Although George W. Bush is often called a Neoconservative by his critics, the truth is that this accusation is more one of rhetoric than reality. While Neocons may actively support him, by background and belief he's much more of a traditional Republican than any kind of Neocon, but because of the negative perception of Neocons his opponents do everything they can to paint him as one.
The standard definition of a Neocon is someone who subscribes to the tenets of 'New Conservatism', the more extreme social agenda favored by groups like the Christian Coalition. This differs from traditional conservatism and traditional Republicanism in a number of significant ways. Conservative beliefs come in two basic flavors, social and fiscal. Social conservatives believe in traditional values. Fiscal conservatives believe in limited government and free trade. Until the 1960s the Republican party was socially liberal and fiscally conservative and the Democratic party was socially conservative and fiscally liberal. The Republicans liked business and liked individual rights, while the Democrats liked big-government and traditional religious values. The Republicans were the party that freed the slaves and free trade and the Democrats were the party of the KKK and the massive government expansion of FDR.
In the 1960s the Democratic party changed, largely as a result of the politics of John F. Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson who took the party from being a socially conservative southern party to one which embraced the civil rights movement and other progressive social policies while still favoring big government. This created a problem for traditional Republicans because the Democrats began to cut into their support base in the northeastern states. The Republicans responded by courting traditionally Democratic southerners who were opposed to large government but were also more socially conservative than the northern wing of their party. This started a process of change in the Republican party which eventually led to taking over the Democratic base in the south, and with that acquiring as adherents the most reactionary elements in southern politics, religiously motivated extremists who promoted a radical faith-based social agenda with only limited interest in issues of economic policy.
These new Republicans are the Neocons and George W. Bush really isn't one of them. He's not really from Texas and he's not really a southern rancher or oilman. His family is from Connecticut and their background is in banking. They're the essence of traditional New England Republican businessmen. They're patricians who have a long history of political involvement in the Republican party, not the party of the Neocons, but the party of William McKinley and Andrew Mellon. Their ancestors came to America in the colonial period and they have long-established family wealth. They go to private prep schools and then Yale, belong to private clubs, own summer houses in Maine and have all the trappings of the priveleged classes of the northeast and are not given to extreme religious fervor. Bush's grandfather Prescott was in banking before he went into politics and he was a standard business-oriented Republican of his era. Bush's father was one of the most liberal Republicans in congress and had a great deal of trouble finding support and acceptance within his own party as it became more socially conservative in the 1970s and 80s. Part of his problem when seeking a second term was erosion of support among southerners who preferred to vote for a moderate southern democrat than someone they saw as a northeastern elitist.
Article comments
— go to most recent comments1 - Steve S
Dave it's interesting, because as I type this, the most current post on Kos is basically saying the same thing you are. Here. I know you don't like Kos, but I think with someone on the Left, like Kos, agreeing with you that Bush is using the Neocons for votes, rather than being one of them should mean something.
I recommend the Kos story to see the Left's perspective of what you just talked about.
2 - Dave Nalle
Thanks for the link to the Kos story. It's not quite on the same lines. I'm not sure that the 'faith based initiative' thing was ever really a Neocon mainline item. It's just a kind of random idea that got tacked onto the agenda because it sounded good. Once it got there I'm not sure that anyone thought of it as much of a priority or had much of an idea how to make it work. It's one of those things that sounds great in a speech, but poses all sorts of technical problems when you actually attempt to implement it.
More telling I think is Bush's very diffident behavior towards the religious right, such as his recent phoned in appearance at the right to life rally. He does the minimum to keep them off his back, but has no real intention of giving them any of the crazy stuff they want.
Kos, of course, spins this negative, because they are opposed to the pro-business, pro-ownership, pro-individual policies of the administration, but to me it seems very positive because I like the idea of a prosperous economy, lower taxes and social security reform. But then, unlike the folks at Kos I care more about what helps out individual Americans than what advances a quasi-socialist, group-advancement agenda.
Dave
3 - DrPat
Interesting perspective on Dubya and the neo-cons - and I suspect, a lot closer to the truth than the Bush Administration would like to have made public. (...that also means that he has to keep them on board by actually doing something to serve their agenda. Remember, these are fanatics...).
Brr-rrr. That's cold.
4 - Steve S
Thanks for the link to the Kos story. It's not quite on the same lines.
I saw a different perspective, a different rationale as to what it means and all that, but I saw the same premise as yours. That Bush is pandering/catering to a group, rather than being a part of that group.
It's one of those things that sounds great in a speech, but poses all sorts of technical problems when you actually attempt to implement it.
Yeah, all it's really done so far is give a bunch of right wingers millions of dollars of government money.
More telling I think is Bush's very diffident behavior towards the religious right
I took that to be the premise of Kos's post.
Kos, of course, spins this negative, because they are opposed to the pro-business, pro-ownership, pro-individual policies of the administration,
Probably because they, like myself, see Bush's policies as causing more harm than good. It's good that you point out that they are opposed to pro-business, pro-ownership pro-individual policies of the administration and not pro-business and pro-ownership, pro-individual policies overall.
I like the idea of a prosperous economy, lower taxes and social security reform.
I like that too! RIght now, I haven't had a raise in 5 years, my job is being fazed out, like the Democratic party, I want to reform social security to make it stronger, not destroy it, etc., so hopefully someday we can have a president that will give me that!
unlike the folks at Kos I care more about what helps out individual Americans
I'm glad you care about individuals like me. Since my situation has gotten progressively worse since Bush took office, hopefully you will join me in wishing for a progressive change in leadership.
5 - Maurice
I'm an atheist and I think killing the unborn in the womb is wrong. Do we value life or not? George Bush is a religious man; doesn't he value life? Is his religion cool with murder.
Incidentally, the big news today is about whether lobsters feel pain. What about the pain of being torn apart as a giant vacuum rips you from your mothers womb?
Don't even respond to this. I don't want to ruin Dave's post with an abortion arguement. I just had to vent.
6 - Maurice
Steve S
you paint a very negative picture. Sorry to hear about your job being fazed out. I am no fan of GWB but I do know that SS needs to be fixed. Paying in a dollar to get back 75 cents and knowing that it will only get worse is a bad scenario. Lower taxes help but Bush needs to shrink the size of government. When the parasite becomes larger than the host, the host dies.
7 - Steve S
Both sides agree Social Security needs to be fixed, the dispute is over how.
My job is scheduled to be phazed out in May and I've known about it, since around last May, so I've had the time to get preparations underway. The economy might not be bad enough to cause a sudden layoff, but my point was, it's not booming for all of us, or jobs wouldn't be phased out. I often read about the specific groups it is booming for, though, so I can see how there's a perspective that things are good. My job is apparently going to Bangladesh.
8 - Aaman
Insightful post, Dave - gives further credence to the reality that left, right - they're all oppo-sames
9 - Dave Nalle
Steve - I should have picked this up from your blog, but somehow didn't see it on there. What kind of job do you have? Or more to the point, what kind of job do you want?
As a general rule the administration is not causing jobs to be phased out. Overall unemployment is now down since Bush took office. But the economy is evolving and the demographics of the country are shifting. Some jobs are going away and new, different jobs are being created - often in a different part of the country alltogether. This is a trend which has been going on for quite a while.
My point being - don't blame the administration for the loss of your specific job - larger forces are at work than some bureaucrats in DC can fully control. But be glad there's a dynamic employment environment operating in the US. It ought to make it easier to find a new job.
Dave
10 - bhw
Overall unemployment is now down since Bush took office.
But that's because many people have stopped looking for work, not because they have found jobs. Their benefits have run out and they're not working or looking, so they're not figured into the unemployment numbers.
Some jobs are going away and new, different jobs are being created - often in a different part of the country alltogether.
This has been a "jobless" recovery. Some new jobs have been created since W. took office and since 9/11, but overall, the creation of new jobs has fallen short of the number needed to account for the new workers entering the workforce. One of the reasons those unemployed people I talked about above have stopped looking for work is because not enough new jobs are being created, particularly in certain career fields.
11 - Jim Carruthers
Thanks for the re-assurance and clarification that the USA threatens this planet and all who reside here, I guess.
12 - Hal Pawluk
What an amazing definiton of a neocon!
Flaming neocons like Wolfowitz, Perle and Kristol - who used the religious right to help them gain power - would not recognize themselves in the odd picture you painted.
Wow.
13 - Eric Olsen
I had a rather different conception as well, focusing on the use of American power to further the cause of liberty and all of that. I didn't think there was much of a domestic agenda component, and certainly not the Christian right angle since many are Jewish!
14 - Hal Pawluk
I do, however, agree that Bush is not a neocon.
He's just their pawn.
15 - Hal Pawluk
On the domestic front, they did get involved in illegal immigration - they didn't mind it continuing - a few years ago.
This probably wasn't as much them being neocons as wanting the cheaper labor for their companies and investments. For this viewpoint, the American Enterprise Institute is a better marker than the Project for the New American Century (the foreign policy compnent).
For any lurkers really interested I have a series of posts on neocons with lots of links to right-wing sources, documentation starting with their roots as Trotskyists, etc. (link opens in new window)
They're really power-hungry shape-shifters.
16 - Steve S
Steve - I should have picked this up from your blog, but somehow didn't see it on there. What kind of job do you have? Or more to the point, what kind of job do you want?
I do database maintenance from home, but not the coding, I do maintenance on the data itself, on the actual text content, mostly.
Because there is no available day care in this town, and because, in order to bring the budget in line, basically all available resources to me were part of what has been shut down by Governor Swartzenegger, I find I am entering the profession of work-from-home, self-employed. *shudder*. I hear it's very lucrative.
How come when things are good for some people, it's because Bush has good economic policies, and when things are bad, it's not really his fault?
I was really able to climb the economic ladder under Clinton. Things have stalled, and no matter who's fault that is, the economic ladder here is still missing more than a few rungs, and that can be blamed on somebody.
While some outsourcing is inevitable, I do find outsourcing to be more heavily embraced by one side than another.
17 - RJ
"I haven't had a raise in 5 years, my job is being fazed out"
Have you tried looking for a new job? Or going back to school?
Or will the Dems just do all the work for you, assuming they eventually come back into power?
18 - RJ
"I'm an atheist and I think killing the unborn in the womb is wrong."
Amen! ;-)
I'm an agnostic, and I dislike abortion immensely.
But hey, all those millions of people who oppose abortion are just religious fundamentalist lunatics, right?
...
19 - RJ
"The economy might not be bad enough to cause a sudden layoff, but my point was, it's not booming for all of us, or jobs wouldn't be phased out."
In even the most booming economies, some jobs are "fazed out."
Capitalism tends to utilize its "invisible hand" in such a way as to better the macro-economy. In doing so, some individuals are temporarily inconvenienced.
Adam Smith would shed no tears for you, I'm afraid...
20 - RJ
"One of the reasons those unemployed people I talked about above have stopped looking for work is because not enough new jobs are being created, particularly in certain career fields."
We just ran an employment ad, where I work.
We seem to do so almost every month.
Of course, those looking for entry-level positions that start at 40K need not apply...
21 - RJ
Eric and Hal:
I agree with you both that I tend to view the "NeoCons" a bit differently.
I view them as pro-active on foreign policy, and pretty liberal socially and economically.
22 - RJ
Hal:
Bush has been weak on border policy because he doesn't want to offend Hispanic voters. He wants (and gets, in growing numbers) their votes.
No mammoth corporate conspiracies need apply...
23 - RJ
"Because there is no available day care in this town"
I thought you lived in a town of several hundred thousand?
24 - Dave Nalle
BHW Opined:
>>But that's because many people have stopped looking for work, not because they have found jobs. Their benefits have run out and they're not working or looking, so they're not figured into the unemployment numbers.<<
The numbers don't support this popular Democrat theory. The BLS maintains numbers on new hires and people who give up on looking for jobs, and in fact the number of people who are no longer looking has declined slightly in the past year, and new hires have risen slightly, accounting for the overall decline in unemployment. The vast majority of the chronically unemployed have been part of that group for a long, long time. They're not people who just recently gave up looking.
>>This has been a "jobless" recovery. Some new jobs have been created since W. took office and since 9/11, but overall, the creation of new jobs has fallen short of the number needed to account for the new workers entering the workforce. One of the reasons those unemployed people I talked about above have stopped looking for work is because not enough new jobs are being created, particularly in certain career fields.<<
You must be talking to some picky unemployed people, because around here $10-$12 per hour jobs are a dime a dozen and they can't find qualified people to fill them - qualified being able to read and type 45wpm and of course having a high school degree.
The truth is that unemployment has gone low enough now that we're actually in a marginal labor shortage as we were at the end of the Clinton administration. You just need to be willing to go where the jobs are to take advantage of it.
Dave
25 - Dave Nalle
Steve S. Wrote:
>>I do database maintenance from home, but not the coding, I do maintenance on the data itself, on the actual text content, mostly.<<
If you want to work from home that's an excellent job to have.
>>Because there is no available day care in this town,<<
Good lord, what kind of town doesn't have available daycare slots? Maybe it's time for you to start a daycare - damned fine money in daycares.
>> and because, in order to bring the budget in line, basically all available resources to me were part of what has been shut down by Governor Swartzenegger,<<
He shut down your salary?
>> I find I am entering the profession of work-from-home, self-employed. *shudder*. I hear it's very lucrative.<<
It's how I work, and I tell you, it's the new American way. You'll come to love it, especially since you have kid to take care of too. You can work flexible hours and spend more time with the kid. Can't beat it.
>>How come when things are good for some people, it's because Bush has good economic policies, and when things are bad, it's not really his fault?<<
The only thing that you can absolutely lay on the president is the tax cut, which helps everyone and may have some stimulating effect on jobs. The overall state of the job market is too large an economic force for the president's policies to have much short-term impact on.
>>I was really able to climb the economic ladder under Clinton. <<
Illusory. Clinton had very little to do with this. It was the tech boom which dovetailed nicely with your area of work.
>>Things have stalled, and no matter who's fault that is, the economic ladder here is still missing more than a few rungs, and that can be blamed on somebody.<<
Well, you can blame it on anyone you want, but I wouldn't say that doing so is fair or accurate. In California the blame has to go to the tech boom which loaded the state up with tech professionals who are now superfluous and the situation won't stabilize until a significant number of them move out to other states.
Dave