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| Fifth Column |
| The anti-neocon fever |
| 2007-11-09 |
| James Kirchick, City Journal Not long ago, while visiting a friend at Oxford University, I found myself in a heated political discussion with a Scotsman. The subject of our dispute was the Iraq war, but the conversation turned toward the rise of latent anti-Semitism in once-respectable quarters of British opinion. Two years earlier, a story entitled “A Kosher Conspiracy?,” illustrated by a gold Star of David plunged into the heart of the Union Jack, graced the cover of Britain’s most prominent left-wing magazine, The New Statesman. Since then, the intellectual climate had only worsened. In response to my remark that many use the epithet “neocon” to describe Jews, my interlocutor replied, “I’d rather be an anti-Semite than a neocon.” Today, no other political label gets thrown around as frequently, or with as much reckless abandon, as “neocon.” The most popular liberal blogs name and shame neocons, real or imagined, on a daily basis. The term is used in a fashion similar to the way “communist” was during the 1950s—an all-encompassing indictment—this time indicating an imperialistic and “warmongering,” even an “insane,” worldview. The anti-neocon fervor has reached truly McCarthyite proportions: just a few months ago, Steve Clemons of the left-wing New America Foundation argued in favor of “Purging the Neocons from the American Soul.” . . . By now, “neocon” has mutated into a political curse word to discredit not just those who happily accept their status as neoconservatives, but also anyone who merely believes that the West should respond in muscular fashion to national security threats, such as those posed by the cooperation of Iran, Syria, and North Korea on nuclear weapons technology and the equipping of terrorist groups around the world. The chief purpose of this emergent rhetorical style is to cast aspersions on anyone who believes, say, that Iran must not attain nuclear weapons, even if it requires war. International Herald Tribune columnist Roger Cohen, for instance, notes that “neocon has morphed into an all-purpose insult for anyone who still believes that American power is inextricable from global stability and still thinks the muscular anti-totalitarian U.S. interventionism that brought down Slobodan Milosevic has a place, and still argues, like Christopher Hitchens, that ousting Saddam Hussein put the United States ‘on the right side of history.’” Examples of this new, broader, definitional standard abound. In 2004, writing in The Nation, Michael Lind termed the National Endowment for Democracy—a nonpartisan institution that provides millions of dollars to democracy activists around the world—“the quintessential neocon institution.” French intellectual Bernard Henri-Lévy deems France’s Foreign Minister, Bernard Kouchner, a “neoconservative,” a label that the socialist Kouchner would likely find surprising. But Kouchner, who founded Doctors Without Borders and was one of the very few left-wing supporters of NATO intervention in the Balkans, recently observed that “it is necessary to prepare for the worst” against Iran, adding, “The worst, it’s war”—enough to range him in the neocon camp, it seems. When Joe Lieberman, whose positions on domestic policy are indistinguishable from those of the majority of his colleagues in the Senate Democratic caucus, makes mere mention of Iranian or Syrian support for armed elements in Iraq, Matthew Yglesias—one of the most popular leftist bloggers, writing from his perch at The Atlantic—duly calls the senator a “neocon,” a “psychotic rightwinger,” and a “warmongerer.” The long tradition of liberal anti-totalitarianism thus appears to have come to an end, at least in mainstream political rhetoric. What about human rights groups like Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch? Largely staffed by leftists, these days they escape the neoconservative charge because they generally presume moral equivalence between democracies and anti-American thuggocracies. . . . Freedom House, on the other hand, which rates countries on a scale from 1 (most free) to 7 (least free), and explicitly ranks some nations (invariably Western democracies) as “more free” than others, has long been the bane of the leftist “human rights community.” Welcome to the new political discourse. |
| Posted by:Mike |
| #5 Hurrah! More new posters! Welcome, Six Gun Neo-Con, and all the rest of you. We're glad you're here. :-) |
| Posted by: trailing wife 2007-11-09 22:47 |
| #4 The term neo-con is a clever little term devised to use as a deceptive, derogatory label of traditional American thinking. The first time I was called a neo-con was the first time I entered a blog and expressed my views. Views held by my father, my grandfather and many of the founding fathers of this nation. However, by labeling traditional American thinking with the word "neo-con" is the lefts attempt to say in short that this thinking is new "neo" conservative "con" thinking and is dangerous for America. Another left wing attempt of destroying traditional America. |
| Posted by: Six Gun Neo-Con 2007-11-09 22:38 |
| #3 I grew up with the Blues. Many of my good friends are Blue. It seems to me to be shallow, confusing existance full of duality and superstition. A few years ago someone I know made a trip back there to see his friends. He was 'Bushwacked' for his beliefs and treated him like it was an intervention. Having this intel, when I made a trip back I was ready for this tactic. Asking politely and genuinely interested in what a neocon is, since I had not heard phrase, nobody could give me the same answer. After this was brought up they continued onto the current events talking points they clued me in on what is going on according to them, assuming since I grew up with them that I automatically agreed with such position. When I disagreed with them on some topics I was started to call me a neocon even though none had given me a good description. "Have you read this book?" was a common question and when I asked what the book was about all I was told was, "Well, you are a damn idiot." Pointing out that all they were saying is that a neocon is anyone who disagreed with them and not something they could categorize me specifically broke their ambush by using their own words from minutes beforehand. Continuing to turn their words, such as the example above 'So you would rather hate a group of people than be what I am, what does that mean since you cannot even describe what I am. And what does that say about some of the social policies that I agree with you on?' Great fun, getting all three of them talking about the same time and all contradiction themselves - like they were ingredients in a smoothie with my finger choosing the blender speed. I lost some friends but they were the flakes..the ones who are trying to work out their beliefs we still talk politics but on a very shallow level unless they are in a group. Just one person's briefed insight into the neohippie thinking process, still fighting the power their parents started I guess. For them it started as chic (for my friends cant speak for others), and who can be as clever as the writers for Daily Show, but ended up being an anchor into their whole self image. IMO it is a sympton of the, politely worded for our lady readers, the 'nannification of America'. And for those lefties who are so powerless and sad as to try to cause a cold civil war in America you really do not want to do that. Get out of that trapped existance and practice what you preach, the acceptance of others' opinions. Start with your neighbors here before fully taking on the ways of complete strangers who more than likely giggle at the very irony of the leftists way of life, which they would not blink to destroy, helping their cause. Rather than going around calling Cheney the crazy uncle, call for action against the slaughters of real buddhists, you know the ones of which the leftist claim to be of similar beliefs. Purge the neocons. Sounds like similar rhetoric used in times past to justify mass murder. Free thinking liberals, Clemons calls for the very destruction of life and civil liberties he lies about defending. Do not listen to that ass because as #1 says, bring it on. You threaten my family and I am shoulder to shoulder as is the rest of the silent majority. /lunch hungry rant |
| Posted by: swksvolFF 2007-11-09 12:59 |
| #2 Liberal anti-totalitarianism ended with WW2. Liberals hated the Nazis because the Soviets said so. Since the Soviets never gave them new programming after the collapse they continue to refer to all of their enemies as Nazi's. It's sad. |
| Posted by: rjschwarz 2007-11-09 11:47 |
| #1 Bring it on, libbies. |
| Posted by: Six Gun Neo-Con 2007-11-09 11:15 |