I’ll tell you another thing tribal loyalties have rendered sinful and heretical: ascribing sincerity to members of the other tribe, which is something Greenwald seems unwilling or unable to do.
Greenwald is wrong, on two counts.
If we take Greenwald’s theory of partisanship to its logical conclusion, then no one is ever capable of learning or changing – and, of course, everyone is a cynical partisan hack. Yet his attack on the sincerity of the rising antiwar GOP’ers such as Sen. Rand Paul and the "Kucinich Republicans" in the House, is manifestly unfair: many if not most of them weren’t even in office during the Bush era, and, indeed, arose specifically in opposition to the free-spending "Big Government conservatism" that characterized Bush II’s reign.
Secondly, Greenwald is wrong about the defense of civil liberties and opposition to the militarism of the National Security State being "inherently" "non-ideological." Indeed, no more intensely ideological issues are currently at the heart of the national discourse. The revival of the Old Right in the Republican party and among the grassroots conservative movement is an intensely ideological phenomenon, one which inherently distrusts any and all government action – including overseas. The GOP Establishment is fighting a losing rearguard action against them, but they have the momentum and seem destined to triumph – precisely because of the disaster visited on the nation (and the GOP) by Bush II’s foreign and domestic policies.
Opposition to the gutting of the Constitution and the policy of untrammeled imperialism is inherently inscribed in the conservative-libertarian tradition, and the revival of this tradition is what is energizing the "tea partiers" and the rising "Kucinich Republicans." Except that they aren’t "Kucinich Republican," they’re Taft Republicans, as in Robert A. Taft [.pdf], the leader of the conservative wing of the GOP in the 1940s and early 50s, whose opposition to interventionism and the Warfare State, although not always consistent, symbolized what the liberal interventionists of the time derided as "reactionary isolationism."
Greenwald's argument is that anti-war Republicans opposed to "whatever Obama is doing this week" as opposed to war in Afghanistan, Iraq, Pakistan, Libya, and hey, Yemen. Raimondo argues the opposite, that anti-war Republicans like Ron Paul are coming around after Bush and deserve progressive support at least as a means to an end for dismantling the permanent warfare state.
The real problem is given away at the end of Raimondo's article:
According to Glenn, we have to wait until Obama is defeated and a Republican is installed in the White House before we can properly judge the motives of antiwar/civil libertarian Republicans and gauge them on his Sincerity Meter. I, for one, am not willing to wait that long – and we don’t have to. The reality is that – given the conduct of the "progressives" in Congress, and in the media, during the Obama years – it’s the sincerity of the "progressives," whose faith in government is apparently boundless, that really has to be called into question.
And this has led to quite the pissing match between the two over who hates Obama and the Democrats more right now, while being "libertarian" enough to embrace the GOP.
And people keep wondering why "progressives" keep failing to win over people and get things done when our "own side" is racing to see how quickly they can disown Obama first and allow Republicans to get back into complete control of the country again, which is a situation I think both of these guys would heartily enjoy because of the increased voice they would have.
So why are these guys considered allies of the left, exactly?
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