Culture Wars Nearly Lost, Buchanan Warns

WASHINGTON – "Americans who look on this cultural revolution as politics as usual do not understand it,” Pat Buchanan writes in his new book, "The Death of the West .”

Those who seek to de-Christianize America, and who seek to demonize America’s heroes, trash our history and condemn our folk ways are not just presenting another "political opinion.” These people, or at least those who presume to speak for them, are revolutionaries.

Buchanan quotes that "budding social revolutionary Adolf Hitler” as saying, "Strength lies not in defense, but in attack.”

We used to think the only people within our borders who would tear down our country carried Communist Party cards or sported a long line of communist-front affiliations. Not so, although there’s a little overlap amongst a few of the older present-day revolutionaries. But this is the counterculture of the 1960s taking off where Lenin’s failed revolution left off.

"We will steal your children!” the '60s radicals howled at Middle America. "They did,” Buchanan says.

A whole generation has now grown up for whom the cultural revolution is no revolution at all, says the author, "but a culture they were born into and have known all their lives. Public homosexuality, pornography, abortion, trash talk on TV and in the movies, and filthy lyrics in popular music have been around since before they can remember.”

During the Hitler-Stalin war of 1939-1945, there were plenty of documentaries showing how Nazi Germany was aiming its propaganda at the children because it believed if it could control the children, it would control the future. But we could not imagine that it could happen here.

The cultural revolution cannot be appeased, warns the author. "Its relentless, reckless use of terms like extremist, sexist, homophobe, nativist, xenophobe, fascist, and Nazi testifies to how seriously it takes the struggle and how it views those who resist. To true believers in the revolution, the Right is not just wrong; the Right is evil.”

No person of good will enjoys being demonized night after night on television. No one wants to be branded as "insensitive," "mean-spirited,” or any of the other trigger words hurled at Middle America. So the party of Middle America seeks to emphasize that it too is "compassionate,” that it too believes in "the politics of inclusion.”

Of course, there is nothing wrong with "compassionate conservatism.” But there are those who would argue that compassion is the very essence of conservatism, as Ronald Reagan clearly showed when he pursued policies that created 20 million jobs and brought down the "Evil Empire.” What could be more "compassionate” than that?

As for America’s past, this from Buchanan: "Western Man was one of the many villains, but Western Man was also the only hero. For the West did not invent slavery, but it alone abolished slavery.” Again, what could be more "compassionate” than that?

"The intimidators failed with Clarence Thomas but succeeded with some conservatives who, like defeated peoples, no longer make demands. They just want to get along. But, in a culture war, where the other side is always making demands, and the other side is always ready to fight, this translates into endless retreats and eventual defeat.”

Buchanan’s prescription for the GOP’s political success? "Go hunting where the ducks are.” If the Republicans can raise their share of the vote by appealing to their base, he says, the GOP can regain its majority.

The bottom line: "If the GOP would come out for an end to the racial preferences and a moratorium on immigration, and appeal to the great silent majority, as Democrats appeal to minorities, the party’s chances in national elections could not but improve.”

And just in case anyone missed the point, there is this warning: "The Gore-Nader three-million-vote margin over Bush-Cheney may be the last wake-up call the Republican party will receive.”

Buchanan quotes that "budding social revolutionary Adolf Hitler” as saying, "Strength lies not in defense, but in attack.”

"We will steal your children!” the '60s radicals howled at Middle America. "They did,” Buchanan says.

And just in case anyone missed the point, there is this warning: "The Gore-Nader three-million-vote margin over Bush-Cheney may be the last wake-up call the Republican party will receive.”

The culture war IS lost -- pre-1960s US culture is gone, never to return.

BUT -- this modern culture too shall pass.

New cultures always arise. If conservatives want a say in the culture of 2020, now is the time to cut back on the activism and boycotts, and instead start a band, act, write, produce films, plays, CDs. To forget about "saving" an already dead past, and work on creating a new future.

You can't fight something with nothing. The future culture belongs to those who BUILD it, for better or worse.

Stop whining, and start building.

While Pat as the messenger became totally flawed IMO, at times his message rings loud with clarity. Of course he and this author are correct about the cultural revolution. I am not sure that mainstream conservatives will or can accept the premise herein, as the extreme right wing, hate element, scares most of them into disassociating themselves from the ideas in an attempt to distance themselves from the "neo nazi" messangers that trumpet those same ideas.

The author said it best: "No person of good will enjoys being demonized night after night on television. No one wants to be branded as "insensitive," "mean-spirited,” or any of the other trigger words hurled at Middle America. So the party of Middle America seeks to emphasize that it too is "compassionate,” that it too believes in "the politics of inclusion.” "

Unfortunately, we fall into the very trap that was set for us by the 60's cultural revolutionaries in the first place. We really are "slouching towards Gomorra".

As for America’s past, this from Buchanan: "Western Man was one of the many villains, but Western Man was also the only hero. For the West did not invent slavery, but it alone abolished slavery.”

I think this point needs to be made much more often. Our culture may not be perfect, but it sure beats any other one.

Poor Pat, no matter how often and eloquently he tells the "truth," the American people can no longer recognize the truth. He is too far above the heads of the people; yet he is the most populist person in American politics! I think America's love affair with "dumbed-down" education has guaranteed liberal success forever. Pat makes a great point that if the Nader vote were added to the Gore vote, Gore would have been declared a six-point winner! And Gore would be on his way to recementing the Democrat base where it could not be disassembled in the future.

Oh, excellent post. Excellent. But keep in mind that Pat's, what, 62 now? Odds are, he won't be around in 2020.

Pat's old, and bitter. "These kids today," is essentially the thrust of his book, summed up in three words or less. It's over, it's lost, the past is gone, gone, gone.

Sorry, who cares? There's work to be done for the future, as you put it so well.

It must really suck to be old and bitter. I'd like to see myself as old and satisfied somewhere down the road, not as a 60-something Cassandra ;)

What bothers me is that I'm 40, and I've been hearing these complaints for 25 years.

25 years ago, most of my fellow conservatives were "activists" and YAFers who ignored the arts.

25 years ago I was telling them to join and participate in the arts.

And 25 years later, it seems nothing has changed. College age YAFers still whine about the arts, and giggle and smirk over their "victories" with their dittohead websites and phone calls to talk radio. Maybe they'll start a campus paper. But it's just spouting opinions, not really creating.

Meanwhile, young liberals act, write, start a band, make films, et al. They engage and entertain apolitical, moderate Americans, creating art that sells their culture between the lines. Liberal, but not so that you can clearly put your finger on it.

Mike Medved said he thinks the arts are dominated by the Left, partly because conservatives, when they graduate college, concentrate on careers and family, while Leftists are willing to make the sacrifice of doing without while they pursue the arts -- a field with little security, and in which one cannot raise a family.

Medved may be right.

Great post. I have been using a slightly different expression for the same thing. Those who can paint the future will own it. The future will not look like now. It will not look like the 1950s. It will look like whatever we make it.

Every immigrant wants the same thing we do. If we can show them how to obtain it they will follow us through hell to get there. Who would you rather have on our side, some slack jawed punk with a nose ring and orange hair or some brown skinned young father who just walked 400 miles through burning deserts for a chance to be an American? The choice ought to be easy.

There have been movies like "Top Gun" which would have been laughed at in 1969; in the 1980's there were television shows like "Tour of Duty" that did not depict every soldier in Vietnam as a baby killer; and just a few short years ago, "Pride and Prejudice" was all the rage. We still have the video, and all the women I know love it. Tom Clancy's novels were bestsellers and the movies made from them made hundreds of millions. All of these productions had their day in the sun, so it's not that a few people aren't trying.

The problem is the critical savagery they face (P&P excluded). Mel Gibson made "The Patriot" and you would have thought that he made a homage to the SS from the BS that was printed about it(Buchanan talks about it in his book). I thought it was a great movie, and so did a lot of other people. But the attacks were ridiculous.

Remember that any script has to be accepted by reviewers and producers who are the worst of the worst. Try pushing a script with an implicit pro-family, anti-gay message. The reviewer will call his boyfriend and tell him how awful his day has been what with these nasty people trying to get him to produce these ugly things. So, maybe people are trying, they just can't get past the gatekeepers....unless you're Mel.

I think this point needs to be made much more often.

I'm afraid that both Pat and you are wrong on this account. Ancient China abolished slavery near the end the Warring States period (771 - 221 BC).

Ancient China abolished slavery near the end the Warring States period (771 - 221 BC).

You may be right. My knowledge of ancient China isn't the greatest.

But in modern times, America is getting a lot of flack for once having had slaves, some time ago. Other countries still have slavery, and practice it right now, when we started dealing with the situation over 100 years ago.

Are there still problems in the U.S.? Yes, but overall, our society doesn't condone or formalize the situation - unlike other countries and societies throughout the world. Therefore, compared to those other countries, America is well ahead on the issue of slavery. "First," in other words.

Yes, but that would be far to difficult, it would involve work, perhaps some original thinking, more than speech writing and such anyway. A far easier to build yourself a bitter pyre and burn upon it, you know, bemoaning our failure, eternal failure it seems to some, yes, yes, all is lost, forever! The West, Christianity, Freedom, gone! destroyed! forever! It is all fallen into fate! Doom, doom! Drive out the outsiders perhaps, drive out those fiends, no matter how many may yet exist, we must save the remnants. But no! All is doomed! Strive we may, but in vain!

As such is far to many's attitudes and thoughts-but can we really believe that the West-and Christianity-will fail, will fall so easily, if at all? Can we believe it must be so, with little change? Nay, I like your attitude, rebuild upon what is fallen, refurbish the great ideals and beliefs-they have not faded away forever: they have survived, will survive. Christianity is not dead, will not die, it will prevail until the end of the age. And these days are not some dismal end of the Church, for certain, and I do not think it is the end of the West either. The West has survived for thousands of years, it will survive yet. Perhaps a new Dark Age is falling, perhaps not, but I do not yet see the end. But alas, such words do not go far in selling books or working up a crowd!

Buchanan's scare mongering completely ignores the fact that: (1) a new wave of minorities and immigrants have rescued this nation from financial and spiritual bankruptcy approximately every 40 years since its inception; (2) this nation is, and always has been, an amalgamation of different cultures and races, in order to become "one nation" (ever had Chinese food?); (3) what about the "death of the American Indian?"; and (4) Most immigrants do come here to become Americans, but are quickly reviled and rejected by many Americans, and made to feel unwelcome or unappreciated. This happened to the Irish, the Germans, the European Jews, the Italians, the Greeks, the Turks, the Chinese, the Indians, the French, the Mexicans, the South Americans, and just about everyone else.

Since my parents came over here on the Mayflower in 1637, (John & Dorothy of Ipswich, on "The Rose," April 8th, 1637) do I have the right to tell each and every person on this board, or Pat Buchanan, for that matter (whose family actually came here in the mid 1800s from Ireland and Scotland) to pack up and leave?

The fact of the matter is that every successive wave of immigrants has made me and my family, richer and more succesful, and has further entrenched us here in the USA.

If these immigrants didn't start coming since the 1600s, I have no doubt that this country would not be the international and domestic success story that it is today. No doubt whatsoever.

Amen.

The fact of the matter is that every successive wave of immigrants has made me and my family, richer and more succesful, and has further entrenched us here in the USA.

How are they making you richer? Are you hiring them off the street and paying them crappy wages....now there's something to boast about.

If these immigrants didn't start coming since the 1600s, I have no doubt that this country would not be the international and domestic success story that it is today. No doubt whatsoever.

Where do you live B_C? LA-LA LAND? Illegal immigrants are marching over the southern border like fire ants headed for a french fry. As nice and as sincere these illegals may be, they aren't building any railroads and they aren't learning any english. Here is what they are doing: raising my taxes, raising my health insurance costs, causing kaos in the schools, not paying any taxes themselves, sending any money they make back to Mexico, having a ton of kids and raising them on welfare, costing the southern states tons of money to 'protect' the border....etc and etc.

"The fact of the matter is that every successive wave of immigrants has made me and my family, richer and more successful, and has further entrenched us here in the USA. "

BUT...In the past immigration was controlled and generally brought in the skills and manpower needed.

Now there is no discrimination . As though anyone and everyone has the right and OK to come in. We don't want to do away with immigration. Simply make it more discriminatory.

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