You may heard that Republican Jon Huntsman joined the very librul Brookings Institution. This isn’t something I care much about, I don’t have a problem with Huntsman, and I think the think tanks are a big propaganda scam. But the reaction from the right amuses me:
Brookings features some of the more highly regarded national security gurus and anti-isolationists from the center of the political spectrum including Ken Pollack, Robert Kagan and Ben Wittes. How is Huntsman, who has taken a knee-jerk anti-internationalist position more akin to the left-wing Center for American Progress, going to fit in?
In other words, why would a moderate like Huntsman be at a neoconservative think tank? Actually, it’s not such a bad question.
burnspbesq
I read Ben Wittes on an almost-daily basis; he’s one of the core bloggers at Lawfare. I don’t think “neoconservative” is a remotely accurate description of his views. He has about as much in common with Bill Kristol or Leon Weisleiter as you do with Taylor Swift.
Even if it were, the actual Brookings (as opposed to the caricature of Brookings that Leftblogistan believes in) is home to scholars across a pretty broad range of ideologies. I don’t see Huntsman as an uncomfortable fit.
DougJ
@burnspbesq:
Wittes is borderline, I’ll grant you. What about Kagan and Pollack though?
Valdivia
sorry Kagan and Pollock are not centrists. They are bought and paid for neocon right. I think getting Huntsman in there is a way of investing in the future of the neocon cause.
Baud
You didn’t quote the best part:
burnspbesq
@DougJ:
Don’t read them regularly. Would have to invest some time (that, unfortunately, I don’t have right now) in order to provide a response that would be more than a WAG.
DougJ
@burnspbesq:
Also too, neoconservatism began as center-left domestically, far right on foreign policy. That’s more or less what Brookings is. That, and a promoter of the establishment, which is also a neocon hobby horse.
DougJ
@burnspbesq:
Kagan describes himself as a non-Straussian neocon.
On lawfare, I’ve looked at it, and it’s almost all conservatives writing for it, though, right? I realize that Wittes claims to identify as a centrist, but it’s mostly a conservative blog, isn’t it? (I’ve only looked at it a few times, correct me if I’m wrong).
Violet
OT, but did anyone see how the Romney campaign refers to their donors? They call them investors:
People who invest expect a return on their investment. What are Romney’s “investors” expecting? What kind of “return” are they being promised?
I hope the Democrats keep repeating this one over and over. Romney has investors, not donors.
Valdivia
@DougJ:
this is exactly right. If you ever saw the documentary Arguing The World you see how this evolution took place. This is why for a long time the neocon agenda seemed to not fit perfectly with the Republican party, that was until Kristol (father and juinor) joined up on the wingnut crusade.
Mudge
Interesting that “anti-internationalist” now means anti-war. Huntsman’s time in China makes him far more cognizant of internationalism than anyone at Brookings.
Baud
@Violet:
2 to 1, if Romney wins, there will be an IPO for shares in the United States government.
ETA: Corrected for mathematical accuracy.
MattF
Rubin takes it for granted that Brookings should be and seeks to be ideologically homogeneous. The notion that someone with actual diplomatic and political experience would look good to Brookings is simply outside her field-of-view.
MikeBoyScout
It’s the American Century!
Get with the program.
Bombs & more bombs away!
burnspbesq
@DougJ:
Jack Goldsmith self-identifies as conservative, but I think that’s a stretch. He is, after all, the guy who un-wrote the Yoo/Bybee torture memos. I don’t see Bobby Chesney as especially conservative.
The bigger point about Lawfare is that it’s the go-to blog on national-security and IHL issues not because of any supposed ideological bent, but because the people who write it really know their shit, and because ideology doesn’t trump expertise.
Warren Terra
I think the Center For American Progress is an important voice, and in a dialogue dominated by the far aright I’m glad it’s out there, but in what sense is it “left-wing”? Left-tolerant, perhaps, or even Left-compatible; from a right-wing viewpoint, Left-leaning; but Left Wing?
Valdivia
@MattF:
excellent point. In Rubin’s world unless everyone is on the same page, embracing the orthodoxy, they are not allowed to play or partake in the conversation. And I guess, I too fall a bit into this trap, thinking that the neocons would see Huntsman as someone they can seduce intellectually. But if we are going to buy the idea that a think tank is a place were you exchange ideas (not a wingnut welfare processing plant) having Hunstman is a feather in their cap.
DougJ
@burnspbesq:
Okay, you’re right. I couldn’t remember Goldsmith’s exact role on the torture memos, i had it confused.
I still maintain that on foreign policy, Brookings is neocon. Some might say “liberal hawk”, but that’s not a distinction I make.
burnspbesq
I think if you were to dig into Lawfare’s archive and read what was written late last year during the controversy over the detention language in the FY 2012 NDAA, you might be pleasantly surprised.
Violet
I can’t believe we are spending time trying to decide if these idiots are “centrist” or “neoconservative” or “conservative”. Why the hell does it matter what they call themselves or what someone else calls them? Those words don’t even mean anything. They’re nothing but sports team logos people use to let others know what team they’re supporting.
When there are two sides, one that is batshit crazy and one that is sane, the center is uncomfortably close to batshit crazy. These people are not “centrist” or “neoconservative” or “conservative”, they are batshit crazy or sane. They should be identified as such.
jl
I clicked the link and saw this ‘conservative’ view was from Jennifer Rubin, so just skimmed it.
So, I disagree. It is a bad question, coming from a person who has a bad point of view, with a mind so twisted, she can barely see.
Regardless of the true nature, or natures of think tanks of various flavors, seems to me that Rubin views the whole world from a professional hack’s point of view. Everything and anything is just an adjunct to the ultimate political and individual power struggle. So, of course, any think tank is just a vehicle for promotion of oneself or ones team.
No matter how bad, in general, organizations covered by the word ‘think thank’ have become, Rubin’s attitude is worse.
Edit: And, big think tanks are big places, and cover many areas. Often the main ideological orientation will change depending on subject. Seems to me that Brookings foreign policy think tank celebs are not very centrist, but that says little about what goes on in other parts of the organization, for example, urban affairs or macroeconomics.
And, as a commenter above notes (Edit: Violet), a lot of US foreign policy experts are pretty wacked out, regardless of what label you want to slap on them.
kth
@Mudge: antiwar only means anti-internationalist to a crackpot like Jennifer Rubin. The inverse would seem to be that American unilateralism is the real internationalism. That’s just nutty beyond description.
Nellcote
@Violet:
One of the things that stuck in mind from the McCain oppo research on Rmoney ’08 was that he saw the campaign as winning “market share” rather than winning an election.
Villago Delenda Est
Oh, so now these fascist shitstains are labeling anti-imperialism/unlimited intervention as “anti-internationalist”?
Damn, Huntsman must be a fucking isolationist! Recall all ambassadors, close the borders, it’s Festung Amerika time!
Valdivia
@Nellcote: @Violet:
this could work even better as every business Romney invested in was to raid it no?
Also–It is truly galling to see that Rove is at this retreat and in the Village it’s seen as totally ok, even when he runs a SuperPack that is aiding Romney every step of the way.
Amanda in the South Bay
@burnspbesq:
Is Lawfare an actual arm of Brookings? I would guess that Brookings does a lot of foreign policy stuff that is outside the purview of what Lawfare covers.
Violet
@Valdivia: I think it’s all part of a pattern. Voters aren’t people who vote, they’re “market share.” Donors aren’t people who donate, they’re “investors.” Pretty much everyone knows the words “investors” and “market share” but I don’t think they like being described in that way. Or they don’t like seeing very wealthy donors being described as investors because it only highlights why they can’t get any attention from their government. They’re not rich. They’re only “market share”, and that’s only as an aggregate, not as an individual.
It all ties into the “corporations are people, my friend” comment. If corporations are people, then donors are investors and voters are market share. Works perfectly. The only problem is, I don’t think the average American is going to like it.
I really hope Dems hammer this home.
smintheus
@DougJ: Wittes of the Hoover Institute? A rightwinger, extremist, neocon. He advocates for indefinite detention without trial and a permanent war on terror. He’s also fluffed in print a string of controversial Republicans: Ken Starr, Alito, Roberts. I can’t see how he can be described as centrist or non-partisan.
smintheus
@Violet: That’s just lovely, Mitt Romney in a nutshell right there.
jl
@Violet:
The retreat is part of a meticulous effort by the campaign to keep its biggest supporters personally invested in the candidate as he hurtles toward November.
Personally: the impossible
Invested: the obvious
oxymoronic impossibility strikes the Romney camp!
What is it? Obvious corruption, a sad case of intellectual capture of the Romney mindset, or business acumen badly needed to run these United States?
It aint the third choice, so I hope I hear about Romney ‘investors’ on some campaign spots soon.
Valdivia
@Violet:
I completely agree. I also hope it gets highlighted far and wide. I saw in TPM that the Obama campaign has a new video out using Romney’s words and the outsourcing story, Really strong.
smintheus
@burnspbesq: Wow, so being against torture…or against sloppy legal reasoning justifying torture…disqualifies one as ‘conservative’? The term has lost all meaning.
Violet
@smintheus: Thanks! I think we need to publicize it. I hope someone who is a frontpager here picks up on the concept.
If we could get a link to the “market share” statement, that would help. Then they would be all his words or his campaign’s words.
Valdivia
@Violet:
I emailed Bennen and credited you, hoping that he will pull some of this together in a post.
Anoniminous
@Violet:
(Briefly, since I doubt you’re all that interested in Semiotics … :-)
Labels are used for human convenience during communication.
For propaganda purposes it makes attaching a high negative emotive value to the label – like the RW has done with “liberal” – a whole bunch easier. It also makes it easier to smear the entire referent Category by referring to a member, or element, of that Category by using (the Informal Logical Error):
l is a member of group L
l supports {nasty thing}
Therefore: Group L supports {nasty thing}
QED (sic)
For NOT-propaganda reasons using labels limit the needed bandwidth of the communication channel and the volume of data/information flowing along the channel.
Violet
@Valdivia: Wow, thanks. And I hope he does pick up on it. I hope lots of people do.
smintheus
@Violet: This is not the McCain Oppo Research book, but it speaks to the same thing, from a June 2008 NYT article:
McCain’s Oppo file also says that Romney described himself as a “CEO Governor”.
Violet
@Anoniminous: I understand why people use labels. Thanks for the detailed explanation, though. My exasperation with it is along the lines of why people get annoyed with Andrew Sullivan for decrying how “conservatives today aren’t ‘real conservatives’ if judging by Burkean standards.” Blah, blah, blah. It’s spending a lot of time not recognizing that other people don’t care what “conservative” means or not admitting that other people have been racist jerks all along.
And at some level it’s playing by other people’s rules. Who cares if they’re conservative or neo-conservative or left-leaning-hawkish-libertarians or whatever? They’re BATSHIT CRAZY. I think it’s important to point out that they are, even if they feel like subdividing themselves into these narrow groups somehow makes them less so.
burnspbesq
@Amanda in the South Bay:
Don’t think so. Goldsmith has no connection to Brookings of which I’m aware; he teaches at Harvard Law and was formerly at DOJ. Chesney is a non-resident scholar at Brookings, but his primary gig is at UT Law. Wittes appears to be the only full-time Brookings person.
The other senior contributors are mostly law profs, except for John Bellinger, who is a partner in a major DC law firm and previously held senior positions at State and DOJ.
burnspbesq
@smintheus:
Have you actually bothered to read any of his recent work, or are you just playing bullshit guilt-by-association games?
burnspbesq
@smintheus:
Ya THINK???
smintheus
@burnspbesq: Yes, I’ve read as much of his work as I could stomach.
Anoniminous
@Violet:
The “real Conservatives” Silly-van keeps going on about exist only in his head. Ditto with “Burkean Values/Standards.”
H’mmmmmmm …
If you really want to understand the why, wherefore, what, and how’s …
May I suggest reading the two classics of Social Psychology: Obedience to Authority and The Stanford Prison studies.
Anoniminous
@Violet:
Notice how cleverly that “fits” into the RW propaganda line that the best President would be a Businessman? The best propaganda creates a Climate of Cognitive Closure so no matter the topic, the person produces the induced/learned response.
smintheus
@Violet: Ok, I read through the McCain Oppo file looking for the ‘market share’ statement, and it was quoted from a Slate writer (Daniel Gross, “The CEO Candidate,” Slate.com, 2/26/07).
More interesting for me, though off topic, was this from the same section of the Oppo file:
There’s a lot of devastating stuff about Romney in that file. You can imagine the firestorm that Republicans would raise if for ex. a Dem candidate had nominated a judge who referred to state police as “storm troopers” and talked about wanting to kill her husband.
Villago Delenda Est
“competes in markets”
The goal of every CEO is to establish, ideally, monopoly control of the market so it ceases to be free. The invisible hand becomes the slave of the CEO.
This is why a disinterested (in the I want more filthy lucre sense) party needs to step in and restrain CEOs. By firing squad, if necessary. In order to preserve the market.
Because corporatists LOATHE competition, and want to destroy anyone who gets in their way as they seek to create monopolies.
Some obscure guy named Smith figured this out over two centuries ago.
Violet
@Anoniminous: Yes, it does. But I think most people feel uncomfortable with the concept of corporations being people. And people want to be seen and treated as people, not as market share. For Romney, or his campaign, to state it so bluntly makes it clear that voters are not people, they’re just a way to increase profits. I don’t think people will like that.
Violet
@smintheus: That second quote fits quite well into the picture of Romney as a bully. And bullies are cowards. Romney is a coward. It fits because it’s true.
Anoniminous
@Violet:
I hope people won’t and there’s evidence – from the Milgram studies – people tend to discount social forces and communications when the source is “A Business.”
And I need to go AFC. (The Spousal Unit commands! I obey. ;-)
IM
That is funny. At least according to Larison, the actual positions of presidential candidate Huntsman were quite interventionist. Only from the perspective of Rubin he is lacking in zeal.
So he should quite fit into the Brookings mainstream.
Villago Delenda Est
@IM:
Well, he wasn’t ready to start bombing Iran as soon as the fanatical racist tiny religious parties in Israel gave the command.
That makes him an obvious isolationist.
jl
@Villago Delenda Est:
” Because corporatists LOATHE competition, ”
In corporate marketing, having to compete in a market for a more or less standardized product on the basis of price is known as ‘price hell’. To be avoided at all costs.
A lot of this is harmless stuff that is a small price to pay for consumer choice in a free society (Coke or Pepsi? Do you shell out a little more or less for Colgate or Crest?).
But when corporations can corrupt the political process with vast quantities of money, and shape a crony corporate culture, it creates big harms at a fast pace.
Adam Smith knew this over 200 years ago. But that part is not convenient now, so is dismissed.
lamh35
wait, did Romney advisor really say that POTUS “outsources jobs to Nebraska”???? as if that’s equivlent to Bain and Romney’s outsourcing to other countries. I mean they are aware that Nebraska IS a part of the USA…right????
NobodySpecial
Simply put, the Brookings Institute is not the friend of anyone on the left. Their all-in response to Iraq told the tale to anyone who would read it, and nothing they’ve done since has moved them off that marker.
Valdivia
@lamh35:
what? linky please :)
jl
@lamh35: I think it is impossible to figure out what the Romney flacks are saying. They are flim flamming at a furious pace, and trying to distract from parts of the WaPo article that that they cannot respond to at all.
I say, good. Let them keep spinning. The term ‘private equity’ covers a lot of things, some more good, others more bad. Romney at Bain was a leveraged buyout vulture corporate shell game capitalist grifter. More they try to explain, the more that will become apparent.
I will await the stories on how Bain found brave and intrepid capital for exciting and productive new ideas and small start ups with high risk. Or how older companies brought them in to work to increase their real economic productivity. But I won’t hold my breath. It was about taking over companies, grabbing any cash available and avoiding any liabilities, one way or another, whatever that took.
jl
@Valdivia:
Here is the last one I read at TPM. Don’t try to make sense of what they (Edit, that is, the Romney flacks) are saying, I think it will be a waste of your time.
Romney Adviser: Reporter Confused The ‘Notion Of Outsourcing’
http://livewire.talkingpointsmemo.com/entries/romney-adviser-reporter-confused-notion-of-outsourcing
Valdivia
@jl:
thanks. as someone at TPM said Friday, if they have to explain the outsourcing thing they are already loosing.
jl
@Valdivia: I think Obama doesn’t even need to make any uncivil attacks, just needs to keep the issue in the debate.
Early on, as early as the 80s, it became difficult to tell when leveraged buyouts did something useful, and then they were smash and grab corporate shell game that broke up companies, privatized the profits and socialized the losses.
The legal and regulatory vagaries of US financial markets can make the hostile takeover of a productive profitable firm, if the firm has certain financial vulnerabilities.
Bain was into exploiting that business model to grab the cash and avoid the costs using legal and financial flim flam. That is the essence.
Whether jobs went to Nebraska or India or wherever is not the essence of it. And I think will become clear as well.
lamh35
@jl:
Yep, that’s the link.
http://livewire.talkingpointsmemo.com/entries/romney-adviser-reporter-confused-notion-of-outsourcing
Uhmm, what? That really is a reach.
FlipYrWhig
@DougJ: You don’t think there’s a distinction between liberal hawks and neoconservatives? I think there’s a gulf of distinction there. The primary objective of liberal hawks is protecting human rights by force of arms. The primary objective of neoconservatives is projecting American power and prestige as widely as possible. From a hard left perspective those views can be made to overlap because, one might say, universalizing the notion of human rights is itself a kind of imperialism, or that human rights discourse is always a pretext for looting and exploitation. But even when neocons and liberal hawks endorse similar ideas about military force, they do it with thought processes and principles that are very much at odds.
Valdivia
@jl:
I agree and I don’t think Obama is doing anything uncivil (though according to Romney and the Village merely mentioning is the Civil War, even if he is running as Mr Corporate America) The ad at TPM is pretty effective.
jl
@lamh35:
@Valdivia:
I think that if outsourcing from, say, Ohio, to Nebraska or India, increases real economic productivity, and reasonable measures are taken to help the people who lose their jobs in Ohio, then it can be good thing, and doesn’t make much difference where the jobs go.
If the outsourcing is part of a legal and financial corporate con game to smash the company and grab its cash and avoid its liabilities, with no increase in real economic productivity, then it is definitely a bad thing, and doesn’t make any difference where the jobs go.
It’s whether Bain was mainly doing corporate con games. I think it was, and it will be impossible to hide that if the Romney people have to keep explaining and spinning.
Valdivia
@jl:
I completely agree. I also think that even without the con-game part which I am sure they were doing, the outsourcing locally not internationally is not going to play well in the midwest or towns that have suffered from it. To these people outsourcing means something very specific too.
lamh35
@jl: @Valdivia:
Romney Adviser Hits Back On Bain Offshoring: Obama Is ‘Outsourcing’ Jobs To Nebraska!
Valdivia
@lamh35:
obviously the ones who don’t get outsourcing is them! gah, what idiots.
jl
@Valdivia: I think every story about layed off workers from a profitable take over target who were stiffed is a valid story that points to something wrong with Bain and other leveraged buyout artist business models.
Suppose breaking up the company increased real productivity, that is, it was good thing. Then there should have been profits for Bain and some left over to retrain or relocate the workers. So if the workers were stiffed, then Bain was greedy.
If nothing could be done for the layed off workers because there was no money, then why was the deal done in the first place? Was it done to accomplish anything useful at all? Or was it done because legal and finanacial loopholes and gimmicks could be exploited by a ruthless bunch with lots of money to grab some cash and shove off the losses to some one else?
One of the reasons for the mess the US has gotten itself into economically is that there have been a lot of opportunities to do the latter, and increasingly so since the mid 1980s.
jl
@lamh35:
Thanks. I cannot figure out any sense to it.
A media full of incompetent know nothings, lets a political hack spin meaningless talking points and emit nonsense buzzwords.
There is no sense to what these people are saying. I wouldn’t spend much time trying to figure it out.
smintheus
@jl: Reading through the list of tapes McCain in 2008 compiled on Romney, there’s one where Romney jokes about how he and his buddies at Bain would “launch a hostile takeover of New Hampshire”.
On other occasions, he was on tape talking about taking over RI and CT as well.
b-psycho
Funny of Jennifer to mention CAP, because on their blog while Huntsman was still running they pointed out that he’s just as much of a war monger as the rest of them are. But I guess to her unless you’re screaming “NUKE ‘EM ALL!!!” and foaming at the mouth like a rabid dog you’re a hippie peacenik.
Valdivia
@jl:
the word gimmick, for me, is the epitome of Romney and his campaign.
smintheus
And speaking of those tapes, I’ve been trying to find the one where Romney talks about putting old people in greenhouses and watering them every day.
Mike G
@Mudge:
I noticed that too.
Their attitude is, what good is the rest of the world (except Israel) but to send troops and bomb brown people?
jl
@smintheus:
No Vermont? How did he miss Ben and Jerry’s and the ski resorts?
a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)
@Violet: Did anyone read today’s (6/24)Doonebsury? Summed it up pretty well, in terms of the differing views of “people” to each side.
TycheSD
Perhaps it means that Jon Huntsman isn’t really a “knee-jerk anti-internationalist.”
TycheSD
Perhaps it means that Jon Huntsman isn’t really a “knee-jerk anti-internationalist.”
I_D_Inuse
@Valdivia:
So sorry but the real world is not light or dark but a mix of both, neither fish nor fowl but both protein and necessary for human life no matter how idiotic ideological the left,right and in-between rantings sound. It is called relativity. In the real world of USA/America, it means and depends, if you believe in reality, learning how to deal with ambiguity and gray areas rather than black and white. Our national characteristic as Americans is to demand black or white…however the world is a very nuanced shade of gray.
DougJ
@I_D_Inuse:
Sure it’s not 50 shades?
Jay
“How is Huntsman, who has taken a knee-jerk anti-internationalist position more akin to the left-wing Center for American Progress, going to fit in?”
“Knee – jerk anti – internationalist position?”
Let’s translate that from the Rubinese: if you don’t reflexively support every shooting war in which America involves itself, you’re an anti – internationalist.
Gouge my eyes out with a dull spoon.
Kal
@Violet: They are investors in the sense that they expect an ROI in the form of legislation that insures they are not obliged to pay taxes even in case of a national emergency nor will they ever be obliged to behave in a responsible manner no matter how egregiously wrong they may be.