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 A new conservatism has swept the Republicans to power in the late 20th Century. It is likely that the GOP still relies most on traditional constituencies like big business, libertarians, and Country Club Republicans who want tax breaks and smaller government. What has put them over the top has been many votes of the New Right, which represents the newest manifestation of right-wing populism in the United States. Add to that the hard work of the not- so- numerous Neoconservatives, who have excelled at polemics, generating fresh ideas, and selling so-called neo-liberal economics. Other factors contributing to the conservative triumph are a well financed information machine, skillful use of cognitive psychology and advertising techniques, and Democratic ineptitude.

 

RIGHT-WING POPULISM: THE GOP'S MOST POTENT WEAPON

After the 2004 defeat of John Kerry, many concluded that it was how one spoke about cultural issues that made the difference, and that George W. Bush’s appeal to conservative religious people explained what had happened. In fact, a more powerful and complex force was at work in establishing Republican dominance in the United States, right-wing populism as embodied in the New Right. At work was much more than many people responding to several hot button, values-laden issues. The Democrats were up against a complex, powerful social movement that took decades to build and a mind-set that will prove very difficult to change. True, the outlook of the Christian right lends itself to right-wing populism, but they are two different but closely related phenomena. Today’s incarnation of Right-wing populism is equated with evangelical religion, but it could stand alone as it frequently does in Europe. Right-wing populism is at the heart of the New Right’s identity and is largely a reaction against social change and comes wrapped as ultra-Americanism and assertive nationalism, which got a great boost from the terrible events of September 11, 2001.

Failing to fully understand what they were up against, some Democrats slightly toned down their support for all forms of abortion, and many of them acquired a book on cognitive linguistics that correctly showed that Republicans were very skilled at recasting unpopular policies in favorable langage and at "branding" Democrats as very undesirable political products. The reading will do them some good, but it is necessary for them to learn much more about right-wing populism.

The main elements of populism are celebrating "the people" and battling elites. American right-wing populists believe the country is dominated by an elitist coalition of big government bureaucrats, old money aristocrats, and the so-called "New Class" of academicians, intellectuals, media people, and technocrats. The belief that the elite looks down on other Americans gives right-wing populism its great force which is expressed in anger, resentment, and determination to go to the polls and strike a blow against their enemies. The elitists are accused of trying to destroy American culture, and the New Right sees a nation divided by two starkly different cultures, one good and one evil. The term "liberal" has been redefined to mean people who are trying to overturn traditional American culture by supporting moral relativism, permissiveness, softness on crime, pornography, abortion, homosexuality, euthanasia, and stem cell research. It is a simplistic black and white picture that bears little resemblance to reality but, with the help of a small army of propagandists, pundits and preachers, it has become the core frame of reference for the New Right. While Ann Coulter, Rush Limbaugh, and FOX NEWS readily come to mind, it should be recalled that these messages are
repeated daily by hundreds of Christian radio stations, Christian Broadcasting Network, and five smaller evangelical cable networks.
 
 Growing belief that liberals are conspiring to undermine American culture and are contemptuous of ordinary Americans has generated paranoia and rage which has activated the New Right and enabled it to grow steadily as a political force over three decades. The fear and loathing of so-called elitists and their alleged plans to destroy American culture is far more important in motivating political action than particular issues like abortion or gay marriage.

American right-wing populism’s four main characteristics are majoritarianism– even in defiance of constitutional government, anti-elitism, intense nationalism, and anti-intellectualism. Historically, populism has led to anti-Semitism and racism. Polish writer Adam Michnik suggested that populism always contains an element of envy and employs demagoguery. When mixed with intense nationalism, it can produce fascism. However, it is likely that right populism would lose some of its charm in the United States if it were to spawn overt and excessive authoritarianism and obvious anti-Semitism or racism.

In the past, forms of populism in the United States have burned themselves out fairly quickly because they soon were manifesting more than a little bizarre and outrageous behavior. This latest incarnation has steadily grown over three decades, and zealous followers have been kept on somewhat acceptable paths by an army of radio talk show hosts, pundits, and very adept political managers. It has been no small accomplishment.

American right-wing populism it is very attractive to small entrepreneurs and ordinary Americans, often members of the white working class. In both Europe and America white males from the working class were particularly attracted to populism. They faced job insecurity and declining standards of living, and, especially in the United States, they resented the loss of privileges that had traditionally flowed from their status as white males. Yearning for the restoration of their roles as defenders and providers, some American men even joined militias, extremist organizations that display the repressive dimensions of right-wing populism when carried too far.

In the United States, however, right-wing populism appealed to an element that was not so important in Europe–evangelical, fundamentalist, and traditional Christianity. What has developed is, in the words of Italian writer Emilio Gentile defined "political religion, " defined as the use of religion , its language and symbols for political combat. The Christian adherents of the new right-wing populism have been called the Religious or Christian Right. Forty-two percent of American voters describe themselves as born-again, and about 75% of them have come to support the Republican party. In time the majority of traditionalist Catholics joined them on the religious right. It was unified by opposition to abortion, stem cell research, euthanasia, and homosexual practice. Some members of the Christian Right differ from non-religious right-wing populists in that they are interested in eroding the wall separating church and state, and they are even more opposed to an open society. A few on the Christian Right adhere to "dominionism," the belief that true Christians must acquire political power and lead the nation by carrying our their biblical principles.

The Christian Right took shape in the 1970, and were helped come into being by conservative operatives and strategists Paul Weyrich, Richard Viguerie, E.E. McAteer, and Howard Phillips. Their strategy proved to be so effective that one would expect it to have been hatched by several brilliant sociologists. In an 1976 interview, Viguerie said they were busy building support among evangelicals and getting "preachers into politics." They focused on ministers like Reverend Jerry Falwell, who believed America was being ruled by the "wicked." Christian Voice, an important evangelical group, was then saying that America was being attacked by "Satanist forces." This kind of black and white thinking did not invite dialogue, only fear, anger, and determination to seize power. By 2005, members of the Christian Right were announcing that those who opposed efforts to strip Democratic Senators of the right to filibuster against Republican judicial nominees were enemies of God. Republican Congressman Christopher Shays admitted that his party had been transformed into the "party of theocracy." Former Senator John Danforth, an Episcopal priest, observed that his party had been transformed "into the political arm of conservative Christians."

In most respects, there was a meshing of views and attitudes between the evangelicals and the right-wing populists. Even many members of the evangelical Churches, while usually voting for Republicans, were much more inclined to agree with their ministers on the evils of feminism or abortion than on other questions. Perhaps they were acting at the polls more as right-wing populists than as evangelicals, but certainly the appeals to the Religious Right helped activate their populism. Whether as evangelicals or as populists, they were equally disposed to demand that the United States take a more assertive role in world affairs, and they were frustrated when foreign countries failed to heed the leadership of this virtuous nation. Both were likely to see the Vietnam War a noble venture. For decades, this burning nationalism or what scholars call "foreign policy fundamentalism" bad been firmly suppressed by a bipartisan foreign policy establishment. With the election of George W. Bush, those favoring a far more aggressive and assertive foreign policy took power, and public outrage over the terrible events of September 11, 2001 made it possible for them to implement their policies. For some on the Christian Right, the invasion of Iraq was predicted in the Book of Revelation and should be seem as a large step toward the events of end times when one third of humankind is slain and millions of sinners are sent to eternal hellfire and torment.

It is unclear how far and how fast right-wing populism can continue to spread across a population. It is growing by leaps in bounds in Islamic countries, where conditions are more than ripe for its spread. Experience in the United States has demonstrated its steady growth, and the continual spread of evangelical Christianity seems to prepare its way for still more New Right growth. In the 1950s, people who held views similar to those of the New right were considered part of the so-called lunatic fringe. By the 1980s, there were many more of these people, but their views were not considered mainstream. Today, the New Right dominates the nation’s most powerful political party and has reason to claim that its outlook is becoming that of mainstream America.

The New Right, Right-Wing Populism, and Displaced Economic Anxiety

Historically, movements for social change have often been instruments of status groups that felt an intense need to assert and legitimize their identities. Right wing populism, here in the form of the New Right and abroad, usually is fed by the bitterness and frustration of people facing status loss. These people do not want to be like people in the so-called "blue" states; they are simply intent upon expressing their identity as "decent" people and their anger over being mistreated because of that decency. Their status group anger has been framed in terms of authenticity. They are the real Americans as opposed to the phoneys.

Economic stagnation and the breakdown of welfare capitalism in the United States disoriented millions of people, who sought answers and affirmation of their identities. One might expect them to drift into a political movement that clearly and directly addressed their situation. However, cultural arguments touch people more deeply, and they were to accept an ideology that somewhat tangentially offered them some economic relief. In Europe, those who lost their jobs, faced great insecurity or had to accept less income and benefits are loosely called the "abandoned workers." In the United States, there is a very broad definition of middle class, and the New Right here is considered a middle class phenomenon. Among the recruits to
right-wing populism were many Reagan Democrats, who faced great economic insecurity but also believed their cultural and religious values were under assault.

What has emerged in the last thirty years, is a self-conscious status group in the United States, the members of which would not object to the descriptive term "Middle America." Over time, this vast status group became desperate and anxious, believing their social and economic positions were slipping or in danger of slipping.. These middle class Americans developed a sub-culture or collective consciousness made up of orientations that guide their actions, particularly at election time. These orientations represent a form of conservative populism. Invariably, conservative populists identified their own fates with that of the nation, which also faced very grave threats. They, like their nation, were virtuous and deserved primacy among other people and nations. Their opponents were not just somewhat wrong, they were "evil."

Max Weber argued that there is a strong need for psychic comfort or a feeling of established worthiness. He thought that class consciousness was essentially "psychological thoughts of men about their lives. " In this instance, we are not dealing with a class. Status groups also a very similar form of consciousness, and in the late Twentieth Century marketing and other techniques that make it possible to frame information and arguments in such a way as to shape the content of that consciousness. Weber believed the most compelling ideologies developed when a powerful set of ideas were taken up by the disadvantaged. That is why it was so important to persuade a vast slice of middle Americans, regardless of their economic status, that they are somehow disadvantaged.

Today, the party of the right-wing populists controls every branch of the national government state governments. Nevertheless, the anger of the right-wing populists has not abated because they believe that the media, press, universities, and entertainment are still dominated by liberals who are committed to destroying American culture. To some degree the belief that they are conspired against victims is a tonic and confers upon them special identities. They cannot congratulate themselves on their political success or the fact that the press largely has been intimidated into soft-pedalling or ignoring stories that would offend conservatives. Their radio and television shockmeisters continually remind them that they are not safe as long as there is a Hillary Clinton or Ted Kennedy in the Senate or as long as The New York Times or Washington Post remain in print.

Cultural crusades have been powered by anxiety rooted in economic and status tensions. Concern over economic and status questions is redirected to cultural quests where the chances of success seem greater. At work is an historical process that somehow displaced feelings of deep economic anxieties, which reappeared as cultural resentments. The "somehow" means we cannot explain how or why it happened other than to note that these occurrences from Roman times forward can best be seen as examples of the irrational and unconscious in history. What can be called psycho-cultural climates exist in history, as the great Lucien Febvre suggested, but the followers of Clio have made little progress in deciphering t hem. Intense stress and fear that one was losing control of ones destiny generates the emotional energy that drives these psycho-historical situations. Going back even farther than the Romans, we find examples of oppressed peoples becoming somehow "Gods’s elect." Arguably this occurred in the case of the ancient Jews. Historians have developed the formula "oppressed people, elect people." Elect, of course, meant chosen. In the modern American setting, the word "elect" is both an adjective and a verb.

The rise of the New Right had some of the characteristics of a half-political, half-religious revival. A psychohistorian would say that revivalism is sometimes "a symptom of incipient regression in a life of a community under conditions of stress." The revival need not always take a religious form, for example contemporary Rumania seems to be going through a period of great anxiety that is producing a revival of old songs, ballads, and dances, and interest in imaginary heroes of the past. In the contemporary American case, the religious revivals of the 19th Century are being reenacted in modern form and the laissez faire economics of the robber baron heroes are recast as the essentials of American tradition. Of course, the United States is very different from Romania. Yet both have entered periods when radical cultural reorganization, when the corporate spirit has declined and many have not quite figured out how to cope with the fre4edom and individualism that came with it. Some experience an intense need to belong which adherence to the New Right satisfies. ( In fourth century BCE Athens, a similar period of anxiety and transition occurred and many reacted by joining the new mystery cults while others embraced a greater degree of secularism.)

In the case of contemporary America, economic anxiety occurred after a period of great abundance and what seemed to be the promise of continued affluence– fulfillment of the American Dream. It occurred simultaneously with the emergence of postmodern culture, which brought in its wake ambiguity and contradiction in respect to values. A great majority of the same people experiencing economic anxiety were also troubled by new threats to their values. Perhaps some found the new mental freedom an invitation to inner anarchy, as Adorno noted half a century ago. In any event, they lacked the mental structures to address the cultural disorientation of the period and its potential threats in matters of conscience. Some probably found that their central cultural and religious beliefs were not as strong as they had though and that they craved a consistent and rigorous way of thinking. They were unprepared for a pluralistic culture and moral ambiguities. The crusade of the New Right seemed to resolve these inner conflicts and allowed them to cope with the anxieties of these times.
 

The New Right in Historical Context

The right-wing populism of the New Right shares many characteristics with the right-wing populism in Europe and right-wing populism in the American past. Among the commonalities are a sense of victimhood, intense nationalism, fear of cultural pluralism, and the potential for acceptance of conspiracy theories and authoritarianism.

In 1984 ,the French National Front became the first European right-populist party to escape marginalization at the polls by combining nationalist xenophobia with ant-government establishment nationalism. The combination of these issues represented a successful "master frame"– as the European scholars call it, which was soon copied by emerging similar parties in Europe. They were also partially successful in overcoming the stigma of anti-democratic policies, authoritarianism, and biological racism that they inherited from similar movements earlier in the Twentieth Century. These parties attracted largely working class voters, people who generally would have stayed with left and socialist parties had then shown any inclination to address the economic threats posed by postindustrial society.

Once convinced that their old parties could not or would not deal with the problems growing out of the global economy, these voters looked to express their concerns about declining social status and threats to their cultural values. Biological racism is no longer acceptable in Europe, so these new parties adopt what some call "culturalracism," but they claim not to go beyond pointing out that new subcultures are incompatible with the European heritage. The claim that the new subcultures would bring about the extinction of the older European tradition caused great fear and rage, emotions likely to cement political affiliations and mobilize voters. Anti-political establishment populism was very attractive to them because they were convinced that the liberals and socialists in power no longer cared about them and richly deserved punishment. Leaders of the new right-populist parties portrayed themselves as being outside the political class. People who have lost faith in government and their old political party are more likely to form new cognitive routes to interpret reality.

It is difficult to establish how much racism attends right-wing populism in the United States. It is rarely an overt element, and appeals to it are masked at as calls for law and order and criticisms of people who are alleged to lack the work ethic. Right-wing populism in both Europe and the United States is marked by intense nationalism, fear of cultural pluralism, and contempt for much of the heritage of the Enlightenment.

Some believe that right wing populism is an ante-room to fascism, but worries about this cannot be entertained until Republican populists have serious violated constitutionalism and deprived others of basic rights. The New Right has demonstrated strong authoritarian tendencies by drastically limiting the rights of the minority in the House of Representatives and threatening to strip the Senate minority of certain filibuster rights. There is also an on-going effort to muzzle progressive professors. The Right has consistently attempted to intimidate the media into providing coverage it considers suitable. However, none of this represents clear violations of law, and intemperate rhetoric is not an acid acid test for fascism.

Polish writer Adam Michnik suggested that populism always contains an element of envy and employs demagoguery. When mixed with intense nationalism, it can produce fascism. After 9/11 intense nationalism was wed to right- wing populism , producing an irresistible political force Populist nationalists have learned that extreme nationalist and aggressive policies can forge powerful political majorities, and they have been unable to refrain from regular use of this very effective political ploy. Provoking hatred of foreign enemies as well as fellow Americans who happen to disagree is too effective a tool not to deploy whenever necessary. Republicans used it to tar opponents as allies of terrorists and Saddam Hussein, increasing their majorities in the House and Senate and reelecting their warrior-hero George W. Bush.

The traditional conservative thinker John Lukacs wrote, "when...temperance is weak, or unenforced, or unpopular, then democracy is nothing else than populism. More precisely : then it is nationalist populism....the fundamental problem of the future." Right-wing populism easily morphed into nationalist populism. Anyone objecting to any policy claimed to be part of the war on terrorism was likely to have her patriotism questioned. Jim Gibbons, a Republican Congressman from Nebraska, was to say it was "too damn bad we didn’t buy {critics of the Iraq war} tickets to become human shields there. He also said those who complained about corporate contributions to President Bush were "communists. " Such outbursts are relatively rare because they tend to spook independent voters, but his remarks accurately reflect the spirit of nationalist populism. There were many other ways to say the same thing without alarming independents and moderates.

So far the union of right-wing populism and extreme nationalism has not produced fascism, but it has clearly threatened the health of our democratic polity. John Lukacs believes the new populism could almost destroy democracy because it so easily degenerates into the tyranny of the majority. 'Nationalism is a very low and cheap common denominator that unites people,'' Lukacs says. ''It is hatred that unites people. People take satisfaction from the idea that we are good because our enemies are evil. This is a very American syndrome, but it is also universally true of mankind.'' Lukacs was one of the few conservative intellectuals to object to Senator Joseph McCarthy; it is likely that he will have even less company this time around.

Previous manifestations of American right-wing populism have had the quality of a Roman candle. They burned brightly but fairly briefly. There were the anti-Semitic followers of Father Charles Coughlin, the anti-Communist crusaders led by Senator Joseph McCarthy who also the American WASP establishment, and the anti-black backlash populists of George C. Wallace. In many ways ,Wallace pioneered in developing many of the arguments employed by the today’s New Right. Those three movements were short lived because their extremism quickly became obvious. This lesson has been learned by right-wing populist strategist here and abroad.

Especially in the United States, the movement has continued to grow over three decades because its extremist tendencies have been somewhat contained and masked. The New Right constitutes a serious threat to democracy, and will probably result in drastically remodeling how the Congress and Executive Branch do business. Popular pressure will probably further mute the mainstream press, but in the short term official assaults on individual rights may not exceed what was accomplished in the Patriot Act. The drift toward authoritarianism will most likely be contained because rapid progress in that direction could alarm a large portion of the electorate.

 MEET THE NEOCONSERVATIVES
 . The new Republican coalition of the late Twentieth Century garnered many highly talented and zealous recruits from the ranks of the neoconservative, people who were once liberal intellectuals and former leftists who joined conservative ranks in the 1970s and after. Many of them became conservative journalists or worked for the emerging network of conservative think tanks. Some who once espoused socialism became its determined critics. They were fiercely anti-communist, supported the Vietnam War, and were put off by the New Left, which opposed the war and took cultural positions the neoconservatives denounced as destructive. These refugees from the left and liberalism found it comfortable to ally with conservatives who still believed the Cold War was not over and that the USSR was an enormous threat to the US. The have been described by suspicious conservatives as "ex-liberals, socialists, and Trotskyites, boat people from the McGovern revolution who rafted over to the GOP…." 1

There was an unsuccessful neoconservative effort in 1976 to win the Democratic presidential nomination for hawk Henry M. Jackson. Most neoconservatives migrated to the Republican party.While still liberals of different stripes, the neoconservatives -- moved away from a critique of capitalism and capitalist culture. The vast majority of them would eventually kick off all the traces of liberalism.  . With time and the increasing rightward drift of the party, the Republican neoconservatives tended to show less and less interest in economic and social justice. As they became strong advocates of neoliberal economics, they adopted the view that leaving the poor deal with market forces was preferable to their old New Dealish positions. . They had concluded that liberal solution had not worked and described them selves as liberals who had been "mugged" by reality. 2

Neoconservatives become outspoken supporters of neoliberal economics and its Social Darwinian views of society and helping the poor be responsible for themselves. They were not adverse to some state assistance in guiding the poor toward economic independence. However, it took some time for many of them to turn their backs on the New Deal heritage. As late as 1983, Irving Kristol was defending the long-standing liberal position on welfare. In time, less was heard from neoconservatives about this However there is little evidence that the neoconservatives ever got over their distaste for libertarians.3

In the 1970s, there was a great upsurge of "backlash populism" or right-wing populism that swept up many of these former left-wing intellectuals in its wake. They became Neoconservatives. In the process, some of them accepted an anti-statism, for which some unorthodox forms of Marxism had conditioned them. Others employed anti-statist language while working to enlarge governmental and executive branch power as tools for the implementation of their plans. Neoconservatives of most stripes would gradually become somewhat less distinguishable from all but the most extreme elements in the New Right. Like the New Right, they believe they are justified no using any hardball techniques to get what they want, including dirty tricks and lies. Unlike many on the New Right, they believe in expanding the federal government, and there is evidence that over time they have converted Republican colleagues on the New Right to this view. Both neoconservatives have contempt for libertarians, and both have a tendency to reshape traditional views of the constitution to suite their purposes. While the New right believes that power should be exercised by a godly and moral elite, the neoconservatives expect power to be in the hands of an elite composed of highly educated individuals who are guided by their ideology.

Neoconservatives are essentially secularists who want to preserve what is best of the Enlightenment heritage. Most are skeptics but value religion as a guarantor of order and morality. Oddly enough, some prominent Roman Catholics are neoconservatives despite the view of the dominant neoconservative view of religion. The New Right had reason to be suspicious of the neoconservatives but over time they have worked well together. In temperament, they are not as different as might be expected, as both groups tend to produce zealots and ideologues.

Neoconservative Foreign Policy

Neoconservatives were impatient with the gradual, moderate approach to foreign policy of those who pursued containment as the basic strategy for dealing with the Soviet Union. The neoconservatives were anxious to more directly confront the Soviets and to deploy American power to reshape the world to conform to American ideals. Neoconservative intellectuals had contempt for Henry Kissinger, who worked for accommodation with the Soviet Union. They were hawkish, critical of deterrence, and inclined to exaggerate the power of the Soviet Union. They were convinced that theirs’ was a righteous cause and that any many means were justified in battling Communism.

Since President Richard Nixon opened relations with China and pursued détente, there was a tendency for politicians and writers to believe the Cold War was on the way to being ended. One reason they so disliked Jimmy Carter and called him an "isolationist" and "appeaser" is that they understood that the Georgian was pursuing Nixon’s policy of defusing the Cold War. It t is doubtful that many liberals grasped this. They ridiculed Carter for trying to bring democracy to other nations, but when they gained control of US foreign policy in the first years of the Twenty-First Century, they did the same thing. They followed Norman Podhoretz in warning that the United States was about to be "Finlandized" into economic and political subordination to the Soviet Union. In the eighties, they eagerly worked for Ronald Reagan because he harped on the evil of communism. Working for him, they called the right-wing Contra thugs in Nicaragua and Angola’s Jonas Savimbi "freedom fighters."

Typical of the Jewish Neo-Cons, was Paul D. Wolfowitz who worked was to have a strong influence on Republican military and foreign policy in the administrations of the Bushes. While at the University of Chicago, he became the protégé of Albert Wohlstetter, a hawkish geo-military thinker who would later become a bitter critic of détente.   He had been pushing for the overthrow of Saddam Hussein since 1979 and eventually fashioned a doctrine that called for a U.S. war to overthrow Saddam as a first step in remodeling the region to make it safe for Israel. In time he would exert enormous influence. Because the Neo Conservative were urban and intellectuals, they were not entirely accepted by the New Right.   Eliot Abrams, Norman Podhorentz’s son-in-law was another influential Neo Conservative who served in the Reagan administration and was convicted of lying to Congress. He was to direct White House Middle East policy for George W. Bush. Perhaps the most influential neoconservative foreign policy spokesman was Richard Perle who worked with Donald Rumsefeld in the Ford Administration to damage the Salt II Arms Treaty. Richard Perle, known as the "Prince of Darkness," became another key advisor in the second Bush administration. As Assistant Secretary of Defense, he played a major role in persuading Ronald Reagan to spend vast amounts on defense and to launch the so-called Star Wars defensive missile system. Perle and other neoconservatives occupied second and third tier positions in the Reagan administration. James Baker, Bush Sr.’s Secretary of State, was uncomfortable with their foreign policy moralism and grandiose designs and "couldn’t wait to sweep [them]out ." Their moralism would later be called "hard Wilsonianism."

Perle and other neoconservatives believed that the end of the Cold War gave the United States a golden opportunity to reshape the Middle East. While working for the Reagan administration, he discovered to be assisting an Israeli arms manufacturer. By the 1990s, he came to oppose the Israel-Palestine peace process, used his influence with Israel to scuttle Bill Clinton’s Camp David Peace Conference, and advised Israel to set aside talks with the Palestinians and concentrate overthrowing the Iraqi government and reconfigure the political dynamics of the region. 4 Once in power, Wolfowitz urged the administration to give Israel a free hand in dealing with the Palestinians. 

At the end of the First Gulf War, neoconservative Paul Wolfowitz believed that George W. Bush muffed an opportunity to oust Saddam Hussein. In 1992, Paul Wolfowitz and Scooter Libby, working for then Secretary of Defense Dick Cheney wrote a paper entitled "Defense Planning Guidance Defense" stating that the United States should pay less attention to the opinions of allies and be more willing to use force and use force to gain its ends in the world. They were assisted by Zalmay Khalilzad, who was then the Bush administration’s ambassador to Iraq . This paper embodied what came to be known as the Wsolfowitz Doctrine. Secretary Dick Cheney and Paul Wolfowitz, his undersecretary for policy, looked to the day when the US would cash in on its military preeminence to reorder the world along the lines of American democracy and values. They looked forward to a permanent military presence on six continents in order to prevent all "potential competitors from even aspiring to a larger regional or global role." These views conflicted with the outlook of the senior Bush and the paper put was aside.  Their proposals were considered rash and extreme at the time, but these views were to become the nucleus of the Bush Doctrine, which was enunciated in 2002.

Richard Perle is a key architect of neoconservative foreign policy. He is a fellow at the American Enterprise Institute and attends meetings of the editorial board of the Jerusalem Post. Perle is a close friend of David Wurmser, another AEI scholar, known for his hawkish, pro-Israel views. Other Neo-Cons to operate out of the AEI were Michael Ledeen and Irving Kristol. Allies Matthew Sculy and John Shattan are well positioned in the White House and Lewis Libby is Vice President Cheney’s chief-of-staff. Prize-winning London based journalist John Pilger considered Perle a dangerous person who thought about "total war" in the 1980s against the Soviet Union and later applied the same approach to Iraq. Perle became head of the Pentagon’s Defense Policy Council under Secretary Donald Rumsfeld’s chief advisor in the administration of George W. Bush and is credited with foreshadowing the administration’s new defense doctrine of pre-emptive threats and strikes. Paul Wolfowitz was Deputy Secretary of Defense.  In the administration the younger George Bush, Wolfowitz’s unilateral militarism found eager supporters among a top policy team shaped by traditional deep- southern militarism.  

In foreign affairs, the neoconservatives and religious right frequently found common ground. Frequently, members of the Christian Right had supported so-called foreign policy fundamentalists or aggressive nationalists who were impatient with restraint in the use of force against Communism. The foreign policy fundamentalists of the 1960s and 1970s were impatient with foreign policy professionals who seemed to be too concerned with complexities, nuances, and desire avoid a unilateralist foreign policy. Alexander Haig, Ronald Reagan’s first Secretary of State, could be classified a foreign policy fundamentalist. He once stunned Howard Baker and Michael Deaver by talking about bombing Cuba, saying "We can make that fucking place look like a parking lot!" Neoconservative hawks shared this impatience and were idealists who believed that the United States should be more willing to use its power to transform the world to come closer to US ideals.

Their concerns converged most frequently in the Middle East. The Christian Right had theological reasons to protect Israel, and many of the Neoconservative hawks were Jews and very pro-Likud. Overlooking the already greatly deteriorated state of the Soviet Union, they saw the Reagan defense program as a "Hail Mary pass" that worked. They also saw George H. W. Bush’s victory in the 1991 Gulf War as another bold stoke for which they deserved much credit. These successes reinforced the idea that by just "leaning forward", in Wolfowitz’s words, the US could make great positive changes in the world.9 As the Soviet Union imploded, neoconservatives saw a golden opportunity for the United States to deal with its remaining enemies. Charles Krauthammer wrote a column entitled "Universal Dominion: Toward a Unipolar World," in which he spelled out the neoconservative doctrine of "a unipolar world whose center is a confederated West" led by the sole superpower, the United States. The term "unipolar" did not survive, but neoconservatives continued to build on their vision of the United States using its power to reshape the world.

LEO STRAUSS AND THE NEOCONS

It has been said that the late University of Chicago philosopher Leo Strauss was the spiritual godfather of the neoconservatives. He had a profound influence upon Irving Kristol, Paul Wolfowitz, Norman Podhorentz, William Kristol, and Gary Schmitt, leader of the Project for the New American Century. Strauss was a Jewish refugee from Nazi Germany who taught political philosophy at the University of Chicago for twenty-five years. He never accepted the label of conservative, but his thinking was to have a great appeal to conservatives. His thinking was quite different from what constituted mainstream conservatives in his lifetime or after his death. His outlook was very critical of much in modern culture and was rooted in pre-modern thought

No doubt most neoconservatives have not read the works of Leo Strauss, but their thinking has been strongly influenced by him. Staussians seemed to view themselves as superior persons, perhaps because they possess esoteric knowledge and value ancient virtues Neoconservatives are Straussians to the extent that the fear the masses and democracy, believe in a government by an elite which should enjoy special dignity, accept the notion that the wise lead by telling noble lies, and insist that the worst thing that could befall the United States would be if its people no longer believed in their own superiority.

Straussian thought did not revere tradition, as did conservatives of the stamp of Edmund Burke. His basic outlook was that pre-modern philosophers had found it necessary to say what they had to say "between the lines" to protect themselves from the masses and governments. Most of them had concluded that there were no truths, no natural law, and no gods. They saw morality as necessary for order but knew it was only based on customs and prejudices. Straussians share an esoteric approach to knowledge; knew that their basic beliefs should be shared with only an elite and believed that modern philosophy, in trying to address the common man, eventually exposed ordinary people to knowledge they could not live with comfortably. This led to nihilism and relativism, which Strauss and his followers deplored, and ultimately the wreckage of modern culture and the spawning of the New Left. The Straussians opposed moral relativism, but at root they were philosophical relativists. They placed a premium on truth and justice; some saw them as salutary myths and others think it possible to almost approximate them.

Strauss and his followers thought their mission was to work to salvage what they could of liberal democracy and the best of Western Culture, but they differed among themselves on accomplish this. He had contempt for the weakness of the Weimar Republic and taught that masses need strong leadership which is willing to deceive them when necessary. He believed that perpetual deception was necessary to give the people the leadership they needed, and feared the disorder that could flow from excessive dissent. He noted that the best way to insure a stable political order is to bring about unity through fear of an external threat and said such a threat should be manufactured if it did not actually exist.

Strauss’s teachings laid the groundwork for an aggressive foreign policy that was to include unilateralism, preemptive strikes, and frequent warfare. He taught that the "liberal democracies live in constant danger from hostile elements abroad." Given this situation, "to make the world safe for the Western democracies, one must make the whole globe democratic…." Democracies have a natural right to battle their barbarous opponents and have an obligation, as victors, to teach conquered peoples western democratic values.

Strauss told his inner circle that religion must be used by "true wise men" to control the masses and lead them in the correct direction. He claimed that religion was false, but its deception must be hidden from the people. Most neoconservatives did not crusade against abortion or to restore prayer to the schools, but they developed many other themes to ingratiate conservative Christians. The Neo Conservatives found that by exploiting questions of promiscuity, drug use, rising crime, homosexuality, pornography, and assaults on traditional culture, they could activate fundamentalist and evangelical Christians. It did not matter that Strauss, himself, said the drug problem could be handled by handing out free doses on a daily basis.

Strauss advised his students to avoid ideological partisanship and dogmatism. Yet many of them ignored this advice, forming an ideological clique in the academy and hiring one another. In the political realm, they tend to be dogmatic and cliquish.

 

 

 

 

 NEOCONS BEGIN TO WORRY ABOUT NEW RIGHT'S EXCESSIVE ZEAL
 
    Recently, the New Right has been talking about punishing judges whose decisions they do not like.  Texas  senator John Cornyn asked if people might eventually "engage in violence" if "unaccountable judges" continued to make political decisions.  Tom Delay talked about punishing judges  who refused to rule as he wanted in the Terri Schiavo case. He probably meant making them squirm before Congressional committees.  Phyllis Schafley said Anthony Kennedy's decision forbidding capital punishment of juveniles was "a good ground [for] impeachment. "
 
 A high profile conference was held to consider the topic "Remedies to Judicial Tyranny."  One remedy, of course, was to strip the Senate Democrats of the right to filibuster judicial nominations. It was said that Democrats are enemies of people of faith.   The threatening and highly emotional speeches raised participant's anger to a fever pitch. Gary Cass, a lobbyist for Reverend D. James Kennedy, explained that arousing anger was a necessary political technique, and that political operatives like him would later find ways to channel it into  what he thought were acceptable directions.
 
Neoconservative pundit Charles Krauthammer was sufficiently alarmed by the attacks on the judiciary that he wrote in defense of the courts as necessary checks on tyranny.  A psychiatrist by profession, he obviously understood how powerful a tool anger and rage can be. He has written a great deal over the years to arouse anger at an imaginary liberal elite that supposedly looked down on ordinary people.  Neoconservative David Brooks, who has not engaged in inflamatory writing,  warned that Senator Bill Frist's plan to end use of the filibuster against judicial nominations could almost wipe out the Senate's function as a deliberative body. Even conservative George Will asked if the powers of governance were being turned over to religious interests.  Of course, the neoconservatives cannot complain too much about the New Right zealots without attacking the base that has given their party power.
 
     The zealots of the New Right have already done grave damage to our political process. In the House of Representatives, the Democrats no longer have much of a legislative role, and Republicans pretty much march in lock step behond Tom Delay.  In the Senate,  some damage has been done to the legislative process. Democrats have been kept off conference committees a few times, but more frequently, only  pliable Democrats are admitted to conference committees considering important legislation. The few moderate Republicans in that chamber seem afraid to wander off the party reservation very often.  The leadership of both chambers has repeatedly pressured lobbying firms to fire Democrats and hire Republicans.
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

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