Liberalism is thankfully dying

Theresa May wastes British taxpayers'  money attending things like the G20 summit when she is no longer the British leader. Had she resigned in time Boris could have been there, which would have been useful. She took time to berate Vladimir Putin, but no-one cares what she says.

"Name dropping, I think Mr. Putin is probably the nastiest man I ever met and I have met him on about a dozen occasions."

Lord 'Chris' Patten said this on Jonathan Dimbleby's last 'Any Questions' programme on BBC Radio Four last night. Lord Blunket, who is blind, then said that his dog started barking when he met Vladimir Putin at a reception. He said he hoped he was not breaching a confidence when he said 

"I said to the Queen, 'I'm sorry, your majesty' to which she replied  'Dogs have interesting instincts, don't they, Mr Blunket?'"

The dog was right. Vladimir Putin is a very unpleasant man indeed, a street thug, the man who invaded Ukraine and provoked several proxy wars in defence of what he saw as Russian interests. He seems unrepentant about the attempt by his secret service to kill a former Russian spy on English soil in Salisbury, a very mysterious story.

He attacked liberalism in an interview with the Financial Times just before the summit. I quote from it.

"One can criticise Trump for his intention to build a wall between Mexico and the US. It could be going too far. Yes, maybe so. I am not arguing about this point. But he had to do something about the huge inflow of migrants and narcotics. Nobody is doing anything. They say this is bad and that is bad as well. Tell me, what is good then? What should be done? Nobody has proposed
anything. I do not mean that a wall must be built or tariffs raised by 5 per cent annually in the economic relations with Mexico. This is not what I am saying, yet something must be done. He is at least looking for a solution.

"What am I driving at? Those who are concerned about this, ordinary Americans, they look at this and say, Good for him, at least he is doing something, suggesting ideas and looking for a solution. As for the liberal idea, its proponents are not doing anything. They say that all is well, that everything is as it should be. But is it? They are sitting in their cosy offices, while those who are facing the problem every day in Texas or Florida are not happy, they will soon have problems of their own. Does anyone think about them?

"The same is happening in Europe. I discussed this with many of my colleagues, but nobody has the answer. The say they cannot pursue a hardline policy for various reasons. Why exactly? Just because. We have the law, they say. Well, then change the law! We have quite a few problems of our own in this sphere as well. We have open borders with the former Soviet republics, but their people at least speak Russian. Do you see what I mean? And besides, we in Russia have taken steps to streamline the situation in this sphere. We are now working in the countries from which the migrants come, teaching Russian at their schools, and we are also working with them here. We have toughened the legislation to show that migrants must respect the laws, customs and culture of the country. In other words, the situation is not simple in Russia either, but we have started working to improve it. Whereas the liberal idea presupposes that nothing needs to be done. The migrants can kill, plunder and rape with impunity because their rights as migrants must be protected. What rights are these?

"Every crime must have its punishment. So, the liberal idea has become obsolete. It has come into conflict with the interests of the overwhelming majority of the population."

Peter Franklin commented on this in Unherd 

"This is obvious rubbish. No western politician of any standing, no matter how liberal, argues that migrant rights involve allowing them to “kill, plunder and rape with impunity”."

But though, of course, no-one argues in favour of murder or rape, allowing a million young men mostly without papers to enter Europe has led to murders and rapes. The childish obfuscation of people like Peter Franklin, and so many other people, on the subject of migrants is the obvious rubbish. 

What Putin said, like it or not, is not. It made good sense.

This is what makes some people take Putin's self-interested side. They see that liberalism is not protecting them or the nations of Europe from outsiders.

Putin was not speaking candidly - he never is. He is a pathological liar. He was making a calculated attempt to win support in the Western democracies and he will have succeeded with some, probably many people. 

He is also painting himself as a soul-mate of Donald Trump and the populists. The Financial Times, which hates Brexit, made a link between Putin, Trump, populists and Brexit, though Brexit is a separate issue.

Make no mistake, Putin is not Salazar or Franco, not a Christian conservative, not a white nationalist whatever that is, not a Tsar or any of the other delusions right-wing people have about him. He is an old-fashioned Bolshevik who became oligarch in chief of a kleptocracy run by the former KGB. 

A Romanian friend said to me that he is the best leader Russia could have at the moment. We can't know that, and I wish she had a genuine Christian conservative in charge, but none is available.

Putin is right about liberalism. Liberalism has outlived many of its reasons for existing and is dying. 

This is a good thing. It is time not for dictators or for Putins but for genuine conservatism (not the liberalism of Mr Macron or the social democracy of Mrs Merkel or Mrs May) to take over in the West (Russia is not ready). 

That does not mean having less freedom or democracy, but I hope much more. 

One of the surprises of history, for many middle class people but not for me, is that people who are least well-off are usually most conservative. The most well-off and best educated in the West are increasingly the least conservative. 

Eastern Europe is different but liberalism is coming here too via people educated at Western universities.

Chris Patten once admitted to being a liberal internationalist, asking

'What else is there to be?'

That sounds reasonable, until you learn that he said in 2011 that the EU, by accepting Turkey as a member,

'would show that we could embrace an Islamic democracy and build a strong bridge between Europe and Western Asia. That, in turn, would create a new European identity and narrative, a new reason for the EU to exist in this century, a way of rejecting the divisive politics of old.'

This is not the European ideal of the E.E.C.'s founders, but it was a position eagerly embraced by British liberal politicians of all parties, most notably David Cameron.

Lord Patten is not a left-winger, but a liberal conservative. He is a good man, unlike Mr Putin, and probably a good, though liberal, Catholic. He sticks up for the British Empire, which he said was as great as the Roman Empire, and he tries to stick up for free speech in Oxford University, of which he is Chancellor. 

He tried to do his best for England and, when he governed it, Hong Kong, but his sort of liberalism and Theresa May's much more authoritarian variety will come to an end. 

The music of the spheres ordains it.