Talk:Neoconservatism (United States)/Archive 1

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I scraped a vile piece of garbage in favor of this completely new article. Why didn't the original authors come out and just call it "Jewish conservatism" and allude to Zionist conspiracies? I loath the neoconservatives, but the old piece was an anti-Semitic diatribe.

Some of that content was good, but a lot of seemingly anti-Semitic biases slipped in the article.

172

Is this neoconservatism something that only occurs in the USA? If that is not the case, this article seems way too US-centric. If it is the case, then it might be a good idea to say so more clearly in the first line. - Kimiko 07:27 Apr 26, 2003 (UTC)

Well, essentially the answer is yes. It's very much a US movement started by an elite clique of US foreign policy circles (largely in New York and Washington, not even throughout the whole country). Now maybe the article can discuss the parallels to Thatcher in Britain. In fact it should. I’ll get to that. 172

What, none of them come from Texas?! :) -- Zoe

Not the ones with the brains. 172

I made a few changes, mostly typos, and removed one word (realistic) as POV. One thing that does bother me a bit is the oversimplification of the pre-WW2 debate. Internationalists were not Interventionists, and socialists in the US were of various minds during the pre-war debate. Soviet-aligned Communists certainly changed their mind regarding intervention in Europe based on Nazi Germany's relationship with the Soviet Union. Yes, it is a tangential side issue, but it sort of sticks out to me (maybe because I've been studying this debate for the past few months). Oh, and the roots of Iraq war go farther back than even the Vietnam war (something I am trying to clarify in my articles on early Iraqi prime ministers). Other than that, I cannot see the older article in the history, so I cannot compare it, except on the basis of the edits. I will take a closer look at it though. Thanks for the heads up, 172. Danny

I'm well-aware of all this. I was just trying to suggest that many factions on the left influenced their early thinking. And I wanted to characterize them as generally center-left (with a propensity to lean more and more anti-Soviet), anti-fascist, working class, and eager to see US entry into the Second World War for the sake of brevity.

172

This article is heavily leaning towards foreign policy. Neocons have had strong opinions about domestic issues too. Someone please add this. --Cema 15:59 Apr 26, 2003 (UTC)

The domestic issues are there, but nobody denies that they're more focused on foreign policy than domestic policy. 172

Good additions, Roadrunner. 172

I would like to see more added on what divides neoconservatives from traditional conservatives. On certain issues, don't neoconservatives have what otherwise might be considered centrist, or liberal, positions? This point is only briefly discussed. RK

The differences between them and the free market libertarians, the protectionist/isolationist/nativist wing of conservatism, the traditional right, exemplified by Bill Buckley, and religious conservatives is in the article, but if someone wants to elaborate that would be great. If not, I could get around to it if something else doesn't distract me. 172

I would like to see information linking neoconservativism in the US, Britain, and other countries. What relationship is there between the movements? How do they differ? Danny

There aren't any "links" really, but parallels. Neoconservatism is more of a clique than a movement. 172

To highlight just how this area looks from outside, consider this part: "Broadly sympathetic to Woodrow Wilson's idealistic goals to force American ideals of government, economics, and culture abroad, they grew to eject his reliance on international organizations and treaties..."

To my eyes, and I suspect those of many others, this does not show any fundamental disparity or change but a mere tactical shift. Where before this sort of person wasn't on top and found it convenient to ringbark imperialist methods, now such people find it convenient to apply those methods rather than decry them. But since the whole thing has been destructive of other ways all along, whether Jefferson's asymmetrical embargo early on or Roosevelt's taking strategic resources from a beleaguered Britain, it all looks harmful from here. PML.

A nice reference, esp. for students: The Essential Neo-Conservative Reader, ISBN: 0201154889 (paperback) or ISBN: 0201479680 (hardback). Published in 1996, so missing some of the recent input. Still an important source. --Cema 00:00 Apr 30, 2003 (UTC)

I'm familiar with this source as well. Your contributions to this article, Cema, would be a great help. Most needed right now is links to the academics and policy-makers cited in this article. 172

The new section on relationships with other forms of US conservatism did not belong where some users had placed it. It was placed in a part of the article detailing what shifted them to the right. So a section distinguishing a neoconservative from a libertarian in this early in the article would not have appropriate, since we don�t have the prototypical neoconservative species established at this point in the chronology.

Also, most of the content in that new section had already been established. This section is best as a concluding paragraph.

172

This is a very interesting article. It cuts through the rhetoric of both sides fairly well. However, it does overtly argue one side on the charges of dual loyalty. While I agree with the stance articulated in the article (that the charges of dual loyalty are baseless), perhaps this section could be reworded according to the NPOV guidelines. Wenteng 04:54, 29 Jul 2003 (UTC)

The neoconservatives also support a robust American stance on Israel, particularly on supporting any Likud-led government. Hey, where is that Likud-led part coming from? Any factual or documental support? Cema 05:42, 18 Aug 2003 (UTC)

Well, it is a bit of a stretch to state that American commentators, academics, and officials have partisan ties to the Likud, but the sentence is more or less referring to the skepticism of the Oslo Accords under the Labour government of Rabin and the Camp David Summit under the government of Baraq. Likud and neoconservative views on the peace process and Palestinian terrorism generally coincide. If anything, the neoconservatives have been to the right of Sharon lately on these matters. 172 05:52, 18 Aug 2003 (UTC)
Well perhaps, but it is not the same as support of any Likud-led government. I think that phrase needs to be seriously edited. Cema 23:06, 20 Aug 2003 (UTC)

I can't decide what annoys me more about this article.

  • That it suggests that there is something known as neo-conservatism

(which is about as much of an oxymoron as you can get. Neo, meaning new, and conservatism, meaning trying to keep the same.)

  • That it is a liberal defining what conservatism is, and what we stand for.
  • Or that even in conservatism, the neo variety, leftists have to give themselves credit for starting it.

Oh, and whats with the writing? Its written like someone who wanted to prove what they learned in college.

John Abbott

Answers.
* Neoconservatism is an established name for a loosely defined group of people with certain common views on polytics and society. There is nothing wrong with the name.
* A liberal can define what conservatism is, and vice versa, without any problem. One cannot restrict definition of a group to members of the group only.
* The original neoconservatists were indeed former leftists. This is a well known fact.
As for the writing, well — improve it! This is wikipedia, after all.
Cema 03:48, 23 Aug 2003 (UTC)


All right, what's this this garbled "alleged Iraq was doing" link? This doesn't make any sense!

following the election of George W. Bush [...], the influence of neoconservatism in the Bush administration appears to have increased. How's that? Until this point, the flow of words was rather pleasant, I did not even want to NPOV it. But the eye stumbles here. I will delete the "following the election" part, okay? :-) Cema 08:30, 26 Aug 2003 (UTC)

This article still leans heavily towards the International, as opposed to domestic, issues. Obviously, this has been a hot topic recently. But will someone please add an overview of the domestic policy? So much words are spent on arguing whether or not the US position on the invasion of Iraq was justified. This is an article about neoconservatism, not US foreign policy. Cema 08:36, 26 Aug 2003 (UTC)

I'm brand-new to this fascinating site (and don't even know how to "log in" yet, so I'm just an anonymous IP number now), so maybe editing a page as controversial as this one is a little foolhardy... but I did it anyway. Just a few edits, in an attempt to make the page a little more ideologically neutral. I'm *not* a neocon, but the article I found there obviously had a strong anti-neocon bias. Most importantly, I removed the line about part of the neocon philosophy being drawn from Trotskyite Communism. I know what that refers to (the "permanent revolution" etc.) but the only people who make that ludicrous claim are far-right hardline anti-neocons, typically the followers of Patrick Buchanan. Accusing the neocons of being partially communistic, no matter what else you may think of them, is simply wrong. I noticed that another article on this site went to great lengths to distinguish "Islamofascism" from true (historical) fascism. Fine, but then why allow the far more absurd contention that neocons are some kind of Trotskyists?

Well done, 66.167.184.173. Hope you log in and stick around. -- Viajero 08:31, Aug 29, 2003 (UTC)

Well, anti-neocon POV is still strong in places. Just a few questions.

  • Did Reagan administration really support the apartheid South Africa, and if so, did neocons support it too?
  • Vietnam War, which was by no means a revolution being orchestrated by the Soviets from Moscow, long a charge of neoconservatives who view Third World liberation struggles as illegitimate: while the former may be correct to a large extent (it was strongly actively supported by the Soviets, but not controlled by them), the latter does not ring true.
  • Why is the Trotskyite relationship mentioned 4 times in the first two paragraphs? In addition, the charge that The influence of the Trotskyites perhaps left them with strong anti-Soviet tendencies should be NPOVed; perhaps they simply saw the Soviet Union for what it was, eh?
  • Two full paragraphs on the Vietnam situation. This was a serious wound in the American psyche, I understand, but this is an article on neoconservatives, and not an anthropological essay. And again POV: the Vietnam conflict has cast a shadow on their arguably simplistic worldview of good and evil. Well, arguably not!
  • This paragraph about Gorbachev, what is it doing here anyway? How is glasnost related to neocons? No explanation is given.

And so on, and so forth. Frankly, large portions of the article still read like a college essay written by a social studies major with an agenda. And where is the domestic material?

I will add a notice in the beginning. Cema 03:34, 31 Aug 2003 (UTC)

Cema:

One could detect an agenda from your very comments, evident especially with your snide, 'maybe the saw them for what they were, eh?'

BTW, you completely missed the point of that remark. The point was not that this is true and everything else is wrong. The point was that the claim in the article was just as unfounded as the eh-claim. While we cannot keep an article purely logical and free of speculation, at least we can cover all important possibilities. Or, alternatively, avoid speculating. Cema 06:30, 1 Sep 2003 (UTC)

Regardless of your ostensible agenda, I'm going to shortly address your points.

  • At no point, to my knowledge, does the article state that the Reagan administration supported the policies of apartheid, but refers to support among the American right of South Africa's role as an anti-Communist proxy in the Southern African region, especially in the 1980s, when South African forces intervened militarily to crush the Marxist SWAPO liberation movement in South West Africa, and aided UNITA rebels pitted against the Marxist MPLA in Angola. Perhaps you do not remember that US sanctions against South Africa were enacted by Congress overriding Reagan's veto. The neoconservatives supported Reagan's position with the tacit approval of South Africa's role as an anti-Communist force in the region. Thus, the references to South Africa are relevant to the article, especially when describing the Kirkpatrick doctrine.
The article says: Under this doctrine, the Reagan administration actively supported the dictatorships of Augusto Pinochet, Ferdinand Marcos and the racist apartheid regime in South Africa. The words "supported [...] racist apartheid regime", if unqualified, read as if it supported the regime of apartheid.
Indeed, I do not remember how the US sanctions were initiated, although I am not surprised it was Congress and not Reagan. And I do not think that disagreement with the apartheid policies logically implies support of the sanctions (although statistically it is strongly related). References to South Africa are relevant as an example of the usage of anti-Communist proxy regimes, but this should be formulated in a neutral manner.
Well, I do remember. If you do not, do some research. 172 19:45, 31 Aug 2003 (UTC)
What are you arguing with? Just for the sake of argument? Cema 06:21, 1 Sep 2003 (UTC)
Cema
  • Again, this was a reference to the Kirpatrick doctrine, a pillar of neoconservative thought. I think that there's a separate entry on it if you are skeptical. However, I'm not going to spoon feed on this page right now since I simply don't have the time.
I am not skeptical. I am tired of the bias. I need neutral texts. I do not want to write anything in the entry (except fixing typos) for a while, but I am afraid I will not see a neutral version any time soon. Cema


  • Perhaps the relationship to the Trotskyites can be clarified. I don't have time at the moment, but perhaps you'd want to do some research so that you'd offer a better explanation of the evolution of though among the first generation of neoconservative thinkers, such as Irving Kristol.
  • There's little need to explain what should be the obvious relevance to the sections on Vietnam. Simply put, the neoconservatives have long been advocates of getting over what they see as "Vietnam syndrome."
Well said. Why not put it in precisely these words? This would be succinct and to the point and completely NPOV. I understand you may not have time, but I am trying to minimize my participation in this entry because, frankly, the more I read it, the more irritated I become... Cema
  • Gorbachev was mentioned in the context of the disillusion of the Soviet Union. This section addresses the argument linking Reagan administration policies to the collapse of communism. The neoconservatives have actively cultivated this view. 172 04:54, 31 Aug 2003 (UTC)
I obviously have an agenda (full disclosure: I am very close to neocons on most International issues and some domestic too; I am not American (yet) but have been living here since the early 1990s). Because I know my bias, I do not remove the stuff I do not agree with, and often abstain from NPOVing it, so that it would not lean the other way. But I see the POV and am bothered by it. (Sometimes, in certain other articles, I did edit POV that was similar to mine or undeservedly "flattering" to my side, but I did not do it here: too much verbiage.)
Notice that the way you formulate your thoughts on the talk page is much better than the way it is written on the entry page. Maybe, if you ever have time, you could walk through it and rewrite it your way? I explained above why I do not want to do this.
Thanks. Cema 19:19, 31 Aug 2003 (UTC)

I tried to NPOV the Vietnam bit a little. If you ask me, a lot of this article still has a lot of bias. The underlying message seems to be that all neo con beliefs are stupid and illogical ("They tried to say the Vietnam war was about Soviet expansionism, but it was really just a peasant revolution, the big dopes!"). user:J.J.

Well, I see it this way too. But like I said, I do not want to edit the article while I am angry, because it will simply skew it the other way. At the same time, 172 apparently likes it this way and is not going to edit it either. Cema 06:21, 1 Sep 2003 (UTC)
You don't need to be that afraid. I am sure you can do a few casual edits here and there without injecting too much of your own agenda. The article makes me mad as well, so I just look at, and edit little isolated bits. I agree, though, that reading and editing through the whole thing is probably not a good idea. Too many articles on Wikipedia already read like a "back and forth" conversation between a righist and a leftist. user:J.J.
Yes. But not when I am angry. :-) Cema 15:15, 3 Sep 2003 (UTC)

No. While I have been an active contributor to this article, I am far from the sole writer. I do not have the right to rewrite the article at the behest of one person. I am not going to rewrite the article to fit your 'here are the luminaries, the liberals mugged by reality, who saw the evil of the Evil Empire' perspective. Neoconservative polemics can be found in the Wall Street Journal, the Weekly Standard, Commentary, and so on, but they have no place in an encyclopedia. You've had your regime change in Iraq, but you're not going to have an 'article change' on Wikipedia. 172 19:43, 31 Aug 2003 (UTC)

Now there is someone without bias here. You've had this, you've had that... :-( Yeah, I've had enough. And the article remains biased. Cema 06:21, 1 Sep 2003 (UTC)

Why not Neoconservatism (US) or Neoconservatism in the United States? The current title is not conventional. --Jiang 01:51, 1 Sep 2003 (UTC)

I am not aware of a neoconservative movement outside of the US. Is there any? Cema 06:21, 1 Sep 2003 (UTC)
See Neoconservatism --Jiang 22:31, 1 Sep 2003 (UTC)
OK, thanks. Cema 15:15, 3 Sep 2003 (UTC)
If no one objects I'll move this to my second suggestion above. --Jiang 22:32, 1 Sep 2003 (UTC)

neoconservatives in the 1960s were much less interested in Israel before the June 1967 Six Day War. It has only been since this conflict, which has raised the specter of Israel's military invincibility, that the neoconservatives have become preoccupied by Israel's security interests. Is this specter of invincibility relevant here? And is this claim factually correct? Cema 19:28, 6 Sep 2003 (UTC)

Yes, it is. And read on to see why it's relevant. 172 03:21, 7 Sep 2003 (UTC)
I'd like to see some citations from reputable authorities. Half the material in this article is the same superficial stuff that I see in the newspaper every day. I reviewed my copy of Sachar's massive history, and the supposed neocon preoccupation with Israel was apparently unnoticeable. Stan 04:57, 7 Sep 2003 (UTC)

Now, 172. You don't own this article. You decided to remove the NPOVing editing I did the day before; I can restore it, you can delete it again, and so on. We will not play this childish game. Anyone can take a look ( http://www.wikipedia.org/w/wiki.phtml?title=Neoconservatism_(United_States)&diff=0&oldid=1403499 ) and decide if it should stay or go. But you do disappoint me. Cema 14:19, 8 Sep 2003 (UTC)

Why am I being accused of anti-Israel bias? I'm a committed Zionist with Israeli relatives. We're talking about nuclear proliferation in the Middle East. I don't understand how this could be bashing Israel by any stretch of the imagination. France, which was arguably Israel's key backer before the Six Day War, aided the construction of the nuclear reactor at Dimona. Why are the two of you so upset about this? 172 17:26, 8 Sep 2003 (UTC)

Maybe somebody accuses you of anti-Israel bias; not me. But I am accusing you of anti-neocon bias. Not of having such bias (we all have some), but of putting it in the article. Whether it is conscious or not.
For example, take this France-Israel-Dimona issue. Sure, France helped Israel to start its nuclear program, which likely includes military aspects as well as civilian ones. This might be very important in an article on Israel, nuclear proliferation, etc, etc. But how is it relevant in an article on American neoconservatism?
Cema 11:07, 9 Sep 2003 (EDT)

RK accused me of bashing Israel, not you. But that's not important. Let me deal with the problems you stated above. We're dealing with Israel because neoconservatives have long defended, and even embraced, Israeli tactics to ensure its security, often arguing that the United States should adopt them and employ them, especially in the Middle East. Israel's pre-emptive attacks on the Egyptian air force leading up to the Six Day War in 1967, the raid on Entebbe, and Israel's attacks on nuclear facilities in Libya and Iraq in the 1980s were, in many respects, precursors to the Bush Doctrine. However, a context was provided for these actions since history is not occurring in a vacuum in which all variables are constant. It's simply important to note that Iraq in 1982 wasn't considered a pariah state by the world's leading nations, or even if it was, it wasn't considered a threat on the scale that it was after the 1990 invasion of Kuwait. Noting this, neoconservatives have lauded Israeli foresight in attacking Iraq in 1982 while some still view those attacks with skepticism. Thus, providing the backgrounding does not favor one set of political leanings over another.

This article doesn't have an anti-neocon bias. It presents their arguments and characterizes their worldview, while bringing up counter-arguments for the sake of balance. You seem to have a problem with all attemps to bring in that balance. 172 18:32, 9 Sep 2003 (EDT)

I'm personally anti-neocon, and the anti-neocon bias is pretty evident to me. The arguments put forth by neocons are brief and simplified, while the counter-arguments are given at more length and drag in lots of semi-relevant points. I looked at this article in hopes of understanding the neocon worldview better and came away with no more enlightenment than from the average editorial page column. There are a bunch of sweeping statements with no authority given for them for them, so for all I know they're just personal opinion. Also the reference list is pathetic; there should be an arms-length list of books that the leading neocons have written to set out their case, not a ragbag of dubious websites. It shouldn't be that hard to collect good refs; if nothing else, amazon.com is more than happy to supply a bunch of matches if you give it a search term or author name. Stan 20:42, 9 Sep 2003 (EDT)

I have come across a couple of online articles in which neoconservatives describe what their view of neoconservatism is. Would be nice if someone else read them and decided if they are worth being added to the bibliography.

  • [1] The Neoconservative Persuasion . From the August 25, 2003 issue: What it was, and what it is. By Irving Kristol. The Weekly Standard, 08/25/2003, Volume 008, Issue 47.
  • [2] The Neoconservative Cabal by Joshua Muravchik. Commentary, September 1, 2003.

I personally think reading them gives an important perspective of the neocon POV, as to how they see (1) themselves and (2) the way others see them.

Cema 16:25, 13 Sep 2003 (UTC)

I added more about the Neo Cons break with the New Left. Editing this article, I realize how all over the place it is. As others have mentioned, it really does read like a university paper, with akward citations sprinkled throughout, and lacking any sort of coherient organization. While I don't like to blindly edit peoples' work, I think large chunks of this article are irrelevant (such as the thuroughly pointless Vietnam debate, which I stupidly contributed to, making it even longer and more confusing) and should be deleted. user:J.J.

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