Why No One Should Ever Listen to Max Boot

March 15, 2023  By Paul Krause

Max Boot, one of the most bloodthirsty American analysts and commentators, has apparently woken up long after most Americans with half his education, about the limits of American power and the disastrous wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. Thankfully for us, he has penned his reawakening in the pages of Foreign Affairs, that astute bulwark of the establishment, a journal of which I am, in fact, a subscriber.

For 20 years, Boot has been calling for regime change, democracy building abroad, and even leaving American troops in dangerous brushfire to “polic[e] the frontiers of the Pax Americana.” Now, he says he’s changed................Not only has Max Boot been wrong on all the major foreign policy issues since the end of the Cold War, he is also wrong in presenting what the older, indeed, venerable, tradition of neoconservatism was about. Boot is an atheist; he despises religion (just like most contemporary “neocons” who have fallen very far from the tree), and has called for an openly and unapologetically atheistic president. Too bad Irving Kristol isn’t alive to rebuke him. A man who has been wrong for so long and a man who lies about his rediscovery of genuine neoconservatism is a man no one should listen to ever again.............To Read More....

My Take - One of the things I find in common among neocons like George Will, Charles Krauthammer, now dead, and this guy, is they're atheists.  They press the idea they're conservatives but they're bent is toward more government control.  

In truth, I don't think they know what they believe since they're atheists they have no solid moral foundation, just like the left.  I wonder just how many of this ilk are atheists.  I know people like John Kasich attend church, and he quotes scripture to push his views, but his use of scripture is clearly twisted, and he embraces views that may be popular in Christian churches today, but that doesn't make them scriptural.  

Is there a pattern there?  I think so, and will be paying closer attention to that from now on.

The Unsung White House Official Who Warned President Trump in 2017 that the Deep State Was Trying to Prematurely End his Presidency

March 13, 2022 By John Dale Dunn

No President of The United States ever before faced anything comparable to the organized effort of officials within his administration to sabotage Donald J. Trump’s presidency and drive him from office.  The Memo by Rich Higgins [216 pp, Kindle 9.99 Hard Copy 22.34 ISBN‎-0999705938‎ Washington D.C. Calamo Press 2020] is a first and only book by an American soldier and patriot who exposes the deep state and the anti-Trump coup activities.

Rich Higgins earned his early reputation as an ordnance (explosives) expert in Iraq during and after the War for Iraqi Freedom of 2002 and 2003.  Higgins went from being an ordnance man to becoming an expert on insurgency warfare, since explosives were the favored weapons of insurgents.  They are usually outgunned and out manned so they retreat to asymmetric (guerilla) warfare heavily dependent on hit and run and explosives, which demoralize and disrupt the efforts of the larger force. ...........To Read More....

 

Who Will Be the Next Neoconservatives?

Posted on April 19, 2021 by Steven Hayward in Coronavirus, Fake News, Hollywood, Media, Media Bias

 As the country going through a cycle of leftist madness last seen in the 1960s, we can recall that a number of liberals woke up to the defects of their creed, and became the founding generation of “neoconservatives,” that is, liberals who had been “mugged by reality.” That original generation were mostly academic social scientists of one stripe or another.

Will we see a new generation of “neoconservatives” arising out of the present madness? And if so where will they come from? Probably not from academia, but from journalism (think Glenn Greenwald, Matt Yglesias, and even Jonathan Chait to some extent), and—dare I say or hope for it—Hollywood?

Exhibit One is lefty comedian Bill Maher, who, as we’ve noted before, has delivered several ringing attacks on cancel culture and political correctness in general. Last Friday he went off on liberals, the media, and their treatment of COVID. And surprisingly for Maher, this rant has fewer of his crude f-bombs, so I can give this one a PG-13 rating.

If he keeps this up, he’ll be voting Republican sooner or later. Given how many comedians are seeing the humorlessness of the left, I suspect many of them are going to come around, if they haven’t already...........To Read More....

 

Fusionists Are the Japanese Holdouts of American Politics

It is deeply irresponsible for the Right to continue anchoring itself to this long-irrelevant worldview.

Deion A. Kathawa August 14th, 2019

Fusionism—a political synthesis which stresses the compatibility of libertarian freedom with traditional moral values—faces an identity crisis. Political philosopher and one-time Communist Frank Meyer conceived fusionism after World War II, as well as its corresponding political coalition, which he compared to a three-legged stool. Fusionism committed to a muscular foreign policy, social and moral traditionalism, and free markets. Practically, President Reagan masterfully wielded the sword of fusionism and with it slayed the dragon of Soviet Communism.
 

Fusionism has a venerable history, and so we owe the concept a debt of gratitude. But it’s time to put it out to pasture, for the good of America. Because right now, the self-proclaimed and doctrinaire fusionists—so-called respectable, non-icky NeverTrump conservatives —more resemble Japanese holdouts than they do serious right-wing intellectuals...........To Read More.....

 

Neoconservatism: The Lessons Learned

Darren Beattie replying to What Democracy Requires

A brief guide to putting America first.

Irving Kristol defined a neoconservative as a liberal “mugged by reality.” A select number of these erstwhile liberals wisely chose to hand over their valuables to their muggers—in this case many of the comforting sociological illusions underpinning President Johnson’s “Great Society.”

Decades later a new type of neoconservative emerged. This second generation, perhaps determined that no future “muggings” should occur, launched what could well be the most awesome and devastating counter-assault on reality in recent political history.

Fortified with a mixture of Post-Cold War triumphalism and universalist illusions of spreading global democracy, this neoconservative cadre focused their efforts on foreign, rather than domestic, policy. But the crown jewel of its military adventures, the Iraq War, was also its crowning disgrace.

The roots of that grievous error showed clearly in the Republican establishment’s reluctance even to acknowledge it—much less attempt to learn from it. Of the sixteen candidates in the 2016 Presidential primary, thirteen years after then-President Bush declared “mission accomplished,” only two dared criticize the Iraq War and the experts behind it. One, Donald Trump, won the Presidency in a stunning victory against the vigorous opposition of the GOP establishment and its powerful institutional allies around the Western world.

With this victory, the failures behind the neoconservative foreign policy establishment, particularly in the Middle-East, could no longer hide behind embarrassed silence. But it is not enough to smugly point out failures. In order to seize the opportunity Trump’s presidency created and to develop a successful foreign policy vision for the 21st century, we must learn from those failures. Two general lessons are especially noteworthy.............To Read More......

When Anti-Trump Conservatives Abandon Reason and the Law

 Defending an FBI that attempted a coup

Melissa Mackenzie   January 18, 2019

Failed presidential hopeful David French sees nothing wrong with the American federal police force, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, investigating their commanding officer because he possesses policies they don’t like. It’s absolutely fine, according to French and other Never Trump conservatives, that a salacious fiction such as peeing and prostitutes and Russian hotel beds could be floated to the President as “information” or, one could say, a warning. Like the mafia warns. Or the secret police warn. Just for your own good, but don’t worry, you’re not the subject of an investigation.

These cops are being “prudent and proper,” French assures. Really? Substitute any other president into this scenario. President Barack Obama’s State Department gave the Russians a “reset button” and promised flexibility after the election, gave Iran piles of cash to fund terrorism and lied about it, caused destabilization in Iraq, Syria, Libya, Egypt, and encouraged evil potentates the world over. He fired 197 military generals in five years. And yet, he led American foreign policy into the muck with nary an FBI sneeze...........To Read More......

The Era of Conservative Torpor Is Over

Hillary Clinton’s 2016 campaign is remembered for several things—none of them good.

By Chris Buskirk| January 8th, 2019

The highlights include failing to campaign in the “Blue Wall” states of the upper Midwest, commissioning fictional opposition research from FusionGPS that failed to move the needle with voters but forms the basis of Robert Mueller’s anti-Trump crusade, and describing Trump supporters as deplorable and irredeemable. It’s part of what Charles Kesler calls “the Left’s growing alienation from middle America.” But that self-alienation isn’t the exclusive province of the political and cultural Left.

Elite opinion makers on the Right are often no better, and sometimes worse.

Witness the descent into Lear-like madness of Bill Kristol, founder and former editor of the recently deceased neoconservative journal The Weekly Standard. His peculiar obsession with the person of Donald Trump destroyed the magazine he founded and possibly the careers of the people led astray by his siren song. It also exposed the fact that while Kristol has occasionally had policy goals in common with conservatives, he never shared our devotion to the principles and institutions of the American founding that made possible more than two centuries of peace and prosperity. And to add insult to injury, it was discovered in 2018 that he’s taking money from Left wing billionaires to finance his jihad. ...............To Read More.....

My Take - Definition is everything, because definition leads to clarity, and clarity leads to understanding.  Many of us already had the correct understanding, but now Trump has forced clarity and understanding on the nation. 

The author uses the word "torpor" in the title, which I thought was worth exploring as the word means, "a state of physical or mental inactivity; lethargy".  If nothing else comes out of the Trump administration, he has cleared the air over who is and who isn't and conservative and what is and what isn't conservative thought.

Now we know for sure these neocons have been nothing but traitors to the conservative base in America making promises they never intended to keep and publicly taking positions they didn't really believe in.  Now..... that allows conservatives to come out fighting with no restrictions.  People like George Will, Charles Krauthammer, Bill Kristol, John Kasich, Bush, McCain, Romney, and the rest of that cabal of neocon politicians and neocon writers have been pulling the wool over everyone's eyes for decades.  But now we have clarity. 

This next two years are going to be among the most interesting two years in American history.

Polishing Jonah Goldberg

“American Greatness,” as all things Trump in general, has gotten under his skin.

Ed Morrow December 29, 2018

Jonah Goldberg wrote a column for National Review before departing for his Christmas holiday in Hawaii. Was it a retelling of a long ago night before Christmas, when a tiny Jonah in footy PJs couldn’t sleep for hope of a pony under the tree? No. It was a screed titled “Conservative Facts.” What set off Goldberg was a column in American Greatness by Chris Buskirk titled “Death of The Weekly Standard Signals Rebirth of the Right.”..............He bitches.

Buskirk’s column applauded the failure of the Weekly Standard.........like many conservatives, sees neoconservatism as an ism that through “titanic hubris and priggish moralism” failed conservatism..............They believe that while America was trying to build democracy in foreign lands with our blood and treasure, America, at home, was being transformed into something unrecognizable.......... Good motives don’t guarantee good results..............Neocon-endorsed wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.......... but there appears to be no end to the bloodshed.

Neocons also failed to reduce Big Government, the target they explicitly reviled in their foundling days. .............during the heyday of neoconservatism “a new generation of careerists, sycophants, and know-nothings flooded Washington eager to find a Beltway sinecure. The legacy conservative media began to change. Step by step it abandoned historic American principles and ultimately came to despise the American people.............If Hillary Clinton had won the presidency, she would have sent America far down the road to something appalling............. Millions of Americans understand this but Goldberg doesn’t and disregards their concerns............ Kristol says that he piously prefers democratic and constitutional politics “But if it comes to it, [I] prefer the deep state to the Trump state.” That’s a shocking remark................To Read More.....

Jonah Goldberg and Cardinal Newman

By Roger Kimball | December 29th, 2018

My friend Jonah Goldberg has prompted me to think a bit about the issue of character as it relates to public service. Jonah thinks that Donald Trump is a man of bad character. He’s written this several times, most recently, I believe, at National Review where he puts it negatively: it is an “obvious truth,” he says, that “President Trump is not a man of good character.”

In August, on Twitter, Jonah issued a challenge that, he noted, he had been pressing for three years: “Please come up with a definition of good character that Donald Trump can clear.”...........

My question is this: what is the character that Jonah wants us to champion and that he stipulates Donald Trump lacks? Let us grant that the president is an imperfect man. What betokens worse character: tweeting rude things or having sex with your intern in the Oval Office? What’s worse, insulting Bob Corker or using the Department of Justice and the IRS to harass and persecute your political opponents?...........To Read More......

Trump Decided To Withdraw From Syria After Stumping John Bolton With One Question

December 24, 2018 Scott Morefield

President Donald Trump reportedly stumped nationwide safety adviser John Bolton with one essential query earlier than making his heavily-criticized resolution to withdraw U.S. forces from Syria. The president agreed to the withdrawal throughout a December 14 cellphone name with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, two officers informed NBC Information, however the authentic objective of the decision had been “for Trump to inform Erdogan to again off” threats to assault American supported Kurdish rebels, NBC reported.

However Trump went off-script in the course of the name and agreed with Erdogan, significantly when the Turkish president requested Trump, “Why are you continue to there?” when the Islamic State had been 99 % defeated………The president’s resolution to withdraw U.S. forces from Syria and Afghanistan has been roundly criticized by neoconservative politicians, navy brass, and even Democrats usually against struggle however desirous to discover a level with which to hammer the president. Nonetheless, it does symbolize Trump’s want to maintain a key marketing campaign promise, and has not been without its defenders, together with Kentucky Senator Rand Paul.

“One international coverage blunder after one other in Iraq and Afghanistan and Libya hasn’t labored out for our nationwide curiosity.”.............. “And let’s speak about Syria,” he added. “Let’s speak concerning the truth — ISIS is the enemy of Russia. ISIS is the enemy of Assad. ISIS is the enemy of Turkey."

"Are we supposed to remain in Syria for era after era, spilling American blood to combat the enemies of all these nations? Wolf, when did the American individuals signal as much as be in each struggle in each place in each facet of each battle throughout planet earth?”…………To Read More…

My Take - "Wolf, when did the American people sign up to be in every war in every place in every side of every conflict all over planet earth?”

July 1944 at Bretton Woods, and although that agreement officially ended in the 50's the concept has continued ever since and was the foundational concept for the IMF and the United Nations, all of which followed after, all of which need to be scrapped. We're coming to the end of the Bretton Woods era, and all those who've benefited are upset. I like Bolton for the most part, but he still has one foot in the Bretton Woods pond. The Neo-con will either convert or be gone. And the problem with so many surrounding Trump is they don't want to convert, they want to convert Trump.

Comey, of all people, has said it must be a shock to Trump to have so many people working for him to leave on principle, talking about Mattis. No, I don't think it's a shock. It's a warm and fuzzy feeling to have them quit.

When Trump came into office, he had only those he brought in with him on his side, and some of them had to be purged. It's impossible to purge as many as need to be purged when you're view of how the world should work is so different from those around you, and I'm not meaning the Democrats. I hope more people leave as a matter of "principle."

All of those people are now clearly defining what the difference is between the Republican neo-cons and the Republican conservatives. That's been the biggest reason the Republicans are called the stupid party, the party rank and file (that basket full of deplorables) were being either lied to or at best misled.  John McCain, Flake, Corker, George Will, Bill Kristol, Krauthammer and a host of others were all part of that cabal.  That's going to change. As for how much?

We'll see!

Death of The Weekly Standard Signals Rebirth of the Right

By Chris Buskirk| December 17th, 2018

Neoconservatism is dead, long live American conservatism.............The Standard was a creature of a particular time and place—the 1990s, the Bush-Clinton ascendancy, and Washington, D.C.’s insular, self-referential political class. As such, it never really fit within the broad flow of historic American conservatism. It was always, and intentionally, something different.............They were always blithely unconstrained by any identifiable political philosophy other than the unwavering belief that they should run the country. They represented nothing so much as the mid-20th-century country club set that was content to see the size and scope of government expand as long as they got a piece of the action. And The Weekly Standard was there every step of the way, advocating so-called big-government conservatism at home and moral imperialism abroad..........

Get it? In their worldview, Phil Anschutz is a dilettante incapable of rising to their level. But they were plenty happy to take his money while it lasted. By all reports, Anschutz has subsidized many millions of losses at The Weekly Standard to say nothing of the embarrassment of the past few years.

Perhaps the final nail in the coffin was the revelation by Julie Kelly that Bill Kristol and his claque of NeverTrump agitators did not have simply a principled difference, but in fact had become fifth columnists financed by left-wing billionaires like Pierre Omidyar..........To Read More....  

Get Ready for the Neo-Neoconservatives

by Rachel Lu October 3, 2016

 

Millennials may be souring on the old world of the political and cultural Left. For Daniel Patrick Moynihan, it was the racism charges that broke the camel’s back. His famous 1965 report on the pathologies of black culture landed him in a hornet’s nest. “I was not a bigot,” he wrote later, “but the good guys were calling me a racist, while here was this fellow Buckley saying these thoughtful things.

 

Glazer and I began to notice that we were getting treated in National Review with a much higher level of intellectual honesty.” Moynihan was just one of many erstwhile-liberals who was startled to find a rare bastion of sanity in National Review.

 

That trickle of refugees from liberalism would prove critical to getting William Buckley’s fledgling conservative movement off the ground. Having once regarded themselves as liberals, many neoconservatives had managed to attain influential mainstream positions that traditionalists of Russell Kirk’s persuasion would likely have found difficult.

 

They were invaluable for raising the movement’s profile. At the same time, their experience and background made them savvy to policy. They would lay the groundwork for conservative policy developments over the next several decades............Read more

My Take - The author's article is a mixed bag of tricks, until you realize she was a former Peace Corp volunteer and a Bob Novak Journalism Fellow.  Talk about a mixed bag, and like all neo-cons she's not committed to anything conservative that represents a solid moral foundation.  Another Will/Krauthammer "conservative", which means just about nothing.