Posted on 05/31/2003 10:47:25 AM PDT by Richard Poe
I first began working with Robert Locke when I was editor of David Horowitz's FrontPageMagazine.com. Locke was then a highly original thinker, who offered daring, unapologetic defenses of the nation-state and the imperial West.
Alas, poor Locke has been incorporated into the Borg -- which is to say that he now writes for Pat Buchanan's American Conservative. If Locke's latest production for that magazine, "Nation-Busting: The Trouble with Globalism" is any indication, I fear that Mr. Locke's famously independent spirit may have been tamed by the commissars of what I call "paleo-parasitism." And that is sad.
Locke's article contains two contradictions. Two may not seem like many, but these are very special contradictions -- diagnostic ones, in fact -- tell-tale markers of Buchananite ideology. They distinguish Buchanan's drones much as the number 666 brands the servants of the Beast. Together, they constitute the distinctive "doublethink" without which no American Conservative article would be complete.
I am deeply disappointed to find them in any article by Robert Locke. Here they are:
CONTRADICTION #1: Imperialism of Past Centuries Good -- 21st-Century Imperialism Bad
Locke raises no objection to the means by which European civilization attained global hegemony since 1492. Indeed, he has written eloquently in defense of the "right of conquest." In this, I support Locke 100 percent.
Yet, at some indeterminate point in the past, Mr. Locke seems to imply, the spirit of conquest and exploration lost its validity. It became a much-cherished museum piece, to be admired in books and invoked in historical think-pieces, but to be condemned wherever it reared its head in the actual affairs of men.
For instance, Locke implies that American civilization acquired "messianic" or expansionist tendencies in the 20th century only in response to the challenge of Soviet aggression -- a dysfunctional reaction to a dysfunctional situation, as therapeutic historians might describe it.
But if our 20th-century "messianism" is an aberration, when did it begin? Did it start with the U.S. expeditionary force sent to crush the Bolsheviks during the Russian Civil War? Did it start with our colonial war against the Philippine rebels? With the Spanish-American War? The various U.S. interventions in Central America? The Battle of Wounded Knee?
Go ask the Indians, the Dutch, the French, the Spaniards and the Mexicans -- all of whom vanished beneath the steamroller of American "Manifest Destiny" -- to pinpoint the year in which American "messianism" was born. Ask them to state whether or not they would accuse Norman Podhoretz and his Cold War neocons of instigating it.
Now that the Russians supposedly no longer threaten us -- a dubious proposition at best -- Locke calls upon Americans to abandon our "obsolete habit of projecting power." But what does he suppose will happen when we stop projecting power?
The Panama Canal offers a splendid example. As recently noted in my column, "The Idiot's Guide to Chinagate," we have unilaterally abandoned the Panana Canal. Consequently, a more ambitious and energetic people, the Chinese, have moved in to take control of it. Whatever "messianic" fervor impelled Theodore Roosevelt to dig that canal in the first place no longer moves our foreign policy elites. Mr. Locke should be pleased.
CONTRADICTION #2: Globalist Treason Bad -- Multipolarist Treason Good
"[L]ike Marxism, globalism has a genius for inspiring disloyalty to one’s country," writes Locke. And so it does. You cannot serve two masters. Loyalty to world government leads inexorably to betrayal of your own country.
But is not the same true of "multipolarity" -- the doctrine Locke pushes, which states that no single country, such as the USA, should be allowed to gain overwhelming, "unipolar" advantage over others? "The sooner we face the inevitability of a multi-polar world, the more of a head start we can have in arranging our place within its inevitably complex web of alliances," writes Locke.
Again, I refer to "The Idiot's Guide to Chinagate," for an illustration of the concrete effects of multipolarism -- the very doctrine which Bill Clinton invoked to justify selling out American interests to China.
Mr. Locke accuses America of "projecting power into any available vacuum," a "messianic" practice which he says "has led us into pointless involvements in places like Bosnia, Somalia, and Haiti." I too condemn these Clintonian adventures. Yet, I see no sign that they arose from any compulsive tendency on America's part to "project power" into "any available vacuum." If America had such a tendency, we would not have abandoned Panama to the Chinese.
There was a time when I looked to Mr. Locke's essays for laser-like coherence, in a world of fuzzy thinking. I hope those days will return soon. But as long as Mr. Locke worships at the temple of Pat Buchanan -- excuse me, as long as he writes for the American Conservative -- I fear he will have little of interest to say.
Dear AntiGuv:
If you disagree with what I wrote, please tell me why you disagree with it.
If you find it incoherent, please point out its specific incoherencies.
Why no, that would be silly and presumptuous. It would never occur to me to do such a thing.
Why do you ask?
He appears blinded by the light of Buchanan's patriotism. Pat believes we should conserve America first. Pat sees that the first half of the last century, American fought in Europe. In the second half, American fought in the Orient. Now the neo-con world conquestors wants us to take on the Arabs. Pat wants fortress American and avoid the USA dying from the cuts of a thousand battles like England. More and more people will come to agree with Buchanan.
Pat is for war when war is made on us and that includes Pearl Harbor and Germany. He supported Bush big time in Afghan. Pat is not for war for the interest of Taiwan, Korea, Kuwait, Kosovo, Ireland, Germany, Israel, France, the UN or the rock of Gibraltar. Time for them to fight their own wars. Pat is resented because he does not go along with foreign special interests and gets the usual left wing type smears from those posing as conservatives.
Pat Buchanan is wrong about some things, but he's been right about others. When he's been right, he's been willing to tell some truths that make the average sheeple very uncomfortable. A personal attack against him is a bad thing because it makes one appear to be working out a grudge over some of the truth that he has told.
CONTRADICTION #1: Imperialism of Past Centuries Good -- 21st-Century Imperialism Bad
Robert Locke does not contradict himself. Indeed, his views are reconciled within the Hobbes and the Middle East you cite:
None of this should be construed as implying that conquests are a good idea. The fact that we recognize conquests after the fact does not remove the fact that they are bloody, inhumane, and violate previously recognized sovereignties. Conquerors may deserve our recognition, but not our admiration or encouragement. Conservatives should know the difference between accepting the realities of the way the world works and endorsing them as positive goods. But accepting international reality is a prerequisite of maintaining international order, which is a positive good.
Evidently, you failed to grasp that difference to which Locke alludes... Onward to your second point:
CONTRADICTION #2: Globalist Treason Bad -- Multipolarist Treason Good
Condemnation of globalist ideology & endorsement (or, more accurately, acceptance) of multipolarity are not contradictory by any stretch of the imagination. You attribute a consequence to Locke which he cannot be assumed to endorse, and then rail against this strawman of your own devise. Aside from that fact, little of your exposition actually addresses the above allegation (you switch gears to a critique of his objection to "messianic" policies, as he calls them) so I cannot properly critique this on its merits. That's the inherent problem with incoherence..
If you'd like, I could address the subpoints despite the fact that they don't especially relate to the subheading..
Robert Locke does not contradict himself. Indeed, his views are reconciled within the Hobbes and the Middle East column you cite:
I know Robert Locke personally and like him. I attacked his ideas, not his person, in the above critique.
As for Pat Buchanan, I never met the man, and harbor no ill will toward him. However, his ideas are unsound. They cannot be embraced without employing Orwellian "doublethink" -- exactly as described above -- and I have noticed that every writer who contributes to the American Conservative quickly adopts Buchananite doublethink.
If pointing out this fact constitutes an unseemly "personal attack" in your mind, this would suggest that you consider Buchanan's core opinions sacrosanct and above criticism. Your discomfort with forthright discussion only deepens my impression that an oddly cult-like atmosphere prevails in the Buchananite camp.
I certainly don't consider Mr. Buchanan's opinions to be above criticism and have criticized them many times. I've been flamed by some of his supporters for those criticims as much as anyone has. In accusing me of holding him above criticism, you only further demonstrate your own ignorance and your own tendency to accuse first and maybe try to educate yourself later. (At this point, I've yet to see evidence of the later education.)
Aside from the issues, I agree that Mr. Buchanan does seem to attract people who follow him mindlessly. However, for every person who follows him mindlessly, there are three or four who hate him with equal blindness. I had hoped that you weren't one of these people. The fact that you completely glossed over my agreement with substantive criticisms and focused on disagreement with the inflamatory parts of your post is evidence of your own blindness.
As I said in my first post, I think you originally made some good points. Some of Mr. Buchanan's ideas are wrong. You pointed out two of them, and I think you did so without distorting the points that Mr. Buchanan has tried to make. It's a shame about your answer and the rest of your post.
Conservatives should know the difference between accepting the realities of the way the world works and endorsing them as positive goods.
Locke is correct. One should accept the reality that sometimes wars -- even wars of conquest and colonization -- are an indispensable part of life, without necessarily endorsing them as a positive or unmitigated good.
While I support the present war, I am not so ignorant or barbarous as to tout it as an unmitigated good. Therefore, your quotation from Locke misses the point. It does not debunk my position, nor does it answer or address any question or objection I raised to Locke's position.
You argued, as follows:
Condemnation of globalist ideology & endorsement (or, more accurately, acceptance) of multipolarity are not contradictory by any stretch of the imagination.
History offers no example of a stable, multipolar world. When the lights went out in Europe in 1914, there were people still living who remembered the dreadful upheaval of the Napoleonic epoch. As for the classical Greeks and their appealing system of independent city-states, they made ceaseless war on each other right up until the moment they were swallowed up by Alexander's empire.
We cannot avoid war. We can only train, equip and prepare ourselves for its coming -- or not, as we choose.
Multipolarity is just another excuse -- like globalism -- for allowing other nations to grow strong enough to hurt us. The concept serves no other purpose that I can discern. The cant I hear about "multipolarity" is almost perfectly analogous to the corresponding cant about "globalism." The practical effects of these sister doctrines are identical and interchangeable, as Chinagate demonstrates with crystal clarity.
If some profound difference exists between the two, you have failed to demonstrate it.
I agree that Mr. Buchanan does seem to attract people who follow him mindlessly.
If we agree on this point, then we agree on the most important concern expressed in my article.
Evidently, my use of language struck you as more colorful than you would deem appropriate. You are entitled to your opinion. However, since every instance you cited of colorful language revolved around the same point (that I find a disturbingly cult-like undertone to much Buchananite behavior) -- and since you appear to agree with this point -- I fail to see why you characterize my observation as a "smear." The word "smear" implies a false accusation, not a true accusation which you happen to believe was expressed with insufficient tact.
As for your implication that my opinions on Buchanan are intemperate, uninformed, ill-considered and even dishonest, I can only direct you to a previous article I wrote in Buchanan's defense, and leave it to your conscience to determine whether you have judged me fairly, and whether I have judged Buchanan soberly. Here is the link:
"Pat Buchanan and the New Barbarism" (March 1, 2002)
Whatever the case, regarding your followup statement:
Therefore, your quotation from Locke misses the point. It does not debunk my position, nor does it answer or address any question or objection I raised to Locke's position.
No, it does not miss the point. The quotation refutes the allegation of contradiction, which was the stated objective of your expository efforts. Beyond all that, you establish nothing other than that you disagree with Locke. That's all fine and good. Locke presumably also disagrees with you, and so do I. That does not establish contradiction in your views, but only the fallacy in your position so far as we're concerned...
History offers no example of a stable, multipolar world.
History also offers no example of a stable, unipolar world. Both statements are meaningless in the context employed here. Anything beyond these twin facts is nothing more than a personal value judgment regarding which construction of global affairs offers greater probability of increased stability. In any event, Locke's essential argument does not rest on the value of multipolarity, but rather on its reality over time..
Multipolarity is just another excuse -- like globalism -- for allowing other nations to grow strong enough to hurt us. The concept serves no other purpose that I can discern.
Locke essentially argues that other nations will grow strong enough to "hurt us" simply because they will do so, whether we like it or not. In fact, he appears to argue that our attempts to enforce a unipolar world order make it more likely that other nation's will feel compelled to challenge us. Locke is right in that regard; you would obviously disagree. Again, whatever the case, you do not establish any contradiction in Locke's viewpoints, but only your personal disagreement. Locke believes that we will be better served seeking to cooperate with other nations rather than antagonize them. You disagree.
So far as I can tell, the primary disagreement is that Locke understands the U.S. cannot maintain its hegemonic position indefinitely and you believe that it can.
So far as I can tell, the primary disagreement is that Locke understands the U.S. cannot maintain its hegemonic position indefinitely and you believe that it can.
No country has ever maintained a hegemonic position indefinitely. I certainly do not believe the United States will succeed where the Senatus Populusque Romanus failed.
Actually, the point of my article has nothing to do with that issue. My point is that -- unless I seriously misunderstood Locke's position in the past -- his latest article appears to represent a significant change, both in style and substance, in his manner of writing about the war.
In the past, none of Locke's writings about the war struck me as wrongheaded. We seemed to be in rough agreement. Now that he is writing for the American Conservative, I find myself in sudden and very profound disagreement with him.
I see three possibilities here:
I give my vote to Number 3.1. I was not reading Locke with sufficient attentiveness before.
2. Locke was not being entirely candid before regarding his views on the war.
3. Locke has been incorporated into the Borg, as a consequence of writing for the American Conservative.
PS. Have you scene John Fonte's piece in the 6/2 edition of National Review?
Robert is not an isolationist. He has quite a bit of support for the Victorian British Empire. He is a Straussian on religious/moral issues. He is an odd match for TAC except on economic matters and the National question.
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