A Chosen People without God--The Rise of the Neocons
Jacob Heilbrunn, They Knew They Were Right: The Rise Of The Neocons, Double Day, 336 pages.
It is always risky to write the obituary of neoconservatism, despite the now fashionable view that this is an idea whose time is finally gone. As Jacob Heilbrunn demonstrates in They Knew They Were Right: The Rise Of The Neocons, the neoconservatives have always been a tenacious bunch. Who could have predicted that a small group of ex-Trotskyite intellectuals would not only shape foreign policy for the Republican Party in the last three decades but also reinvent conservatism in America? Heilbrunn, a former senior editor of The New Republic, wisely prefers to emphasize the past success of the neoconservatives rather than offer ironclad predictions about their future influence, settling for rather safe forecasts such as his claim that American soldiers will be in Iraq for another four years, whoever wins the election in 2008.
The title of the book is Heilbrunn’s essential explanation for the success of the neoconservatives—they knew they were right. Their sheer self-confidence of the neoconservatives, their belief that they have The Answer, is astounding and goes a long way in explaining their stunning victories. For this reason, the author emphasizes the radical origins of the movement. Heilbrunn offers a readable (though not terribly original) account of how the future leaders of neoconservatism (especially Irving Kristol) got their start as public intellectuals engaged in various fratricidal battles between Trotskyites and Stalinists in the 1930s and 1940s. Despite this parochial beginning, these former leftist radicals—who eventually became ardent anti-Communists—possessed the will to power necessary to enter and then transform the mainstream of American politics, especially on the right. As they eventually moved from the left to the right in the 1970s, this will to change the world through endless promotion of their ideas never flagged.
Heilbrunn does not find it sufficient, however, to explain the success of the movement solely on the basis of a latent leftist orientation. Ethnicity as much as ideology explains the success of neoconservatism. In claiming that it is “in a decisive respect a Jewish phenomenon,” Heilbrunn is not simply pointing out that most neoconservatives are Jewish. Rather, he portrays the neoconservatives as living out the drama of a modern-day Mosaic narrative. The movement has always been a “prophetic” one, since its avatars began with an “exodus” from the Trotskyite left to the Democratic Party, spent time in the “wilderness” of the breakdown of bipartisan consensus in the 1960s, achieved “redemption” as they moved rightward into the Republican Party, and have now returned to “exile’ after the debacle of the Iraq war.
Although Heilbrunn does not get into the intellectual origins of political theology, historians of ideas will immediately recognize his stage-theory of history as a version of the “secularization hypothesis” famously defended by Max Weber, Karl Löwith, and many other socio-historical theorists in the 20th century. Secularization of biblical ideas is nothing new, of course, if that simply means the process of transforming religious credos into a brazenly political agenda. Practically every major political movement on the left in modernity has “immanentized the eschaton” (to use Eric Voegelin’s memorable phrase) by conflating the Kingdom of God with the Kingdom of Man. This use of secularization is Heilbrunn’s best defense—whether he knows it or not—against the predictable charge that he is anti-Semitic for emphasizing the Jewish origins of neoconservatism. The fact that neoconservatives have thought and acted in terms of secularized Judaism places them in the larger company of many other atheistic ideologues who were more than willing to bring heaven down to earth through political action. In the post-Holocaust age, it is not terribly shocking to discover that even secular Jews are tempted to embrace political messianism. Still, when neoconservatives see themselves as a “chosen people” struggling to break out of their intellectual captivity, this has more to do with leftist adulteration of biblical thought than with any teaching of the Old Testament. (My favorite phrase for describing this misuse of the Bible is the indulgence of believing in “chosenness without God.”)
Anybody who seriously reads neoconservative authors, particularly the writings of the students of the German-Jewish political philosopher Leo Strauss, will not spy anything particularly religious in their thought. (Strauss taught that true political philosophers were unbelievers.) Whether neoconservatives consciously understand their indebtedness to secularization is not a point, however, which interests Heilbrunn. Still, it should be of interest to any religious American who has ever been tempted to support neoconservatism. The lack of success which neoconservatives have had in “delivering” Jewish votes to the Republicans—a fact whose importance Heilbrunn correctly points to—may well reveal concern among American Jews about the neoconservative usage of religious themes.
This aside, the neoconservatives’ winning over the Christian Right in the 1970s is surely one of the greatest political success stories of all time. Secular-minded eastern seaboard intellectuals and evangelical Protestants of the South and Midwest are an odd coupling, to be sure. And at first glance it’s not at all clear what could possibly unite them. It certainly helped that neoconservatives and evangelicals were equally disgusted by the leftist excesses of the 1960s; that has been well-documented. Yet I suspect that a great deal of neoconservative success also lies in tapping into the readiness of Americans—Left or Right—to see themselves as a chosen people who must liberate the world from evil. Even if neoconservatives generally believe in what I call “chosenness without God” (or what David Gelernter calls “American Zionism”), this brazenly secularist theology has not deterred many American Christians from embracing a frankly idolatrous and blasphemous set of beliefs. In any case, this use of chosenness has helped the neoconservatives to redefine conservatism in America, to the point of defeating traditional conservatives—the heirs of Robert Taft—who were less convinced that America should act as an agent of the Almighty in foreign affairs.
One of the most serious limitations of Heilbrunn’s study is his failure to discuss in sufficient detail the neoconservative war against traditional American conservatism. (There is no mention, for example, of the Bradford controversy of the early 1980s, which represented the first big triumph of neoconservatives over their enemies to their right.) In emphasizing the neoconservatives’ taking part in intramural squabbles on the left, Heilbrunn shows no interest in explaining why neoconservatives were so successful in easing traditional rightists (we now know them as “paleoconservatives”) out of positions of power. Had he focused on this important period of history, he would have only strengthened his overall thesis that neoconservatives are radicals who have never tolerated opposition—whether in their Trotskyite days or in their takeover of the GOP.
While Heilbrunn’s favorite explanation for neoconservative success on the right is, once again, the sheer power of their will (they never doubted that they were right), let’s not forget that access to money and power helps too. It is simply too easy for the author to claim that “neoconservatism slowly became a self-perpetuating elite, much like the hated WASP establishment, though one that was based not on wealth but on ideas.” While one should not discount the power of secularizing theologies that confuse the Providence of God with a call to democratize the world, the fact is that neoconservatives have been extraordinarily successful in securing the access to media and postwar power elites in order to tell them what they want to hear about America’s true “mission” in the world.
Heilbrunn himself provides one powerful example of how influence can trump the intrinsic merits of ideas. Neoconservatives from Henry “Scoop” Jackson and Albert Wohlstetter in the 1970s to Natan Sharansky and Robert Kagan in the 1990s have succeeded in portraying a foreign policy of “realism” as one devoid of all moral concerns. That great defender of realism, George Kennan, constantly faced criticism for advocating an approach to foreign affairs which privileged matters of self-interest over ideology and ethics. Neoconservatives jumped into the debate over realism after Israel faced the threat of annihilation at the hands of her Arab neighbors in the late 1960s and early 1970s, and out of this context of anxiety over Israel’s very survival came the neoconservative belief that America must never distinguish her self-interest from its moral mission to protect and spread democracy all over the world. Presumably realists (like Henry Kissinger, a favorite target of neoconservatives) were so amoral and calculating that they were more than willing to sacrifice innocent peoples to their enemies (reminiscent of Munich-style appeasement). The neoconservatives successfully persuaded many Americans, especially in the GOP, that realism was a pessimistic and even isolationist abdication of America’s responsibility to embrace the cause of freedom-loving peoples everywhere.
While Heilbrunn provides a fine description of the neoconservative battle to defeat realists in foreign policy circles, he still tends to portray this struggle as a battle of ideas rather than one over access to influence. The neoconservative attack on realism does not bear intellectual scrutiny. Anyone who has studied realism seriously cannot accept the neoconservative stereotype that realists have ice-water running through their veins. Kennan never claimed that morality had no place in foreign policy: he simply questioned the wisdom of assuming that peoples of the world (especially Russians) should be judged according to American standards. Was it moral, Kennan often asked, to presuppose that all human beings desire democracy, American-style? What critics like Reinhold Niebuhr and his neoconservative admirers ignorantly dismissed as Kennan’s indifference to morality was in fact his subtle blend of realism and ethics in foreign policy. It was simply arrogant and delusional, in Kennan’s view, to believe that within every person lies an inner Thomas Jefferson just waiting to break out. (Sadly, this wisdom was lost on the neoconservatives who pushed for the invasion of Iraq in 2003.)
If the neoconservatives’ case against realism is based on straw-men arguments, then what explains their success on the right? After all, traditional conservatives were not nearly as opposed to realism as the neoconservatives were. I offer two explanations. First, one must never discount the appeal of political messianism to large voting blocs of the American public. Twentieth-century evangelical Protestants have always been somewhat enamored with the idea of their nation as the “almost chosen people” (in the words of Lincoln) who must set out to free the world of modern-day Pharaohs (as Richard Gamble has amply documented in his The War for Righteousness). Norman Podhoretz’s talk of World War IV with “Islamo-fascism” certainly resonates with the most apocalyptically inclined evangelicals. Second, the money and power which neoconservatives managed to enjoy tilted the debate against realism in their favor. Their success was not total—Ronald Reagan was far too much of a “realist” in foreign policy in the eyes of neoconservatives who despised his attempts to negotiate arms-control agreements with Gorbachev—but the neocons certainly gained access to affluent constituencies with a vested interest in spreading American influence (like big business).
The neoconservatives also grew influencial by capitalizing on the Kulturpessimismus among elites in the 1970s who believed that America’s best days were behind her. The neoconservative success in defending an optimistic view of America’s mission in the world contrasted sharply with Carter’s infamous “malaise” speech of 1979. It is no surprise that America’s political class, haunted by Vietnam and stung by the Iranian hostage crisis, warmly embraced the neoconservative vision of democracy-building. Indeed, the neoconservative move out of the “wilderness” and into the light of “redemption” had less to do with the power of their ideas than with anxiety over America’s future as the 1980s approached.
While Heilbrunn at times discusses the battles between neoconservatives and paleoconservatives over the true mission of America, this struggle takes second-place to his overall focus on the pro-Israeli biases of the movement. Although I don’t doubt for a moment that Israel is of great importance to neoconservatives, the success of their movement does not simply lie with their use of the Exodus narrative or their access to the wealth of the Israeli lobby. Like it or not, they were able to displace an attitude of defeatism in America’s elites with a sunny vision for the republic. One reason, I believe, that paleoconservatives have been often unable to defeat the neoconservatives is because of the paleos are not inclination to understate the fact that America’s leaders and citizens desire an optimistic creed. After the defeat in Vietnam, neoconservatives were able to position themselves as the true defenders of the “last, best hope.” After the 9-11 attacks, they were able to legitimize the grim war on terror with the happy promise of a democratic revolution in the Middle East which would end terror once and for all (David Frum and Richard Perle even promised to “end to evil”?) In both cases, the neocons were able to outmaneuver both liberals and conservatives who had doubts about the limits of American power. Rightly or wrongly, optimism (no matter how “boobish,” in the words of Mencken) tends to be lucrative in America. Just look at the Obama campaign.
Even if paleoconservatives are fundamentally correct about the lack of wisdom which neoconservatives often convey when they defend the cause of democracy on a global scale (secularized theology once again!), they can’t doubt that this message of hope resonates with many Americans. I have recently come to the conclusion that paleoconservatives made a mistake in surrendering the interpretation of the legacy of Lincoln to their enemies on the right. Neoconservatives have succeeded in portraying Honest Abe as a global democrat and moral universalist, whose rhetoric calls for an optimistic faith in the cause of liberty. This success is so extensive that even avowed enemies of the president like Thomas DiLorenzo agree with exuberant defenders like Harry Jaffa that Lincoln was indeed a democratic imperialist (they just disagree on the benefits of this legacy). In accepting the neoconservative view that Lincoln would have supported the Iraq War, paleoconservatives have made it easier for their enemies to capture one of the most inspirational figures in the nation’s history as grist for their many mills. (Whatever happened to conservative defenses of Lincoln as a realist in politics?)
Despite the often glaring inattention to detail which Heilbrunn displays towards battles on the right, I agree with the author that it is premature to anticipate the exit of neoconservatives just yet. The neoconservatives have proven themselves so adept at rewriting the history and symbolism of American politics that there is no reason to imagine the waning of their political theology. Even without the question of Israel’s survival, the neoconservatives can manipulate the messianic hopes of vast swaths of the American electorate. For all the talk about an incipient revival of “realism” in foreign policy, neither Obama nor McCain gives any indication that Kennan-style thinking will be allowed to compete with the politics of “hope,” even if this means more wars down the line. If the Democrats withdraw from Iraq (I’m not holding my breath) and the country collapses into a state of nature, just watch the neoconservatives launch endless recriminations about who “lost” not only the war but also the true mission of America. Once again, they might just prove to many Americans that they were right.
Dr. Grant Havers teaches philosophy and politics at Trinity Western University (Canada).
Comments
“The fact that neoconservatives have thought and acted in terms of secularized Judaism places them in the larger company of many other atheistic ideologues who were more than willing to bring heaven down to earth through political action. In the post-Holocaust age, it is not terribly shocking to discover that even secular Jews are tempted to embrace political messianism.”
I believe the fact that Neconservatism IS largely secularized Judaism is one of the characteristics that makes it most dangerous. Unlike universalistic Christianity, Judaism is particularistic, which means its general ethos was never intended to be applied to humanity as a whole, but rather merely to the Israelites vis a vis “the nations.”
Certainly the Ten Commandments may have universal merit, but in its entirety, Judaism is intended exclusively for the Jews—and that exclusivity is in part what makes it Judaism. The Neocon Bush administration, not surprisingly, has operated the occupation of Iraq like the Israelis have operated the occupation of Palestine—as if the Arabs are sub-human, non-chosen philistines.
The reason the Neocons are so warped, conflicted and incompetent is that in their megalomania, they have universalistic pretensions, but in practice, personal beliefs, preferences and bias’s, they are largely made up of parochial New York City Jewish hicks who confused themselves with Old Testament prophets, with a smattering of “Christian” Zionist evangelical hicks who confuses themselves with Christians.
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The intellectual trajectory of mosts neocons seems to be this: They discover that while they still love big government, they no longer love poor people.
Not all neocons are atheists, BTW. Michael Medved and Ben Stein for example are all for G-d and country as long as said country’s flag contains a six pointed star and no red color.
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Finally some adult conversation. Let the games begin.
“I told him that before I would make the pledge which he proposed, I would meet the war which either England or France or all the powers of Christendom might wage, and that I would stand and fight until the last man among us fell in the conflict...that neither as a citizen nor as President would I permit or tolerate any intermeddling of any European power on this continent....”
James Polk
“Political ties bind the Union together---not merely a common necessity, but the common interests of empire---of such empire as the world has never seen. The control of the national power is the control of the great western continent; and the control of this continent is to be in a very few years the controlling influence in the world...”
William Seward
I hope you can see my point. These “covetous” thoughts and “rapacious” considerations were very much alive in the “country” well before anyone knew who August Belmont was; much less Brandeis, Croley, Mahan Lippmann, Barauch, Frankfurter, Creel, Sherwood, MacLeish, Frost Buckley et. al..In fact, any cursory reading of Ben Franklin spells out Milner, Rhodes, Smuts with a 150 year heads up.
Now Nathaniel Hawthorne understood, as did his soon to be sainted daughter Rose. So did Ambrose Bierce and many, many others. Didn’t matter, Don’t matter. It’s as old as Rome, if not much, much older.
Those out there in “political land” whether left or right are merely witting or unwittingly wings of the same eagle of prey. The Declaration & Constitution were about NATIONAL independence, not PERSONAL independence. LIBERTY applied to property, not being. Nations(empire) are requisite for the collection of debt, the quarantee of credit...period. The rest is smoke to keep the plebes warm to the whole scam. There is no “welfare state"(most of which goes to the S&P;500)...without the “warfare state"(a smaller portion of the S&P;500)....equally there is no “warfare state” without the “welfare state”. Sadly, this is our National Narrative, our collective interest & agenda...and has been since day one. Thomas More’s dystopia starts, “in the beginning there was America”.
To somehow suggest that the neo-khans are acting in contradiction to the “american way” is completly preposterous. Rather,they are conspicuously perpetrating “the governing charter” since the reformation. The true founders of this country are “Diamond” Pitt(William” father) and Robert Morris. All else is pure fable. The Straussians are telling the truth. It is we that enable & enrich “the noble lie”. To place blame for our troubles & sorrows on the most recent versions of Flavius Josephus “fatal embracers” is the convenient act of an intellectual & moral coward. Marc Rich & Pincus Green just execute trades that “we” are too embarresed to have our names found on. It is not National Security. It is National Embarrassment. I am certain Mr Taki could confirm, at least, that. Israel & all the others are merely Anglo Beacheads. I am convinced that Amerika...is just one as well. The world has not been “americanized”...IT has been ANGLICIZED. Soccer as the world’s game...need you know more.
The only issue left is to confront our past and discern the deblitating metaphysics that produced it. If you can get past that with any energy or enthusiasm remaining… then try figuring out what could “really” been done to change it.
My best quess is...they all like the way it is...just fine , thank you very much. That’s how it got here in the first place. Luther & Calvin did not “protest” too long or too hard....but they did create German Mercantilism. Weber is right. Money became Myth and drew all its elements & energies from Christianity. First they finished off the Kosmos, then they finished off Nature, then they finished off Man...which is why we now call ourselves “mankinders”. We live off the backs of others, both home & abroad. We are not our brothers’ keeper. We are the KEEPER of our BROTHER. Please don’t attempt to deny these disgusting realities...by deflecting “blame” on some subsidized, predictable “Harvard Jews”.
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Addenda:: the biggest neo-khans of them all were Emerson, Brooks & Henry Adams...Nobody worshipped Hegel more than these lovely Cambridge boyzs.
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It would seem that a significant portion of the spectator citizenry actually enjoys the sturm und drang of the Neo Con Bolshevikis. Turning Bolshevism upside down, they transformed it for aspirational consumerist America. The Worker would not wave the flag, the Preening Intellectual would. These folks assiduously cultivated media , lobbying and government ties and with that, insured their triumphalist cant would prevail. After all, their use of “exceptionalism” is as old as the Republic.
What really exaggerated their impact was the joining of the Nixon Southern Strategy, the so called conversion of the Dixiecrats into Republicanism coupled to the Neo Cons selection of that party as host. Combining Intellectual, media sponsored triumphalism with Dixiecrat xenophobic militancy and you have a potent force that makes Jacksonianism look like crochet night at the local woman’s club. With the social construct in flux and decay, the rhetoric of the Neo Con , a kind of smiling passive aggressive belligerence appeals to more of the leisuretariet than does the smarmy political correctness of the degenerate , labor-deprived Democrat party. Petting the dog does not seem to have as long a lasting entertainment value in the culture as does kicking it.
Like all great messianic revolutionary movements that disdain mere “realism”, there is rarely anyone aboard watching the purse strings and eventually , they run out of victims and soon after that, money and then the entire thing comes crashing down around both themselves and the imbeciles who listened to their hortatory blandishments.
We’ve some time to go before we are rid of them...perhaps the Chinese will find it’s own Neo-Con era..... because we are just now moving into the auto-ass-whoopin phase. For their part, the public cant seem to get enough of it. Sure, they say there is a significant anti-war movement and the President’s approval rating is at a stunning 20% but three uber-statist and two pro-war party candidates remain. Interestingly enough, the Russians were likely better at sucking it up and getting on with life after the Bolshevikis ran them into the ground. This culture of entitled nitwits will not be nearly so sanguine...if a lot more sanguinary.
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To Mr Sabin, with all due respect: It is we sir who are “gone”. It is “they” that remain. In point of fact: the Emperor has all his shiney clothes. While we, on the other hand, are shivering in a homeless, pastless “nakedness”. This whole thing is really no more demanding than an afternoon with “Aesop Fables”. You got to pay the cost to be the boss....and given the abundance of “sharcroppers” currently out there....I’d say that a substantial downpayment has already been made. Modernity is a dreaded fever. The Creator must be effectively discredited & deformed before He can be successfully foisted upon. The Abrahamic madmen; first made claims, then demands and now, finally, dictations. The suicidal chambers of Amerika have become nothing more than an insistance on dying under a “foreclosed” roof, eating cheap sweets after performing days of highbrow welfare… Thus, Mr Obama is to become our next National Houseboy and… help tidy “the kiddies” up.
We can no longer think spirit to being to personality to existence to appearance. With much thanks to Ockham, Descartes, Hume & all the other “useful idiot savant” contributing “editors”...now, we only swirl in eternal appearances. No past, no future...just infinite present. Downright oriental I’d say. Neo-Khans as groomed, pigtailed mandarins, eunuchs, Jannisaries. Maybe we should realize “histoouy”; as a storm of forgiveness...that includes remembrance. Yet, in spite of forgiveness & remembrance....there is no reconciliation.
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Great article up to the point where Linconln is made to be anything other than a dictator that created most of the mess we find ourselves in. 600,000 men died to protect the abstract notion of ‘nation’. It has been abstract ideology run amuck since.
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As a secular Jew who is also a lifelong liberal (and damned proud of it), I’m appalled at the number of my “co-religionists” who populate this movement - one that I consider despicable for its incredibly self-serving agenda. Where is the concept here of Tikun Olam ("heal the world"), which is a cornerstone of our faith? Neocons seem to live by the credo, “I’ve got mine, now screw you.” Sad, and disgusting.
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Mr. Havers makes some interesting arguments but he is remiss in not mentioning a principal reason for neoconservative ideas becoming Republican-conservative orthodoxy. Gentile pundits and politicians find it financially and socially rewarding to be reflexively pro-Israel and enemies of “Islamo-fascism.” Would a conservative pundit appear on Fox News or write essays for Wall Street Journal, National Review or the Weekly Standard if they were critical of Israel or opposed the Iraq War fiasco? Frankly, Sean Hannity, Rush Limbaugh, Bill O’Reilly, Fred Barnes, and scores of other conservatives have become quite wealthy internalizing neoconservative pieties. Apart from Pat Buchanan, no conservative politician or pundit who has access to the mainstream media had the courage to oppose the Iraq War, the Israeli invasion of Lebanon in which over 1,000 civilians were killed (many of whom were Christians), or the coming conflict with Iran.
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With each passing day, a certain Professor from Long Beach is beginning to make more and more sense.
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Thanks for the intelligent and provoking review of a mediocre book. You raised a point that needs to be developed: Jews as a people and Judaism as a religion never pretended to provide a global/universalistic message. In fact, that has been one of the main differences betweeh Judaism and Christianity. The notion of the Chosen People is nationalist, if not tribalist, and assumes particularism and a sense of isolationism. Hence there have never been Jewish missionaries and the Jews who played a leading role in the universal political “religions” in the West—liberalism, socialism, communism—were all secular and assimilated Jews. From that perspective, neoconservatism is really not very different in a sense of being a secular political religion that promotes a universal democratic revolution, or Wilsonianism, led by a Universal America (as opposed to a nationalist one); indeed, if anything, Wilson was a secualr missionary (as opposed to TR who was a nationalist). Moreover, not unlike the socialists who challenged the ruling elites in Europe and who helped arouse the anti-Semitism of the masses, “democratizing” the Middle East is bound to give rise to radical Islamic movements who are more of a threat to Israel than the current status-quo in the region (re elections in Palestine). The point is that the secular intellectual figures in the neoconservative movement doesn’t represent long-term “Jewish interests,” but the interests of a small political-intellectual group that benefits from the rise of the American Global Crusading State. Most Israeli leaders regard Washington as nothing more than a ad-hoc partner (not unlike Moscow in the early late 1940’s and France in the 1950’s)and not as an long-term ideological ally.
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Mr Hadar:: A few days ago I asked Mr. Richert to describe and explain his referrenced “American interest” and....by distinquishing between the interests of the “unruly” american people… and the interest of the authoritative “Amerikan” State(ruling caste).
Simililiarly, I would like to ask you the same question regarding Israel or “the Jews”....marked, if you will by the same distinctions. Please add or include your sense of the matter of “american interest”....if you are so inclined.
Please be advised that Mr Richert’s chose not to respond to such a silly question. Obviously, you always retain such an option, or preference, whichever, it might actually be.
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To Andrew:: Please remember that neither Sparticus nor Moses nor Paul nor Augustine were against slavery. Rather, they were only against it for them...it was quite ok for you or me.
Stop sweatin’ the ethnicities....the formulas, the structures, the systems, the functions, the dogmas, the doctines… It is all basically bad history & terrible analysis & very, very bad “faith”. Overall, I think the MECHANICS are killin’ you. They are playin’ you like a fiddle. They are workin’ you like a SLAVE. The flesh is willin’ but the spirit wants nothin’ to do with it.
Finally, Andrew, reading some of your posts from another current Taki article. Your historical understanding of the British Isles & the subsequent immigrations of its people needs some more reading. For starters, please be advised that “scotus” means irish...and Irish is Celtic. You poor boy, unfortunately, have little clue where you came from....and by how and by why. Blog less, Read more. See reading as a genuine “opening” to God’s creation...and be very thankful for ALL of IT.
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Grant Havers just showed me a copy
of his perceptive review in Vancouver, where I am speaking at his university. I think Leon is correct that Grant has produced a thoughtful study of a dismally mediocre book, which obviously looks like the kind of pseudo-critical evaluation of their dubious achievements that neocons and their liberal buds would encourage. Among Grant’s points that are well taken is that Heilbrunn’s attempt to distinguish between WASP wealth and neocon braininess exemplifies the PC cringe. Multinationals and others have showered the neocons with largess because they are useful propagandists. It is not because neocon vulgarians have exhibited higher cognitive abilities than did Anglo-Saxon Protestants like George Kennan. Is Heilbrunn criticizing the neocons or simply sucking up to them?
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The success of the Neocons is not due to the powers of a small, fringe group within the Republican Party. Their influence comes from the powers of the combined Jewish organizations when focused on one single topic: Israel.
When it comes to supporting Israel, almost all Jews will put aside all differences they may have and make sure Israeli interests are met first and foremost, even if those interests do not align with American interests.
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Leon Hadar wrote: “the Jews who played a leading role in the universal political “religions” in the West—liberalism, socialism, communism—were all secular and assimilated Jews. From that perspective, neoconservatism is really not very different in a sense of being a secular political religion that promotes a universal democratic revolution, or Wilsonianism, led by a Universal America”
Suggesting that because the Neocons are secular and assimilated, as were Communist Jews who also murdered millions, does not get organized Judaism off the hook. Many of the Neocons were raised as religious Jews, as were many Jewish Communists. They learned the value (or lack thereof) of non-Jewish life from their religion, and carried that with them into their “secular” political religion. Another reason the Judaism of the Neocons is relevant is because much of their world view and program is formulated and designed with an eye on “is it good for Israel” (an organized Jewish state).
I can understand why individual Jews like Leon Hadar don’t want their entire religion implicated by the actions of a few thousand ideologues, but when organized Jewry got behind the Neocons (and their Neolib understudies) politically, financially, and culturally (ie mass media), it implicated itself in their actions.
If Neoconservatism had been a smashing success, you can bet that organized Jewry would have been crowing its Jewish roots from the rooftops. Since it’s an abject failure, organized Judaism is instead slowly backing too the door… “Who are these guys? They may call themselves Jews, but they’re really secular atheist types, aren’t they…blah…blay…blah…”
Organized Jewry pulled a similar stunt when Communism went awry.
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“Organized Jewry”?
Who’s the Jewish Pope, anyway?
“Organized Jewry” is like saying “Organized Protestantism”.
“Jewry”, for almost 2,000 years, has been, by definition, “unorganized”. There’s no Temple, there’s no priesthood, there’s nothing for them to “organize” around. “Jewry” was Protestantism before Protestantism was “cool”. It’s a go-it-alone kind of endeavor, with no need of leadership, other than whatever congregation or movement to which you wish to attach yourself, if any at all, even.
Ersatz-Israel DAMN sure isn’t “Organized Jewry”, nor are any and all the rabbinical associations in the world today. By definition, nothing speak for or “organizes” Jewry, other than the High Priest of the Temple or the King of Israel. There’s no Temple, there’s no High Priest, and there’s no King of Israel.
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There’s no Temple, there’s no High Priest, and there’s no King of Israel.*
*Other than, of course:
Jesus, Who is all three.
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Andrew, the point is not Irish. The point is that the Irish were Celts that were not Romanized. They were pushed around, first by Romans & then by Huns....moving West. Please never stop understanding Europe as the Western-most point of ASIA...an Asiatic peninsula, if you will. Asia was always about the “herd” and still is(so is Europe & America...and the fellah from Regensberg knows it...too, too well)....The Mediterranean Basin is Asiatic, Oriental...Jews are Asiatic, Oriental....but so are Slavs & Tuetons. In fact, the Jews “divined” the messiah to make them “King of Asia”. A Better Alexander.....But then so did Germans & Russians & Franks & Americans & Spainards etc. German Idealism is as self-proclaimed an Asiatic event as ever took place in HUMAN HISTORY. The Bulk of your American History is under the spell of Germany not England...and the same goes for England, bye the bye. The entirety of English Philosophy is an explanation & justification for “hedonism”.
The Nazarene, for obvious reasons, didn’t cut it anywhere, much less north of the Alps. The Celts saw life as “is created”. Everyone else saw it as “was created”. To me, that explains everything you & I need to know.
The Hindus identified the individual soul...but only for purposes of materialistic “suffering”. The Greeks picked up on that...but only to the point of materialistic “blending”. It was the Nazarene that took all of that “synthesis” and spilled it upside down & inside out...He put them all on their unsuspecting asses. After He, there was a HUMAN SOUL.... united to the caring heart of the Father. The Sermon on the Mount is not about stomachs or “homo economus” gone socialpolitik. It is about the individual soul attached to the Heart of Creation. The difference between Jews & Catholics is SERIOUS… Catholics believe in an individual soul. Jews believe in a collective soul.-BIG DIFFERENCE- Catholics believe in “Faith"… in the Supernatural Union...Jews & Greeks believe in Time & Space, the Temporal Majesty-BIG DIFFERENCE-Catholics believe in a lovin’ merciful God....Jews believe in a punishing, Justice in your face God....and of course the Greeks believed in Heidegger’s god.....antagonistic & indifferent....It is what it is Andrew...but it is not for us to lose FAITH...over it....that would be the wrong move.
The American Celts possessed the joy d’vivre...fiddles, harmonicas, banjos,...whistling....now that that is all gone. What you have left is stories about Eliot Spitzer & Bear Stearns...go figure...One last thing....after the Revolutionary War, when just about everyone was on their ass....Abigail Adams was buying up war-bonds for fractions of fractions....those bonds required taxes and taxes require soldiers...both desperate situations. Abigail got her National Government and those bonds were redeemed in full(specie//not the paper they were issued as.)....You & me Mr Andrew have more problems than we can contemplate....much less act upon...but I assure you that was the idea from the get-go....always, Mission Accomplished.
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Mr Gottfried::; “ WASP wealth & Neo-con braininess”...now that’s rich. You actually meant to say WASP MONOPOLY & NEO-CON CUNNING didn’t you? Now, please Herr, Professor Gottfried, who is suckin’ up to who??...please do not so dramatically disturb the Jewish intellectual “intelligence” myth so easily...some people depend on it to get through the nite....both sides, eh?
Finally, Professor, kiss your lucky stars that you get paid so well for blowin’ everlasting smoke up some kid’s ass....rationality has become nothin’ more than enforced gullibility. Check your 401-K...should you have any doubts.
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Another neoconservative ingredient is self-acclaimed exclusive moral dominion, the same foundation for all modern-day secular (but messianic) messengers - from Marx to Freud. After all, every person assumes that he or she is right and opponents wrong. But with a few tweaks of propriety, “right” becomes righteous. Then opponents aren’t merely wrong, they are evil. The self-proscribed power to assign good and evil assumes the power to assign life and death, and, with some gasoline and gunpowder, the resultant disasters play out on a grander and grander scale.
No, the “neoconservative attack on realism does not bear intellectual scrutiny” any more than do any of their propositions and arguments. The neoconservatives are clever, they play to fear, and they have vast resources of wealth and communications assets supported by political – and ethnic – communion.
Despite all this, polls this week indicate more than 60 percent of Americans want out of Iraq this year, so there’s a limit to how far and how long the sharpies can snooker the rubes.
If they really are as smart as they’ve been telling us, thumping their chests in endless, self-aggrandizing bravura, they MUST be worried.
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“polls this week indicate” that nobody gives a rat’s ass what you think....as long as you do what you are told, startin’ with paying your taxes(which very few people could stop even if they wanted to....for which you can thank your neo-khan god Milton Freidman & his lovely Bonnie, Anna Schwartz.)
Note to all: The Constitution among many other troubling concerns is an un-enforceable, un-exitable contract....meaning it’s il-legal. The American Civil War should have taught you at least that. Lincoln, like Mao, and all the others, understood that power comes out of the barrel of a gun. The Constitution could not exist in traditional common law. The Constitution is a death sentence.
There would be no Constitution if not for the Bill of Rights. The Constitution barely passed even with the Bill of Rights. The Declaration, by the way, passed by one vote. The Bill of Rights is GONE. And all you patriots out there, better plan on taking over NORAD before expecting to get it back.
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‘Ersatz-Israel DAMN sure isn’t “Organized Jewry”...’
You’re wrong about that. I suggest you study Israel a little more closely. As an officially ‘Jewish state,’ Israel is, by definition, organized Jewry, as are the diaspora Jewish Zionist organizations that work for/on behalf of it. If these don’t meet the definition of organized religion, nothing does.
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Arch-Bishop Martin Feldstein just pronounced “the US is in recession”. No shit, Marty. But not in Cambridge or Washington or Palo Alto...go figure.
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Forrest, still tryin’ to tree those coons, eh.....Rabbis Schwartz & Friedman are responsible for the withholding tax....and, of course, you realize that none of the Groton boys wanted anything to do with it....but as Roosevelt told Parson Landgrab...the Mossad made me do it!!!
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“to subjugate the South, establish a black republic in lieu of the exterminated whites, and extend a protectorate over them while they raised our cotton”....Orville H Browning, London Times, 1863.
Browning assumed Stephen Douglas’s Senate seat upon Douglas’s death. Browning was Andrew Jackson’s Secratary of the Interior(good luck to those Lockean Indians).
Now, August Belmont was the head of the Democratic Party during the same period...and of course, Louis Brandeis was born in Kentucky shortly thereafter...looks like a neo-khan no brainer to me.
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Editing with apologies: Browning was Andrew Johnson’s Secretary of the Interior...not Andrew Jackson’s. Brownng was from Kentucky.
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In response to Jim and Ed: U.S. national interest refers usually to what the American people, through their elected political institutions, regard as their core security and economic strategic interests that they are willing to protect, including if necessary through the use of military force. An over-extension of U.S. power to achieve goals that go beyond these national interests, end-up producing opposition at home that lead to changes in policy—sooner or later. That assumes of course that the “system” (Congress, etc.) is still operating. Now.. it’s impossible to define “Jewish interests” because there isn’t a central government representing Jews in America, Russia, France, Finland, etc. Israel, on the other hand, is supposed to be a “normal” nation-state with security and economic interests that contrary to the neocon axiom—what’s good for Israel is good for America, and vice versa—are not the same as those of the U.S. In fact, the interests of the Israeli state (btw, more than twenty percent of its citizens are not Jewish) are not even the same as those of Jewish communities in the U.S. and elsewhere. And to make things even more complex, there is a vigorous debate inside Israel on what is exactly Israel’s long-term interests. I personally think that recognizing this reality and by extension, moving to “normalize” U.S.-Israel relationship (in my books “Sandstorm” and “Quagmire") I call for gradual U.S. disengagement from the Middle East) would benefit both the long-term interests of the U.S.—and Israel.
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Leon,
What I take from your comment is that there is no Jewish consensus on “Jewish interests” and therefore no universal Jewish effort to pursue same at America’s expense or anyone else’s. Agreed.
There is, however, a Jewish nationalist interest (Zionism/Israel) and there is an organized, coordinated effort by both Jewish nationalists in Israel and Jewish nationalists in America to pursue those interests at America’s expense.
Saying that the American people will pursue their nation’s best interests over time presupposes that the American people’s primary loyalty is to America. In the case of Jewish-American Zionists, I dispute this. In the case of Christian Zionists, I doubt this. In the case of Zionized left-liberal Judeophiles, I believe they are hopelessly confused.
So who is responsible for the conflicts of interest, confusion and general morass with regard to what is America’s best national interests on the question of Israel and wars for Israel, and on the larger question of American foreign policy and the question of “Islamofascism”? I place primary blame on Jewish-American Zionists, who for decades have been acting as agents for a foreign country.
You say that a properly operating system will, over time, self-correct. But the system is not operating properly due to the Israel lobby and its Jewish-American Zionist agents.
I suppose an argument might be made that if Americans are stupid enough to allow a tiny minority to co-opt their entire system and indoctrinate a significant percentage of their citizens, the country deserves whatever it gets. But the Israel lobby didn’t spring up over night; it was the result of a persistent collusion of Jewish American Zionists working within and without the system over the course of decades to channel the system’s resources (sometimes illegally) towards Zionist interests, and over time it became a self-sustaining, self-perpetuating juggernaut financed largely by American taxpayers. As I see it, Jewish American Zionist have abused their American citizenship rights to engage in a willful conspiracy to overthrow the interests of the US government and the majority of its people.
So how does America rid itself of the Israel lobby and recalibrate itself back in line with its own national interests? Well, that’s another article:
http://www.judeofascism.com/2007/12/what-is-judeofascism.html
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Referring to the Radical Republicans in 1864, Lincoln said:
“They are utterly lawless---the unhandiest devils in the world to deal with---but after all their faces are set Zionwards.”
Mr Hadar thank you for your remarks.
Overall, national interest, whether American or otherwise continues to sound like “beat’em & eat’em”. It also parallels the three laws of thermodynamics, 1) you can’t win 2) you can’t break even 3) you can’t get out of the game.
Edmund Burke’s comments about the Clive’s & Hastings of his world..."soon the lawbreakers over there will be the lawmakers here” needs no further appreciation but could certainly use further updated explanation.
Having been born in 1951 & paid fairly close attention to these issues since comin’ of age. I have noticed a striking & significant change in recent years(Clinton-Bush/Baby Busters). That is, many of the people I visit with whether from here or there no longer find the STATE relevant to their lives. Moreover, they essentially qualify it as an annoying, disappointing nuissance. This regard extends to all national institutions.(education, media, military, justice, religious, et al.) Reminding me of reactions to the Church’s Supremacy towards the “end”....people of all walks & talks of life simply “don’t believe” anymore. My most persistent thought is Man without either God or State.
As for the American State: the ideas of “consent of the governed, checks & balances, sovereignty of the individual, will of the people” etc., are now regarded as late nite TV farce. It ALL looks like a Monty Python hour. I believe the American people & many others are having a very hard time squaring the Cold War Victory with the post-Cold War World....comments like the “reality-based” one made to Ron Susskind only serve to aggravate a festering sore. The wall may have come down in Berlin, but only to gone up every where else. And if America won the Cold-War, how is it that the “Stasi” are now in charge everywhere? The Russian “capitualtion” looks more & more Trojan by the day. If we won, how is it that we live & act like’em.?
In concluding, I would like to add one last observation. It seems to me that whether in America or Britain, Israel or wherever...that the war between the “national interest” and the people has reach an alarming “tipping point”...the centre is not holding anywhere. Anecdotally, I do not believe that the State(national interst) can afford to marginalize society much more than it already has without prompting situations that will make most situations unrecognizable. The coming economic downturn in the “west” will serve not only to disappoint, but equally as important...remove the distractions of stocks & real estate....leaving a pretty bare view of the real world. This will be impacting the retiring “baby boomer” generation world-wide.
PS///Michael Oren, although an apologist in his work, “Power, Faith & Fantasy… lays out a decent history of the American foreign behaviour(policy) in the Mediterranean Basin since the “Founding”.It should certainly help some see the “Neo-khan, Israeli” situation from a larger, longer American background. Apologists are to be considered most helpful...think of it as uncontrite confession.
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“ Peace in Cuba is necessary to the welfare of the people of the United States”....Secretary of State, Yonatan Netanyahu Sherman,1897.
Amerikans have had only two permanent devotions in their curious history...China & Cuba...go figure.
“In other words, I believe the teachings of experience and history, and that our race, I hope our institutions--are to spread over the continent and that the hybrid races of the West must succumb, and fade away before the superior energies of the white man”.
John Forsyth, former Secretary of State and the Buchanan representative to Mexico, 1858.
Shit, who needs Darwin or Kleptling after that. Are we villains of a misunderstood, mistaken illusion?
Is the blood that flows in our veins...Hippocritic, or Hypocratic?
So many “chosen”...so many “promised lands”. So many debits & defaults.
The producing economic, non-political class must be kept in a constant state of terrorized, dissembled bondage...so that the non-economic political class can remain debuttantes in their stylish, respectable “jackboots”...We are hacked...but not hacked off...because we “divine” to be hackers.
First we were the granaries, then we were the workshops, then we were the arsenals, then we were the clearing houses....then we were NONE of the Above....go figure.
Mighty blustery challenges, eh what?
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Just out of curiosity...WHERE are all those pink-eyed, albino, Nancied Patriots out there?...Roger Clemens would should like to know.
Amerika, you’re just another fay, anglin’ anglo bugger!! Bend ‘em over fast Francis Bacon style, cuzz’ they got a freakin’ red-beam on your ass...and your mortgaged couch ain’t goin’ make a damned bit of difference.
Then again, you can always jump Elian & his family on Easter morning...now that was a redemption....and quite a resurrection to BOOT.
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To Friar Forrest with weekend regards::: all those purchased “pens” you mentioned...are in my humbled opinion.... the “problem”, not the solution...agents of power, all. Most ink is just poison. Like Willi “Mascone” Munszenberg said...all news is lies. Any thoughtful examination would quickly reveal...it sure as shit ain’t new.
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Maybe we should just face it. We are Pagan, we are Barbarian, we are Totalitarian...but at least we do it Amerikan style. May all our sins be Original.
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To jim:
You are certainly one of the most confusing, well read, a--holes I have ever heard. Talk about blowing smoke! I wonder what in the world you must be smoking? Settle down!
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More on NATIONAL INTEREST:
“When I say that Russia may go her own way, and Mexico hers, I say so with a sense that I have the right in Russia and in Mexico, and also a right to see that they do not go their own way to the extent of blocking my way to what of good they hold.”
“‘The world is mine,’ is not the mere dramatic utterance of an escaped convict or of an overmastering leader of men....What a people hold, they hold as trustees for the world...It is good American practice....The Monroe Doctrine is an expression of it....That is why we are talking of backward peoples and recognizing for them another law than that of self-determination, a limited law of self-determination, a leading-string law.”
Secretary of the Interior Franklin K Lane, 1922...an attorney for the Doheny Oil intersts.(Bill Buckley’s father understood, ...and so did Billy boy)
As for Neo-khans...we grow’em like dandy-lions. In fact, if you don’t neo-khan...you barely grow at all.
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The ease with which the neocons hijacked an administration and congress is a testimony to the 800 LB gorillas in the room. They prevailed because:
1. There was an idelogical and moral void that was easily filled by the neocons, there was no one on the bridge except monica and hubris.
2. They provide the smokescreen needed by the Military Industrial zionist allaince (MIZA) to justify spending the blood and treasure of the U.S. in the service of MIZA.
The Future:
- We are discovering that MIZA deficit spending fails to avert economic disaster as the “multiplier effect” doesn’t seem to operate, probably because 80 % of the spending ends up in gold or swiss bank accounts, rather than creating jobs and incomes.
- The game is changing as the ones with the trillions(the chinese...) are buying up raw materials, and buying influence all over the world.
- The neocons will keep representing MIZA (who else?) until the $ stops buying very much of MIZA services or anything else.
Then we will wonder how come we could not see that ideology is only the talking points of a socio economic structure, and we live in one called MIZA.
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“Mighty blustery challenges, eh what?”
Hmm… blustery…
Right, jim. …Riiiiight.
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Switzerland just announced a 25 yr, 28 Billion dollar natural gas deal with Iran. My best quess is that Marc Rich & Pincus Green were somewhere “in” the room, if not, I’ll still bet they were “near by”. So much for the Neo-khan theories...or maybe not...depending on the “terms”.
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Jim’s tricks are tiresome. It is better to read one phrase from a truth teller than read a million sentences from a liar.
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Aass So, young Stan....google the natural gas deal...then, let’s have your “gas"… one phrase from a truth teller.
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