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orange blossom
Joined: 20 Mar 2007
Posts: 1052
Location: Australia
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 Posted: Wed Jul 02, 2008 10:47 am Post subject: Return of the Neo-Cons? Vietnam, Iraq, and now Iran |
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Geez, God forbid. Why do pushy people always get around to have their way and don't have to suffer the retribution?
The prospect of the neo-Cons making a comeback to the forefront is indeed frightening. Perhaps that's one good reason to vote for Obama instead of McCain if only he could remain steadfast on his foreign policy aspirations to effect real change away from neo-Con adverturism.
http://www.smh.com.au/news/opinion/never-say-die-return-of-the-warriors/2008/07/01/1214678038502.html
Never say die - return of the warriors
| Quote: | The neocons who pushed for the invasion of Iraq got egg on their faces, but are regrouping for another battle, writes Peter Hartcher.
At a dinner in London this year, a leading US commentator on foreign policy decided to have some fun at the expense of America's neoconservatives.
The neocons, as they have come to be known, are the ideologues who successfully advocated the invasion of Iraq. They may have been thoroughly discredited by that blighted war, but they are now regrouping.
At the dinner, Kurt Campbell told his companions that some people compared the neocons to vampires and werewolves, creatures able to stay alive long after they should have been dead.
But Campbell, a Pentagon official in the Clinton administration and now head of the Centre for a New American Security, a Washington think tank, wanted to explain that these metaphors did not quite capture the true nature of the neocon.
A silver bullet in the heart could kill a vampire, but not a neocon; and werewolves went crazy at night, but a neocon did crazy things at any time, Campbell joked to much laughter, reported Steve Clemons of the New America Foundation in his blog, The Washington Note.
Campbell continued that "a better analogy was 'intellectual special forces' - highly trained, confident, ninja-like, working well in small teams but always seeking to define the terrain of conflict. They will not stand and fight if things go poorly but instead will search for a better battle."
The problem was that a leading neocon was at the same dinner. Robert Kagan was not amused. He decided to protest. The Americans were in London for a conference the next day. Kagan, who had been invited as a speaker, decided to boycott the conference so he could avoid sharing the stage with Campbell.
A rueful Campbell went shopping to buy Kagan a tie and wrote him a note of apology, says Clemons. Here is the irony. Kagan is a card-carrying neocon. He was a co-founder of the main neocon vehicle for pressing for the invasion of Iraq, the Project for the New American Century. Through this he shares responsibility for that disastrous misadventure.
Yet it was not Kagan writing the apology. It was Campbell, a member of the "realist" school of foreign policy and not an advocate of the invasion, while Kagan struck an indignant pose. Elsewhere, Campbell had marvelled at this phenomenon - the insouciance of people he calls Iraqitects: "Perhaps part of the curiosity is because this current generation of war planners has conducted themselves so much differently than the Vietnam era Masters of the Universe," he wrote in The New York Times in November.
"Many from the version 1.0 of the best and the brightest - those intrepid Cold Warriors who led the country to a slogging defeat in Vietnam - had to subsequently endure booing on college campuses, shunning from old friends and colleagues, brutal treatment from the commentariat of the time, and the kind of bitter despair that generally accompanies a thoroughgoing battlefield defeat.
"The version 2.0 era of neoconservative advocates of military action to topple Saddam have behaved very differently in the midst of our current quagmire in Iraq. Almost all have generally tried to put on a brave public face and to remain on the intellectual offensive, pointing out the weaknesses and limitations of their critics and full of ideas for what the US can do next in the world. Even after offering atrocious advice to President Bush during the 2000 campaign, most of them are back again."
And they have indeed found their "better battle". The neocons are now agitating nonstop in the campaign to attack Iran.
But weren't the neocons in the Bush Administration all purged?
Men like the deputy secretary of defence, Paul Wolfowitz, and the undersecretary of defence for policy, Doug Feith, were forced out. So was the former US ambassador to the UN, John Bolton, and the chief of staff to the Vice-President, Lewis "Scooter" Libby.
With no neocons in government, surely their only attacks now have to be rhetorical - surely they cannot wage war. But a number of key neocons have arrived in the inner circle of the candidate to become the next Republican president, John McCain.
This is being taken very seriously by American foreign policymakers. "There's no doubt that some neocons like Senator Joe Lieberman are linked to McCain at the elbow like Siamese twins," said one of the grey eminences of US foreign policy, Zbigniew Brzezinski, national security adviser to Jimmy Carter and now an adviser to the Democrats' presidential candidate, Barack Obama.
"Lieberman believes that we are already in World War Four and his complaint is that we are not sufficiently conscious of it or sufficiently belligerent," Brzezinski told the Herald. On Iran, Lieberman advocates air strikes to disable its nuclear program.
Other notable neocons who are now counted as McCain advisers are Bolton; William Kristol, the editor of the neoconservative journal The Weekly Standard and son of the neocon intellectual founder, Irving Kristol; a former Wolfowitz ally at the Bush Pentagon, Peter Rodman, and the easily offended Robert Kagan.
Crucially, a neocon has landed as chief co-ordinator of McCain's foreign policy and national security teams. Randy Scheunemann was the founder of the Committee for the Liberation of Iraq and, like Kagan, was one of the founders of the Project for the New American Century.
This clustering of neocons around a possible next president troubles American analysts for two principal reasons.
First, the neocons' record lends them no credibility, yet their positioning around the candidate gives them enormous potential power. The neocons were adamant about the need to invade Iraq. Kristol and Kagan wrote in 2001: "The road that leads to real security and peace is the road that runs through Baghdad." They were wrong. The invasion destabilised Iraq and unleashed a civil war between the Sunnis and Shiites whose future remains completely unpredictable.
The invasion empowered Iran. It energised terrorists around the world. It compromised US power. It sent the US to its lowest point in world regard since Vietnam. [b]It needlessly killed hundreds of thousands of innocent Iraqi civilians and 4000 US troops to date. Its [b]ultimate financial cost will be counted in the trillions of dollars. It reduced Iraq's oil output. And yet the neocons, in general, remain unbowed and unrepentant.
Second, the neocons' world view is ideological; zealotry is a poor guide for cool-headed and judicious policy-making. The neocon, unlike the realist, is an idealist and believes in a revolutionary doctrine. He believes that America's unique mission is to civilise the world at gunpoint.
Professor Andrew Bacevich, of Boston University, says there are five defining characteristics of neoconservatism. The neocon believes that:
* US global domination is benign and other nations see it as such;
* Any lapse in US domination will create chaos;
* Military force is necessary to impose democracy;
* US military power must always be expanded to allow it to intervene decisively in every critical region of the world simultaneously if necessary; and
* Realists in foreign policy must be aggressively targeted and defeated.
As Bacevich puts it, the neocon cannot abide the realist because "realism was about defending national interests, not transforming the global order".
So it has been much remarked in Washington that McCain's advisory group contains not only some of America's leading neocons, but also some of its famous realists. Asked about the influence of neocons in McCain's campaign, his lead Asia adviser, Mike Green, points to this fact: "If you look at McCain's senior group, it includes Henry Kissinger and George Shultz and Bob Zoellick - it's hardly a pantheon of neocons.
"And the advisory group, at the next level down, includes moderate conservatives like me," said the former senior director for Asia in the Bush White House. "I have never felt I've needed to butt heads with neocons.
"But John McCain has been involved in national security for decades. The idea that he could be taken over by any adviser is totally mistaken. On almost everything, McCain already has a stated position."
And his stated position on Iran? "You mean a serious position, or him singing 'Bomb Iran'?" asks Green, referring to the infamous YouTube clip of McCain during a public appearance singing those two words over and over to the tune of the Beach Boys tune Barbara Anne.
Asked for the longer version of the candidate's position, Green says: "Barack Obama's pledge to meet personally with the leadership of Iran is definitely not where McCain is. He's been one of the leading people in the Senate arguing that Iran is the leading threat to Iraq, arguing that Iran is on the offensive in Gaza and Lebanon and efforts of diplomacy and offers of carrots have been rebuffed by the regime.
"You have France, Germany and Britain arguing we need more pressure on Iran - that's pretty much where McCain is. He is sceptical of what you can get through talking. The more important thing is to put more pressure on them."
Green portrays this as a practical middle way of approaching Tehran: "There is more to Iran policy than bombing them or talking to them."
Steve Clemons of the New America Foundation explains that he is anxious about the neocons' Iran policy "because they regard the mullahs of Iran as the greatest threat to Western values, and many of them also worry about Israel. When you take these concerns and then consider Iran with nukes, the neocons just go crazy."
But the simple answer is not necessarily to vote Democrat: "I worry that Barack Obama worries that he won't be trusted by the American people on national security and he may be looking for an action to define himself. So Obama could end up looking a lot like a neocon."
It is easy to make fun of the neocons, but Washington is alive with the concern that they may yet have the last laugh. |
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orange blossom
Joined: 20 Mar 2007
Posts: 1052
Location: Australia
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| Posted: Wed Jul 02, 2008 10:54 am Post subject: Obama has to defend his patriotism and win trust |
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Obama has been forced to defend his patriotism for America. Appearances, contrived niceties and preconceived ideas seem to take precedence over a candidate's background and actual beliefs.
http://news.smh.com.au/obama-forced-to-defend-his-patriotism-20080701-2zky.html
| Quote: | | Democratic presidential hopeful Barack Obama has rejected questions about his patriotism even as he drew fire for a supporter's attack on Republican rival John McCain's military record. |
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| Quote: | Obama has battled persistent criticism about his failure to wear a flag pin on his lapel, viewed as a symbol of patriotism for some US politicians. He often wears one now.
He also has been the target of internet rumours about his willingness to cite the Pledge of Allegiance, and his wife, Michelle, has been criticised for a remark she claimed was taken out of context about feeling proud of her country. |
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Lai CF
Joined: 17 Jun 2008
Posts: 29
Location: Dubai
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| Posted: Wed Jul 02, 2008 3:55 pm Post subject: |
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Please define for me the philosophy of neo-con?
Why are they know as neo-con?
_________________
The Law of The Kingdom is the Law
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orange blossom
Joined: 20 Mar 2007
Posts: 1052
Location: Australia
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| Posted: Thu Jul 03, 2008 5:00 am Post subject: Neo-Cons - who are they? |
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Neo-Con is neoconservative. This is not my definition. Examples of neo-con administrations are Ronald Reagan and GW Bush. Dick Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld are seen as primemovers of neo-conservatism. Though it is difficult to pinpoint the exact traits, and in the absence of hard and fast rules, the term neocon serves as a general guide in an attempt to understand the inclinations of politicians.
- conservative : The term neoconservative was originally used as a criticism against liberals who had "moved to the right".
- ideological : to spread "democracy" abroad whatever it takes, including undermining human rights, colluding with authoritarian regimes, aggression, belligerence and betrayal of democratic principles when applied to the international arena.
- imperialist foreign policy and war mongering.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neoconservative
| Quote: | | Historically, neoconservatives supported a militant anticommunism, tolerated more social welfare spending than was sometimes acceptable to libertarians and paleoconservatives, and sympathized with a non-traditional foreign policy agenda that was less deferential to traditional conceptions of diplomacy and international law and less inclined to compromise principles, even if that meant unilateral action. |
Distinction between conservatives and neo-Cons
| Quote: | Most neoconservatives are members of the Republican Party. They have been in electoral alignment with other conservatives and served in the same presidential administrations. While they have often ignored ideological differences in alliance against those to their left, neoconservatives differ from traditional or paleoconservatives. In particular, they disagree with nativism, protectionism, and non-interventionism in foreign policy, ideologies rooted in American history and exemplified by former Republican paleoconservative Pat Buchanan. Compared with traditional conservatism and libertarianism, which may be non-interventionist, neoconservatism emphasizes defense capability, challenging regimes hostile to the values and interests of the United States, and pressing for free-market policies abroad. Neoconservatives also believe in democratic peace theory, the proposition that democracies never or almost never go to war with one another.
Neoconservatives disagree with political realism in foreign policy, often associated with Richard Nixon and Henry Kissinger. Though Republican and anti-communist, Nixon and Kissinger made pragmatic accommodation with dictators and sought peace through negotiations, diplomacy, and arms control. They pursued détente with the Soviet Union, rather than rollback, and established relations with the communist People's Republic of China. |
| Quote: | During the 1970s political scientist Jeane Kirkpatrick criticized the Democratic Party, to which she belonged. She opposed the nomination of the antiwar George McGovern in 1972, and accused the Jimmy Carter administration (1977-1981) of applying a double standard in human rights, by tolerating abuses in communist states, while withdrawing support of anti-communist autocrats. She joined Ronald Reagan's successful 1980 campaign for president as his foreign policy adviser. She was U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations from 1981 to 1985. During this period, the United States increased its support for anti-communist governments, even going so far as to support some that engaged in human rights abuses, as part of its general hard line against communism.
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the early Bush Administration did not exhibit strong support for neoconservative principles. As a candidate Bush argued for a restrained foreign policy, stating his opposition to the idea of nation-building. |
But Bush's policy changed dramatically after 9/11, or did it give neo-Cons in his inner circle the excuse to go on the offensive? Thus emerged : The Bush Doctrine of preemptive war.
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Wynston
Joined: 01 May 2008
Posts: 64
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| Posted: Thu Jul 03, 2008 5:57 am Post subject: Obama becoming neocon? |
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Obama has lost his fire for change? Don't let your supporters down! Shifting ground to be more neo-Con would tarnish Obama's fresh image as a symbol of change. Winning some votes from neocon constituency would entail sacrificing Obama's liberal supporters. You can't have your cake and eat it.
From NYT :
| Quote: | In recent days, more than 7,000 Obama supporters have organized on a social networking site on Mr. Obama’s own campaign Web site. They are calling on Mr. Obama to reverse his decision to endorse legislation supported by President Bush to expand the government’s domestic spying powers while also providing legal protection to the telecommunication companies that worked with the National Security Agency’s domestic wiretapping program after the Sept. 11 attacks.
xxxxx
Several activists and bloggers predicted that Mr. Obama’s move toward the center on some issues could sharply reduce the intensity of support he has enjoyed from liberal activists. Such enthusiasm helped power his effort to secure the Democratic nomination, and it has been one of his campaign’s most important tools for fund-raising and organizing around the country.
Markos Moulitsas, a liberal blogger and founder of the Daily Kos Web site, said he had decided to cut back on the amount of money he would contribute to the Obama campaign because of the FISA reversal.
“I will continue to support him,” Mr. Moulitsas said in an interview. “But I was going to write him a check, and I decided I would rather put that money with Democrats who will uphold the Constitution.”
Greg Craig, a Washington lawyer who advises the Obama campaign, said Tuesday in an interview that Mr. Obama had decided to support the compromise FISA legislation only after concluding it was the best deal possible.
“This was a deliberative process, and not something that was shooting from the hip,” Mr. Craig said. “Obviously, there was an element of what’s possible here. But he concluded that with FISA expiring, that it was better to get a compromise than letting the law expire.”
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Moved: Tue Aug 26, 2008 1:06 am by Admin
From General : Political Developments to America, Europe |
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