funny the way Ron Paul supporter Don Black used to be in the National "SOCIALIST" White People's Party and now calls himself Conservative... and no one calls him a NeoCon. Much like the word Anti-Semitism ...I don't use that word either anymore because the Muslims are looking to co-opt it... I'm now saying the original JudenHass to define the hate I deal with. The Etymology of the word is not as important as it's history. People who have given up on socialism after experiencing it is not what defines the term as much as the party of people who went by the name. Same as the word used to describe the haters of Jews. It was meant to define them in less offensive way, but now is being used against it's intention. Language is a living thing and you must learn to grab new meaning as your enemies steal the thunder in agreed understanding. Even if your opponents are wrong in their arguments and knowledge, their ideas gain momentum by shear will.
George Orwell famously remarked that the new definition of a fascist is someone you don’t like. This seems to be what Ron Paul and his little minions are
attempting to do with the word “neocon”:
In the face of several electoral challenges from tea party-connected candidates, Texas Republican Congressman Ron Paul cautioned in a recent interview that “neocon influence” is “infiltrating” the movement he is often credited for creating.
…
“My message is somewhat different,” he said. “The message gets somewhat diluted” with large movements of this nature.
“Everybody likes to join what looks like a popular movement, then they want to come in and influence that movement,” Paul continued.
His core issues, such as creating transparency at the Federal Reserve, recalling overseas soldiers and ending the drug war, are “not what is generally heard from the Republican party,” he said.
“Neocon issues in public policy are not exactly dead these days,” he explained, seemingly pointing to the Obama administration. “Progressive Democrats aren’t really happy with foreign policy. … That’s the infiltration, philosophically, in different positions.”
First of all, who on Earth has credited Ron Paul for creating the Tea Party movement? My understanding is that the impetus behind it sits with Rick Santelli, the CNBC commentator who randomly came up with the idea while standing on the floor of the
New York Stock Exchange Chicago Mercantile Exchange (thanks, Anthony!). While the Tea Party movement has a decidedly libertarian bent, it’s more of a Reagan “libertarianism-is-the-heart-and-soul-of-conservatism” kind of bent than a Paul “The Federal Reserve wants to deep-fry your children” one.
More importantly, though, is the question: what the heck is a “neocon” to these people? Neoconservatism, properly defined, arose as a
response to 60’s radicalism. Its godfathers, Irving Kristol and Norman Podhoretz, were former Trotskyist radicals who became, as it was so famously put, “mugged by reality” into accepting a “new” conservatism: cultural traditionalism, a vigorously anti-Communist foreign policy, and a cautious form of free-market economics that accepted the inevitability of the welfare state. Its founders were mostly, though not exclusively, Jewish: Jeane Kirkpatrick can hardly be considered Jewish, for instance.
Today, what we know as “neoconservatism” tends to be vigorously and proactively anti-totalitarian foreign policy: the kind that accepts intervention and international institutions (when they can be worked for America’s benefit). They’re more “big stick” than “walk softly.” And that big stick is America’s superior morality. What we know as the “neoconservative” foreign policy tendency has been accepted by figures, with particular variations, from Barry Goldwater, Ayn Rand, Ann Coulter, Rudy Giuliani, and Ronald Reagan. Not that we’ve got anything like unanimous consent: commentators like Pat Buchanan, Dinesh D’Souza, William F. Buckley, and Robert Spencer do not or did not accept neoconservatism, thinking it too optimistic about the human condition, too quick to think foreign cultures malleable, or too inappropriate with regard to America’s role in the world.
“Neocon” is typically employed as a pejorative. It is discordant to the ear, particularly because of the second half of the term: a “con” is a bad deal, a fake. “Neo” makes use of the long-e sound, a distinctly unmusical tone. Lacking is the augustness of the full term “conservatism,” and the according history. “Neocon,” with its cadence, becomes something of a smear in itself (despite some attempts to “take it back,” by those like Irwin Stelzer, for instance, editor of “The Neocon Reader”).
Is Sarah Palin a “neocon”? After endorsing Ron Paul’s son for Congress, giving a
shout-out to Ron Paul over a video for MTV, and insisting that “
we’d better not be at war [over oil],” her instincts certainly don’t lay in that realm. Now, she’s committed heresy by becoming the Eliza Doolittle of the famously neoconservative
Weekly Standard crowd. She signed a letter calling for a surge in troops in Afghanistan along with Kristol, Kagan, and the “usual neocon suspects.” But she
did just endorse a Paul.
Moreover, when have ending the drug war — a quixotic libertarian cause — and recalling overseas troops been an aim of the Tea Party movement? As I demonstrated earlier this evening, Pat Buchanan has also bought into this bizarre delusion: they look at the Tea Party movement and see themselves. (One might accuse me of harboring the same symptoms by so frequently referring to Ayn Rand in relation to the Tea Partiers, but I’m not the one who is spiking up sales of
Atlas Shrugged or holding up “Shrug, Atlas” and “Who Is John Galt?” posters!) Ron Paul
wants the Tea Party movement to be about him, and when it comes to capitalism, it’s right on board with him — but not with his bizarre, meaningless crusade against “neocons” and the Drug War. I’d wager that the Tea Party movement, like most Americans, opposes efforts to legalize drugs. This is unfortunate, but it’s
true.
If Barack Obama is a “neocon,” as Paul seems to imply (hey, he did just ramp up the war in Afghanistan, right? Neocon!), if Sarah Palin is a “neocon,” if George W. Bush is a “neocon,” if anyone who thinks that America should stand by Israel is a “neocon” (have you checked out the comments by the Paultards on my [retracted]
Debra Medina endorsement?) — then the word is meaningless and only serves as a pejorative. Toss it.
