Hungary seems to be a bastion of sobriety – Newsweek is the editor of Mandiner
American conservatives could learn from the struggles of the Hungarian right, Josh Hammer tells our newspaper. The editor of Newsweek magazine was asked about the conflicts between the EU and Hungary, the struggles of conservative social policy and the future of journalism at the MCC Budapest Summit conference. Our interview.
Josh Hammer head of the opinion section of the American weekly Newsweek, researcher at the Edmund Burke Foundation, policy advisor to the Internet Accountability Project. He graduated as an economist from Duke University and earned a law degree from the University of Chicago. A journalist, constitutional lawyer, host of the Natswon Squad podcast by Newsweek The Debate and the Edmund Burke Foundation, his writings regularly appear in conservative papers such as National Review, The Spectator or The American Conservative.
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What is your impression of Hungary’s role in European and international politics?
In the last 5 years, the political prestige of Hungary relative to its geographical size4 has increased. American conservatives in particular have completely aroused government policy. They learned a lot about these from Rod Dreher’s writings and Tucker Carlson’s TV interview. The stakeholder focuses on how a country with a vatative leadership nurtures its national traditions,
how strong it can be, perhaps vomiting on what the liberal world order says about it.
What I have seen from Hungary so far is convincing: a vibrant intellectual environment, strong conservative institutions. It seems to be a bastion of sobriety in the sea of madness. European and international politics are in a whirlwind.
Hungary is really moving against the trends, the spirit of the age: sovereignty, national identity, Christian foundations, family policy. Do you see this as a coherent struggle to defend the “old normality”?
A coherent fight, for sure. Of course, one cannot say whether one will be successful in the long run. Hungary knows what it stands for. What you have listed are enduring social values, the fundamental values of conservatism. In the Hungarian-EU debate, Brussels has many concerns about Hungarian politics, and we do not yet see the outcome of the conflict. But the scene of this fight is coherent and, in fact, extremely respectable. American conservatives could learn from this.
For American conservatives, what in Hungarian politics that is missing from their traditions may be novel or even domesticated?
American conservative thinking has been thinking in one scheme for many decades: a small state, tax cuts, simplification of regulations. They cut back on everything – and there’s a lot of good in that – but they build little. Neutrality is their motto, they want to create neutral conditions in all areas, and that carries a great danger. The left is ideologically charged with almost everything, and when conservatives respond to let ideology put this discipline at a disadvantage, at that moment. The vision of the right must also be translated into concrete bills, and things that are useful to society must be put into practice and implemented – the Child Protection Act is a good example of this:
this is a matter of conservative opinion and can be seen to have the support of the majority of society,
it represents normalcy, so it has to be done. Don’t just talk about it. Here, in Budapest, we see and examine the practical model of national conservatism. It can win political choices, it can govern.
Josh Hammer
However, the institutions of the European Union are constantly being criticized. There are fundamental differences in attitudes between the parties.
The idea of founding the European Union was a good one, the old membership still has its advantages, but what is happening over the years is a sad phenomenon. I supported it when the UK decided in 2016 for full sovereignty and independence.
I don’t think Hungary will quit,
but it is very respectable how it fights for member sovereignty and national identity within the EU.
The Court of Justice of the European Union has ruled that breaches of the rule of law can be punished by depriving it of money. The issue of the rule of law and care has been linked. Do you also share the view that the loop around Hungary needs to be closed because a viable conservative model of government has been established?
I’m a lawyer, but I’m American, so I’m not at home in European law. The U.S. constitutional situation is this: the U.S. is made up of 50 federal states, and the general constitutional trend over the past hundred years is that the federal government is taking more and more power away from state governments. I suspect this is happening here in Europe as well. The EU system is also based on a multi-level exercise of power, and the nature of these systems is that the higher-level center of power tries to seize as much power as possible. The social and family policy steps of the Hungarian Conservative government, its position on migration and other policies are facing new trends, so I am not surprised by the reactions in Brussels.
They will do their utmost to assume as many powers as possible at the expense of Hungarian sovereignty.
Brussels is convinced that he alone knows what is good for Europe.
The MCC Budapest Summit, which he attended, was about the challenges of education. One of the topics of discussion is the Hungarian Child Protection Act, which aims to remove inappropriate sexual content from the lives of minors, especially LGBTQ propaganda. Was this a necessary legislative step?
As far as I know, the Child Protection Act is about preventing minors from being educated on gender issues in schools and not being exposed to LGBTQ propaganda. I don’t understand why this is classified as anti-LGBTQ legislation. A very similar piece of legislation was recently adopted in Florida (“Don’t say heat,” Bill), which prohibits the propagation of all forms of sexual orientation and gender identity in educational institutions. For me, this is a completely normal direction of regulation, since
directing the spiritual development of children is the right and duty of parents, not the bureaucrats of educational institutions.
It is a completely reprehensible practice for a kindergarten teacher, for example, to talk to a 5-year-old child about a gay identity. If Hungarian law protects the rights of children and parents, I can only support that.
Education is a strategic sector, the way of thinking of future generations is shaped by teachers, it is no coincidence that the cultural war is taking place here most strongly. Is it important to have institutions where sexual, national or religious identity is at stake, or should all ideological influence be excluded from schools?
It depends on what ideological forces we are talking about. As I mentioned, the right way to raise children sexually is to leave it to the parents.
On the issue of national identity, however, my view is that the education system cannot be neutral in this
– it is important for young people to be educated about national belonging, the role and importance of the community. An essential element of our identity is that we also know our own past, national destiny issues, and the lives of our own personal, bloody ancestors. In this field, too, the role of parents in education is primary, but there is also a secondary role here, and that is the school.
If governments enact child protection laws, critics will shout homophobia, restrict illegal migration, Islamophobia, strengthen national identity, possibly anti-Semitism. How has this stigmatizing “new talk” become so strong?
Good suggestion. Let me start by saying that I am Jewish. When I read at home that Hungary’s political climate is anti-Semitic, I am outraged. Jews are not attacked on the streets of Budapest, synagogues are not set on fire, as in France or Belgium. I don’t know where this charge comes from. Maybe from the fact that those street posters depicting George Soros, and that was criticized by government critics as anti-Semitic.
But György Soros is not a symbol of Judaism, but of the ideology of an open society.
He is the enemy of the nation-states, the enemy of America, of Hungary, who is openly criticized by many rabbis for his destructive activities.
If you have already mentioned Soros, the leaked recordings were published the other day, proving that the NGOs associated with the Soros Foundation have an influence on journalists and the shades of writing about the Hungarian government. How strong is the Soros network?
George Soros is a very influential man. In the United States, he is the biggest supporter of the “liberal-minded prosecutors’ movement: an informal criminal association of liberal-minded lawyers and cases to liberalize local criminal law regulations in a liberal direction. There are almost every forum in almost every city, state justice. Behind their activities is Soros funding. European policy is primarily influenced by its views on the issue of immigration, and anti-immigration issues and projects are primarily affected here.
Finally, let’s talk about the situation in the press. How can the Newswees be preserved as a central, reliable source of news, for the first time that American political life and the media have become harshly polarized?
Newsweek specialty press products in the U.S. media market. We have a completely different approach than rival weekly newspapers. All political approaches find in the opinion column that I am the leader – the first I am personally a conative-minded journalist. I have three deputies: a right-wing journalist, a centrist journalist and a left-wing journalist – so we deal with the four incoming opinion articles, political essays, and expert commentaries in fours; these are edited.
I disagree with most of the writing, yet they appear.
Newsweek’s opinion section is sharply separated from the paper’s news section, which strives for objectivity, and the opinion section allows room for all sorts of opinions. How does it work? Do they have stable funding to keep party political expectations away from the paper?
Yes, page management and the owner support this page philosophy, so you can do it that way. The definition of Newsweek’s mission is on our website:
we give space to all opinions, we oppose the culture of abolition
– with that, we are white ravens even in the American media market. The news and opinion columns are completely separated, I have little contact with our reporters.
But that doesn’t make it clear whether Newsweek is a liberal or a conservative newspaper …
Its direction is difficult because it is open to both systems of political approach.
Do you believe in the future of factual journalism? The present is about the flow of news dictated by algorithms, the flood of uncontrolled information, and the compilation of news and opinion journalism.
This is a difficult matter. I believe in it because we can still do it in practice. Newsweek is facing media trends, with both right-wing and left-wing narratives appearing in it, and there is a separate news section separated from opinions. I hope that there will be a future for factual journalism, it certainly is. Let’s talk in ten years and we’ll see!
photo: Dávid Mátrai