Neo-cons forever!

Douglas Murray (pdf) argues not only that he, a Brit, can be Neo-conservative, but also that we all should be. In critiquing the left's response to the War on Terrorism he takes no prisoners:

But let’s look for a moment at what is being put forward to replace what had being, to only some extent accurately, described as the neo-conservative project. The declaration that Iraq may be failing causes barely disguised glee among some opponents of the war. A number of the most prominent left-wing columnists in Britain and America have expressed open delight at the prospect of President Bush and Tony Blair being taught a lesson. Evidently such moral people wishing the death of thousands of Iraqis is nothing besides giving Bush and Blair a bashing. At this stage, there is a branch of the left that is now subsumed by outright nihilism and support for violence. As Paul Berman charted in his recent brilliant book on Joschka Fischer, “They have ended up coming right round the other way.”

And then there are those who have decided, for instance, that the election of Hamas or the tortuous negotiations over the new Iraqi government demonstrate that these foreigners aren’t really keen on freedom, or don’t really want to have a say in the running of their own countries. You hear this one from right and left now, and it is – and the word is one which has been so overused that I hardly ever use it – but it is an idea which is, without any doubt, one of the most genuinely racist ideas I know. The election of Hamas is a problem we have with Hamas, not a problem we have with democracy. Likewise, the painfully slow forming of a new government and continued civil unrest in Iraq does not demonstrate, as many are now claiming, that Saddam kept a lid on things. This phrase I believe will go down in history alongside Mussolini and his train timetabling arrangements for sheer, unimaginative wickedness.

Read the whole thing.