These former New Deal Democrats broke with the so called "New Left" and once preferred to be called paleoliberals. They believed in what some called the vital center of liberalism, but neoconservative is a more useful, utilitarian term for modern times and modern political realities.
What does this have to do with conservatism? Good question. Neocons, who have co-opted conservative, Republican administrations but also have influence in the current administration, may reflect the views of their patron saint, Irving Kristol who called Republicans the "stupid party." They are anything but conservative and have contempt for traditional conservatism as obscene, reactionary and lacking "intellectualism."
Neocons believe in striking your enemies first and frequently; America as the world's policeman; the welfare state; open borders; a secular view of religion; and using America's religious right as a tool to further their own agenda. They focus on the Middle East and diplomacy by American tank and nuclear might if necessary.
Both Irving Kristol and his son Bill Kristol, who has been Sarah Palin's foremost promoter and inventor, embraced the term neoconservative. Others within the club avoid the term as an anti Semitic pejorative. David Brooks who calls anyone disagrees with Neocons as "full-mooners fixated on a sort of Yiddish Trilateral Commission."
Neocons are socialists, ex-Marxists, rooted in the hard left incubators of liberal intellectualism; globalist wolves in sheep's clothing who have contaminated and confused U.S. conservatism. They hide their true agenda from those they use but have contempt for through their fronts on Fox News and the editorial page of the Wall Street Journal, both Murdoch outlets. Traditional social conservatives may believe these folks actually share their core values.
The Neocon legacy? The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan; sanctioned torture of "enemy combatants"; a weakened and overtaxed America; a growing police state in America in the name of anti-terrorism; a central government that tripled in size under the neocon dominated George W. Bush Administration; a simplistic us v. them mentality that seeks enemies not friends in the world; and perhaps, a coming war with Iran which they seek as passionately as they did the war in Iraq.
Their faces are as diverse as Dick Cheney, Karl Rove, Elliot Abrams, David Frum, John Bolton, Sean Hannity, Richard Perle, Charles Krauthammer, and now it seems, Sarah Palin.
How do you discern the real conservatives from these pretenders? Approach your expositor of right wing jingoism, and tell him or her, that you believe in America First, bringing our troops home, balancing the budget, ending foreign entanglements and foreign aid, policing our borders and adhering to the U.S. Constitution.
Step back as the phony invections of Ronald Reagan and the effected paternalism for the fools they must suffer fade away and the noble lies Plato offered to promote an illegitimate, elitist agenda are swept away like chaff before the gale of truth; merely a vapor like the smoke in the cafeteria in old New York where young intellectuals entered as Trotsky loyalists and left as neo-Leninists seeking to change the world through their will and power they project in proportions greatly exceeding their actual numbers in the body politic.
