Peter Beinart, another in a list of writers recommended by Andrew Sullivan (h/t, in other words), thinks we’re entering an era of illiberalism:
Now, as Netanyahu’s twelve years in power come to an end, there’s reason to believe that he was right [that the future belongs to authoritarian capitalism]. Over the last decade, leaders in his mold have sprung up across the globe. When Netanyahu returned as Israel’s prime minister in 2009, his chauvinistic, free market hyper-nationalism appeared anachronistic. Then, the following year, Viktor Orban reclaimed the prime ministership of Hungary. In 2012, Putin returned as President of Russia and Xi became General Secretary of the Chinese Communist Party. In 2014, Narendra Modi became prime minister of India. In 2017, Donald Trump became president of the United States. In 2019, Jair Bolsonaro became president of Brazil. All of a sudden, Netanyahu was elder statesman of a club of authoritarian, populist bigots. That’s his global legacy. In Israel-Palestine, Netanyahu will be remembered for having dug the two-state solution’s grave. But internationally, he’s done something bigger: He’s helped to father our illiberal age.
He may be right, but I have suspicions about extending trend lines with no interrogation of those people on the backs of which these extensions rest. As they observe a lack of disaster when the coalition replacing Netanyahu take power, as Biden continues to provide quietly competent leadership, etc etc, these folks who previously supported these dubious characters, at least in the democracies, may quietly give up on them, even refuse to admit to having supported them out of simple embarrassment.
Be that as it may, I prefer a different label, based on Beinart’s own statement, and that would be The Era Of Enormous Fucking Egos:
And, like Trump, Netanyahu’s communication style has always included large doses of lying. From the British officials who nicknamed Bibi “the armor-plated bullshitter” to Bill Clinton aide Joe Lockhart, who recalled that Netanyahu “could open his mouth and you could have no confidence that anything that came out of it was the truth” to Netanyahu’s own former aide, Limor Livnat, who Caspit and Kfir quote as saying that, “You cannot believe a word he says,” people who dealt with Netanyahu have long noted his fraught relationship with the truth. Which helps explain why, when prosecuted for corruption, Netanyahu responded with a campaign of brazen deceit that threatened to delegitimize Israel’s judicial system.
The irony is that Netanyahu has long seen himself as this era’s Winston Churchill, the man courageous enough to stare evil in the face when other leaders preferred appeasement. The two men do have things in common: Churchill was a racist too. But, nonetheless, Churchill helped lead a global coalition that defended liberal democracy in its hour of peril. Netanyahu has done something closer to the opposite: He has helped to lead the coalition of authoritarians that now imperils liberal democracy across the globe.
Sure, leadership nearly always requires an ego at the national level. But when it involves chronic mendacity, a fixation on reputation rather than essential truth, then it’s intolerable in a leader.
