Bruce Herschensohn

Stanley Bruce Herschensohn (born September 10, 1932) is an American political commentator, author and senior fellow at the Pepperdine University School of Public Policy in Malibu, California.^[1][2]

Herschensohn quickly rose to prominence in the Republican Party, becoming a consultant to the Republican National Convention in 1972 and joined the Nixon administration on September 11, 1972. He served primarily as a speech writer.^[3] He left following Nixon's resignation, but served on the Ronald Reagan Presidential Transition Team and as an official in the Reagan administration.

Previously, Herschensohn has been a Distinguished Fellow at the Claremont Institute and a fellow at the Institute of Politics at Harvard's John F. Kennedy School of Government in Cambridge, Massachusetts. He has taught politics at the University of Maryland, Whittier College and at Pepperdine University's School of Public Policy.^[4]

Political campaigns

1986 U.S. Senate primary election

In 1986, Herschensohn unsuccessfully sought the Republican nomination for the United States Senate seat held by Democrat Alan Cranston. He finished far ahead of the crowded pack in the Central Valley and Orange County,^[5] but finished second to U.S. Representative Ed Zschau of the Silicon Valley, who won the nomination by plurality.

In the general election, Cranston barely defeated the moderate Zschau to secure his fourth and final Senate term in what was by far Cranston's closest Senate election. Zschau, considered a moderate to liberal Republican, later left the party and became an independent.

1992 U.S. Senate primary election

In 1992, when Cranston retired, Herschensohn won the Republican nomination narrowly defeating U.S. Representative Tom Campbell, a more moderate Republican who had been on the faculty of Stanford University and who had been elected to Zschau's former Congressional seat. Herschensohn received 956,136 votes (38.2 percent) to Campbell's 895,970 (35.8 percent). The remaining 417,848 ballots (16.7 percent) went to Mayor Sonny Bono of Palm Springs, also a relative moderate. During the primary campaign and afterwards, Herschensohn became a close friend of Bono and encouraged his former rival to seek election to the United States House of Representatives in 1994.

1992 U.S. Senate general election

Herschensohn, the Republican nominee and a Los Angeles area conservative radio and TV personality, lost the 1992 general election to the Democratic Party nominee Barbara Boxer after news that he attended a strip club came to light, while winning over one million votes more than the national ticket of the Republican Party.

Career

• RKO Pictures, Los Angeles, CA
  • Studio messenger, 1950–51
  • In art department, 1953–55
• General Dynamics Corp., Convair Division, San Diego, CA, film maker and director, 1955–56
• Self-employed film director, producer, and writer in Los Angeles, CA, 1956–68
  • Director, John F. Kennedy: Years of Lightning, Day of Drums (1964)
• Member of board of trustees of American Film Institute, 1967–
• U.S. delegation to International Film Festival
  • Chairman of delegation, Czechoslovakia, 1968
  • Member of delegation in U.S.S.R., 1969
• U.S. Information Agency, Washington, DC, director of Motion Picture and Television Service, 1968–72
• Instructor for "U.S. Image Abroad" at the University of Maryland, 1972
• Member of board of governors of Charles Edison Memorial Youth Foundation
• Consultant to 1972 Republican National Convention
• White House, Washington, D.C. (Richard Nixon administration)
  • Staff assistant to president, 1972–73
  • Deputy special assistant, 1973–74
• Self-employed film director, producer, and writer, 1975–76
• Freelance writer, 1976–
• Ronald Reagan Presidential Transition Team, 1980
• Political commentator for Los Angeles KABC-TV radio and TV stations, 1978–1991
• Senior Fellow, School of Public Policy at Pepperdine University, 2006–
• Nonresident Associate Fellow, Nixon Center
• board of directors, Center for Individual Freedom

Authorship

Herschensohn has written a number of books on foreign policy, his most recent being Obama's Globe: A President's Abandonment of US Allies Around the World.

• The Gods of Antenna, Arlington House. (1976)
• Lost Trumpets: A Conservative's Map to America's Destiny, The Claremont Institute Press, Claremont, California. (1994)
• Hong Kong at the Handover (Editor), Lexington Books, Lanham, Maryland. (1999)
• Across the Taiwan Strait: Democracy: The Bridge Between Mainland China and Taiwan (Editor), Lexington Books. (2002)
• Passport: A Novel of The Cold War (1st ed.). New York: I Books. 2003. ISBN 978-0-7434-7984-4. 
• Taiwan : the threatened democracy. Los Angeles: World Ahead Pub. 2006. ISBN 978-0-9778984-2-8. Retrieved 2008-12-07. 
• Above Empyrean : a novel of the final days of the war on Islamic terrorism (1st ed.). New York: Beaufort Books. 2008. ISBN 978-0-8253-0516-0. Retrieved 2008-12-07. 
• An American Amnesia: How the U.S. Congress Forced the Surrenders of South Vietnam and Cambodia. New York: Beaufort Books. 2010. ISBN 978-0-8253-0632-7. 
• Obama's Globe: A President's Abandonment of US Allies Around the World. New York: Beaufort Books. 2012. ISBN 978-0825306853. 

Editorial Reviews for Obama's Globe: Dennis Prager, best-selling author and nationally syndicated radio show host: "It's truly a critical book." "Brief and powerful." "It's something that the Romney campaign ought to memorize." "The Dean, in my opinion, of observers of foreign policy – Bruce Herschensohn." "My favorite analyst of world affairs, Bruce Herschensohn. And I mean that quite literally."

The American Spectator: "Bruce Herschensohn calmly makes a devastating case against the foreign policy of President Barack Hussein Obama and, more importantly, offers readers a foundation on which they can build their own ability to assess American international relations going forward."^[6]

FrontPage Magazine: "In the first presidential debate of the 2012 election, Republican challenger Mitt Romney defeated Barack Obama handily in a takedown of the President's devastating domestic policies. Foreign policy wasn't addressed, but all Romney need to do to brush up for a victory in that arena is study Bruce Herschensohn's new book."^[7]

Human Events: "Herschensohn was once a former deputy special assistant to President Nixon, who hailed him as 'particularly well qualified in an area I find important, foreign policy. He is an expert in that area.' To have been called an expert in foreign policy by Richard Nixon is like having Pavarotti say you're a great singer. Nixon often dazzled audiences with tours d'horizon of international affairs, and Herschensohn does the same...."^[8]

ConservativeHQ: "...it is definitely a must read for anyone wishing to understand why America seems more alone in the world now than it has ever been."^[9]

• Author of films:
  • "Tall Man Five-Five", (Strategic Air Command)
  • "Karma", International Communications Foundation
  • "The President", U.S. Information Agency
  • "Bridges of the Barrios", U.S. Information Agency
  • "The Five Cities of June", U.S. Information Agency
  • "John F. Kennedy: Years of Lightning, Day of Drums", U.S. Information Agency
  • "Eulogy to 5:02", U.S. Information Agency
• Contributor of stories to, among others:
  • Conservative Digest
  • Newsday
  • Newsweek
  • Human Events
  • Saturday Evening Post

Awards

• Arthur S. Flemming Award, 1969
• Academy Award from Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, 1970, for short documentary film "Czechoslovakia: 1968"
• Academy Award nominations, 1969 and 1972
• distinguished service award from U.S. Information Agency, 1972
• award from Council Against Communist Aggression, 1972

References

External links

• Brief Bio on Pepperdine University website
• Appearances on C-SPAN