In Defense of Good Stuff

I think Ross Douthat makes many good points in response to Robert Kagan's "Neocon Nation" but let me remark at greater length on the problem Ross identifies and then passes over lightly in favor of a different problem:

The first is the broadness of its argument, which elides the fact that those “variations” within the interventionist camp can be very significant indeed, and that the shared belief in "American power and the ability of the United States to use that power to beneficial ends in the world" is for many critics of neoconservatism the beginning of the argument, rather than the end of it.

I think this is what comes of dwelling too long in rhetorical foxholes alongside people who accuse their political opponents of holding "anti-American" views. Obviously, the vast majority of Americans are going to believe that American power ought to be used to beneficial ends in the world. It would be bizarre, after all, to hold a self-conscious believe that American power ought to be used for malign ends. That's just human psychology, not a fact about our political culture or our foreign policy. The whole game is in answering questions like what kind of power? what kind of uses? which ends are beneficial? Adolf Hitler and Angela Merkel both believe that Germany, as Europe's largest nation, ought to play a significent role in the affairs of the continent and this tells us nothing at all about either of them or their policies.

Some people believe that things like invading Iraq will help secure beneficial ends. Others believe that a defensively-oriented military posture combined with an economy open to foreign goods and immigrants will best secure beneficial ends. Some think the United States ought to secure beneficial ends by working to strengthen and uphold international institutions and laws, whereas others regard these institutions as tools of the week designed to prevented us from bringing the beneficence of unilateral hegemony to the world. This is the entire content of our foreign policy debate.

For neocons to stand amidst the wreckage that their ideas have wrought vaguely muttered that everyone who believes that it's good to do good stuff really agrees with them is a little absurd.

Comments

I think this post sets a new Yglesias record for typos!

Posted by Ron | April 11, 2008 4:51 PM

Adolf Hitler and Angela Merkel both believe that Germany...

Interesting use of tenses... unless you know something we don't.

Posted by right | April 11, 2008 4:53 PM

tools of the week

Also I think Tim Taylor used to host this show on Home Improvement.

Posted by right | April 11, 2008 4:58 PM

whereas others regard these institutions as tools of the week designed to prevented us from bringing the beneficence of unilateral hegemony to the world.
***********************************************

For neocons to stand amidst the wreckage that their ideas have wrought vaguely muttered that everyone who believes that it's good to do good
*************************************************

I mean, just wow. "tools of the week"? "vaguely muttered"?

I know it's Friday night, but how many beers have you had?

Posted by Campesino | April 11, 2008 5:01 PM

Interesting use of tenses

I was wondering how one could do that properly.

Posted by SomeCallMeTim | April 11, 2008 5:03 PM

Jeebus it's difficult to tell what Matthew's talking about in light of all the typos.

But, if I'm reading this right, Matthew's missing the point. Of course nobody thinks we ought to use American power "for malign ends". But there are a whole mass of left-wingers out there who believe that whenever the United States does use its power abroad, it inevitably screws things up, and therefore we ought to just not use our power abroad. It's not just that we ought not invade Iraq, but that we ought not use our power to support Kosovo, or Somalia, or Darfur, or Israel. You might know some of those people.

Posted by Al | April 11, 2008 5:03 PM

What a bunch of idiots.

If you have nothing better to do than count typos and grammatical errors in blog entries, you should go stick your heads back up your asses and leave the grownups alone while we discuss actual Ideas!

Posted by Scott Ferguson | April 11, 2008 5:14 PM

MY does misuse the term ought, but it doesn't take away from his point.

Just because Americans believe the US can use it's power in benevolent ways does not mean that we should be constantly interfering in other's affairs. Frequently the best interference is non-interference.

Posted by mpowell | April 11, 2008 5:17 PM

Well, Al is always a hoot.

This is where wingnut cognitive dissonance causes their heads to explode.

I can remember a time in the late 90's when it was actually the Al types who ridiculed "nation-building" and foreign interventions and that Tom Delay would not even support a congressional resolution merely stating support for the troops serving in the Kosovo intervention.

Many/most self-described "liberals" these days still support the war in Afghanistan and at least some would support a Bush administration intervention in Darfur.

From the evidence available, it appears that Al and friends will only support foreign adventures if a Republican is in the White HOuse, and immediately flip once a Dem is in the White House.

These are weird, crazy people.

Posted by pjhawk | April 11, 2008 5:18 PM

One should reserve a small part of your thinking to the idea that actors, political actors here in the US, are acting out of purely evil intent. Doing so can be quite liberating. If you really get off on torture and death then our policies make perfect sense. If you get off on your ability to "create our own reality", taking godlike powers unto yourself, then so many things fall into place in analyzing events.

Then too an evil intent does not only have to come only from a love of death and destruction but can also come from a desire for excessive wealth and power. You can pick your point of excessive.

Along these lines sometime around the start of the Iraq invasion I picked a benchmark number out of the sky for the deaths that will occur in the Middle East and Muslim Africa directly and indirectly by our presence and actions there. I picked 100 million. Roughly what the last centuries great killers accomplished, with some inflation. I'm sticking with that prediction.

Posted by rapier | April 11, 2008 5:21 PM

Thank you, Scott.

I would like to float the supposition that this passage from Ross is a more symptomatic utterance than Matt seems to recognize, despite how he initially frames it. What you have here is a rhetorical artifact of the deeper truth that the teeming neocon masses are profoundly infected with the corrosive notion that everyone to the left of, say, Joe Lieberman is an objective ally of Hamas, Hezbollah, Osama, and the devil himself. Sadly, I would fully expect to find Ross Douthat's brain infected by this very derangement. Besides being itself a profoundly unpatriotic view of that large part of America that is composed of The Rest Of Us, it has the great disadvantage of being, as I say, a literal derangement--that is to say, a fatally counterfactual idee fixe that falsely colors the entire neocon worldview. As a native son of smalltown America, I am beyond sick and fucking tired of these whack jobs who presume to pronounce upon my patriotism every time I differ with their demented views on what is best for the country. That is all. Have another beer, Matt, by all means.

Posted by elle loco | April 11, 2008 5:23 PM

pjhawk, you are missing the distinction between "the United States" and "the government". Its the latter that inevitably screws things up. Thus the United States ought to project power, while the government ought not meddle with health care. Its very simple.

Posted by rickhavoc | April 11, 2008 5:26 PM

Also, for the benefit of MY blog's vast international readership, know that the weather in DC this afternoon is, finally, picture perfect Happy Hour On The Deck nice.

Posted by rickhavoc | April 11, 2008 5:31 PM

What a bunch of idiots.

If you have nothing better to do than count typos and grammatical errors in blog entries, you should go stick your heads back up your asses and leave the grownups alone while we discuss actual Ideas!

Posted by Scott Ferguson | April 11, 2008 5:14 PM
************************************************
Educatted and perfessinal groanupps noe thet mekking lutts of eerers in there rittin enerfears weht komunicating an diskussin there Ectual Idees! Du itt enuff and pepple mite thenk ur an idjit, knot a Harvard gaduat. Sum one who makess his livin by rite-tin oat to kare enuff to get teh basicss rite, doan u thenk?

Posted by Campesino | April 11, 2008 6:11 PM

Matt, you really need to do a post or two about the final act of the neo-con comedy. That might well be the return of Osama bin Laden to Afghanistan as Bush vacates the White House. There's an interesting post over at Abu Muqawama about the effects of commodities and oil inflation on Afghanistan. Which is another way of saying, the effects of Bush's non-economic policy. It is, of course, dire, and the white house is, of course, paying no attention at all. With the result that more than food riots might result.

It would be an appropriate ending. The farside nosepicker's President hasn't failed to that one final degree that makes for true artistry yet.

Posted by roger | April 11, 2008 6:26 PM

rickhavoc your post is so funny.

Posted by Hans B | April 11, 2008 7:34 PM

matt don't spell, i mean spill your drink on your keyboard...

Posted by jvoe | April 11, 2008 8:36 PM

As a native son of smalltown America, I am beyond sick and fucking tired of these whack jobs who presume to pronounce upon my patriotism every time I differ with their demented views on what is best for the country. That is all. Have another beer, Matt, by all means.

My thoughts exactly. Cheers. Robert Kagan can kiss my world historical ass.

Posted by fnook | April 11, 2008 8:40 PM

The most important issue in philosophy today is the question of whether there exists an event or set of events which, in even in theory, could cause Fred Kagan and the rest of the neocons to finally shut the fuck up. And, relatedly, whether there exists an event which could cause the press to stop printing their stupid, crappy little articles.

Posted by brooksfoe | April 12, 2008 8:47 AM

The Jew That Ran Germany

A ten year occupation
with 50,000 casaulties
and 5000 dead Americans
to stabilize Germany.
It sounds statiscally very similiar
to what we're experiencing in Iraq.

They did the numbers right in 1940's
they are the same numbers
that have been used since the Roman times,
it's not a mystery,
it's not fantasy,
it's hardcore military science.
Donny Rumsfeld was amateur complete
right down to his corporate tie and shoes.

Old Adolf Hitler the Jew.
Oh yes Adolf had a hardtime with his grandmother
being a Jew.
He destroyed his home town
and all his family records.
Why you ask?
Because it wouldn't seem right
to have a NAZI Jew leading Germany would it?
(The man was wacked in the head...)

He didn't want to be a Jew.
He didn't want to be Austrian.
He didn't even want to be a German.
He wanted to be a Norweigian
(and a Viking)
like all good NAZIs wanted to be...
I don't recall any Vikings launching boats
from Germany in mass numbers can you?

People are very strange...
yes very strange indeed.

Posted by Steve Real | April 13, 2008 7:04 AM

The Jew That Ran Germany

A ten year occupation
with 50,000 casaulties
and 5000 dead Americans
to stabilize Germany.
It sounds statiscally very similiar
to what we're experiencing in Iraq.

They did the numbers right in 1940's
they are the same numbers
that have been used since the Roman times,
it's not a mystery,
it's not fantasy,
it's hardcore military science.
Donny Rumsfeld was amateur complete
right down to his corporate tie and shoes.

Old Adolf Hitler the Jew.
Oh yes Adolf had a hardtime with his grandmother
being a Jew.
He destroyed his home town
and all his family records.
Why you ask?
Because it wouldn't seem right
to have a NAZI Jew leading Germany would it?
(The man was wacked in the head...)

He didn't want to be a Jew.
He didn't want to be Austrian.
He didn't even want to be a German.
He wanted to be a Norweigian
(and a Viking)
like all good NAZIs wanted to be...
I don't recall any Vikings launching boats
from Germany in mass numbers can you?

People are very strange...
yes very strange indeed.

Posted by Steve Real | April 13, 2008 7:04 AM

The Jew That Ran Germany

A ten year occupation
with 50,000 casaulties
and 5000 dead Americans
to stabilize Germany.
It sounds statiscally very similiar
to what we're experiencing in Iraq.

They did the numbers right in 1940's
they are the same numbers
that have been used since the Roman times,
it's not a mystery,
it's not fantasy,
it's hardcore military science.
Donny Rumsfeld was amateur complete
right down to his corporate tie and shoes.

Old Adolf Hitler the Jew.
Oh yes Adolf had a hardtime with his grandmother
being a Jew.
He destroyed his home town
and all his family records.
Why you ask?
Because it wouldn't seem right
to have a NAZI Jew leading Germany would it?
(The man was wacked in the head...)

He didn't want to be a Jew.
He didn't want to be Austrian.
He didn't even want to be a German.
He wanted to be a Norweigian
(and a Viking)
like all good NAZIs wanted to be...
I don't recall any Vikings launching boats
from Germany in mass numbers can you?

People are very strange...
yes very strange indeed.

Posted by Steve Real | April 13, 2008 7:05 AM