possible. the deal. Violence should be foresworn, but even that is If Obama and Kerry truly believe the Jewish presence of secondary importance to the state itself. in East Jerusalem is illicit, then they should have voted “A great deal is, however, expected of Israel. for the resolution. Instead, they took the coward’s way Settlements are to be frozen, including their ‘natural out. They opened the vault to the criminals and placed growth.’ Israel must bolster the Palestinian economy, the jewels in their hands while wearing white gloves provide Palestinians with jobs, and so there would be no residual trace make things better in Gaza. Israel is to of their fin erprints. The abstention give; the Palestinians are to receive. Is- was in some weird sense the mark of rael’s giving is to be accompanied by a their bad conscience. They wanted JOHN promise of reduced violence. Palestin- THE EDITORPODHORETZ something to happen while maintain- ian receiving will be accompanied by ing some historical deniability about Israel’s surrender of more territory beyond the entirety their involvement in it. of Gaza and the near-entirety of the West Bank already In the eight years of the Obama presidency, war in Palestinian hands. Israel, the president asserts, will broke out twice between the Palestinians and the Is- be better off if all this happens. Trust him. He’s Israel’s raelis and nearly broke out a third time. In each case, friend. A better friend than anyone else, remember, the issue was not the West Bank, or East Jerusalem, or because he’s willing to be honest about Israel’s need to anything near. The two wars and the third near-war sacrifice itself on the altar of nothing more than a prom- took place in and around Gaza, from which Israel had ise, and maybe not even that. withdrawn unilaterally in 2005—more than three years “And so the turn against Israel that so many pre- before Obama took office. The wars were the result of dicted during the 2008 campaign is coming to pass— aggressions by the terrorist organization Hamas. with a smile, and a nod, and an invocation of a word The idea that the settlements and the Jewish that actually means something very different from presence in East Jerusalem are the main barrier to friendship. It might even mean its opposite.” peace between Israel and the Palestinians was proved The decision in December by President Obama to to be a lie right before Obama’s eyes in 2009, and 2012, abstain on a UN Security Council vote effectively declar- and 2014. And he didn’t care to see it, because he is ing any Jewish presence in East Jerusalem or the West blinded by an antipathy he wishes to ascribe to Israeli Bank a violation of the Fourth Geneva Convention and action when honesty would compel him to find it in his therefore illegal under international law marked the own misguided leftist ideology—or within his own soul. moment he crossed the finish line in the course he had Israel has survived the horrendous blessing of charted from 2008 onward. The turn against Israel was Barack Obama’s false friendship.q Commentary 1 EdLetter.indd 1 1/12/17 2:41 PM February 2017 Vol. 143 : No. 2 Articles Tevi Will There Be an Internal Revolt 12 Troy Against Trump? Of bureaucrats I have known, worked with, and couldn’t fire Noah C. Decisions and Revisions 18 Rothman That a Moment Will Reverse How Democrats and liberals will now say exactly the opposite of what they said during the Obama years. Abe Fair Is Foul and Foul Is Fair 24 Greenwald During the Trump years, expect the left to reverse course on foreign policy. Seth The Cautionary Tale 28 Mandel of Samantha Power Every day she has to wake up knowing she became what she despised. Joseph Hope I Die Before I Get Young 34 Epstein The sixties, forever with us. Contents.indd 2 1/12/17 2:42 PM Politics & Ideas Ronald Moral Equivalence Run Amok 39 Radosh Bad Moon Rising, by Arthur M. Eckstein John Dispelling the Myths 42 Steele The Upside of Inequality, by Edward Conard Gordon Naomi We See You 44 Schaefer Riley The Attention Merchants, by Tim Wu Daniel A Party of One 46 DiSalvo When Ideas Mattered: A Nathan Glazer Reader, Edited by Joseph Dorman and Leslie Lenkowsky Culture & Civilization Terry The Darkness of Hank Williams 49 Teachout Hillbilly Elegist. Jonathan S. A False Theatrical Peace 52 Tobin Oslo in New York. Matthew Mediacracy: 55 Continetti Twilight of the Narratives From the Editor 1 The Way We Live Now, by Christine Rosen 4 In the Future, Everyone Will Be Dead for 15 Minutes Letters 6 Letter from Washington, by Andrew Ferguson ‘Everybody Says How Cool I Am’ 9 Contents.indd 3 1/12/17 2:42 PM In the Future, Everyone Will Be Dead for 15 Minutes URING THE LAST FEW WEEKS of 2016, some thus altered our standards for judging fame. Today, when celebrities died. Every year celebrities die, of Kim Kardashian catches a cold, we read about it; when D course, but for some reason the deaths of the a contestant who lost on Survivor: Gabon ten years ago pop singer George Michael, the actress Carrie Fisher, dies unexpectedly, the tabloids carry the story right next and Fisher’s mother, Debbie Reynolds, was a trifecta too to news of the latest terrorist attack. crushing for humanity to bear. Soon, #f—k2016 It seems that although we know intuitively was trending on Twitter as people ex- that death is the great leveler and that no pressed their disbelief and sadness at THE WAY number of sycophants in your entou- the death of so many beloved famous rage or followers on Twitter or plastic people, as well as a more general dis- We Live Now surgeons on speed dial can prevent gust for the year that had just elapsed. CHRISTINE ROSEN it, we believe that celebrities are im- A panicky South Carolina man even mune to it. Our worship of fame has launched a GoFundMe page to “Help Pro- always been in part an envy of the wealth tect Betty White from 2016,” which raised $2,000 to and control that the famous supposedly enjoy. With keep the Grim Reaper from slaying the beloved Golden social media granting us real-time access to the lives Girl. (On the advice of Ms. White, who remains alive and of celebrities, and on-demand entertainment services well at age 94, he donated the money to charity.) that provide an endless library of actors’ past film and Why has the reaction to celebrity death become TV shows, our celebrities (even our B- and C-list celebri- more intense and more personalized in recent years? ties) seem always and ever available to us and immune More often than not, people act as if the loss of a 1980s to the ravages of aging. No wonder their deaths take us pop icon or an aging movie star is a personal affront and by surprise. feel moved to proclaim their grief on social media in ways Never mind that this conceit allows us to avoid that previous generations would have found maudlin some uncomfortable truths about our heroes, such as and embarrassing. the fact that many of the celebrities who died “too soon” One reason might be the simple fact that there are in 2016 (Prince, David Bowie, Fisher, Michael) had been too many celebrities.