Monday, July 17, 2006
George Will Slaps Down Kristol, Neo-Cons
Yesterday on This Week with George Stephanopoulos, George Will took William Kristol and The Weekly Standard to the woodshed for advocating a U.S. attack on Iran. Steve Clemons of The Washington Note says Will's going to do more of the same tomorrow in his syndicated Washington Post column:
No matter what you think about George Will (and I know from comments appended to previous posts that many of you do not like Will in the least), it's nice to hear somebody from the right criticize the neo-conservative foreign policy. Clemons notes in the comments section of his post that Kristol and the other neo-cons "have become an 'Any Excuse To Bomb Iran' operation" and it will take conservatives like George Will to repudiate them in order to avoid the "Big Regional War" Kristol and his ilk want.
It is important that we on the left acknowledge Will's points here and publicize them. Because as I write this post, Larry Kudlow and Joe Scarborough are on MSNBC banging the drum for war against Iran and tying it to the larger war on terror, using Gingrich's WWIII theory to boot!!! These fuckers actually think the U.S. can take out both Iran and Syria and remake the Middle East in Middle America's image. Thank god there are some conservatives like George Will and Pat Buchanan circulating around the pundit circuit to expose the neo-con agenda and remind us just how badly that neo-con agenda has gone so far.
The administration, justly criticized for its Iraq premises and their execution, is suddenly receiving some criticism so untethered from reality as to defy caricature. The national, ethnic and religious dynamics of the Middle East are opaque to most people, but to The Weekly Standard -- voice of a spectacularly misnamed radicalism, "neoconservativism" -- everything is crystal clear: Iran is the key to everything.
"No Islamic Republic of Iran, no Hezbollah. No Islamic Republic of Iran, no one to prop up the Assad regime in Syria. No Iranian support for Syria. . ." You get the drift.
So, The Weekly Standard says. . .
"We might consider countering this act of Iranian aggression with a military strike against Iranian nuclear facilities. Why wait? Does anyone think a nuclear Iran can be contained? That the current regime will negotiate in good faith? It would be easier to act sooner rather than later. Yes, there would be repercussions -- and they would be healthy ones, showing a strong America that has rejected further appeasement."
"Why wait?" Perhaps because the U.S. military has enough on its plate, in the deteriorating wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, which both border Iran. And perhaps because containment, although of uncertain success, did work against Stalin and his successors, and might be preferable to a war against a nation much larger and more formidable than Iraq. And if Assad's regime does not fall after The Weekly Standard's hoped-for third war, with Iran, does the magazine hope for a fourth?
As for the "healthy" repercussions that The Weekly Standard is so eager to experience from yet another war: One envies that publication's powers of prophecy, but wishes it had exercised them on the nation's behalf before all of the surprises -- all of them unpleasant -- that Iraq has inflicted. And regarding the "appeasement" that The Weekly Standard decries: Does the magazine really wish the administration had heeded its earlier (Dec. 20, 2004) editorial advocating war with yet another nation -- the bombing of Syria?
No matter what you think about George Will (and I know from comments appended to previous posts that many of you do not like Will in the least), it's nice to hear somebody from the right criticize the neo-conservative foreign policy. Clemons notes in the comments section of his post that Kristol and the other neo-cons "have become an 'Any Excuse To Bomb Iran' operation" and it will take conservatives like George Will to repudiate them in order to avoid the "Big Regional War" Kristol and his ilk want.
It is important that we on the left acknowledge Will's points here and publicize them. Because as I write this post, Larry Kudlow and Joe Scarborough are on MSNBC banging the drum for war against Iran and tying it to the larger war on terror, using Gingrich's WWIII theory to boot!!! These fuckers actually think the U.S. can take out both Iran and Syria and remake the Middle East in Middle America's image. Thank god there are some conservatives like George Will and Pat Buchanan circulating around the pundit circuit to expose the neo-con agenda and remind us just how badly that neo-con agenda has gone so far.
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You really have to wonder when guys like Will and Buchanon are against the neo-con agenda.
You also have to wonder if these guys can count. Has anyone done a comparison of the population, land mass, and relief between Iraq and Iran?
Buchanon said once again this weekend, "Cowboy diplomacy is dead."
Thanks Pat.
You also have to wonder if these guys can count. Has anyone done a comparison of the population, land mass, and relief between Iraq and Iran?
Buchanon said once again this weekend, "Cowboy diplomacy is dead."
Thanks Pat.
Buchanan was against the Iraq war from the beginning.
In his book from a few years ago, "Where The Right Went Wrong: How The NeoCons SubverReagan Revolution and Hijacked the Bush Presidency," Buchanan argued that the attacking an Arab country that had nothing to do w/ 9/11 was arrogant, ill-thought out and played right into Bin laden's hands.
He was right, obviously. Only he said this back in 2003 when it wasn't cool.
Buchanan's really conservative on some issues (especially the cultural ones) and he obviously has an anxiety over the browning of America (thus his immigration stance.)
But I have to say this about Pat: just when you think you've got him pegged, he can surprise you. He argued last night on Scarborough Country that what Israel is doing to the Lebanese people is "immoral". He said "Listen, it is one thing for the Israelis to attack Hezbollah and take out their capacity to hit Israel with rockets. But it is something elese for them to attack all the infrastructure and to attack innocent Lebanese citizens and set this country of Lebanon, which is a friend to the United States, back 20 years. These are immoral actions."
Buchanan also noted that it was ridiculous for Israel to say Lebanon should be disarming Hezbollah when Israel itself, with the best-trained army in the world, has been trying to disarm Hezbollah for 18 years and has failed.
The rest of the guys on Scarborough Country (Joe, Larry Kudlow, Barry McCaffrey), on the other hand, all thought Israel should finish off Hezbollah and head into Syria and then Iran.
Buchanan said "You know what, if the president has information that Syria is directly behind this, he should show his hand and reveal it. If not, he should keep his mouth closed."
As crazy as this sounds, whenever I watch these stupid shows, Buchanan often comes across as the fucking realistic sane guy! Doesn't that say just how far the conservative movement has shifted from the reagan days to the Kristol era?
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In his book from a few years ago, "Where The Right Went Wrong: How The NeoCons SubverReagan Revolution and Hijacked the Bush Presidency," Buchanan argued that the attacking an Arab country that had nothing to do w/ 9/11 was arrogant, ill-thought out and played right into Bin laden's hands.
He was right, obviously. Only he said this back in 2003 when it wasn't cool.
Buchanan's really conservative on some issues (especially the cultural ones) and he obviously has an anxiety over the browning of America (thus his immigration stance.)
But I have to say this about Pat: just when you think you've got him pegged, he can surprise you. He argued last night on Scarborough Country that what Israel is doing to the Lebanese people is "immoral". He said "Listen, it is one thing for the Israelis to attack Hezbollah and take out their capacity to hit Israel with rockets. But it is something elese for them to attack all the infrastructure and to attack innocent Lebanese citizens and set this country of Lebanon, which is a friend to the United States, back 20 years. These are immoral actions."
Buchanan also noted that it was ridiculous for Israel to say Lebanon should be disarming Hezbollah when Israel itself, with the best-trained army in the world, has been trying to disarm Hezbollah for 18 years and has failed.
The rest of the guys on Scarborough Country (Joe, Larry Kudlow, Barry McCaffrey), on the other hand, all thought Israel should finish off Hezbollah and head into Syria and then Iran.
Buchanan said "You know what, if the president has information that Syria is directly behind this, he should show his hand and reveal it. If not, he should keep his mouth closed."
As crazy as this sounds, whenever I watch these stupid shows, Buchanan often comes across as the fucking realistic sane guy! Doesn't that say just how far the conservative movement has shifted from the reagan days to the Kristol era?
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