Michael Anton returns to gov't

The only right-wing intellectual who has actually had an influence on politics since the Iraq War is Michael Anton, author of the notorious Flight 93 Election essay, which no one would publish until his friends at the Claremont Review of Books chose to do so, a dangerous step for an academic review that stays out of politics. It proved incredibly popular, it was reviled in the press, loved by the readers, & it is still today the best articulation of the case for Trump.

Conservatism, whatever it is, has not produced or even encouraged anything comparable either in terms of describing the political conflict to which we are all witness & perhaps even party—or in terms of advancing a position that could secure victory in the conflict.

In the decade I’ve been involved in conservative intellectual & political affairs, I’ve heard from people in most if not all of the factions in the conservative grab bag, & usually the more remarkable representatives admit the amazing achievement of Anton, even when they disagree with him. I’ve heard him applauded for it, held as an example, compared with the luminaries of mid-century conservatism even by the most elegant think tank libertarians who avoid the muck & mire of political conflict.

I say all this for two reasons; first, conservatives should honor Anton, it’s bad conduct & it’s bad business to do otherwise. Private praise of the kind I’m describing is in a sense more worthy because more truthful—people saying such things to me or to each other rather than to Anton’s face, especially when they are opposed to him politically, suggest something of honesty, an absence of flattery which is almost impossible for us today to achieve. But the public things count more in another way—he should get at least a medal.

Second, the examples we set are very important. Our politics is very contentious, but we have no examples of polemicists who also have a high education, whose indignation & whose anger are seasoned with political experience & a dedication to America. I’ve heard from young men that Anton’s example changed their lives, since he’s neither mealy-mouthed nor simply all talk. Perhaps also because he put his reputation & livelihood on the line, offering himself up to be doxxed by his former friends or, well, not exactly friends, but colleagues or acquaintances. He betrayed the neocons & they him.

That was all to one side—writing—but Anton is also a public servant, a politician of sorts. He served on the National Security Council during the administration of the younger Bush president. He grew discontent with the neoconservative policy & the arrogant impotence of Washington. Then he returned to serve in the Trump administration & his experience has, if anything, confirmed him in his judgment that the future of America lies with Trump.

Well, he’s going back into public service in a much more important position—here’s the news:

That Director of Policy Planning sounds pretty horrible, the kind of bureaucracy from which we flee as if on wing, but the position really is important. Trump has not had people with the education, experience, ambition, & loyalty he needs working in high positions; now he does. It’s urgently necessary to formulate a new foreign policy that fits the dangers America is facing while taking into consideration the internal difficulties I mentioned before, partly the political conflict between the people & the elites. That’s all of American politics now & the result is that we end up in maddening situations.

For example, while Trump replaced Biden at the ceremonial reopening of Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris, Biden was preparing to give a speech to the nation about how he’s responsible for destroying yet another Middle Eastern country, an American specialty in the 21st c., in this case Syria. The local tyrant, Assad, has been toppled with American involvement. Now a kind of local Al Qaeda is taking over. What next?

Back in 2022, I urged Anton to do more political writing—there is a great need for persuasive argument at a high level to confront the remarkable prestige of liberal elites & of the institutions they control. There are no real organs of opinion on foreign affairs that have anything to do with the post-Trump GOP, never mind the conservative priorities in politics now to be implemented by a new administration. So opinion elites, electorate, politicians, & administrators are largely unable to come together.

Anton reminded me he did follow up the Flight 93 Election with a more elaborate broadside, The Stakes: America at The Point of No Return, which you should also buy & read. I think he meant thereby to suggest that thinkers should be modest—he did what he could, the book came out during the 2020 campaign, but it didn’t cause an explosion & didn’t sway either the discourse or the election or anything else. But I suggest it’s quite revealing as well as instructive—it’s a tract for the times at a level we almost never achieve these days, yet it’s immediately accessible to voters & intellectuals alike, & it has the quality of looking more to the future than the past, a useful departure from the laments of the conservatives.

Maybe he was not only modest, but also wise—another electoral cycle down the road, the GOP is returning to D.C., Anton is returning to gov’t, & it will be possible not merely to speak, but to do things. I think his career in politics with all the drama since 2016 should encourage, even inspire lots of other ambitious intellectuals to step into the arena, try their luck, & maybe achieve something at the national level.