Saturday, January 06, 2007

"Isolationist Left"

The Editors deal with Lord Weisberg's wankery fairly well, but I'd like to highlight something else. When did the "isolationist Left" become some sort of important force in American politics, or some sort of named movement? I, like most people who did, opposed the Iraq war because it was The Worst Idea Ever transparently marketed with lies swallowed by rubes like Lord Weisberg and embedded in a political campaign which involved impugning the patriotism of, you know, people like me simply because we opposed The Worst Idea Ever.

Isolationism in the US has long found its home on the Right - from opposing entry into WWII to opposing any and all participation in international institutions to Bob Dole's "Democrat wars" to George "We don't do nation building" Bush. Fuck the world, we're taking our ball and going home has long been part of the conservative genetic code.


Now, if you start asserting that the opposite of "isolationism" is "blowing shit up whenever someone makes us mad" and there is nothing else such as, you know, engaging with the world by creating and maintaining and whenever possible working within established international institutions so beloved by that ultimate Truman Democrat known as Harry S. Truman, then there's a case that can be made that there is an "isolationist Left." If you mean that some people on The Left are so silly and naive to think that sometimes foreign policy decisions - including the beloved Blowing Shit Up one - are made by people who have more narrow interests in mind than the nebulously abstract The National Interest, then I suppose you would be correct that those dirty fucking hippies must be smoking that Isolationist ganja. Stop dropping the brown acid you dirty fucking hippies!

Being less than enthusiastic about blowing shit up does not make one "isolationist," but we are stuck with very silly people like Lord Weisberg who when they look at the Iraq war see little other than a referendum on the brilliance of Lord Weisberg.

Wanker.