Posted on 09/18/2009 1:13:45 PM PDT by EveningStar
Irving Kristol, 89, a forceful essayist, editor and university professor who became the leading architect of neoconservatism, which he called a political and intellectual movement for disaffected ex-liberals like himself who had been "mugged by reality," died Friday at the Capital Hospice in Arlington.
He spent much of his career in New York but had for the last two decades lived at the Watergate apartments in the District. He died of complications from lung cancer, said his son, William Kristol, the founder and editor of the conservative Weekly Standard magazine.
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...
Condolences to Bill Kristol, and to the rest of the family.
RIP
(Let’s try that again)
Some select quotations/writings of Comrade Kristol:
“If you have standards, moral standards, you have to want to make them prevail, and at the very least you have to argue in their favor. Now, show me where libertarians have argued in some comprehensive way for a set of moral standards. ... I don’t think morality can be decided on the private level. I think you need public guidance and public support for a moral consensus. The average person has to know instinctively, without thinking too much about it, how he should raise his children.”
“A welfare state, properly conceived, can be an integral part of a conservative society.”
“If you care for the quality of life in our American democracy, then you have to be for censorship.”
“There are different kinds of truths for different kinds of people. There are truths appropriate for children; truths that are appropriate for students; truths that are appropriate for educated adults; and truths that are appropriate for highly educated adults, and the notion that there should be one set of truths available to everyone is a modern democratic fallacy. It doesn’t work.”
“Patriotism springs from love of the nation’s past; nationalism arises out of the hope for the nation’s future.”
Paleoconservatism decayed for a clear reason— it makes no sense to found a rightwing political program based only on the status quo and resist change, when the status quo is appeasement, socialism, and counterculture.
Neocons were responsible for creating the three pillars of the modern right: 1) A strong, active military 2) economic growth and 3) culture, not counter-culture.
The paleocons were isolationist/non-interventionists who supported protectionism, and defended social issues in terms of conformity and homogeneity. Most conservatives today are neos, whether they know it or not.
For awhile they were, especially after 9/11. But sense has returned. Look at the anti-government protests and sentiments going on. Some think conservatives, after the failure of neoconservatism, have simply returned to the paleoconservative ideaology of Buchanan, Kirk, even Reagan for the most part. I believe we’re in the early stages of something very different but vastly better for us as conservatives but also as Americans. We’re beginning the era of libertarianism. If Newton’s Third Law is correct, then the only logical response to the expansion of government both in the name of social progress and national security (both fallacies IMO) is the fight to shrink government, both at home and abroad, and to restore our republic. Kristol himself said that patriots stand proud of their nation’s past, nationalists attempt to bring about their view of the nation’s future. Of course, he said this in defense of nationalism.
“We’re beginning the era of libertarianism.”
That means we’re beginning another era of appeasement, crime, drug abuse, juvenile delinquency, family breakdown — our society disintegrating internally while external threats move in for the kill.
Libertarians are a lot like socialists — they think man is born good, and institutions corrupt him. They only differ on the boogeyman— the socialists think it is the corporations, while libertarians blame the state. Conservatives, both paleo and neo, realize that man is born evil, and institutions are our only hope to make him halfway good.
Once one realize what the religious call “Original Sin” — man’s tragic weakness for evil — one will be far less trusting of tyrants, terrorists, drug dealers, violent criminals, and even the market economy to some extent.
If Kristol should be remembered for anything, it should be for his analysis of counterculture. Capitalism, through its productivity, makes it seem like Mickey Mouse happy-endings are a law of nature. This creates the entitlement mentality that thinks that prosperity and peace don’t come with sacrifice. The bourgeois citizen is replaced with the bourgeois consumer, who, living in a world without risk, wants everything and wants it now, as if our actions (and inactions!) do not come with consequences.
Kristol is right. Think about it. The most capitalist areas of the country coincidentally have the most socialist voters.
It used to be that “neocon” was a term only used by the rabid anti-semetic left.
More recently it has been embraced by the anti-semetic right, few as they may be, namely Pat Buchanan and Ron Paul supporters.
Almost forgot.
Thoughts are with William Kristol and his family.
Spot on sir. I’m not sure when being a Goldwater conservative stopped being cool?
Reagan actually was one of those liberals who was “mugged by reality.”
Rest in Peace Irving.
claiming folks who call socially lib to moderate fiscal conservatives like Krauthammer or Brooks NeoCons are antiSemites is barely different than Bro calling folks who disagree with him racists
and btw..according to most political tests I'm around 25% Neoconservative and am no Jew...not by a long shot
I have nothing against the old man who just died...God bless him and I more or less like his boy but conservatives lukewarm on the culture war can defend their positions on the merits rather than claiming Jewish minority victim hood status
it's wrong and it's part of an overall problem which paralyzes us across all discussions which involve minority cultural participation whether racial, ethnic or religious
this notion that if you are aminority of any sort and have if your people have suffered in the past ala slavery or the Holocasut then you are somehow immune from criticism is 100% codswallop and destructive...
the truth is never a perjorative
Kristol was an amazing man with an amazing intellect. So is his wife. They both have an intense and extensive history in the movement from classic liberalism (which bears no resemblance to what modern America refers to as “liberals”) to conservatism.
RIP, good man.
So, the man done fine by me and in general the neo-cons provoked debate on both sides of the political spectrum.
Anyway RIP to someone who was willing to think.
I prefer to think of myself as a "small-l" libertarian, who believes that the proper role of government is to provide a safe and orderly environment for people to live, work, and raise a family, provide a venue to settle disputes, and otherwise stay out of people's hair.
You seem to think all people are the same. I think that there is a spectrum, with some people reasonably good (i.e. of sufficiently good character that they will behave honestly even when nobody is looking), some people are criminal, and those in the middle will be reasonably good, but prone to cheat around the edges.
The legitimate purpose of the State is to punish violence and dishonesty, but not to enforce charity.
Additionally, for "institutions" to be effective in "making him halfway good", the institutions need to be staffed by good people. Experience shows that institutions with power over peoples lives tend to attract people who WANT power over others, and not for good reasons. As long as we do not have angels to staff the State, it is good to limit the State's power to do harm.
Interesting but that has more to do with geography and proximity to European and Asian immigration disembarkation points or just junctions of trade than it does the peoples.
I have enjoyed both your posts here. From raising 5 kids and observing the world for 52 years and studying classical humanities it is my opinion we are born quite self centered though not evil. There is good in most of us and needs cultivating.
I think government if here to serve us and create collective security and in a theoretical sense to promote what is innate in all of us to further the rights in life the Founders wrote about. Of course that is an open definition.
Who nails the nature of man....Christ. Hobbes and Socrates after that.
JH Bowden.
Right you are!
I would add to your list:
A foreign policy that suits America’s pro-growth economy.
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