# A Neo-Con Repents **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [November 4, 2006, 7:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-neo-con-repents/379112 "2006-11-04T19:59:13Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2006, 6:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-neo-con-repents/379112/41 "2006-11-05T18:39:27Z")
[QUOTE=Captain Amazing] Cheney and Rumsfeld weren’t and aren’t neocons. They’re businessmen and foreign policy realists. [/quote] That’s a funny sort of ‘realism’ you’ve got there, friend. They signed the PNAC statement of principles. Can one not be a neocon if one is a businessman? I don’t exactly see that. > [@](#): > > Yea, the Iraq war hasn’t turned out well. That doesn’t mean that overthrowing Sadaam and trying to set up a democratic government in Iraq was a bad itdea. It just means that the administration, including its neocon members, should have had a better plan. They should have had plans for what to do after Baghdad fell, That, right there, kicks them out of the ‘realist’ camp, doesn’t it? > [@](#): > > they should have put more troops and money in (troops to close the borders, provide security and stop looting and rioting, money to begin reconstruction of the infrastructure), and they should have both realized and convinced the American people that we would have to have troops in Iraq for a while, up to ten years after the war. Well, _yeah_. But they didn’t, because they weren’t realists; they were apparently believers that once liberated, democracy would happen as if by magic. That’s neoconservatism all the way: we can invade a country and bring it democracy, as if we were delivering a pizza. (Faster, please.) ---
**Author:** ![LouisB](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/dfb087/32.png) [@LouisB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/LouisB)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2006, 7:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-neo-con-repents/379112/42 "2006-11-05T19:08:39Z")
[QUOTE=Jim’s Son] There is a symposium on [nationalreview.com](http://nationalreview.com) where David Frum, Richard Perle, Michael Ledden and Michael Rubin discuss how “Vanity Fair” twisted their words. Like so many left wingers, “Vanity Fair” is upset a psychopathic mass murderer who had Weapons of Mass Destruction and supportedc terrorists has been removed and a democracy installed. So naturally “Vanity Fair” would lie and twist staements..it is what leftwingers do everyday. They pine over the mass murderers and filth the world has produced: Lenin, Stalin, Castro, Mao Tse-Tung, Arafat, Amin when they are not ridiculing the brave people who remove such slime. [/QUOTE] Do you actually believe a word of this garbage you have thrown out? If so, I most fervently hope that you are not and never will be in a position to influence the thinking of anyone, ever, at any place or time. ---
**Author:** ![Starving\_Artist](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/aeb1de/32.png) [@Starving\_Artist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Starving_Artist)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2006, 7:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-neo-con-repents/379112/43 "2006-11-05T19:12:18Z")
[QUOTE=GIGObuster] Nope, if no cite is produced then it naturally follows that it is you who is lying. [/QUOTE] It means nothing of the sort. It’s simply an unsupported assertion. Further, you know as well as I (and anyone else who’s been around here for more than a day) that even 200 cites of lefties exhibiting the behavior **Jim’s Son** attributes to them will accomplish nothing more than endless denials and/or equivocation. He is clearly stating his opinion–an opinion which is based on what he has seen coming from the left in this country and an opinion with which I agree. If the conservatives around here were as quick to demand cites everytime someone cast generalized aspersions on tighty-righties, neocons, Bushbots, etc., we’d have time for little else. ---
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2006, 7:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-neo-con-repents/379112/44 "2006-11-05T19:47:28Z")
[More Cheney realism](http://americablog.blogspot.com/2006/11/cheney-were-staying-course-and-moving.html): “victory in Iraq” is the objective, and it’s “full speed ahead” on that basis. Maybe they’ve been reading a lot of Marquez lately, and have confused “magical realism” with the real thing. ---
**Author:** ![tomndebb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9e5f3/32.png) [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2006, 7:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-neo-con-repents/379112/45 "2006-11-05T19:48:37Z")
[QUOTE=Starving Artist] If the conservatives around here were as quick to demand cites everytime someone cast generalized aspersions on tighty-righties, neocons, Bushbots, etc., we’d have time for little else. [/QUOTE] I have seen no lack of calls for citations from those on the Right and wonder where you got the idea that the behaviors of the Left and Right on this board differ much, at all. I would tend to agree that **GIGObuster** ’s demand for citations for what is obviously uninformed personal bias on the part of **Jim’s Son** is a bit heavy-handed, (my personal approach would be to either ignore or laugh at that which is obviously content free), but turning this into one more “Righties are doodyheads/Lefties are sillikins” exchange is not going to produce an intelligent discussion, either. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2006, 7:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-neo-con-repents/379112/46 "2006-11-05T19:56:18Z")
[QUOTE=Jonathan Chance] My premise: _The neoconservative movement is fatally flawed in its understanding of the American political climate, the American cultural climate, and the American electoral climate._ [/QUOTE] Actually, I think its main problem is a flawed understanding of the political and cultural climates of the **foreign** countries where the neocons aspire to install democratic government and (more importantly) free-market capitalism. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2006, 8:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-neo-con-repents/379112/47 "2006-11-05T20:04:45Z")
[QUOTE=waterj2] Is it just me, or is that a really creepy picture of Richard Perle? [/QUOTE] He looks like he should be stroking a white Persian cat . . . with his other hand on the lever that opens the trapdoor over the shark tank . . . ---
**Author:** ![Starving\_Artist](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/aeb1de/32.png) [@Starving\_Artist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Starving_Artist)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2006, 8:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-neo-con-repents/379112/48 "2006-11-05T20:28:02Z")
[QUOTE=tomndebb] I have seen no lack of calls for citations from those on the Right and wonder where you got the idea that the behaviors of the Left and Right on this board differ much, at all. I would tend to agree that **GIGObuster** ’s demand for citations for what is obviously uninformed personal bias on the part of **Jim’s Son** is a bit heavy-handed… [/QUOTE] You say bias; I say observation based on life experience.🙂 But be that as it may, my main objection was the claim that an assertion without a cite was a lie. The rest was admittedly editorializing on my part, and, now that I think about it, is largely based on what I’ve seen in the Pit where I spend most of my time. I will acknowledge that here in GD it may well be that conservative posters call for cites on a par with their liberal adversaries. ---
**Author:** ![David\_Simmons](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/9de053/32.png) [@David\_Simmons](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/David_Simmons)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2006, 8:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-neo-con-repents/379112/49 "2006-11-05T20:51:46Z")
[QUOTE=Captain Amazing] Yea, the Iraq war hasn’t turned out well. That doesn’t mean that overthrowing Sadaam and trying to set up a democratic government in Iraq was a bad itdea. [/QUOTE] Maybe a program to get rid of Saddam and establish democracy was a reasonable goal. I doubt that it was reasonable but pretend that is was. It doesn’t automatically follow from that, that an invasion of Iraq in the face of widespread world opposition was the best way to get to the goal. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2006, 9:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-neo-con-repents/379112/50 "2006-11-05T21:02:25Z")
[QUOTE=Jim’s Son] There is a symposium on [nationalreview.com](http://nationalreview.com) where David Frum, Richard Perle, Michael Ledden and Michael Rubin discuss how “Vanity Fair” twisted their words. Like so many left wingers, “Vanity Fair” is upset a psychopathic mass murderer who had Weapons of Mass Destruction and supportedc terrorists has been removed and a democracy installed. So naturally “Vanity Fair” would lie and twist staements..it is what leftwingers do everyday. They pine over the mass murderers and filth the world has produced: Lenin, Stalin, Castro, Mao Tse-Tung, Arafat, Amin when they are not ridiculing the brave people who remove such slime. [/QUOTE] This is the first time I have ever seen _Vanity Fair_ characterized as “left-wing.” Please tell us about the treasonous lies promulgated by _Cosmopolitan_ and _GQ._ ---
**Author:** ![GIGObuster](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gigobuster/32/421_2.png) [@GIGObuster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GIGObuster)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2006, 9:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-neo-con-repents/379112/51 "2006-11-05T21:03:29Z")
[QUOTE=Starving Artist] You say bias; I say observation based on life experience.🙂 [/quote] The experience with you so far has demonstrated that I am glad that you do appear with no cites to support even if your life experience can be applied to the issues at hand. 🙂 > [@](#): > > But be that as it may, my main objection was the claim that an assertion without a cite was a lie. The rest was admittedly editorializing on my part, and, now that I think about it, is largely based on what I’ve seen in the Pit where I spend most of my time. I will acknowledge that here in GD it may well be that conservative posters call for cites on a par with their liberal adversaries. Indeed, as I even cited what I said on my post, in GD I expect conservatives to ask for cites. ---
**Author:** ![Starving\_Artist](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/aeb1de/32.png) [@Starving\_Artist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Starving_Artist)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2006, 9:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-neo-con-repents/379112/52 "2006-11-05T21:14:01Z")
[QUOTE=BrainGlutton] This is the first time I have ever seen _Vanity Fair_ characterized as “left-wing.” [/QUOTE] I take it then that you’re somewhat ignorant of the magazine’s content and editorial page. ---
**Author:** ![BrainGlutton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/82dd89/32.png) [@BrainGlutton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BrainGlutton)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2006, 9:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-neo-con-repents/379112/53 "2006-11-05T21:16:25Z")
Perhaps the neocons think the Iraq occupation-reconstruction would have gone exactly as intended, if only the neocons at the Pentagon been allowed to run the whole thing their own way, and had not [had to share power with the “realists” at the State Department.](http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?t=381910) ---
**Author:** ![Starving\_Artist](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/aeb1de/32.png) [@Starving\_Artist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Starving_Artist)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2006, 9:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-neo-con-repents/379112/54 "2006-11-05T21:18:28Z")
[QUOTE=GIGObuster] The experience with you so far has demonstrated that I am glad that you do appear with no cites to support even if your life experience can be applied to the issues at hand. 🙂 [/QUOTE] Thank you. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![elucidator](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/8edcca/32.png) [@elucidator](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/elucidator)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2006, 9:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-neo-con-repents/379112/55 "2006-11-05T21:21:22Z")
Let me help you out here, **SA** , its a matter of calibration. Being more liberal than Calvin Coolidge is not “left-wing”. I am “left-wing”, Der Trihs is most _definitely_ “left wing”, and you are…well, wrong. ---
**Author:** ![Starving\_Artist](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/aeb1de/32.png) [@Starving\_Artist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Starving_Artist)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2006, 9:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-neo-con-repents/379112/56 "2006-11-05T21:37:36Z")
[QUOTE=elucidator] Let me help you out here, **SA** , its a matter of calibration. Being more liberal than Calvin Coolidge is not “left-wing”. I am “left-wing”, Der Trihs is most _definitely_ “left wing”, and you are…well, wrong. [/QUOTE] About what, mon frere? That time I was wrong occurred long before I knew you. ---
**Author:** ![Valteron](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/f17d59/32.png) [@Valteron](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Valteron)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2006, 10:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-neo-con-repents/379112/57 "2006-11-05T22:32:22Z")
So all the neo-cons are saying that the mess in Iran was not their idea!?? I am reminded of a quote by Churchill: “Victory has many fathers; defeat is an orphan.” ---
**Author:** ![Captain\_Amazing](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/6de8d8/32.png) [@Captain\_Amazing](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Captain_Amazing)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2006, 10:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-neo-con-repents/379112/58 "2006-11-05T22:45:18Z")
[QUOTE=RTFirefly] That’s a funny sort of ‘realism’ you’ve got there, friend. They signed the PNAC statement of principles. Can one not be a neocon if one is a businessman? I don’t exactly see that. [/quote] They signed the PNAC statement of principles, but I don’t know that it means anything. I mean, Gary Bauer signed it, for God’s sake. I, at least, always got the impression that Cheney, especially, was more concerned about securing oil supplies than helping Iraq. And I can’t think of many businessmen who are neocons. Most neocons are academics or opinion columnists. > [@](#): > > That, right there, kicks them out of the ‘realist’ camp, doesn’t it? That doesn’t have anything to do with whether or not they were realists. It just means that they were poor planners. > [@](#): > > Well, _yeah_. But they didn’t, because they weren’t realists; they were apparently believers that once liberated, democracy would happen as if by magic. That’s neoconservatism all the way: we can invade a country and bring it democracy, as if we were delivering a pizza. (Faster, please.) Maybe there was some of that, but it seems like it was more, firstly, a cost saving measure by Rumsfeld…remember Rumsfeld’s “military reform”…the idea that the army was too big and unweildy, and that what we needed for the future were small, quick, mobile deployments. Secondly, I think it was the very realist hesitation toward nation building. There was the idea of “Oh, Sadaam’s a threat, lets take him out and then turn it over to the Iraqis.” Thirdly, there was an overreliance on the UN…there was the idea that all the countries that didn’t back the war would, once the removal of the Ba’athist government had happened, come in and do the reconstruction. Fourthly, for political reasons, the administration wanted to minimize our role in Iraq. They didn’t want to have to try to sell a multi-year expensive occupation. ---
**Author:** ![tomndebb](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/b9e5f3/32.png) [@tomndebb](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tomndebb)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2006, 10:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-neo-con-repents/379112/59 "2006-11-05T22:50:38Z")
> [@](#): > > I am reminded of a quote by Churchill: Actually, that is generally attributed to John F. Kennedy who quoted it as an “old saying” following the Bay of Pigs. The closest actual phrase appears to be that of Count Galeazzo Ciano, “_La Victoria trova cento padri, e nessuno vuole riconoscere l’insuccesso._”, (rendered by Bartlett’s as “As always, victory finds a hundred fathers but defeat is an orphan.”), from Ciano’s diary, dated September 9, 1942. [This has been a Straight Dope[sup]®[/sup] factoid.] ---
**Author:** ![rjung](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/45deac/32.png) [@rjung](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rjung)\ **Post date:** [November 5, 2006, 11:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-neo-con-repents/379112/60 "2006-11-05T23:24:15Z")
[QUOTE=Valteron] So all the neo-cons are saying that the mess in Iran was not their idea!?? [/quote] Well, of course – conservatives are experts at (not) taking responsibility! > [@elucidator](#): > > Let me help you out here, **SA,** its a matter of calibration. Being more liberal than Calvin Coolidge is not “left-wing”. I am “left-wing”, Der Trihs is most definitely “left wing”, and you are…well, wrong. **SA** thinks Bush is doing a “heckuva job.” 'nuff said. 😉 [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-neo-con-repents/379112.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/a-neo-con-repents/379112.md?page=4)