← Autodidact Archive · Original Dissent · Texas Dissident
Thread ID: 3330 | Posts: 7 | Started: 2002-10-31
2002-10-31 08:46 | User Profile
[url=http://www.lewrockwell.com/gottfried/gottfried37.html]Forget the Left, Neocon or Otherwise[/url]
by Paul Gottfried
Lew Rockwell got it right when he introduced David Cornââ¬â¢s commentary for The Nation (November 11) by explaining that Corn was "defending his fellow social democrats [the neocons]." Corn emphatically rejects Ronald Radoshââ¬â¢s statements about a "convergence" between the anti-war Left and the isolationist Right. He also showers contempt on Buchananââ¬â¢s talk about the need to "deneoconize" the American Right. Corn compares that to Buchananââ¬â¢s unsuccessful bids for the presidency and to his dubious attempts to promote "cultural wars."
The Nation may be sending the paleos an unmistakable warning. The Left, which is a multicultural big-government force, is not looking for allies on our side of the aisle. It is happy with the current arrangements, in which Bill Bennett and Dinesh Dââ¬â¢Souza get to speak for the "Right" while most of the political class continues to speak for the leftwing social democrats. Although there may be occasional intramural bickering, e.g., among the various Middle East factions or about how far to push the feminist agenda or socialized medicine, leftists are content to disagree among themselves ââ¬â while consigning our guys to the outer reaches of Hell.
By this stage of the game, you would think that all right-wingers would see the picture. But they donââ¬â¢t and still dream of grand alliances that will stretch across the ideological chasm. There are, in my opinion, two reasons for this persistent illusion. One, some of those on our side have personal ambitions and are susceptible to the hope that they can make friends with influential leftists by stressing a few overlapping opinions. Unfortunately the political world doesnââ¬â¢t work that way. The Left hates us viscerally, the way Nazis hated Jews, even if Hitlerites were willing to negotiate with Zionist representatives to make Europe "Judenrein." Sucking up to powerful leftist literati wonââ¬â¢t change this situation, as Cornââ¬â¢s fevered attempt to find evidence of fascist (or Pinochetite) tendencies in Buchananââ¬â¢s anti-war polemics amply demonstrates.
Two, some on our side are driven by an understandable desire to fight the political establishment with well-positioned allies. Thus Murray Rothbard and Ralph Raico, who could never be reasonably accused of compromising their beliefs, tried to build an alliance in the sixties and seventies with leftist opponents of the warfare state. Nothing much came of this enterprise, except for a few scholarly ventures most notably with the pre-neocon Ronald Radosh, and as far as I know, this alliance-building was subsequently abandoned by the Right, where it had been taken more seriously than by the other side. Despite such setbacks, some rightists continue to hope that the Left will stop slamming the door in their faces. If only lefties and misnamed liberals would join hands with us, we would be able to move forward and push the neocons out of their position in the right-center of a leftward moving spectrum.
This may happen in oneââ¬â¢s imagination but nowhere else. The neocons are where they are because thatââ¬â¢s where the Left wants them to be, whether or not we and the Left may occasionally agree for different reasons about some fleeting issue.
The true strategy for our side is the one that Corn scornfully attributes to Buchanan, fighting house-by-house to get back our occupied city. And without allies, that war of attrition will be tough and (God willing!) ugly, too ugly for the girly boys who appear on TV with air-blown hair to push this country into war. Those media types are the preferred debating partners for David Corn and others like him. On the social and most political issues, they can at least agree to disagree, unlike a harder Right or a libertarian movement, which yearns to junk anti-discrimination laws, entitlements, liberal immigration, and other marks of leftist progress. On the things that really count, like an all-controlling centralized managerial regime, David Corn and Bill Kristol have far more in common with each other than either does with our side.
*October 31, 2002
Paul Gottfried [send him mail] is professor of history at Elizabethtown College and author of, most recently, the highly recommended Multiculturalism and the Politics of Guilt.
Copyright é 2002 LewRockwell.com*
2002-10-31 20:21 | User Profile
I sent a note to Gottfried about this article, asking if his aggressive stance could be counted as a statement of sorts; and I urged him to continue to name names.
He responded by suggesting I read his new book on multiculturalism, to which I responded by recommending Culture of Critique.
His response was to say that he didn't really disagree with MacDonald's conclusions about the "malevolent role of Jewish groups in destroying American gentile society", although he felt MacDonald "underestimates the present vile condition of the gentile societies under siege."
I'm responding to him that, in my opinion, MacDonald credits that malevolence for much of our societies current vile condition.
2002-10-31 20:51 | User Profile
That's great to hear, whitebread. My first thought when I read this piece was that Gottfried had been reading AntiYuppie recently.
We've had the "gentile condition" vs. "jewish malevolence" argument here more than once. Some may liken it to the old "which came first, the chicken or the egg" question, but to me the answer is quite obvious.
The chicken came first.
2002-10-31 21:54 | User Profile
There's a discussion between MacDonald and Gottfried at: [url=http://www.csulb.edu/~kmacd/books.htm]http://www.csulb.edu/~kmacd/books.htm[/url] (search for second instance of 'Gottfried' on page).
Both men make their points well I think (and no-one accuses anyone of 'hate'!).
2002-11-01 08:56 | User Profile
Originally posted by Leveller@Oct 31 2002, 21:54 **There's a discussion between MacDonald and Gottfried at: [url=http://www.csulb.edu/~kmacd/books.htm]http://www.csulb.edu/~kmacd/books.htm[/url] (search for second instance of 'Gottfried' on page).
Both men make their points well I think (and no-one accuses anyone of 'hate'!).**
Thanks for reproducing this Leveller. I think I posted this before (A Race Apart) but MacDonald's response here is very interesting.
I think they had a further exchange in Chronicles letters. It seems to me the general gist is to some extent, while they both agree on the origins of the managerial state, MacDonald tends to ascribe a larger extent of its creation to Jews than Gottfried. Gottfried mentioned, as I've seen other Jewish conservatives often do, the example of Scandanavia, where managerials and social liberalism developed rapidly even tough, unlike mainland Europe, Jewish presence in all levels of society was very small to negligible.
Discussions like this do test the limits and implications of MacDonalds theory Its the point really where evolutionary psychologist brecomes social philospherand political pundit, attempting to extent (the rather nebulous) reaches of his theory.
Overall though they do agree pretty much on most aspects of western society though.
(I'd add MacDonald's theory realy applies only to western civilization and the way Jewish influence in its cultural centers helped determine its outcome. Anyone who for some reason is familar with the idiosynchric politics of areas on the outside or periphery of the European mainstream (like Sweden, etc, or even countries like Japan) tend not to be cultural innovators, but rather tend to watch developments in the western mainstream closely and borrow from them. )
2002-11-01 13:36 | User Profile
Originally posted by Frederick William I@Nov 1 2002, 02:56 I think they had a further exchange in Chronicles letters. It seems to me the general gist is to some extent, while they both agree on the origins of the managerial state, MacDonald tends to ascribe a larger extent of its creation to Jews than Gottfried. Gottfried mentioned, as I've seen other Jewish conservatives often do, the example of Scandanavia, where managerials and social liberalism developed rapidly even though, unlike mainland Europe, Jewish presence in all levels of society was very small to negligible.
After Patton (George C. Scott) learns, to his disappointment, that Rommel had not directed the battle - but was, in fact, in Berlin at the time being treated for nasal diptheria - Patton's G2 reassures him that certainly it had been Rommel's plan which had been realized by the German troops on the battlefield. And that, if you defeat Rommel's plan, you defeat Rommel.
2002-11-01 17:08 | User Profile
Originally posted by NeoNietzsche@Nov 1 2002, 13:36 After Patton (George C. Scott) learns, to his disappointment, that Rommel had not directed the battle - but was, in fact, in Berlin at the time being treated for nasal diptheria - Patton's G2 reassures him that certainly it had been Rommel's plan which had been realized by the German troops on the battlefield. And that, if you defeat Rommel's plan, you defeat Rommel.
I don't believe Patton was entirely appeased by that explanation, but it was probably at least in large part true, even though Rommel in person always could have made a few last minute changes. (Although German generals had ceded a lot of their real battlefield autonomy and authority to the prerogatives of Fuehrer micromanagement anyway).