This "remoralization" of American foreign policy can be put
into place for an additional $60-$80 billion per year -- "not a radical
proposal," our authors assert, when you consider that, without it,
we could well be forced to "stand by and watch" the monsters "ravaging
and pillaging to their hearts' content."
Overcoming public antipathy to higher defense spending requires making citizens
notice that "they have never had it so good" and that they have
taken the "fruits of their hegemonic power for granted." The appeal
for a revitalized (and, above all, benevolent) hegemonism, Kristol and Kagan
aver, would be best modeled on Paul Nitze's NSC-68 planning document of
1950 which bipolarized the world neatly into virtuous (us), and diabolical
(them, and their friends). Presumably, making such a case "loudly,
cogently, and persistently" will make it all a little less recondite
for the average dolt, causing the populace to identify its material well-being
with the merits of a bristling American power-projection ordained to topple
all the new bogeymen and fashion a "world order shaped to suit American
interests and principles. " To do so would be "good for the world."
America's ability to scapegoat and punish the world, we learn, has a consonant
tie-in with conservatism's domestic agenda. Indeed, the "remoralization
of America at home" requires such a foreign policy. Upholding the "core
elements of the Western tradition at home"-- i.e., "relimiting"
the social services safety net, warring against "relativistic multiculturalism"
and the "collapse of standards" -- requires a commensurate application
of American principles abroad. Here we've come full circle back to David
Stockman at the woodshed. A collateral objective of Reagan's military spending
bender was to leave no funding available for social spending, and the additional
defense budget outlays Kristol/Kagan propose would rekindle that vision,
consistent with a "broader, more enlightened understanding of America's
interests." In short, a revival of one-stop shopping at its finest.
If Dole's remarks the other day at Philadelphia's World Affairs Council
are indicative, the editorial board of The Weekly Standard will be
writing his foreign policy speeches from now on. Dole's wheezy fulminations
about restoring "decisiveness" and "purpose" to U.S.
foreign policy (not to mention "nobility" and "principle")
had all the odor of the Kristol/Kagan plea to stanch American anomie.
The Russian elections are clearly providing the opening for the interjection
of this crypto-fascist swill. The moment couldn't offer a more favorable
auspice for renewing a deliberate misinterpretation of Russian intentions;
this is a set piece for Dole and those who have his ear. Likely more than
40 percent of Russians in the runoff will vote against the glories of free
market capitalism, a provocation Dole defined as "challenging the interests
of America and the West."
Clinton's porcine slipperiness vanishes on this issue, you can hear the
neo-cons chanting as they ready his enclosure. Meanwhile we remain a kept
audience to Dole's decomposing before our eyes into minute clumps of servility.
Roll over, Machiavelli, tell Paul Nitze the news.