The Neoconservative Persuasion - by Irving Kristol

[dajabr]

WHAT EXACTLY IS NEOCONSERVATISM? Journalists, and now even presidential candidates, speak with an enviable confidence on who or what is "neoconservative," and seem to assume the meaning is fully revealed in the name. Those of us who are designated as "neocons" are amused, flattered, or dismissive, depending on the context. It is reasonable to wonder: Is there any "there" there?

Even I, frequently referred to as the "godfather" of all those neocons, have had my moments of wonderment. A few years ago I said (and, alas, wrote) that neoconservatism had had its own distinctive qualities in its early years, but by now had been absorbed into the mainstream of American conservatism. I was wrong, and the reason I was wrong is that, ever since its origin among disillusioned liberal intellectuals in the 1970s, what we call neoconservatism has been one of those intellectual undercurrents that surface only intermittently. It is not a "movement," as the conspiratorial critics would have it. Neoconservatism is what the late historian of Jacksonian America, Marvin Meyers, called a "persuasion," one that manifests itself over time, but erratically, and one whose meaning we clearly glimpse only in retrospect.

Viewed in this way, one can say that the historical task and political purpose of neoconservatism would seem to be this: to convert the Republican party, and American conservatism in general, against their respective wills, into a new kind of conservative politics suitable to governing a modern democracy. That this new conservative politics is distinctly American is beyond doubt. There is nothing like neoconservatism in Europe, and most European conservatives are highly skeptical of its legitimacy. The fact that conservatism in the United States is so much healthier than in Europe, so much more politically effective, surely has something to do with the existence of neoconservatism. But Europeans, who think it absurd to look to the United States for lessons in political innovation, resolutely refuse to consider this possibility.

More: http://www.weeklystandard.com/Content/Public/Articles/0...


THE NEOCONS COME OUT
Kristol's 'persuasion' – big government at home, empire abroad

http://www.antiwar.com/justin/j081803.html

[Fovea]

1. How incredibly outdated it is

as a compendium of odd snippits of laissez faire, jingoism, and faith based economics. Kristol lauds the relative health of conservatism in the US over europe, but ignores with malice the relative health of the European worker over the American.

It uses the invisible hand of capitalism and the miracle of democracy in ways that neither Adam Smith, or James Madison would condone.

[bodhisattava]

2. Of course, the real agenda behind all this economic posturing

is to tie the jews of US closely with the rightwing power elite so that the US security interests in the Middle East will be merged with that of Israel.The ultimate aim is the demonization of the Arabs by exploting the innate racism of the white power elites
and to ally the jews and the christans in a ltter day Judeo-Christian crusade. Note how effectively all these aims are concealed
in this article when recent events starting with the ascension of
GWB,9/11 and Iraq war have pretty well confirmed the hidden agenda.