November 25-December 1, 2004

artpicks

Pat Answers

by A.D. Amorosi

books

With shock-and-awe visions of Democratic presidential loss still embedded in our addled brains, there are a few ways to approach Pat Buchanan. Charge at the White Christian Right Guy with a sharpened wooden stick. Or throw a handful of those gumball machine jawbreakers and Super Balls at him.

Then again, you could approach Pat Buchanan—an old-school, pre-Cold War conservative who wears his Catholicism on his crisp white Botany 500 sleeve—with the weird respect that should be accorded to anyone who's written Where the Right Went Wrong: How Neoconservatives Subverted the Reagan Revolution and Hijacked the Bush Presidency (Thomas Dunne Books, $24.95).

Unlike the current klatch of neoconservatives around him, the former presidential candidate, right-wingman and scribe for Rolling Stone, National Review and Conservative Digest has a harsh but pragmatic and reasoned view of the Bush administration. With near Zell Miller-like vitriol, Buchanan tears into all manner of Bush doctrine—the ridiculousness of Iraq, the fumbles of all branches of so-called intelligence, the utter audaciousness of its pigheaded zeal in the face of total disaster. Rather than froth and foam, Buchanan places Bush and the neconservatives' blinders-on march toward Valhalla in historical context, going back to the Roman Empire. He also intelligently takes on Islam and its thousand years of struggle. Even when he's boneheaded and wrong (see his take on Mexican immigration), you're amazed by the diligence of his arguments and wealth of research. Think of Where the Right Went Wrong as Buchanan's Fahrenheit 9/11.

Minus the partisanship and the trucker hat.

Pat Buchanan appears Tue., Nov. 30, 6:30 p.m., $6-$12, National Constitution Center, Kirby Auditorium, 525 Arch St. Reservations required. Call 215-409-6700 or e-mail adultprograms@constitutioncenter.org.