The Get-Cheney Squad
"Men sleep peacefully in their beds at night because rough men stand ready to do violence on their behalf."
George Orwell's truth comes to mind as one reads that Eric Holder has named a special prosecutor to go after the "rough men" who, to keep us sleeping peacefully at night, went too far in frightening Khalid Sheik Muhammad, the engineer of the September massacres.
Yet, it seems now indisputable that those CIA interrogators, with their rough methods, got vital intelligence that saved American lives, as Dick Cheney has consistently contended.
According to the Washington Times, which reviewed the newly declassified CIA documents, those interrogators "produced life-saving intelligence that disrupted numerous terrorist plots."
They elicited the names of al-Qaida agents who planned anthrax attacks on Westerners and a massive bombing of Camp Lemonier, the U.S. base in East Africa. They got the names of 70 recruits al-Qaida deemed "suitable for Western attacks" and of the men who made the bomb used on the U.S. consulate in Karachi.
Iyman Faris, an al-Qaeda sleeper agent and truck driver in Ohio, is serving 20 years because of information the CIA got from KSM and associates. Other operations aborted include al-Qaida "plots to fly airliners into buildings on the West Coast, setting off bombs in U.S. cities and planning to employ a network of Pakistanis to target gas stations, railroad tracks and the Brooklyn Bridge."
What were the "inhumane" techniques CIA interrogators used to uncover these plans for the mass murder of Americans?
"Interrogators lifted one detainee off the floor by his arms, while they were bound behind his back with a belt," reports the Washington Post. "Another interrogator used a stiff brush to clean a detainee, scrubbing so roughly that his legs were raw with abrasions. Another squeezed a detainee's neck at his carotid artery until he began to pass out."
The CIA, we are told, used mock executions to frighten captives and threatened to kill KSM's children and rape his mother. Power drills were brandished in interrogation rooms.
Were any children killed? No. Was anyone's mother raped? No. Was the power drill used? No.
Was anyone executed in front of a witness to make him talk? No. It was faked, as Sean Connery faked it in The Untouchables to get an underling to blab to Eliot Ness, aka Kevin Costner, about how he could take down Al Capone's mob.
As for threatening to kill the children of our enemies, we did not do that in "The Good War." Instead, what we did was kill them in the thousands every night in air raids over Germany and Japan.
In the Tokyo firestorm of February 1945, the Dresden raid in March, and the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki in August, we killed grandparents, mothers, fathers, wives, sisters, daughters and sons of the enemy in the scores of thousands on each of those days.
Can it be that the same United States that honored Col. Paul Tibbets and put his Enola Gay, which dropped the bomb on Hiroshima, on display in its Air and Space Museum is going to prosecute a CIA agent for faking an execution and threatening, but never intending, to kill the children of Khalid Sheik Muhammad?
Why is Barack Obama allowing these prosecutions to proceed?
In 2004, career lawyers at Justice looked over the same reports and concluded that prosecutions would not serve the national interest. Obama has himself said he wants to move on.
Now, he and Holder may not like what was done back then, but who does? And where is the criminal intent? These agents are not sadists. They were trying to get intel to abort plots and apprehend terrorists to prevent them from killing us. And they succeeded. Not a single terrorist attack on the United States in eight years.
Do we the people, some of whom may be alive because of what those CIA men did, want them disgraced, prosecuted and punished for not going strictly by the book in protecting us from terrorists?
In its lead editorial Tuesday, "Following the Torture Trail," the Washington Post declaims, "The real culprits in this sordid story are the higher-ups, starting with former President George W. Bush and former Vice President Richard Cheney who led America down the degraded path of state-sponsored torture."
But why is Obama yielding to the clamor of a left that will not be satiated until Cheney and Bush are indicted as Class A war criminals? Is that in the national interest? Is it in Obama's interest to tear his country apart to expose and punish these CIA agents?
In the 1960s, Robert Kennedy and the boys at Justice set up a "Get Hoffa Squad" to take down Teamsters boss Jimmy Hoffa. It was a vendetta that succeeded.
This vendetta will not. For, on the issue of national security, as Barack will painfully discover, he is not more trusted than Dick Cheney or the rough men at the CIA who did the harsh interrogations of terrorists, to keep us sleeping peacefully at night.
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"Yet, it seems now indisputable that those CIA interrogators, with their rough methods, got vital intelligence that saved American lives, as Dick Cheney has consistently contended.
According to the Washington Times, ...."
Sure, if the WT says it's so, then it's "indisputable". Why not just admit that, like nearly everyone else, you have no idea what the truth is about the CIA's methods and the results those methods have produced? You don't know what has been done in our names by the CIA and an article in the Times is evidence of nothing more than that the Times published the article.
I don't need any "rough men" torturing, threatening or killing people in order for me to sleep well at night. If you do, maybe you need to turn off the TV and stop reading propaganda rags like the WT, the NYT and the WP.
I think you're being unfair to Pat. All he's saying is that this is a party political vendetta and not a human rights crusade, as Holder would have us believe. As for you not needing 'rough men', are you saying that armies and police departments are unnecessary?
lol. No, it's not "all he's saying." He's once again rallying around to the side of the very interventionist neocon fellow travellers who marginalized him and America First-ism from the GOP.
There should be a term like Stockholm Syndrome invented for Pat's flaw in this area.
Fair enough, i suppose. I do think Pat has had trouble differentiating the Republican party of his youth from the neocon vehicle it is today. However, his point still stands, this is Holder going after Bush/Cheney in order to satisfy the Democratic far left, not an attempt to serve justice.
In the good old days of the USSR, it was routine for the new power elite to issue denunciations and launch purges against their predecessors. Hallelujah! We are now witnessing a swing toward puritanical, progressive socialism. Alexander Solzhenitsyn warned people this would happen immediatley after his settling in Vermont. The question is; do we go with the flow or offer up weak resistance?
Etienne Gervaise,
As is usually true, I agree with your observation:" The question is; do we go with the flow or offer up weak resistance?"
The worst of "conservatives" are going with the flow and the best can offer only weak resisitance. Chronicles is one of the best but it is small, suspected and countered by ten thousand voices of chaos for every single truth it utters. What I like about Alexander Cockburn is not his proposed solutions, but his honest observations. What I can never quite understand about Pat is why he still feels obligated to defend men who were so much a part of his demise within the republican ranks. Before Pat left for the Reform party in 2000, W. Bush said he wished Pat would stay in the Republican primaries so he could "whip him good." This meant of course he would never allow Pat in the debates, would use his influence with the republican party to raise the bar to 15% of registered voters to qualify for the national debate, appointed Dick Cheney to vet potential vice-presidential candidates, and invited Christine Todd Whitman to make the republican appeal for life at the national convention.
One note of curiosity is whether Alan Dershowitz who was another proponent of torture (as was Pat) will now come to the defense of Bush/Cheney. My guess is the same as yours, they will either go with the flow or offer weak resisitance. The problem with quoting Alexander Solzhenitsyn is that he knew what he was speaking about, neo-cons and duopolists rely upon the fact that most people do not until it is too late.
#1. Since Obama is in power, you are finally able to sleep like a baby. Thank God.
Mr. Bailey, your repeated attempts to suggests that anyone who disagrees with you must support Obama are getting tiresome. Scratch that—they were tiresome even before the election when you tried to claim that I was doing so when I raised points of concern about John McCain and Sarah Palin.
I doubt that you would find any regular commenter on ChroniclesMagazine.org who voted for Obama. Give it a rest.
Let the dems have Bush and Cheney. It'll save real conservatives the time and energy of having to unmask and unseat the neo-con/one-worlder pretenders for themselves.
I'm afraid Mr. Buchanan is showing that one can only with difficulty escape the perspective set in one's formative years. Pat simply translates the Cold War mindset onto the "Global War on Terror", even as he opposes it as a grand notion.
In my view, the value of the CIA has never been proven. The claims of busting up terror plots (which are then used to expand gov't power and restrain the rights of ordinary Americans, not simply criminal aliens) must be viewed with a grain of salt.
Pat should quit fearing for the CIA bureaucrats. They seem to care first about their prerogatives. Peddling "enhanced interrogation" helped curry favor with the Bush W.H. against the queasy FBI. The notion that protecting the country animated any of the Bush WH or CIA, has little credibility. Cheney et al pushed these techniques (and the later war against Iraq) because they knew it would be an electoral bludgeon. I don't see where CIA bureaucrats deserve sympathy.
Republicans and "conservatives" seem to forget about "Big Gov't" and "faceless bureaucrats" when the agency and its bureaucrats carry guns and badges.
This Holder story just means the worm has turned. But it's still a worm.
The broad sway of comments here concede the political spectrum in self-defeating ways. If that sounds too oblique, let me just point out that
Glen Greenwald, published in Buchanan's American Conservative for the right reasons, represents a healthy vibrant part of the anti-imperial Left which considers the Obama/Holder machinations a possible purposeful effort to sidetrack deserved punishment for the likes of Cheney and an effort to sustain the powers of the Police State.
Mr. Richert, I remember that you were telling me back then that Obama was not gonna raise taxes. Then you were telling me how the bailout of GM was a good thing and that you did not agree on my Stockholm Syndrome theory on the Obama voters. Now I suggest to you that many more of the commenters on this site voted for Obama than you think. As for me, I had no enthusiasm for McCain/Palin, but I am always concerned about the consistent progress that the Statists, Socialists or in other words Marxists, are able to achieve due to the unwillingness of the Conservatives to engage in activism against the Democrats. Conservatives also need to free themselves of Marxist inspired delusions that were snuck in by others into their world view. There is no need to redefine Conservatism which is what some are trying do, because it is already defined in our Constitution. What we need to do is to spread the word and not put down those who are. When we are doing so, putting down other Conservatives because they are supposedly shills for the Republican party and big business, opportunists, racists or just plain stupid, we are helping Obama and this is what is happening with some of the posters and columnists here. So I am trying to point out the effect of their statements. The comment that I have posted at #7, I believe is appropriate. I don't see how one can claim to be any type of Conservative if one is constantly attacking a variety of conservative voices including Pat, Tom and Mr. Murchinson on this site, while delighting in Cockburn's putdowns of Conservatives. (I will leave PCR out of this because I have a great respect for him, but am lately saddened by the way in which he, let's just say, always stops short of hitting the target.)
As for the concern that we need to have for the CIA. The CIA needs to be what it is. It is doing a difficult job under difficult circumstances. I sleep very well knowing that those that are running it are running it the way they are. Those who are criticizing the CIA are malcontents. They don't wish the CIA to be successful, because it does not fit in their worldview, which is essentially Marxist, that the world is run by a cabal of rich bankers, that the US constitution is a hoax, that the rich get richer and the poor get poorer and I can go on. I realize that a Paleo is supposed to have no sacred cows and that he prides himself on ability to connect different ideas in very original ways and that the goal is to come up with brilliant insights and I appreciate that. But the outlook of a Paleo needs to stay Conservative if it is to be effective. That is may main concern and why I post what I post. I hope you do not continue to take all this the wrong way, as I support the Chronicles.
#11. Perfectly illustrates my point.
Mr. Richert, I remember that you were telling me back then that Obama was not gonna raise taxes.
Mr. Bailey, if you remember such a thing, you should be able to find the statement and quote me. I never claimed such a thing—what idiot would think that Obama wouldn't raise taxes? If you cannot prove otherwise, please retract your statement.
Then you were telling me how the bailout of GM was a good thing
Again, something I never said. I did go on record as saying that government-backed loans (not a bailout) might be the least bad of all options. That's as far as I ever went. Again, feel free to prove me wrong, and if you cannot, please retract your statement.
you did not agree on my Stockholm Syndrome theory on the Obama voters
That is certainly true. You're batting one for three. But disagreeing with you is not the same as supporting Obama, which is how you consistently portray those who disagree with you.
As for your other points, what you refuse to understand is that some of us—many of us? most of us?—see those that you think are "spreading the word" as simply "lite" versions of Obama, et al.. You write that "Conservatives also need to free themselves of Marxist inspired delusions that were snuck in by others into their world view," but the people whom you keep telling us we should not attack—Dick Cheney, for instance—are precisely those who snuck those delusions into mainstream conservatism.
PJB is right that there is a resemblance here to an Orwell book. However, the book is Animal Farm and the analogy is that the Republicans morphed into the enemy they fought during the Cold War. The interrogation methods that Cheney and his fellow militarists are so zealous for were plagiarized directly from those used by the Chinese Communists during the Korean War against American soldiers. As I've written here before, the operative ideology of today's Republicans is Unitary Executive Theory, i.e., one man rule as it is advocated by neocons.
We prosecuted our enemies from past wars for doing what Cheney promoted. Any Chronicles supporter who deludes themself that this was done for their benefit is delusional. Conservatives are merely the voting herd that radicals like Cheney have to draw upon in order to get the tools of power necessary to put into effect their dreams of domination. Just as their preferred contractor, Blackwater (I won't use their nom de guerre), hires foreigners for their proposed assassination teams who would have no qualms being used against domestic "unlawful enemy combatants," radicals like Cheney have no loyalty to this country either.
Unfortunately, the offense that should be investigated, but won't, is treason, by virtually all of the Republican establishment. The
Washington Times had the following headline on August 28, 2009:
Chalabi Aide Tied To Shi'ite Terrorists
Iran-backed league accused of killing Marines
Remember Ahmad Chalabi? Dubya's pal. And Iranian handler apparently. Who is responsible for causing so much military and financial harm to this country under the influence of this Iranian agent of influence. Dubya, under Cheney's sinister influence, as directed by Chalabi.
That is the viewpoint we need to taake. Furthermore, who created a precedent that American soldiers are no longer entitled to the protections of the Geneva Conventions? Again, the Cheney Gang.
It is sad to see PJB eagerly trying to join the gang after he led the resistance so valiantly, until recently. This Gang has done irreparable harm to America and they must be repudiated entirely. Finally, this morning, on Good Morning Joe, Joe Scarborough made it official. Charles Krauthammer, not David Brooks, is the official ideologist of "conservatives." With that, political conservatism is dead, and deservedly so. Maybe "Classical Liberalism," what our Constitution represents, isn't so bad.
Mr. Richert, I do not wish to fight with you over what you said and did not say and definitely not on technical grounds. These are the impressions you left me with, you are welcome to review them yourself in the threads and come to your conclusion why I said what I said. I am standing by my statements, I understand your lack of confort with Palin/ McCain but I don't understand the apathy.
As far as the order of the discussion on these pages, nobody is disagreeing with me. I am doing the disagreeing, whether it is the atrocious smears made by your columnist on Ronald Reagan, or the delusional posts of some of the commenters whether it is a Lewinsky-Starr conspiracy or that Holder is actual purpose is to get Cheney off the hook. You be the judge whether these commenters are Obama voters or Conservatives. If you are saying that these posters vote Republican I would say that you are wrong. Moreover it is quite likely that they are plants from the likes of Media Matters.
As for your last paragraph, if you feel that someone like Mark Levin is a "lite" version of Obama, I beg to differ. Nothing could be further from the truth. In my view, he would be a far more appropriate columnist than Cockburn for the Chronicles.
The last statement that "Dick Cheney, for instance—are precisely those who snuck those delusions into mainstream conservatism", I could not disagree with you more and I am not a fan of Cheney's either. And even if it were true, the posters that are obsessed with Cheney would be equally hostile toward any similarly endowed Republican that gets the things done. That is not to say that Dick Cheney is Ronald Reagan or that he is above criticism. But he is not the enemy. The Marxist are and Comrade Obama in particular. BY ATTACKING OUR OWN THE DEMOCRATS WIN.
In closing I have one more question: Why is it that the CIA is constantly being investigated by the Democrat administrations? Is it because there are irregularities or because they want to discredit American foreign policy and spread the Marxist dominion to those countries like Honduras that are resisting it? Ronald Reagan managed to contain communism in Latin America for a generation even tough he almost got empeached by the Democrats over it. So Why do we have to have a discussion about whether Obama and Cheney are on the same page when it comes to Marxism? It is just not so.
Mr. Richert, I must say I am getting a little tired of this, but I want to show you something in case you did not read it. What in the world is this commenter little ways above talking about? Where do these ideas come from? How is this in any way connected with Conservatism? YOu wanna tell me that this commenter votes Republican? It is more likely an Obama voter! I am referring to these:
"radicals like Cheney have no loyalty to this country either."
"American soldiers are no longer entitled to the protections of the Geneva Conventions"
"Charles Krauthammer, not David Brooks, is the official ideologist of “conservatives.” With that, political conservatism is dead, and deservedly so. Maybe “Classical Liberalism,” what our Constitution represents, isn’t so bad"
and does it sound that this commenter likes PAT who is according to him apparently getting paid off:
"It is sad to see PJB eagerly trying to join the gang after he led the resistance so valiantly, until recently."
So please do not begrudge me for trying to point these things out. Pat is constantly getting hammered here for his posts and so are Tom Piatak and Bill Murchinson and it is always for the wrong reasons.
Jack,
What Cheney did is cook the books about Iraq and their weapons of mass destruction in order to stir up support for a war of choice against a country that did not want war with us, did not attack us and has left thousands of young American men and women dead or lame as a consequence. Then when folks working for the CIA told the truth about uranium shipments from Niger, he had his Chief of Staff, Scooter Libby, go after the CIA and take the technical foul for his Ole Ball Coach. When the President commuted the prison portion of Mr. Libby's sentence but did not pardon him as the principle participant of Mr. Cheneny's scheme, Mr. Cheney continued to add to the Presidential burdens by pressing the issue until the very last days of the Mr. Bush's term.
As you say, Mr. Cheney was not in over his head, rather he was an experienced Washington insider, republican operative and representative of a kind of fraudulent conservatism so dear to the hearts and minds of many like yourself. Or in your own words,"When we are putting down other Conservatives because they are supposedly shills for the Republican party and big business, opportunists, racists or just plain stupid, we are helping Obama." and thus Obama was elected. With such an acute analysis comes the sad conclusion that your gripe is with Cheney and the republicans who have betrayed your naive, but sincere and honest faith in large governments morphing into empires. Killing the messenger of bad news and horrible truths is a normal human reaction ever since Noah was embarrased by his drunken, nakedness in his own tent before his very own sons who covered him in his sleep out of respect. But the small graces and recognition for what is, can and often do lead to a truth that sets one free of unhappy delusions and misplaced faith. Thank God that Chronicles and many of its readers and columnists represent a faith in something greater than themselves or the party line, I suggest an avid and energetic citizen such as yourself give it a try someday "for heaven and the republics sake."
And, I have to add, citing Orwell in this instance is silly. Buchanan himself has denied that terrorism is other than a tactic or that it presents an "existential threat" as did communism.
Frankly, his quote of Orwell sounds more like Demi Moore's silly soliloquoy in a "Few Good Looking Men" when she pines for Gitmo Marines as ones who stand on the wall.
You'll pardon me if I'm too much a man to get so worried about OBL, Mehsud, et al that I rush girlishly into Cheney's embrace as "a man who does dirty, necessary work."
I know I'm half PJB's age, but grow up. This is all just about politics. The Bush/Cheney GWOT was just about politics. If there's a "get Cheney" squad, that's just about politics. Maybe middle Americans will realize that these political men don't care a whit for them except that their sons man their military adventures (whether in Iraq or Afghanistan.)
Maybe Mr. Bailey could name even one commentator in these posts who voted for Obama. That doesn't mean that all of us voted Republican - I voted for Chuck Baldwin in the general election. But then Pastor Baldwin advocates withdrawing all US forces stationed outside the country and returning them home - a genuine anti-imperialist stand which probably makes him, in Mr. Bailey's eyes, a Marxist.
Mr. Richert, I do not wish to fight with you over what you said and did not say and definitely not on technical grounds.
So truth, Mr. Bailey, is "technical grounds"?
There's no reason to fight. You claimed that I told you specific things—not that I left you certain "impressions," whatever that may mean. So now, you have a choice—you can find lines that I wrote that specifically say what you claim I said, or you can retract your statements.
If you do neither, but simply repeat that "I am standing by my statements," then I have really no choice but to believe that you are simply uninterested in the truth.
YOu wanna tell me that this commenter votes Republican? It is more likely an Obama voter!
Or it's possible that he simply did not vote for either Obama or McCain. Again, you jump to the conclusion that anyone who disagrees with you or whose words you do not like supports Obama.
It wasn't true when you were talking about me, and I very much doubt that it's true of any of the commenters on this site.
I don't want to stick my hand into a dog fight, but I think this squabble is worth having.
I delayed my paid subscription to Chronicles for a long time, in part because as a grad student, I watch even $24 closely, but mostly because it took me a long time to feel confident in the loyalties and beliefs of Chronicles.
This group is mainly critical. "My enemy's enemy is my friend" is an ancient truth very difficult to totally disavow. Many resources on this site are devoted to criticizing the Marxists that Mr. Bailey is so concerned with. But many (maybe more?) are devoted to criticizing the NeoCons. Although both are in each current political party, maybe in each politician, their concentrations are pretty different. Chronicles, for example, has a whole column devoted to knocking the NRO. There is no similar column devoted to knocking a Marxist rag. Maybe there are good reasons for that I'm not familiar with, all I'm saying is to a practical mind, it can become disorienting.
The auto bailout might be an example. Mr. Richert, I'm sure you are right about your literal ("technical") statements during the auto bailout -- I do remember that time well since I argued against you during some of it. Whether to you it was the least bad option or a positive idea is a substantial difference only to theologians and philosophers, not to practical people. The end result was that you argued vociferously for it.
Many, though perhaps not the contributors, on this site are much more critical of PJB than they are of BHO, and that bears noting.
Mr. McCabe,
The reason I note the follies of NRO on this website is because I used to relay them to Sam Francis when we talked on the phone, and Sam suggested it would be a good idea to write them up.
I would never have voted for Obama, who was rattling the sword against Afghanistan during the campaign. Nor McCain and am glad Ron Paul counselled against doing so. A Paul/Kucinich ticket I would have considered, Nader and/or Baldwin. The ruling class must be disempowered.
I wonder if Buchanan is obvivious to former Powell aide Col. Lawrence Wilkerson's testimony that torture worked alright-in gaining false confessions linking Saddam to al Qaeda, a Cheney goal.
Mr. Hoop,
I have the misfortune of living in Dennis Kucinich's congressional district. He is skillful only at grandstanding and self-promotion. He nearly ruined Cleveland when he was mayor, he has shamefully turned his back on the unborn to curry favor with his leftist fans in Hollywood, and just today endorsed the former head of the Ohio Communist Party in his bid for a seat on Cleveland City Council.
Whether to you it was the least bad option or a positive idea is a substantial difference only to theologians and philosophers, not to practical people.
No, Mr. McCabe, it was precisely the opposite. Some of us were looking at the practical effects that a collapse of the U.S. auto industry would have, and trying to figure out how to avoid the worst of them. Meanwhile, those committed to a certain economic philosophy were unwilling to look at the practical effects—or, worse yet, were celebrating them.
By the way, Mr. McCabe, we had this little exchange back during the discussion of government-backed loans to the Big Three:
And frankly, that's what happened.
@ #23, "Many, though perhaps not the contributors, on this site are much more critical of PJB than they are of BHO, and that bears noting."
Bears noting. Why? What is unusual about criticizing apostates to the principles for which one stands and that they, the apostate, professes to stand for. I have no reason to criticize a Marxist for not having a correct understanding of marxism. As a conservative though, I certainly should criticize those who claim to speak for me if what they say is harmful to the principles that I stand for and believe in. We all know the consequences of the Trojan Horse. A healthy conservatism will expel a bacillus when it attempts a political take over; an unhealty one becomes consumed by the bacillus.
@24, Mr. Piatak, thanks for the background. The more I learn about Sam Francis, the more I want to learn about him.
@27, Mr. Richert, I am not trying to alter or pervert your original arguments. I was trying to show the difficulty in establishing a practical argument around here -- the same kind of practicality you more eloquently pulled off about the auto industry. Although I too tire of Mr. Bailey's dogged attacks that by mad repetition seem out of place, I do think the source of his frustration is a valid concern and a somewhat consistent part of Chronicles. I am plenty open to practical concerns, whether they are yours at the micro level of lost jobs or his at the macro level of political opposition.
@28, I think whether that has actually happened remains to be seen.
@29, Todd, first off, thanks for "bacillus", I had to look that one up. Second, I am often struck by the Trojan horse argument, for example, that Reagan opened the door for the NeoCons to infest conservatism (or more directly, the GOP), yet I am then surprised with the resistance the inverted argument is rejected, that paleocons could concoct a Trojan horse of their own.
That a public wrapping would be necessary for this to happen seems to be a stumbling block for many. And until a viable face or name is found, PJB might remain the closest thing to it for now. Yet he is constantly lambasted here for his political suggestions. (When he plays the historian, it's another matter.) I can only imagine how the good Dr. Ron Paul would be treated if he posted anything here that stepped over and into the realm of libertarian. Yet, Mr. Cockburn is interesting.
Otherwise, if you think a politician will ever speak (and act) entirely for you, then it is probably best to give up political discourse entirely.
Pat is an outstanding historian, historically dissecting the consequences of militarism and imperialism. Unfortunately, when his focus shifts to the present, he refuses to reconsider his identity as a "conservative," in spite of what that term now describes politically. Consequently, he is unable to see that the "conservative" pals he promotes by not challenging their brand of conservatism, as he did on this site a couple weeks ago promoting "conservative" authors, are the descendants and current version of the militarists and imperialists he castigates in his books, and an occasional article yet. Consequently, when PJB promotes the neocons, the militarist Republicans, and the Fox News commentators; poor Pat should get, and deserves, the same scorn merited by the commentators. He cannot be their propagandist without associating himself with the ideas he promotes.
I often wonder why I read the comments at this site. One fellow seems to believe that everybody associated with Chronicles must be supporters of Obama because they are not Republican zealots. Another informs us that everyone here only criticizes, before launching into a criticism of the site and everyone associated with it. Yet another feels it his duty to contradict everyone, an arrogance so absurd that he actually argues history with Dr. Wilson, an eminent historian. I cannot fathom why these people bother to visit this site unless they feel it is their duty to set straight our misguided and ignorant notions. Though they win no converts, they never seem to give up. They are like a stubborn fly flitting off and on my face, an aggravation that just will not go away.
The real 'difficulty' in pulling off an argument around practicality seems to be that the un-informed and ill-informed seem to want to say something and then proceed to rage on about something they don't even remotely comprehend. They quickly tire of learning about it and then declare the subject 'academic' and unsolvable.
Men more wise than me have stated on this site: plenty of people would do better just staying quiet and learning from the discussion at hand rather than injecting their meritless thoughts.
"The reason I note the follies of NRO on this website is because I used to relay them to Sam Francis when we talked on the phone, and Sam suggested it would be a good idea to write them up"
He was right. Please do not stop. There are millions of people in America with truly conservative inclinations who support the GOP out of habit, swallowing whole its propaganda unquestioningly. Criticism of that propaganda - and of the "news" organs that serve as megaphones for it - is profoundly important.
I agree with S.L. Toddard. I believe this is exactly the right forum for Mr. Piatak to speak truth to establishment lies, Mr. Richert to encourage candor and give real facts about manufacturing, and Dr. Fleming to teach about our common history. I certainly hope they won't be dissuaded by the chorus of negativity and confusion that occasionally errupts. I personally believe there are many silently reading and learning here.
Eagle (et al), if your comments are directed at mine, then you have gotten me all wrong. I'm not trying to dissuade anyone -- certainly not the gentlemen you mentioned -- from doing what they do so well. I am trying to fan the flames in fact.
I have probably benefited more from the destruction of neocon fallacies around here than anything else, but it is boring and unproductive when commenters rail an author for building the slightest bridges with other "conservatives". And at the same time, the tone and content of some of the articles posted here give off a misleading or confusing first impression if honest conservatives are to be continually brought into the fold and educated. Dr. Phillips pointed that out well about the current PCR article. It is a tough line to balance, and I certainly do not have the answer.
I wonder if Tom Piatek knows Sam Francis was harshly critical of right-to-life as a false front non-opposition movement and regarded abortion as a tangential issue. Also that Bernie Sanders and Ron Paul work together on the audit the Federal Reserve issue. Or that
if you go to youtube and review the old Soviet National Anthem public performances and contrast them with the contemporary minority-inflected ghettoized US National Anthem renditions, you will get a hint the Soviet was a conservative force whereas the worldwide culturally dysgenic American runaway capitalist/materialist force serves as a revolutionary disintegrating mechanism of the worst kind.
Sorry for the near-duplicate if the earlier Sept 2 post wasn't deleted. It did not appear when I initially checked the site. Please delete the latter if the former is running, as even now it reads "awaiting moderation"
"I wonder if Tom Piatek knows Sam Francis was harshly critical of right-to-life as a false front non-opposition movement and regarded abortion as a tangential issue."
Sam wanted something practical done about it and recognized the Republicans were using the issue to draw conservative and southern democrats into a box canyon where they would be nibbled to death by talking ducks known as "neo-cons" on the one hand and allow the take over of the democratc party easier for the multi-cultural, death merchants on the other. He knew if it went back to the states that the red states would reject it and that it might do the blue states some good to kill each other off. I have heard this repeated about Sam over and over again but it is a false flag to suggest that Sam Francis disagreed with the two thousand year old christian tradition of not exposing infants. Furthermore,he was right about abortion being a tangential issue to a whole perspective about human living that the neo-conservatives only vaguely understood and the left openly and honestly despised and wanted destroyed.
This is the kind of stuff that baffles me about Pat. In the American Conservative in 2004 he wrote the election article calling on for the election of Bush, saying it is "time to come home". I believe he did the same for McCain again last year. McCain was one of the men that led the charge for running him out of the GOP in 2000. Then on Morning Joe he pals around with his idiot sidekicks laughing and joking around then says the bailouts were necessary, etc. His American Conservative was built around being anti war anti torture and now he writes that it has kept us safe at night?