Perhaps they could hire Ward Churchill again to restore their credibility.

Perhaps the Chancellor simply wanted to obtain some intellectual diversity for the University.

An article with such a narrow view you can hardly see it.

Like an animal in a zoo? Who better than the chimp himself? Any zoologist that understands beasts can understand conservatives. No need to create a new department.

I actually believe that any argument, and any analysis of policy, can be pursued at unbounded depths (i.e. infinite depths), and that includes conservative arguments.

The real problem with general conservative arguments is that they are not viable in a democratic system where the voters are well-informed, in that they do not likely lead to the improvement of the welfare of the majority of those alive today. However, if one's moral system leads one to value the welfare of future humans as much as present humans, and one sincerely believes that certain conservative policies would do more to increase human knowledge, human genetic potential, or improve some other human resource, and thereby improve the prospects for future human welfare, then one could honestly and sincerely argue for such conservative policies, but not with the expectation of electoral victories, unless one could overcome the hurdle of convincing the majority that they too should value future humans as much as present ones.

And there are other avenues of conservative thought that could be pursued in an honest and straightforward fashion, but that does not appear to be what most modern US conservatives wish to do. They have become stuck in a mindset where they accept that their policy prescriptions would lose elections if most voters were well-informed, and so they endeavor to produce the most ingenious false arguments and fallacies to trick the voting public. And that avenue is not one that lends itself to healthy and honest research and discussion.

KIVALS: You must have been away for the weekend. Nice to see you back! As for your above comments, the classic example on obfuscating facts is the conservative wish to open the "Social Security" funds to private investment. Then there is the argument by a conservative like John Dean who is crazed by what the Bush neocon hit men squad have done to the nation by fusing the 3 branches of government, and tying corporations to its workings with generous doses of military might (not to mention funding) thrown into the mix. He challenges what "conservative" means today given that those in power use the term while undermining its purism.

Siouxrose,

Yes, the Republican nonsense on SS is tiresome. I certainly would not argue that any of the Republican propaganda would qualify as honest, healthy conservative argument.

I just wrote a response to your post on the Bugliosi thread. I was gone for the long weekend and I will be leaving on a month-long trip tomorrow. I will miss CD but it will be relaxing to take a break from work and all the blogs.

Have a good June!

It is for precisely this kind of idiocy (as well as excessive spending on a football program) that I refuse to donate a single penny to this institution -- my alleged alma mater.

I am strongly opposed to corporatist and neo-conservative war mongers, however I sincerely believe that every thoughtful person ought to read Russell Kirks works. Although I ultimately end up rejecting his rejection of modernity he IS thought provoking and I'm quite certain that he'd be spinning in his grave about how Republicans have abused the conservative legacy. For example one of the most well argued indictments against the draft I have ever seen is here:

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/765281/posts

If you read Kirks Ten Conservative Principles you can see that George Bush and the Republican party are pretty much the opposite of a true philosophical conservative.

http://www.kirkcenter.org/kirk/ten-principles.html

Thus I would say someone like Russell Kirk is in fact an honorable opponent and I say that as a direct action anarcho syndicalist considerably to the left of say the Green party. I for one would have no problem with a "conservative studies" program that studied Edmund Burke, Russell Kirk and early enlightenment thinkers if it was alongside women's studies, GBLT studies, Asian studies, African American studies etc. Of course it can rightly be argued that most studies are white male studies and that's certainly true and worth taking into consideration, and also if this proposal is to replace lefty studies problems it's of course absurd.

IF it was on the level, and if its not a ploy to replace other programs I wouldn't have an a-prori problem with it, in fact I think the Republican party in it's current form would be impossible if people were aware of what early conservatives actually thought. As one more mind bomb I leave for your consideration:

http://www.amconmag.com/2006/2006_08_28/index1.html

Not as a defense of conservationism, frankly I think even it's most refined forms it ends up sucking, but so that we may know what the most thoughtful of our opponents think, and to keep our minds limber. There are many anti war isolationists in that issues "left right does it matter" debate and I personally think it's interesting to anyone with a thoughtful turn of mind.

Of course BTW I would ALSO demand Ward Churchill be reinstated, the essay that caused all the brouh hhah was VERY interesting as well and not at all what is was made out to be in the media.

As Bill Moyers wisely said "Beware the Simplifiers"

"Now remember, this is 1991, so Kirk is speaking of George H.W. Bush, not the current president, for whom these remarks could be amplified many times over.

"Presidents Woodrow Wilson, Franklin Roosevelt, and Lyndon Johnson were enthusiasts for American domination of the world," Kirk said in his speech. "Now George Bush appears to be emulating those eminent Democrats. When the Republicans, once upon a time, nominated for the presidency a 'One World' candidate, Wendell Willkie, they were sadly trounced. In general, Republicans throughout the twentieth century have been advocates of prudence and restraint in the conduct of foreign affairs."

President Bush, Kirk said, had embarked upon "a radical course of intervention in the region of the Persian Gulf. After carpet-bombing the Cradle of Civilization as no country ever had been bombed before, Mr. Bush sent in hundreds of thousands of soldiers to overrun the Iraqi bunkers – that were garrisoned by dead men, asphyxiated."

And why, exactly? "The Bush Administration found it difficult to answer that question clearly. In the beginning it was implied that the American national interest required low petroleum prices: therefore, if need be, smite and spare not!"

Kirk then recalled Edmund Burke's rebuke to the Pitt ministry in 1795, when the British government seemed to be on the verge of going to war with France over the issue of navigation on the River Scheldt in the Netherlands. "A war for the Scheldt? A war for a chamber-pot!" Burke said. Today, said Kirk, one may as well say, "A war for Kuwait? A war for an oilcan!" "

http://www.lewrockwell.com/woods/woods69.html

Imagine a so called "conseravtive" saying that now? Hmmmm...

August 28, 2006 Issue
Copyright © 2006 The American Conservative

Andrew J. Bacevich

In a domestic political context, the terms "liberal" and "conservative" still retain considerable value. To imagine, however, that the actually existing Democratic Party is genuinely committed to liberal principles or to fancy that the Republican Party qualifies as authentically conservative is to err profoundly. However much Democratic and Republican partisans may pretend to differ, they actually subscribe to a common agenda. Ranking at the very top of that agenda is the imperative of currying favor with the moneyed interests that enable the two parties to sustain their monopoly on power. Party leaders may pontificate about social justice or liberty, but the name of the game is boodle—federal largesse distributed to secure the allegiance of supporters, "contributions" harvested from those same supporters to buy the next election, all continuing in a cycle without end.

In the political mainstream, expediency rules and principles are expendable—as baby-boomer Presidents Bill Clinton and George W. Bush have each amply demonstrated. In a system as corrupt as ours has become, principles survive chiefly among those who occupy the political fringe—populists, pinks, aging New Leftists, agrarians, radical environmentalists, Catholic Workers, libertarians, and paleocons. When it comes to illuminating the hypocrisies and contradictions that afflict the American way of life, each of these groups has something to offer—which is why the thinking conservative will find more of value these days in The New York Review of Books than in National Review and why true-blue progressives are better off subscribing to The American Conservative than to The New Republic.

In a foreign-policy context, "liberal" and "conservative" don't have any real meaning and never have. When it comes to statecraft, the operative dichotomy does not pit Left against Right, realists against idealists, or (as President Bush has fraudulently argued) isolationists against those committed to engagement and leadership. The real divide today occurs between those who buy into the myths of the American Century and those who see those myths for what they are: once useful contrivances that have become a source of self-delusion endangering the national interest.

The American Century is a morality tale. It instructs and inspires but also warns. It tells of how Americans, having lost their innocence on Dec. 7, 1941, rose up in righteous anger to smite a succession of evildoers. The American Century began when the nation finally embraced its providentially assigned mission to spread liberty around the world. Present-day adherents to this school—self-described liberals like Peter Beinart no less than self-described conservatives like William Kristol—do not doubt that the events of Sept. 11, 2001 simply inaugurated the next phase of this grand undertaking. Absent a failure of nerve on the part of the American people—the bogeyman of isolationism always lurks nearby—final victory in the global war on terror is certain to be ours, thereby securing the utopia of permanent U.S. global dominion. The story of the American Century, endlessly reiterated by members of the political elite, has become our substitute for history.

In the opposing camp are those who credit America's rise to power to something other than righteousness and a dedication to liberty for all. It was not righteousness that bought Louisiana, took California, annexed Hawaii, seized the Philippines, and converted the Caribbean into an American lake. Nor did past administrations collaborate with Stalin, court the Saudi royals, depose Mossadegh, befriend Somoza, arrange the overthrow of Diem, court Mao, and tilt in favor of Saddam against the ayatollahs because of our devotion to democracy and human rights.

Judge actions such as these as you will: nefarious, reckless, shortsighted, necessary, or merely amoral. What cannot be denied is that they describe a pattern of behavior that does not differ in substance from that of most other great powers in history. Like others, the United States acts in pursuit of its perceived self-interest. Professions of concern for freedom, democracy, and human rights serve as little more than window-dressing.

The insiders who dominate U.S. foreign policy have a vested interest in sustaining the twaddle about an American Century. After all, it cements their hold on power. The American Century emphasizes secrecy and deference to those who are presumably "in the know." It shields members of this self-perpetuating elite from accountability. It provides a handy cloak for megalomania and a ready excuse for error. It keeps debate over foreign policy and its implications narrow and insipid—as the Democratic critique of the Iraq War has demonstrated. It excludes the great unwashed.

American exceptionalism is a delusion. The beginning of wisdom in foreign policy lies in seeing ourselves as we really are and in acknowledging our responsibility for the mess in which we find ourselves, in Iraq and elsewhere. When it comes to extricating ourselves from that mess, the first order of business is to clean up our own act. Principled liberals and authentic conservatives will disagree on how best to do so, but that surely is a debate worth having.

Andrew J. Bacevich is professor of history and international relations at Boston University.

August 28, 2006 Issue

http://www.amconmag.com/2006/2006_08_28/article.html

At the risk of igniting a firestorm I have to say this is a far more USEFUL anti-war perspective than anything offered up by ostensibly lefty "spiritual" followers.