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Asked in an interview recently to name my favorite Christmas movie‚ I went through the usual routine of naming several candidates — new and old‚ mostly black and white — before inevitably getting to the point‚ the undeniable‚ the obvious: Frank Capra’s 1946 masterpiece‚ It’s a Wonderful Life. “Look‚” I fessed up‚ “I know it might seem trite to say this‚ but can’t we all just be honest and concede that It’s a Wonderful Life is not only the greatest Christmas movie ever made but the greatest movie ever made period? There is no debating this. I cry like a little girl every time I watch it.” Many guys have told me the same. Yes‚ guys — the males of the species. These are guys who otherwise‚ like me‚ might pick The Godfather (I or II)‚ and identify with Michael Corleone or Marlon Brando’s character‚ or perhaps might point to Hugh Jackman’s “John Valjean” in the terrific 2012 version of Les Miserables‚ or a Humphrey Bogart or John Wayne role. To quote my colleague David Ayers‚ writing last year after visiting Jimmy Stewart’s hometown museum: “Once again this Christmas season‚ countless Americans sat down to watch Frank Capra’s Christmas classic‚ It’s a Wonderful Life‚ starring the great Jimmy Stewart. I’ve seen the movie plenty of times. So why did it leave me crying again this year?” (Bruce Bawer has said the same in these pages.) Yes‚ why? It has that effect‚ unavoidably. Real Artistry When asked to name a favorite film‚ I suppose many are tempted to invoke some faux-intellectual‚ foreign‚ Frenchy‚ avant-garde drivel. But for a hick like me from Butler‚ Pennsylvania‚ there are no such airs. (Incidentally‚ in part because I’m from Western Pennsylvania‚ The Deer Hunter is also a favorite of mine.) Many a snob would deny Capra’s masterpiece its rightful place in the film pantheon‚ akin to sneering at the beautiful work of a Norman Rockwell while waxing silly over some bizarro hunk of nightmarish slop hung on a wall in some museum of modern “art.” But that’s their problem. Norman Rockwell produced real artistry‚ as did Frank Capra. To repeat‚ note that I’ve gone so far as to assert that Capra’s It’s a Wonderful Life is not only the best Christmas movie ever‚ but the best movie ever. Quite a claim‚ eh? Well‚ whilst recently reading Capra’s memoirs‚ I was pleasantly surprised to see that Capra himself said the same. Before quoting him‚ let me say that Frank Capra (1897-1991) was not an arrogant man. Moreover‚ as for cynics who sneer at Capra’s work as sentimental‚ sappy‚ and overly idealistic‚ if they more carefully studied his films they would see that they included plenty of dark moments. That included Jimmy Stewart’s George Bailey — the cheerful protagonist — hitting some very low dark-night-of-the-soul moments. The pivotal moment for George in It’s a Wonderful Life comes while standing atop a bridge ready to plunge into the freezing water to commit suicide (not exactly a Rockwell portrait). So‚ what did Frank Capra himself say about It’s a Wonderful Life? “I thought it was the greatest film I had ever made‚” wrote Capra in his 1971 autobiography. “Better yet‚ I thought it was the greatest film anybody ever made” (emphasis original). Yes‚ that anyone ever made. Capra thought so. This was a man who also made masterpieces such as Meet John Doe (Barbara Stanwyck‚ Gary Cooper‚ and William Brennan)‚ Mr. Smith Goes to Washington (Jimmy Stewart‚ Jean Arthur‚ and Claude Rains)‚ It Happened One Night (Clark Gable and Claudette Colbert)‚ You Can’t Take It With You (Lionel Barrymore‚ Jimmy Stewart‚ Jean Arthur‚ and Edward Arnold)‚ Mr. Deeds Goes to Town (Gary Cooper and Jean Arthur)‚ and so many more. “It wasn’t made for the oh-so-bored critics‚ or the oh-so-jaded literati‚” continued Capra.  No‚ it wasn’t. Those types‚ the Manhattan crowd‚ predictably panned it.  ‘No Man Is a Failure’ The effete elitist Bosley Crowther of the New York Times dismissed Capra’s film as a “figment of simple Polyanna platitudes.” (Crowther‚ conversely‚ swooned over the egregious pro-Stalin flick‚ Mission to Moscow.) Over at the New Yorker‚ the highbrows snickered at Capra’s “baby talk‚” and particularly found the film’s guardian-angel stuff to be‚ well‚ just unbearably childish: “Henry Travers [who played Clarence the guardian angel]‚ God help him‚ has the job of portraying Mr. Stewart’s guardian angel.”  Oh‚ the horrors! Poor Travers! Guardian angels? Huh! The New Republic‚ the bible of the American Left‚ sneered at Capra’s work: “Hollywood’s Horatio Alger fights with more cinematic know-how and zeal than any other director to convince movie audiences that American life is exactly like the Saturday Evening Post covers of Norman Rockwell.” Interestingly‚ the New Republic had no problem with Soviet life. “I am a patriot for Russia; the Future is there‚” glowed TNR’s Lincoln Steffens. “Russia will win out and it will save the world.” Leave it to the New Republic to defend Alger Hiss and Stalin’s USSR but not Norman Rockwell and Frank Capra’s It’s a Wonderful Life.  Do enlighten us more‚ comrades!  As for Frank Capra‚ who dealt head-on with Hollywood’s communist left‚ he was undeterred by these ideological scolds. His film was not for those people. Capra explained who it was for: “It was my kind of film for my kind of people; the motion picture I had wanted to make since I first peered into a movie camera’s eyepiece in that San Francisco Jewish gymnasium.” Capra’s people were those who had come to America like him as a poor‚ penniless immigrant from Sicily‚ with no chance for the Ivy League education bequeathed to bluebloods like Bosley Crowther and the blathering Bolshies at the New Republic. To Capra‚ It’s a Wonderful Life was “A film to tell the weary‚ the disheartened‚ and disillusioned; the wino‚ the junkie‚ the prostitute; those behind prison walls and those behind the Iron Curtains‚ that no man is a failure!” (emphasis original) Capra’s cry — that line‚ “no man is a failure“— chokes me up now as I picture in my mind the scene when Clarence the guardian angel says precisely that to George Bailey. Of course‚ the story reaches its climax when George Bailey gets that message. A revived Bailey dashes through snowy Bedford Falls with new life‚ shouting “Merry Christmas!” to all. I’m always struck by that image because I grew up seeing it at Christmas time in Western Pennsylvania towns like Emporium‚ St. Mary’s‚ Brockway‚ Bedford (yes‚ Bedford)‚ and even Jimmy Stewart’s hometown of Indiana‚ Pennsylvania‚ where Capra could have shot that scene in a December with no need for snow machines. No person need be a failure. As Capra further explained‚ he wanted “To show those born slow of foot or slow of mind‚ those oldest sisters condemned to spinsterhood‚ and those oldest sons condemned to unschooled toil‚ that each man’s life touches so many other lives [emphasis original]. And that if he isn’t around it would leave an awful hole.” Capra went on: “A film that expressed its love for the homeless and the loveless; for her whose cross is heavy and him whose touch is ashes; for the Magdalenes stoned by hypocrites and the afflicted Lazarus with only dogs to lick their sores. I wanted to shout it to the abandoned grandfathers staring vacantly in nursing homes…. I wanted to shout‚ ‘You are the salt of the earth. And It’s a Wonderful Life is my memorial to you!’” He wanted them to know‚ “No man is poor who has one friend.”  That’s yet another scene from the film that chokes me up every time. And if that doesn’t touch your heart‚ Mr. Crowther‚ Mr. New Republic‚ Mr. New Yorker‚ Mr. Whoever‚ then I feel bad for you.  A great message from a great movie. Remember it always. Merry Christmas‚ everyone. The post It’s a Wonderful <;i>;Film<;/i>; — Yes‚ the Best Ever appeared first on The American Spectator | USA News and Politics.

As the festive season approaches‚ with its twinkling lights and merry carols‚ the item topping my Christmas wish list is fiscal responsibility from Congress and the administration. If this sounds like an economist conflating policy with goodwill‚ remember this: In a world where holiday wishes usually lean toward “stuff” — gadgets‚ games‚ and glittering jewels — my wish would bring long-term prosperity‚ stability‚ and cheer far beyond the fleeting joy of unwrapping presents. READ MORE from Veronique de Rugy: Congress Will Need a New Idea in 2024. Will It Choose a Good One? Here are two small steps Congress could take to jumpstart the fiscal stability process that are uncontroversial and bipartisan (or‚ at least‚ they should be). However‚ before I begin‚ I’ll remind you why we shouldn’t let Congress fool us into believing fiscal responsibility is impossible. In the last four years‚ public debt has increased by 53 percent thanks to the massive expansion during the COVID emergency. Huge gains are possible simply by eliminating temporary programs that were created. As much as people enjoy the illusion of free money handed out by Uncle Sam‚ it’s been unmasked by inflation. Would it be terrible to go back to where we were before the pandemic‚ when the economy and wages were growing‚ and most Americans liked that direction? The first step involves curtailing emergency-spending loopholes. Emergency spending is intended for unforeseen‚ urgent expenditures arising from natural disasters‚ economic crises‚ or other unexpected serious situations. It’s typically exempt from ordinary budgetary constraints and processes. The idea is for governments to respond quickly without the delay of standard budgetary procedures. Unfortunately‚ the emergency-spending label has long been abused. Regular‚ predictable expenditures are often labelled as “emergencies” to bypass normal budgetary controls and scrutiny. This ability to spend without much oversight is awfully convenient for politicians and‚ as a result‚ makes emergency spending a significant driver of government debt. In a new study of the issue‚ Romina Bocca and Dominik Lett of the Cato Institute write: “Congress has designated $12 trillion in inflation-adjusted emergency and related cap-exempt spending over the last three decades. That’s 43 percent of the current public debt without including interest costs.” There’s no way this much spending is based on unforeseen emergencies. Congress can give our children‚ who (as always) will probably foot the bill‚ quite the gift by deciding now to finally take on emergency-spending reform. That would involve more transparency‚ stricter criteria about what constitutes an emergency‚ and better integration of emergency spending into the overall fiscal framework to ensure that such funds are used effectively and responsibly. The second step is to tackle the staggering issue of improper payments made by the federal government‚ which soared to $236 billion in 2023. A new paper by Matt Dickerson at EPIC for America notes that this number represents a 5.42 percent improper rate. This adds up to more than the combined total funding of several major government departments‚ even surpassing the $185 billion provided for the U.S. Army in the same year. Since 2015‚ improper payments have increased by $100 billion. Over the last 20 years‚ the federal government reported a total of at least $2.4 trillion in improper payments. Considering that less than 5 percent of improper payments were underpayments‚ and that the federal government barely even tries to recover overpayments‚ stopping this trend would make a big difference in reducing budget deficits. I think we can all agree that improper payments that grow year-after-year are symptomatic of the sloppiness with which the government manages taxpayers’ hard-earned money. Putting an end to this particularly unacceptable spending should be a no-brainer that transcends bipartisan politics. Over at the Heritage Foundation‚ Rachel Greszler rightfully notes that legislators “must verify that government payments are valid‚ hold bad administrators accountable‚ and minimize Americans’ reliance on federal programs.” She is correct that reducing the reliance on programs that experience the largest amounts of improper payments‚ either as a share of the program (Earned Income Tax Credit) or in absolute dollars (Medicaid)‚ is essential. But‚ also‚ bureaucrats themselves should be held accountable for their mistakes. These small changes won’t fix everything. Only a reform of entitlement programs would do that. And embracing fiscal responsibility might not bring the immediate thrill of unwrapping a new toy or gadget — especially for our kids. However‚ its benefits would endure. Changes could signal a commitment to a more stable and prosperous future not just for us but for generations to come. This Christmas‚ let’s hang our stockings with a hope for fiscal sanity‚ a gift that truly would keep on giving. Veronique de Rugy is the George Gibbs Chair in Political Economy and a senior research fellow at the Mercatus Center at George Mason University. To find out more about Veronique de Rugy and read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists‚ visit the Creators Syndicate webpage at www.creators.com. COPYRIGHT 2023 CREATORS.COM The post Congress‚ Here Are Two Bipartisan Gift Ideas for Our Children appeared first on The American Spectator | USA News and Politics.

At the Dec. 14-15 summit of European Union (EU) leaders‚ Hungary’s soft Euroscepticism took center stage when Prime Minister Viktor Orbán refused to vote in favor of opening accession negotiations with Ukraine. In addition‚ he blocked the EU from giving the war-torn country 50 billion euros in aid. While Orbán cited Ukraine’s lack of readiness and discrimination against Hungarians living within its borders as the rationale‚ critics argue that his primary motives are pecuniary and political. The EU has denied Hungary access to 13 billion euros for allegedly violating rule-of-law standards. Orbán’s veto served as pushback against these accusations (which he denies) and as a ploy to secure the funds that his country needs. The Orbán government also asserts that the United States-led West has squandered its moral legitimacy and global hegemony. The winds of change are shaping a new multipolar world in which China‚ and an expanded Sinosphere across Eurasia‚ will rival the Washington-Brussels-Berlin axis of power. Though Orbán urged the West to “accept that there are two suns in the sky‚” he expects the U.S. to confront an ascendant China by dividing the world into a bloc-based international order reminiscent of the Cold War. Lest Hungary be once again relegated to the periphery‚ it must pursue a geopolitical and geo-economic strategy of “increased connectivity” with the rising East. Spurned by the West‚ Hungary Goes East At the dawn of the 20th century‚ Budapest was poised to rule Central Europe as the co-capital of the Austro-Hungarian Dual Monarchy‚ and it built one of the largest parliament buildings in the world. The neo-Gothic architectural marvel on the banks of the Danube reflected the nation’s triumphant optimism for the future. But by the end of the Great War‚ the defeated country was reduced to a rump state‚ having lost one-third of its population‚ access to the sea‚ and the vast majority of its natural resources including iron ore‚ timber‚ and agricultural land. That the Entente Powers punished Germany following World War 1 is well known. Lesser known are the severe penalties exacted from the junior partner of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. The 1920 Treaty of Trianon forced Hungary to give up 70 percent of its territory to new successor states (Czechoslovakia and Yugoslavia)‚ neighboring Romania‚ and even Austria. Hungarians perceived Trianon as an excessively punitive‚ traumatic event (sentiments that echo even today)‚ which called into question their place in Europe. In his book‚ Go East! A History of Hungarian Turanism (2022)‚ historian Balázs Ablonczy writes that poets and intellectuals subsequently advocated a reorientation of Hungarian identity toward Asia. He points out that literary scholar Frigyes Riedl praised the moral and religious ideals of Asia as “worth more than the modern European ones.” Orientalists rejected the Western academic classification of Hungarian as a Finno-Ugric language‚ which ethnically grouped the Hungarian people with Finns and Estonians. The latter were seen as culturally inferior. Instead‚ Orientalism relied on medieval accounts of powerful Turkic tribes — hailing from the Altai Mountains in Central Asia — that conquered the Carpathian Basin to establish Hungary. The movement sought new political alliances with Turkic peoples as a means of resisting Pan-Slavic and Pan-Germanic nationalism. According to genetic studies‚ the Hungarian tribes that settled the Carpathian Basin in the late ninth century B.C. originated from the Finno-Ugric and Turkic peoples of the Eurasian steppes‚ along with admixture from Caucasian peoples and Eastern European Slavs. Losing World War II turned Hungary into a hostage of the Soviet Union for 40 years‚ which renewed a sense of belonging to the Free World. But this enthusiasm for the West was short-lived. High inflation and recessions riddled the post-communist transition and plummeted standards of living. Then in 2008‚ the global financial crisis devastated Hungary’s export-driven and foreign investment-controlled economy‚ resulting in one of the worst contractions in its history (6.6 percent annual GDP decline in 2009). Viktor Orbán and his center-right Fidesz party won a landslide victory in the 2010 parliamentary elections after campaigning on a nationalist platform of economic self-rule. Balázs Orbán (Political Director to the Prime Minister) explains that Hungarians countered their disillusionment with liberal democracy by turning to their Turkic heritage for “inspiration and momentum” as well as political action. The new government revived Hungarian Orientalism in political discourse with the launch of its “Opening to the East” policy‚ designed to increase trade partnerships with Central Asian Turkic nations‚ Turkey‚ Russia‚ and China. In 2018‚ Hungary became an observer state in the Organization of Turkic States (comprising Azerbaijan‚ Kazakhstan‚ Kyrgyzstan‚ Turkmenistan‚ Uzbekistan‚ and Turkey). Since joining China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) in 2013‚ Hungary has become a poster child for Chinese foreign direct investment in Central Europe. It has received billions of euros from China for large-scale infrastructure projects including the Budapest-to-Belgrade railway. The BRI is a grandiose project to build comprehensive networks ­— consisting of road and rail routes‚ oil and gas pipelines‚ power grids‚ and seaports ­— that connect China with over 150 countries across Eurasia and Southeast Asia. It aims to create an economically and politically integrated “Greater Eurasia” (originally a Russian project) and subsume the economies of its member states under a Sinocentric bloc. The flagship initiative reflects China’s imperialist approach to global governance and its overarching goal of constructing an alternate world order that challenges U.S. dominance. It is worth noting that the Hungarian government has neither eschewed the Chinese effort to construct a geopolitical bloc nor has it extended its criticism of the EU’s “colonial” policies to China. Opponents of the West’s left-liberal politics and progressive messianism argue that Chinese mercantile imperialism constitutes the lesser of two evils. While such a claim is subject to debate‚ the fact remains that small states like Hungary cannot escape the gravitational pull of great powers. Non-alignment promises national self-determination in a world dominated by bloc politics‚ but it can only go so far when confronted with realpolitik. For example‚ India — a founding member of the Cold War-era Non-Aligned Movement — was forced to ask the U.S. and then the Soviet Union for military assistance against invading Chinese forces in 1962. Stephen Kotkin‚ an eminent historian of Russia and Eurasia‚ observes that empires rise and fall but “blocs endure.” When the Sleeping Giant Awakens The 2016 victory of Donald Trump and Brexit evinced an Anglo-American reckoning with the failures of globalization‚ namely the hollowing out of the middle- and low-income classes due to deindustrialization‚ unfair global trade‚ and mass immigration. The Trump Administration reversed Barack Obama’s oxymoronic “Leading from Behind” foreign policy by promoting peace through strength and expanding the U.S. sphere of influence. Poised to win the Republican Party nomination‚ Trump leads Joe Biden in five (out of six) key battleground states according to the November 2023 New York Times/Siena College poll. If Trump prevails in the 2024 presidential elections‚ his administration will pursue a more determined agenda to thwart China’s geopolitical ambitions. Although Viktor Orbán has been a vocal supporter of Trump‚ he defied pressure from the Trump Administration to abandon China’s Huawei 5G technology over spying and national security concerns; in fact‚ the Chinese telecommunications company opened a new research and development center in Budapest in 2020 — a move that could cause friction between Hungary and a future conservative White House. A successful conservative U.S. presidency post-2024 will balance its “America First” persuasion with prudent measures to prevent China from exploiting regional power vacuums. The need to limit Beijing’s footprint is especially urgent in countries such as Hungary‚ which seek partnerships for economic development and carry grievances of historical injustice against the West. Meg Hansen is the Budapest Fellowship Program’s Visiting Senior Fellow at the Danube Institute in Hungary. Previously‚ she served as president of a State Policy Network-affiliated think tank in Vermont. The post Hungary May Side With China Instead of the West appeared first on The American Spectator | USA News and Politics.