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Black Tie International:
The 2009
Mightier Pen Luncheon
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The
2009 Mightier Pen
Luncheon
Photos by:
Joyce Brooks
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Tova Leidesdorf, Georgette
Mosbacher, Barbara Winston and
Charlene Haroche, Luncheon-Chair
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Barbara Winston and
Frank J. Gaffney, Jr., President & CEO
Center for Security Policy |
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Father John Sheehan, SJ
with Honoree, Norman Podhoretz |
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Mrs. Pamela (Cushing) Donner, Alex
Donner and Kate Edmonds Donner, the New York
Director for the Center for Security Policy |
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Sharon Bush |
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Liz
Peek, David Webb and Christine Brim, Senior Vice
President for Policy and Program Management, Center
for Security Policy |
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Laurence C. Leeds, Jr., Georgette Mosbacher and
Chuck Scarborough |
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Joyce
Brooks, Herbert I. London, Ph.D., President Hudson
Institute and Barbara Winston |
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Andrew
McCarthy, Former Prosecutor for the 1993 WTC Bombing
- National Review Online - Recipient of the 2008
Mightier Pen Award and author of "Willful Blindness"
with Christine Brim |
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Robert
R. Rothenberg |
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Peter
Graefe |
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John
Wohlstetter, Senior Fellow Technology & Democracy
Project, Discovery Institute |
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Lisa
Slavin and Sophie Haddad, Chair of the Regents
Council,
Center for Security Policy |
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On Tuesday, December
15 in New York City’s legendary
‘21’ Club, the Center for Security Policy honored
Norman Podhoretz with its Mightier Pen Award. The
Mightier Pen Award was inaugurated in 2001 in
recognition of individuals who have, through their
published writings, contributed both to the public
appreciation of the need for robust U.S. national
security policies and the perpetuation of military
strength as indispensable ingredients in
international peace.
Norman Podhoretz is editor-at-large of Commentary
Magazine, where he served as editor-in-chief from
1960-1995. He has written hundreds of articles for
many major American periodicals, lectured at many
universities and before many civic and religious
groups on foreign policy, American culture, and
Jewish affairs.
Mr. Podhoretz was introduced by his longtime
associate at Commentary, Neal Kozodoy, as America's
"most hated intellectual”— a reference to the
intensely vituperative response from his
‘ex-friends’ on the left since he made his
ideological break with them some thirty years
ago. "In 'breaking ranks' with the left.," Mr.
Kozodoy noted, "he committed so traitorous an act to
the intellectual class to which he belonged, that he
could never be forgiven, but instead must be
eternally and repeatedly consigned to the flames."
Mr. Kozodoy identified another source of the left's
strident animus for Mr. Podhoretz. "Running like a
crimson thread through every word penned by Norman's Mightier Pen is a disposition, a
sentiment, a conviction. The most galling conviction
of all.. unabashed, unapologetic, unalloyed,
unambiguous, unconstrained and unqualified love of
the
United States."
Both in his prepared remarks and in answering
questions, Mr. Podhoretz addressed the issue of
Iran and its quest for nuclear
weapons and, specifically, recent American
diplomatic history that, he believes, will make a
confrontation inevitable.
He cited now-discredited the 2007 National
Intelligence Estimate as a politicized document
designed to preclude any moves by the Bush
Administration to stop Iran's advance. The Estimate
was, "a different kind of bomb... obviously designed
to blow up the near-universal consensus that had
flowed from the conclusions reached by the
intelligence community itself in its 2005 NIE." On
the effect of that 'bomb,' Mr. Podhoretz said, "what
had been politically very difficult for Bush to do,
now became impossible."
With regards to the Obama Administration, Mr.
Podhoretz believes it has "adopted the mistaken
belief that, 'we could learn to live with an Iranian
bomb.'" He recounted a recent debate with writer
Fareed Zakaria who expressed this view
paradigmaticly. "If Bush was prevented from acting
by exterior forces, the obstacles that prevent Obama
from acting are lodged in his own mind and heart. It
is next to inconceivable that he will take military
action against Iran."
"Deterrence could not be relied upon with a regime
ruled by Islamofascist revolutionaries who not only
are ready to die for their beliefs, but cared less
about protecting their people than about the spread
of their ideology and their power. If the Mullahs
got the bomb... it was not they who would be
deterred, but we."
Looking towards
Jerusalem, Mr.
Podhoretz assessed the likelihood of an Israeli
first strike on Iranian nuclear facilities.
"With time running rapidly out, only the Israelis
can save us all from a nuclear Armageddon. I believe
the Israelis are prepared to do it; I also believe
that Barack Obama is prepared to stop them, and that
he may succeed in doing so. In that case, G-d help
the Israelis and the rest of us as well."
As a recipient of the Mightier Pen, Mr. Podhoretz
joins some of
America’s most influential and
beloved political writers—including William F.
Buckley, Jr., Mark Helprin, Charles Krauthammer, and
Mark Steyn.
For more information
on the Mightier Penn Award and the Center for
Security Policy please visit
www.SecureFreedom.org.
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please contact:
joyce@blacktiemagazine.com |
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