Nicholas Quinn Rosenkranz: The Threat to Free Speech – Commentary Magazine

How to make enemies and alienate others.

On Thursday, the progressive left treated itself to an orgiastic display of self-destruction. In the name of opposing all that Donald Trump deigns to grace with his favor, American progressives found themselves attacking Bill Clintons brand of centrist politics, defendingwoefully misunderstoodcalls for jihad, and dismissing unqualified praise for the West as racially suspect.

Democrats lashed out at former Clinton Strategist Mark Penn on Thursday for recommending that the Democratic Party rediscover its respect for Christians and working-class Trump voters and embrace fiscal conservatism. The nearly unanimous response from the activist left was to dismiss this sage advice. The administration that he served in locked up more black, African-American men than those enslaved in 1850, said former Bernie Sanders campaign staffer Tezlyn Figar. Nostalgia for the 1990s may be politically potent, but it is also very un-woke.

When members of the left werent attacking one of the Democratic Partys most popular figures, they were defending the word jihad and its champion, Womens March organizer Linda Sarsour. In a speech to the Islamic Society of North America over the weekend, the Muslim liberal activist said it is her hope that Allah accepts from us that as a form of jihad.we stand up to those who oppress our communities. Sarsour defined the term as a word of truth in front of a tyrant ruler or leader, though any sentient being knows that her interpretation is subject to much debate in the Muslim world. She added that it is her hope that the Muslim community would be perpetually outraged and that their first priority should not be to assimilate or please any other people and authority.

Naturally, the story of a Muslim activist whos embraced by mainstream Democratic outfits while calling for a form of jihad against the president wasnt treated as the real story. The Republican reaction to the story was the story. Muslim activist Linda Sarsours reference to jihad draws conservative wrath, read the Washington Posts headline. Right-Wing Outlets Read Violence into Sarsours Anti-Trump Jihad, declared the Daily Beast. The people disagreeing with @lsarsour clearly dont understand what Jihad means, wrote Temple University professor Marc Lamont Hill, who was quoted favorably in Timemagazine. Of course, Sarsour was not inciting violence, but her liberal allies now appear committed to explaining why this is not a pipe.

Among Thursdays tiresome outrages, perhaps none was more destructive to the progressive lefts general allure than the liberal reaction to Donald Trumps speech in Poland. It was, perhaps, the most classically liberal and historically erudite speech that Donald Trump has ever made. It praised Western values, heritage, and achievement without qualification. For the left, however, adoration for the West undiluted by apologetics for racism, bigotry, and colonial subjugation is not just a display of ignorance. It might as well be an endorsement of those evils.

It wasnt just Trumps praise for Western achievement that was deemed a display of subtle racism, although it did not escape that censure from the lefts cultural arbiters. It was also his warnings about the threats facing the West: We must work together to confront forces, Trump said, that threaten over time to undermine these values and erase bonds of culture, faith, and tradition that make us who we are. Trump added: Do we have the desire and courage to preserve our civilization in the face of those who would subvert and destroy it?

Because this speech was drafted by anti-immigration activist Stephen Miller, among others, these lines certainly referred not just to threats from without, such as those presented by a revanchist Russia and Islamist radicalism, but also those within, such as the influx of refugees from the Muslim world into Europe. That paranoia can be toxic, and it merits skepticism. But praising the West, the Enlightenment to which it gave birth, and the standards of prosperity, tolerance, and civilization that typify it is not insidious in the slightest. To suggest otherwise is histrionic. Guess how the progressive left reacted to Trumps speech?

The West is not an ideological or economic term, wrote theAtlantics Peter Beinart. The West is a racial and religious term. The south and east only threaten the Wests survival if you see non-white, non-Christian immigrants as invaders, Beinart insisted. They only threaten the Wests survival if by West you mean white, Christian hegemony. This is true only if we accept Beinarts premise; that the West is only a racial and religious affiliation and not a set of political traditions. If we see the West as a champion of individual liberty, freedom of worship, reason and rationality, and republican governancenot to mention a bulwark against the forces of reaction, totalitarianism, and theocracyBeinarts definition is both narrow and incoherent.

That incoherence didnt stop the progressive left from joining him. President Donald Trump issued a battle cryfor family, for freedom, for country, and for God, wrote Vox.coms Sarah Wildman, in a speech that often resorted to rhetorical conceits typically used by the European and American alt-right. Imagine being a political writer in this moment and being utterly unable to identify clear white nationalist dog whistles, wrote CBS News political analyst and Slate correspondent Jamelle Bouie. [Y]ou dont have to have a deep familiarity with the tropes of white supremacy to see this s*** for what it clearly is.

Attacking centrist politics, criticizing those who react negatively to the liberal rejection of assimilation and endorsement of jihad, and declaring that praise for the West is a form of veiled racism; these are odd ways to go about making friends and allies. The progressive wing of the party appears determined to swell the ranks of their opposition, if only by defining their opposition in absurdly broad terms. If the progressive left was actively trying to alienate its potential supporters and marginalize itself, what would it do differently?

The mask falls off "anti-Zionism."

The 75,000 strong Mennonite Church-USA has joined a few other church organizations in voting to divest from companies profiting from the occupation. They seem rather proud of themselves for having chosen a third way.

What this means in the resolutions terms is that the Mennonites will admit complicity in anti-Semitism and also admit complicity in Israels activities in the West Bank. They will form committees to navel-gaze concerning the first problem and single out Israel for economic punishment to deal with the second.

Whats shocking about this resolution, which Church leaders boast is the work of two years of study, is that it treats anti-Semitism and Israels presence in the West Bank as equivalent crimes. The Mennonites will resolve to avoid both! Although the drafters of the resolution acknowledged that Palestinians have turned to violence, they have evidently done so only to achieve security and seek their freedom. In spite of the resolutions hand-wringing concerning anti-Semitism, there is not a word about Palestinian anti-Semitism and the role it has played in frustrating peace efforts in the region.

Nor are these peace efforts the subject of any reflection in the resolution. As far as the drafters are concerned, the Israelis marched into the West Bank in 1967who can say why?and have doggedly continued there, even though they could easily withdraw. The resolution recognizes that Israelis feel threatened but not that they actually are threatened. Indeed, that Israelis feel threatened is treated as evidence that security walls and other measures Israelis have taken for their security have been useless. It is hard to believe that intelligent and well-meaning people justify serious actions on so flimsy a basis, as if the ongoing need for security suggests that one ought to lay down ones arms. But the Mennonite Church takes no risk, so they can afford to be frivolous about serious matters.

Apart from singling out the Jewish state for singular punishment, the Mennonites are studiously neutral. Somehow in their years of study, they missed that the Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) movement endorsed in 2015 an ongoing, youth-led Palestinian uprising whose weapon of choice at that time was the knife. There can be no excuse for not knowing this and therefore no excuse for simply noting, concerning BDS that there are vigorous critics of BDS who raise a range of concerns as well as groups who support BDS as a nonviolent alternative to violent liberation efforts.

Of course, some of those critics point out that BDS has at best cheered on anti-Semitism. But the Mennonites, though they are in bed with BDS-supporting Jewish Voice for Peace, see no need to get to the bottom of it. Their affectation of neutrality here means that they simply dont care about the consequences of working hand-in-glove with a movement that, while it claims to be nonviolent, is effectively the propaganda wing of the violent resistance.

The Mennonites also studiously avoid taking a position on whether a majority Jewish state should exist at all. On the matter of a two-state or one-state solutionthe latter of which means that Jews will be a minority everywhere in the worldthat should be left up to Israeli and Palestinian people. Sure, the end of the Jewish state in the Middle East would leave Jews defenseless in a region teeming with anti-Semitism, but not to worry. The Mennonites have already raised seed money and initiated plans for several conferences in the next biennium on topics including Mennonite involvement in the Holocaust and how we read scripture in light of the Holocaust. They will make up for their blithe indifference to the fate of Jews today by conferencing, and maybe even shedding a few golden tears, about the fate of Jews last century.

The resolution has called on Mennonites to cultivate relationships with Jewish representatives and bodies in the U.S. I will leave it to knowers of the Torah to say whether we are required to associate with a small group of morally obtuse, self-righteous preeners. But if it were left up to me, I would tell them to go to hell.

Is the Trump era a blip or a realignment?

Political media has a bias toward covering the powerful and, at the moment, Democrats are anything but powerful. The intramural debate over how Democrats should navigate the post-Obama environment is, however, far livelier than the presss utter indifference would suggest.

The partisan liberals engaged in deliberations over how the Democratic Party will evolve in the age of Trump have settled into two camps: those who think the party has to change and those who dont. This observation can only be made from the proper remove, it seems. Both the progressive wing and its triangulating centrists are dead certain that the other guy is in full control of the party they call home.

In the opinion pages of the New York Times, Democratic strategist Mark Penn and Manhattan Borough President Andrew Stein offer up a rallying cry for those in the change camp. They argue that the party must adapt to a political environment in which their voters are being poached by a GOP that is no longer a monolithically conservative party. The authors claim that this mission will only succeed if Democrats abandon the hardline progressivism that typified the party in the Obama years.

Their argument takes aim at identity liberalism and the leftist activists who dominate the caucus process. They contend that Democrats need to combat campus speech policing, shun free trade, demonstrate renewed respect for Christians, and embrace fiscal responsibility over profligacy. Only by resurrecting the spirit of the Democratic Leadership Council can Democrats wash the stink off their partys brand.

This salvo was aimed squarely at modern liberal orthodoxy, and progressivisms patriarchs recognize heresy when they see it. Papa needs a new contract! mocked MSNBC host Joy Reid. Rolling out Mark Penn to voice the last dying screeches of the Clintonite center-left is fitting, said The Young Turks correspondent Mark Tracey. Thank you, Mark Penn, for giving liberals [and] leftists something to unite over, wrote liberal author Jill Filipovic. That Dems should do none of this.

It is hardly surprising that progressives would resist a total repudiation of the progressive program. They believe themselves to be the perpetual opposition within a party that already thinks like Penn and Stein suggest it should. The current model and the current strategy of the Democratic Party is an absolute failure, declared Bernie Sanders. The irony of this coming from the Democratic Partys chief attractiona septuagenarian who pointedly refuses to call himself a Democratis under-appreciated.

Sanderss model appeals to what the New York Times dubbed the partys ascendant militant wing. That is not an agenda for the middle of the country but for the coasts and urban enclaves, which can theoretically overwhelm the GOPs suburban vote. That agenda can be summed up in one word: spending. Universal, state-funded health care; free college tuition; tax speculation on Wall Street; expand access to Social Security; cure diseases like HIV/AIDS; and climate justice toward a sustainable economy, whatever that means.

This tension between the partys two halves has been out in the open for months. It led to real and sustained conflict in battles ranging from the fight over the next chair of the Democratic National Committee to special election primaries. It was evident in the partys efforts to mimic the GOP, from former Governor Steve Beshears folksy response to Donald Trumps address to Congress to Democrats unprecedented and reflexive hostility toward even innocuous Trump appointments.

Following a dispiriting loss in Georgia, Democratic elected officials briefly resolved to do somethinganythingto demonstrate that their party was receptive to the electorates repeated votes of no confidence. That sentiment was short lived. The Democratic Partys approach to the Trump environment was perhaps best summarized by the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committees latest attempt at a slogan: I mean, have you seen the other guys?

Americas two political parties have endured feast and famine before and emerged stronger for it. The Democrats present identity crisis isnt exactly unknown territory, but that should be cold comfort.

In October of 1982, the Democratic Party appeared hollow and its program stale. Of a sudden, wrote Daniel Patrick Moynihan in 1980, the GOP has become the party of ideas. That year, the GOP won the White House, 34 seats in the House, and 12 in the Senate. With a month to go before Reagans first midterm and despite a stalled economic recovery and mounting unemployment, Democrats were still anxious about their failure to meet the moment.

Were still the party of Tip ONeill and Jimmy Carter, said the depressed Democratic consultant Joe Rothstein. Washington Post editor Robert Kaiser observed that the Democratic Party, once the party of the little guy, had become captured by lawyers, corporatists, and activist minorities. Democrats rebounded some in November of that year, but they did not fully recover in Congress until Reagans second midterm election.

The early 1980s represented a period of political realignment, but that was only obvious in retrospect. And Democrats did eventually meet that moment, but it took a decade and the emergence of a Southern, centrist governor to do it.

Were the GOPs victories in the Obama years merely a reaction to his presidency, or has the earth shifted under Democratic feet? Democrats havent even asked the question. Perhaps they dont want to know the answer.

Only one Trump is the real Trump.

What is more revealing of a president? His extemporaneous and unguarded thoughts or his vetted, polished statements? Donald Trump, the man and his administration, must be taken whole. When it comes to Americas relationship with Russia, this is an administration devoted to sending dangerously mixed signals.

On Thursday, in a speech in Poland delivered ahead of the G20 summit, Trump cast himself as the latest in a line of American presidents who dedicated themselves to the defense of liberty. The president touted the Wests virtuous intellectual and political traditions, and he did so without any of the self-conscious apologetics that Western elites seem to think marks a man of intellect. We put faith and family, not government and bureaucracy, at the center of our lives, the president declared. He quoted Pope John Paul IIs 1979 address to the Polish people who, when laboring under the stifling Marxist secularism, observed that the people of America and Europe still cry out, We want God.

Not only did Trump defend the Western worlds intellectual heritage, he championed its right to defend itself against the chief threat to its interests in Europe: Russia. Trump demanded that Moscow put a halt to destabilizing activities in Ukraine and end its support for hostile regimes, including those in Iran and Syria. He explicitly stated his intention to honor the Atlantic Alliances mutual defense provisionssomething he has so far been reluctant to do. Moreover, Trump drew a parallel to the threats Russia poses to Europe todayand Poland specificallyand those they presented in the past under the former Soviet Union. The Soviets, he noted, tried to destroy this nation forever by shattering its will to survive.

The Trump administration has backed this rhetoric up with action. Earlier this week, Trump agreed to provide Warsaw with sophisticated anti-missile batteriesreaffirming a commitment made to Poland and the Czech Republic by George W. Bush. Contrary to the protestations of the Obama administration that put a halt to that agreement, the reversal of that commitment was seen both in Central Europe and Moscow as deference to the Russian claim that ABM technology was destabilizing. The Trump administration has also begun shipments of liquid natural gas to Poland, the first of which arrived last month. This reduces Europes compromising dependence on Russian energy imports.

These policies dovetail with the Trump administrations refusal to reduce the burden of Obama-era sanctions on Russia until Moscow withdraws its forces from the territory it occupies in Ukraine. If the Trump administration was expected to go soft on Russia, it has not lived up to its expectations.

This Donald Trump is, however, at war with another Donald Trumpthe Donald Trump who speaks from the heart and without a script. That Donald Trump is conspicuously deferential toward Moscow and well-versed on Russian interests. If President Trump is poised to defend the West against the threats it faces from traditional adversaries like those in the Kremlin, he will only say so when those words are the words on the teleprompter.

Before his speech on Thursday, Donald Trump was asked why he is so reluctant to call out Moscow for its efforts to intervene in the 2016 presidential election even though he believes those hacks of private American political institutions were Russian in origin. I think it was Russia, and it could have been other people in other countries, Trump said. He conceded that several of Americas intelligence agenciesthe FBI, CIA, the National Security Agency, and the Office of the Director of National Intelligenceconcluded that the Russian government orchestrated an influence campaign, including cyber espionage operations, designed to influence the course of American political events. And while he said the history of the run-up to the Iraq War ensured that everyone should be cautious about intelligence estimates, Trump proceeded to scold his predecessor for failing to respond forcefully to Russian meddling.

In Trumps view, Russia is responsible for an attack on American sovereignty, his predecessor choked when confronted with this assault, and he is prepared to ratify that choke as official American policy by declining to rectify what he regards as Obamas mistake. Good luck squaring that circular logic.

There is a charitable line of argument that suggests Trump is averse to attacking Russia for meddling in the 2016 election because it undermines his legitimacy as president. That line does not, however, explain why the president was so observant of Russian interests and disinclined to criticize Vladimir Putin over the course of the 2016 campaign.

In the summer of last year, Trump told the New York Timesthat he may not respond to an attack by Russia on a NATO ally in the Baltics, such as Estonia, because those countries arent paying their bills. Never mind that Estonia was one of only five NATO allies that did meet the alliances defense-spending requirements. Trump endorsed Russias military intervention in Syria as an operation aimed at terrorist elements like ISIS, even though Russia spent most of its energies attacking U.S. supported anti-Assad rebels and neutralizing British and American covert facilities.

When confronted by the fact that Putin presides over a regime in which journalists and opposition figures have a habit of dying violent deaths, Trump replied as a candidate: I think our country does plenty of killing. He reprised the line as the president. There are a lot of killers. Weve got a lot of killers, he told Fox News in February. What, you think our country is so innocent? As a candidate, Trump surrounded himself with figures with ties to pro-Putin elements in Moscow. That indiscretion has led to a series of congressional and Justice Department investigations into that campaign, which saps this administration of authority.

These two Donald Trumps are reconcilable, but only with the understanding that the real Donald Trump is the guy without a Teleprompter in front of him. Its only modestly reassuring that the administration he runs does not appear to share his persuasion. Trumps speechwriters and political appointees arent the president. When the crisis comes, it will be the true Donald Trump who determines the course of history.

From the July/August COMMENTARY symposium.

The following is an excerpt from COMMENTARYs symposium on the threat to free speech:

Speech is under threat on American campuses as never before. Censorship in various forms is on the rise. And this year, the threat to free speech on campus took an even darker turn, toward actual violence. The prospect of Milo Yiannopoulos speaking at Berkeley provoked riots that caused more than $100,000 worth of property damage on the campus. The prospect of Charles Murray speaking at Middlebury led to a riot that put a liberal professor in the hospital with a concussion. Ann Coulters speech at Berkeley was cancelled after the university determined that none of the appropriate venues could be protected from known security threats on the date in question.

The free-speech crisis on campus is caused, at least in part, by a more insidious campus pathology: the almost complete lack of intellectual diversity on elite university faculties. At Yale, for example, the number of registered Republicans in the economics department is zero; in the psychology department, there is one. Overall, there are 4,410 faculty members at Yale, and the total number of those who donated to a Republican candidate during the 2016 primaries was three.

So when todays students purport to feel unsafe at the mere prospect of a conservative speaker on campus, it may be easy to mock them as delicate snowflakes, but in one sense, their reaction is understandable: If students are shocked at the prospect of a Republican behind a university podium, perhaps it is because many of them have never before laid eyes on one.

To see the connection between free speech and intellectual diversity, consider the recent commencement speech of Harvard President Drew Gilpin Faust:

Universities must be places open to the kind of debate that can change ideas.Silencing ideas or basking in intellectual orthodoxy independent of facts and evidence impedes our access to new and better ideas, and it inhibits a full and considered rejection of bad ones....We must work to ensure that universities do not become bubbles isolated from the concerns and discourse of the society that surrounds them. Universities must model a commitment to the notion that truth cannot simply be claimed, but must be establishedestablished through reasoned argument, assessment, and even sometimes uncomfortable challenges that provide the foundation for truth.

Faust is exactly right. But, alas, her commencement audience might be forgiven a certain skepticism. After all, the number of registered Republicans in several departments at Harvarde.g., history and psychologyis exactly zero. In those departments, the professors themselves may be basking in intellectual orthodoxy without ever facing uncomfortable challenges. This may help explain why some students will do everything in their power to keep conservative speakers off campus: They notice that faculty hiring committees seem to do exactly the same thing.

In short, it is a promising sign that true liberal academics like Faust have started speaking eloquently about the crucial importance of civil, reasoned disagreement. But they will be more convincing on this point when they hire a few colleagues with whom they actually disagree.

Read the entire symposium on the threat to free speech in the July/August issue of COMMENTARY here.

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Nicholas Quinn Rosenkranz: The Threat to Free Speech - Commentary Magazine