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Dan Hannan: Leading Europe’s Dramatic Shift to the Right
A politician on the rise has some clear advice for American conservatives.
Despite finishing at the top of June’s European election in his region of the U.K., Dan Hannan is probably still more of a “star” in the U.S. and the rest of the Anglosphere than in his native Britain. This fame resulted from his rip-roaring roast of Gordon Brown at the European Parliament that became a huge hit on YouTube.
Hannan is rather blasé and philosophical about the patronizing treatment he receives from British media. Hannan quoted Dr. Seuss — his daughter’s favorite author — in his acceptance speech, which had BBC host David Dimbleby remarking to Hannan that he “didn’t know Dr. Seuss’ work.” Hannan kept his cool.
Hannan conducted the following interview with me via email:
How do you feel about being part of what seems to be a return of the Right against the forces of socialism (in contrast to the recent election in the U.S.)?
Do you have any advice for those on the Right in the U.S. who are feeling down in the dumps because of the state of the Republican Party and the movement in general?
Now that the Conservatives are finally leaving the EPP do you think it’s a load off your mind? How will this affect how you operate?
In the light of a “move to the Right” in the last set of elections, how do think this will affect the parliament and the E.U. as a whole?
Hannan: Yes, Europe has swung away from socialism. But it’s important for Americans to realize where Europe is starting from — it is quite normal on this side of the Atlantic for governments to take 45 or 50 percent of GDP in tax. So Europe’s swing to the Right and the U.S. swing to the Left still leave America less socialist than Europe.
None the less, the swing is significant for this reason. Voters are now way ahead of their politicians on the issue of tax and spend. While the political parties dance about trying not to use the word “cuts,” the electorate has clocked that reductions are urgent. The recession is forcing everyone to make economies: every business, every household. Do we really need two cars? Is there a cheaper mobile phone package? Can we get a better deal on insurance? They can see that it is possible — necessary indeed — to cut spending, but that such cuts need not have too deleterious an impact on our quality of life. And they simply can’t understand why the same logic doesn’t apply to the government. It is outrageous to exempt the public sector from the shrinkage of the economy — i.e., to tax the wealth creators even more in order to cushion the rest.
One of the reasons we Tories are leaving the EPP, and forming a new alliance of Euro-skeptic parties, is to make these arguments. We will put together a coalition of Atlanticist, free-market conservative parties that believe in national independence and parliamentary democracy. In doing so, we will break the monopoly in Brussels. Because, I stress this again, the “swing to the Right” was, in many cases, a swing to pantywaist Christian Democrat parties whose politicians, in the U.S., would be bang in the middle of the Democratic Party.
Advice for American conservatives? Only this. The Republican Party’s success depended on its becoming a popular party — that is, a party that was for the people against the governing elites. Half a century ago, it was a party of big business and old money, and it kept losing: it was in permanent opposition in both houses, and tended to win the presidency only when it fielded a non-partisan Ike-type candidate. Then it changed: it embraced localism, small government and states’ rights. It went from being a New England, preppy, country club party to being a Sun Belt, anti-Washington mass movement. And you know what? It started winning.
My worry is that, in recent years, the party has gone into reverse. It has become, as in pre-Goldwater days, the party of federal spending, budget deficits, external protectionism (the steel tariffs), overseas garrisons, the denial of states’ rights (the gay marriage amendment) and, latterly, bailouts and nationalizations.
I speak as someone who has a more uncomplicated loyalty to the GOP than to my own party, and I desperately want it to start winning again. But that means getting back to basics: to the basic idea that informed the U.S. Constitution, namely that decisions should be taken as closely as possible to the people they affect.
If you like what Dan Hannan MEP has to say, you might want to follow him on his blog. He always makes a very good case for his positions.
I would like to thank Dan — who is a rather busy man — for answering my questions in such a detailed manner.
Andrew Ian Dodge blogs at Dodgeblogium.
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21 Comments
1. David Thomson:Dan Hannan is fairly sensible on economic issues. However, he also an apparently guilt tripped white dude who naively had good things to say about Barack Obama. Hannan had obviously never studied the American president’s past utterances concerning economic matters. This is what he should have added during the interview: Americans must stop Obama. He is the greatest threat to your pocketbooks and personal freedom.
Jun 25, 2009 - 3:35 am 2. WestWright:Thanks Mr. Dodge, great interview with Dan Hannan. I recommend everyone checkout Hannan’s excellent blog @ the Telegraph for astute coverage of the EU and GB politics!
Jun 25, 2009 - 4:45 am 3. David W. Lincoln:Daniel Hannan has been praised by me before, and I say those words of praise are still warranted.
As long as the GOP is fighting over Sarah Palin, Daniel Hannan is the de facto face of Common Sense policy.
For, I am still convinced that those in the GOP who wrinkle their noses when Sarah Palin is mentioned, they are more interested in being seated when the rich and powerful are gathered, rather than being told there is no room for them.
Jun 25, 2009 - 6:18 am 4. seven:A real man with a chest. He offers hope and beneficial change.
Jun 25, 2009 - 10:03 am 5. Ian Thorpe:Dan Hannan is more of a star in the US because wile Europeans are broadly against more centralisation and federalisation we are also against unregulated capitalism (which leads to Fascism) Europe, including European Conservative parties is broadly classic liberal, believing in individual freedom and self determination withing a mutually supportive community while Dan and his fellow travellers tend to the “every man for himself” economic position and very tight social control.
Having sai that he’s a good guy and is doing a heel of a job for the anti-federalisation movement.
Jun 25, 2009 - 12:58 pm 6. Brett_McS:“..unregulated capitalism … leads to Fascism”? I never thought of Weimar Germany as an example of ‘unregulated capitalism’. Quite the opposite.
Jun 25, 2009 - 3:23 pm 7. Athena:‘The denial of state’s rights?’ Surely he can’t reasonably believe that the GMA would pass and what does he have to say about judges deciding the issue without voter consent or input?
Jun 25, 2009 - 4:29 pm 8. D'oh!:Well, “unregulated capitalism” (like true “Marxism”, I suppose) has never been tried. So we don’t really know, do we? The only place there ever was anything like “unregulated capitalism” was in the U.S. around, say, 1900. And I am very sad to say that it was primarily Republicans who reigned it in with things like trade tariffs and monopoly laws. But fascism? In the U.S.? Never really saw any of it here until after the last national election. And how you can be a “classic liberal, believing in individual freedom and self determination” without having capitalism as the foundational economic paradigm is beyond me. All “classic liberals” were capitalists and didn’t give a hoot about any “a mutually supportive community”, you could look it up.
Jun 25, 2009 - 4:29 pm 9. "progressive"watch:We in America need to swing right also. The problem for us has been the Republican elite’s main goal is being elite. They really have no other values. Rather than making a stand on something they have moved to the left,then a little more,then a little more… They haven’t stopped moving. They are moving more than a little during this time of “crisis,crisis.”
Jun 25, 2009 - 5:11 pm 10. Bohemond:Ian Thorpe:
“individual freedom and self determination withing a mutually supportive community”
“mutually supportive community” of course being a euphemism for the welfare state- that is the coercive extraction of wealth from the productive for the benefit of spongers, deadbeats, and jobsworths. Leading inexorably to all-powerful bureaucracies, quangoes and nannies, and the end of said individual freedom and self-determination. The Lord of the Manor has been replaced by the Council, but it’s still serfdom. Except serfs paid lower taxes.
“Every man for himself” is also called Individual Responsibility- and it works. Ever wonder why the stagnation and unemployment Europe considers normal, Americans would consider a recession?
Incidentally, quien es mas Fascista, Reagan’s America or Brussels-ruled Europe?
Jun 25, 2009 - 5:43 pm 11. Kristen McFarland:As an American, it has been progressive policies from both political parties that have determined the course our country has taken over the last hundred years. Liberalism has become a dirty word and they have reverted back to the term ‘progressive’ which started with Theodore Roosevelt (a Republican) and continued with Woodrow Wilson (a Democrat). The progressive movement is a total cancer that is now leading to a disaster of economic proportions that we will all feel around the globe. Everything the current occupant of the Oval Office has done to date is totally unconstitional and the only thing we can do now is wait for the ruinous results and ultimate climb out of it.
Jun 25, 2009 - 6:20 pm 12. samuel - texas hunting man:Yah, socialism only works when you have enough cash to burn. Maybe that lack will keep us from going all the way.
Jun 25, 2009 - 6:24 pm 13. Dave Surls:The only reasons the Republicans started winning some national elections is because they’ve refused to disband all the socialistic crap the Democrats have put into place since the 1930s, and also because the Dems first royally screwed the pooch in Vietnam, and then followed up that little triumph by putting a buffoon by the name of Jimmy Carter in the White House.
The Republicans have done a lot of talking about reducing the size of government, but they haven’t done doodly squat to actually reduce it…and government in America is bigger now, than it’s ever been.
Jun 25, 2009 - 6:29 pm 14. MHL outside beltway:What is Dodge’s position on Islamic terrorism and the war being waged by the Arabs against Israel?
Sadly, the views held by most of the Conservative Party and that of their leader David Cameron are not significantly different from that of Labor and the rest of the Arab appeasers of the left.
Jun 26, 2009 - 8:43 am 15. Helen:The proportion of the Conservative vote in Hannan’s region actually went down from last time in a year of exceptionally low turn-out. I am afraid his party is leading nobody nowhere. And there is no such thing as a “European” right as Andrew Dodge knows well and Dan Hannan ought to know. Each country is different. We can’t even revive the right in Britain. So I do not think any of us are in a position to lecture Americans.
Jun 26, 2009 - 9:16 am 16. seguin:“So I do not think any of us are in a position to lecture Americans.”
Maybe stuff sucks in Britain. I don’t know, I haven’t been there since the early 2000s. But this Hannan guy is right, so I say let him lecture, no matter what the rest of Britain believes. Right is right, no matter where you’re from.
Jun 27, 2009 - 4:58 pm 17. Jim Baker:#13 Dave, X2
Europe will never lead the way to anything resembling individual liberty, and they know it. The chances for that are long gone. The United States of America was the ONLY hope for that. But as we can all see, we have messed it up big time. I hope all this safety and security is worth the cost.
Jun 27, 2009 - 6:56 pm 18. Larry Sheldon:I have been reading Mr. Hannan since the first viral speech and have thereby learned a number of things.
Among the things I have learned is, when reading or listening to him, I need to have a good dictionary close at hand.
It is true that he on occasion uses a “Briticism” that is foreign to my ear, but that is not the major source of need for the dictionary.
The major source is his use of precisely the right word, in preference to an ordinary “close enough for government work” word that others might use. That they would use if they were to tackle the problem that he is shining a bright white light upon, that is.
A delightful read, and his 1-minute speeches are priceless. (Can you imagine one of our pols being able to clear his throat in a minute?)
Jun 27, 2009 - 7:32 pm 19. Peter Montbriand:Heard Hannan on a show called the Jason Lewis show(check it out if you’re a libertarian leaning conservative, used to fill in for Rush). He’s more conservative than many American conservatives. He’s quite a breath of fresh air to hear. I think he “gets” American exceptionalism better than most of us.
Jun 28, 2009 - 12:17 am 20. Marc Malone:I think his great speech repudiating Brown had a tremendous effect on the elections in Europe. It may well be the reason for the move rightward. I understand it went massively viral in the EU, as well as here.
I love when Fox News has him on as a guest. He’s just so precise and refreshing.
Jun 28, 2009 - 1:00 am 21. Crystal:Once again Dan Hannan is the voice of reason, too bad more Americans are so drunk on the Obama kool aid they won’t listen to the facts presented. He is explaining why universal health care won’t work! Maybe we could find him a birth certificate in Hawaii and have him run for president!
Jul 23, 2009 - 6:27 pm