thebulwark--2020-06-27--John Bolton’s Contribution to ‘America First’

“ A disgruntled boring fool who only wanted to go to war.
” This is how President Trump recently described former National Security Advisor John Bolton , whose book The Room Where It Happened : A White House Memoir has managed to snatch headlines amid the worst civil unrest in the United States in decades , a pandemic that has left more than 120,000 Americans dead , and an economic crisis worse than anything since the Great Depression .
And no wonder : Even after years of desensitization to Trump , the book contains a series of claims that still @ @ @ @ @ @ @ promised to “ take care ” of an investigation into a Trukish state-owned bank that was suspected of evading sanctions on Iran .
He made a similar promise to the Chinese telecom firm ZTE , and pleaded with Chinese president Xi Jinping to buy American agricultural products in a quest to help him win reelection .
He told Xi that the two-term presidential limit should be lifted for him ( Trump , not Xi ) , and expressed his approval for the concentration camps in which more than a million Uighurs are being @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Trump launches his predictable volley of insults and accusations at Bolton ( his M.O .
for any former administration official who speaks out against him ) , it ’ s important to take a look at how he ’ s going after a man he hand-picked to advise him on national security .
Trump ’ s most aggressive criticism of Bolton has focused on his hawkishness : Beyond arguing that Bolton “ only wanted to go to war , ” Trump lambasted him for suggesting that the United States should consider a military @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Wacko John Bolton went on Deface the Nation and so stupidly said that he looked at the ‘ Libyan Model ’ for North Korea , ” Trump taunted , “ all hell broke out.
” This concern about bellicose language is extraordinary coming from a president who threatened North Korea with “ fire and fury like the world has never seen , ” but it raises a question : Why did Trump hire Bolton in the first place ?
Bolton ’ s hawkishness couldn ’ t have come as a surprise to Trump @ @ @ @ @ @ @ May 2019 profile of Bolton for the New Yorker , “ Trump admired Bolton ’ s Fox appearances ‒ he has praised him as a ‘ tough cookie.
’ ” When Filkins asked about the potential for disagreement with Trump , Bolton assured him , “ The President knows where I stand on all the issues , because he watched me on Fox News.
” Trump was explicitly aware of Bolton ’ s attitude toward military interventionism ‒ a former senior administration official told Filkins that Trump was wary of “ his interventionist @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , ’ the official said .
‘ John wants to bomb everyone.
’ ” Yet despite Trump ’ s “ maximum pressure ” campaign against Iran and support for increased defense spending , he has also attempted to wind down the United States ’ “ endless wars ” through the Taliban peace deal , the disastrous decision to withdraw U.S. troops from northeastern Syria , and other policies that would be anathema to Bolton .
It wasn ’ t Bolton ’ s attitude toward interventionism that Trump admired ‒ the rationale behind selecting @ @ @ @ @ @ @ summarized by the noxious slogan Trump uses to describe his foreign policy : America First .
As Filkins put it in his profile of Bolton : “ Trump ’ s foreign policy , to the extent that he has one , tends toward isolationism , while Bolton ’ s is expansive but heavily unilateral , spurning allies when necessary .
At times , though , unilateralism can sound a lot like America First.
” In Bolton ’ s view , many international institutions and agreements are ploys to constrain or harm the United @ @ @ @ @ @ @ In fact , many of the points Bolton made during the Obama years were almost perfect prefigurations of Trump ’ s policies today .
Bolton is hostile to multilateral institutions and agreements because he believes they are undemocratic encroachments on American sovereignty .
For example , in a 2011 article that accused the Obama administration of using international institutions as a way to circumvent domestic political constraints , Bolton argued that “ limiting America ’ s military options and capabilities through international agreements and organizations is a high priority for the Obama administration.
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ everything from arms control treaties to the UN to the International Criminal Court ( ICC ) .
Bolton observed that the Obama administration had been “ hard at work since Inauguration Day negotiating with Russia to significantly reduce both America ’ s nuclear weapons and delivery systems , ” and he was critical of Obama-era arms control agreements such as New START .
Now the Trump administration has announced that it will pull the U.S. out of the Open Skies Treaty ( which allows countries to track military movements and installations with reconnaissance @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Forces Treaty last year .
New START will expire in February 2021 , and while the Russian government says it ’ s willing to renew the treaty for five years without preconditions , the Trump administration is considering whether instead to push for a new treaty that would incorporate China .
The chances of a successful replacement are slim .
Bolton described the ICC as a “ giant opportunity to second-guess the United States and the actions we take in self-defense.
” Earlier this month , Trump issued an executive order which declares @ @ @ @ @ @ @ infringe upon the sovereignty of the United States ” after authorizing an investigation of possible war crimes in Afghanistan .
The order states that this constitutes a “ national emergency ” and announces the imposition of sanctions on ICC officials who are responsible for investigating U.S. personnel—an unprecedented attack on the court .
“ Under our Constitution , ” Bolton argued in 2011 , “ we are fully capable of deciding how and when to use military force , how our warriors should conduct themselves , and how to deal with those who @ @ @ @ @ @ @ few months ago , President Trump granted full pardons to a pair of Army officers who had been charged with war crimes—one of whom , 1st Lt. Clint Lorance , was serving a 19-year sentence for ordering his soldiers to fire on three men in Afghanistan .
Trump also promoted a Navy SEAL who was acquitted on the charge of murdering a prisoner of war but convicted of posing with the man ’ s corpse .
Bolton argued that the United States didn ’ t need and didn ’ t deserve international supervision @ @ @ @ @ @ @ as carte blanche for lawlessness .
Bolton said , “ We do not need international human rights experts , prosecutors , or courts to satisfy our own high standards for American behavior.
” But he makes it clear that observing high standards of behavior isn ’ t his dominant concern—what he cares most about is protecting American “ sovereignty.
” “ Many senior administration officials , ” he wrote in 2011 , “ have demonstrated their sympathy for using international ‘ human rights ’ norms on the conduct of war to constrain the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of protecting human rights with multilateral laws , norms , and institutions , he hears a veiled threat to the United States .
Trump hears the same thing , which is why he constantly insists that trade agreements , alliances , and international organizations are actually mechanisms for attacking the United States .
Trump obsessively emphasizes what he regards as the pitfalls of international cooperation while ignoring the overwhelming benefits , and this has drastic implications for the policies he pursues .
Trump argues that “ Our allies take advantage of us far @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the United States ’ role in NATO and its economic relationships with European and East Asian allies as “ ridiculously unfair ” and decries the “ massive amounts of money spent on protecting other countries ” while “ we get nothing but Trade Deficits and Losses.
” To Trump , NATO ’ s record of maintaining stability and security in Europe since World War II is tantamount to getting “ nothing ” for “ massive amounts of money spent.
” His rhetoric suggests that he would prefer the alliance worked as a protection @ @ @ @ @ @ @ for its security services ( in fact , host countries already fund a wide range of projects and initiatives such as housing and other facilities for American troops , tax abatements , etc. )
.
Trump described the Trans-Pacific Partnership as a “ rape of our country.
” Instead of seeing TPP as one of the few effective checks on China ’ s economic rise and an opportunity to guide trade policy for 40 percent of the world economy , he regarded it as another ploy to hobble the United States .
He @ @ @ @ @ @ @ “ disadvantages the United States to the exclusive benefit of other countries.
” Trump didn ’ t see the Accord as an international effort to address an urgent crisis—he saw it as a “ massive redistribution of United States wealth to other countries.
” The words “ sovereign ” and “ sovereignty ” appear dozens of times in the Trump administration ’ s National Security Strategy .
It promises to defend “ America ’ s sovereignty without apology.
” It explains that international engagement “ does not mean the United States should abandon @ @ @ @ @ @ @ state.
” When the U.S. participates in multilateral organizations and initiatives , “ we must protect American sovereignty.
” The United States “ will not cede sovereignty to those that claim authority over American citizens and are in conflict with our constitutional framework.
” Although the National Security Strategy was written under Bolton ’ s predecessor , H. R. McMaster , this is the language Bolton uses as well , presenting a wide range of international institutions as infringements on American democracy and law .
Trump and Bolton don ’ t just regard @ @ @ @ @ @ @ part of a conscious plot to undermine American democracy and limit American power .
During the speech announcing his decision to withdraw from the Paris Climate Accord , Trump outlined an international conspiracy to sabotage the United States : “ The same nations asking us to stay in the agreement are the countries that have collectively cost America trillions of dollars through tough trade practices and , in many cases , lax contributions to our critical military alliance .
You see what ’ s happening… at what point do they start laughing at @ @ @ @ @ @ @ accused Obama administration officials of trying to bypass the American political system by “ retreating ” to international organizations and “ hoping they and their international leftist allies can win there what they failed to win at home.
” But no international agreement or institution will function if countries aren ’ t willing to make concessions and apply rules and norms to themselves as well as others .
Perhaps it ’ s too much to expect Trump to understand that NATO , the European Union ( which he labeled a “ foe ” @ @ @ @ @ @ @ institutions that the United States helped build not only for the benefit of other countries , but for our own as well .
Together , these bodies have helped to avert war and stabilize the world for the past three-quarters of a century .
It was in the context of this stability that the United States defeated communism , became a global hyperpower , and experienced unprecedented economic growth .
Can ’ t Trump and Bolton agree that at least some of these results were good , and perhaps even worth the price @ @ @ @ @ @ @ his feud with the president is dominating the headlines and selling piles of books , Bolton says Trump ’ s foreign policy is built around a single variable : what will get him reelected .
While it ’ s true that Trump ’ s cynicism is a force of nature , Bolton may want to reflect on his own role in perpetuating the insular and paranoid ideas that have animated the president ’ s populist assault on the international system that the United States has built over the past 70 years .

“A disgruntled boring fool who only wanted to go to war.” This is how President Trump recently described former National Security Advisor John Bolton, whose book The Room Where It Happened: A White House Memoir has managed to snatch headlines amid the worst civil unrest in the United States in decades, a pandemic that has left more than 120,000 Americans dead, and an economic crisis worse than anything since the Great Depression.
And no wonder: Even after years of desensitization to Trump, the book contains a series of claims that still manage to shock and horrify: Trump promised to “take care” of an investigation into a Turkish state-owned bank that was suspected of evading sanctions on Iran. He made a similar promise to the Chinese telecom firm ZTE, and pleaded with Chinese president Xi Jinping to buy American agricultural products in a quest to help him win reelection. He told Xi that the two-term presidential limit should be lifted for him (Trump, not Xi), and expressed his approval for the concentration camps in which more than a million Uighurs are being detained and “re-educated.”
But as Trump launches his predictable volley of insults and accusations at Bolton (his M.O. for any former administration official who speaks out against him), it’s important to take a look at how he’s going after a man he hand-picked to advise him on national security. Trump’s most aggressive criticism of Bolton has focused on his hawkishness: Beyond arguing that Bolton “only wanted to go to war,” Trump lambasted him for suggesting that the United States should consider a military response to North Korea. “When Wacko John Bolton went on Deface the Nation and so stupidly said that he looked at the ‘Libyan Model’ for North Korea,” Trump taunted, “all hell broke out.” This concern about bellicose language is extraordinary coming from a president who threatened North Korea with “fire and fury like the world has never seen,” but it raises a question: Why did Trump hire Bolton in the first place?
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Bolton’s hawkishness couldn’t have come as a surprise to Trump. As Dexter Filkins notes in a May 2019 profile of Bolton for the New Yorker, “Trump admired Bolton’s Fox appearances ‒ he has praised him as a ‘tough cookie.’” When Filkins asked about the potential for disagreement with Trump, Bolton assured him, “The President knows where I stand on all the issues, because he watched me on Fox News.”
Trump was explicitly aware of Bolton’s attitude toward military interventionism ‒ a former senior administration official told Filkins that Trump was wary of “his interventionist mind-set. ‘Trump had big reservations,’ the official said. ‘John wants to bomb everyone.’” Yet despite Trump’s “maximum pressure” campaign against Iran and support for increased defense spending, he has also attempted to wind down the United States’ “endless wars” through the Taliban peace deal, the disastrous decision to withdraw U.S. troops from northeastern Syria, and other policies that would be anathema to Bolton.
It wasn’t Bolton’s attitude toward interventionism that Trump admired ‒ the rationale behind selecting him as national security advisor is best summarized by the noxious slogan Trump uses to describe his foreign policy: America First. As Filkins put it in his profile of Bolton: “Trump’s foreign policy, to the extent that he has one, tends toward isolationism, while Bolton’s is expansive but heavily unilateral, spurning allies when necessary. At times, though, unilateralism can sound a lot like America First.”
In Bolton’s view, many international institutions and agreements are ploys to constrain or harm the United States—a zero-sum attitude that Trump shares. In fact, many of the points Bolton made during the Obama years were almost perfect prefigurations of Trump’s policies today.
Bolton is hostile to multilateral institutions and agreements because he believes they are undemocratic encroachments on American sovereignty. For example, in a 2011 article that accused the Obama administration of using international institutions as a way to circumvent domestic political constraints, Bolton argued that “limiting America’s military options and capabilities through international agreements and organizations is a high priority for the Obama administration.” In the piece, Bolton condemned everything from arms control treaties to the UN to the International Criminal Court (ICC).
Bolton observed that the Obama administration had been “hard at work since Inauguration Day negotiating with Russia to significantly reduce both America’s nuclear weapons and delivery systems,” and he was critical of Obama-era arms control agreements such as New START. Now the Trump administration has announced that it will pull the U.S. out of the Open Skies Treaty (which allows countries to track military movements and installations with reconnaissance flights) after exiting the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty last year. New START will expire in February 2021, and while the Russian government says it’s willing to renew the treaty for five years without preconditions, the Trump administration is considering whether instead to push for a new treaty that would incorporate China. The chances of a successful replacement are slim.
Bolton described the ICC as a “giant opportunity to second-guess the United States and the actions we take in self-defense.” Earlier this month, Trump issued an executive order which declares that the ICC is threatening to “infringe upon the sovereignty of the United States” after authorizing an investigation of possible war crimes in Afghanistan. The order states that this constitutes a “national emergency” and announces the imposition of sanctions on ICC officials who are responsible for investigating U.S. personnel—an unprecedented attack on the court.
“Under our Constitution,” Bolton argued in 2011, “we are fully capable of deciding how and when to use military force, how our warriors should conduct themselves, and how to deal with those who violate our standards.” But just a few months ago, President Trump granted full pardons to a pair of Army officers who had been charged with war crimes—one of whom, 1st Lt. Clint Lorance, was serving a 19-year sentence for ordering his soldiers to fire on three men in Afghanistan. Trump also promoted a Navy SEAL who was acquitted on the charge of murdering a prisoner of war but convicted of posing with the man’s corpse. Bolton argued that the United States didn’t need and didn’t deserve international supervision. Trump interpreted the freedom from supervision as carte blanche for lawlessness.
Bolton said, “We do not need international human rights experts, prosecutors, or courts to satisfy our own high standards for American behavior.” But he makes it clear that observing high standards of behavior isn’t his dominant concern—what he cares most about is protecting American “sovereignty.” “Many senior administration officials,” he wrote in 2011, “have demonstrated their sympathy for using international ‘human rights’ norms on the conduct of war to constrain the United States.” When Bolton hears talk of protecting human rights with multilateral laws, norms, and institutions, he hears a veiled threat to the United States.
Trump hears the same thing, which is why he constantly insists that trade agreements, alliances, and international organizations are actually mechanisms for attacking the United States. Trump obsessively emphasizes what he regards as the pitfalls of international cooperation while ignoring the overwhelming benefits, and this has drastic implications for the policies he pursues.
Trump argues that “Our allies take advantage of us far greater than our enemies.” He regards the United States’ role in NATO and its economic relationships with European and East Asian allies as “ridiculously unfair” and decries the “massive amounts of money spent on protecting other countries” while “we get nothing but Trade Deficits and Losses.” To Trump, NATO’s record of maintaining stability and security in Europe since World War II is tantamount to getting “nothing” for “massive amounts of money spent.” His rhetoric suggests that he would prefer the alliance worked as a protection racket in which the U.S. is paid for its security services (in fact, host countries already fund a wide range of projects and initiatives such as housing and other facilities for American troops, tax abatements, etc.).
Trump described the Trans-Pacific Partnership as a “rape of our country.” Instead of seeing TPP as one of the few effective checks on China’s economic rise and an opportunity to guide trade policy for 40 percent of the world economy, he regarded it as another ploy to hobble the United States.
He also claimed that the Paris Climate Accord “disadvantages the United States to the exclusive benefit of other countries.” Trump didn’t see the Accord as an international effort to address an urgent crisis—he saw it as a “massive redistribution of United States wealth to other countries.”
The words “sovereign” and “sovereignty” appear dozens of times in the Trump administration’s National Security Strategy. It promises to defend “America’s sovereignty without apology.” It explains that international engagement “does not mean the United States should abandon its rights and duties as a sovereign state.” When the U.S. participates in multilateral organizations and initiatives, “we must protect American sovereignty.” The United States “will not cede sovereignty to those that claim authority over American citizens and are in conflict with our constitutional framework.” Although the National Security Strategy was written under Bolton’s predecessor, H. R. McMaster, this is the language Bolton uses as well, presenting a wide range of international institutions as infringements on American democracy and law.
Trump and Bolton don’t just regard multilateralism as wrongheaded—they believe it’s part of a conscious plot to undermine American democracy and limit American power. During the speech announcing his decision to withdraw from the Paris Climate Accord, Trump outlined an international conspiracy to sabotage the United States: “The same nations asking us to stay in the agreement are the countries that have collectively cost America trillions of dollars through tough trade practices and, in many cases, lax contributions to our critical military alliance. You see what’s happening… at what point do they start laughing at us as a country?”
Bolton accused Obama administration officials of trying to bypass the American political system by “retreating” to international organizations and “hoping they and their international leftist allies can win there what they failed to win at home.” But no international agreement or institution will function if countries aren’t willing to make concessions and apply rules and norms to themselves as well as others.
Perhaps it’s too much to expect Trump to understand that NATO, the European Union (which he labeled a “foe”), and the United Nations are institutions that the United States helped build not only for the benefit of other countries, but for our own as well. Together, these bodies have helped to avert war and stabilize the world for the past three-quarters of a century. It was in the context of this stability that the United States defeated communism, became a global hyperpower, and experienced unprecedented economic growth. Can’t Trump and Bolton agree that at least some of these results were good, and perhaps even worth the price of slightly limited autonomy?
Now that his feud with the president is dominating the headlines and selling piles of books, Bolton says Trump’s foreign policy is built around a single variable: what will get him reelected. While it’s true that Trump’s cynicism is a force of nature, Bolton may want to reflect on his own role in perpetuating the insular and paranoid ideas that have animated the president’s populist assault on the international system that the United States has built over the past 70 years.


thebulwark--2020-06-27--We Need ‘Dad History’ to Help Understand Our Monuments

The monuments are coming down indiscriminately now .
What started with Confederates and continued with Columbus has moved on to George Washington , who , though a slave owner , was instrumental in founding the nation , and Ulysses S. Grant , who led the military victory that preserved the nation and ended slavery .
We need a broad public understanding of our nation ’ s past military and political leaders , the historical context in which they lived , how they succeeded , how they failed , and what their legacy should be .
Only then can we make @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the past .
All too often , however , military and political histories for general readers are dismissed as “ Dad History , ” after the popularity of such subjects among middle-aged men .
That attitude is a problem .
According to critics , Dad History is written in a celebratory tone by white men for white men about white men .
It cares only about themes of leadership , the greatness of statesmen , and war ( some wars much more than others ) .
Dad History allegedly crowds out other topics @ @ @ @ @ @ @ authors , and leaves the impression that history writing is supposed to glorify America .
Sometimes , Dad History can seem downright ridiculous , as in the pattern of George Washington biographers conspicuously discussing his massive thighs , as a recent author noted .
The criticism of Dad History has a point .
For many years , traditional topics like politics and war were usually written by white men for readers who looked like them , and history publishing has been fertile ground for books that smooth over the ugly reality of the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the mark .
David McCullough ’ s The Pioneers : The Heroic Story of the Settlers Who Brought the American Ideal West , for example , was rightly criticized on publication last year for the way McCullough truncated his cast of characters to exclude the Native Americans his heroic pioneers displaced .
Joseph Ellis churns out Founding Fathers books so frequently it is hard to tell them apart .
Meanwhile , the less said about Bill O ’ Reilly ’ s “ Killing [ X ] ” series , now nine volumes strong @ @ @ @ @ @ @ books as representative of all Dad History is wrong , however .
Even among books published for general readers , McCullough , Ellis , and O ’ Reilly occupy only a portion of a store ’ s shelves .
They hardly have a monopoly on traditional subjects .
Political and military history publishing is alive and well .
In my own field of early America , I think immediately of recently published books by Serena Zabin on the Boston Massacre ; Lindsay Chervinsky on President Washington ’ s cabinet ; Erica Armstrong Dunbar @ @ @ @ @ @ @ who ran away from Washington ; Joanne Freeman on congressional violence and the road to the Civil War ; and Megan Kate Nelson on the Civil War in the West .
Notice that these historians are all women .
People from many different backgrounds write great books on traditional subjects .
And even if contemporary authors don ’ t confine themselves to chronicling the public deeds of great men , they do offer enough political scheming , hard-won battles , and reflections on the nature of leadership to satisfy even the crustiest old @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of putting down Dad History is that it insults readers , people who want to learn something about the past and who happen to have tastes different from the gatekeepers of elite culture .
Take the biography of Grant by Dad History mainstay Ron Chernow .
Someone who read the book or watched the recent History Channel documentary series it inspired would know the complexity of Grant ’ s experience with slavery .
Raised in an anti-slavery family , Grant married into a slave-owning one and often found himself harried by both his @ @ @ @ @ @ @ much influenced by the other side .
For a time , Grant managed the enslaved workers at his father-in-law ’ s plantation and himself owned a man , whom he emancipated in 1859 .
Grant was no abolitionist , but as president he pushed forward Reconstruction and fought the emergent Ku Klux Klan .
Maybe Grant doesn ’ t deserve a statue—as president , his policy toward Native Americans was hardly praiseworthy .
But he doesn ’ t deserve to be lumped in with the Confederates he defeated , either .
Good history @ @ @ @ @ @ @ kind of discernment .
Dad History is the kind of history most Americans find accessible enough to read .
Instead of being criticized , high-quality Dad History should be hailed for what it is : a crucial way to learn and to inform our civic debates and public understanding .

The monuments are coming down indiscriminately now. What started with Confederates and continued with Columbus has moved on to George Washington, who, though a slave owner, was instrumental in founding the nation, and Ulysses S. Grant, who led the military victory that preserved the nation and ended slavery.
We need a broad public understanding of our nation’s past military and political leaders, the historical context in which they lived, how they succeeded, how they failed, and what their legacy should be. Only then can we make informed decisions about how best to commemorate the past.
All too often, however, military and political histories for general readers are dismissed as “Dad History,” after the popularity of such subjects among middle-aged men. That attitude is a problem.
According to critics, Dad History is written in a celebratory tone by white men for white men about white men. It cares only about themes of leadership, the greatness of statesmen, and war (some wars much more than others). Dad History allegedly crowds out other topics, conceals the work of non-white male authors, and leaves the impression that history writing is supposed to glorify America. Sometimes, Dad History can seem downright ridiculous, as in the pattern of George Washington biographers conspicuously discussing his massive thighs, as a recent author noted.
Podcast · August 15 2023 A.B. Stoddard: All the Ex-President’s Conspirators Donald Trump has been a low-rent mobster for his entire career, and now he’s getting…
The criticism of Dad History has a point. For many years, traditional topics like politics and war were usually written by white men for readers who looked like them, and history publishing has been fertile ground for books that smooth over the ugly reality of the past.
Some bestselling Dad Histories miss the mark. David McCullough’s The Pioneers: The Heroic Story of the Settlers Who Brought the American Ideal West, for example, was rightly criticized on publication last year for the way McCullough truncated his cast of characters to exclude the Native Americans his heroic pioneers displaced. Joseph Ellis churns out Founding Fathers books so frequently it is hard to tell them apart. Meanwhile, the less said about Bill O’Reilly’s “Killing [X]” series, now nine volumes strong, the better.
To see these books as representative of all Dad History is wrong, however. Even among books published for general readers, McCullough, Ellis, and O’Reilly occupy only a portion of a store’s shelves. They hardly have a monopoly on traditional subjects.
Political and military history publishing is alive and well. In my own field of early America, I think immediately of recently published books by Serena Zabin on the Boston Massacre; Lindsay Chervinsky on President Washington’s cabinet; Erica Armstrong Dunbar on Ona Judge, an enslaved woman who ran away from Washington; Joanne Freeman on congressional violence and the road to the Civil War; and Megan Kate Nelson on the Civil War in the West.
Notice that these historians are all women. People from many different backgrounds write great books on traditional subjects. And even if contemporary authors don’t confine themselves to chronicling the public deeds of great men, they do offer enough political scheming, hard-won battles, and reflections on the nature of leadership to satisfy even the crustiest old history-reading dad.
The most troubling part of putting down Dad History is that it insults readers, people who want to learn something about the past and who happen to have tastes different from the gatekeepers of elite culture.
Take the biography of Grant by Dad History mainstay Ron Chernow. Someone who read the book or watched the recent History Channel documentary series it inspired would know the complexity of Grant’s experience with slavery. Raised in an anti-slavery family, Grant married into a slave-owning one and often found himself harried by both his father and his father-in-law for being too much influenced by the other side.
For a time, Grant managed the enslaved workers at his father-in-law’s plantation and himself owned a man, whom he emancipated in 1859. Grant was no abolitionist, but as president he pushed forward Reconstruction and fought the emergent Ku Klux Klan.
Maybe Grant doesn’t deserve a statue—as president, his policy toward Native Americans was hardly praiseworthy. But he doesn’t deserve to be lumped in with the Confederates he defeated, either. Good history, of whatever kind, teaches that kind of discernment.
Dad History is the kind of history most Americans find accessible enough to read. Instead of being criticized, high-quality Dad History should be hailed for what it is: a crucial way to learn and to inform our civic debates and public understanding.


thebulwark--2020-06-27--The COVID Resurgence and Trump’s ‘Red Wall’ States

In the past few years , as the pundits sorted out what they thought would be the most important Electoral College states in the 2020 presidential race , they have rightly tended to focus on the “ Blue Wall ” states .
Those would be the Rust Belt and Midwest swing states with Great Lakes shorelines—particularly Pennsylvania , Michigan , and Wisconsin , three states that Hillary Rodham Clinton was expected to win but lost to Donald Trump by a combined total of 77,000 votes .
While there were many reasons why Clinton didn ’ t win , the main @ @ @ @ @ @ @ states loved Trump but that they didn ’ t like her .
If she had won those three states she would be running as the incumbent this year .
But as we look at the map now , the important action appears to have moved 1,000-plus miles south and west , to what we might call the “ Red Wall ” states , especially Florida , Texas , and Arizona .
Trump won those three states in 2016 and desperately needs to win them again this year .
If he loses any two @ @ @ @ @ @ @ he is a dead man walking politically—even if he takes the three Blue Wall states .
It is the pandemic that has put these southern states in play , and the recent national COVID-19 resurgence , which is hitting those three Republican stronghold states particularly hard , could be a factor in flipping them in the election .
The case numbers are setting records , death counts are not dropping as they have been in some other parts of the country , and hospitalizations in these states are leading the nation .
And @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Trump is playing the Hillary Clinton role this time around .
Joe Biden isn ’ t rising in the polls because voters love him ; Biden ’ s numbers are good because the undecideds don ’ t like Trump .
A big part of that has to do with the COVID-19 pandemic , and that is a big and growing issue in the Red Wall states .
As of this week , Texas has over 4,000 COVID-19 patients hospitalized and Arizona about 4,400 .
( Florida only releases the yearly total , which @ @ @ @ @ @ @ beds in Houston , the nation ’ s fourth largest city , are filling up so fast that Texas Children ’ s Hospital is starting to treat adult patients , and 97 percent of ICU beds at Texas Medical Center were reportedly in use this week .
In Florida , the average number of new cases per day was 725 in May ; it has been over 2,000 per day in June .
Texas averaged 884 per day in May and over 2,600 per day this month .
Arizona ’ s daily average @ @ @ @ @ @ @ May and over 1,600 in June .
Those are increases of 184 percent for Florida , 129 percent for Texas , and a whopping 320 percent for Arizona .
These states have , to varying extents , paused their reopenings and begun requiring face masks in more circumstances .
With physical distancing and job uncertainty continuing for millions of people , there is in these states an uneasiness about the future .
Their citizens can see for themselves the dire consequences of a muddled national policy .
And it ’ s clear , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ this once-in-a-century public health crisis as anything but that .
Case in point : In discussing why the pandemic is still raging across the country—the number of daily new cases crossed 40,000 this week—he said the rise was largely an artifact of increased testing .
“ When you have all those tests , you have more cases , ” Trump said .
“ We want to do testing .
We want to do everything , but they use it to make us look bad.
” He also said this week that he was @ @ @ @ @ @ @ told staffers he wanted testing slowed down .
Voters in these Red Wall states are perceiving that Trump seems finished with the virus while the virus is not finished with them .
There are just over four months left until the election , and we are now in the part of the calendar—the period at the end of the second quarter ( June ) and beginning of the third quarter ( July ) —in which , historically , many undecided voters have started making up their minds .
To listen to the news @ @ @ @ @ @ @ wait until late October and then flip a coin .
But mid-summer is when it begins , and this year COVID-19 will be a major factor .
“ In Texas , the state is getting hit by three crises at one time—the fallout in the energy sector , the COVID-19 increase , and the racial unrest , ” said Richard Murray , University of Houston political scientist .
Trump “ is not perceived by most Texans as having handled any of them very well .
He is definitely losing his suburban voter strength @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ t help under these circumstances , it actually hurts him.
” Cal Jillson , a political scientist at Southern Methodist University in Dallas , sees it the same way .
The president ’ s “ handling of the economic and pandemic issues for this state have already dropped him by about 5 or 6 points in the polls , ” Jillson said .
“ If he continues not to deal with the COVID-19 issues , it will be a slow bleed for him in Texas.
” A key part of the voter @ @ @ @ @ @ @ is a search for conflict resolution .
What is happening instead this year is that the COVID-19 upswings in the Red Wall states are extending uncertainty .
Incumbents always lose support if they are presiding over uncertainty .
In Arizona , Trump is facing trouble from “ two opposite ends of the electorate , ” according to Thomas Volgy , a University of Arizona political scientist .
“ Younger minorities are active in the racial issues , and it looks like there will be higher turnout against Trump by those activists.
” But @ @ @ @ @ @ @ be favorable to Trump , “ are disproportionately being harmed by the COVID-19 outbreak , and are beginning to question how he has their interests in his mind as he is dealing with this.
” “ Right now , the voters are linking the destruction of the economy with the current increases in deaths and cases , ” Volgy said .
“ States can ’ t function this way and the independent voters are flocking away from Trump .
The timing of this couldn ’ t be worse for him.
” In an @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Marie Kennedy , the Arizona director of the AARP , observed that the Trump administration has “ failed on so many levels.
” She said that her organization has yet to receive a response to four letters outlining concerns to the governor , and a fifth letter is being sent out .
“ My level of frustration is high , ” she said .
“ We could have stopped this.
” As bad as the COVID-19 news looks right now , it is likely to look far worse very soon .
Remember , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the rate of new cases .
Since the number of new cases has surged in the last few weeks , it is close to a certainty that the death rate will soon follow .
And it is entirely possible that the rise in cases and deaths in Texas , Arizona , and Florida will continue through July and into the beginning of August .
What could all this mean for Trump ’ s political support in those three states ?
Take the Interstate 4 corridor in Florida , about nineteen counties from Tampa/St @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
In 2016 , Trump won these counties by about 217,000 votes in 2016 .
He lost the rest of the state by about 100,000 votes , but his I-4 corridor success was enough to win Florida ’ s 29 electoral votes .
These counties have had 666 COVID-19 deaths so far , as of Friday .
In the week ending on June 24 , there were 9,217 new cases identified in this important swath of Florida .
In the week ending on June 10 , there were 3,413 infection cases .
That @ @ @ @ @ @ @ The next week-to-fourteen-day period of time , I think , is going to be absolutely critical , ” Orange County , Florida , mayor Jerry Demings said in an interview last week .
“ It will become clearer to us [ then ] what is the next course of action.
” In the Texas Triangle , the combined new case numbers for the Dallas/Fort Worth , Houston , and Austin/San Antonio metro areas has gone up from 9,613 to 21,092 in that same time period , a 130 percent increase .
These three @ @ @ @ @ @ @ 1,397 COVID deaths so far this year .
“ This is crunch time for us , ” Austin mayor Steve Adler said on MSNBC on Friday , noting that his city ’ s hospitals are nearing capacity .
In the Valley of the Sun in southern Arizona , anchored by the big cities of Phoenix and Tucson , there have been 1,077 deaths thus far .
Three weeks ago , there were 7,607 new cases filed ; there were 17,467 cases filed in the week before June 24 .
That is a 130 @ @ @ @ @ @ @ get angry when I see people refuse to wear a mask or physically distance from others or stay home when they could because it is inconvenient—or as a political statement , ” Dr. Bradley A. Dreifuss , an ER doctor in Tucson , wrote in a New York Times op-ed yesterday—sounding very much like New York ER doctors in early April .
“ If you do not wear a mask and physically distance , you are putting yourself and others in harm ’ s way .
You are putting us in harm ’ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ us to risk our lives to save you.
” We can not know yet how the undecided voters in those places will come down on Election Day .
But it is a fact that the Red Wall states are now leaning toward Biden .
Trump beat Clinton by about 91,000 votes in Arizona in 2016 , and by about 113,000 in Florida .
His victory in Texas was much bigger , about 800,000 .
The states ’ polls , however , say that all are in play : According to the RealClear poll @ @ @ @ @ @ @ percent in Arizona and 6.8 percent in Florida .
And in Texas , where Trump trounced Clinton by 10 percentage points in 2016 , he is up just 2.0 percent over Biden .
The conventional wisdom says that if Florida falls to Biden , it is all over given the state ’ s 29 electoral votes .
Adding to the blame game is that citizens of these three states can not travel now to New York , New Jersey , or Connecticut without having to be quarantined for fourteen days upon their arrival @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
The elderly in Florida and the high numbers of Puerto Ricans there , many of whom have relatives in New York , aren ’ t going to be happy with that and won ’ t blame New York governor Andrew Cuomo for the travel restrictions .
The blame will likely end up at Pennsylvania Avenue in Washington , D.C. “ Right now , COVID-19 at its best is not good for Trump in Florida , and at its worst , is quite damaging for him , ” Aubrey Jewett , a political @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Orlando .
“ People in Florida were feeling a little better since we reopened , and there was some semblance of normalcy returning.
” “ But the change in the [ COVID-19 ] infection rates has traction , and the Interstate 4 Corridor could have a big impact against Trump , ” he said .
“ Orlando is big in the tourism business and so many people are still not back working .
“ This part of the state is not fashionable or trendy and is very practical about voting .
When the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ climbing , you are still out of work , and this doesn ’ t seem to have any ending , then I think it could have some traction [ for the November election ] .
If it was just one of those factors , then maybe people will say , ‘ This is the price we pay , ’ and would have more acceptance .
But it has become a life-and-death issue for voters , and that is never good for an incumbent president .
”

In the past few years, as the pundits sorted out what they thought would be the most important Electoral College states in the 2020 presidential race, they have rightly tended to focus on the “Blue Wall” states. Those would be the Rust Belt and Midwest swing states with Great Lakes shorelines—particularly Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin, three states that Hillary Rodham Clinton was expected to win but lost to Donald Trump by a combined total of 77,000 votes.
While there were many reasons why Clinton didn’t win, the main reason was not that voters in these states loved Trump but that they didn’t like her. If she had won those three states she would be running as the incumbent this year.
But as we look at the map now, the important action appears to have moved 1,000-plus miles south and west, to what we might call the “Red Wall” states, especially Florida, Texas, and Arizona. Trump won those three states in 2016 and desperately needs to win them again this year. If he loses any two of those three Red Wall states, he is a dead man walking politically—even if he takes the three Blue Wall states.
It is the pandemic that has put these southern states in play, and the recent national COVID-19 resurgence, which is hitting those three Republican stronghold states particularly hard, could be a factor in flipping them in the election. The case numbers are setting records, death counts are not dropping as they have been in some other parts of the country, and hospitalizations in these states are leading the nation.
And in an irony of political history, Trump is playing the Hillary Clinton role this time around. Joe Biden isn’t rising in the polls because voters love him; Biden’s numbers are good because the undecideds don’t like Trump. A big part of that has to do with the COVID-19 pandemic, and that is a big and growing issue in the Red Wall states.
As of this week, Texas has over 4,000 COVID-19 patients hospitalized and Arizona about 4,400. (Florida only releases the yearly total, which is close to 14,000.) Hospital beds in Houston, the nation’s fourth largest city, are filling up so fast that Texas Children’s Hospital is starting to treat adult patients, and 97 percent of ICU beds at Texas Medical Center were reportedly in use this week.
In Florida, the average number of new cases per day was 725 in May; it has been over 2,000 per day in June. Texas averaged 884 per day in May and over 2,600 per day this month. Arizona’s daily average of new cases was around 400 in May and over 1,600 in June. Those are increases of 184 percent for Florida, 129 percent for Texas, and a whopping 320 percent for Arizona. These states have, to varying extents, paused their reopenings and begun requiring face masks in more circumstances. With physical distancing and job uncertainty continuing for millions of people, there is in these states an uneasiness about the future. Their citizens can see for themselves the dire consequences of a muddled national policy.
And it’s clear, too, that the president is treating this once-in-a-century public health crisis as anything but that. Case in point: In discussing why the pandemic is still raging across the country—the number of daily new cases crossed 40,000 this week—he said the rise was largely an artifact of increased testing. “When you have all those tests, you have more cases,” Trump said. “We want to do testing. We want to do everything, but they use it to make us look bad.” He also said this week that he was serious, not joking, about having told staffers he wanted testing slowed down.
Voters in these Red Wall states are perceiving that Trump seems finished with the virus while the virus is not finished with them.
Podcast · August 15 2023 A.B. Stoddard: All the Ex-President’s Conspirators Donald Trump has been a low-rent mobster for his entire career, and now he’s getting…
There are just over four months left until the election, and we are now in the part of the calendar—the period at the end of the second quarter (June) and beginning of the third quarter (July)—in which, historically, many undecided voters have started making up their minds. To listen to the news media, you might think that undecideds wait until late October and then flip a coin. But mid-summer is when it begins, and this year COVID-19 will be a major factor.
“In Texas, the state is getting hit by three crises at one time—the fallout in the energy sector, the COVID-19 increase, and the racial unrest,” said Richard Murray, University of Houston political scientist. Trump “is not perceived by most Texans as having handled any of them very well. He is definitely losing his suburban voter strength. His strength as a counter-puncher doesn’t help under these circumstances, it actually hurts him.”
Cal Jillson, a political scientist at Southern Methodist University in Dallas, sees it the same way. The president’s “handling of the economic and pandemic issues for this state have already dropped him by about 5 or 6 points in the polls,” Jillson said. “If he continues not to deal with the COVID-19 issues, it will be a slow bleed for him in Texas.”
A key part of the voter decision-making at this point in the campaign is a search for conflict resolution. What is happening instead this year is that the COVID-19 upswings in the Red Wall states are extending uncertainty. Incumbents always lose support if they are presiding over uncertainty.
In Arizona, Trump is facing trouble from “two opposite ends of the electorate,” according to Thomas Volgy, a University of Arizona political scientist. “Younger minorities are active in the racial issues, and it looks like there will be higher turnout against Trump by those activists.” But over-65s, who have generally tended to be favorable to Trump, “are disproportionately being harmed by the COVID-19 outbreak, and are beginning to question how he has their interests in his mind as he is dealing with this.”
“Right now, the voters are linking the destruction of the economy with the current increases in deaths and cases,” Volgy said. “States can’t function this way and the independent voters are flocking away from Trump. The timing of this couldn’t be worse for him.”
In an interview with the Washington Post, Dana Marie Kennedy, the Arizona director of the AARP, observed that the Trump administration has “failed on so many levels.” She said that her organization has yet to receive a response to four letters outlining concerns to the governor, and a fifth letter is being sent out. “My level of frustration is high,” she said. “We could have stopped this.”
As bad as the COVID-19 news looks right now, it is likely to look far worse very soon. Remember, the death toll tends to lag behind the rate of new cases. Since the number of new cases has surged in the last few weeks, it is close to a certainty that the death rate will soon follow. And it is entirely possible that the rise in cases and deaths in Texas, Arizona, and Florida will continue through July and into the beginning of August.
What could all this mean for Trump’s political support in those three states?
Take the Interstate 4 corridor in Florida, about nineteen counties from Tampa/St. Petersburg to Orlando to Daytona Beach. In 2016, Trump won these counties by about 217,000 votes in 2016. He lost the rest of the state by about 100,000 votes, but his I-4 corridor success was enough to win Florida’s 29 electoral votes. These counties have had 666 COVID-19 deaths so far, as of Friday.
In the week ending on June 24, there were 9,217 new cases identified in this important swath of Florida. In the week ending on June 10, there were 3,413 infection cases. That is a 170 percent increase.
“The next week-to-fourteen-day period of time, I think, is going to be absolutely critical,” Orange County, Florida, mayor Jerry Demings said in an interview last week. “It will become clearer to us [then] what is the next course of action.”
In the Texas Triangle, the combined new case numbers for the Dallas/Fort Worth, Houston, and Austin/San Antonio metro areas has gone up from 9,613 to 21,092 in that same time period, a 130 percent increase. These three big metro areas have had a combined 1,397 COVID deaths so far this year. “This is crunch time for us,” Austin mayor Steve Adler said on MSNBC on Friday, noting that his city’s hospitals are nearing capacity.
In the Valley of the Sun in southern Arizona, anchored by the big cities of Phoenix and Tucson, there have been 1,077 deaths thus far. Three weeks ago, there were 7,607 new cases filed; there were 17,467 cases filed in the week before June 24. That is a 130 percent increase as well.
“I get angry when I see people refuse to wear a mask or physically distance from others or stay home when they could because it is inconvenient—or as a political statement,” Dr. Bradley A. Dreifuss, an ER doctor in Tucson, wrote in a New York Times op-ed yesterday—sounding very much like New York ER doctors in early April. “If you do not wear a mask and physically distance, you are putting yourself and others in harm’s way. You are putting us in harm’s way. Then you will expect us to risk our lives to save you.”
We cannot know yet how the undecided voters in those places will come down on Election Day. But it is a fact that the Red Wall states are now leaning toward Biden. Trump beat Clinton by about 91,000 votes in Arizona in 2016, and by about 113,000 in Florida. His victory in Texas was much bigger, about 800,000. The states’ polls, however, say that all are in play: According to the RealClear poll averages, Biden is up by 4.0 percent in Arizona and 6.8 percent in Florida. And in Texas, where Trump trounced Clinton by 10 percentage points in 2016, he is up just 2.0 percent over Biden. The conventional wisdom says that if Florida falls to Biden, it is all over given the state’s 29 electoral votes.
Adding to the blame game is that citizens of these three states cannot travel now to New York, New Jersey, or Connecticut without having to be quarantined for fourteen days upon their arrival in these states up north and east. The elderly in Florida and the high numbers of Puerto Ricans there, many of whom have relatives in New York, aren’t going to be happy with that and won’t blame New York governor Andrew Cuomo for the travel restrictions. The blame will likely end up at Pennsylvania Avenue in Washington, D.C.
“Right now, COVID-19 at its best is not good for Trump in Florida, and at its worst, is quite damaging for him,” Aubrey Jewett, a political scientist at University of Central Florida in Orlando. “People in Florida were feeling a little better since we reopened, and there was some semblance of normalcy returning.”
“But the change in the [COVID-19] infection rates has traction, and the Interstate 4 Corridor could have a big impact against Trump,” he said. “Orlando is big in the tourism business and so many people are still not back working.
“This part of the state is not fashionable or trendy and is very practical about voting. When the hospitals are full, the infection rates climbing, you are still out of work, and this doesn’t seem to have any ending, then I think it could have some traction [for the November election]. If it was just one of those factors, then maybe people will say, ‘This is the price we pay,’ and would have more acceptance. But it has become a life-and-death issue for voters, and that is never good for an incumbent president.”


thebulwark--2020-06-29--What Evangelicals’ Coziness with Trump Puts at Risk

However you think about Donald Trump ’ s core constituency—whether you think of it as made up of patrons in small-town diners or forgotten factory workers or aging Fox viewers or something less flattering—no one disputes that high turnout among evangelical Christians is a required element in Trump ’ s bid for re-election .
Most of Trump ’ s association with evangelicals has been dubious ; he has spent time with prosperity-gospel preachers who dabble in outright heresy , such as Paula White , while also courting megachurch pastors within established denominations , like Robert Jeffress of First Baptist Church @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , Trump has earned a backhanded endorsement from a far more intellectually and morally serious evangelical figure : Albert Mohler , author , radio host , and president of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville , Kentucky .
It pains me to take public issue with Al Mohler .
I am the son and grandson of Southern Baptist pastors , and I am grateful to leaders like Mohler who were part of a movement to prevent a liberal theological shift that would have turned Southern Baptists into just another mainline denomination .
( @ @ @ @ @ @ @ a view of Nicene orthodoxy as antiquated , if not optional . )
More personally , I am grateful to Mohler from a distance , because it was his writing , along with that of Chuck Colson , Father Richard John Neuhaus , and the recently deceased Ravi Zacharias that helped me remain a believer at a time when it would have been all too easy to walk away from the faith .
All of which is to say that Al Mohler is no lightweight ; he is a serious man who is @ @ @ @ @ @ @ latest book is ominously titled The Gathering Storm .
It ’ s an overwrought warning against encroaching secularism .
Greg Forster ’ s recent respectful critique in Law & Liberty is well worth reading in full , but here are a couple of takeaways .
First , Mohler ’ s solution to rising secularism never extends beyond standard right-wing politics .
In a time when conservatism carries multiple meanings , this is hardly helpful .
Next , Forster notes that Mohler approaches a more serious criticism of political liberalism .
By now this @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of religious conservatism—liberalism leads to secularism and waning of religious devotion , virtue , etc.—but it ’ s a new critique for Mohler .
Forster wisely notes that Mohler would make a profound error in dismantling the thousand-year-old project of natural law that culminated in liberalism .
Mohler ’ s best work would be his day job as seminary president , training young pastors to carry out their duties in local churches in such a way that virtue and institution-building would be most welcome secondary effects of their ministries .
Forster ’ s @ @ @ @ @ @ @ clearly respects Mohler and his disagreements with him originate in good faith .
I join Forster in believing that Mohler—and all Christians who would walk away from the liberal project—are playing with fire .
You might argue that religious anti-liberalism has a certain nihilistic bent , but you ’ d hardly get that impression from Mohler , with his three-piece suits , rep ties , and cleanly polished Allen Edmonds shoes .
Still Mohler ’ s position creates a framework that allows him to take public positions that leave him vulnerable to a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Mohler has opened himself up to critique is with his recent spate of comments declaring that he will be a de facto Republican for the indefinite future .
It ’ s no surprise that Mohler has been a reliable Republican voter ; that ’ s been true of evangelicals for perhaps thirty years .
And on a purely philosophical level , there ’ s good reason for that .
From Burke and Tocqueville to Buckley , Kirk , and the evangelical intellectual hero Carl F. H. Henry , the conservatism of local institutions @ @ @ @ @ @ @ compatible with evangelical orthodoxy than the vision of Rousseau , Hegel , and their progressive descendants that became commonplace in older mainline churches a century ago .
Yet that elective affinity between theology and political philosophy does not necessitate explicit partisan loyalty , and pledging such loyalty has the practical effect of reducing segments of the church into mere voting blocs that operate on the basis of political trade-offs as opposed to deeply held convictions .
Consciously or not , when Mohler recently pledged his support of the Republican party , he gave @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Mitch McConnell ’ s cunning Senate moves all the way up to President Trump ’ s troubling rhetoric .
The motivation for Mohler ’ s fealty was the usual one—federal judges who protect religious liberty and would curtail abortion .
I would agree that the appointment of many qualified jurists has been one of the few highlights of the last three and a half years , but—the question rises once more—at what cost ?
Here Mohler is guilty of a serious political sin , what Jonah Goldberg has often called “ one-thingism.
” @ @ @ @ @ @ @ really matter to us , but when a large movement declares that one issue rises above all others , that movement is signaling that it will tolerate heterodoxy on any other issue in exchange for their own political prize .
This is not just a foolish political calculation ; it is damaging to evangelicalism ’ s integrity .
( Mohler expounded on this position in an interview with Isaac Chotiner in the New Yorker last week . )
There is another problem for Mohler that rests on his strategic silence .
Common among @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to say about the left , but is almost totally silent in the face of activism and commentary that transgresses the boundaries of civil society that the right traditionally valued .
In 2016 , though he never explicitly announced whom he voted for , Mohler leveled intense criticism at Trump in the pages of the Washington Post after the leak of the Access Hollywood tape .
He has tempered his criticism as time has gone on , and his admission in April makes his vote in November all but official .
This failure @ @ @ @ @ @ @ faithfulness has created a vacuum where any action in service to evangelical political goals becomes excused or even laudable .
In this sense Mohler ’ s voice echoes not so much that of the president himself ( that task falls to Paula White and Robert Jeffress ) as the prospective inheritors of Trumpism like Senators Tom Cotton and Josh Hawley .
Whatever else can be said about the space Mohler occupies among evangelicals , his role is that of an elder statesman .
He is not a populist rabble-rouser like , say , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ radio host .
Metaxas is a tragic example of populism gone wild among evangelicals .
Although his biographies of William Wilberforce ( 2007 ) and Dietrich Bonhoffer ( 2009 ) faced academic criticism , his Socrates in the City program brought together a variety of religious and cultural voices for important conversations .
His turn towards Trumpism in recent years has sometimes been silly—Metaxas penned a couple of children ’ s books wherein Trump ( or rather a Flintstones-like “ Donald the Caveman ” cartoon character ) accomplishes fictional tasks such as wall-building @ @ @ @ @ @ @ been outrageous—as when Metaxas accused Trump ’ s critics of being demonic , and claimed that the reaction to the Access Hollywood tape radicalized him towards then-candidate Trump , instead of wondering whether perhaps such a man might not be suited to the nation ’ s highest office .
Metaxas follows the trajectory of so much anti-anti-conservatism wherein the enemy of my enemy is my friend .
He has given a platform to Milo Yiannopoulos long after the provocateur merited one ( assuming he ever did ) .
He has called British white-nationalist @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and chose to have her on his radio program in the week following nationwide protests in response to the death of George Floyd .
While Christians may arrive at divergent political positions on race , immigration , and other issues , both Yiannopoulos and Hopkins have repeatedly taken public stances that ought to place them outside the bounds of respectable civic discourse .
It ’ s hard to fathom why Metaxas would consider either worth his time .
Moreover , it ’ s hard to fathom why a supposedly thoughtful leader like Mohler @ @ @ @ @ @ @ radio show without calling him to account for giving breathing room to such noxious opinions .
Finally we arrive at Kayleigh McEnany .
McEnany ’ s rise has been meteoric , from production on Mike Huckabee ’ s TV show to White press secretary by the age of 32 .
As impressive as her ascent has been , McEnany ’ s career has been marked by a penchant for controversy .
Long before Donald Trump descended the escalator at Trump Tower , McEnany peddled Obama birther conspiracies on Twitter and CNN , and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to her work , making her a natural fit for her present role .
McEnany is also an evangelical Christian .
Her recent tribute to the Christian apologist Ravi Zacharias drew thousands of views on the internet , including from some prominent evangelical intellectuals .
Andrew Walker , a professor of theology at the seminary where Al Mohler serves as president , responded this way to McEnany ’ s tribute to Zacharias : This earned Walker a retweet from the president himself , as well as a considerable amount of criticism that Walker @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
That may be true in part , but it can not be true in whole .
McEnany ’ s remembrance of Razi Zacharias was moving—and I echo her gratitude for his life and work—but the only reason she has the forum for such a tribute is because she is the White House press secretary , a role she has exercised with cynical aplomb .
At her post for less than three months , she ’ s already pushed the Joe Scarborough murder conspiracy , accused White House reporters of wanting to see @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ’ s photo op at St. John ’ s Church after the Lafayette Square incident as Churchillian .
Her statements on these subjects run the gamut from exaggerations to slanders .
By her own admission in last week ’ s profile in the Atlantic , McEnany sees no discontinuity between her work as press secretary for a highly contentious White House and the profession of her Christian faith .
It ’ s past time for credible evangelicals to state publicly that one can not engage in brazenly deceitful political activity and then enjoy @ @ @ @ @ @ @ of partisanship all at the same time .
But this is the evangelical malady .
So consumed are they with the gathering storms of secularism and progressivism , and so committed are they to conservative politics , that anyone deemed to be on their side goes mostly free of criticism .
Evangelical criticism of Donald Trump has largely subsided , and figures like Metaxas and McEnany get a pass either because of their own witness as Christians or their stance against secularism or simply because they ’ re in some sense seen as @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Dancing with slanderous conspiracies or even white nationalism gets swept under the rug in service to a higher goal , which is why supposed standard-bearers like Mohler direct their ire elsewhere .
This is the end result of a Manichean outlook that refuses to see the complexity of life—a tragedy indeed for those who claim to hold to an Augustinian faith .
Part of the deep connection between orthodox Christianity and conservatism is the understanding that because people are sinful and broken , our societies are complex and can not be managed from @ @ @ @ @ @ @ s also true in other ways ; changes in our world , with some obvious and grave exceptions , can not be chalked up to encroaching secularism and then attacked like a 18th-century army lined up on a battlefield .
You can not excuse political and cultural malfeasance on the grounds that the enemy of your enemy is somehow your friend .
Such an outlook reduces evangelicals to a mere interest group ; people who should be united by a common religious creed in time become just another political tribe .

However you think about Donald Trump’s core constituency—whether you think of it as made up of patrons in small-town diners or forgotten factory workers or aging Fox viewers or something less flattering—no one disputes that high turnout among evangelical Christians is a required element in Trump’s bid for re-election. Most of Trump’s association with evangelicals has been dubious; he has spent time with prosperity-gospel preachers who dabble in outright heresy, such as Paula White, while also courting megachurch pastors within established denominations, like Robert Jeffress of First Baptist Church of Dallas.
More recently, though, Trump has earned a backhanded endorsement from a far more intellectually and morally serious evangelical figure: Albert Mohler, author, radio host, and president of Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Kentucky.
It pains me to take public issue with Al Mohler. I am the son and grandson of Southern Baptist pastors, and I am grateful to leaders like Mohler who were part of a movement to prevent a liberal theological shift that would have turned Southern Baptists into just another mainline denomination. (By theological liberalism, I mean primarily a view of Nicene orthodoxy as antiquated, if not optional.) More personally, I am grateful to Mohler from a distance, because it was his writing, along with that of Chuck Colson, Father Richard John Neuhaus, and the recently deceased Ravi Zacharias that helped me remain a believer at a time when it would have been all too easy to walk away from the faith. All of which is to say that Al Mohler is no lightweight; he is a serious man who is not easily dismissed.
Podcast · August 15 2023 A.B. Stoddard: All the Ex-President’s Conspirators Donald Trump has been a low-rent mobster for his entire career, and now he’s getting…
Mohler’s latest book is ominously titled The Gathering Storm. It’s an overwrought warning against encroaching secularism. Greg Forster’s recent respectful critique in Law & Liberty is well worth reading in full, but here are a couple of takeaways. First, Mohler’s solution to rising secularism never extends beyond standard right-wing politics. In a time when conservatism carries multiple meanings, this is hardly helpful. Next, Forster notes that Mohler approaches a more serious criticism of political liberalism. By now this is old hat for a certain type of religious conservatism—liberalism leads to secularism and waning of religious devotion, virtue, etc.—but it’s a new critique for Mohler. Forster wisely notes that Mohler would make a profound error in dismantling the thousand-year-old project of natural law that culminated in liberalism. Mohler’s best work would be his day job as seminary president, training young pastors to carry out their duties in local churches in such a way that virtue and institution-building would be most welcome secondary effects of their ministries.
Forster’s review is direct but kind. He clearly respects Mohler and his disagreements with him originate in good faith. I join Forster in believing that Mohler—and all Christians who would walk away from the liberal project—are playing with fire. You might argue that religious anti-liberalism has a certain nihilistic bent, but you’d hardly get that impression from Mohler, with his three-piece suits, rep ties, and cleanly polished Allen Edmonds shoes. Still Mohler’s position creates a framework that allows him to take public positions that leave him vulnerable to a variety of criticism.
One way that Mohler has opened himself up to critique is with his recent spate of comments declaring that he will be a de facto Republican for the indefinite future. It’s no surprise that Mohler has been a reliable Republican voter; that’s been true of evangelicals for perhaps thirty years. And on a purely philosophical level, there’s good reason for that. From Burke and Tocqueville to Buckley, Kirk, and the evangelical intellectual hero Carl F. H. Henry, the conservatism of local institutions and limited state power is more easily compatible with evangelical orthodoxy than the vision of Rousseau, Hegel, and their progressive descendants that became commonplace in older mainline churches a century ago. Yet that elective affinity between theology and political philosophy does not necessitate explicit partisan loyalty, and pledging such loyalty has the practical effect of reducing segments of the church into mere voting blocs that operate on the basis of political trade-offs as opposed to deeply held convictions.
Consciously or not, when Mohler recently pledged his support of the Republican party, he gave theological cover to the party, from Mitch McConnell’s cunning Senate moves all the way up to President Trump’s troubling rhetoric. The motivation for Mohler’s fealty was the usual one—federal judges who protect religious liberty and would curtail abortion. I would agree that the appointment of many qualified jurists has been one of the few highlights of the last three and a half years, but—the question rises once more—at what cost? Here Mohler is guilty of a serious political sin, what Jonah Goldberg has often called “one-thingism.” All of us have our issues that really matter to us, but when a large movement declares that one issue rises above all others, that movement is signaling that it will tolerate heterodoxy on any other issue in exchange for their own political prize. This is not just a foolish political calculation; it is damaging to evangelicalism’s integrity. (Mohler expounded on this position in an interview with Isaac Chotiner in the New Yorker last week.)
There is another problem for Mohler that rests on his strategic silence. Common among anti-anti-Trump conservatives, this method has plenty to say about the left, but is almost totally silent in the face of activism and commentary that transgresses the boundaries of civil society that the right traditionally valued. In 2016, though he never explicitly announced whom he voted for, Mohler leveled intense criticism at Trump in the pages of the Washington Post after the leak of the Access Hollywood tape. He has tempered his criticism as time has gone on, and his admission in April makes his vote in November all but official. This failure to articulate a nonpartisan voice for evangelical faithfulness has created a vacuum where any action in service to evangelical political goals becomes excused or even laudable. In this sense Mohler’s voice echoes not so much that of the president himself (that task falls to Paula White and Robert Jeffress) as the prospective inheritors of Trumpism like Senators Tom Cotton and Josh Hawley.
Whatever else can be said about the space Mohler occupies among evangelicals, his role is that of an elder statesman. He is not a populist rabble-rouser like, say, Eric Metaxas, the author and conservative radio host. Metaxas is a tragic example of populism gone wild among evangelicals. Although his biographies of William Wilberforce (2007) and Dietrich Bonhoffer (2009) faced academic criticism, his Socrates in the City program brought together a variety of religious and cultural voices for important conversations. His turn towards Trumpism in recent years has sometimes been silly—Metaxas penned a couple of children’s books wherein Trump (or rather a Flintstones-like “Donald the Caveman” cartoon character) accomplishes fictional tasks such as wall-building and swamp-draining. And it has sometimes been outrageous—as when Metaxas accused Trump’s critics of being demonic, and claimed that the reaction to the Access Hollywood tape radicalized him towards then-candidate Trump, instead of wondering whether perhaps such a man might not be suited to the nation’s highest office.
Metaxas follows the trajectory of so much anti-anti-conservatism wherein the enemy of my enemy is my friend. He has given a platform to Milo Yiannopoulos long after the provocateur merited one (assuming he ever did). He has called British white-nationalist Katie Hopkins “his hero,” and chose to have her on his radio program in the week following nationwide protests in response to the death of George Floyd. While Christians may arrive at divergent political positions on race, immigration, and other issues, both Yiannopoulos and Hopkins have repeatedly taken public stances that ought to place them outside the bounds of respectable civic discourse. It’s hard to fathom why Metaxas would consider either worth his time. Moreover, it’s hard to fathom why a supposedly thoughtful leader like Mohler would give Metaxas airtime on his own radio show without calling him to account for giving breathing room to such noxious opinions.
Finally we arrive at Kayleigh McEnany. McEnany’s rise has been meteoric, from production on Mike Huckabee’s TV show to White House press secretary by the age of 32. As impressive as her ascent has been, McEnany’s career has been marked by a penchant for controversy. Long before Donald Trump descended the escalator at Trump Tower, McEnany peddled Obama birther conspiracies on Twitter and CNN, and there has always been air of confrontation to her work, making her a natural fit for her present role. McEnany is also an evangelical Christian. Her recent tribute to the Christian apologist Ravi Zacharias drew thousands of views on the internet, including from some prominent evangelical intellectuals. Andrew Walker, a professor of theology at the seminary where Al Mohler serves as president, responded this way to McEnany’s tribute to Zacharias:
Put your politics aside for a second and let’s just be human: @PressSec’s tribute to @RaviZacharias is very sincere and moving. It is no small thing that the White House Press Secretary is offering these remarks: https://t.co/SwK3jQK7b5 — Andrew T. Walker (@andrewtwalk) May 20, 2020
This earned Walker a retweet from the president himself, as well as a considerable amount of criticism that Walker later brushed off as Trump Derangement Syndrome. That may be true in part, but it cannot be true in whole. McEnany’s remembrance of Razi Zacharias was moving—and I echo her gratitude for his life and work—but the only reason she has the forum for such a tribute is because she is the White House press secretary, a role she has exercised with cynical aplomb. At her post for less than three months, she’s already pushed the Joe Scarborough murder conspiracy, accused White House reporters of wanting to see churches closed, and described the president’s photo op at St. John’s Church after the Lafayette Square incident as Churchillian. Her statements on these subjects run the gamut from exaggerations to slanders. By her own admission in last week’s profile in the Atlantic, McEnany sees no discontinuity between her work as press secretary for a highly contentious White House and the profession of her Christian faith. It’s past time for credible evangelicals to state publicly that one cannot engage in brazenly deceitful political activity and then enjoy a forum for expressions of faith free of partisanship all at the same time.
But this is the evangelical malady. So consumed are they with the gathering storms of secularism and progressivism, and so committed are they to conservative politics, that anyone deemed to be on their side goes mostly free of criticism. Evangelical criticism of Donald Trump has largely subsided, and figures like Metaxas and McEnany get a pass either because of their own witness as Christians or their stance against secularism or simply because they’re in some sense seen as being on the “right team.” Dancing with slanderous conspiracies or even white nationalism gets swept under the rug in service to a higher goal, which is why supposed standard-bearers like Mohler direct their ire elsewhere.
This is the end result of a Manichean outlook that refuses to see the complexity of life—a tragedy indeed for those who claim to hold to an Augustinian faith. Part of the deep connection between orthodox Christianity and conservatism is the understanding that because people are sinful and broken, our societies are complex and cannot be managed from the top down. But that’s also true in other ways; changes in our world, with some obvious and grave exceptions, cannot be chalked up to encroaching secularism and then attacked like a 18th-century army lined up on a battlefield. You cannot excuse political and cultural malfeasance on the grounds that the enemy of your enemy is somehow your friend. Such an outlook reduces evangelicals to a mere interest group; people who should be united by a common religious creed in time become just another political tribe.


thebulwark--2020-06-29--The Russian Bounty Scandal Shouldn’t Surprise Anyone

On Friday , the New York Times broke the story that Russian military intelligence has been making payments to terrorists in Afghanistan—the same terrorists the United States is seeking a peace deal with—in exchange for killing U.S. servicemembers .
Further reports confirmed that the rewards contributed to the deaths of American servicemembers .
These are , plain and simple , bounties being put on the heads of American soldiers even as the American president sucks up to Vladimir Putin .
As Putin was rewarding the killing of U.S. troops , President Trump and his Republican supporters in Congress and friendly @ @ @ @ @ @ @ debunked conspiracy theory about Ukrainian meddling in the U.S. elections , the administration was sending healthcare aid to Russia amidst the pandemic , and Trump himself was having secret conversations with Vladimir Putin with no notetaker or adviser present in the room—an unprecedented risk .
The Trump administration has not denied the story .
Instead , the president of the United States claims to have been blindsided by it .
If that ’ s true , then it means that he hasn ’ t been paying attention .
Because the Russian bounties should @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the Russian way of war .
Russia ’ s use of mercenaries and proxies goes back to the tsarist days , when they used Swedish mercenaries against the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth .
During the Cold War , the Soviets supported both the North Koreans and the North Vietnamese in order to prolong those wars and prevent Western success .
In both conflicts , these proxy wars became direct , as U.S. and Soviet forces eventually engaged in direct air combat—though the Soviet pilots flew with Korean- and Vietnamese-marked aircraft to avoid responsibility .
( @ @ @ @ @ @ @ 1989 . )
And this modus operandi has continued in the post-Soviet years .
The Daily Beast ’ s Michael Weiss has covered Russia ’ s employment of mercenaries in Syria and Libya , and he acknowledges that Russian mercenary operations are not limited to these two countries .
The most famous , recent case of Russian mercenaries might be the 2018 confrontation between mercenaries of the Wagner Group , a paramilitary outfit overseen by an oligarch with close ties to Putin , and American special operations forces in Syria .
Wagner Group @ @ @ @ @ @ @ numbers and for different roles in Venezuela , Ukraine , and Libya .
Why has Russia historically used proxies ?
For the same reasons other countries sometimes do .
Like all people , Russian citizens are more sensitive if their servicemembers die in defense of another government than if mercenaries do the dying , especially since Russia still has a military draft .
And also , there ’ s the issue of plausible deniability .
Upon American retaliation against his mercenaries , Putin can decide whether he would like to escalate or cease @ @ @ @ @ @ @ has to do in the latter case is claim that the people pursuing Russian military goals are not under his command .
Which is exactly what he did after the battle in Syria .
In the case of the Taliban , the proxies aren ’ t even Russian , so the deniability is that much easier .
But those are the strategic reasons .
What is Putin ’ s policy objective in this case , for offering bounties for the killing of American soldiers ?
Putin is a revisionist leader , meaning that @ @ @ @ @ @ @ goals of the status quo power—the United States .
The Afghanistan war has been America ’ s longest war .
For the past two decades , victory has been around the corner but never achieved .
The Trump administration is seeking an honorable departure from Afghanistan—at least honorable in their own minds—and Putin wants to prevent this .
If the United States were to leave Afghanistan , we would have more resources available for deployment elsewhere—perhaps in contravention of Russian interests .
Putin would be happy to have America remain entangled in Afghanistan @ @ @ @ @ @ @ happy to have America pull out precipitously , without having arranged a deal that turns Afghanistan into a permanent U.S. ally .
Either of those outcomes weakens America ’ s standing as the status quo power , and amping up the American death toll is helpful to both potentialities .
Putin is playing an ambitious game with very bad cards , and he ’ s playing it well .
He wants to diminish U.S. influence around the world but is short of cash , conventional military power , and time .
Which is @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , including disinformation campaigns to create political chaos , election interference , cyberattacks , building nuclear weapons , building electronic warfare capabilities , support for anti-U.S. and anti-Western proxies , and employment of mercenaries—all of which are much cheaper than maintaining a large , conventional military .
The conventional wisdom in American foreign policy circles is that China is our biggest long-term challenge .
Indeed , nobody should underestimate the Chinese threat , but the Russian bear is no less dangerous .
To begin with , Putin is a much shrewder operator than @ @ @ @ @ @ @ against the Russian economy have hurt its long-term growth path , Putin ’ s government has taken steps to mitigate its political exposure to economic stagnation , from closer integration with China to reorganizing the base of political support for the ruling elite domestically .
Finally , Putin ’ s nuclear stockpile is significantly larger than that of China , making Russia ’ s aggregate firepower much greater than China ’ s .
Again , this is not to understate the Chinese threat .
The old “ two-and-a-half-war doctrine ” existed for a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ allies should be working to contain both powers .
In the meantime , Americans—including our president—should learn the lessons of the last two decades of Russo-American relations , conducted by two Democratic and two Republican administrations : Putin ’ s Russia can not be engaged with because Putin ’ s legitimacy is dependent on his opposition to the West .
The Russian bounties are just one more piece of evidence suggesting that we should accept reality and form a long-term foreign policy—accepted by both political parties—that treats Russia as a long-term challenge .

On Friday, the New York Times broke the story that Russian military intelligence has been making payments to terrorists in Afghanistan—the same terrorists the United States is seeking a peace deal with—in exchange for killing U.S. servicemembers. Further reports confirmed that the rewards contributed to the deaths of American servicemembers. These are, plain and simple, bounties being put on the heads of American soldiers even as the American president sucks up to Vladimir Putin.
As Putin was rewarding the killing of U.S. troops, President Trump and his Republican supporters in Congress and friendly media were repeating the Kremlin’s debunked conspiracy theory about Ukrainian meddling in the U.S. elections, the administration was sending healthcare aid to Russia amidst the pandemic, and Trump himself was having secret conversations with Vladimir Putin with no notetaker or adviser present in the room—an unprecedented risk.
The Trump administration has not denied the story. Instead, the president of the United States claims to have been blindsided by it.
If that’s true, then it means that he hasn’t been paying attention. Because the Russian bounties should surprise no one.
It’s the Russian way of war.
Podcast · August 15 2023 A.B. Stoddard: All the Ex-President’s Conspirators Donald Trump has been a low-rent mobster for his entire career, and now he’s getting…
Russia’s use of mercenaries and proxies goes back to the tsarist days, when they used Swedish mercenaries against the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. During the Cold War, the Soviets supported both the North Koreans and the North Vietnamese in order to prolong those wars and prevent Western success. In both conflicts, these proxy wars became direct, as U.S. and Soviet forces eventually engaged in direct air combat—though the Soviet pilots flew with Korean- and Vietnamese-marked aircraft to avoid responsibility. (The Russians finally acknowledged their actions in 1989.)
And this modus operandi has continued in the post-Soviet years. The Daily Beast’s Michael Weiss has covered Russia’s employment of mercenaries in Syria and Libya, and he acknowledges that Russian mercenary operations are not limited to these two countries. The most famous, recent case of Russian mercenaries might be the 2018 confrontation between mercenaries of the Wagner Group, a paramilitary outfit overseen by an oligarch with close ties to Putin, and American special operations forces in Syria. Wagner Group contractors have also shown up in different numbers and for different roles in Venezuela, Ukraine, and Libya.
Why has Russia historically used proxies? For the same reasons other countries sometimes do. Like all people, Russian citizens are more sensitive if their servicemembers die in defense of another government than if mercenaries do the dying, especially since Russia still has a military draft.
And also, there’s the issue of plausible deniability. Upon American retaliation against his mercenaries, Putin can decide whether he would like to escalate or cease action without public embarrassment. All he has to do in the latter case is claim that the people pursuing Russian military goals are not under his command. Which is exactly what he did after the battle in Syria. In the case of the Taliban, the proxies aren’t even Russian, so the deniability is that much easier.
But those are the strategic reasons. What is Putin’s policy objective in this case, for offering bounties for the killing of American soldiers?
Putin is a revisionist leader, meaning that his chief priority is to undermine the goals of the status quo power—the United States.
The Afghanistan war has been America’s longest war. For the past two decades, victory has been around the corner but never achieved. The Trump administration is seeking an honorable departure from Afghanistan—at least honorable in their own minds—and Putin wants to prevent this.
If the United States were to leave Afghanistan, we would have more resources available for deployment elsewhere—perhaps in contravention of Russian interests.
Putin would be happy to have America remain entangled in Afghanistan indefinitely. And he would also be happy to have America pull out precipitously, without having arranged a deal that turns Afghanistan into a permanent U.S. ally. Either of those outcomes weakens America’s standing as the status quo power, and amping up the American death toll is helpful to both potentialities.
Putin is playing an ambitious game with very bad cards, and he’s playing it well.
He wants to diminish U.S. influence around the world but is short of cash, conventional military power, and time. Which is why he has turned to low-cost strategies, including disinformation campaigns to create political chaos, election interference, cyberattacks, building nuclear weapons, building electronic warfare capabilities, support for anti-U.S. and anti-Western proxies, and employment of mercenaries—all of which are much cheaper than maintaining a large, conventional military.
The conventional wisdom in American foreign policy circles is that China is our biggest long-term challenge. Indeed, nobody should underestimate the Chinese threat, but the Russian bear is no less dangerous. To begin with, Putin is a much shrewder operator than his Chinese counterparts. While Western sanctions against the Russian economy have hurt its long-term growth path, Putin’s government has taken steps to mitigate its political exposure to economic stagnation, from closer integration with China to reorganizing the base of political support for the ruling elite domestically. Finally, Putin’s nuclear stockpile is significantly larger than that of China, making Russia’s aggregate firepower much greater than China’s.
Again, this is not to understate the Chinese threat. The old “two-and-a-half-war doctrine” existed for a reason. The United States and its allies should be working to contain both powers.
In the meantime, Americans—including our president—should learn the lessons of the last two decades of Russo-American relations, conducted by two Democratic and two Republican administrations: Putin’s Russia cannot be engaged with because Putin’s legitimacy is dependent on his opposition to the West.
The Russian bounties are just one more piece of evidence suggesting that we should accept reality and form a long-term foreign policy—accepted by both political parties—that treats Russia as a long-term challenge.