George Wilson Bush?

Jeff Taylor | January 19, 2005

Glad to see more folks, conservatives even, finally noticing that GWB has more than a touch of Woodrow Wilson in him.

You can read history books, and Reason, for an idea of just how horrible Wilson was as president. Then you might try The 42nd Parallel by John Dos Passos for one man's literary take on Wilson's troubled times.

Comments

TWC|1.19.05 @ 11:42AM|#

You mean stuff like Wilson firing every black that had a government job in DC after he took office?

|1.19.05 @ 11:42AM|#

Wilson was also a racist. Indeed, I affectionately refer to him as the "Jim Crow President." That's why his protrayal today as enlightened idealist is so sickening.

Thankfully I don't believe this particular malady afflicts 43 though.

|1.19.05 @ 11:43AM|#

TWC,

We are of the same mind I see.

|1.19.05 @ 11:45AM|#

Hi Reason. The "conservatives even" link is broken.

|1.19.05 @ 12:00PM|#

Lies all lies, Wilson was a Democrat and Democrats have always been for civil rights.

Abraham Lincoln was a Democrat because he freed the slaves.

|1.19.05 @ 12:02PM|#

Back when both parties were racist, both parties were racist. Quite an insight you've got there.

|1.19.05 @ 12:06PM|#

That's a good point, joe, except for the part where Wilson rolled back the integration of federal employees his Republican predecessors has acccomplished.

|1.19.05 @ 12:13PM|#

Current world events trace more of their origins back to problems caused (at least exacerbated) by World War 1, and Wilson's entry into that war. Israel, Iraq, you name it.

Tell me again why we were "Protecting the world for democracy" by defending the (much larger) British Empire from the (continental, limited) German Empire?

Guess that's why it's a running joke on the Simpsons how Grandpa spews evils about "That Kaiser! We sure whooped 'em!", when he was truthfully no different than any other European monarch at the time.

|1.19.05 @ 12:26PM|#

OK, OK, Bush is bad ... but Woodrow Wilson would be much, much worse.

fyodor|1.19.05 @ 12:30PM|#

Comparing today's Democrats and Republicans to their respective forebears is an exercise in futility because the parties have obviously gone through some major changes over the decades, maybe even to the point of flip-flopping with each other. It's perfectly fair to question whether the Democrats' current popularity among blacks really means their election is better for blacks or better in general, but it's hardly relevant to bring up the respective parties' actions a century ago as if that means anything about their actions or motives today.

Warren|1.19.05 @ 12:40PM|#

If only this meant there was another Calvin Coolidge waiting in the wings.

clarityiniowa|1.19.05 @ 12:49PM|#

fyodor, Amen. Can't tell the players without a scorecard these days, and, sadly, there are no scorecards one can trust.

|1.19.05 @ 1:03PM|#

Jesus Keerist joe does your knee hurt from jerking it that fuckin' hard?

I appreciate your blind loyalty. Its what keeps demagogues like me in office.

|1.19.05 @ 1:26PM|#

I am not a great fan of Wilson or his racial views but his supposed praise of Birth of a Nation is very likely a myth, as I pointed out at http://groups-beta.google.com/group/soc.history.what-if/msg/b05fa69e95db6320

|1.19.05 @ 1:36PM|#

Gary: "Let's also note that the Republicans never nominated to the Presidency anyone (to my knowledge) as remotely as racist as Wilson."

"A perfectly stupid race can never rise to a very high plane; the negro, for instance, has been kept down as much by lack of intellectual development as anything else."--Theodore Roosevelt. (Yes, he did dine with Booker T. Washington, but this remark is as racist as any I have seen attributed to any president...)

|1.19.05 @ 1:41PM|#

Josh, the Republicans were pulling out of Reconstruction just as fast as the Democrats were pushing them. There was certainly a time when the Republican Party was racially progressive, but that era ended long before Woodrow Wilson came on the scene. The Party of Lincoln was, literally, the Party of Lincoln - not even his Vice President stood behind Lincoln's efforts.

Yes, Marion, I can see how accusing the Democrats of being one of two racist parties is a kneejerk defense of Democrats' anti-racism. Oh, wait, I can't. BTW, the man's name is "Marion Barry," dipshit.

Gary, while Southern Democrats certainly were more racist than Northeastern Republicans, it's safe to say that even those Republicans who were considered "open to the needs of blacks" in the early 20th century would be considered off the charts racists today. Also, in the late 19th/early 20th century, virtually all popular ideologies included openly racist elements. It wasn't really until the Dixiecrats realigned into the GOP that either party, or either end of the political spectrum, adopted opposition to racism as a core principle.

|1.19.05 @ 1:47PM|#

Listen to Jonah Goldberg trying to reformulate the Plame affair in a way that makes Bush seem enlightened (from the second link - Corner):

If you think what Bush "does" to his "enemies" is bad you must shudder at the thought of what Wilson did to his. Valerie Plame may or may not have been "outed" in retribution, but Wilson would have undoubtedly put Michael Moore in prison.

Right, Jonah, since Bush isn't throwing film producers in jail, he's practically a civil libertarian.

|1.19.05 @ 2:02PM|#

I think fyodor said it best. The parties today are coalitions reflecting the current political landscape, and both parties have little in common with parties from the past bearing the same names. In 30 years, there will most likely still be 2 major parties with the same names, but it's impossible to predict whether they'll have anything in common with the current parties.

But those who want to are of course free to continue the pissing contest.

J. Goard|1.19.05 @ 2:04PM|#

David,

I had thought that your quote didn't deserve to be disparaged as 'racist'. By itself (of course more than a little anachronistically), it could be read as blaming anti-intellectual features of Negro culture. Then I found more of the quote:

"All reflecting men of both races are united in feeling that race purity must be maintained. The(African) porters are strong, patient, good-humored savages with something childlike about them that makes one really fond of them. Of course, like all savages and most children, they have their limitations."

What ever happened to the backhanded racial compliment? Ah, the good old days...

|1.19.05 @ 2:04PM|#

thoreau,

The only person involved in a pissing contest are "joe" and "Marion Berry" [sic].

|1.19.05 @ 2:08PM|#

...and actually, I'm arguing a "pox on both their houses" position.

|1.19.05 @ 2:16PM|#

I should have realized that T.R. would trip me up, in light of his support for forced sterilization and other "progressive" causes (notably Churchill also supported such efforts at one point).

|1.19.05 @ 2:57PM|#

NEWS FLASH!!!

Things are still pretty much the same....

|1.19.05 @ 2:58PM|#

It's funny how the parties have flip-flopped.

Josh, the Republicans were pulling out of Reconstruction just as fast as the Democrats were pushing them.

In all fairness to the Republicans (and I hate being fair esp to Republicans) they pulled out of Reconstruction because of electoral pressure more than loss of conscience. As part of the deal to win the contested 1876 election the Republicans essentially agreed to end Reconstruction.

This flip-flopping wasn't limited to parties either. While US Grant had tried hard to enforce reconstruction and actually lamented the failure to deliver justice to blacks in the face of southern white resistance his son was notorious for keeping blacks out of West Point. Of course Grant was a man of his times and while he might have supported some abstract concept of racial justice we have no way of knowing how he might have felt about blacks at West Point.

Even so Republicans continued a program of patronage directed at blacks. That was ended by Wilson.

Two of the biggest advances in race relations were brought about by two democrats with histories of indifference to or outright hostility to civil rights: Harry Truman's integration of the armed forces and LBJ's Civil Rights Act of 1964. Both might have been motivated by pragmatism neverthless acting against your party's core support takes some courage.

I find it amusing that so many Republicans deny their party's big Federal government "Progressive" past while so many democrats deny their party's racist past.

Gary, Speaking of Jack London, did you catch the Ken Burns film about Jack Johnson? It was on PBS here the last two nights.

|1.19.05 @ 3:14PM|#

Oh, yeah, Wilsonianism. There's a big difference between Bush's outlook and Wilson's. Wilson's vision of spreading democracy revolved around removing global powers from their imperial authority over far-off nations. He didnt' propose replacing Britain's rule over India with America's. Bush and his PNAC fellow travellers view American control over distant countries as consistent with, even mandatory for, their freedome and democracy.

|1.19.05 @ 3:15PM|#

Isaac,Gary,

Jack London's SF short story "The Unparalleled Invasion" end's with the genocide of the "chinese race". The man definitely had a thing about race.
http://www.web-books.com/Classics/Stories/London5/London5C3P1.htm

|1.19.05 @ 3:15PM|#

Isaac Bertram,

I've always been a fan of London's novels, BTW, even though they heavily borrowed from Sir Walter Scott, Conrad, Cooper, etc.

|1.19.05 @ 3:18PM|#

SM,

The notion of a "yellow peril" was pretty rampant in those days.

fyodor|1.19.05 @ 3:28PM|#

Odd that Churchill would blame the rise of Communism and Naziism on the US's coming to Britain's aid in WWI, as he was quoted as saying in the Reason book review linked in the blog post. Did England really act against its own interest by accepting US help and winning that war?

BTW, here's a thought: the Iraq War backers loved to cite Japan and Germany after WWII as examples of democracy working in conquered nations where some had predicted it couldn't work, but among the counter examples I hadn't really considered before was Germany after WWI. Sure, democracy worked there for a little while....

|1.19.05 @ 3:41PM|#

fyodor,

A Europe controlled by the Germans would have been a nightmare for Britain. BTW, I always love how people attempt to shift the blame for WWI and WWII away from the Germans.

|1.19.05 @ 3:46PM|#

Isaac Bertram,

Burns can get a little melodramatic at times.

fyodor,

There's a pretty good reason why Britain allied with the French; they didn't want the channel controlled by the Germans directly or indirectly. They wanted a strong France as a buffer against the Germans and as a means to guarantee Dutch and Belgian independence. For Britain a hostile nation across the channel would have gotten back to the same situation they were in during the Napoleonic wars. And that situation would of course have been worse if Britain chose to surrender in 1916 or 1917.

|1.19.05 @ 3:55PM|#

leadership UAW should be leadership of the UAW

fyodor|1.19.05 @ 3:56PM|#

Um, fine and good, Gary, but I don't see what that has to do with Churchill's quoted charge that the US's entrance into WWI led to the rise of Naziism, Communism and WWII, which I still don't understand.

|1.19.05 @ 4:01PM|#

fyodor,

Well, the point is that WWI undermined the German and Russian regimes so as to some rather radical ideologies to take hold in those countries. Of course the U.S. entrance into WWI had literally nothing to do with the rise of communism in Russia. As to Germany's collapse, one has to ask what would have happened if the reverse occurred - what if France and Britain had collapsed and were left to fester in their defeat? Clearly things wouldn't have been so bad for Britain (since it still had the larger fleet, hand't lost any of its territory, etc.), but France could have turned out to fill the role the Germans filled in WWII.

People who argue that a victory for Germany would have been better don't appreciate the fact such a victory wouldn't have happened in a vacuum.

fyodor|1.19.05 @ 4:05PM|#

GG,

So you disagree with Churchill? And by extension the Reasonoid position on Woodrow Wilson in this regard?

|1.19.05 @ 4:13PM|#

the man's name is "Marion Barry," dipshit.

NO NO I'm Chuck's cousin not the former mayor of DC

OK OK like i'm the only dipshit here that ever fucking misspelled anything.

fyodor|1.19.05 @ 4:17PM|#

Didn't Marion Berry do Johnny B. Cooked?

|1.19.05 @ 4:21PM|#

fyodor,

No, I do not agree with the Niall Ferguson (if that's the author whose book was reviewed) argument that WWI would have been better for Britain to lose/not fight in. Germany controlling the continental side of the channel would have been a nightmare for Britain; especially in light of the generally paranoid nature of the German regime at the time and the naval competition between the two parties.

fyodor|1.19.05 @ 4:36PM|#

The review is a book by one Warren Zimmerman, who argues that Wilson's foreign policy was a continuation of Teddy Roosevelt's. The reviewer, Contributing Editor Michael McMenamin, takes issue with this, saying (for starters),

A good argument can be made, however, that the direction was not steady, and that American foreign policy in the 10 years after the first Roosevelt -- especially the policy followed by Roosevelt�s nemesis, Woodrow Wilson -- played a major, albeit unintended, role in the births of both Nazi Germany and Soviet Russia.

No less than Winston Churchill suggested as much in 1936: "America should have minded her own business and stayed out of the World War. If you hadn�t entered the war the Allies would have made peace with Germany in the spring of 1917. Had we made peace then there would have been no collapse in Russia followed by Communism, no breakdown in Italy followed by Fascism, and Germany would not have signed the Versailles Treaty, which has enthroned Nazism in Germany. If America had stayed out of the war, all of these �isms� wouldn�t today be sweeping the continent and breaking down parliamentary government, and if England had made peace early in 1917, it would have saved over one million British, French, American and other lives."

Since instead of minding her own business, American entered the war on the side of England, I find this statement by Churchill quite odd. Since these unintended consequences seem to be at the heart of the conservative/libertarian case against Wilson, I figured that understanding this charge by Churchill (and quoted in a Reason article linked in this blog) might help me better understand the anti-Wilson sentiment being expressed here and why Bush is being said to repeat Wilson's mistakes. I think I understand all this to a large degree, but not to the degree that I understand why Churchill would say such a thing. Hoping you (GG) or someone can enlighten me without my having to read several voluminous volumes.

fyodor|1.19.05 @ 4:38PM|#

The italics, i.e. the quote from the review, was supposed to last two paragraphs rather than one.

|1.19.05 @ 4:53PM|#

fyodor,

If you hadn�t entered the war the Allies would have made peace with Germany in the spring of 1917.

I'm afraid that Churchill was flat out wrong; peace overtures by Britain and France in that year (even following America's entry) were rejected by the Germans (as late as November 1917 I might add). Furthermore, the rise of Lloyd George to PM preceded America's entry into the war, and that to be frank was the most important factor in Britain's continuing efforts. A similar change in political leadership in France in November 1917 (Clemenceau became PM) also was crititical to the continuation of France's efforts following the mutiny of April-May 1917.

Let's not also forget Churchill's hostility towards Lloyd George can be seen at play in his statement.

|1.19.05 @ 4:54PM|#

fyodor,

Churchill said a lot of things that people would like to forget, these include his dark opinion of Indian independence, his dim views of "wogs," etc.

|1.19.05 @ 5:15PM|#

fyodor at January 19, 2005 04:36 PM
Hoping you (GG) or someone can enlighten me without my having to read several voluminous volumes
yeah, what fyodor said.

And the free english/history/biology (and other science) lesson's are also a welcome perk, thanks Reason commentors/posters.

?what is the pc title for a commentors/posters.

|1.19.05 @ 5:47PM|#

Not to mention that Russia would've slid into communism whether or not we entered the war. The beatdown from Japan probably had a greater psychological effect on the Russians, the conditions and ration problems of WWI laid the foundation and left the military sufficiently weakened to allow the revolution to succeed. I guess my point is, I don't see where Churchill comes off blaming us for the rise of communism. The other two areas, I can see, but the Triple Entente had more to do with the Russian Revolution than American interference.

fyodor|1.19.05 @ 6:13PM|#

Mo,

And even if the US's involvement in WWI had some connection to the rise of Naziism and Fascism, is it the kind of connection where you could lay the blame on the US? As in, the US should have known better? Because if the US should have known better than to help England fight against Germany, then surely England should have known better than to fight Germany in the first place! That's why Churchill's charge doesn't seem to make much sense. And so while there may very well be much bad stuff to blame on Wilson, I don't think I would use that quote of Churchill's as support.

gaius marius|1.19.05 @ 6:21PM|#

France could have turned out to fill the role the Germans filled in WWII.

that's always possible, mr gunnels, but i think it unlikely. german idealism and darwinism had conflated to form the idea of aryan superiority well before ww1 -- if germany had won, much of the west would have seen that as the racially-correct outcome.

the angst of the opposite outcome in spite of those convictions compounded the painfully ironic instrument of defeat -- successful german attack breaking through at the somme on march 1918 leading to the disintegration of the german army, counterattack and defeat -- did much to fuel the german sentiment of victory suspended.

france, on the other hand, frequently (and correctly) entertained the notion of its own decadence in the fin de siecle, and may well have folded into the dustbin relatively quietly -- as many (though certainly not all) french subsequently seemed prepared to do under vichy.

this is not, fwiw, some assault on french national manhood, and i don't intend any of this as insult to anyone. just speculation, of course.

|1.19.05 @ 6:43PM|#

France could have turned out to fill the role the Germans filled in WWII.

That's an interesting idea to contemplate. Except, of course, their first move would be to surrender to Poland.

this is not, fwiw, some assault on french national manhood, and i don't intend any of this as insult to anyone.

I'm sorry, but someone had to take the cheap shot, and since you refused, I had to.

You make me feel dirty.

|1.19.05 @ 8:48PM|#

Here's from Patrick J. Buchanan's column today in AntiWar.com:
"As with Wilson, Bush's belief in the salvific power of free elections has become near religious. He has told staff he believes that, 50 years from now, he will be remembered for his 'forward strategy of freedom.' His inaugural address is to be about liberty."
Is Salvific Pat on the "W" (Wilson) bandwagon or what?

The crescendo of violence in Iraq is almost universally assumed to be a build-up to election day.
What will CBS, NBC, etc. say, when the violence is even greater AFTER erection day over there? Oops?
Maybe even the NYT will issue an apology?

|1.20.05 @ 9:00AM|#

gaius marius,

I wouldn't call the German offensive of 1918 successful; the French and British gave ground to grind the offensive to a halt.

Anyway, my point is that arguing that a German victory in WWI would have been beneficial over the long run ignores the potential negative consequences of such a victory.

Your argument stresses German idealism and Darwinism, but note that similar currents were at play in France before WWI and after the war.

|1.20.05 @ 9:10AM|#

gaius marius,

...may well have folded into the dustbin relatively quietly -- as many (though certainly not all) french subsequently seemed prepared to do under vichy.

Vichy was considered by its adherents to be a "renewal" of France; indeed, it would be entirely inaccurate to state that the French people as a whole had given up on their nation after 1940. Indeed, given France's periodic experience with loss and triumphant recovery, it was indeed expected by many if not most Frenchmen that France would overcome its defeat at the hands of the Germans.