Is the Neocon vision coming to fruition?

#51
#51
Rasputin_Vol said:
THIS!!!

How many Ivy League graduates have driven this country into the ground in the last 50 years?
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Come on.

I'll grant you that the Ivies fuel the high brow left, but there are plenty in those halls who don't buy the party line in the least.
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#52
#52
milohimself said:
Academics running things in DC?

Uh, it's people with lots of "charisma" and special interest groups. Not academics.

So anyways, you were saying? Having the smartest, brightest people figuring things out isn't a good idea?
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People that have no practical, real world experience offer nothing. All they offer is theory, not experience (most of the time) gotten from actually having done something to create wealth or prosperity.

Plus, we have been fishing in the same pond for our leadership for far too long. Maybe, just maybe, we should reconsider having these Ivy League types running our country. It can't get any worse...
 
#54
#54
lawgator1 said:
Ah yes, anti-intellectualism, the last desperate refuge of the envious.
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I don't think Rasputin fits your anti-intellectualism description and he's plenty intelligent to to be envious. I think his point is about the hard left ideology that the ivory towers now proudly espouse.
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#55
#55
lawgator1 said:
Ah yes, anti-intellectualism, the last desperate refuge of the envious.
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:sigh:

Totally didn't read a word I wrote.

It's not envy or haterism. It's just that we have given these guys their time at the plate. Look at what direction we are heading in over that last 40 years... Time to consider ideas from a different pool.
 
#56
#56
BigPapaVol said:
I don't think Rasputin fits your anti-intellectualism description and he's plenty intelligent to to be envious. I think his point is about the hard left ideology that the ivory towers now proudly espouse.
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They can espouse it all they want, but I still don't see where academia has run anything. I've only see DC as being run by politicians, there latchers-on and special interest groups fighting for their attention and time.

IMO DC is far closer in nature to Hollywood than Cambridge.
 
#57
#57
milohimself said:
Academics running things in DC?

Uh, it's people with lots of "charisma" and special interest groups. Not academics.

So anyways, you were saying? Having the smartest, brightest people figuring things out isn't a good idea?
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as Rasputin said, there are very few people in Obama's administration that have any real world experience. No, I don't mean gibbs' fictional "real world", either.

Academia is also not the last bastion of the smartest and brightest.

@IP, it's not a disdain for intellectuals. It's more contempt for the people the media trot out as academic experts. Idiots like Paul Krugman and Ramsey Clarke are given megaphones while true intellectuals like Thomas Sowell and John Parnell are ignored.
 
#58
#58
MG1968 said:
as Rasputin said, there are very few people in Obama's administration that have any real world experience. No, I don't mean gibbs' fictional "real world", either.

Academia is also not the last bastion of the smartest and brightest.

@IP, it's not a disdain for intellectuals. It's more contempt for the people the media trot out as academic experts. Idiots like Paul Krugman and Ramsey Clarke are given megaphones while true intellectuals like Thomas Sowell and John Parnell are ignored.
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I don't disagree with any of the quoted. Academia and intellectuals are both big tents with more diversity than they get credit for.
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#59
#59
MG1968 said:
as Rasputin said, there are very few people in Obama's administration that have any real world experience. No, I don't mean gibbs' fictional "real world", either.

Academia is also not the last bastion of the smartest and brightest.

@IP, it's not a disdain for intellectuals. It's more contempt for the people the media trot out as academic experts. Idiots like Paul Krugman and Ramsey Clarke are given megaphones while true intellectuals like Thomas Sowell and John Parnell are ignored.
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They're only idiots because you disagree with them.
 
#61
#61
MG1968 said:
no, Paul Krugman is an idiot. He removed any doubt about that a few hours after the Phoenix shootings.
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Right. A Nobel prize, NTT, NEG, two best-sellers, and one of the most visited blogs on the web makes you an idiot.

Hilarious.
 
#62
#62
bam15 said:
Right. A Nobel prize, NTT, NEG, two best-sellers, and one of the most visited blogs on the web makes you an idiot.

Hilarious.
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Thomas Sowell can run intellectual circles around Krugman. So could most small business owners. Krugman is well educated, to be sure, but that doesn't provide immunity from idiocy.
 
#66
#66
Funny how Ramsey Clark and Krugman are libs while Thomas Sowell and some dude from Pembroke are out in right field.

Apparently that makes them brighter.
 
#67
#67
bam15 said:
Funny how Ramsey Clark and Krugman are libs while Thomas Sowell and some dude from Pembroke are out in right field.

Apparently that makes them brighter.
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Total coincidence, I'm sure
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#69
#69
milohimself said:
The Chinese will handle their business.

Aside from having easily the most viable economy in the world, their form of government lends itself to extreme stability.

It seems as if they're structured same as they ever were.
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My point was that their focus will become more domestic than international. Chinese dependence on international trade for economic success and a better educated population are relatively new phenomena for their gov't.
milohimself said:
You're right, left to their own devices, these reformed and new governments in the ME are likely going to end up at least a bit more anti-American in nature.
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As I stated in another thread, taking the 'America is supporting our oppressor' out of the equation could make them less hostile to the US. Most of the Islamist propaganda mentions US support for Isreal and support for dictators in the region as reasons to see us as the great Satan. This is how they maintain the enlistment of disillusioned, unemployed youth. I'm holding onto hope that this is less motivated by religion than economic opportunity and liberty. Unfortunately, Islamists in most areas are well established and organized so my optimism is hesitant.
 
#70
#70
Re: china that's true, but they can afford to be.

The rest I generally agree with.
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#71
#71
volinbham said:
Just throwing this out. With the potential revolts occurring across the ME, is the neocon view of toppling dominoes coming to fruition?

Put another way, do you think things such as the images of people voting Iraq and coalition governments and/or the ousting of Taliban rule in Afghanistan have had any material role in motivating the revolts in Egypt, Iran, Libya, Morrocco, etc.?

I'll hang up and listen.
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Only if we ignore all of history over the last 60 years, I'm afraid. If anything, the US presence in Iraq was meant to deter popular revolts in the region - another failure of the policy (obviously). We need only look at the US reaction to MSR - across both aisles. Not once did we back the protesters (who, actually, were asking for exactly what Obama talked about 18 months before), even when Mubarak's position was untenable. This also overlooks the fact that Mubarak was our loyal puppet for a very long time, and the recepient, I believe, of the second largest foreign aid pile for three decades (Israel being #1). He has been the neocon / US proxy in MSR for a very, very long time. These little details are well-known throughout the Middle East. If Obama had come out on Day One and said, "I support the youth of Tahrir Square" American flags would have been waving all down the Nile. As such, we missed yet another historic opportunity.

But the very notion of Neocon democratic sympathies must be scrutinized with a fair amount of honesty and rigor as well. Take a look at Angola (since it is still on page one) and the neocon response to democracy there for a critical object lesson on "constructive engagement" and "democracy." The lessons will be similar everywhere you look.

Reagan installed the Taliban in the first place btw. Called them the equivalent of our "founding fathers." They are hardly gone either.
 
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#72
#72
utgibbs said:
Only if we ignore all of history over the last 60 years, I'm afraid. If anything, the US presence in Iraq was meant to deter popular revolts in the region - another failure of the policy (obviously). We need only look at the US reaction to MSR - across both aisles. Not once did we back the protesters (who, actually, were asking for exactly what Obama talked about 18 months before), even when Mubarak's position was untenable. This also overlooks the fact that Mubarak was our loyal puppet for a very long time, and the recepient, I believe, of the second largest foreign aid pile for three decades (Israel being #1). He has been the neocon / US proxy in MSR for a very, very long time.

But the very notion of Neocon democratic sympathies must be scrutinized with a fair amount of honesty and rigor as well. Take a look at Angola (since it is still on page one) and the neocon response to democracy there for a critical object lesson on "constructive engagement" and "democracy." The lessons will be similar everywhere you look.
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???

I was trying to use context clues to help, but still have no idea what it is.

MSR - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
 
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#73
#73
Rasputin_Vol said:
???

I was trying to use context clues to help, but still have no idea what it is.

MSR - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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Egyptians call their country "Musser". I didn't spell it phonetically; I left out the vowels as they commonly do in all but the most formal Arabic writing. It's the "strong S" in Arabic as well, the saud:

14-saud.gif
 
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#74
#74
utgibbs said:
Egyptians call their country "Musser". I didn't spell it phonetically; I left out the vowels as they commonly do in all but the most formal Arabic writing. It's the "strong S" in Arabic as well.
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Well dang... how silly of me not to figure that out. Thanks.


:unsure:
 
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