ofcourse, ex-liberals, traitors against irrationality, who become conservatives or neo-cons
represent the sweetest ideological conversions of all. but how and why ?
the current generation of tottering liberals is a list of intellectual celebrities that compares
favorably to the original core of disillusioned leftists. ignatieff, walzer and hitchens
spearhead today's crowd.
irving kristol defined a neoconservative as a liberal who has been mugged by reality.
as a former troskyite, kristol's 'reality' began with stalin's purge of trotskyites. he (and
a few compadres) turned anti-communist and from there inched there way across the
spectrum as more and more of their former reality crumbled under the weight of endless
disaster.
ideology fails when actual events disprove the core premises. simple, eh ? you care for
a particular world view to promote and ensure the kind of change you envision. but failure
intrudes. monstrous failure. reagan helped to destroy communism with the push neo-cons
gave him away from feckless detente. he became critical, confrontational, angry. the
soviet empire is no more.
therefore, what it takes for the influential few to lead a large change are . . . results.
we either have success or failure. the new ideas carry the era or they don't.
represent the sweetest ideological conversions of all. but how and why ?
the current generation of tottering liberals is a list of intellectual celebrities that compares
favorably to the original core of disillusioned leftists. ignatieff, walzer and hitchens
spearhead today's crowd.
irving kristol defined a neoconservative as a liberal who has been mugged by reality.
as a former troskyite, kristol's 'reality' began with stalin's purge of trotskyites. he (and
a few compadres) turned anti-communist and from there inched there way across the
spectrum as more and more of their former reality crumbled under the weight of endless
disaster.
ideology fails when actual events disprove the core premises. simple, eh ? you care for
a particular world view to promote and ensure the kind of change you envision. but failure
intrudes. monstrous failure. reagan helped to destroy communism with the push neo-cons
gave him away from feckless detente. he became critical, confrontational, angry. the
soviet empire is no more.
therefore, what it takes for the influential few to lead a large change are . . . results.
we either have success or failure. the new ideas carry the era or they don't.
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