August 5, 2021 --

At the conclusion of the movie "Casablanca," with the letters of transit in his hands as he and wife Ilsa head to the plane that will take them out of Casablanca to Lisbon, Victor Laszlo remarks to Rick Blaine,  "Welcome back to the fight. This time I know our side will win."

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That reassuring remark from Victor Laszlo came to mind on reading classicist scholar/farmer Victor Davis Hanson's latest column at American Greatness: "The American Descent Into Madness."

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Hanson ended his typically comprehensive observations, in his usual, felicitous, style with a sort of "This time I know our side will win" remark, too:  "[W]e tens of millions are not going to cede freedom of thought and expression to thousands of Maoists."   It is not clear that the forces arrayed against our founding legacy of liberty are Little Red book-carrying Maoists, literally; they do seem, however, to be totalitarian minded -- brooking no dissent.  (America cannot be America without freedom of speech.)

Hanson implies that the call by black radicals, in the last quarter of the 20th century, that "justice" will be achieved "by any means necessary." seems to have become the call of the totalitarian-mind Democrats, in Washington, D.C., and out.  Hanson dates our time of national madness from the start of the Biden administration.   

This  writer, however, would  date the "[d]escent" much earlier -- back to January 2014, if not earlier.  It was more than seven years ago that New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo declared "conservatives" who are pro-life, pro-Second Amendment, persona non grata within his realm. 

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Consider, too,  that the transformation of the millennia-old view of marriages as a bond between man and woman occurred BB,  before Biden.  Indeed the transformation of the very concept of "man" and "woman" occurred BB, as well.

Hanson discusses eight categories of this descent, which should be ascribed not to "America," but to the deranged left -- and what else is one to expect from deranged persons but their descent into madness?   He comprehensively discusses the matter of "citizenship," orchestrated by the left, along the southern border for politically demographic (and, it might be added, demagogic) purpose; the left's lax view toward property crime; the  anti-free speech movement in academia; the ruthlessness of the  "Commissars and Jacobins" on the left; the left's disregard of the perils of inflation; the development of a woke military; the left's continued romance with Cuba's Castroites, and Biden's apparent willingness to place America under the thumb of the UN's globalists.

This writer believes there is no conservative voice more eloquent than that of Victor Davis Hanson -- with one caveat:  his criticism of the left seems to tilt more heavily towards the descriptive, than to the analytical.  That is not to say his arguments are devoid of some probing of the left's derangement, but one looks for more specifics of this derangement: including the leftist's easy resort to opinion devoid of a smidgen of factual statement.  The deranged leftist denounces Donald Trump merely by accusation, and expects Republicans to accept the invidious opinion as fact.  An illustration of this mindset is apparent in the Cuomo comment cited above, wherein this scandal-tarred governor pretended  to distinguish  between "moderate" conservatives and "extreme" conservatives.  One looks to  a Victor Davis Hanson to ring out to Republican officials that for the deranged left, the "moderate" Republican is the Republican who grovels before the hegemony of the deranged left.  (Yes, the RINOs and Never Trumps are grovelists.)

The most obvious example of the leftist demand that Americans accept their accusations as statements of facts is the ordeal of the Russian hoax that the deranged left put the country through, 2017-18.   Where were the voices of common sense to assert, with respect to leftist accusations against President Trump and Republicans, as well, that there was no there there? An artillery of common sense, consisting of thousands of shells of specifics, cannonaded mightily against the lies, the false claims, of the deranged left, might well have prevented the ordeal of -- why not call it Mueller-gate (for certainly special counsel Robert Mueller  fronted for the deep state in its attempt to overthrow the constitutionally-elected 45th president of the United States)?

The political battle for the soul of America -- its legacy of liberty -- is underway. Conservatives like Victor Davis Hanson are our generals,  leading the fight to maintain freedom.  To persuade patriotic Americans, let alone the people they send to Congress, in addition to providing the troops a survey of the landscape of the battlefield  -- (to change metaphors) --diagnosis  in some detail of the malady afflicting the deranged leftists, would be useful.