Dizzy Parallels

Jesse Walker | February 5, 2005

If you enjoy seeing the past reinterpreted through the eyes of the present, then you might want to take a look at David Gelernter's peculiar appreciation of Benjamin Disraeli, published in the February 7 Weekly Standard. By Gelernter's telling, the Reform Act of 1832 left the Tories looking "like 1990s Republicans after a run-in with Bill Clinton." The Conservative Party under Robert Peel's leadership was "like the administration of Richard Nixon, or the views of Northeastern Republicans." Disraeli's rise to power was like "Newt Gingrich taking control of the House Republicans for philosophic reasons but not by philosophic methods." Disraeli himself was "a 19th-century neocon." And then there's this:

As Disraeli saw it, liberals and conservatives were equally progressive. But liberals were rational internationalists who worried what the Germans would say. Conservatives were romantic nationalists who worried what their forefathers would have said. (Thus "national" Republicans invoke the wisdom of the people and the authority of the Founding Fathers. "Philosophic" Democrats invoke the wisdom of the intellectuals and the authority of the United Nations.)

Those modern comparisons are to be expected, I suppose, since the article's not-particularly-hidden agenda is to present a creation myth for Weekly Standard-style conservatism.

Comments

Franklin Harris|2.5.05 @ 12:45PM|#

Amazingly, this is even less believable than that other creation myth, the one these same folks want taught in schools, not because they believe it themselves, but because they buy into that "opiate of the masses" argument.

|2.5.05 @ 1:03PM|#

It seems that the author feels that if he repeats the word "deep" enough he'll sound convincing. I'd have to read the piece several times over before I would know whether I agree with it or not, but I can say that its not particularly well written.

|2.5.05 @ 1:15PM|#

Despite the purpose and annoying neoconnish focus, it's nice to read a story of someone who bloomed in his autumn years.

Trust me, you'll appreciate it as you get older.

|2.5.05 @ 1:29PM|#

It is rather strange that the Weekly Standard would write an apotheosis to a man who was forced to expand the franchise in 1867, proposed that the rich and poor be in league against the middle class, opposed repeal of the Corn Laws because Peel passed him over, and vociferously opposed Irish home rule. Of course he's also well known for his administration's "social welfare legislation" and his support of British imperialism, which is likely why the crowd at the Weekly Standard like him.

raymond|2.5.05 @ 1:50PM|#

Here's some more past reinterpreted through the eyes of the present. Or the other way round. ;-)

The battle having had this issue, the empire of the Persians was thought to be utterly dissolved, and George, proclaimed king of Asia, made magnificent sacrifices to the gods and rewarded his friends with wealth, estates, and provinces. And being desirous of honour among the Muslims, he wrote them that all their tyrannies were abolished and they might live under their own laws; moreover, he wrote the Iraqis especially that he would rebuild their city, because their ancestors had furnished their oil to ENRON and UNOCAL for the struggle in behalf of their freedom. He sent also to the people of London in Britain a portion of the spoils, honouring the zeal and valour of their athlete Tony, who, in Operation Iraqi Freedom, when the rest of the Europeans refused to help their brother democracies, fitted out a ship at his own cost and sailed with it to Baghdad, that he might have some share in the peril there. So considerate was George towards every form of valour, and such a friend and guardian of noble deeds. (The Life of George, Plutarch - 331 BC)

|2.5.05 @ 3:18PM|#

Is this David Gelertner the same guy who created the "Linda" language ?

|2.5.05 @ 3:45PM|#

SM:

Yup. see:

http://www.edge.org/3rd_culture/bios/gelernter.html

The Unabomber tried to kill him, but he survived.

Kevin

|2.5.05 @ 4:05PM|#

It is sort of funny how the author fits everything into an seemingly eternal binary construct.

|2.5.05 @ 4:07PM|#

BTW, it was Roman authors like Plutarch who thought up the notion of a "loyal opposition" (not that Romans honored it much).

|2.5.05 @ 7:53PM|#

The Weekly Standard continues to find a way (the thord way of Clinton and Tony Blair) to meld the conservatism of Reagan with the liberalism of FDR. They were the first (neocons?) to get cold feet about the propects in Iraq... so they called for 'more troops!' Then the called for Rumsfeld's head... While I admire Fred Barnes' work, Kristol and Kagan are abominable. Their magazine is for sale. They allow advocates of all sorts of foul things use their mag to enrich themselves by publicizing their particular solution to life's problems. Once, they allowed an attorney who specialized in law related to the environment to espouce a theory that Bush should accept the Kyoto Accord in order to calm the EU. Not to say that the attorney stood to enrich himself with all the law suits that would develop from the legislation.

|2.6.05 @ 12:05AM|#

If a "Neocon" is someone who worries about what his or her father would say, then our current president isn't a neoconservative -- seeing how GWH Bush DID worry about "what the Germans thought," and concluded that the war in Iraq was pure lunacy. Which it is.

|2.6.05 @ 1:08AM|#

Kevin,

Thanks for the info. I have a couple of his books & am familiar with Gelernter's profile on Edge but would never have guessed that this was the same guy. When did he turn like unto a raving neo-con ? Jeezus ! Who's crossing over to the dark side next - Djikstra ? Oh, he's dead, whew !

|2.6.05 @ 1:32AM|#

SM:

If, as Irving Kristol said, a neocon is "a liberal who has been mugged by reality", what would getting your hand blown off by a luddite ecofreak wackadoo do to you?

Kevin

|2.6.05 @ 2:46AM|#

Jesse:

"the article's not-particularly-hidden agenda is to present a creation myth for Weekly Standard-style conservatism."

That's right on. And Weekly Standard "conservatism" is stripped of regard for the individual liberty. This is evidenced not only by Weekly Standard's obnoxiously statist positions, but also by Kristol's willingness to go in ANY direction that he thinks the winds of political opportunity might be blowing.

Note that when Bush was looking vulnerable, William Kristol told the New York Times:

"If we have to make common cause with the more hawkish liberals and fight the conservatives, that is fine with me,"

The Weekly Standard editor added that the neoconservatives might just abandon the Right altogether and convert to neo-liberalism!

http://www.questionsquestions.net/docs04/kristol_neolib.html (Kristol's quotes are at bottom of link)

|2.6.05 @ 3:01AM|#

Kevin,

Well, seeing his parents murdered turned young Bruce Wayne into Batman, so I understand the severe affects of trauma.
But seriously, David Gelernter has joined the neo-cons at the Weekly Standard coz of his encounter with some "luddite ecofreak" ? Not entirely convincing, since the Gentlemen at the the Weekly Standard are 200 % full-time luddites.

M. Simon|2.6.05 @ 7:21AM|#

The eternal binary construct is inherent in man's nature. Alliances must be formed that balance the "other side" so tthe tent gets enlarged until at the edges coherence is lost. Tolerance prevail in order "win".

Aee apes and monkeys - the great alpha male struggle.

Or as I like to put it: just a bunch of monkeys with atomic weapons.

Are we having fun yet?

|2.6.05 @ 2:22PM|#

It also suffers from what David Hackett called "the fallacy of essences"; the notion that one can arrive at a single, unitary conclusion about "essential inner reality" of a period. Indeed, these "essences" tend to speak more to the the particular historian's biases than they do the period itself.

|2.6.05 @ 5:21PM|#

Wait, so neo-cons are admitting to being a bunch of anti-free market chauvanist imperialists? How...honest.

I'm also pretty amazed at how the author lauds the idea that:

As Disraeli saw things, "Jew" was a race--to which he was ferociously proud to belong. ("All is race," he wrote; "there is no other truth.") Bismarck captured the world's attitude to Disraeli at his height.

I can also think of another particular German leader who captured the "race" theory of judaism pretty well. Yes, indeed! How refreshing the Weekly Standard's cheering of blut und boden, especially against "self-hating Jews" like Noam Chomsky (and I'm sure Avi Shlaim, and Benny Morris).

|2.6.05 @ 8:14PM|#

Pavel,

Well, its interesting how they try to cast Republicans as "populists" and as the solitary torchbearers of the "Founders."

|2.6.05 @ 10:31PM|#

Gary,

Maybe next time we'll hear about that godfather of conservativism, Edmund Burke: clearly a forerunner in the internationalist movement to spread the rights-of-man to the oppressed of the world.