[FoRK] At the risk of inflaming JB and others ...

[James Tauber]

The entire section attributed to me below is a direct quote from the  
article I referenced. You asked for support that Hitchens was a  
neocon, I said he probably wasn't in name but that he agreed with them  
on foreign policy. You still expressed doubt. I quoted an article  
where he expresses his agreement both on Bosnia and responses to 9/11.

Are you arguing with Hitchens, the article or me?

James

On Mar 29, 2008, at 12:41 PM, Jeff Bone wrote:
>
> On Mar 29, 2008, at 9:18 AM, James Tauber wrote:
>
>> There are two strands of conservatism on the US right that Hitch  
>> has always opposed. The first was the Barry Goldwater-Pat Buchanan  
>> isolationist right. They argued for "America First" - disengagement  
>> from the world, and the abandonment of Europe to fascism. The  
>> second was the Henry Kissinger right, which argued for the  
>> installation of pro-American, pro-business regimes, even if it  
>> meant liquidating democracies (as in Chile or Iran) and supporting  
>> and equipping practitioners of genocide.
>>
>> He believes neoconservatism is a distinctively new strain of  
>> thought, preached by ex-leftists, who believed in using US power to  
>> spread democracy. "It's explicitly anti-Kissingerian. Kissinger  
>> hates this stuff. He opposed intervening in the Balkans. Kissinger  
>> Associates were dead against [the war in] Iraq. He can't understand  
>> the idea of backing democracy - it's totally alien to him."
>
> Don't believe for a second that the actual goal of the neo-cons is  
> the propagation of democracy and capitalism, and claiming to support  
> democracy has better public relations value and thus serves their  
> political needs.  Means, not end.  They only advocate that on the  
> surface because in practice so-called democracies are, in many ways,  
> easier to subvert and control than autocracies.  It was Kissinger  
> that acted out of character in failing to support Iraq;  at the end  
> of the day, in many ways the neo-cons could be described as "more  
> Kissinger than Kissinger" in wanting to install pro-American and pro- 
> business puppet regimes.