Nonsensical New Conservatives

The neo-conservative cult that has placed a stranglehold on America's foreign policy affairs is a relatively recent phenomenon. Bush the Elder and pre-pacemaker Dick Cheney, had both previously rejected the idea of regime change and a U.S. military occupation of Iraq during the 90's. Since that time and with the opportunity of 9-11, neo-conservatives, new conservatives led by such luminaries as Bill Kristol and Richard Perle, have pushed to mainstream the radical, extremist foreign policy philosophies that have resulted in the current quagmire situation in Iraq. The thinking once regarded as foolish and dangerous military adventurism has now, under the presidency of Bush/Cheney, been mainstreamed. In just 7 short years pre-emptive wars of choice and American occupied middle eastern territories has, somehow, become the accepted foreign policy norm.

Despite the fact that 60% of Americans want our occupation in Iraq to end, despite the fact that Americans by almost 2-1 want out troops to come home……the neo-conservative cult and it's lapdog, the main media, continue to embrace the cult's extreme and radical philosophy as the new paradigm.

If this seems like exaggeration, I would challenge you to find in mainstream media's coverage of Iraq today any serious discussion of how the pre-emptive attack of Iraq, itself, was misguided, illegal or in some way the wrong thing to do. Media mouthpieces will wring their hands about mistakes being made after the attack was well under way. But never, or almost never, is there a thoughtful presentation explaining how attacking Iraq was the wrong thing to do in the first place.

The resolute George W. Bush, implementer of the new foreign policy cult's agenda in Iraq, is still operating the smoke screen machine he used 6 years ago to buffalo public opinion into accepting a pre-emptive unilateral act of military aggression against a non-threatening country.

President Bush gave warning yesterday that Iraq’s “fragile situation” required the US to maintain a strong military presence there, even as he defended the withdrawal of British troops from Basra, the scene of heavy fighting in recent days.

In an interview with The Times, he backed the Iraqi Government’s decision to “respond forcefully” to the spiralling violence by “criminal elements” and Shia extremists in Basra. “It was a very positive moment in the development of a sovereign nation that is willing to take on elements that believe they are beyond the law,” the President said. Link

Resurgent violence in Basra is a "very positive moment".

After months of diminished outbreaks of violence in the southern Iraqi city of Basra, the appearance of renewed violence by Sadrists and other Shi-ites is a "very positive moment". Seems like crazy talk. The same kind of neo-conservative crazy talk that led us into Iraq originally.

While the build-up and the fraud-up towards an aggressive military act of imperialism was proceeding forward in 2002 and early 2003, there was a surrealistic feel to all of it. Nagging questions remained. Why would we be attacking and then occupying a country crippled by the first Gulf War and decimated by years of sanctions and no fly zone bombings? Why would America be so urgently hellbent to attack a sovereign country posing no threat to our nation? And why, especially, were we going to invade and occupy Iraq when Bin Laden's boys had never been in Iraq? It all seemed like crazy talk….didn't make any sense.

And so, over 5 years later, the words of the first neo-conservative president in America still don't make any sense. After the president and his co-conspirators misled Congress and the American public over why we were going to unilaterally attack and militarily occupy Iraq in the frst place, George W. Bush proceeded to mislead us about every aspect of the quagmire his neo-conservative leadership led us into. Stay the course, stand-up stand down, surge…..and now a new outbreak of violence is called a "very positive moment".

The man who wants to be the 2nd neo-conservative U.S. president, the second American military extremist of 21st century America, has every intention of continuing the nonsense Bush, the Junior, has begun. John McCain defines what "success" should look like whenever the U.S. decides to attack a non-threatening sovereign nation….

Many people ask, how should we define success? Success in Iraq and Afghanistan is the establishment of peaceful, stable, prosperous, democratic states that pose no threat to neighbors and contribute to the defeat of terrorists. It is the triumph of religious tolerance over violent radicalism. Link

Neo-conservative nonsense…..the same nonsense that has placed us in the quagmire we are currently in……has mainstreamed for the conservative movement in the U.S. a policy which traditional conservatism has always rejected. Nation building. Now John McCain, having fully grasped the baton of the neo-con cult, is defining "success" in Iraq as some distant, decades down the road, nation building hope of a peaceful, democratic future Iraq and Afghanistan.

100 years may not be long enough.

My point here is to illustrate the wildly radical and extreme philosophy of the relatively recent phenomenon of the neo-conservative cult perched atop our foreign policy controls. Make no mistake….the same foolish nonsense we're hearing today about surge, success, victory, nation building and winning…..is all part and parcel of the same nonsense we were told prior to Operation Iraqi Freedom's media assisted lift off. It was foolish nonsense then, it's still foolish nonsense now.

These neo-conservative leaders are extremely dangerous to the future of America. They must be stopped before the cult, like Jim Jones' People's Temple, kills us all.

UPDATE:This interview speaks for itself….

AMY GOODMAN: We’re talking to Robert Dreyfuss, investigative reporter, contributing editor at The Nation magazine. His latest piece is called “Hothead McCain.” McCain famously said that US forces might end up staying in Iraq for 100 years. What role did John McCain play in the surge and in shaping, if he did, any part of President Bush’s policy in Iraq, the war?

ROBERT DREYFUSS: Oh, I would say that of all the politicians in the United States, McCain was number one in a crucial moment, when the President, President Bush, had to decide whether to accept the Baker-Hamilton report, which called for phasing out US combat forces over a period of sixteen months or alternatively escalating the war. And at that time, McCain was the number one voice in calling for an escalation. He had traveled to Iraq. He had said we need more troops. I believe he was calling for at least 50,000 troops. He worked closely along with Senator Lieberman, who’s now his traveling companion. McCain and Lieberman spoke at the American Enterprise Institute and worked closely with Robert and Frederick Kagan, who—Frederick Kagan, in particular, who is at AEI and was the author of the report that led to the surge and was brought into the administration by Vice President Cheney, who went over to AEI and consulted with them. It was that team—Kagan, McCain, Lieberman and Cheney—who convinced the President to go with the escalation a year ago in January.

And McCain was not only advocating the surge, but really pushing, and is today pushing, for a long-term presence by the United States in Iraq, using Iraq as an aircraft carrier to support American power throughout the Persian Gulf and the Middle East and Central Asia. And his advisers told me so. When I spoke to Randy Scheunemann at length, he said, in fact, yes, we want to stay in Iraq for a long time, not just to stabilize Iraq, but because we may have to deal with many threats from the region. And of course you have to include Iran as among the possible threats that we’d have to deal with, according to McCain.

So I would say that McCain and the surge are almost identical, and it’s McCain who we have to thank for the fact that two years ago we didn’t start withdrawing from Iraq, but in fact escalated to the point where the next president will have probably 130,000 troops on the ground when he or she takes office. Link