Pat Buchanan sounds off on NeoConservatives

"If we have to make common cause with the more hawkish liberals and fight the conservatives, that is fine with me," William Kristol has told the New York Times.

The Weekly Standard editor added that the neoconservatives may just abandon the Right altogether and convert to neoliberalism.

Alluding to his father Irving's definition of a neoconservative as a liberal who has been mugged by reality, Kristol describes a neoliberal as a "neoconservative who has been mugged by reality in Iraq."

Ranking his political preferences, Kristol added, "I will take Bush over Kerry, but Kerry over Buchanan ... If you read the last few issues of the Weekly Standard, it has as much or more in common with the liberal hawks than with traditional conservatives."

Yes, it does. But as John Kerry backs partial-birth abortion, quotas, raising taxes, homosexual unions, liberals on the Supreme Court and has a voting record to the left of Teddy Kennedy, how can Kristol prefer him to other conservatives? Answer: War and Israel.

Like Kristol, Kerry wants more U.S. troops sent to Iraq where they can advance the neocons' project for empire. And at a fund-raiser in Juno Beach, Fla., Kerry declared eternal fealty to Israel: "I have a 100 percent record – not a 99, a 100 percent record – of sustaining the special relationship and friendship that we have with Israel."

Kristol's warning that the neocons could break with the Right and go to Kerry is an admission of what many conservatives have long argued. To neocons, Israel comes first, second and third, conservative principles be damned.

The day after Kristol said he preferred Kerry to conservatives skeptical of committing more troops to Iraq, this item appeared in the Wall Street Journal: "Mr. Kristol thinks Mr. Bush should use the revelations [from the Woodward book] to shake up his war cabinet by firing Mr. Powell ... along with Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, who has pushed for smaller deployments of U.S. forces than some critics, including Mr. Kristol, think wise."

Set aside the suicidal folly of Bush dynamiting his war cabinet in an election year by firing its most famous members, and consider the ingratitude, the rootlessness and the cynicism on display here.

When it was launched in 1995, the Weekly Standard called on Colin Powell to run for president and offered its endorsement. Purpose: Hook up with the most popular man in the GOP who could restore the neocons and Kristols to pre-eminence and power. Powell rebuffed the offer. Ever since, he has been a target of abuse for having repelled the boarding party.

As for Rumsfeld, he has been a hero of neoconservatives for two decades. He co-signed the neocons' 1998 open letter to Clinton urging war on Iraq. He brought Wolfowitz and Douglas Feith into his Pentagon in the No. 2 and 3 slots. He put Richard Perle in charge of the Defense Review Board. After 9-11, according to Richard Clarke, Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz were making the case for attacking Iraq immediately, even before Bush had ousted the Taliban enablers of al-Qaida and bin Laden.

Agree or disagree with the defense secretary, Rumsfeld has been a lion in the neocon cause. To see the Weekly Standard snake on him like this brings to mind that wretched crowd in Yankee Stadium that took to booing Joe DiMaggio at the end of his career.

With Iraq turning into the Mesopotamian morass some of us warned it would become, the neo-Jacobins have decided they are not going to be the ones to ride the tumbrels.

In times like this, character comes through. By turning on the men they persuaded to go to war, by fabricating alibis and inventing excuses to absolve themselves of culpability for what they labored to create, they have revealed themselves for what they are: hustlers and opportunists devoid of principle, driven by an ideology of power and a passionate attachment to a nation not their own.

The Old Right curmudgeons who warned us against giving these vagabonds food, shelter and a warm place by the fire were right. We should have put them back out on the street.

President Bush should have listened to his father, who kept the neocons at some remove, and he had best beware, because they have a major card yet to play. That card is escalation.

With the situation in Iraq deteriorating, the neocon agenda is to widen the war into Syria, Iran and perhaps Saudi Arabia, and convert it into "World War IV," the war of their dreams, a war of civilizations, an Armageddon, with America and Israel on one side and Islam on the other.

Exiting Iraq with honor and avoiding the wider war for which the neocons are even now scheming is the first duty of patriots.

http://www.wnd.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=38206

"By turning on the men they persuaded to go to war, by fabricating alibis and inventing excuses to absolve themselves of culpability for what they labored to create, they have revealed themselves for what they are: hustlers and opportunists devoid of principle, driven by an ideology of power and a passionate attachment to a nation not their own."

I love that because many in the nation eat it up and spews it out on anyone who has the nerve to ask "WTF is going on here?"

So I ask, WTF is going on here?

And at a fund-raiser in Juno Beach, Fla., Kerry declared eternal fealty to Israel: "I have a 100 percent record – not a 99, a 100 percent record – of sustaining the special relationship and friendship that we have with Israel."

I just don't get his? Someone has to explain to me this "special relationship" with Israel. At one point can they fend for themselves? I strongly believe they have a right to a state, and I support their resitance and war manuevers against the Arabs that want them pushed into the sea. They have nuclear weapons, eventhough UN resolutions continue demand their account of them and their dismantling. Just not going to happen... Israel w/ Nukes means an Israel period. Without it, they're overun by the Terroristinians, Syrians, and Jordan.

On another thread, I asked why the US gives Israel billions of dollars a year for their economy. How is this constitutional? Why are American Taxpayers, 50% of all US taxpayers because the other half doesn't pay taxes, forced to send money to foreign countries.

Finally.. please don't make this an anti-semtic thread. I just want to know how it is possible for our National Govt. to send money overseas while our nation's infrastructure crumbles and our borders continue to be unprotected.

Several points:

Regarding Buchanon, he's only conservative on social religious issues. On everything else, he's ultra-liberal. The only issues that seperate his ideology from Jesse Jackson are abortion, school prayer and affirmative action.

Israel is often a vital ally against terrorists and rogue nations. For example, they bombed the Osirak facility back in the 80s, preventing Saddam from becoming a nuclear power. Just the same, I'm not in favor of sending them billions of dollars in aid, nor do I like how we've become involved and associated with a so-called peace process which is destined for failure. In truth, our $$$ to Israel and Egypt has prevented both countries from performing the necessary economic reforms that both need so badly. Israel is mired in an archaic unsustainable socialist economy propped up by American aid. I had high hopes for Netanyahu when he promised to ween Israel off its dependence on foreign aid and make it economically independent. Sadly, he never lifted more than a token finger to carry out any such reforms. The Israelis are a remarkably entrepreneurial people, but they have become addicted to our aid. The US, however, won't stop feeding their habit for a couple of reasons. First, for fear of alienating Jewish voters. (It's the same kind of political impediment that prevents us from ending the counterproductive Cuban embargo - prospective Presidential candidates know it will cost them Florida). Second, the aid is also a corporate subsidy for US banks. Israel has reached the point where all of its aid money goes to pay off interest it owes to US lending institutions. Thus you have a powerful business lobby along with a powerful ethnic lobby to ensure the process does not end, despite the fact that both countries are worse off in the long run.

Finally, though, there is really no connection between US support for Israel and the decision to oust Saddam. This is one of Buchanon's favorite red herrings. We went after Saddam because he's an SOB, not because we were kow-towing to AIPAC.

Originally posted by riggo-toni

Several points:

Regarding Buchanon, he's only conservative on social religious issues. On everything else, he's ultra-liberal. The only issues that seperate his ideology from Jesse Jackson are abortion, school prayer and affirmative action.

Israel is often a vital ally against terrorists and rogue nations. For example, they bombed the Osirak facility back in the 80s, preventing Saddam from becoming a nuclear power. Just the same, I'm not in favor of sending them billions of dollars in aid, nor do I like how we've become involved and associated with a so-called peace process which is destined for failure. In truth, our $$$ to Israel and Egypt has prevented both countries from performing the necessary economic reforms that both need so badly. Israel is mired in an archaic unsustainable socialist economy propped up by American aid. I had high hopes for Netanyahu when he promised to ween Israel off its dependence on foreign aid and make it economically independent. Sadly, he never lifted more than a token finger to carry out any such reforms. The Israelis are a remarkably entrepreneurial people, but they have become addicted to our aid. The US, however, won't stop feeding their habit for a couple of reasons. First, for fear of alienating Jewish voters. (It's the same kind of political impediment that prevents us from ending the counterproductive Cuban embargo - prospective Presidential candidates know it will cost them Florida). Second, the aid is also a corporate subsidy for US banks. Israel has reached the point where all of its aid money goes to pay off interest it owes to US lending institutions. Thus you have a powerful business lobby along with a powerful ethnic lobby to ensure the process does not end, despite the fact that both countries are worse off in the long run.

Finally, though, there is really no connection between US support for Israel and the decision to oust Saddam. This is one of Buchanon's favorite red herrings. We went after Saddam because he's an SOB, not because we were kow-towing to AIPAC.

good post. I agree with a lot of it, as with Cskins. I'm not an anti-semite, nor am I an isolationist, but the preferential treatment to Israel is above and beyond what we do for any other country.

Originally posted by Cskin

On another thread, I asked why the US gives Israel billions of dollars a year for their economy. How is this constitutional? Why are American Taxpayers, 50% of all US taxpayers because the other half doesn't pay taxes, forced to send money to foreign countries.

Israel is the true welfare state.