Posted by
John Ostrowski on Thursday, August 31, 2006 7:55:25 PM
Irving Kristol wrote a damning op-ed in 2003 about neoconservatism. He referred to it not as an ideology or a variant of conservatism, but as a persuasion -- a uniquely American persuasion. In this op-ed the so-called "godfather" of neoconservatism admitted to one of the great heresies of the neoconservative movement: "[Neoconservatism's] 20th-century heroes tend to be TR, FDR and Ronald Reagan."
FDR? Really? I've heard this charge so many times from prominent paleocons, but until I came across this three-year old article earlier today, I had no idea it was true.
Before tackling neoconservatism, I should point out that it was neoconservatism that first really energized me. As a high school sophomore, I supported Bush's 2000 election as best I could (obviously I couldn't vote, but I could argue with my classmates, the vast majority of whom supported Gore). But it wasn't until 2002 and 2003, when the impending Iraq war became
the issue did I enthusiastically line up behind the president. Yes, I supported him before then. I'm strongly pro-life, so I supported Bush for that reason. But the Iraq war became the subject of so many debates that it was impossible not to take sides and argue with opponents. I strongly supported military action in Iraq.
I look at Iraq and the Middle East today and I see a disaster. I ignored the warnings of the Vatican. I ignored the warnings of Pat Buchanan, writing him off as a black sheep of the conservative movement. I see now how wrong I was.
Examining Kristol's op-ed it's easy to see where neoconservatism goes wrong:
[L]arge nations, whose identity is ideological, like the Soviet Union of yesteryear and the United States of today, inevitably have ideological interests in addition to more material concerns. Barring extraordinary events, the Univted States will always feel obliged to defend, if possible, a democractic nation under attack from nondemocratic forces, external or internal.
In 1990, Pat Buchanan wrote:
High among these is the democratist temptation, the worship of democracy as a form of governance and the concomitant ambition to see all mankind embrace it, or explain why not. Like all idolatries, democratism substitutes a false god for the real, a love of process for a love of country.
Democracy gave Germany Hitler. Democracy gave us a Lebanese government partially controlled by Hezbollah. Democracy in Afghanistan is slowly inching back toward the Taliban. How long until democracy gives us an Iraq ruled by sectarian leaders, pushing Sharia law on the willing citizens?
Kristol asserted in his 2003 article that America is uniquely powerful, that neoconservatism is embraced widely by the American people, that obituaries for neoconservatism were written too early, and that neoconservatism is uniquely American.
I ask, is it too early to start writing America's obituary?
Pat Buchanan has been warning about the decline of America for quite some time now. I didn't take him seriously because, as I said, to me he was the black sheep of conservatism. But suddenly is warnings are real. America, under the neoconservatives is running huge deficits. Foreign powers control much of our debt. Our military is almost everywhere. If we are to act as Kristol wants America to, there will be no "almost" in that sentence. Our military will be everywhere. Every attack on democracy, internal or external, will need to see the United States rushing in and acting as the savior. If these operations go half as bad as Iraq has, we will soon be the hated hegemony (as if we're not already) and our decline will have begun.
Why might European conservatism not mimic American (neo)conservatism? That is easy to answer, though it probably didn't even occur to Kristol. Europe has been there, done that. Spain, France, England, Germany, they all controlled vast empires, sticking their noses in places they didn't belong. They invested huge sums of money in controlling foreign lands. They all fell from power, and now none can be considered world powers. The conservatives in Europe learned from this. Americans didn't.
History books one thousand years from now will tell of the American Republic, it's rise and fall, and its internal destruction at the hands of neoconservatives.