The Outsider Perspective Issue 370 | The Beltway Outsiders

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Good Friday Morning! Especially to Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, who ended California Governor Gavin Newsom on live television. DeSantis came with guns blazing, and one of the hottest points came when DeSantis quoted someone that Newsom knows well – Bonchie has the writeup at RedState and the video. It’s well worth your time.

These kinds of debates used to be more common on television. In 1967, newly elected California Governor Ronald Reagan debated freshly elected New York Senator Robert F. Kennedy (RFK had not yet announced for President and was a year away from his assassination). The topic was the Vietnam War and CBS called it the Town Meeting of the World. Students from across the world asked questions, and in the aftermath it was uniformly agreed that Reagan won the debate.

William F. Buckley founded National Review and made a career out of these forums. His show Firing Line brought on people across the spectrum to debate ideas and current events. Modern cable television has devolved into the panel hits, which are nowhere near as good. It’s why podcasts and YouTube are booming – people want to hear those big conversations with prominent people.

This week, I will dig into Henry Kissinger’s legacy. I wrote columns on him and Charlie Munger for the Conservative Institute. I wanted to touch more on Kissinger’s legacy as it relates to modern politicians here – links to follow.

Quick hits:

About a week after the Hamas terrorist attacks in Israel, MSNBC started realizing it had an anti-Semitism problem. It had multiple hosts, journalists, and more who were willing to go to bat for Hamas. The first step MSNBC did was to “quietly sideline” three journalists. Semafor noted that all were Muslims. When the press covers it, they are alleging anti-Muslim bias at MSNBC. If true, that would suggest a lawsuit, but so far, nothing from any of the parties involved. One of the people taken off air temporarily was Mehdi Hasan, one of the more vocal anti-Semites you’ll find on TV or X/Twitter. Hasan had his own show until this week when MSNBC canceled it entirely. NBC has denied that this has anything to do with Hasan’s espoused beliefs, and they plan to keep him for various hits. To rephrase Clarence Darrow, I’ve never wished a man to lose his TV job, but I have read some cancellation notices with great pleasure.
The pivot away from electric vehicles is growing. General Motors had previously announced it was pulling R&D money from EVs but didn’t announce what it would do with it. We know now. It’s using money formerly going to EVs, $10 billion in total, to exercise stock share buybacks. That’s being done to reassure investors after union costs are skyrocketing with these new labor deals. WSJ put it this way: “The company said it would offset the higher labor costs by reducing capital spending on EVs and other programs, simplifying its vehicle lineup and cutting expenses in marketing, engineering and other areas.” Why does this matter? The Biden White House has targeted 2030 as the year when EV sales should be 50% of the overall sales in the market. With all the companies bailing on EVs, that goal looks less and less likely. Consumers don’t want them, and the car companies (outside Tesla), don’t want to make them.
We will get an extensive look at antitrust as the year closes. The WSJ reports that Cigna and Humana are looking at a merger. If allowed, the combined company would be the 3rd largest health insurer in the United States, behind UnitedHealth and CVS Health. Any approved deal would have to require divestment. WSJ suggests, “In a move that could serve to diffuse antitrust concerns, Cigna has been exploring the sale of its existing Medicare Advantage business, which could fetch several billion dollars in a divestment.” They aim to finalize any potential deal by the end of the year, which would kickstart 2024 with a huge antitrust challenge from the DOJ and other agencies. For reference, Cigna and Anthem (now ElevanceHealth) tried merging but got blocked several years ago. There was a lot of bad blood between the companies after that. TBD if this goes the same way, but the combined company would have an estimated size near $140 billion.

Where you can find me this week

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Congress Should Fund Israel And Demand Answers On Ukraine – Conservative Institute

Israeli Military Force Released The Hostages, Not Diplomacy – Conservative Institute

Charlie Munger (1924 – 2023) – Paragon Of American Investing – Conservative Institute

Henry Kissinger (1923 – 2023) – A Geopolitical Titan – Conservative Institute

No More Statesmen Like Kissinger

I don’t write obituary columns often, but I wrote two this week. The first is about Charlie Munger, one of the greatest investors of all time and a veritable fount of wisdom. The other is on Henry Kissinger, one of the most significant geopolitical thinkers ever.

I wanted to touch more on Kissinger and his legacy here, from the vantage point of how modern politicians get him wrong. If you haven’t read it, Kissinger’s most important book is “Diplomacy.” Outside George F. Kennan’s “X Telegram,” which predicted the fall of the USSR in 1946, Kissinger’s tome is the best book on geopolitics ever written.

And I say that as someone who came away convinced Kissinger wasn’t correct on everything.

You have to grapple with Kissinger, at every step. His history is airtight, and the lessons he draws are rock solid. Where we differ is one of perspective. Kissinger loves the statesman. And on that note, I’m not in total disagreement. Countries with great statesmen are in a better spot than those without.

Kissinger builds on realism in geopolitics by tracing various historical threads from Cardinal Richelieu (1585 – 1642) through Metternich, Bismarck, and his own experiences in the Nixon White House. What makes everyone that he names great, in his eyes, is their ability to realistically view the world and achieve specific ends for their nation in a world adrift in principle optimism.

Kissinger is in the mold of Machiavelli’s Prince and views the world like Thomas Hobbes. It’s a brutal world, and the strong tame it with force, balancing their adversaries when total defeat is impossible. For Kissinger, there is never an end to something, just an ongoing struggle between nations.

In his book on China, he draws a difference between Western and Eastern thought by focusing on the games they play. In the West, Chess reigns supreme. There are winners, and losers. You are defined by your ability to achieve victory.

By contrast, in Asia, there is the game Wei qi, or “Go.” In this game, the goal is to encircle more of your enemy’s territory than your own. Kissinger draws from this a lesson in foreign policy: you’re always trying to contain an opponent, not defeat them.

The key to Kissinger’s work is understanding the importance of realism, and keeping a clear eye on events. The temptation in Kissinger’s is to believe you’re the hero of the story, the grandmaster standing athwart history, moving the dials, and balancing the interests of the world into a perfect equilibrium.

I’ll give you a man I know who believes this: Barack Obama. Years ago, I read a piece on Obama’s foreign policy leanings. One of the critical people for him was George H. W. Bush’s advisor, Brent Snowcroft. Obama loved how Bush and Snowcroft worked together to balance various countries against each other to produce better results.

Which brings us to Obama’s Middle East policy. He wanted the US out of the Middle East, in the worst way. Instead of trying to build on the US relationship with Israel, Obama chose the opposite path. He wanted to build up Iran, an enemy of both Saudi Arabia and Israel, in a bid to balance the region. The central idea here is that if everyone has the same strength, they’ll all stay at peace because they don’t have a decisive advantage in a conflict.

It’s an idea that Kissinger draws from Metternich’s deal in the Congress of Vienna (1914/15, post Napoleon). Also, Bismarck and Disraeli with the Congress of Berlin (1877-78), which prevented World War I from occurring in the 19th century and pushed it into the 20th.

For the Kissinger-style diplomat, these events provide a hope of preventing war by balancing the interests of everyone to avoid wider conflict. Obama saw the Middle East as a region imbalanced, and in need of a grand genius to bring it back into balance, even if it meant dealing with evil regimes like Iran. The hyper-realists look past this because the goals are larger: saving a region from itself.

My disagreement with all of this was simple: I accept that great statesmen can provide moments of needed leadership – but that’s not a lasting way to build anything.

One of the earliest historians, Polybius, came to the same conclusions that Socrates found while examining constitutions: the only way to build a lasting country was to have a mixed government that split powers up to prevent decay over time. Every form of government: democracy, aristocracy, and monarchy had its plusses and minuses – but they all failed.

Kissinger and his progeny believe that we need a world run by a great Philosopher-King (like Plato), who will balance the world justly. Basic politics, from Federalist 10 on down, tells you that eventually, you’re getting a lousy leader. It’s a guarantee. If your system or order can’t handle that, it’s not worth the time of day.

We don’t make laws for good men but for evil. Societies are designed around preventing bad things. If your theories depend on the greatness of a Metternich or Kissinger on the scene, what happens when they leave?

I much prefer the Reagan or Teddy Roosevelt stance on all this: carry a bigger stick than anyone else, but don’t look for a reason to use it. And I see a need to oppose things like communism or groups like Hamas, that tear nations apart.

And for every good version of one of these great statesmen, you also have the wannabes, like Obama or Blinken. A point I make in the obituary column for Kissinger is that I don’t see another version of him on the world stage right now. If you want that kind of realism, it just got a lot harder to achieve. This isn’t a slight on Democrats only. I don’t see it in the Republican Party either.

If you can’t depend on these giants to guide a nation, you need something that outlasts them. That’s why everyone, from Socrates to the Founders, looked at fixed constitutions with a mixed government. And in foreign policy, it means carrying a bigger stick than anyone else.

Links of the week

The Death of the Old Europe—and the Rise of the Right: Geert Wilders’ landslide victory in the Netherlands has shocked Europe. It didn’t shock Ayaan Hirsi Ali and Evelyn Markus. – The FP

Hazmat-Suited ‘Big White Men’ Return to Disinfect China as Pneumonia Grips Nation – Breitbart

MASSACHUSETTS says it’s being hit by wave of ‘white lung’ pneumonia in children as Ohio county issues similar warning – after China and Europe saw surge in cases and hospitalizations – DailyMail

The European cities ‘most likely to be hit hardest’ by China’s mystery ‘pneumonia’ outbreak: One city has already seen ‘pneumonia’ cases in children rapidly increase since the outbreak in China – The Sun

Surge in ‘white lung syndrome’ after China is ordered to release more data – The Metro

Federal government investigating multiple hacks of US water utilities: Iranian hackers suspected to be behind attacks targeting facilities that use Israeli-made equipment. – Politico

73% of Jewish students have seen or been victims of on-campus antisemitism since start of Israel-Hamas war: study – NYPost

Harvard, Penn, MIT Presidents Called Before Congress on Antisemitism – Bloomberg

Nuts: U.K. Member of Parliament Calls Grey Squirrels ‘The Hamas of the Squirrel World’ – The Mediaite

Judge blocks Montana TikTok ban law: The judge agreed that the law should be blocked based on the three claims put forth by TikTok. – Politico

X/Twitter Thread(s) of the week