Posted on 11/29/2004 10:50:26 AM PST by SJackson
I could be enjoying Thanksgiving weekend but instead I will review Pat Buchanan’s latest book, Where the Right Went Wrong: How Neoconservatives Subverted the Reagan Revolution and Hijacked the Bush Presidency. Of course, one could legitimately ask why I should give much thought to the ideas of a man who spends much of his time this day on a television network watched by almost as few people than voted for him in the 2000 presidential election. Although Buchanan’s influence may be waning his ideas do have a small following in this country. Many of his ideas, unfortunately, revolve around blaming Israel for the ills the United States and the rest of the world. When such ideas go unchallenged there is tendency amongst people to either go along with the ideas or at least think they are unobjectionable. In introducing this work Buchanan’s objective is to “retrace our steps to see where we lost our way, and discover the way back home to a conservative politics of principle our beloved country so transparently needs now more than ever.”
Interestingly, Buchanan endorsed President Bush for re-election in the pages of his magazine The American Conservative. Yet in this book it is clear that Buchanan has as little regard for Bush’s intellect as the Maureen Dowds and Molly Ivins of the world amongst many others. As demonstrated by this passage concerning foreign policy, Buchanan confuses Bush’s curiosity for someone subject to manipulation:
Before he took his oath, he had probably rarely read or heard such democratist rhetoric before. Who put those ideas in his head? Who put those words in his mouth? Who got us into this hellish mess in Mesopatamia?
Fortunately for his readers, Buchanan does not keep us in suspense. He gives us the skinny on his favorite Jewish targets Paul Wolfowitz and Richard Perle and their omniscient powers. Though last time I checked neither man was a member of the Bush Administration’s Cabinet. Indeed, Perle does not currently hold any position within the Bush Administration. Nevertheless this does little to stop Buchanan from frothing at the mouth. Who would benefit from these endless wars in a region that holds nothing vital to America - save oil, which the Arabs must sell to us to survive? Who would benefit from a “war of civilizations” with Islam? Who, other than these neoconservatives and Ariel Sharon?
Gee, why would Pat have us believe that the Wahhabi’s are holding signs that read, “Will Work for Oil?” But then again this is Pat Buchanan we are talking about. He declares the “neoconservatives could not have taken America to war on Iraq” without persuading the President, the Vice-President, the Secretary of Defense and the Secretary of State of “the necessity of war.” As if that wasn’t enough, Buchanan further argues that they could not have achieved this objective “without collaborators in the neoconservative and mainstream media.” So who are these collaborators? Buchanan names syndicated columnist Charles Krauthammer, Max Boot and Robert Kagan. I guess one could add William Bennett to the list but he’s not Jewish so that doesn’t count in Buchanan’s book.
So let me see if I get this straight. Buchanan would have us believe that Paul Wolfowitz and Richard Perle (with assistance from Charles Krauthammer, Max Boot and Robert Kagan) somehow duped President Bush, Vice President Cheney, Secretary of State Donald Rumsfeld and Secretary of State Colin Powell through either hypnosis (or through being forced to read Buchanan’s A Republic, Not An Empire) that the United States ought to go to war in Iraq.
These observations seem almost benign compared to Buchanan’s subsequent chapter on Islam and terrorism. In his chapter, “Is Islam the Enemy?” Buchanan proclaims, “We are not hated for who we are. We are hated for what we do.” He specifies five grievances the Islamic world has against the United States and argues “we need to listen to what they say – not what we say – about America”:
a) “Preaching democracy and human rights while propping up dictatorships and oligarchies that oppress Muslims”;
b) “By moving thousands of U.S. soldiers, especially women soldiers, onto the sacred soil of Saudi Arabia (italics mine), we have insulted Arab honor and defiled the land on which sit the holiest sites of Islam.”;
c) “America’s neopagan culture”. By this Buchanan specifies “alcohol, drugs, abortions, filthy magazines, blasphemous books, dirty movies, hellish music.”;
d) Let us not forget Israel. Buchanan argues that it is OK for Israel to defy UN Resolutions but not Iraq.
e) Let us not forget Iraq. “We attacked, invaded, and occupied a prostrate Arab nation that did not attack us, did not want war with us, and could not resist us, on the pretext that Iraq had played a role in the 9/11 horrors and was building weapons of mass destruction to attack us.”
It is all well and good for the Islamic world to attack America for promoting human rights and democracy while propping up dictatorships and oligarchies but it is an empty argument. The Muslim world does not exactly have a strong history in promoting democracy and human rights. Whatever the United States past history in propping up dictatorships and oligarchies if these Muslim countries were so committed to promoting democracy and human rights why aren’t they doing more to assist our efforts and that of the people of Afghanistan and Iraq in building democracy and human rights? It is because democracy and human rights are precisely the last things the powers that be in the Muslim world want.
So why is it that Buchanan considers the soil of Saudi Arabia sacred but spits on Israeli soil? In any case, this certainly negates any claim on the first grievance. The Muslim world allegedly resents us for propping up dictatorships like the Wahhabis in Saudi Arabia but yet Saudi soil is too sacred for Americans to set foot? As for female soldiers, radical Islam has a big hang up regarding not only women soldiers but women in general. This is why in Saudi Arabia women need their husband’s permission to drive or to work. This is why if a woman is raped in Saudi Arabia it is not the rapist who is punished but the woman who was raped (and often by death) for dishonoring her family. If this is the sort of culture Buchanan wants to defend I can only feel pity for him.
As for our neopagan culture, it is interesting that many in the Muslim world seem to have little problem producing music videos that extol the virtue of Palestinian suicide bombers. The al-Qaeda network seems to have little trouble using cutting edge multi-media that owes a great deal to our so-called “neopagan culture” to recruit members. Would the Muslim world be happier with us if we suddenly bought old Cat Stevens albums in large numbers?
The fact that Buchanan should place Israel and Saddam’s Iraq on the same moral plane demonstrates that he has more in common with George Soros than with George W. Bush. Iraq violated 17 UN Security Council Resolutions that were a consequence of Saddam’s violations of the Gulf War Ceasefire and were grounds for resuming the 1991 Gulf War. That war technically never ended. Israel is the subject of many non-binding UN General Assembly Resolutions but not binding UN Security Council resolutions – because of the U.S. veto. The United States consistently vetoes such resolutions because the rest of the Security Council never have acknowledged the PLO, Hamas, Hezbollah as being terrorist organizations nor have they condemned them for acts of terrorism.
As for Iraq, I refer Mr. Buchanan to the previous paragraph. If Mr. Buchanan were to occasionally pick up a newspaper he might recognize that U.S. and British planes were attacked daily by Saddam in the no fly zone, his state run media frequently proclaimed it would bring the Great Satan to its knees. Buchanan also neglects to mention that Saddam publicly praised 9/11 which undoubtedly raised suspicions. While Saddam may not have been in possession of WMDs, the Bush Administration could not risk that he might have them and either use them himself or sell them to a foreign agent. Iraq is a better place because the Bush Administration could not tolerate such a risk.
But then again Buchanan would not recognize such an argument. After all, what can one expect from someone who fails to distinguish between war and terrorism? Buchanan begins his Chapter titled “Unwinnable War?” with a quote from the late actor Sir Peter Ustinov who remarked, “Terrorism is the war of the poor, and War is the terrorism of the rich.” This is not far removed from the Far Left bumper sticker “War is Terrorism.” Buchanan writes:
Is terrorism evil? Certainly. But when Churchill ordered his secret services “to set Europe ablaze”, the methods Allied agents used were the sabotage of trains, assassination of German pilots and military officers, bombing of buildings, and execution of collaborators. The French Maquis and Italian partisans did the same. To the Allies, they were heroes fighting a just war, and the stories of their exploits are now legend.
Actually, war is not terrorism. Certainly, modern warfare is not. The examples Buchanan uses in this Chapter such as the French and Russian Revolutions, the Boxer Rebellion and even World War I date the Geneva Convention which governs modern warfare. The above paragraph does not mention anything about deliberately executing civilians now does it? In war, there are rules of engagement. Terrorism accords no such decorum. Buchanan laments about Abu Ghraib as if he were an editorial writer for the New York Times. But those perpetrators were turned in by fellow soldiers and are being held accountable for their actions. Meanwhile, Palestinian terrorists get streets and soccer tournaments named after them. If Buchanan cannot discern between war and terrorism then he is no conservative.
But this should come as no surprise because when he lists terrorist organizations he lists right after the IRA – the Irgun and Stern Gang – organizations that have been defunct for nearly sixty years. Yet the PLO, Hamas and Islamic Jihad are never mentioned. Buchanan only mentions Hezbollah because it had nothing to do with 9/11. Asking Pat Buchanan to define a terrorist organization makes about as much sense as asking Charles Manson to write a murder statute.
Even in Buchanan’s chapter on China titled “Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon” he spends part of the chapter blaming Israel for its arms sales to China. Otherwise, Buchanan is unclear on the subject. With regard to Taiwan, he laments that the United States “has been Taiwan’s only true friend, and the U.S. commitment to the island grows weaker each decade.” Yet by the middle chapter, Buchanan asks, “Is regime change in China not an end goal of President Bush’s “world democratic revolution?” In a matter of a few pages, Buchanan chides Bush for not sufficiently backing Taiwan and then wonders if it plans to overthrow Beijing?
Buchanan becomes outright bizarre in his chapter “Economic Treason” when he proclaims that the “hidden agenda of a global economy is global socialism.” Somehow I think global socialism was the furthest thing on the minds of Ronald Reagan, Brian Mulroney, the Business Roundtable and the Business Council on National Issues in their support and implementation of the Canada-United States Free Trade Agreement which later became the blueprint of NAFTA and hemispheric free trade as we understand it today.
In his Chapter titled “Conservative Impersonators” Buchanan declares, “In every way, we are becoming a Third World country.” Gee, I haven’t exactly noticed a rising trend in infant mortality or decline in life expectancy. Buchanan longs for the days when the United States raised its revenue from tariffs on imports. Well, those days are long over. What Buchanan does not mention is that President Bush placed tariffs on steel and where that did get him? The tariffs drove the price of steel up and that increased costs on small and medium sized businesses forcing them to layoff workers or go out of business altogether. The WTO was wise to rule against the President on steel tariffs and he was equally wise to comply with the ruling. It did nothing but harm the very American worker that Buchanan supposedly was looking out for during his three failed Presidential bids.
Sure, free trade has displaced workers in certain industries. Yet Buchanan offers no alternatives other than pay homage to the way things never were. Buchanan, at one point, goes off in a tangent and complains about the alleged seizure of library records under Section 215 of the Patriot Act. Yet that section never specifically mentions libraries. This is a fantasy concocted by Vermont Socialist Congressman Bernie Sanders. For a fellow who claims to be an authentic conservative he relies too eagerly on information from left wing sources like Sanders, Thomas Walkom of the Toronto Star and Thomas Friedman of the New York Times.
Buchanan at once lambastes Congress for using its powers when it concerns government spending and abdicating its powers where it concerns matters of war as well as domestic matters such as abortion, gay marriage and stem cell research. Buchanan cannot resist taking another shot at the neoconservatives on certain domestic issues “To neoconservatives obsessed with Iraq, such matters as abortion, gay marriage, stem cell research, cloning, are but distractions,” writes Buchanan. Distractions? Obviously, Buchanan has never read David Frum’s numerous articles opposing gay marriage. When I revealed to Frum in e-mail correspondence that I support gay marriage, he sent attachments to so many articles he had written on the subject that it overloaded my inbox. Nor does it appear that Buchanan has read Charles Krauthammer’s impassioned criticisms of stem cell research. Anyone who watches Special Report with Brit Hume on the FOX News Channel will know that nothing gets Krauthammer more animated in panel discussions than stem cell research. Not even Israel.
The only thing resembling a sensible idea that Buchanan offers in the entire book is that Congress limit the powers of lower Courts with respect to issues that they can adjudicate. Of course, I said it this resembled a sensible idea. I didn’t suggest it actually was sensible much less desirable. Buchanan wants Congress to enforce Article III, Section II of the Constitution to amend the Defense of Marriage Act to deem the legislation beyond the purview of the Supreme Court. Yet the fact that eleven states have already passed constitutional amendments banning gay marriage earlier this month suggests that this is a matter best left to the states and not the federal government.
Pat Buchanan claims to want to discover a way back home to conservative politics of principle. But how Buchanan find a way back home when he himself lost his way long ago? Aside from three failed Presidential campaigns and earning the disdain of most conservatives, including William F. Buckley, Buchanan is long on doom and gloom and short on hope and optimism. There is, of course, nothing wrong with a healthy dose of cynicism but when one has nothing good to say about the country in which one lives expect that it was good place to live half a century ago then what exactly is it that Pat Buchanan wants to conserve?
Pat Buchanan spent parts of three decades advising three different Republican Presidents. For the past decade or so, Buchanan has been a thorn in the side of two Republican Presidents. Despite this, President Bush has been re-elected with more votes than he received four years ago. The Republicans have gained seats in the House, the Senate as well as state legislatures and gubernatorial houses. The Republicans have become the majority party in the United States. They have done this without having to listen to a word from Pat Buchanan. The fact that Buchanan directs his anger at men who he perceives that have the ear of President Bush namely Wolfowitz and Perle is an indication that he would like to have the ear of the President of the United States – any President – to take his advice. But Buchanan calculated incorrectly and for that he has only himself to blame. He embraced tariffs at the very point where they have been all but dumped on the ash heap of history. He embraced anti-Israeli (and anti-Semitic) sentiments at a time when Republican Party activists increasingly identified with Israel and Judaism, evangelical Christians in particular. He fancied himself a politician when he is better suited at dispensing advice behind the scenes. But it is too late to turn back. Where the Right Went Wrong demonstrates that Pat Buchanan is out of step with the Right as he is out of step with America.
He's not good for much else.
There's gold in them there kooks
I thought the book was pretty good. It has some flaws. And this reviewer has some good points. But the larger argument about whether we become more powerful by expansion or retraction of the empire is certainly worth debating.
His last book was great. "Death of the West" was all about demographics, and the fact that 'the west' (he includes Japan in his definition) is shrinking due to low birth rates. If anyone else had written it, I think it would have been a top book for intellectual journals and critics to discuss. As it was, he was pretty much ignored because serious people have stopped listening to Pat a while ago.
Hell hath no fury like the Israeli lobby.
Maybe Pat is on to something. I wonder if anyone else has ever suggested the Jews were behind all of our woes?
The intimidating power of the "Jewish lobby" is not a new phenomenon, but has long been an important factor in American life.
I think Pat’s been published in Mark’s rag.
Iraq, simplified.
For reasons which are understandable from their viewpoint as they are inadvisable from ours, for reasons which are not American, [they] wish to involve us in the war. We cannot blame them for looking out for what they believe to be their own interests, but we must also look out for ours. We cannot allow the natural passions and prejudices of other peoples to lead our country to destruction.
True, he's not original. For all his "Christian Nation" jabbering, I'd think he'd be happy to see Hispanic Catholics moving here.
Who needs to quote Pat, when they have George Washington:
"Real patriots, who may resist the intrigues of the favorite, are liable to become suspected and odious; while its tools and dupes usurp the applause and confidence of the people, to surrender their interests."
BTW, where did I quote Pat?
You didn't. You said weber published him. A big quote, if you will.
Any doubt he'd be labled a "crank" for expressing those views today?
Washington? Not at all. You're presuming he'd somehow agree with Pat that the "neo-cons" and their Jewish lobby allies run the country.
What the "Israel lobby" ought to concern itself with is the lack of leadership and support it gets from the majority of American Jews, who did their darnedest to get an anti-Israel candidate elected president.
I'm not certain that's what Pat said, I think he believes that the neocons had a significant influence on our most recent foreign policy undertaking: Iraq. A far cry from saying they run the country. What I was saying with regard to Washington is that isolationism itself has a longer pedigree than Pat Buchanan's ideology.
Meant the Spotlight. He lifted the gas chamber nonsense from Weber, though Weber credits him for the widespread exposure.
As to the "Israel Lobby" what you perceive as lack of leadership and support it is a function of the fact that it doesn't exist. AIPAC could be described that way I suppose, easily as influential as the AARP, the NRA, and the AAA, not to mention multiple unions. The last thing they should be doing is endorsing political parties.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.