In trying to find something you might like to look at, I thought you might enjoy this from Glenn Greenwald on April 4. It gave me lots of hope the neocon movement will not only die, but will die hard and be vilified and extinct. (Greenwald contrasts Tony Blair's gentle statement regarding the release of the sailors taken hostage with Newt's, who complained it was a missed attempt for the glorious war.):
Yes, Newt's plan -- threatening Iran with war, naval blockades, destroying their gas refinery and their economy, forcing their citizens to "use oxen to pull carts" -- would have been so much better than Blair's wimpy, appeasing approach. After all, what it's all about -- everything -- is, as Newt put it: we must "show the planet that you're tiny and we're not."Try to understand, a guy named Newt would get beaten up several times everyday until graduating from high school.
Showing the planet that they're "tiny and we're not" really does sum up, almost completely, the entire neoconservative compulsion, which is the same thing as neoconservatism itself. As I've noted before, they talk about every foreign policy issue with themes of dominance, submission and humiliation as the centerpiece. It's the Abu Grahib Theory of Foreign Affairs, and it actually is quite uncomfortable even to read.
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They always want war not for any ideological or geopolitical reason, but because war (or at least compelling submission through the threat of war) is the only real hard-core way to -- as Newt put it -- "show the planet that you're tiny and we're not." If you review any of their foreign policy arguments about war and terrorism, this is the sentiment animating all of it.
None of this is an attempt to infer their motives or to pscyhoanalyze them. This is what they are explicitly saying, themselves, about what they think and what motivates them. This is why they not only lack an aversion to war, but urgently crave it as their first resort. Diplomacy and consensual resolutions do not end with humiliations or conclusive evidence of who is powerful and who is tiny. Only war, shock and awe, naked prisoners on dog leashes, and orange-clad, shackled detainees with bowed heads in cages enable that.
The minute another country does not completely submit to our will, we must threaten them with war and then wage one if they do not comply. Otherwise, we are humiliated and exposed as weak.
The neoconservative psyche is the same as the neoconservative approach to the world. Their only real criticism of George Bush is that he has not been sufficiently militaristic and forceful. What they are really searching for is the candidate who will do what Newt outlined above while chatting with Hugh Hewitt, who continuously interjected with "amens" such as "That makes compelling, compelling sense," outcries which become palpably more excited the more Newt talked about all the things he would block and bomb.
3 comments:
isn't beating up newt simply a demonstration of his beliefs in another guise...? just sayin'...
Yeah, no kidding! Glenn's bit describes Newt as the true dream candidate of Bush-supporting "conservatives" (impeded only by the small, unfortunate fact that he is one of America's most deeply unpopular figures -- an odd result given that we hear that (a) Gingrich is the only "real conservative" and (b) the 2006 elections proved that America is clamoring for a "real conservative"). He's conservative all right, conservative in intelligence, common sense, human kindness and his desire for fiscal responsibility. It's a way to perpetuate the myth that 2006's stolen election was a landslide win, and that the "unconservative" republican vision is majority opinion, when it never was and never will be.
My question is, where is the MIA response to this ugliness? The MSM media misses a golden opportunity by failing to embark in "conservaive" bashing. Maybe Sam Zell has the sense to take a chance. If he does, he's reading the market properly. I really have my fingers crossed for Mr. Zell and his new media bundle. And while I'm up on this soap box, good Bushie- and Newt-"conservatives" still need to figure out what the word "conservative" means.
Someone from the salamander genus, perhaps? I always took Newt to emblemize how the republican party doesn't care what anyone thinks, and deliberately promotes toads and trolls as a testament to their ability to organize and spew bullshit. The problem is, all this fooling around turns into a habit they aren't even aware of anymore. If this guy is a political mastermind, I'm a speckled baboon.
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