When you lose Max Boot, it's all over.
Posted on 03/11/2023 5:45:38 AM PST by JonPreston
Shortly after September 11, 2001, I became known as a “neoconservative.” The term was a bit puzzling, because I wasn’t new to conservatism; I had been on the right ever since I could remember. But the “neocon” label came to be used after 9/11 to denote a particular strain of conservatism that placed human rights and democracy promotion at the forefront of U.S. foreign policy. This was a very different mindset from the realpolitik approach of such Republicans as President Dwight Eisouenhower, President Richard Nixon, and Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, and it had a natural appeal to someone like me whose family had come to the United States in search of freedom. (We arrived from the Soviet Union in 1976, when I was six years old.) Having lived in a communist dictatorship, I supported the United States spreading freedom abroad. That, in turn, led me to become a strong supporter of military action in Afghanistan and Iraq.
The neoconservative position—which eventually triumphed in the George W. Bush administration—was that the United States could not simply topple the old regimes and leave chaos in their wake. The Americans had to stay and work with local allies to build democratic showcases that could inspire liberal change in the Middle East. In this way, Washington could finally lance the boil of militant Islamism, which had afflicted America ever since the Iran hostage crisis in 1979.
In retrospect, I was wildly overoptimistic about the prospects of exporting democracy by force, underestimating both the difficulties and the costs of such a massive undertaking. I am a neocon no more, at least as that term has been understood since 9/11.
(Excerpt) Read more at foreignaffairs.com ...
When you lose Max Boot, it's all over.
I had this guy pegged as a flaming @sshole from the first time I saw him on TV and read his ludicrous propaganda.
I wonder if he’ll ever admit he was wrong about Trump too.
How does he feel about the globalist butt boy moniker?
Neocon has turned into a negative probably because of the Iraq and afghanistan wars which everyone celebrated until it went on too long. Most are embarrassed that they were cheerleaders in this. Just like those who voted for dole, McCain, bush, Romney. Now that they are not considered pure, these same supporters are eating crow pretending they weren’t the main problem.
Max and Naomi are the first I’m aware of to admit their mistakes to the conservative base they either took for granted or pilloried. Keep an eye out for more defections and public mae culpas. (Mae culpi?)
...On second thought, few folks like Bill Maher and Scott Adams who make a living from their observations, commentary, and opinions have begun to question their own positions over some long-held beliefs. So these may be signs of a sea change in society taking place. I hope it’s for the better!
America made the mistake of allowing Iraq to be a theocracy without freedom of religion. Globalists think the muzzies are their ticket to global dominance
Ugh. I read FP as it’s good to see how other folks think - admittedly much of it has produced poor results in the last 15-20 years.
Boot is a bomb thrower from the WP. He could have done his mea culpa there.
Was good of him to acknowledge that SECDEF Rumsfeld wanted no part of this nation building.
Next we’ll see Scarborough confess his sins. NOT!
Max Boot lost me a looooooonnnnnngggg time ago.
Got it!
He’s not admitting any mistakes here. He’s just serving notice that one of two things has happened: (1) the political agenda of his employers has changed, or (2) he has new employers.
“It appears Max Boot, a Neocon of the 1st Order, is getting out in front of the political Death Cult he helped to promote”
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He’s war mongering scum, why didn’t he come out prior to this Ukraine fiasco? He now sees how bad things are turning out there and is hoping to weasel out of responsibility. All of these neocons need to be thrown out of our government.
I don’t believe him
Exactly right. It's a Death Cult and they're trying to save themselves.
Well done linking Naomi and Boot together.
The neocons such as Boot argued that Achmed Chalabi, a convicted swindler in Jordan and a Shia Iraqi, was the “George Washington of Iraq” who would lead the new participatory democracy. So the Iraqi GW returned as a self-recognized “hero” to run the government after the first Iraqi election. The only problem was that Chalabi got all of one-half of one percent of the Iraqi vote, not even the Shia voted for him as the commonfolks in the country knew exactly what kind of slime he was, truth that somehow escaped the neocons and their acolytes in the CIA and other government agencies. Chalabi had been one of our main sources of the “intel” on WMDs and advocated the “US forces will be greeted with cakes and flowers” BS; he also turned out to have very cosy relations with Iranian intelligence, which saw a real coup in the US spend its blood and treasure getting rid of their main strategic enemy in Iraq. No, Mr. Boot you cannot redeem yourself now; you need to get the boot.
“Neocon has turned into a negative probably because of the Iraq and afghanistan wars which everyone celebrated until it went on too long.”
I think America starts out with one, limited objective, achieves it and then someone says, “Well, that worked out. Now what else can we do.” It’s not mission creep, it’s mission sprinting.
In the future if someone does something bad to us that needs to be addressed, go in, kick a few butts and get the heck out.
I agree. My first thought after reading this was, what new term will they use to describe the invading of sovereign nations and clubbing it's citizens into a hazy form of democracy.
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has exposed the stoogery of the Libertarians.
The worst nightmare of a Libertarian would be The State forcing its civilians into a meat-grinder on the front lines.
That is exactly what Putin is doing.
But instead of Libertarians railing against that, they instead become his Stooges online.
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