Buckley on Markets: "Horrifying," "Repetitious," "Like Sex"

Commentator Jon Utley, who offers this summary of the recent FreedomFest conference in Las Vegas, recently pointed me to a very interesting May 4 Wash Post piece by political scientist Corey Robin. A contributor to the new anthology Cold War Triumphalism, Robin discusses how conservatives found in 9/11 a justification to return to a higher calling in politics: Empire building. In recounting conversations he had with William F. Buckley and Irving Kristol in 2000, he writes:

"The trouble with the emphasis in conservatism on the market," Buckley told me, "is that it becomes rather boring. You hear it once, you master the idea. The notion of devoting your life to it is horrifying if only because it's so repetitious. It's like sex." Kristol confessed to a yearning for an American empire: "What's the point of being the greatest, most powerful nation in the world and not having an imperial role?"

Robin continues:

For neoconservatives, who had thrilled to the crusade against communism, all that was left of Ronald Reagan's legacy after the Cold War was a sunny entrepreneurialism, which found a welcome home in Bill Clinton's America. While neocons favor capitalism, they do not believe it is the highest achievement of civilization. Like their predecessors -- from Edmund Burke, Samuel Coleridge and Henry Adams to T.S. Eliot, Martin Heidegger and Michael Oakeshott -- today's conservatives prize mystery and vitality over calculation and technology. Such romantic sensibilities are inspired by questions of politics and, especially, of war. It is only natural, then, that the neocons would take up the call of empire, seeking a world that is about something more than money and markets.

Immediately following 9/11, intellectuals, politicians and pundits seized upon the terrorist strikes as a deliverance from the miasma Buckley and Kristol had been criticizing. Even commentators on the left saw the attacks as stirring a sleeping nation; Frank Rich announced in the New York Times that "this week's nightmare, it's now clear, has awakened us from a frivolous if not decadent decade-long dream."

Whole thing here. While there are many things to disagree with, it's a very interesting piece, one that not only gets at post-Cold War tensions between libertarians and conservatives but, more important, the pan-ideological attraction of war, empire, and more.

Comments

[Wm F Buckley]

Well, that's what I thought before I hit the swing scene. 3-somes, 4-somes, bondage, it's all part of my life now. Instead, I think I'll compare free market conservatism to defecation.

[joe]

Martin Heidegger, a proto-neocon? How does that work?

[Gadfly]

One must really think deep, Todd - to the point of fooling yourself - to conclude that we are defending the US in Iraq. The logic used to reach that conclusion can also be used to invade practically any country on earth.

[Shirley Knott]

Why, Joe, its simple -- any former member of the Nazi party, and author of a "principled" defense of nazism, should certainly be considered a 'proto-neocon'.
OK, I suppose we could expand the neologism and consider him a quasi-proto-neocon, but that would be silly.
Heidegger was no defender of liberty.

Shirley Knott

[wellfellow]

Very interesting article, albeit fraught with some pretty gross assumptions. My favorites,

"Coping with such a world requires pagan courage and barbaric virtu, qualities many conservatives embrace over the more prosaic goods of peace and prosperity."

"today's conservatives prize mystery and vitality over calculation and technology"

Because vitality and prosperity are so absolutely antonymic!

Even so, this is a great topic and I was thoroughly interested!

[wellfellow]

"-- today's conservatives prize mystery and vitality over calculation and technology"

"Coping with such a world requires pagan courage and barbaric virtu, qualities many conservatives embrace over the more prosaic goods of peace and prosperity."

How antonymic! Vitality and prosperity...

Fraught with gross assumptions, and intersting article nonetheless.

[wellfellow]

How about one more time...

[JDM]

"The logic used to reach that conclusion can also be used to invade practically any country on earth."

"Practically any?" Really?

(Ha ha, Fyodor.)

[Kraorh]

DIGRESSION ON HEIDEGGER
(Apologies to those who don't care about Heidegger)

Heidegger wasn't just a conservative - he was a card-carrying member of the Nazi Party, and in 1933, arranged to get his mentor Husserl expelled, and himself put in, as chancellor of the University of Heidleburg because Husserl's wife was Jewish.

The true irony is that among scholars and intellectuals who adore Heidegger today, you will search in vain to find any who harbor political inclinations anywhere to the right of Ralph Nader. (And as you might expect, there's a cottage industry dedicated to saying why Heidegger's Naziism doesn't matter or is greatly exaggerated.)

Heidegger is normally taken to be an early advocate of environmentalism, and a bitter opponent of technology. His environmentalism harkened back to a very old version of conservativism that people today might not recognize at first - stasism (to borrow Virginia Postrel's term), and at times, even the belief in a glorious past superior to our present.

Think of how conservatives today talk about the religious and moral values of the past - substitute technology (or lack thereof), and you have Heidegger. Unlike the Old Left, which thought science would be the key to validating New Dealism, Marxism, or whichever variety of Old Leftism being defended, Heidegger was very skeptical of the value of science. He idealized the country life, and especially nature as such, as more authentic. But this view is very congenial to the New Left which has adopted Heidegger as an influence.

All in all - Heidegger's conservativism says a great deal about the difference between conservatives and liberal enviromentalists today. Conservatives who believe in the creative destruction of free markets are more radical than they realize, though they contradict themselves in their advocacy of the older, more "pure" morality and religion of previous ages. Liberals think of themselves as challengers to the status quo, yet like good conservatives they have to appeal to the bucolic paradise of nature before the introduction of technology.

Back to this article - this only makes neo-conservativism more perplexing. Like Heidegger, they appeal to the mystery and vitality of older ages, making them reactionary - yet the actions they adovocate radically _disrupt_ the status quo, making them radical. Hegelian synthesis, or just ideological confusion? I'm inclined to think the latter.

[Kraorh]

DIGRESSION ON HEIDEGGER
(Apologies to those who don't care about Heidegger)

Heidegger wasn't just a conservative - he was a card-carrying member of the Nazi Party, and in 1933, arranged to get his mentor Husserl expelled, and himself put in, as chancellor of the University of Heidleburg because Husserl's wife was Jewish.

The true irony is that among scholars and intellectuals who adore Heidegger today, you will search in vain to find any who harbor political inclinations anywhere to the right of Ralph Nader. (And as you might expect, there's a cottage industry dedicated to saying why Heidegger's Naziism doesn't matter or is greatly exaggerated.)

Heidegger is normally taken to be an early advocate of environmentalism, and a bitter opponent of technology. His environmentalism harkened back to a very old version of conservativism that people today might not recognize at first - stasism (to borrow Virginia Postrel's term), and at times, even the belief in a glorious past superior to our present.

Think of how conservatives today talk about the religious and moral values of the past - substitute technology (or lack thereof), and you have Heidegger. Unlike the Old Left, which thought science would be the key to validating New Dealism, Marxism, or whichever variety of Old Leftism being defended, Heidegger was very skeptical of the value of science. He idealized the country life, and especially nature as such, as more authentic. But this view is very congenial to the New Left which has adopted Heidegger as an influence.

All in all - Heidegger's conservativism says a great deal about the difference between conservatives and liberal enviromentalists today. Conservatives who believe in the creative destruction of free markets are more radical than they realize, though they contradict themselves in their advocacy of the older, more "pure" morality and religion of previous ages. Liberals think of themselves as challengers to the status quo, yet like good conservatives they have to appeal to the bucolic paradise of nature before the introduction of technology.

Back to this article - this only makes neo-conservativism more perplexing. Like Heidegger, they appeal to the mystery and vitality of older ages, making them reactionary - yet the actions they adovocate radically _disrupt_ the status quo, making them radical. Hegelian synthesis, or just ideological confusion? I'm inclined to think the latter.

[JDM]

"Conservatives who believe in the creative destruction of free markets are more radical than they realize, though they contradict themselves in their advocacy of the older, more "pure" morality and religion of previous ages."

"Hegelian synthesis, or just ideological confusion? I'm inclined to think the latter."

Do you think it's possible that you aren't making an honest attempt to figure out what they are actually thinking? One can argue for older morality and a newer economic system without contradicting themselves. I prefer older movies and newer TV - how is it that I've managed to avoid a psychic meltdown?

[mak_nas]

kr, i suspect that the neocons are actually derivative of marx -- they are entirely reactionary, in the naturalistic moral sense and the interventionist economic sense. no defenders of free markets, these -- witness the massive expansion of government spending and authority. when they cut taxes, it is not out of an intention to reduce government control -- it is because our form of government is changing. corporations have become part of the control scheme; benefitting them is of direct benefit to government.

this is no anticorporate screed -- no one doubts the power of markets and entrepeneurialism. but it is foolish to ignore the growing powerful synthesis of large corporation and government in western civilization, paticularly obvious in the defense sector but spanning financial and technology across the board.

[fyodor]

Kraorh,

Off topic, but if the Old Left pro-science thinking it would bring social progress, what to make of the sentiments expressed by pinko Charlie Chaplain in Modern Times?

(Genius pinko that he was...)

[mobile]

Kristol on the police?

What's the point of having a
monopoly on the legal initiation of force
in your jurisdiction if you're not going
to use it?

Kristol on Congress?

What's the point of having the
power to create laws that the people of
the country will have to obey if you are
not going to exercise it?

Kristol on Saddam Hussein?

What's the point of being
the supreme leader and wielding unconstrained
dictatorial power over your country's
people if you're not going to bother
terrorizing them with your secret police
and inflicting creatively sadistic torture
on them?

etc.

[Gary Gunnels]

Call me a snake,

You'll find that all empires have had to stoop to such things; think of the Nazi empire, which went along with the Danish evacuation of Jews from their country in WWII. You seem to assume that empire equals an all-powerful state which brooks no compromise; that has never been the history of empire - indeed, most empires have been at least part built on compromises and deals.

[Jason Ligon]

RE: FreedomFest

As H&R natives could well imagine, the more interesting parts didn't involve the war. The Iraq talk was endless grandstanding. Utley himself, in one of the break out sessions on Iraq, opened by saying that supporters of the war were untraveled and largely uneducated, and so there. Nevermind that folks like Gordon Tullock were sitting in the audience at the time. Browne in a Q&A dodged my question asking why we are supposed to consider the negative consequences of action ("blowback") but not the consequences of inaction. D'nish actually did quite well in that debate.

The rest of the conference was much more interesting. David Friedman on "Future Imperfect", a panel on minarchy vs. anarchy, the previously mentioned (in another thread) coalition talk by Grover Norquist, and Stossel's talk were highlights.

[Call me snake]

To which empire do we aspire? Roman? Mercantilist? Napoleonic? Late 19th Century Imperial?

The problem is when one compares our "empire" to any of those models the connections blur: We have pre-existing bases in Turkey but had to bribe and cajole and STILL they refused and we abided by it??!? That's an empire? We stop bombing on Vieques, our own territory? That's empire? Castro's been a giant pain in the ass for 40 years including killing thousands of his own people but we let him be 90 miles from FL?

Vespasian and Phillip II are slapping each other on the back, laughing at our "empire".

You can go the Hitchens route and decry mideast client states like the Saudis, but that's miles from empire.

[Call me snake]

To which empire do we aspire? Roman? Mercantilist? Napoleonic? Late 19th Century Imperial?

The problem is when one compares our "empire" to any of those models the connections blur: We have pre-existing bases in Turkey but had to bribe and cajole and STILL they refused and we abided by it??!? That's an empire? We stop bombing on Vieques, our own territory because Lt. Castillo is angry? That's empire? Castro's been a giant pain in the ass for 40 years including killing thousands of his own people but we let him be 90 miles from FL?

Vespasian and Phillip II are slapping each other on the back, laughing at our "empire". I guess you can go the Hitchens route and decry mideast client states like the Saudis, but that's miles from empire.

Just because it's a unipolar superpower world does not make us de facto an empire.

[fyodor]

"What's the point of being the greatest, most powerful nation in the world and not having an imperial role?"

Maybe, just, maybe: defense??

[Sam I Was]

We should not be imperial. That's a given.

However, our freedom is now being threatened by dimwits who in previous eras would not have had the means to threaten us. They have this means only because of our freedom -- more specifically, because of what our freedom has produced: technology, access, a mobile world.

In that context, it is quite OK to go into the Middle East and clean things up. If they're going to use our planes and cell phones and openness, they certainly don't need to be using them against us. We are fully justified, morally and otherwise, in bringing American-ness to a place that is empowered by the fruits of our freedom but uses them to threaten us.

Transforming the Middle East isn't like the Dutch grabbing a bunch of islands in the Atlantic because they want more territory. It's about protecting ourselves. There's a difference between "imperial" and "proactive."

[fyodor]

"today's conservatives prize mystery and vitality over calculation and technology"

You want mystery, fine, go explore a cave!! But there's a difference when you force your appetite for excitement on others who had other ideas besides being a pawn in your game!!

[Gadfly]

We're "protecting ourselves" in Iraq?

BWAHAHAHAHA!!

[Todd Fletcher]

Gadfly, I've come to expect deep thinking posts from you, but you just out-did yourself.

[fyodor]

Blah, blah, blah. Very few of us disagree that our adventure in Iraq was justified were it truly necessary and intrinsic to our national defense. But of course many of us sure do disagree on whether it was, and is. If we get into that now, we'll be over a hundred bitter and angry posts real quick. I'm only commenting on what was actually just blogged, and while I can't verify the veracity of the quoted article, it obviously goes way beyond preemptive defense.

[Jason Ligon]

Appealing to the collective to elevate themselves by exerting force on some minority is the evil.

If the process is democratic and in the context of a capitalist system, the evil is one of the left.

If the process is the preservation of a systematic mechanism of appropriation from parties unequal under the law, the evil is one of the right.

It is all collectivism, and I don't see one being preferable to the other in an objective sense.

[M. Simon]

The problem of commercial relations in a modern world is a real problem.

A modern society requires access to all 92 chemical elements. Such elements are not evenly distributed on the earh. An unwillinness to trade on the part of an entity that controls a given resource is a threat to the lives of the people dependent on modern technology for their living.

Think of it this way: doubling the price of oil overr a short span of time will cause a great deal of hardship among the poor. A rise of a factor of ten over a similar period would cause the deaths of a great many: in fact such a price spike if intentionally caused would be considered an act of war.

A real empire (in the old sense) would set the price of a resource. In the American empire the empire only requires a williness to trade. America is willing to let the market set the price.

Such an attitude of course is an infringement on absolute liberty. However, such liberty exists only in the mind of utopians.

Another point to contemplate is what kind of government might forbid its citizens from owning resources and freely trading such resources? Would such an entity be consonant with the liberty of its citizens?

Personally I'm a Liberty Bell libertarian. "Proclaim Liberty through out the land..." except I'd include the waters too. Militant evangelical libertarianism is not too popular these days except among certain Republicans and former leftists (remember all those liberation movements praised by the left in the 60s? The overthrow of tyrants used to be a big lefty selling point. Roger Simon would be a perfect exemplar of such a liberal in a post 9/11 world.)

It is not surprising at all that many neo-cons are former Democrats.

[Gary Gunnels]

Xboy,

Yes, Heidegger is a perfect example of the sort of conservatives that supported Hitler; the notions of heimat, volk, etc. were part and parcel of all of that. Indeed, its the sort of jingoistic, national-chauvanist, blut und boden ideology that has always been involved in conservative thought.