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08/30/2003 Archived Entry: "libertarians and conservatives cont'd"

SPEAKING OF FIGHTING BETWEEN LIBERTARIANS AND CONSERVATIVES: A few days ago, the paleolibertarian writer Karen De Coster took ESR to task for being a “flaming, Republican-neocon-worshipping website,” and accused us – or, more specifically, Izzy Lyman and me – of “LewRockwell.com-bashing.” This appears on her personal blog - scroll down to August 25.

Since Ms. De Coster, who has written for us, could not see who the authors of the posts were, she can be forgiven for not noticing that she was citing a Pat Buchanan-supporting home-schooling activist and a persistent critic of big government conservatism who also supports immigration reform as evidence of ESR’s alleged neocon credentials. But something needs to be said for the record on some other points.

Since Izzy, aka Person #1 is more than capable of defending herself, I’ll confine my remarks to my own post as Person #2.

As should be plain from my original entry, I did not criticize paleoconservatives because, as Ms. De Coster says, “the paleos criticize neocons,” nor did I single them out for criticism. Instead, I took a more balanced view of the debate and offered some criticism of both sides. I also linked to several paleo-oriented pieces in the post and fail to see where I “bashed” any of them.

In fact, I expressed my desire to see a more civil paleocon-neocon debate and contended that the reasons for its absence were as much personal as ideological. You don’t think that the disputes between, say, David Frum and Robert Novak, or Frum and Taki are every bit as much about personal issues as political ones? De Coster selectively quotes me on this point, repeating my assertion about being paleocons resenting the relative lack of influence that has attended their being shut out from many of the major mainstream outlets for the right but not mentioning my reference to neocon fears of paleocon competition to those outlets from such growing publications as LewRockwell.com and VDARE.com. She incorrectly infers that I was talking about Paul Gottfried’s situation with Catholic University. As I thought was clear from the context, I was referring to the debates and battles for various positions of influence within the conservative movement during the 1990s. As I noted, Peter Brimelow would probably not be running VDARE.com if he had been retained as a senior editor at National Review. Furthermore, The American Conservative might not exist if Pat Buchanan were still close to Bill Buckley and executive editor Scott McConnell had not been ousted as editorial page editor at the New York Post. (The third leading editor, Taki, is still on NR’s masthead as a contributor.)

This isn’t a criticism of these gentlemen, as some of them and their strongest supporters have also pointed out these facts, or a call for them to renounce their principles. It is simply an explanation of the dynamics of this debate and why it has taken on the tone that it has. I recognize that many of the players in this debate have very legitimate personal and professional grievances with each other, and as human beings that can’t help but influence the way these debates sound and play out. I just wish we could focus more on the ideas being debated and less on airy, ideologically charged dismissals – like “unpatriotic conservatives” on the one side and “flaming neocon-worshippers” on the other.

Replies: 3 comments

A neo-con worshipping, warmongering pat (Buchanan) on the back to you, Senor Antle.

P.S. Speaking of warmongering, I like this letter that was written about a certain "spreadsheet warrior."

Hooyah!

Posted by Izzy @ 08/30/2003 10:21 PM EST

I'd simply like to state for the record that I am not "flaming." Hopefully the neo-con thing answers itself.

Posted by Steven Martinovich @ 08/31/2003 02:40 AM EST

If she has written for ESR before, how could she not know what ESR stands for or distinguish among the different columnists?

Posted by James Barnett @ 08/31/2003 10:08 PM EST