The other day, Hungary held its usual quadrennial legislative elections. Hungary has a mono-cameral Parliament of 199 members, most of whom are elected in winner-takes-all single-member constituencies; the rest are elected in a national constituency according to some complicated mix of Proportional Representation & more complicated ideas. Hungary is a small country in Central Europe, of about 10 million people, which has almost inexplicably become an object of great interest to American politics.
For my part, years back I became aware of this strange insistence, first in Europe, then also in America, on a small country that has neither money nor prestige, having suffered terribly under Communist tyranny. So in 2020, I jumped at the chance of hearing Hungarian PM Viktor Orbán talk about his country’s predicament & his political outlook. I wrote it up for American Greatness. In short, I was impressed that the man was both direct & subtle, confident, yet without arrogance, speaking as the intelligent leader of a small, endangered regime. Moreover, he has the pride of having been a youthful anti-Communist dissident & the charm, at almost 60 years, of the successful man of affairs. I cannot say on the basis of what I learned that day whether PM Orbán, leader of the largest party, FIDESZ, has done well for his country; I am sure his countrymen can think of no better, since they returned him to his office for the fourth consecutive time—he leads a coalition of two parties that keeps winning two-third majorities in the Parliament. This is strange in any democracy, & impressive, but of course, it is confined to the Hungarian situation, where former Communists became corrupt oligarchs overnight in the ‘90s &, eventually, PM Orbán persuaded the electorate to throw them out in 2010.
My friend Rod Dreher, who spends quite some time in Hungary, had two recent pieces, before & after the election, showing how our elites willfully misunderstand Hungarian politics out of liberal fanaticism, as well as how cruel their attitude is to a country where people deal with serious difficulties & they might not have better options. Nobody needs to think PM Orbán is a prize horse; decent people could leave it at being glad the country isn’t immiserated as before.
But of course, that’s part of the problem. Liberals cannot tolerate the Christian conservatism offered my Mr. Orbán. Witness Mrs. Hillary Clinton, now a social media influencer:
These deluded wannabe crusaders, as per my previous post, are psychopaths. Were they merely mad, they’d be saying, since we already have a fight with Russia on our hands & China’s next, let’s not alienate EU & NATO members, too. But they want regime change in Ukraine, in Russia, & also in Hungary. Other influencers, including the trashy moralists of Hollywood feel the same:
This nonsense leads me to the leader of the Hungarian opposition, himself an influencer:
You can imagine how popular elite American liberalism is in Hungary, but unlike you, Mr. Marki-Zay had no idea:
Briefly put, this mayor of a small town has lost his own election & his grand coalition opposing FIDESZ has collapsed at the polls. Already, liberals are claiming the election was stolen… It’s not democracy, if the wrong people win… Now, back to this small-time politician who’s popular online & in the capital, Budapest, but a complete bust in the rest of the country. He’s a Catholic, married, with seven children—also, he’s pro-LGBT & wants to introduce gay marriage into Hungary. A man of contradictions, to be sure, but also a good show of how our progressive liberalism corrupts souls & threatens the ruin of countries.
Liberalism has failed in the 21st c. The economic crises have been astonishing; the foreign policy has prepared catastrophes for our future, especially in China, until recently a liberal darling; politically, we hate each other & cannot agree on any urgent issue. This has been going on for a while. Liberals have reacted to this mostly by trying to transform people into bearers of experimental identities that reconcile oppression with scientific transformation of human life, including through mutilation of the body.
Hungary is so hated because it opposes these transformations & the politics they require—indeed, the end of politics, the replacement of popular opinion, debate, & decision with administrative decisions by far-removed courts, which are of course unelected, but which have to redesign the most fundamental institutions of our ways of life.
Stated in its fundamental terms, liberals see in Hungary the specter of right-wing politics, which they hoped they had banished generations back. So long as human beings have a sense of shame, there’s a basis for right-wing politics, however, so it must be dealt with in some drastic way.
Accordingly, liberals at various institutional levels, including through diplomacy, economics, &c., have behaved most shamelessly to Hungary, with a cruelty only fanaticism inspires &, in inspiring, not only excuses, but justifies. Poland is also treated in a similar manner, but somewhat less badly—it is the other Catholic, conservative gov’t in Europe.
I believe this is why conservatives, in Europe & America, have over the last decade gradually come around to embracing Hungary & PM Orbán, treating him sometimes even as a champion. This is a sign of desperation, in a way, since, as I said, it’s a small country of no strategic importance. But that does inspire especially in Christians a certain hope—if this one PM can stand tall against so much hatred & abuse, if he can stay in office lo these twelve years in which so many careers have been made & unmade, so many strange, unpredicted political changes have taken place—the Trump election, Brexit, the Afghanistan catastrophe & retreat, & now war on the outskirts of the European continent—maybe there’s hope for Christians in politics. Conservatism is doing very badly in our times, in my opinion because it’s too apolitical. I don’t think PM Orbán can change that, but I do believe that if people were to learn about the political principles involved in his activity, they would find the resources to attempt something similar in many different countries. But this is most unlikely to happen, because conservatives are on principle opposed to great talent & the most important thing about PM Orbán is that he is a very talented politician. Recruiting his like, fostering the associations that could identify, possibly educate such a man, is of the essence of right-wing politics, & I’ve not heard yet of it being attempted anywhere…
Hungarian elections & liberal cruelty
Well said, it will require the political convictions to actually do politics to change the situation.
Given my wordy disagreements over fine differences with Titus in the post below, I want to indicate that I agree with everything he says here.