The NeoCons Make Unapologetic Call for McCarthyism against Muslims
One of the successors to the NeoCon organization PNAC, the Center for Security Policy, released a report the other day that makes an unapologetic call for trumped up McCarthyism targeted at Muslims.
The study rather humorously models itself on Team B–the alternate analysis Poppy Bush ordered up to paint the Soviet Union as an ongoing threat in 1976. They do so, apparently, in an effort to invoke St. Ronnie’s use of Team B’s “analysis” for electoral gain and ultimately to point to the usefulness of ideology to generate political support for foreign policy adventures. But nowhere do they bother to mention that Team B’s analysis was famously, embarrassingly wrong.
The effect of this authoritative alternative view was profound. Among others, former California Governor Ronald Reagan used the thrust of its findings to challenge détente and those in public office who supported this doctrine. Drawing on the thinking of Team B with regard to national security issues, Reagan nearly defeated President Gerald Ford’s bid for reelection in the 1976 primaries. Four years later, Reagan successfully opposed President Jimmy Carter, with their disagreement over the latter’s detentist foreign and defense policies towards Moscow featuring prominently in the former’s victory.
Most importantly, as President, Ronald Reagan drew on the work of Team B as an intellectual foundation for his strategy for destroying the Soviet Union and discrediting its ideology – a feat begun during his tenure and finally accomplished, thanks to his implementation of that strategy, several years after he left office.
Which is, I guess, CSP’s unapologetic endorsement of simply making shit up to create an enemy.
It’s stuff like this that led me to brand these clowns with the name “utilitarian postmodernists” some years back.
Normally, I wouldn’t pay these clowns any attention–they’ve got a long history of lying to support warmongering. But what really concerns me is the report’s insinuation that the country’s laws protecting speech–which were solidified in the process of protecting leftist speech–are too strong for their trumped up fight against Muslims.
Beginning in the 1960s, however, the Supreme Court drastically reinterpreted the First Amendment, gradually extending the original guarantee of American citizens’ right to engage in political speech, to include a constitutional protection to (a) subversive speech that could be construed as “advocacy,” rather than incitement to imminent lawlessness, and (b) the speech of non-Americans. Bowing to elite opinion, which scoffed at fears of communist penetration of our government and institutions, Congress (in such legislation as the 1965 Immigration Act, the 1978 McGovern Amendment, the 1989 Moynihan-Frank Amendment, and the 1990 Immigration Act) gutted the statutory basis for excluding and deporting individuals based on ideological beliefs, regardless of their subversive tendencies – at least in the absence of demonstrable ties to terrorism, espionage or sabotage.
Let us assume, again for argument’s sake, that there was some validity in the opinion elite’s critique that anti-communism went too far – and set aside the fact that such an assumption requires overlooking post-Soviet revelations that have confirmed communist infiltrations. The prior experience would not mean the security precautions that sufficed to protect our nation from communism are adequate to shield us from a totalitarian ideology cloaked in religious garb.
Such precautions are wholly inadequate for navigating a threat environment in which secretive foreign-sponsored international networks undermine our nation from within. That is especially the case where such networks can exploit the atmosphere of intimidation created by the tactics of their terrorist counterparts (including individual assassinations and mass-murder attacks on our homeland) in a modern technological age of instantaneous cross-continental communications and the increasing availability of mass-destruction weapons that allow ever fewer people to project ever more power.
We were wrong to let leftists exercise their free speech, these fearmongers say, in spite of the fact that our nation survived the Cold War. But the threat from Muslims is even stronger than the threat of a nuclear-armed Soviet Union. And so, they suggest, we must not only abridge the free speech of Muslims, but also change the law to allow deportations of those saying unpopular things.
So to sum up this latest stunt from the NeoCons: they unabashedly admit they intend to make shit up to sow fear of Muslims, and part of that will be targeting Muslims for deportation.
So, to sum it up, Team B wants to lay down in fear and allow the terrorists of 9-11 to win by destroying freedom of speech.
Sounds like a bunch of very lost and weak souls, lacking faith in the strength of our justice and liberty for all.
There’s a kind of vagueness to these criticisms of their insane “ideology” that suggests to me that people are taking that ideology too much at face value. This kind of statement seems about ridiculously parochial goals — Israeli ones, as far as I’m concerned — of going after Hamas and Hezbollah. Aside from the big goals of invading Iraq and Iran, the other thing they wanted the morning of 9-11 was to equate Hamas and Hezbollah with AQ in the public mind, and direct U.S. foreign policy in pursuit of the logical consequences of that. Their utterly indiscriminate warmongering — whether sabre rattling at China or provoking an outright hot war against Russia through its Georgian proxy — is a kind of cloak over the more particular goals they’re so monomaniacally devoted to.
At some point in the future it will be illegal to utter criticism of Israel.
Peculiar that this follows so closely on Peretz’s comments.
That is a very interesting point brendanx. Very interesting.
Especially, when Peretz was a signatory to a CSP based letter in 1998 urging an attack on Iraq. The CSP letter was via the cover CPSG (Committee for Peace and Securty in the Gulf).
Now EW, it should not surprise you that an organization like CSP would start such a fear-ops? Many of their board of directors seems to have a bit of a conflict of interest when it comes to Muslims.
Speak of the devil:
http://www.salon.com/news/harvard/index.html?story=/politics/war_room/2010/09/16/harvard_marty_peretz
No doubt Harvard will be “distressed” when CSP calls for shutting down the Lampoon.
The mention of Dershowitz here reminds me of another of our audacious departures from founding principles a few years ago.
Thanks for the link.
Well, maybe Harvard law will produce a legal opinion that concludes shouting, “Fire,” in a theatre is not illegal. The free speech rights of the shouter must be protected, even if people went running and screaming and some were trampled to death by the confusion caused from such a context of practice of free speech. /s
Sometimes a bastion of intelligence is not a wellspring of good, practical or sound judgement.
It’s so larded with empty verbage:
Ooh, tech savvy.
And I like how they avoid the phrase “weapons of mass destruction”:
This all reminds me of the good old days when Richard Perle was a fixture on the news.
‘High five’ on that comment ;-))
Marcy,
I am not sure if it would add strength to your post but an update with some history on CSP and their historic practice of releasing such reports with a cover letter attached and a long list of signed interested parties of one persuasion, might give some added context.
For the Neocons and PNAC, and their ideological affiliates, there can be no “co-existence” with their “enemies.”
These are “survival of the race” ideologies that see ‘the other’ in the context of a winner take all contest – to be won at all costs.
Unfortunately, those costs – that they are willing to bear in their fevered fear of annihilation – include sacrificing Principle, Reason and Good Judgment in the pursuit of raw animal dominance – which has only hastened the collapse of many a previous civilization.
To them, giving Peace a chance in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, for instance, through a two-state solution is tantamount to surrendering in the Ideology War – they simply can’t accept it.
Instead, they are going to ‘see’ their enemies hard at work against them everywhere they look – even fabricating stories, if useful, to maintain the fervor of the faithful for the ‘war’ effort, and the fear of ‘the other.’
It’s Darwinian religious tribalism run amok in the community of nations.
typo:
Though they really are something more than ordinary fearmongers.
Thank you!
This is where they are coming from. Plus that we are at war with all Islam. Both here and abroad.
It is a mistake to suppose that the government has any legal right to determine citizens rights based on language in the Constitution. Our rights are inherent. As the Declaration of Independence says, we were born with them. And as the Ninth Amendment states:
Depending upon the Constitution (government) to define our rights inevitably leads to threatening our basic human rights. Chief Justice Roberts once said that there is no right to an abortion in the Constitution, and he was correct. There is also no right to breathe or have sex, but they don’t need to be listed in the Constitution because, like the freedom to say whatever the hell we want to say, or even to remain silent, they are basic.
According to statistics from the Iraqi Ministery of Labor and Social Affairs:
“One in every six Iraqis is an orphan.
. . .
“If we consider the numbers of Iraqi orphans in terms of U.S. population of 308 million, the five million Iraqi orphans would be the equivalent of nearly 50 million U.S. orphans. Imagine major U.S. cities such as New York, L.A., Chicago, Houston, Phoenix and Philadelphia all populated completely by orphans.”
LINK.
The vicious campaign [Nixon] ran for Congress in 1946, which Mr. Ambrose describes as **McCarthyism** before the term existed, revealed his ruthless single-mindedness…
**Of course I knew Jerry Voorhis wasn*t a Communist,** Mr. Nixon later replied to accusations that he had lied during the campaign. **But . . . I had to win. . . . The important thing is to win.**
Excerpted from Ronald Steel*s April 26, 1987 review of Ambrose biography of RMNixon in NYT.
They even have their own McCarthy. Bye Joe, Hi Andy.
OT but related – via Charlie Savage (and Spencer has a piece up) we already know that Obama was to the right of Dana Rohrbacher on the release of the Chinese Uighurs at GTIMO; now we have, on the al-Awlaki assassination case – Obamaco to the right of David Rivkin.
Yes, he still wants to have the President be able to blow up American guys and gals he doesn’t care for without any oversight, but he does at least think it should be openly argued in court that it is bc during war, the President gets to pick and choose his targets. Something like that. Once you have an article that bounces from Goldsmith’s imaginations to Rivkin being taken aback over a harsh exec power argument, it’s like watching globs shift in a lava lamp.
LOL. Great minds think alike–posted this just a few minutes ago.
Obama Administration Deliberates Whether to Tack to the Right of David Rivkin
It is exactly like that. Let me give you another example. Inexperienced nominees for the most critical federal judgeships in the nation. You know, the kind of nominee that has not only never been a judge in a court before, but has also never been an advocate in a court before and is pretty much just in the administration end of an Ivy League elitist law school. Well, if that is good enough for the Supreme Court, it is good enough for the 2nd Circuit. Yep, ooops, Mr. Non-constitutional Scholar has done it again:
Good god, Obama forcing me to agree with J. Beauregard Sessions is about like Obama making freaking Rivkin look like a liberal. It just never ends.
Bang head on table.
@ 18 – lol. I’m always a day late/dollar short.
Oh that was pretty much simultaneous. I’m surprised I didn’t bump into you at the vomitorium.
Jeebuz, bmaz.
The woman spent an entire year clerking.
That’s like, ummmm, ya’ know, like… almost twelve whole months.
And you just get all pissy, as if she’s a bit lite on experience.
/s
There are few names that really give me a chill, but McCarthy is one. What a terrible time that was. I can hear it now – “are you now, or have you ever been a Muslim.”
I am presently accepting and reviewing resumes by email from overseas for positions for our hospitality business. One particular individual living in Dubai sent his resume twice. I was going to confirm receipt of his resume by email to Dubia but thought upon reflection, I better not. Its like a cancer.
As another one who lived through McCarthyism I, I try to explain it to younger people like this:
How bad was it?
It was so bad that the Cincinnati Reds, the oldest franchise in major league baseball — and what could be more American than baseball? — the Cincinnati Reds, the oldest franchise in major league baseball, felt compelled to change their name to the Cincinnati Redlegs.
That’s how bad it was.
saw this the other day . . . where it was framed as a “bi partisan” commission
Sharia, Sharia !!! booga booga !! – nope, you boys don’t ever have to worry ’bout ginning up that other war that has resulted in a form of Sharia that has killed, maimed, tortured tens of thousands of Iraqi women for simply going to the bakery alone as they once did under “that monster” Saddam
btw, isn’t whackaloon Boykin among these very serious commissioners ?
when the ruling class gets a bit uncomfy at the prospects of The People challenging their economic hegemony they call in the scare-squad on team-fright, the Center for Security Policy (of course just one of many well-financed ruling class “think” tanks).
the Center for Security Policy can count on the following as staff, board members and associates:
elliot abrams, alan keyes, frank gaffney, doug *smarty pants* feith, mitch daniels, dick cheney, bill *snake eyes* bennett, james inhofe, richard perle, john shadegg, pete wilson, and more…
and what would a rightwing “think” tank be without funding from the scaife’s, and other ‘i got mine, fuck you buddy’ funjobs… certainly not as “successful”
For those who don’t know or might have forgotten, Team B included two members who helped bring down Carter’s administration. They both were assigned to the National Security Council. One of them was Donald Gregg, George Bush Sr’s friend from CIA days, who gave Carter’s briefing book for his debate with reagan to Novack, and the other one was Robert Gates who accompanied Mr. Bush with William Casey to Paris i October 1980 when the deal was made to show a little GOP love for the prisoners Iran was holding by asking them to hold them a little bit longer until Raygun was sworn in.
The fact that Robert Gates is still working in any capacity in a “Democratic” administration goes a long way to show just how much of a one-party system we have. As part of Team B Gates was responsible for analysis of what was going on in the Soviet Union. Instead, he fixed facts to fit what the Gipper wanted to hear and completely missed the collapse of the Soviet Union. One of his assistants, David Cohen, is now the Deputy Commissioner for Intelligence with the NYPD where he has worked in that capacity since shortly after 9/11.
These people have infested our government like termites and they depend on the fact that the so-called journalists working will never out them, that is if any of them even know who they are or what their history is.
Who benefited from Dallas 1963? The Bush family wouldn’t be a bad place to start looking along with the entire Texas political landscape at the time including John Connally.
The anti-Carter political landscape extended into the Democratic Party to its Scoop Jackson wing, and eventually to Ted Kennedy.
The Russian “enemy” I grew up with was finite and containable.
Now the MIC has a world wide battlefield and an unlimited enemy. Because it looks like, talks like and feels like a crusade doesn’t make it a crusade, does it ?
Us and them like george said, right Mr. President?
“he made a sale that essentially puts the Saudi’s on the front line against Iran ”
Iran must be feeling very relieved.
““he made a sale that essentially puts the Saudi’s on the front line against Iran ”
Iran must be feeling very relieved.”
Not really — aside from the possibility that China “might” sell Iran a few arms, they are under sanctions, and my guess is that the China source has been forclosed, as they do much business with the Saudi’s. Russia will fuel light water reactors, but will not be selling arms, as it is in this two ways, as part of the Quartet, and as having signed on to the Iranian Sanctions. Otherwise the markets are pretty much closed to Iran. As I said, the table has been carefully set. The Quartet which is USA, Russia, EU and UN is also a participant in the Israel/Palestine negotiations. Iran has not been able to make a major arms buy for years.
As to bmaz @ 34 — “Kind of the least he could do. Literally.” I think it very smart to put Hillary and Mitchell out front during the meetings, and then should they succeed, Obama comes along and blesses it as Hillary’s and George’s achievement. I have no doubt that Obama has been very much the architect of this — when I look at how all the corners that have been worked over the last year or so, I find it impressive that he has kept himself in the background, and not been tempted to fight any of the small fights that have been pushed at him, but instead stayed focused on something much larger. That is probably the key to keeping the Neo-con or American Likuid fingers away from the pie. They want to make him the target — all that trash talk about Obama the Kenyan Mau-Mau tribesman, or Obama the Muslim, that is all keyed on making him the target. He’s doing fairly well letting all that roll off at least in public.
Some might also say deliberately.
;>)
Since the NeoCons dislike the first amendment so much, would they please stop taking advantage of the free speech part of it and just stop talking.
man I’ve been talking about cheney’s team b forever
they deliberately made shit up to undermine nixon’s detente and it was the very same people who made shit up to get us into Iraq
here’s the story
and when you read that you will be amazed that was printed and published before we went into Iraq, before.
hard to believe we fell for it again after we knew they did it the first time
from the link;
look familiar?
exactly the same script rumsfeld and cheney used before ad they did to get us into Iraq
check this out
it goes on
almost verbatim the script used for Iraq
you all remember this story too, the fiction marketed as semi-true was “the hunt for red october”
now here’s a suggestion, marcy might get in touch with jane for this idea;
jane’s a succesful producer, I believe the REAL story of the “hunt for red october”, the story about how they made the entire thing up with all the same players as those who got us into Iraq
I believe that movie would be ground breaking education, I believe thom hartman would be more then happy to give an assist for research too
It may be that the table is set a little differently this round — new sets of silver, china and crystal.
First off, two major pieces of the Neo-Con combine for different reasons have been somewhat discredited. About a month ago, the Austrian Government on the death of Simon Wiesenthal, released papers indicating that all along, the self-styled Nazi Hunter, HQ’ed in Vienna, keeping his records in shoe boxes and all, who captured Eichmann and all — well all along that operation had been a well funded Mossad Front. All this in no way changes any of the evil attributed to Eichmann, what it does do is somewhat change the narrative of what drives events between 1960 and current times.
Among those “narratives” is the matter of much of the Holocaust Museum creation and all — US and Elsewhere, has been done as an honor to the simple man with passion, and names on cards in shoeboxes. It was around that narrative that funds were raised for museums and programs — for public presence if you will, and then a couple of weeks back when Park 51 heated up, we suddenly heard that the Wiesenthal Institute of Tolerance was on board in opposition to building at the Park 51 site, along with ADL and now the expected list of Neo-con’s.
To make matters somewhat more interesting — and I have no idea where this goes — many of the mid-sized family foundations created to support the various programs and museums named after Wiesenthal, were the targets and victims of Madoff, and have, in essence, been bankrupted and wiped out. This doesn’t mean the programs and museums are destroyed at all, other funders have been recruited to fill in the holes, but financial backing and control has changed, and how as related to program and mission, is not exactly clear yet. Could be the events are unconnected, could be they are. It is just that anyone who has operated in the realm of public organizations opposed to bigotry and discrimination and all — civil and human rights movements, civil society, taking these large, historic, well known groups off the table, and changing the control and finance has implications.
Right now I am looking at a couple of other things in the contemporary mix which could be connected. First — Obama’s announcement last week of the grand agreement with the Saudi’s to sell about 80 Billion worth of high tech military equipment, all American built, and all likely to be supported by those from the districts building the stuff over the years. Obama did not “beg” congress to sell the stuff, no replay of the AWACS contest in Congress about this — he made a sale that essentially puts the Saudi’s on the front line against Iran (thankfully not us), and he told Congress in the midst of high unemployment that the deal was cut. I sense a slight strategy here — just a little pressure on Israel to perhaps settle some turf problems so they can collaborate with the Saudi’s on regional security issues where they have common national interests, again, without us being in the center of it.
And then of course we have Obama backing up Hillary and Mitchell as they facilitate the negotiations between the PA and Israel in DC, Egypt, Israel, and the PA Territory. The Neo-cons are clearly not happy about these meetings and their topics and implications, but will the old play book destroy the process? As I say, I think the table has new decking. My own more or less “working assumption” is that the mish mash about Park 51 was one of those plays, and in the end it did not really succeed.
Kind of the least he could do. Literally.
Simon Wiesenthal isn’t dead.
I had a murky sense that these dynamics were in play, but thank you for making it all more sensible.
I do find it interesting that the more movement on the Is-Pal front there seems to be, the wingier the neocons become. It was to be expected, but still…
After your first couple of times spending a month or two in a single trial, you get a little cranky about this shit.
Thanks for posting your thoughts. Your first point is of great import.
Have you thought of expanding your comment into a post?
Hey these right wing neocons been making shit up for decades.
It wasn’t until the last election that they stopped caring if anyone knew they were lying. It is part of the Republican mission statement.
The Birthers, They Know Ob A Ma isn’t a Muslim and was born in the united states, and even if he wasn’t his mother was a native born U S citizen.
They just don’t care! Teabagger motto if it ain’t true We just make it up!
I would so use this to deport every member of pnac to syria.
Jews hate Muslims. Who knew?
“Jews hate Muslims. Who knew?”
The above is both dangerous and quite untrue. It is the worst kind of the fallacy of sterotyping one can introduce into this kind of discussion, because it suggests your mental constructs have to be around matters of identity, be they religious, cultural or racial. It is very dangerous to reduce a discussion to such simpleminded quickies.
My concern is about the use and misuse of Organizations and Institutions that supposedly stand for such profoundly critical things as Tolerance. I personally have long supported the efforts of Wiesenthal in so far as illuminating the Eichmann’s of the world, and the evil they did. I disagree however with executing Eichmann. I think he was one of the best examples going of the little bureaucrat who finds the rewards of the system can be gained through becoming a super specialist in evil — and I can see great merit in understanding how his brain worked. We might not have to re-teach ourselves so much about how some of the ideas of Max Weber apply to comprehending how bureaucracy can nurture and shield evil if he had applied ourselves to comprehending not just his evil, but his case. But anyhow — Wiesenthal got credit for finding him, and hauling him out of his hidie hole. I believe revelations regarding the various levels of Mossad connections have emerged from his papers, and other materials the Austrian Government has released, some as various associates have died, and their materials have become available to historians.
And yes, Simon Wiesenthal is dead. He died in 2005 in bed in Vienna at the age of 94. His very long obituary from the NYTimes is appended here.
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/09/21/international/europe/21wiesenthal.html
Again, my concern in this instance has nothing at all to do with his life’s work and passion for revealing truths that were inconvenient, my concern deals with introducing the name of his “Tolerance” memorials into the Park 51 matter, and with the long term public misrepresentation of his work as that of a passionate truth teller, when at least some of it was a function of Mossad’s interests. I would say the same thing about CIA, NSA, or any other US misused intelligence outfit that hid behind a front. In my mind, one of the worst thing’s CIA ever did was set up the Liberal Left with massive funding for the Culture Wars with the Soviet Systems during the 1950’s and 60’s, and then once the truth was out, sell all the assets of their enterprises for about a million to Richard Scaife to use to promote Apartheid in South Africa — but that is another story.