Readers have heard me talk about this before, and I hope they will bear with me again: When I was a young man, I experienced a Great Unlearning. What did I unlearn? Much of what I was taught about the world, in Ann Arbor, Mich. In fact, I once thought of writing a book about this experience, to be called The Great Unlearning. It would be a becoming-a-conservative book. Actually, more an eschewing-the-Left book. One of the things I was taught was that I. F. Stone was a great “iconoclast”: an independent, feisty, neither-fear-nor-favor journalist. He was the beloved “Izzy,” a model for us all. Of course, the Right was always trying to tar him as a com-symp, or worse. But that was just your typical McCarthyism. Of course — of course, of course — Stone was once a Soviet agent, and he was always a Soviet apologist. And a liar. You can read all about it, here, in an essay published on Commentary’s website, and adapted from a new book. That book is by John Earl Haynes, Harvey Klehr, and Alexander Vassiliev. Haynes and Klehr have been a two-man truth squad where American Communists are concerned for many years now. And that new book is called Spies: The Rise and Fall of the KGB in America. It is so critically important to unlearn: when there are things to unlearn. Remember Claire Sterling? When I was coming of age, she was vilified as a nut, a right-winger, and an alarmist. She was “poisoning the atmosphere of détente” (of course). And, of course, what she said about the “terror network” turned out to be true. Etc., etc. Etc., etc. ‐Let me see if I have this straight: Miss California was denied the Miss USA crown because, asked about “gay marriage,” she said that marriage should be between a man and a woman, as it has always been? This is a strange, strange country we’re living in. President Obama’s position is that marriage is between a man and a woman. That is the position of the entire Democratic establishment, right? Hillary Clinton, John Kerry, Al Gore, Joe Biden, all of them — right? And yet is disqualifies Miss California? Two seconds ago, no one even thought of the idea of “gay marriage”: a marriage between two persons of the same sex. Now it is beyond the bounds of respectability to oppose such a notion. And it happened so fast. So strange. One more thing: I see, in news reports, that Miss California made “controversial remarks.” Controversial remarks? That marriage is an institution of a man and a woman? So, so, so strange. ‐One thing has become clear, from President Obama’s little world tour, recently completed: It will fall to some of us, over the next four years, or eight, to defend aspects of American power and the American past against our president. Does that sound McCarthyite? I’m sure it does, to some. But then, such accusers we will always have with us. President Obama has found it expedient, or pleasurable, or something, to slight his country for the sake of puffing himself up. You hear echoes of Reverend Wright in his speech, and — may I say it? — of Bill Ayers. He seems to tell audiences, “I’m a good American, but my countrymen? Oh my goodness, what bigoted, blundering boobs.” I like something that Mark Steyn wrote the other day:

Barack Obama is not a banana-republic coup-leader resetting the calendar to Year Zero. [That is, he shouldn’t be.] When he travels abroad, he represents two-and-a-third centuries of constitutional continuity. The impression he gives that that’s all just some dreary backstory of no real relevance to the Barack Obama biopic he’s starring in 24/7 is very unusual in the chief of state of one of the oldest democratic polities on the planet. And not entirely reassuring.

That is putting it mildly, actually. Obama seemed to agree with Daniel Ortega — Daniel Ortega, that thug! — that the Bay of Pigs is something for America to be ashamed of. Not because of the execution of that operation, which was deplorable. Because of its very conception. A reader supplied me an interesting idea: Wouldn’t it be neat if Caroline Kennedy came out and said something? ‐Of course, I deplore many aspects of the American past. So do you. But maybe we deplore different things from the things President Obama deplores. Take America’s abandonment of South Vietnam — or, to put it less sharply, the decision of the U.S. Congress to cut off the government in Saigon. I happen to think that is a hideous stain on America’s record. George W. Bush does too — as evidenced by his citing of the aftermath of our cutoff, when warning of the dangers of abandoning Iraq. The Left howled in pain and outrage when the president talked that way. Well they might have. ‐Do you remember the stir that Ronald Reagan caused when he called the Vietnam War “a noble cause”? Well, think back to the Bay of Pigs, too. I think it was a noble cause — the overthrow of that brutal dictatorship — even if the execution was so bad as to border on the criminal. I wonder what Barack Obama thinks of the Bay of Pigs: noble or ignoble or somewhere in between? I imagine his view is the same as Reverend Wright’s, and Ayers’s, and Rashid Khalidi’s, and Wayne Smith’s, and the Boston Globe’s. I mean, that’s the way it is, right? That’s the guy we elected. ‐How about Vietnam? Does Obama consider that war a “noble cause,” as Reagan did (and as many of the rest of us do)? Wonder if he would give a straight answer. I imagine he would say, “Oh, I don’t want to go back and refight that.” ‐Let me play a little thought experiment with myself. (Sounds dirty, I know.) President Clinton went on “apology tours,” just as President Obama has, and will. They just love to express sorrow to foreigners for America’s sins — other Americans’ sins, of course, not their own. But say a president — an anti-Communist — came along someday and apologized to the people of Vietnam, for our abandonment of them in 1975. For leaving them to the wolves: to become boat people, reeducation-camp internees, or corpses. Would I approve of that apology? I think I would. Or maybe the president could say: “Some of us aren’t too proud of that . . .” ‐Lincoln Diaz-Balart is a Cuban-American congressman from Miami — one of three. The others are his brother Mario and Ileana Ros-Lehtinen. It would be wonderful if Ileana became secretary of state one day. She has the number of dictators, wherever they live. And so, of course, do the Diaz-Balarts. They are universalists in their stand for democracy and human rights. They are not particularists: advocates of liberal democracy for Cuba only. Couple of nights ago, Lincoln Diaz-Balart tore into Obama, on the floor of the House. He lambasted the president for his performance at the Summit of the Americas. To see a video of Diaz-Balart’s speech, go here. He is bad news for the Left, for many reasons: For one thing, he is fearless. For another, he is knowledgeable. He has an interesting personal background as well. His father was a political leader in Cuba. Indeed, he was Fidel Castro’s friend and roommate. And brother-in-law. But the Diaz-Balarts and Castro went their separate ways: The Diaz-Balarts went a democratic way; Castro pursued totalitarian rule. (The Diaz-Balarts, incidentally, will tell you that Castro is not a Communist, and never has been: In his heart, he is a fascist.) Sometimes, Castro likes to play with visiting congressmen, who sit at his knee (or smooch his backside). “Say hello to my nephews for me,” he will say. Back in Washington, the Diaz-Balarts merely scoff. May I put in a quick plug? My 2003 piece on the Diaz-Balarts can be found in my collection, Here, There & Everywhere: here. End of commercial interruption. ‐As Obama’s presidency wears on, it will be incumbent on Republicans in Congress to stand up for certain American views, values, and principles. The president has the lead role in foreign policy, of course; but Congress is not without any role whatsoever. Take the recent Chávez business: our president’s yukking it up with him, the soul-brother clasps, the “mi amigo,” etc. A Republican leader should stand up and say something like the following: “I would like to address myself to beleaguered or disappointed Venezuelans: those who have been imprisoned, or bullied, or driven out. I and other Americans remember you, and stand with you. We look forward to the day when Venezuela has more democratic leadership.” Something simple, nothing fancy — but something that would resonate where it counts. The president may be the chief voice in America, and from America, but he is not the only one. Let other voices at least register. ‐I saw a headline yesterday: “POLL: One in Three Children Fear Earth Apocalypse.” Well, no wonder: Environmental alarmism is instilled in them from a very early age. I gather that such alarmism is one of the most important thrusts in education today — maybe the very most important. Some children are taught that their parents are despoiling the earth by driving cars and using paper towels. Green militants are being created in schools across the country. Educators wield so much power — so very much power. Imagine if they instilled in their charges — oh, I don’t know: a respect for the workings of an open economy, or for American constitutionalism. Wouldn’t that be something? Of course, it would be a different country. ‐Saw a headline from the invaluable MEMRI, the Middle East Media Research Institute: “Arab Intellectual: The Holocaust Must Be Remembered by Everybody — for It Targeted the Very Essence of Humanity.” (For the item, go here.) And that reminded me of something: A lot of people hate MEMRI. They hate it because it exposes pathologies in the Middle East: hatred and kookery, most prominently. A lot of people think MEMRI exists to make Middle Eastern countries look as bad as possible. But one of MEMRI’s founders, Yigal Carmon, told me, years ago, when I interviewed him, that one of the main reasons for starting MEMRI was to give aid and encouragement to Middle Eastern liberals, democrats, and reformers. (By the way, my piece on MEMRI is in the above-mentioned, and above-plugged, collection.) ‐Years ago, a man — a family friend — gave me some invaluable advice: When you go into a job interview, remember: The employer is interested in what you can do for him; not in what he can do for you. Interviewees are always telling interviewers what wonderful things the job would do for them: for the interviewees. That’s bassackwards. I thought of this yesterday when emerging from Central Park. There were the usual purveyors of carriage rides. And one of the drivers barked at a passing couple, “I need money for lunch: How about a ride?” Well, is that the way to go about it? Who cares about the driver’s lunch! What about the pleasurability of a carriage ride? (The couple didn’t bite.) ‐A few months ago, I was talking to a young friend — a mid-teenager. And he mentioned his school, or a school, the Joyce Kilmer School. I said, “Joyce Kilmer — the name is familiar. But I can’t remember who she was.” And my young friend said, “He was a writer,” killed in World War I. Oops. I told him a story: Many years ago, when I was an adolescent, I had heard some recordings by the pianist Abbey Simon. And I said to my teacher, “Do you like her?” My teacher looked at me sternly, and rather rebukefully, and said, “Abbey Simon is a man.” I thought of that on Tuesday night: when attending and covering a Simon recital. “She” is nearing 90. ‐On the Corner yesterday, I read a quotation from “My Country, ’Tis of Thee”: “I love thy rocks and rills.” My friend Lee Hoiby wrote an opera called This Is the Rill Speaking. It is based on a play by Lanford Wilson. And I once read a story about the play. At the theater where it was playing, someone overheard the man in the ticket office, day after day. And what he would hear is this: The phone would ring. And the man would say, “It’s called This Is the Rill Speaking.” Beat. “Rill.” Beat. “I have no idea.” (A rill is a small brook.) (Hey, aren’t brooks small anyway?) (By the way, Hoiby handles this question of definition very, very neatly in his opera — he quotes, musically, “My Country, ’Tis of Thee.”) ‐I’d like to end with a reader letter:

Jay,
I want to encourage you to keep writing about human-rights abuses in places like Cuba and China — no matter what the repetition, keep writing.
When I was about twelve or thirteen, I went camping with my family at Grand Haven State Park in western Michigan. (You know it, right?) There was a kid who went missing in the water, and all kinds of people ran over to where he was last seen. They formed human chains, to go out into the water — there was a strong undertow.
I was standing by my aunt when we first noticed what was going on. Almost as soon as we noticed the trouble, I saw my dad and uncle sprinting down to the beach to help out. I asked my aunt why they were running down there to help, if all those other people were already helping. She said, “Wouldn’t you want every single person looking for you, if you were drowning?”
Duh! Of course I would want everyone looking for me! I can apply this to other situations in life — and I think it applies here. Wouldn’t I want every single person yelling and screaming for my rights if I were being oppressed? Wouldn’t we all?