Dan Hannan: Our Kind of Tea Partier

British MEP Dan Hannan's new book warns America away from copying European style social democracy, but with evidence and reason not vitriol.

It’s worthwhile for those of us who occupy what might be called the dissident liberal remnant of the Republican Party – especially those who hesitate to label themselves or their instincts generally “conservative” – to remind ourselves what we’re doing here in the first place. There is no one who has ever felt the sting of the epithet “RINO” who hasn’t wondered, even if only for a moment, if it might be true. After all, one might think, those other conservatives, with their hatred and their vitriol and their shamelessness, seem so self-assured. Why can we see shades of gray when the “real Republicans” only seem to live in black and white? We sometimes feel a more visceral dislike toward our would-be purgers on the right than we do about our nominal leftist opponents. In the midst of wondering why it was that I had not yet given up on the once-and-future Grand Old Party, I was greatly aided by an unlikely source: British MEP Dan Hannan’s new book The New Road to Serfdom: A Letter of Warning to America. In it, the contrarian parliamentarian makes an honest and convincing case that the European social democratic model has not led to good political or economic outcomes, that the EU suffers from a democratic deficit, and that, above all, the US should not attempt to copy Europe’s example lest it destroy everything that makes America special and valuable.

Hannan’s work is perhaps done the largest disservice by the company it keeps and the appearance of hackery that it presents. Included in the review copy is a publisher’s information sheet with favorable quotations from Newt Gingrich and Dick Morris as well as a glowing reference to Liberty and Tyranny. The cover screams “SERFDOM” in gigantic print, while a wrinkled red banner provides the backdrop for the foreboding subtitle. The book jacket repeats Gingrich and Morris’ quotations as well as one from professional TV bonehead Sean Hannity, while reminding the reader of Hannan’s sudden Fox News fame in 2009, of which this book is a direct consequence. In his acknowledgments, Hannan thanks a list of the usual suspects: Jonah Goldberg, Dick Armey, Newt Gingrich, Heritage, the Competitive Enterprise Institute, etc., etc. Before reading a word, it would be easy to dismiss this as nothing besides one more piece of conservative mass-market agit-prop; like all apologetics, enjoyable for the already-persuaded but inane pabulum for anyone who isn’t yet in the club. Within a few pages, though, and to my pleased surprise, Hannan reminded me of the truth of the old adage about books and covers. The first three chapters are more or less a love letter to the American republic. Perhaps we Americans in 2010 are so unused to foreign praise that we lap it up like a hungry dog when we get it, but the overall effect – mentioning especially the hilarious account of a conversation with what can only be described as a gay redneck – is nonetheless extremely obliging.

Hannan’s ideological pedigree is hard to pin down – within a few pages he affirms the generally liberal idea of America as a propositional nation (though he does not use those words), heaps praise on The West Wing, and then admiringly quotes Kipling’s infamous poem “White Man’s Burden”, which was, to say the least, jarring to see on a page of a 21^st century book. He presents himself most successfully as a fierce advocate of limited government on largely practical, rather than ideological, grounds. Some of Hannan’s best prose occurs when he is directly confronting arguments for the European economic model and criticisms of the American one. He attacks a powerfully simple statement of the European mindset – “Let the Americans work like drones […] Let them gobble sandwiches at their desks instead of having a proper two-hour lunch. There is more to life than GDP” – with an acknowledgment of its appeal and then an economic argument that “eventually, reality imposes itself”. Regardless of whether there is in fact more to life than GDP (I for one think there is, though not perhaps so much more as the average European takes for granted), Hannan is to be praised for confronting the argument rather than ignoring or hand-waving at it, and then countering with evidence and reason rather than unfounded assertions served up with a steaming dose of vitriol. It is sad that the best qualities of Hannan’s writing, his decorum and intellectual honesty, are so basic yet so sorely lacking in American political discourse that his arguments are compelling even when they aren’t entirely coherent. One wants to believe them for the sheer earnestness in which they’re made.

But his arguments aren’t always convincing. The weakest parts of Hannan’s case are the chapters in which he offers his warning about the U.S. adopting European social democracy. He makes a reasonable though boilerplate argument about the harm caused by the New Deal and the ratchet effect in government spending and programs. He rightly praises federalism, and laments its weakening in the 20^th century. He holds up American governmental institutions, particularly those of open primaries and elected local officials, as a model to the world. What he does not convincingly do, however, is convince the reader that those institutions are under any special threat from the Obama administration. He, of course, mentions the auto bailout, the stimulus bill, and a revision of the 1996 Clinton welfare reform, but the accusations that the Obama White House is leading the U.S. down the primrose path to European social democracy seem half-hearted, almost pro forma. He notes that American (read: Fox News) TV personalities “are forever trying to get me to be disobliging about President Obama,” and then gives the reader a list of reasons why he is not and will not be. On the list: decorum, diplomacy, democracy, decency, doubt, and, unalliteratively, because “no friend of the United States wants an American president to fail.” (Rush, would you like some ice for that burn?) Clearly, whatever else he is, Dan Hannan is a very decent human being and a valuable friend of America.

Furthermore, this member of the European Parliament is a shockingly effective guide to the malformed inner workings of the European Union. “Laws and sausages,” you may say – every government, not least the American one, looks bad from the inside. But Hannan devastatingly and successfully argues that over-centralization and bureaucratic overreach has produced a democratic deficit at all levels of European government. Like some aggrandized old imperial civil service, the profusion of unelected agencies, boards, and commissions which answer only to Brussels has produced a governmental class that is wholly remote and unaccountable to the people whose lives its decisions impact. The takeaway: Hannan, a reasonable and well-spoken chap, lays out a compelling case that these shores shouldn’t be infected by European social democracy and bureaucratism – but falters when he tries to say that they are, whether by Barack Obama or anybody else. As a midterm polemic, The New Road to Serfdom is undoubtedly a disappointment. As a call to Americans to reassert the virtues of federalism, decentralization, and individual liberty, it is invaluable.