This Girl's Voice
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| voxpopgirl This Girl's Voice |
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Monday, February 03, 2003 •• protecting american interests: paleocon v.s. neocon ideology ••i am against any nation engaging in a pre-emptive war on any country; and when it comes to being against America entering into war on Iraq, i would never have believed that an "inside the beltway" friend of mine in Washington D.C. who proudly refers to himself as "a Pat Buchanan conservative" and a "pro-American patriot" would ever share the same p.o.v. with a liberal such as myself. however such is the case with my paleocon friend, a 31 year old with "old-time" Republican values, who said that on the grounds of traditional Republican ideology which does not espouse multilateralism to protect "American interests", he is against this war. he says that this is what separates old traditional "value" conservatives like him with the new "flag" conservatives who now populate the Bush administration and have greatly shaped its foreign policy. that got me thinking.... i suppose that depends on how one would define what "america's interests" were, wouldn't it? i mean, if this heavily laden neocon Bush administration, as my paleo conservative pal wholeheartedly believes, is pushing the cause of "Empire" (even though this is not how they are representing it to the American people), and if, as my friend believes, they are going against the traditional Republican values and are instead pushing for multilateralism as a pretext for protecting "america's interests"; as in, "folks -- they could attack us!! they are forcing us into a war!!" (which is roughly what Bush alluded to in his SofU address the other night, when he said "...if war is *forced* upon us..."), then i'm curious. cuz how does an old conservative such as my D.C. friend, then square -- lets' say -- fighting communism -- which was the the centerpiece of the Republicans' mantra for 30 years... when it came to "protecting America's interests" back then? i mean, America dug in deep in carving up sides in Germany delineating the difference between East (communism) and West; then for 40 years, in the name of fighting it because it was in America and it's allies "interests", they put army bases everywhere in Europe; they sent a generation of America's young men to war in Vietnam to fight for America's interests against communism; together with the CIA, they deposed democratically elected leaders in South American countries to rid the threat of communism.... not taking sides here, i really am just now in this moment, coming to wonder how today's neocons couldn't handily point to that ole' paleocon cause (fighting communism) as a rationalization for multilateralism in order to "protect american interests". posted by voxpopgirl | 2/03/2003 |
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