KUHNER: Savage conservatism

OPINION:

Michael Savage has written a timely and important book. The fiery talk radio host, whose show, “The Savage Nation,” boasts nearly 10 million weekly listeners, is on a political jihad against President Obama.

“Trickle Up Poverty: Stopping Obama’s Attack on Our Borders, Economy and Security,” published by Harper Collins, is a conservative cri de coeur - a passionate manifesto aimed at exposing Mr. Obama’s radical socialist agenda. According to Mr. Savage, the president is a leftist adolescent, a narcissist whose megalomania and grand designs threaten to destroy traditional America: “President Obama is like a destructive child who takes apart a priceless watch that was carefully passed down to him,” he writes. “Without regard for the value of what he holds, he recklessly scatters the pieces on the floor and then can’t put them back together again.”

Mr. Savage calls the president “Obama the Destroyer”: his goal is to dismantle American sovereignty and capitalism in order to erect a multicultural social democracy. The author reveals that Mr. Obama’s policies are fundamentally un-American; he is the first post-national leader in U.S. history.

Mr. Savage warns that, far from being a wild-eyed academic Marxist, the president is following a deliberate, systematic strategy of forging a European-style nanny state. He is not simply a naive liberal; rather, he is a revolutionary socialist pursuing “pan-Leninism.” Like the founder of the 1917 Bolshevik Revolution, Vladimir Lenin, Mr. Obama is a man of the internationalist left. His dream is to subsume America into a larger ideological project.

This is why Mr. Obama passed - against the will of the American people - European-style, government-run health care. It is why he zealously supports carbon taxes, cap-and-trade legislation, massive income-tax increases on the wealthy, nationalizing the automakers and much of the financial sector, huge spending programs and the federal funding of abortion. He wants America to become a carbon copy of Europe. In fact, Mr. Savage is convinced that the president is a progressive transnationalist, who ultimately believes in one-world government based in the United Nations. Capitalism, the nation-state and America’s Judeo-Christian heritage must therefore all be swept into the ash heap of history.

Mr. Savage reveals that Mr. Obama is decimating the middle class. His tax-and-spend policies are creating “trickle up poverty” - millions of Americans are losing their jobs, homes and livelihoods because of Obamanomics. America is becoming a two-tiered society marked by the poor who are made dependent upon government handouts and the new ruling class. Mr. Obama and the Democrats - along with their liberal allies in the media, unions and Hollywood - seek to consolidate power. They are not animated by compassion or altruism, but ambition - raw, unbridled lust for social control.

Mr. Savage’s one-nation conservatism does not play well with many in the media - even on the right. He has been marginalized for years, denounced by many liberals and conservatives as a right-wing yahoo, an irresponsible bomb thrower. His real crime, however, is that although he is a conservative, he is also a genuine maverick who wants no part of the decrepit - and venal - GOP establishment. As Mr. Savage puts it, Republicans “raped Lady Liberty for eight years” during the administration of George W. Bush. In short, he is not a lapdog for the GOP.

There is nothing “respectable” or safe about his politics. He is a culture warrior, who is not afraid to challenge the prevailing secular multicultural orthodoxy. He opposes abortion - except in cases where the life of the mother is threatened. He calls for closing the southern border by deploying thousands of U.S. troops. He wants to deport all illegal immigrants convicted of violent crimes. He believes English should be the country’s official language. He argues that the West is in a life-and-death struggle with radical Islam and that all methods to win the war - including profiling - must be used. In short, Mr. Savage is a rarity in today’s New World Order: a flinty nationalist who champions “language, borders and culture.”

He is willing to say publicly what many conservatives will only whisper in private. This is why he is adored by his fans - and despised by his enemies. He is a man of another generation and another time. “The Savage Nation” is one of the last redoubts of free speech in the media unpolluted by political correctness.

Mr. Savage is unique among major conservative radio hosts. He is not a pro-Republican corporatist, nor is he a libertarian materialist obsessed with profit and porn, and neither is he an open-borders free-trader. Instead, he is a conservative traditionalist, who champions God, country and family. His popularity continues to soar, despite relentless smear campaigns, because many Americans recognize that this is the worldview that made our nation great and is essential to restoring the Republic.

Jeffrey T. Kuhner is a columnist at The Washington Times and president of the Edmund Burke Institute, a Washington think tank. He has been a frequent guest host on “The Savage Nation.”